Tertullian: Adversus Praxean

[1] Varie diabolus aemulatus est veritatem. adfectavit illam aliquando defendendo concutere. unicum dominum vindicat, omnipotentem mundi conditorem, ut et de unico haeresim faciat.

[1] Variously the devil has emulated the truth. He has affected at times to shake it by defending it. He vindicates the one Lord, the omnipotent founder of the world, so that even from the One he may make a heresy.

ipsum dicit patrem descendisse in virginem, ipsum ex ea natum, ipsum passum, denique ipsum esse Iesum Christum. excidit sibi coluber, quia Iesum Christum post baptisma Ioannis temptans ut filium dei adgressus est, certus filium deum habere vel ex ipsis scriptures de quibus tunc temptationem struebat:

he says that the very Father descended into the virgin, that the same was born from her, that the same suffered, finally that the same is Jesus Christ. the serpent slipped in this for himself, because, tempting Jesus Christ after the baptism of John, he approached him as the Son of God, being certain to hold the Son as God, even from the very Scriptures on which at that time he was constructing the temptation:

[2] Si tu es filius dei, dic ut lapides isti panes fiant ; item, Si tu es filius dei, deice te hinc; scriptum est enim quod mandavit angelis suis super te, utique pater, ut te manibus suis tollant necubi ad lapidem pedem tuum offendas.

[2] If you are the Son of God, say that these stones become loaves ; likewise, If you are the Son of God, cast yourself down from here; for it is written that he has mandated his angels concerning you—assuredly the Father—so that they may lift you up in their hands, lest perhaps you strike your foot against a stone.

[3] aut numquid mendacium evangeliis exprobrabit dicens, Viderit Matthaeus et Lucas; ceterum ego ad ipsum deum accessi, ipsum omnipotentem cominus temptavi ideo et accessi, ideo et temptavi ; ceterum si filius dei esset nunquam illum fortasse dignarer? sed enim ipse potius a primordio mendax est, et si quem hominem de suo subornavit, ut Praxean.

[3] or will he by chance upbraid the Gospels with a mendacity, saying, Let Matthew and Luke see to it; for my part I approached God himself, I at close quarters tempted the Omnipotent—therefore I approached, therefore I tempted; otherwise, if he were the Son of God, perhaps I would never have deigned to do so? but indeed he himself rather is a liar from the beginning, and if he has suborned any man on his own part, like Praxeas.

[4] nam iste primus ex Asia hoc genus perversitatis intulit Romam, homo et alias inquietus, insuper de iactatione martyrii inflatus ob solum et simplex et breve carceris taedium, quando etsi corpus suum tradidisset exurendum nihil profecisset, dilectionem dei non habens cuius charismata quoque expugnavit.

[4] for this man first from Asia brought this genus of perversity into Rome, a man in other respects also restless, moreover inflated by the vaunting of martyrdom on account of the sole and simple and brief tedium of prison; since even if he had handed over his body to be burned, he would have profited nothing, not having the love of God, whose charismata he also assailed.

[5] nam idem tunc episcopum romanum, agnoscentem iam prophetias Montani, Priscae, Maximillae, et ex ea agnitione pacem ecclesiis Asiae et Phrygiae inferentem, falsa de ipsis prophetis et ecclesiis eorum adseverando et praecessorum eius auctoritates defendendo coegit et litteras pacis revocare iam emissas et a proposito recipiendorum charismatum concessare. ita duo negotia diaboli Praxeas Romae procuravit, prophetiam expulit et haeresim intulit, paracletum fugavit et patrem crucifixit.

[5] for this same man then forced the Roman bishop—who was already recognizing the prophecies of Montanus, Prisca, and Maximilla, and from that recognition was bringing peace to the churches of Asia and Phrygia—by asserting falsehoods about the prophets themselves and their churches and by defending the authorities of his predecessors, both to recall the letters of peace already sent and to draw back from the purpose of receiving the charismata. Thus Praxeas at Rome managed two enterprises of the devil: he expelled prophecy and introduced heresy, he drove away the Paraclete and crucified the Father.

[6] fruticaverant avenae Praxeanae hic quoque superseminatae, dormientibus multis in simplicitate doctrinae: traductae dehinc per quem deus voluit, etiam evulsae videbantur. denique caverat pristinum doctor de emendatione sua, et manet chirographum apud psychicos apud quos tunc gesta res est.

[6] the Praxean oats had here too put forth shoots, oversown, while many were sleeping in the simplicity of doctrine: then, brought to light by him whom God willed, they even seemed to have been uprooted. finally, the former teacher had taken precautions by a notice of his own emendation, and the chirograph remains among the psychics with whom the matter was then transacted.

[7] exinde silentium. et nos quidem postea agnitio paracleti atque defensio disiunxit a psychicis. avenae vero illae ubique tunc semen excusserant: ita aliquamdiu per hypocrisin subdola vivacitate latitavit et nunc denuo erupit.

[7] thereafter, silence. And indeed afterward the recognition of the paraclete and the defense separated us from the psychics. But those oats had then shaken out seed everywhere: thus for some time, through hypocrisy with a sly vitality, it lay hidden, and now again it has burst forth.

sed et denuo eradicabitur, si voluerit dominus, in isto commeatu: si quo minus, die suo colligentur omnes adulterae fruges et cum ceteris scandalis igni inextinguibili cremabuntur.

but even again it will be eradicated, if the Lord shall will, in this campaign: if otherwise, on its own day all the adulterate fruits will be gathered and, together with the other scandals, will be burned in inextinguishable fire.

CAPUT 2.

CHAPTER 2.

[1] Itaque post tempus pater natus et pater passus, ipse deus dominus omnipotens, Iesus Christus praedicatur. nos vero et semper, et nunc magis ut instructiores per paracletum, deductorem scilicet omnis veritatis, unicum quidem deum credimus, sub hac tamen dispensatione, quam oi0konomi/an dicimus, ut unici dei sit et filius, sermo ipsius qui ex ipso processerit, per quem omnia facta sunt et sine quo factum est nihil: hunc missum a patre in virginem et ex ea natum hominem et deum, filium hominis et filium dei, et cognominatum Iesum Christum: hunc passum, hunc mortuum et sepultum secundum scripturas, et resuscitatum a patre et in caelo resumptum sedere ad dexteram patris venturum iudicare vivos et mortuos: qui exinde miserit, secundum promissionem suam, a patre spiritum sanctum paracletum, sanctificatorem fidei eorum qui credunt in patrem et filium et spiritum sanctum.

[1] And so, after a time “the Father born” and “the Father suffered,” he himself God, the Lord Omnipotent, Jesus Christ, is proclaimed. But we both always—and now more, as being more instructed through the Paraclete, namely the guide of all truth—believe in one unique God, yet under this dispensation, which we call oikonomia (economy), that there is also of the unique God a Son, his Word who has proceeded from him, through whom all things were made and without whom nothing was made: this one, sent by the Father into the virgin and from her born man and God, Son of Man and Son of God, and surnamed Jesus Christ: this one suffered, this one died and was buried according to the Scriptures, and, raised again by the Father and taken up into heaven, to sit at the right hand of the Father, will come to judge the living and the dead: who from there has sent, according to his promise, from the Father the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, the sanctifier of the faith of those who believe in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

[2] hanc regulam ab initio evangelii decucurrisse, etiam ante priores quosque haereticos nedum ante Praxean hesternum, probabit tam ipsa posteritas omnium haereticorum quam ipsa novellitas Praxeae hesterni. quo peraeque adversus universas haereses iam hinc praeiudicatum sit id esse, verum quodcunque primum, id esse adulterum quodcunque posterius.

[2] that this rule has run down from the beginning of the gospel, even before each and every earlier heretic, not to say before yesterday’s Praxeas, will be proved as much by the very posteriority of all the heretics as by the very novelty of yesterday’s Praxeas. whereby equally against all heresies from this point it has been prejudged that whatever is first is the true thing, whatever is later is adulterine.

[3] sed salva ista praescriptione ubique tamen propter instructionem et munitionem quorundam dandus est etiam retractatibus locus, vel ne videatur unaquaeque perversitas non examinata sed praeiudicata damnari, maxime haec quae se existimat meram veritatem possidere dum unicum deum non alias putat credendum quam si ipsum eundemque et patrem et filium et spiritum sanctum dicat:

[3] but with that prescription kept safe, everywhere nevertheless, for the instruction and fortification of certain persons, a place must also be given to retractations, lest each perversity seem to be condemned not examined but prejudged, especially this one which esteems itself to possess the mere truth while it thinks the one God must not be believed otherwise than if one say that he himself is the same both Father and Son and Holy Spirit:

[4] quasi non sic quoque unus sit omnia dum ex uno omnia, per substantiae scilicet unitatem, et nihilo minus custodiatur oi0konomi/aj sacramentum quae unitatem in trinitatem disponit, tres dirigens patrem et filium et spiritum, tres autem non statu sed gradu, nec substantia sed forma, nec potestate sed specie, unius autem substantiae et unius status et unius potestatis, quia unus deus ex quo et gradus isti et formae et species in nomine patris et filii et spiritus sancti deputantur. quomodo numerum sine divisione patiuntur procedentes tractatus demonstrabunt.

[4] as if He were not thus also One-who-is-all things, since from One are all things, by the unity, namely, of substance; and nonetheless let the sacrament of the oikonomia (economy/dispensation) be guarded, which arranges the unity into a trinity, directing three: Father and Son and Spirit—three, however, not by status but by grade, not by substance but by form, not by power but by species; yet of one substance and one status and one power, because One God, from whom both these grades and forms and species are assigned in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. How they admit number without division the following treatises will demonstrate.

CAPUT 3.

CHAPTER 3.

[1] Simplices enim quique, ne dixerim imprudentes et idiotae, quae maior semper credentium pars est, quoniam et ipsa regula fidei a pluribus diis saeculi ad unicum et verum deum transfert, non intellegentes unicum quidem sed cum sua oeconomia esse credendum, expavescunt ad oeconomiam. numerum et dispositionem trinitatis divisionem praesumunt unitatis, quando unitas ex semetipsa derivans trinitatem non destruatur ab illa sed administretur. itaque duos et tres iam iactitant a nobis praedicari, se vero unius dei cultores praesumunt, quasi non et unitas irrationaliter collecta haeresim faciat et trinitas rationaliter expensa veritatem constituat.

[1] For indeed the simple, not to say the imprudent and idiots, who are always the greater part of believers, since even the very rule of faith transfers from the many gods of the world to the one and true God, not understanding that the One indeed is to be believed, but with his own economy, are terrified at the economy. They presume the number and disposition of the trinity to be a division of the unity, whereas the unity, deriving the trinity from itself, is not destroyed by it but is administered by it. And so they already keep shouting that two and three are preached by us, while they presume themselves worshipers of one God—as though not even a unity irrationally collected makes heresy, and a trinity rationally weighed out establishes truth.

[2] Monarchiam, inquiunt, tenemus et ita sonum ipsum vocaliter exprimunt etiam Latini, et tam opifice ut putes illos tam bene intellegere monarchiam quam enuntiant; sed monarchiam sonare student Latini, oi0konomi/an intellegere nolunt etiam Graeci. at ego, si quid utriusque linguae praecerpsi, monarchiam nihil aliud significare scio quam singulare et unicum imperium: non tamen praescribere monarchiam ideo quia unius sit eum cuius sit aut filium non habere aut ipsum se sibi filium fecisse aut monarchiam suam non per quos velit administrare. atquin nullam dico dominationem ita unius sui esse, ita singularem, ita monarchiam, ut non etiam per alias proximas personas administretur quas ipsa prospexerit officiales sibi:

[2] “Monarchy,” they say, “we hold,” and thus they even articulate the very sound aloud, even the Latins, and so deftly that you would think they understand monarchy as well as they enunciate it; but while the Latins strive to sound monarchy, they are unwilling to understand oi0konomi/an — and the Greeks as well. But I, if I have gleaned anything from either language, know monarchy to signify nothing else than a singular and unique imperium: yet it does not on that account prescribe to monarchy, because it is of one, that the one whose it is either should not have a son, or made himself a son to himself, or should not administer his monarchy through whatever persons he wishes. Nay rather, I say that no domination is so much its own of one, so singular, so monarchy, as not also to be administered through other proximate persons whom it has provided as officials for itself:

[3] si vero et filius fuerit ei cuius monarchia sit, non statim dividi eam et monarchiam esse desinere si particeps eius adsumatur et filius, sed proinde illius esse principaliter a quo communicatur in filium, et dum illius est proinde monarchiam esse quae a duobus tam unitis continetur.

[3] if indeed there should also be a Son for him whose monarchy it is, it is not forthwith to be divided and to cease to be a monarchy if a participant in it be assumed, even the Son; but accordingly it is his principally by whom it is communicated into the Son, and, while it is his, accordingly to be a monarchy which is contained by two so united.

[4] igitur si et monarchia divina per tot legiones et exercitus angelorum administratur sicut scriptum est, Milies centies centena milia adsistebant ei et milies centena milia apparebant ei, nec ideo unius esse desiit, ut desinat monarchia esse quia per tanta milia virtutum procuratur,

[4] therefore, if even the divine monarchy is administered through so many legions and armies of angels, as it is written, Thousands upon thousands stood by him and thousands of thousands appeared to him, it did not on that account cease to be of one, so that it should cease to be a monarchy because it is managed through so many thousands of powers,

[5] quale est ut deus divisionem et dispersionem pati videatur in filio et in spiritu sancto secundum et tertium sortitis locum, tam consortibus substantiae patris, quas non patitur in tot angelorum numero et quidem tam a substantia patris? membra et pignora et instrumenta et ipsam vim ac totum censum monarchiae eversionem deputas eius? non recte.

[5] what sort of thing is it, that God should seem to suffer division and dispersion in the Son and in the Holy Spirit, who have been allotted the second and the third place, being so much consorts of the Father's substance—divisions which he does not suffer in so great a number of angels, and indeed so from the Father's substance? do you reckon the members and pledges and instruments and the very force and the whole census of the monarchy to be an overthrow of it? not rightly.

[6] malo te ad sensum rei quam ad sonum vocabuli exerceas. eversio enim monarchiae illa est tibi intellegenda cum alia dominatio suae condicionis et proprii status ac per hoc aemula superducitur, cum alius deus infertur adversus creatoremcum Marcione, cum plures secundum Valentinos et Prodicos: tunc in monarchiae eversionem cum in creatoris destructionem.

[6] I would rather that you exercise yourself to the sense of the matter than to the sound of the word. For the overthrow of the monarchy is to be understood by you as this: when another dominion, of its own condition and proper status, and thus a rival, is superinduced; when another god is introduced against the Creator withMarcion, when several, according to the Valentinians and the Prodicians: then it is an overthrow of the monarchy together with a destruction of the Creator.

CAPUT 4.

CHAPTER 4.

[1] Ceterum qui filium non aliunde deduco, sed de substantia patris, nihil facientem sine patris voluntate, omnem a patre consecutum potestatem, quomodo possum de fide destruere monarchiam quam a patre filio traditam in filio servo? hoc mihi et in tertium gradum dictum sit, quia spiritum non aliunde puto quam a patre per filium.

[1] But I, who do not derive the Son from elsewhere, but from the substance of the Father—doing nothing without the Father’s will, having obtained all power from the Father—how can I, on the ground of faith, destroy the monarchy which, handed over by the Father to the Son, I preserve in the Son? Let this be said by me also for the third grade, since I suppose the Spirit to be from no elsewhere than from the Father through the Son.

[2] vide ergo ne tu potius monarchiam destruas, qui dispositionem et dispensationem eius evertis in tot nominibus constitutam in quot deus voluit. adeo autem manet in suo statu, licet trinitas inferatur, ut etiam restitui habeat patri a filio, siquidem apostolus scribit de ultimo fine, Cum tradiderit regnum deo et patri. oportet enim eum regnare usque dum ponat inimicos eius deus sub pedes ipsius, scilicet secundum psalmum, Sede ad dexteram meam donec ponam inimicos tuos scabellum pedum tuorum.

[2] see therefore lest you rather be the one to destroy the monarchy, you who overturn its disposition and dispensation, constituted in as many names as God willed. Yet it remains in its own state, although the Trinity is introduced, to such a degree that it even has to be restored to the Father by the Son, since indeed the apostle writes concerning the ultimate end, When he shall have handed over the kingdom to God and the Father. For he must reign until God puts his enemies under his feet, namely according to the psalm, Sit at my right hand until I place your enemies as the footstool of your feet.

cum autem subiecta erunt illi omnia absque eo qui ei subiecit omnia, tunc et ipse subicietur illi qui ei subiecit omnia, ut sit deus omnia in omnibus.

But when all things shall have been subjected to him, apart from the one who subjected all things to him, then even he himself will be subjected to the one who subjected all things to him, so that God may be all in all.

[3] videmus igitur non obesse monarchiae filium, etsi hodie apud filium est, quia et in suo statu est apud filium et cum suo state restituetur patri a filio. ita eam nemo hoc nomine destruet filium admittat cui et traditam eam a patre et a quo quandoque restituendam patri constat.

[3] we see therefore that the son is not detrimental to the monarchy, even if today it is with the son, because it is also in its own status with the son, and in its own status it will be restored to the father by the son. thus no one will on this ground destroy it he admit the son, to whom it is established both that it was handed over by the father and by whom it is someday to be restored to the father.

[4] hoc uno capitulo epistulae apostolicae potuimus iam et patrem et filium ostendisse duos esse, praeterquam ex nominibus patris et filii, etiam ex eo quod qui tradidit regnum et cui tradidit, item qui subiecit , duo sint necesse est.

[4] By this one chapter of the apostolic epistle we have already been able to show that the Father and the Son are two, besides from the names of Father and Son, also from this: that the one who handed over the kingdom and the one to whom he handed it over, likewise the one who subjected, must be two.

CAPUT 5.

CHAPTER 5.

[1] Sed quia duos unum volant esse, ut idem pater et filius habeatur, oportet et totum de filio examinari, an sit et qui sit et quomodo sit, et ita res ipsa formam suam scripturis et interpretationibus earum patrocinantibus vindicabit. aiunt quidam et Genesim in Hebraico ita incipere, In principio deus fecit sibi filium. hoc ut firmum non sit alia me argumenta deducunt ab ipsa dei dispositione qua fuit ante mundi constitutionem ad usque filii generationem.

[1] But since they want the two to be one, so that the same be accounted both Father and Son, it is necessary that the whole matter concerning the Son likewise be examined—whether he is, and who he is, and how he is—and thus the thing itself will vindicate its own form, with the Scriptures and their interpretations patronizing it. Some say even that Genesis in Hebrew begins thus, “In the beginning God made for himself a son.” But, so that this may not be taken as firm, other arguments are brought forward to me from God’s own disposition (dispensation), which existed before the world’s constitution, right up to the generation of the Son.

[2] ante omnia enim deus erat solus, ipse sibi et mundus et locus et omnia. solus autem quia nihil aliud extrinsecus praeter illum. ceterum ne tunc quidem solus: habebat enim secum quam habebat in semetipso rationem, suam scilicet.

[2] For before all things God was alone, he himself for himself both world and place and all things. Alone, however, because there was nothing else external besides him. Yet not even then alone: for he had with him the Reason which he had in himself—his own, namely.

rationalis enim deus, et ratio in ipso prius, et ita ab ipso omnia: quae ratio sensus ipsius est.

for God is rational, and reason is in him first, and thus from him are all things: which reason is his own sense.

[3] hanc Graeci lo&gon dicunt, quo vocabolo etiam sermonem appellamus: ideoque iam in usu est nostrorum per simplicitatem interpretationis sermonem dicere in primordio apud deum fuisse, cum magis rationem competat antiquiorem haberi, quia [non] sermonalis a principio sed rationalis deus etiam ante principium, et quia ipse quoque sermo ratione consistens priorem eam ut substantiam suam ostendat.

[3] this the Greeks call logos, by which vocable we also entitle speech “sermon”: and therefore it is now in the usage of our people, through the simplicity of interpretation, to say that the sermon was in the beginning with God, whereas it more befits that reason be held the more ancient, because God was [not] sermonal from the beginning but rational even before the beginning, and because the sermon itself also, consisting by reason, shows that to be prior as its own substance.

[4] tamen et sic nihil interest. nam etsi deus nondum sermonem suum miserat, proinde eum cum ipsa et in ipsa ratione intra semetipsum habebat, tacite cogitando et disponendo secum quae per sermonem mox erat dicturus: cum ratione enim sua cogitans atque disponens, sermonem eam efficiebat quam sermone tractabat.

[4] nevertheless even so it makes no difference. For even if God had not yet sent forth his sermon, accordingly he had it with his very reason and in that same reason within himself, silently by thinking and arranging with himself the things which he was soon to say through the sermon: for by thinking and arranging with his own reason, he was making that sermon which he was handling by sermon.

[5] idque quo facilius intellegas, ex te ipso ante recognosce ut ex imagine et similitudine dei, quo habeas et tu in temetipso rationem qui es animal rationale, a rationali scilicet artifice non tantum factus sed etiam ex substantia ipsius animatus. vide, cum tacitus tecum ipse congrederis ratione, hoc ipsum agi intra te, occurrente ea tibi cum sermone ad omnem cogitatus tui motum, ad omnem sensus tui pulsum.

[5] and that you may more easily understand this, first recognize from your own self—as from the image and likeness of God—that you too have within yourself reason, you who are a rational animal, having been made, namely, by a rational artificer, not only made but also animated out of his substance. see, when silently you converse with yourself by reason, that this very thing is transacted within you, reason meeting you together with speech at every movement of your thought, at every pulse of your sense.

[6] quodcunque cogitaveris sermo est, quodcunque senseris ratio est: loquaris illud in animo necesse est, et dum loqueris conlocutorem pateris sermonem, in quo inest haec ipsa ratio qua cum eo cogitans loquaris per quem loquens cogitas. ita secundus quodammodo in te est sermo per quem loqueris cogitando et per quem cogitas loquendo: ipse sermo alius est.

[6] whatever you have thought is discourse, whatever you have sensed is reason: you must speak that in the mind, and while you speak you experience as an interlocutor the discourse, in whom there is this very reason by which, thinking with him, you speak, through whom, speaking, you think. thus, in a certain way, there is in you a second discourse through which you speak by thinking and through which you think by speaking: the discourse itself is other.

[7] quanto ergo plenius hoc agitur in deo cuius tu quoque imago et similitudo censeris, quod habeat in se etiam tacendo rationem et in ratione sermonem? possum itaque non temere praestruxisse et tunc deum ante universitatis constitutionem solum non fuisse, habentem in semetipso proinde rationem et in ratione sermonem quem secundum a se faceret agitando intra se.

[7] How much more fully, then, is this done in God, in whose image and similitude you too are reckoned, that he has in himself, even while being silent, Reason, and in Reason Discourse? I can therefore have not rashly pre-stated that God then, before the constitution of the universe, was not alone, having in himself accordingly Reason, and in Reason Discourse, whom, as second from himself, he would make by agitating within himself.

CAPUT 6.

CHAPTER 6.

[1] Haec vis et haec divini sensus dispositio apud scripturas etiam in sophiae nomine ostenditur. quid enim sapientius ratione dei sive sermone? itaque sophiam quoque exaudi, ut secundam personam conditam: primo, Dominus creavit me initium viarum in opera sua, priusquam terram faceret, priusquam montes collocarentur; ante omnes autem colles generavit me— in sensu suo scilicet condens et generans.

[1] This power and this disposition of the divine sense is shown in the Scriptures also under the name Sophia. For what is wiser than the reason of God or the Word? Therefore also hear Sophia, as a second Person constituted: first, “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works, before he made the earth, before the mountains were set in place; but before all the hills he generated me”— namely, in his own sense, to be sure, founding and generating.

[2] dehinc adsistentem eam ipsa separatione cognosce: Cum pararet, inquit, caelum aderam illi simul; et quomodo fortia faciebat super ventos quae sursum nubila, et quomodo tutos ponebat fontes eius quae sub caelo, ego eram cum illo compingens, ego eram ad quam gaudebat; cottidie autem oblectabar in persona ipsius.

[2] then recognize her as standing by through the very separation: “When he was preparing,” she says, “the heaven, I was present to him at the same time; and how he was making firm, over the winds, the clouds which are above, and how he was setting secure the fountains of that which is under the heaven, I was with him compacting; I was she at whom he rejoiced; and daily I took delight in his persona.”

[3] nam ut primum deus voluit ea quae cum sophia et ratione et sermone disposuerat intra se in substantias et species suas edere, ipsum primum protulit sermonem habentem in se individuas suas rationem et sophiam, ut per ipsum fierent universa per quem erant cogitata atque disposita, immo et facta iam quantum in dei sensu: hoc enim eis deerat, ut coram quoque in suis speciebus atque substantiis cognoscerentur et tenerentur.

[3] for when first God willed to bring forth into their own substances and species the things which, with sophia and reason and word, He had disposed within Himself, He first produced the very Word, having in itself its own undivided reason and sophia, so that through him all things might be made, through whom they had been thought and arranged, nay even already made, so far as in God’s sense: for this was lacking to them, that they also might be known and held in person in their own species and substances.

CAPUT 7.

CHAPTER 7.

[1] Tunc igitur etiam ipse sermo speciem et ornatum suum sumit, sonum et vocem, cum dicit deus, Fiat lux. haec est nativitas perfecta sermonis, dum ex deo procedit; conditus ab eo primum ad cogitatum in nomine sophiae—Dominus condidit me initium viarum; dehinc generatus ad effectum—Cum pararet caelum aderam illi; exinde eum patrem sibi faciens de quo procedendo filius factus est primogenitus, ut ante omnia genitus, et unigenitus, ut solus ex deo genitus, proprie de vulva cordis ipsius secundum quod et pater ipse testatur, Eructavit cor meum sermonem optimum;

[1] Then therefore the sermon itself also takes on its form and ornament, sound and voice, when God says, Let there be light. This is the perfect nativity of the sermon, in that it proceeds from God; founded by him first for thought in the name of sophia—The Lord founded me the beginning of his ways; then generated unto effect—When he was preparing the heaven, I was with him; thereafter making him a father to himself, from whom, by proceeding, the son was made first-begotten, as begotten before all things, and only-begotten, as the only one begotten from God, properly from the womb of his heart, according as the Father himself also testifies, My heart poured forth a most excellent sermon;

[2] ad quem deinceps gaudens proinde gaudentem in persona illius, Filius meus es tu, ego hodie genui te, et, Ante luciferum genui te.

[2] to whom thereafter, rejoicing—and thus rejoicing in his person—“You are my Son; I today have begotten you,” and, “Before the Morning-star I have begotten you.”

[3] sic et filius ex sua persona profitetur patrem in nomine sophiae, Dominus condidit me initium viarum in opera sua, ante omnes autem colles generavit me. nam si hic quidem sophia videtur dicere conditam se a domino in opera et vias eius, alibi autem per sermonem ostenditur omnia facta esse et sine illo nihil factum, sicut et rursum, Sermone eius caeli confirmati sunt et spiritu eius omnes vires eorum— utique eo spiritu qui sermoni inerat—apparet unam eandemque vim esse, nunc in nomine sophiae, nunc in appellatione sermonis, quae initium accepit viarum in dei opera, et quae caelum confirmavit, per quam omnia facta sunt et sine qua nihil factum est.

[3] thus also the Son, from his own person, professes the Father in the name of Sophia, "The Lord founded me the beginning of the ways in his works, and before all the hills he begot me." For if here indeed Sophia seems to say that she was founded by the Lord in works and in his ways, elsewhere however through the sermon it is shown that all things were made and without him nothing was made, just as again, "By his sermon the heavens were confirmed, and by his spirit all their host"— surely by that spirit which was inherent in the sermon—appears one and the same power to be, now under the name of Sophia, now under the appellation of the sermon: the one that received the beginning of the ways in the works of god, and that confirmed the heaven, through which all things were made and without which nothing was made.

[4] nec diutius de isto, quasi non ipse sit sermo et in sophiae et in rationis et in omnis divini animi et spiritus nomine, qui filius factus est dei, de quo prodeundo generatus est.

[4] nor any longer about this, as if he himself were not the sermon and under the name of sophia and in that of reason and of every divine mind and spirit, who has been made the Son of God, from whom, by proceeding forth, he has been begotten.

[5] ergo, inquis, das aliquam substantiam esse sermonem, spirito et sophia et ratione constructam? plane. non vis enim eum substantivum habere in re per substantiae proprietatem, ut res et persona quaedam videri possit et ita capiat secundus a deo constitutus duos efficere, patrem et filium, deum et sermonem:

[5] Therefore, you ask, do you grant that the Word is some substance, constructed by spirit and Sophia and reason? Plainly. For you do not wish him to have a substantive being in reality through the property of substance, so that he may be seen as a certain thing and person so that, being constituted second after God, he may thus make two, the Father and the Son, God and the Word:

[6] quid est enim, dices, sermo nisi vox et sonus oris, et sicut grammatici tradunt aer offensus intellegibilis auditu, ceterum vacuum nescio quid et inane et incorporale? at ego nihil dico de deo inane et vacuum prodire potuisse, ut non de inani et vacuo prolatum, nec carere substantia quod de tanta substantia processit et tantas substantias fecit;

[6] what is, you will say, the word except the voice and sound of the mouth, and, as the grammarians hand down, air struck, intelligible to hearing—otherwise some I‑know‑not‑what vacuum, empty and incorporeal? but I say nothing of God that the empty and the void could have come forth, so that it was not brought forth from emptiness and void, nor does that which proceeded from so great a substance and made so many substances lack substance;

[7] fecit enim et ipse quae facta sunt per illum. quale est ut nihil sit ipse sine quo nihil factum est, ut inanis solida et vacuus plena et incorporalis corporalia sit operatus? nam etsi potest aliquando quid fieri diversum eius per quod fit, nihil tamen potest fieri per id quod vacuum et inane est.

[7] for he too made the things that were made through him. How is it that he himself should be nothing, without whom nothing was made, as though the inane had wrought solid things, and the vacuum full things, and the incorporeal corporeal things? For even if at some time something can be made diverse from that by which it is made, nevertheless nothing can be made through that which is vacuum and inane.

[8] vacua et inanis res est sermo dei qui filius dictus est, qui ipse deus cognominatus est, Et sermo erat apud deum et deus erat sermo? scriptum est, Non sumes nomen dei in vanum. hic certe est qui in effigie dei constitutus non rapinam existimavit esse se aequalem deo.

[8] Is the sermon of God, who was called Son, who himself was cognominated God—“And the sermon was with God and the sermon was God”—a void and empty thing? It is written, “You shall not take the name of God in vain.” This surely is he who, constituted in the effigy of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal to God.

in qua effigie dei? utique in aliqua, non tamen in nulla: quis enim negabit deum corpus esse, etsi deus spiritus est? spiritus enim corpus sui generis in sua effigie.

in what effigy of God? assuredly in some, yet not in none: for who will deny that God is a body, although God is spirit? for spirit is a body of its own kind, in its own effigy.

[9] sed et si invisibilia illa, quaecunque sunt, habent apud deum et suum corpus et suam formam per quae sali deo visibilia sunt, quanto magis quod ex ipsius substantia emissum est sine substantia non erit. quaecunque ergo substantia sermonis fuit, illam dico personam et illi nomen filii vindico, et dam filium agnosco secundum a patre defendo.

[9] But even if those invisible things, whatever they are, have with God both their own body and their own form, through which they are visible to God himself, how much more will that which has been emitted from his very substance not be without substance. Whatever therefore was the substance of the Word, that I call a person, and to it I vindicate the name of Son, and I acknowledge the Son as second after the Father and defend him as being from the Father.

CAPUT 8.

CHAPTER 8.

[1] Hoc si qui putaverit me probolh_n aliquam introducere, id est prolationem rei alterius ex altera, quod facit Valentinus alium atque alium aeonem de aeone producens, primo quidem dicam tibi, non ideo non utitur et veritas vocabulo isto et re ac censu eius quia et haeresis utatur: immo haeresis potius ex veritate accepit quod ad mendacium suum strueret.

[1] If anyone has thought that I introduce some probolē, that is, a prolation of one thing out of another, which Valentinus does, producing one aeon after another from an aeon, first indeed I will say to you: not for that reason does the truth not use both this vocable and the thing and its proper reckoning, because heresy also uses it; rather, heresy took it from the truth, in order to construct its own mendacity.

[2] prolatus est sermo dei an non? hic mecum gradum fige. si prolatus est, cognosce probolh_n veritatis, et viderit haeresis si quid de veritate imitata est.

[2] has the word of God been brought forth, or not? here fix your step with me. if it has been brought forth, recognize the prolation of truth, and heresy shall see whether it has imitated anything from the truth.

iam nunc quaeritur quis quomodo utatur aliqua re et vocabulo eius. Valentinus probola_j suas discernit et separat ab auctore, et ita longe ab eo ponit ut aeon patrem nesciat; denique desiderat nosse nec potest, immo et paene devoratur et dissolvitur in reliquam substantiam.

already now it is inquired who uses some thing and its vocable, and how. Valentinus discerns his probolae and separates them from the author, and so places them far from him that the aeon does not know the Father; finally it desires to know and cannot—nay, it is almost devoured and dissolved into the remaining substance.

[3] apud nos autem solus filius patrem novit, et sinum patris ipse exposuit, et omnia apud patrem audivit et vidit, et quae mandatus est a patre ea et loquitur, nec suam sed patris perfecit voluntatem, quam de proximo immo de initio noverat.

[3] but with us, however, the Son alone knows the Father, and he himself has disclosed the bosom of the Father, and he has heard and seen all things with the Father, and the things with which he has been mandated by the Father, those he also speaks, and he perfected not his own but the Father's will, which he had known from close at hand—nay rather, from the beginning.

[4] quis enim scit quae sint in deo nisi spiritus qui in ipso, est? sermo autem spiritu structus est, et ut ita dixerim sermonis corpus est spiritus. sermo ergo et in patre semper, sicut dicit, Ego in patre: et apud deum semper, sicut scriptum est, Et sermo erat apud deum: et nunquam separatus a patre aut alias a patre quia Ego et pater unum sumus.

[4] for who indeed knows what things are in god except the spirit who is in him? but the sermon is structured by spirit, and, so to speak, the body of the sermon is spirit. therefore the sermon also is always in the father, as he says, I in the father: and always with god, as it is written, And the Word was with god: and never separated from the father nor at any other time from the father, because I and the father are one.

[5] haec erit probolh_ veritatis, custos unitatis, qua prolatum dicimus filium a patre sed non separatum. protulit enim deus sermonem, quemadmodum etiam paracletus docet, sicut radix fruticem et fons fluvium et sol radium: nam et istae species probolhai\ sunt earum substantiarum ex quibus prodeunt. nec dubitaverim filium licere et radicis fruticem et fontis fluvium et solis radium, quia omnis origo parens est et omne quod ex origine profertur progenies est, multo magis sermo dei qui etiam proprie nomen filii accepit: nec frutex tamen a radice nec fluvius a fonte nec radius a sole discernitur, sicut nec a deo sermo.

[5] this will be the probolē of truth, the guardian of unity, whereby we say the Son was brought forth from the Father but not separated. For God brought forth the Word, as even the Paraclete teaches, just as a root [brings forth] a shoot and a spring a river and the sun a ray: for these species too are probolai\ of the substances from which they proceed. Nor would I hesitate that it is allowable to call the Son also the root’s shoot and the spring’s river and the sun’s ray, because every origin is a parent and everything that is brought forth from an origin is progeny, much more the Word of God, who even in the proper sense received the name “Son”: nor, however, is the shoot distinguished from the root nor the river from the spring nor the ray from the sun, just as neither is the Word from God.

[6] igitur secundum horum exemplorum formam profiteor me duos licere deum et sermonem eius, patrem et filium ipsius: nam et radix et frutex duae res sunt sed coniunctae, et fons et flumen duae species sunt sed indivisae, et sol et radius duce formae sunt sed cohaerentes.

[6] therefore, according to the form of these examples, I profess that it is permitted me to acknowledge two, God and his Word his, the Father and his Son: for both root and shoot are two things but conjoined, and spring and river are two species but undivided, and sun and ray are two forms but cohere.

[7] omne quod prodit ex aliquo secundum sit eius necesse est de quo prodit, nec ideo tamen est separatum. secundus autem ubi est, duo sunt, et tertius ubi est, tres sunt. tertius enim est spiritus a deo et filio, sicut tertius a radice fructus ex frutice et tertius a fonte rivus ex flamine et tertius a sole apex ex radio: nihil tamen a matrice alienatur a qua proprietates suas ducit.

[7] whatever proceeds from something, it must be a second of that from which it proceeds, nor on that account is it separated. But where there is a second, there are two, and where there is a third, there are three. For the Spirit is third from God and the Son, just as third from the root is the fruit from the shrub, and third from the spring is the brook from the river, and third from the sun is the apex from the ray: yet nothing is alienated from the matrix from which it draws its properties.

ita trinitas per consertos et connexos gradus a patre decurrens et monarchiae nihil obstrepit et oeconomiae statum protegit.

thus the Trinity, descending from the Father through interlaced and interconnected degrees, does nothing to clash with the monarchy and safeguards the state of the economy.

CAPUT 9.

CHAPTER 9.

[1] Hanc me regulam professum, qua inseparatos ab alterutro patrem et filium et spiritum testor, tene ubique, et ita quid quomodo dicatur agnosces. ecce enim dico alium esse patrem et alium filium et alium spiritum (male accepit idiotes quisque aut perversus hoc dictum, quasi diversitatem sonet et ex diversitate separationem protendat patris et filii et spiritus: necessitate autem hoc dico cum eundem patrem et filium et spiritum contendunt, adversus oeconomiam monarchiae adulantes) non tamen diversitate alium filium a patre sed distributione, nec divisione alium sed distinctione, quia non sit idem pater et filius, vel modulo alias ab alio.

[1] Since I have professed this rule, by which I bear witness that the Father and the Son and the Spirit are inseparable from one another, hold it everywhere, and thus you will recognize what is said and how it is said. For behold, I say that the Father is another and the Son another and the Spirit another (some idiot or perverse person has taken this statement badly, as if it sounded diversity and from diversity extended a separation of Father and Son and Spirit: yet I say this of necessity when they contend that the Father and the Son and the Spirit are the same, flattering the monarchy against the economy) not, however, another by diversity is the Son from the Father, but by distribution, nor another by division but by distinction, because the Father and the Son are not the same, or, by mode, different one from the other.

[2] pater enim tota substantia est, filius vero, derivatio totius et portio, sicut ipse profitetur, Quia pater maior me est: a quo et minoratus canitur in psalmo, Modicum quid citra angelos. sic et pater alias a filio, dum filio maior, dum alias qui generat alius qui generatur, dum alius qui mittit alius qui mittitur, dum alius qui facit alius per quem fit.

[2] for the Father is the whole substance, but the Son, a derivation of the whole and a portion, as he himself professes, Because the Father is greater than I: by whom too he is sung as diminished in the psalm, A little short of the angels. thus also the Father is other than the Son, since he is greater than the Son, since the one who begets is other than the one who is begotten, since the one who sends is other than the one who is sent, since the one who makes is other than the one through whom it is made.

[3] bene quod et dominus usus hoc verbo in persona paracleti non divisionem significavit sed dispositionem: Rogabo enim, inquit, patrem et alium advocatum mittet vobis, spiritum veritatis. sic alium a se paracletum, quomodo et nos a patre alium filium, ut tertium gradum ostenderet in paracleto, sicut nos secundum in filio, propter oeconomiae observationem.

[3] Well that even the Lord, using this word in the person of the Paraclete, signified not division but disposition: “For I will ask,” he says, “the Father, and he will send you another advocate, the Spirit of truth.” Thus another Paraclete from himself, just as we [say] from the Father another Son, so that he might show a third grade in the Paraclete, just as we [show] a second in the Son, on account of the observance of the economy.

[4] ipsum quod pater et filius dicuntur nonne aliud ab alio est? utique omnia quod vocantur hoc erunt, et quod erunt hoc vocabuntur, et permiscere se diversitas vocabulorum non potest omnino, quia nec rerum quarum erunt vocabula. Est est, non non: nam quod amplius est hoc a malo est.

[4] is not the very fact that “Father” and “Son” are said so something other, one from the other? surely all things will be that which they are called, and what they are, this they will be called; and the diversity of terms (vocables) cannot at all be commingled, nor the realities of which they will be the vocables. “Yes, yes; no, no”: for what is more than this is from evil.

CAPUT 10.

CHAPTER 10.

[1] Ita aut pater aut filius est, et neque dies eadem et nox neque pater idem et filius, ut sint ambo unus et utrumque alter, quod vanissimi isti monarchiani volunt. ipse se, inquiunt, filium sibi fecit.

[1] Thus he is either father or son, and neither is day the same as night nor the father the same as the son, so that both are one and each the other, which those most vain Monarchians want. “He made himself, they say, a son to himself.”

[2] atquin pater filium facit et patrem filius: et qui ex alterutro fiunt a semetipsis sibi fieri nullo modo possunt, ut pater se sibi filium faciat et filius se sibi patrem praestet.

[2] But indeed the father makes a son and the son makes a father: and those who come to be from either one cannot in any way be made by themselves for themselves, so that the father should make himself a son to himself and the son should render himself a father to himself.

[3] quae instituit deus etiam ipse custodit. habeat necesse est pater filium ut pater sit, et filius patrem ut filius sit. aliud est autem habere, aliud esse: verbi gratia, ut maritus sim habeam oportet uxorem, non ipse mihi ero uxor.

[3] What God has instituted he himself also keeps. It is necessary that a father have a son in order that he be a father, and that a son have a father in order that he be a son. Moreover, to have is one thing, to be is another: for example, that I may be a husband I ought to have a wife; I myself will not be a wife to myself.

sic etiam ut pater sim filium habeo, non ipse mihi ero filius: et ut filius sim patrem habeo, non ipse mihi ero pater.

so also, in order that I may be a father I have a son, I myself will not be a son to myself: and in order that I may be a son I have a father, I myself will not be a father to myself.

[4] ero enim me faciunt si habuero tunc ero, pater si filium habeam, filius ero si patrem. porro si ipse ero quid eorum, iam non habeo quod ipse ero, nec patrem quia ipse ero pater, nec filium quia ipse ero filius. in quantum autem alterum ex his habere me oportet, alterum esse, in tantum, si utrumque fuero, alterum non ero dum alterum non habeo.

[4] For “I shall be” those things make me, if I shall have; then I shall be a father if I have a son, I shall be a son if I have a father. Furthermore, if I myself shall be whichever of these, I no longer have that which I myself shall be—neither a father, because I myself shall be a father, nor a son, because I myself shall be a son. But inasmuch as it behooves me to have one of these and to be the other, to that extent, if I shall be both, I shall not be the one while I do not have the other.

si enim ipse ero filius qui et pater, iam non habeo filium sed ipse sum filius. non habendo autem filium dum ipse sum filius, quomodo pater ero? habere enim filium debeo ut pater sim: non sum ergo filius, quia patrem non habeo qui facit filium.

For if I myself will be the son who is also the father, I now do not have a son but I myself am the son. But by not having a son while I myself am a son, how will I be a father? For I ought to have a son so that I may be a father: therefore I am not a son, because I do not have a father who makes a son.

[5] aeque si ipse sum pater qui et filius, iam non habeo patrem sed ipse sum pater. non habendo autem patrem dum ipse sum pater, quomodo filius ero? habere enim patrem debeo ut filius sim: non ergo ero pater, quia filium non habeo qui facit patrem.

[5] Likewise, if I myself am the father who is also the son, I no longer have a father but I myself am father. But not having a father while I myself am father, how shall I be a son? For I ought to have a father that I may be a son: therefore I shall not be a father, because I do not have a son who makes a father.

[6] hoc erit totum ingenium diaboli, alterum ex altero excludere dum utrumque in unum sub monarchiae favore concludens neutrum haberi facit, ut et pater non sit qui scilicet filium non habet, et filius non sit qui aeque patrem non habet: dum enim pater est filius non erit. sic monarchiam tenent qui nec patrem nec filium continent.

[6] this will be the whole stratagem of the devil: to exclude the one by means of the other, while, enclosing both into one under the favor of monarchy, he brings it about that neither is held, so that the father is not, who of course does not have a son, and the son is not, who likewise does not have a father; for while he is father, he will not be son. thus they hold the monarchy who contain neither father nor son.

[7] sed nihil deo difficile. quis hoc nesciat? et impossibilia apud saeculum possibilia apud deum quis ignoret?

[7] but nothing is difficult to God. who does not know this? and who would ignore that things impossible in the age are possible with God?

et Stulta mundi elegit deus, ut confundat sapientia. legimus omnia. ergo, inquiunt, difficile non fuit deo ipsum se et patrem et filium facere adversus traditam formam rebus humanis: nam et sterilem parere contra naturam difficile deo non fuit, sicut nec virginem.

and God chose the foolish things of the world, to confound sapience. we read all things. therefore, they say, it was not difficult for God to make himself both Father and Son, contrary to the transmitted form in human affairs: for it was not difficult for God that a barren woman should give birth against nature, just as neither was it difficult that a virgin should do so.

[8] plane nihil deo difficile: sed si tam abrupte in praesumptionibus nostris hac sententia utamur, quidvis de deo confingere poterimus quasi fecerit, quia facere potuerit. non autem, quia omnia potest facere, ideoque credendum est illum fecisse etiam quod non fecerit, sed an fecerit requirendum. potuit, si voluisset, deus pennis hominem ad volandum instruxisse, quod et milvis praestitit: non tamen quia potuit statim et fecit.

[8] plainly nothing is difficult for God: but if we use this maxim so abruptly in our presumptions, we will be able to fabricate anything about God as though he did it, because he could have done it. Not, however, because he can do all things, is it therefore to be believed that he did even what he did not do; rather, whether he did it must be inquired. God could, if he had willed, have equipped the human being with wings for flying, which he also has furnished to kites; yet not because he could did he straightway also do it.

potuit et Praxean et omnes pariter haereticos statini extinxisse: non tamen quia potuit extinxit. oportebat enim et milvos esse et haereticos, oportebat et patrem crucifigi. hac ratione erit aliquid et difficile deo, id scilicet quodcunque non fecerit non quia non potuerit sed quia noluerit.

He could also have extinguished Praxeas and all the heretics alike at once: yet not because he could did he extinguish. It was fitting indeed that there be both kites and heretics; it was fitting also that the Father be crucified. By this reasoning there will be something even difficult for God, namely whatever he has not done—not because he could not, but because he was unwilling.

[9] dei enim posse velle est, et non posse nolle: quod autem voluit, et potuit et ostendit. ergo quia si voluit semetipsum sibi filium facere potuit, et quia si potuit fecit, font probabis illum et potuisse et voluisse si probaveris illum fecisse.

[9] for for God, to be able is to will, and to be unable is to be unwilling; but what he willed, he both was able [to do] and showed. therefore, since if he willed to make himself for himself a son, he could, and since if he could, he did, then you will prove him both to have been able and to have willed, if you have proved that he did it.

CAPUT 11.

CHAPTER 11.

[1] Probare autem tam aperte debebis ex scripturis, quam nos probamus illum sibi filium fecisse sermonem suum. si enim filium nominat, filius autem non alius erit quam qui ex ipso prodiit, sermo autem prodiit ex ipso, hic erit filius, non ipse de quo prodiit: non enim ipse prodiit ex semetipso. porro qui eundem patrem dicis et filium, eundem et protulisse ex semetipso facis et prodisse quod deus est.

[1] However, you ought to prove as openly from the Scriptures as we prove that he made his Word his Son for himself. For if he names a son, the son will be no other than the one who has proceeded from him; but the Word proceeded from him—this will be the Son, not the very one from whom he proceeded: for he himself did not proceed from himself. Moreover, you who say that the Father and the Son are the same, you make the same both to have brought forth from himself and that God has proceeded.

si potuit fecisse, non tamen fecit.

if he was able to have done it, nevertheless he did not do it.

[2] aut exhibe probationem quam expostulo meae similem, id est sic scripturas eundem filium et patrem ostendere quemadmodum apud nos distincte pater et filius demonstrantur: distincte inquam, non divise. sicut ego profero dictum a deo, Eructavit cor meum sermonem optimum, haec tu contra opponas alicubi dixisse deum, Eructavit me cor meum sermonem optimum, ut ipse sit qui et eructavit et quod eructavit, et ipse qui protulerit et qui prolatus sit, si ipse est et sermo et deus.

[2] or else exhibit the proof which I demand, similar to mine, that is, that the Scriptures show the same one to be Son and Father just as with us Father and Son are shown distinctly: distinctly, I say, not divided. Just as I bring forward what is said by God, “My heart has poured forth a most excellent Word,” so you, on the contrary, should set against it that God said somewhere, “My heart has poured forth me, a most excellent Word,” so that he himself would be both the one who has poured forth and that which has been poured forth, and himself both the one who has brought forth and the one who has been brought forth, if he himself is both the Word and God.

[3] ecce ego propono patrem filio dixisse, Filius meus es tu, ego hodie generavi te: si velis ut credam ipsum esse patrem et filium, ostende sic pronuntiatum alibi, Dominus dixit ad se, Filius meus sum ego, ego hodie generavi me; proinde et, Ante luciferum generavi me; et, Dominus condidi me initium viarum in opera mea, ante omnes autem colles generavi me; et si qua alia in hunc modum sunt. quem autem verebatur deus dominus universitatis ita pronuntiare, si ita res erat? an verebatur ne non crederetur si simpliciter se et patrem et filium pronuntiasset?

[3] behold I set forth that the Father said to the Son, You are my Son, I today have begotten you: if you wish that I should believe that he himself is both Father and Son, show it pronounced thus elsewhere, The Lord said to himself, I am my Son, I today have begotten myself; and likewise, Before the morning-star I begot myself; and, The Lord, I founded myself the beginning of the ways in my works, and before all the hills I begot myself; and if there are any other things in this mode. whom, moreover, would God, the Lord of the universe, have feared to pronounce thus, if the matter was so? or was he afraid that he would not be believed if he had simply declared himself both Father and Son?

[4] unum tamen veritus est, mentiri veritatis auctorem semetipsum et suam veritatem. et ideo veracem deum credens, scio illum non aliter quam disposuit pronuntiasse nec aliter disposuisse quam pronuntiavit. tu porro eum mendacem efficias et fallacem, et deceptorem fidei huius, si cum ipse esset sibi filius alii dabat filii personam, quando scripturae omnes et demonstrationem et distinctionem trinitatis ostendant a quibus et praescriptio nostra deducitur, non posse unum atque eundem videri qui loquitur et de quo loquitur et ad quem loquitur, quia neque perversitas neque fallacia deo congruat, ut cum ipse esset ad quem loquebatur, ad alium potius et non ad semetipsum loquatur.

[4] one thing, however, he feared: to lie, the author of truth, against himself and his own truth. And therefore, believing God to be veracious, I know that he has not pronounced otherwise than he disposed, nor disposed otherwise than he pronounced. You, moreover, would make him mendacious and fallacious, and a deceiver of this faith, if, when he himself were son to himself, he were giving to another the persona of son, since all the Scriptures show both the demonstration and the distinction of the Trinity, from which also our prescription is derived: that one and the same cannot appear to be he who speaks and he about whom he speaks and he to whom he speaks; because neither perversity nor fallacy is congruent to God, such that, when he himself were the one to whom he was speaking, he should speak rather to another and not to himself.

[5] accipe igitur et alias voces patris de filio per Esaiam: Ecce filius meus quem elegi, dilectus meus in quem bene sensi; ponam spiritum meum super ipsum et iudicium nationibus annuntiabit. accipe et ad ipsum: Magnum tibi est ut voceris filius meus ad statuendas tribus Iacob et ad convertendam dispersionem Israelis; posui te in lucem nationum, ut sis salus in extremum terrae.

[5] therefore receive also other voices of the Father about the Son through Isaiah: Behold my Son whom I have chosen, my Beloved in whom I have been well-disposed; I will place my Spirit upon him, and he will announce judgment to the nations. receive also to him: It is a great thing for you to be called my Son for establishing the tribes of Jacob and for turning back the dispersion of Israel; I have set you as a light of the nations, that you may be salvation unto the end of the earth.

[6] accipe nunc et filii voces de patre: Spiritus domini super me, quapropter unxit me ad evangelizandum hominibus. item in psalmo ad patrem de eodem: Ne dereliqueris me, donec annuntiem brachium tuum nativitati universae venturae. item in alio: Domine quid multiplicati sunt qui comprimunt me?

[6] receive now also the son’s voices about the Father: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me; wherefore he has anointed me to evangelize to human beings. likewise in a psalm to the Father about the same: Do not forsake me, until I announce your arm to the entire coming generation. likewise in another: Lord, how greatly are they multiplied who oppress me?

[7] sed et omnes paene psalmi qui Christi personam sustinent filium ad patrem, id est Christum ad deum, verba facientem repraesentant. animadverte etiam spiritum loquentem ex tertia persona de patre et filio: Dixit dominus domino meo, Sede ad dexteram meam donec ponam inimicos tuos scabellum pedoni tuorum.

[7] but also almost all the psalms that sustain the persona of Christ represent the Son addressing the Father, that is, Christ addressing God, as speaking. Note also the Spirit speaking in the third person about the Father and the Son: The Lord said to my lord, Sit at my right hand until I place your enemies as a footstool for your feet.

[8] item per Esaiam: Haec dicit dominus domino meo Christo. item per eundem ad patrem de filio: Domine, quis credidit auditui nostro et brachium domini cui revelatum est? annuntiavimus de illo sicut puerulus, sicut radix in terra sitienti, et non erat forma eius nec gloria.

[8] likewise through Isaiah: Thus says the Lord to my lord Christ. Likewise through the same to the Father about the Son: Lord, who has believed our report, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? We announced concerning him as a little boy, as a root in a thirsty land, and there was not his form nor his glory.

[9] haec pauca de multis: nec enim affectamus universas scripturas evolvere, cum et in singulis capitulis plenam maiestatem et auctoritatem contestantes maiorem congressum in retractatibus habeamus. his itaque paucis tamen manifeste distinctio trinitatis exponitur:

[9] these few out of many: for we do not aspire to unroll the entire Scriptures, since even in individual chapters, while attesting full majesty and authority, we have a greater engagement in retractations. By these few, therefore, nevertheless the distinction of the Trinity is manifestly set forth:

[10] est enim ipse qui pronuntiat spiritus, et pater ad quem pronuntiat, et filius de quo pronuntiat. sic et cetera, quae nunc a patre de filio vel ad filium, nunc a filio de patre vel ad patrem, nunc a spiritu pronuntiantur, unamquamque personam in sua proprietate constituunt.

[10] for he is himself the Spirit who pronounces, and the Father to whom he pronounces, and the Son about whom he pronounces. thus also the rest, which are now pronounced by the Father about the Son or to the Son, now by the Son about the Father or to the Father, now by the Spirit, constitute each person in his own propriety.

CAPUT 12.

CHAPTER 12.

[1] Si te adhuc numerus scandalizat trinitatis quasi non connexae in unitate simplici, interrogo quomodo unicus et singularis pluraliter loquitur, Faciamus hominem ad imaginem et similitudinem nostram, cum debuerit dixisse, Faciam hominem ad imaginem et similitudinem meam, utpote unicus et singularis.

[1] If the number of the Trinity still scandalizes you as if not connected in simple unity, I ask how the unique and singular speaks in the plural, Let us make man in our image and likeness, when he ought to have said, I will make man in my image and likeness, as being unique and singular.

[2] sed et in sequentibus, Ecce Adam factus est tanquam unus ex nobis, fallit aut ludit, ut cum unus et solus et singularis esset numerose loqueretur. aut numquid angelis loquebatur, ut Iudaei interpretantur, quia nec ipsi filium agnoscunt? an quia ipse erat pater filius spiritus, ideo pluralem se praestans pluraliter sibi loquebatur?

[2] but also in the following, Behold, Adam has been made as one of us, does he deceive or jest, so that, although he was one and alone and singular, he spoke numerously? or was he perhaps speaking to the angels, as the Jews interpret, because they themselves do not acknowledge the Son? or because he himself was Father, Son, Spirit, therefore presenting himself as plural did he speak in the plural to himself?

[3] immo quia iam adhaerebat illi filius, seconda persona, sermo ipsius, et tertia, spiritus in sermone, ideo pluraliter pronuntiavit Faciamus et Nostrani et Nobis. cum quibus enim faciebat hominem, et quibus faciebat similem? filio quidem qui erat induturus hominem, spiritu vero qui erat sanctificaturus hominem, quasi cum ministris et arbitris ex unitate trinitatis loquebatur.

[3] rather, because already the Son adhered to him, the second person, his Speech, the Word, and the third, the Spirit in the Word, therefore he pronounced in the plural Let Us make and Our and Us. with whom, indeed, was he making the man, and to whom was he making him similar? with the Son indeed, who was going to put on the man, and with the Spirit who was going to sanctify the man, as with ministers and arbiters, from the unity of the Trinity he spoke.

[4] denique sequens scriptura distinguit inter personas: deus hominem, ad imaginem dei fecit illum. cur non suam, si unus qui faciebat et non erat ad cuius faciebat? erat autem ad cuius imaginem faciebat, ad filii scilicet, qui homo futurus certior et verior imaginem suam fecerat dici hominem qui tunc de limo formari habebat, imago veri et similitudo.

[4] finally the following scripture distinguishes among persons: man; in the image of God he made him. why not “his own,” if the one who was making was single and there was not one to whose [image] he was making? but there was one to whose image he was making—namely, the Son’s—who, about to be man, more certain and more true, had caused the man who was then to be formed from clay to be called his image, an image of the True One and a similitude.

[5] sed et in antecedentibus operibus mundi quomodo scriptum est? primum quidem, nondum filio apparente Et dixit deus Fiat lux, et facta est. ipse statim sermo lux vera quae illuminat hominem venientem in hunc mundum, et per illum mundialis quoque lux.

[5] But also in the antecedent works of the world, how is it written? First indeed, with the Son not yet appearing: And God said, Let there be light, and it was made. The Word himself forthwith is the true Light which illuminates the human coming into this world, and through him the worldly light as well.

exinde autem in sermone, Christo adsistente et administrante, deus voluit fieri et deus fecit: Et dixit deus Fiat firmamentum, et fecit deus firmamentum; Et dixit deus Fiant luminaria, et fecit deus luminare maius et minus. sed et cetera utique idem fecit qui et priora, id est sermo dei per quem omnia facta sunt et sine quo factum est nihil.

Thenceforth, however, in the Word, with Christ assisting and administering, God willed that it be made and God made: And God said Let there be a firmament, and God made the firmament; And God said Let there be luminaries, and God made the greater and the lesser luminary. But also the rest assuredly were made by the same who made the former things, that is, the Word of God through whom all things were made and without whom nothing was made.

[6] qui si ipse deus est secundum Ioannem—Deus erat sermo—habes duos, alium dicentem ut fiat, alium facientem. alium autem quomodo accipere debeas iam professus sum, personae non substantiae nomine, ad distinctionem non ad divisionem.

[6] and if he himself is God according to John—The Word was God—you have two: one saying that it be made, another making. But how you ought to take “another” I have already professed: in the name of person, not of substance, for distinction, not for division.

[7] ceterum ubique teneo unam substantiam in tribus cohaerentibus, tamen alium dicam oportet ex necessitate sensus eum qui iubet et eum qui facit. nam nec iuberet, si ipse faceret dum iuberet fieri. per eum tamen iubebat, haud sibi iussurus si unus esset, aut sine iussu facturus; quia non expectasset ut sibi iuberet.

[7] but everywhere I hold one substance in three cohering ones, nevertheless I must say “another” by necessity of the sense: the one who commands and the one who makes. for neither would he command, if he himself were making while he was commanding that it be made. yet he was commanding through him, not about to command himself if he were one, or about to do without a command; because he would not have waited in order to command himself.

CAPUT 13.

CHAPTER 13.

[1] Ergo, inquis, si deus dixit et deus fecit, si alius deus dixit et alius fecit, duo dii praedicantur. si tam durus es, puta interim. et ut adhuc amplius hoc putes, accipe et in psalmo duos deos dictos: Thronus tuus, deus, in aevum, virga regni tui; dilexisti iustitiam et odisti iniquitatem, propterea unxit te deus, deus tuus.

[1] Therefore, you say, if God said and God did, if another god said and another did, two gods are proclaimed. If you are so hard, suppose it for the meantime. And that you may suppose this even more, take also in the psalm two gods spoken of: Your throne, O God, forever, scepter of your kingdom; you have loved justice and hated iniquity; therefore God, your God, has anointed you.

[2] si ad deum loquitur, et unctum deum a deo, affirmat et hic duos deos +pro virga regni tui+. inde et Esaias ad personam Christi, Et Seboin, inquit, viri elati, ad te transibunt et post te sequentur vincti manibus et te adorabunt, quia in te deus est; tu enim es deus noster et nesciebamus, deus Israelis. et hic enim dicendo Deus in te, et Tu deus, duos proponit, qui erat in Christo et Christum ipsum.

[2] If he is speaking to God, and [speaking of] the anointed God by God, he affirms here too two gods +for ‘the scepter of your kingdom’+. From there also Isaiah, to the persona of Christ: “And the Sabeans,” he says, “lofty men, will pass over to you, and after you they will follow, with their hands bound, and they will adore you, because in you God is; for you are our God and we did not know it, the God of Israel.” For here too, by saying “God in you,” and “You are God,” he sets forth two: the One who was in Christ, and Christ himself.

[3] plus est quod in evangelio totidem invenies: In principio erat sermo et sermo erat apud deum et deus erat sermo: unus qui erat, et alius penes quem erat. sed et nomen domini in duobus lego: Dixit dominus domino meo, Sede ad dexteram meam. et Esaias haec dicit Domine, quis credidit auditui nostro, et brachium domini cui revelatuni est?

[3] more than that, you will find just as many in the Gospel: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God—one who was, and another with whom he was. But I also read the name of the Lord in two: The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand. And Isaiah says these things: Lord, who has believed our report, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?

brachium enim tuum non <domini> dixisset, si non dominum patrem et dominum filium intellegi vellet.

for he would not have said your arm, not , unless he wished the Lord Father and the Lord Son to be understood.

[4] etiam adhuc antiquior Genesis: Et pluit dominus super Sodomam et Gomorram sulphur et ignem de caelo a domino. haec aut nega scripta, aut quis es ut non putes accipienda quemadmodum scripta sunt, maxime quae non in allegoriis et parabolis sed in definitionibus certis et simplicibus habent sensum? quodsi ex illis es qui tunc dominum non sustinebant dei se filium ostendentem ne eum dominum crederent, recordare tu cum illis scriptum esse, Ego dixi, Vos dii estis et filii altissimi; et, Stetit deus in ecclesia deorum: ut si homines per fidem filios dei factos deos scriptura pronuntiare non timuit, scias illam multo magis vero et unico dei filio et domini nomen iure contulisse.

[4] even more ancient still is Genesis: And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from heaven from the Lord. either deny these things as written, or who are you that you do not think they are to be received just as they are written, especially those which have their sense not in allegories and parables but in certain and simple definitions? but if you are of those who then could not endure the Lord showing himself to be the Son of God, lest they should believe him to be Lord, remember that it is written along with them, I said, You are gods and sons of the Most High; and, God stood in the church of gods: so that, if Scripture did not fear to proclaim men, made through faith sons of God, gods, you may know that it has much more, to the true and only Son of God, conferred by right the name of and of Lord.

[5] ergo, inquis, provocabo te ut hodie quoque ex auctoritate istarum scripturarum constanter duos deos et duos dominos praedices. absit. nos enim, qui et tempora et causas, scripturarum per dei gratiam inspicimus, maxime paracleti non hominum discipuli, duos quidem definimus, patrem et filium, et iam tres cum spiritu sancto, secundum rationem oeconomiae quae facit numerum, ne, ut vestra perversitas infert, pater ipse credatur natus et passus, quod non licet credi quoniam non ita traditum est.

[5] “Therefore,” you say, “I will challenge you that today also, on the authority of those Scriptures, you should steadfastly proclaim two gods and two lords.” Far be it. For we, who examine both the times and the causes of the Scriptures through the grace of God—above all, disciples of the Paraclete, not of men—do indeed define two, the Father and the Son, and now three with the Holy Spirit, according to the rationale of the economy which makes the number, lest, as your perversity implies, the Father himself be believed to have been born and to have suffered, which it is not permitted to believe, since it has not been handed down thus.

[6] duos tamen deos et duos dominos nunquam ex ore nostro proferimus: non quasi non et pater deus et filius deus et spiritus sanctus deus, et deus unusquisque, sed quoniam retro et duo dii et duo domini praedicabantur, ut, ubi venisset Christus, et deus agnosceretur et dominus vocaretur quia filius dei et domini. si enim una persona et dei et domini in scripturis inveniretur, merito Christus non esset admissus ad nomen dei et domini—nemo enim alius praeter unus deus et unus dominus praedicabatur—et futurum erat ut ipse pater descendisse videretur quia unus deus et unus dominus legebatur, et tota oeconomia eius obumbraretur quae in materiam fidei prospecta atque dispensata est.

[6] nevertheless we never utter two gods and two lords from our mouth: not as though both the Father is God and the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God, and each one God, were not so; but because formerly both “two gods” and “two lords” were being proclaimed, so that, when Christ had come, he might both be recognized as God and be called Lord, because he is the Son of God and of the Lord. for if in the Scriptures one person of both God and Lord were found, Christ would rightly not have been admitted to the name of God and of Lord—for no one else besides “one God” and “one Lord” was being proclaimed—and it would have come about that the Father himself would seem to have descended, because “one God” and “one Lord” was read, and his whole economy would be overshadowed, which has been foreseen and dispensed into the matter of faith.

[7] at ubi venit Christus et cognitus est a nobis quod ipse qui numerum retro fecerat factus secundus a patre et cum spiritu tertius, etiam pater per ipsum plenius manifestatus, redactum est iam nomen dei et domini in unionem: ut, quia nationes a multitudine idolorum transirent ad unicum deum, et differentia constitueretur inter cultores unius et plurimae divinitatis.

[7] but when Christ came and was recognized by us to be the one who had made the number back then, having been made second after the Father and, with the Spirit, third, and the Father too more fully manifested through him, the name of god and of lord was now brought back into union: so that, as the nations were transiting from a multitude of idols to the unique god, a difference might be constituted between the worshipers of the one and of a multiple divinity.

[8] nam et lacere in mundo Christianos oportebat ut filios lucis, lumen mundi unum et deum et dominum colentes et nominantes. ceterum si ex conscientia qua scimus dei nomen et domini et patri et filio et spiritui convenire deos et dominos nominaremus, extinxissemus faces nostras etiam ad martyria timidiores, quibus evadendi quaque pateret occasio iurantibus statim per deos et dominos, ut quidam haeretici quorum dei plures.

[8] for it also behooved Christians to shine in the world as sons of light, the light of the world, worshiping and naming one God and Lord. moreover, if from the conscience by which we know that the name of “God” and of “Lord” is fitting to the Father and the Son and the Spirit, we were to name “gods” and “lords,” we would have extinguished our torches, becoming even more timid toward martyrdoms, for whom an opportunity of escaping would stand open on every side by swearing at once by “gods” and “lords,” as certain heretics do, whose gods are many.

[9] itaque deos omnino non dicam nec dominos, sed apostolum sequar ut si pariter nominandi fuerint pater et filius deum patrem appellem et Iesum Christum dominum nominem. solum autem Christum potero deum dicere, sicut idem apostolus: Ex quibus Christus, qui est, inquit, deus super omnia, benedictus in aevum omne.

[9] therefore I will not at all say “gods” nor “lords,” but I will follow the apostle, so that, if the Father and the Son must be named together, I will call God “Father” and I will name Jesus Christ “Lord.” But Christ alone I shall be able to call “God,” as the same apostle says: “From whom is Christ, who is, he says, God over all, blessed unto every age.”

[10] nam et radium solis seorsum solem vocabo: solem autem nominans cuius est radius, non statim et radium solem appellabo. nam etsi soles duos faciam, tamen et solem et radium eius tam duas res et duas species unius et indivisae substantiae numerabo quam deum et sermonem eius, quam patrem et filium.

[10] for I will even call the ray of the sun, separately, “sun”; but in naming the sun, of which the ray is, I will not straightway also call the ray “sun.” For even if I make two suns, yet both the sun and its ray I will reckon as two things and two species of one and undivided substance, as God and his Word, as Father and Son.

CAPUT 14.

CHAPTER 14.

[1] Adhuc et illa nobis regula adsistit duos vindicantibus patrem et filium, quae invisibilem deum determinavit. cum enim Moyses in Aegypto desiderasset domini conspectum dicens, Si ergo inveni gratiam coram te, manifesta mihi te ut cognoscenter videam te: Non potes videre, inquit, faciem meam ; non enim videbit homo faciem meam et vivet—id est morietur qui viderit.

[1] Still, that rule also stands by us who vindicate two, the Father and the Son, which determined the invisible God. For when Moses in Egypt had desired the Lord’s sight, saying, "If therefore I have found grace before you, make yourself manifest to me, that, being known, I may see you": "You cannot see," he says, "my face; for man shall not see my face and live"—that is, he who shall have seen will die.

[2] invenimus enim et a multis deum visum et neminem tamen eorum qui eum viderant mortuum: visum quidem deum secundum hominum capacitates, non secundum plenitudinem divinitatis. nam patriarchae deum vidisse referuntur ut Abraham et Iacob, et prophetae ut Esaias, ut Ezechiel, et tamen mortui non sunt. igitur aut mori debuerant si eum viderant—deum enim nemo videbit et vivet; aut si deum viderunt et mortui non sunt, scriptura mentitur deum dixisse, Faciem meam homo si viderit non vivet; aut scriptura mentitur [cum invisum aut] cum visum deum profert.

[2] for we find too that God was seen by many, and yet none of those who had seen him was dead: God indeed was seen according to the capacities of humans, not according to the plenitude of divinity. for the patriarchs are reported to have seen God, as Abraham and Jacob, and the prophets, as Isaiah, as Ezekiel, and yet they did not die. therefore, either they ought to have died if they saw him—for no one will see God and live; or, if they saw God and did not die, scripture lies that God said, “My face, if a man shall see it, he will not live;” or scripture lies [when it presents him as unseen or] when it presents God as seen.

[3] iam ergo alius erit qui videbatur, quia non potest idem invisibilis definiri qui videbatur: et consequens erit ut invisibilem patrem intellegamus pro plenitudine maiestatis, visibilem vero filium agnoscamus pro modulo derivationis, sicut nec solem nobis contemplari licet quantum ad ipsam substantiae summam quae est in caelis, radium autem eius toleramus oculis pro temperatura portionis quae in terram inde porrigitur.

[3] therefore now he who was seen will be another, since the same cannot be defined as invisible who was seen: and it will be consequent that we understand the Father as invisible by reason of the plenitude of majesty, but acknowledge the Son as visible according to the measure of derivation, just as it is not permitted us to contemplate the sun with respect to the very summit of its substance which is in the heavens, but we tolerate its ray with our eyes by the tempering of the portion which from there is extended to the earth.

[4] hic ex diverso volet aliquis etiam filium invsibilem contendere, ut sermonem, ut spiritum, et dum unam condicionem patris et filii vindicat unum potius atque eundem confirmare patrem et filium.

[4] Here, by contrast, someone will wish even to contend that the Son is invisible—inasmuch as he is Word, inasmuch as he is Spirit—and while he vindicates one condition of the Father and the Son, he rather confirms one and the same Father and Son.

[5] sed diximus scripturam differentiae patrocinari per visibilis et invisibilis distinctionem. nam et illud adiciunt ad argumentationem, quod si filius tunc ad Moysen loquebatur, ipse faciem suam nemini visibilem pronuntiaret, quia scilicet ipse invisibilis pater fuerit in filii nomine. ac per hoc sic eundem volunt accipi et visibilem et invisibilem, quomodo eundem patrem et filium, quoniam et paulo supra, antequam faciem Moysi negasset, scriptum sit dominum ad Moysen locutum coram velut si quis loquatur ad amicum suum, non minus quam et Iacob, Ego vidi, inquit, dominum facie ad faciem:

[5] but we have said that Scripture sponsors the difference through the distinction of visible and invisible. For they also add this to the argumentation: that if the Son was then speaking to Moses, he himself would pronounce his face visible to no one, because, namely, he himself would have been the invisible Father in the name of the Son. And therefore they want the same one to be received as both visible and invisible, just as the same one as Father and Son, since also a little above, before he had denied his face to Moses, it is written that the Lord spoke to Moses before him, as if someone speaks to his friend, no less than Jacob also, “I have seen,” he says, “the Lord face to face.”

[6] ergo visibilis et invisibilis idem: et quia idem utrumque, ideo et ipse pater invisibilis, qua et filius, visibilis. quasi non expositio scripturae quae fit a nobis filio competat, patre seposito, in sua visibilitate. dicimus enim . et filium suo nomine eatenus invisibilem, qua sermo et spiritus dei, ex substantiae condicione iam nunc, [et qua deus et sermo et spiritus dei] visibilem autem fuisse ante carnem eo modo quo dicit ad Aaron et Mariam, Etsi fuerit prophetes in vobis, in visione cognoscar illi et in somnio loquar illi, non quomodo Moysi os ad os loquar illi in specie (id est in veritate) et non in aenigmate (id est non in imagine): sicut et apostolus, Nunc videmus tanquam per speculum in aenigmate, tunc autem facie ad faciem.

[6] therefore the visible and the invisible are the same: and because both are the same, therefore the Father himself, inasmuch as he is invisible, is, inasmuch as also the Son, visible. as though the exposition of Scripture which is made by us should not pertain to the Son, the Father being set aside, in his own visibility. we say, in fact . and the Son, in his own name, to be invisible to this extent, inasmuch as the Word and the Spirit of God, by the condition of substance even now, [and inasmuch as God and the Word and the Spirit of God] but that he was visible before the flesh in the manner in which he says to Aaron and Miriam, If there shall have been a prophet among you, in a vision I shall be known to him and in a dream I shall speak to him, not as to Moses: mouth to mouth I shall speak to him, in form (that is, in truth) and not in an enigma (that is, not in an image): just as also the Apostle, Now we see as if through a mirror, in an enigma, but then face to face.

[7] igitur cum Moysi servat conspectum suum et colloquium facie ad faciem in futurum (nam hoc postea adimpletum est in montis secessu, sicut legimus in evangelio visoni cum illo Moysen colloquentem), apparet retro semper in speculo et aenigmate et visione et somnio deum (id est filium dei) visum tam prophetis et patriarchis quam et ipsi adhuc Moysi:

[7] therefore, since he preserves for Moses his sight and colloquy face to face for the future (for this was afterwards fulfilled in the secession of the mountain, as we read in the Gospel, in the vision, Moses conversing with him), it appears that previously, always in a mirror and enigma and vision and dream, God (that is, the Son of God) was seen both by the prophets and the patriarchs and even by Moses himself as yet:

[8] et ipse quidem dominus si forte coram ad faciem loquebatur, non tamen ut est homo faciem eius videret, nisi forte in speculo et in aenigmate. denique si sic Moysi locutus est dominus ut et Moyses faciem eius cominus sciret, quomodo statim atque ibidem desiderat faciem eius videre, quam quia viderat non desideraret? quomodo aeque et dominus negat videri faciem suam posse, quam ostenderat, si tamen ostenderat?

[8] and the Lord himself indeed, if by chance he was speaking face to face in person, yet not in such a way that, as a human, one might see his face—unless perhaps in a mirror and in an enigma. Finally, if the Lord spoke thus to Moses that Moses too knew his face at close quarters, how is it that immediately and on the spot he desires to see his face, which, because he had seen it, he would not desire? How likewise does the Lord also deny that his own face can be seen, which he had shown, if indeed he had shown it?

aut quae est facies dei cuius conspectus negatur? si erat quae visa est—Vidi, inquit Iacob, deum facie ad faciem et salva facta est anima mea—alia debet esse facies quae si videatur occidit.

or what is the face of God, the sight of which is denied? If there was that which was seen—“I have seen God face to face,” says Jacob, “and my soul has been made safe”—there must be another face which, if it be seen, kills.

[9] aut numquid filius quidem videbatur— etsi facie, sed ipsum hoc in visione et somnio et speculo et aenigmate, quia sermo et spiritus nisi imaginaria forma videri non potest—faciem autem suam dicit invisibilem patrem? quis enim pater? num facies erit filii, nomine auctoritatis quam genitus a patre consequitur?

[9] Or was it perhaps the Son who was seen—even if as to face, yet this very thing in vision and dream and mirror and enigma, since the word and the spirit cannot be seen except in an imaginary form—while he says that his face is the invisible Father? For what father? Surely not the face of the Son, under the name of the authority which the Begotten obtains from the Father?

non enim et de aliqua maiore persona congruit dicere, Facies mea est ille homo, et, Faciem mihi praestat?

for it is not even congruent to say, of any greater person, My Face is that man, and, He affords me a Face?

[10] Pater, inquit, maior me est: ergo facies erit filii pater. nam et scriptura quid dicit? Spiritus personae eius Christus dominus.

[10] “The Father,” he says, “is greater than I”: therefore the face of the Son will be the Father. For what does Scripture say? The Spirit of his person is Christ the Lord.

ergo si Christus personae paternae spiritus est, merito spiritus cuius persona erat, id est patris eius, faciem suam ex unitate scilicet pronuntiavit. mira res plane an facies filii pater accipi possit qui est caput eius: caput enim Christi deus.

therefore, if Christ is the Spirit of the paternal person, with good reason the Spirit—whose person he was, that is, of his Father—pronounced his own face, namely from unity. a wondrous thing indeed, whether the face of the Son can be taken as the Father, who is his head: for the head of Christ is God.

CAPUT 15.

CHAPTER 15.

[1] Si hunc articulum quaestionibus scripturae veteris non expediam, de novo testamento sumam confirmationem nostrae interpretationis, ne, quodcunque in filium reputo in patrem proinde defendas. ecce enim et in evangeliis et in apostolis visibilem et invisibilem deum deprehendo sub manifesta et personali distinctione condicionis utriusque.

[1] If I do not disentangle this article by inquiries of the Old Scripture, I will take a confirmation of our interpretation from the New Testament, lest you in like manner defend in the Father whatever I reckon in the Son. For behold, both in the Gospels and in the Apostles I detect a visible and an invisible God under a manifest and personal distinction of the condition of each.

[2] exclamat quodammodo Ioannes, Deum nemo vidit unquam: utique nec retro: ademit enim temporis quaestionem dicendo deum nunquam visum. confirmat et apostolus de deo Quem nemo vidit hominum, sed nec videri potest: scilicet quia morietur qui videbit. idem ipsi apostoli et vidisse se Christum et contrectasse testantur.

[2] John, as it were, cries out, "No one has ever seen God": assuredly not in former times either; for he has removed the question of time by saying that God has never been seen. The Apostle also confirms concerning God, "Whom none of men has seen, nor indeed can see": plainly because he who will see will die. The very same apostles testify that they both saw and handled Christ.

[3] porro si ipse est Christus et pater et filius, quomodo et visus est et invisus? ad hanc diversitatem visi et invisi in unum conferendam qui ex diverso nobis argumentabitur recte utrumque dictum, visibilem quidem in carne, invisibilem vero ante carnem, ut idem sit pater invisibilis ante carnem qui et filius visibilis in carne.

[3] moreover, if he himself is Christ and father and son, how was he both seen and unseen? for reconciling this diversity of seen and unseen into one, someone, from a different standpoint, will argue to us that both were rightly said: visible indeed in flesh, but invisible before flesh, so that the same is the father invisible before flesh, who also is the son visible in flesh.

[4] atquin si idem ante carnem invisibilis, quomodo visus etiam retro invenitur ante carnem? aeque si idem post carnem visibilis, quomodo et nunc invisibilis pronuntiatur ab apostolis, nisi quia alias quem et retro visum in aenigmate plenius visibilem caro effecit, sermo scilicet qui et caro factus est, alius quem nunquam quisquam vidit, [nisi] pater scilicet cuius est sermo?

[4] but indeed, if the same one is invisible before the flesh, how is he found also to have been seen back then before the flesh? likewise, if the same one is visible after the flesh, how is he also now pronounced invisible by the apostles, unless because the one who even back then was seen in an enigma the flesh has rendered more fully visible—the Word, namely, who also was made flesh—while the other, whom no one has ever seen, [unless] the Father, namely, whose is the Word?

[5] denique inspiciamus quem apostoli viderint. Quod vidimus, inquit Ioannes, quod audivimus, oculis nostris vidimus, et manus nostrae contrectaverunt de sermone vitae. sermo enim vitae caro factus, et auditus et visus et contrectatus quia caro, qui ante carnem sermo tantum in primordio apud deum patrem, non pater apud semetipsum.

[5] finally, let us inspect whom the apostles saw. “What we have seen,” says John, “what we have heard, we have seen with our eyes, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life.” for the Word of life, made flesh, was both heard and seen and handled because [he was] flesh, whereas before the flesh the Word was only [the Word], in the beginning with God the Father, not the Father with himself.

nam etsi deus sermo, sed apud deum, quia ex deo deus, quia cum patre apud patrem.

for although the Word is God, yet he is with God, because he is God from God, because, with the Father, he is with the Father.

[6] Et vidimus gloriam eius tanquam unigeniti a patre, utique filii scilicet visibilis, glorificati a patre invisibili. et ideo, quoniam sermonem dei deum dixerat, ne adiuvaret adversariorum praesumptionem quasi patrem ipsum vidisset, ad distinguendum inter invisibilem patrem et filium visibilem superdicit ex abundanti, Deum nemo vidit unquam. quem deum?

[6] And we saw his glory as of the Only-Begotten from the Father, namely of the visible Son, glorified by the invisible Father. And therefore, since he had called the Word of God “God,” lest he should aid the adversaries’ presumption as though he had seen the Father himself, in order to distinguish between the invisible Father and the visible Son he furthermore adds, over and above, “No one has ever seen God.” Which God?

sermonem? atquin, Vidimus et audivimus et contrectavimus de sermone vitae, praedictum est. sed quem deum?

the sermon? And yet, “We have seen and we have heard and we have handled concerning the sermon of life,” it has been said beforehand. But which God?

scilicet patrem, apud quem deus erat sermo unigenitus filius, qui sinum patris ipse disseruit.

namely the Father, with whom the Sermon was God, the only-begotten Son, who himself expounded the bosom of the Father.

[7] ipse et auditus et visus, et ne phantasma crederetur etiam contrectatus. hunc et Paulus conspexit, nec tamen patrem vidit: Nonne, inquit, vidi Iesum? Christum autem et ipse deum cognominavit: Quorum patres, et ex quibus Christus secundum carnem, qui est super omnia deus, benedictus in aevum.

[7] he himself both heard and seen, and, lest he be believed a phantasm, even handled. Him also Paul beheld, yet he did not see the Father: “Did I not see Jesus?” Moreover he himself styled Christ as god: “Whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God, blessed unto the age.”

ostendit et ipse visibilem dei filium, id est sermonem dei, quia qui caro factus est Christus dictus est.

he himself also showed the visible Son of God, that is, the sermon of God, because he who was made flesh was called Christ.

[8] de patre autem ad Timotheum: Quem nemo vidit hominum, sed nec videre potest; exaggerans amplius: Qui solus habet immortalitatem et lucem habitat inaccessibilem ; de quo et supra dixerat: Regi autem saeculorum immortali invisibili soli deo; ut et contraria ipsi filio adscriberemus, mortalitatem accessibilitatem. quem mortuum contestatur secundum scripturas et a se novissime visum, per accessibilem utique lucem: quanquam et illam neque ipse sine periculo luminis expertus est, neque Petrus et Ioannes et Iacobus sine rationis et amentia, qui si non passuri filii gloriam sed patrem vidissent credo morituri ibidem: deum enim nemo videbit et vivet.

[8] but about the Father, to Timothy: Whom none of men has seen, nor indeed can see; heightening it further: Who alone has immortality and inhabits inaccessible light; about whom also above he had said: Now to the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only god; so that we would also ascribe to the Son himself the contraries, mortality and accessibility—him whom he attests to have died according to the Scriptures and to have been seen by himself most recently, through an accessible light assuredly: although neither he himself experienced that light without peril of the light, nor Peter and John and James without unreason and madness—who, if they had seen not the glory of the Son destined to suffer but the Father, I believe about to die there on the spot: for no one will see God and live.

[9] si haec ita sunt, constat eum semper visum ab initio qui visus fuerit in fine, et eum nec in fine visum qui nec ab initio fuit visus, et ita duos esse, visum et invisum. filius ergo visus est semper et filius conversatus est semper et filius operatus est semper, ex auctoritate patris et voluntate, quia Filius nihil a semetipso potest facere nisi viderit patrem facientem - in sensu scilicet facientem. pater enim sensu agit, filius vero quod in patris sensu est videns perficit.

[9] if these things are so, it is agreed that he has always been seen from the beginning who was seen at the end, and that he was not seen at the end who was not seen from the beginning, and thus that there are two, the seen and the unseen. therefore the Son has always been seen and the Son has always conversed and the Son has always operated, by the authority and will of the Father, because “the Son can do nothing of himself unless he sees the Father doing” - doing, namely, in intention. for the Father acts in intention, but the Son, seeing what is in the Father’s intention, brings it to perfection.

sic omnia per filium facta sunt et sine illo factum est nihil.

thus all things were made through the Son, and without him nothing was made.

CAPUT 16.

CHAPTER 16.

[1] Nec putes sola opera mundi per filium facta sed et quae a deo exinde gesta sunt. pater enim qui diligit filium et omnia tradidit in sinu eius, utique a primordio diligit et a primordio tradidit. ex quo a primordio sermo erat apud deum et deus erat sermo, cui data est omnis potestas a patre in caelis et in terra, non iudicat pater quemquam sed omne iudicium tradidit filio, a primordio tamen:

[1] Nor should you think that the works of the world alone were made through the Son, but also the things which God has accomplished thereafter. For the father who loves the son and has delivered all things into his bosom assuredly from the beginning loves, and from the beginning delivered. Since from the beginning the word was with God, and the word was God—to whom all power has been given by the father in the heavens and on the earth—the father judges no one, but has handed all judgment over to the son—from the beginning, however:

[2] omnem enim dicens potestatem, et omne iudicium, et omnia per eum facta, et omnia tradita in manu eius, nullam exceptionem temporis permittit, quia omnia non erunt si non omnis temporis fuerint. filius itaque est qui ab initio iudicavit, turrem superbissimam elidens linguasque disperdens, orbem totum aquarum violentia puniens, pluens super Sodomam et Gomorram ignem et sulphurem dominus a domino.

[2] For in saying all power, and all judgment, and that all things were made through him, and that all things were delivered into his hand, he allows no exception of time, because they will not be “all things” if they have not been of all time. Therefore it is the Son who from the beginning judged, striking down the most proud tower and scattering the tongues, punishing the whole world by the violence of waters, raining upon Sodom and Gomorrah fire and sulfur, the Lord from the Lord.

[3] ipse enim et ad humana semper colloquia descendit, ab Adam usque ad patriarchas et prophetas, in visione in somnio in speculo in aenigmate ordinem suum praestruens ab initio semper quem erat persecuturus in finem. ita semper ediscebat et deus in terris cum hominibus conversari, non alius quam sermo qui caro erat futurus. ediscebat autem ut nobis fidem sterneret, ut facilius crederemus filium dei descendisse in saeculum et retro tale quid gestum cognosceremus.

[3] for he himself also always descended to human colloquies, from Adam even to the patriarchs and prophets, in vision, in dream, in mirror, in enigma, pre-structuring his own order from the beginning, that which he was going to pursue unto the end. Thus God too was always learning to converse on earth with human beings, none other than the Word who was going to be flesh. He was learning, moreover, in order to strew for us a foundation of faith, that we might more easily believe that the Son of God had descended into the age, even back then we should recognize that such a thing had been done before.

[4] propter nos enim sicut scripta sunt ita et gesta sunt in quos aevorum fines decucurrerunt. sic etiam adfectus humanos sciebat iam tunc, suscepturus etiam ipsas substantias hominis carnem et animam, interrogans Adam quasi nesciens, Ubi es, Adam? paenitens quod hominem fecisset quasi non praesciens, temptans Abraham quasi ignorans quid sit in homine, offensus reconciliatus eisdem, et si qua haeretici adprehendunt quasi deo indigna ad destructionem creatoris, ignorantes haec in filium competisse qui etiam passiones humanas et sitim et esuriem et lacrimas et ipsam nativitatem ipsamque mortem erat subiturus, propter hoc minoratus a patre modicum citra angelos.

[4] for on account of us, as they were written, so too were they enacted, upon whom the ends of the ages have run their course. thus also he already then knew human affections, being about to assume even the very substances of man, flesh and soul, asking Adam as if not knowing, Where are you, Adam? repenting that he had made man as if not foreknowing, testing Abraham as if ignorant what is in man, being offended and reconciled to the same ones; and whatever things the heretics seize as if unworthy for God for the destruction of the Creator, not knowing that these befitted the Son, who also was going to undergo human passions—both thirst and hunger and tears—and the nativity itself and death itself, on account of this made lesser by the Father a little short of the angels.

[5] sed haeretici quidem nec filio dei deputabunt convenire quae tu ipsi patri inducis quasi ipse se deminoraverit propter nos, cum scriptura alium dicat ab alio minoratum, non ipsum a semetipso. quid si et alius qui coronabatur gloriam et honorem, alius qui coronabat, utique filium pater?

[5] but the heretics indeed will not even assign as fitting to the Son of God the things which you yourself impute to the Father himself, as if he had diminished himself on our account, whereas Scripture says that one was diminished by another, not he by himself. What if also one was being crowned with glory and honor, another was crowning—of course the Son by the Father?

[6] ceterum quale est ut deus omnipotens ille invisibilis quem nemo vidit hominum nec videre potest, ille qui inaccessibilem lucem habitat, ille qui non habitat in manu factis, a cuius conspectu terra contremiscit montes liquescunt ut cera, qui totum orbem manu adprehendit velut nidum, cui caelum thronus et terra scabellum, in quo omnis locus, non ipse in loco, qui universitatis extrema linea est, ille altissimus, in paradiso ad vesperam deambulaverit quaerens Adam, et arcam post introitum Noe clauserit, et apud Abraham sub quercu refrigeraverit, et Moysen de rubo ardenti vocarit, et in fornace Babylonii regis quartus apparuerit—quanquam filius hominis est dictus? +et in imagine et speculo et aenigmate+ scilicet et haec nec de filio dei credenda fuissent si scripta non essent, fortasse non credenda de patre licet scripta, quem isti in vulvam Mariae deducunt et in Pilati tribunal imponunt et in monumento Ioseph reconcludunt.

[6] but how is it that that almighty God, that invisible one whom none of humankind has seen nor can see, he who inhabits unapproachable light, he who does not dwell in hand-made things, at whose sight the earth trembles and the mountains melt like wax, who grasps the whole orb in his hand like a nest, for whom heaven is a throne and earth a footstool, in whom is every place, not he in a place, who is the outermost boundary of the universe, that Most High, has strolled in paradise toward evening seeking Adam, and has shut the ark after Noah’s entry, and has taken refreshment with Abraham under the oak, and has called Moses from the burning bush, and in the furnace of the king of Babylon has appeared as a fourth—although he was called “son of man”? +and in image and mirror and enigma+ to wit, and not even these would have been believed of the Son of God if they had not been written, perhaps not to be believed of the Father, though written—him whom those men lead down into the womb of Mary and place upon Pilate’s tribunal and lock back up in Joseph’s tomb.

[7] hinc igitur apparet error illorum. ignorantes enim a primordio omnem ordinem divinae dispositionis per filium decucurrisse, ipsum credunt patrem et visum et congressum et operatum, et sitim et esuriem passum, adversus prophetam dicentem, Deus aeternus non sitiet nec esuriet omnino - quanto magis nec morietur nec sepelietur—et ita unum deum semper egisse, id est patrem, quae per filium gesta sunt. filium in patris, dicente ipso domino, Ego veni in patris mei nomine; item ad ipsum patrem, Nomen tuum manifestavi hominibus; condicente etiam scriptura, Benedictus qui venit in nomine domini—utique filius in patris nomine.

[7] Hence, therefore, their error appears. For, being ignorant that from the primordium the whole order of the divine dispensation has run its course through the Son, they believe that the Father himself has both been seen and encountered and has operated, and has suffered thirst and hunger, contrary to the prophet saying, “The eternal God will not thirst nor hunger at all - how much more will he neither die nor be buried—”; and thus that the one God, that is, the Father, has always done the things which were accomplished through the Son. The Son in the Father’s name, with the Lord himself saying, ‘I have come in my Father’s name;’ likewise to the Father himself, ‘I have made your Name manifest to men;’ with Scripture also declaring, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’—to wit, the Son in the Father’s name.

[2] et nomen patris Deus omnipotens, Altissimus, Dominus virtutum, Rex Israelis, Qui est. quatenus ita scripturae docent, haec dicimus et in filium compatisse, et in his filium venisse et in his semper egisse et sic ea in se hominibus manifestasse.

[2] and the name of the Father: God Almighty, the Most High, Lord of Hosts, King of Israel, He Who Is. Insofar as the Scriptures teach thus, we say that these have also been shared with the Son, and that in these the Son has come, and in these he has always acted, and thus has made them manifest in himself to men.

[3] Omnia, inquit, patris mea sunt: cur non et nomina? cum ergo legis Deum omnipotentem et Altissimum et Deum virtutum et Regem Israelis et Qui est, vide ne per haec filius etiam demonstretur suo iure Deus qua sermo Dei omnipotentis quaque omnium accepit potestatem, Altissimus qua dextera dei exaltatus sicut Petrus in Actis contionatur, Dominus virtutum quia omnia subiecta sunt illi a patre, Rex Israelis quia illi proprie excidit sors gentis istius, item Qui est quoniam multi filii dicuntur et non sunt.

[3] "All," he says, "that are the Father’s are mine: why not the names as well?" Therefore, when you read God Omnipotent and the Most High and God of powers and King of Israel and He Who Is, see whether through these the Son also is shown, in his own right, to be God , in that he is the Word of God Omnipotent and in that he has received authority over all; the Most High, in that he has been exalted to the right hand of God, as Peter declares in the Acts; Lord of powers, because all things have been subjected to him by the Father; King of Israel, because the lot of that nation has properly fallen to him; likewise He Who Is, since many are called sons and are not.

[4] si autem volunt et Christi nomen patris esse, audient suo loco. interim hic mihi promptum sit responsum adversus id quod et de Apocalypsi Ioannis proferunt, Ego dominus qui est et qui fuit et venit, omnipotens, et sicubi alibi dei omnipotentis appellationem non putant etiam filio convenire: quasi qui venturus sit omnipotens, cum et filius omnipotentis tam omnipotens sit quam deus dei filius.

[4] But if they want even the name of Christ to be the Father’s, they will hear in its proper place. Meanwhile let there be here for me a ready reply against that which they also bring forward from the Apocalypse of John, “I am the Lord who is and who was and who comes, the Almighty,” and if anywhere else they do not think the appellation of God Almighty to be fitting also to the Son: as though he who is to come almighty, since the Son of the Almighty is just as almighty as God, the Son of God.

CAPUT 18.

CHAPTER 18.

[1] Sed hanc societatem nominum paternorum in filio ne facile perspiciant perturbat illos scriptura si quando unicum deum statuit, quasi non eadem et deos et dominos duos proposuerit, ut supra ostendimus. ergo quia duos et unum, inquiunt, invenimus, ideo ambo unus, atque idem et filius et pater.

[1] But this society of paternal names in the Son they do not easily perceive: Scripture perturbs them whenever it establishes a single God, as though the same had not set forth both gods and two lords, as we showed above. Therefore, because, they say, we find both two and one, for that reason both are one, and the same both Son and Father.

[2] porro non periclitatur scriptura ut illi de tua argumentatione succurras ne sibi contraria videatur: habet rationem et cum unicum deum statuit et cum duos patrem et filium ostendit, et sufficit sibi. filium nominari ab ea constat: salvo enim filio recte unicum deum potest determinasse cuius est filius. non enim desinit esse qui habet filium ipse unicus, suo scilicet nomine quotiens sine filio nominatur.

[2] moreover, Scripture is not in peril that you should run to its aid with your argumentation, lest it seem contrary to itself: it has reason both when it establishes a single God and when it shows two, Father and Son, and it suffices for itself. it is evident that the Son is named by it: for, with the Son intact, it could rightly have determined the one and only God, of whom he is Son. for he who has a Son does not cease to be himself the unique one, namely by his own name whenever he is named without the Son.

sine filio autem nominatur cum principaliter determinatur ut prima persona, quae ante filii nomen erat proponenda, quia pater ante cognoscitur et post patrem filius nominatur.

but he is named without the Son when he is primarily determined as the first person, who was to be set forth before the Son’s name, because the Father is known first, and after the Father the Son is named.

[3] igitur unus deus pater, et absque eo alius non est: quod ipse inferens non filium negat sed alium deum: ceterum alius a patre filius non est. denique inspice sequentia huiusmodi pronuntiationum, et invenies fere ad idolorum factitatores atque cultores definitionem earum pertinere ut multitudinem falsorum deorum unio divinitatis expellat, habens tamen filium, quanto individuum et inseparatum a patre, tanto in patre reputandum etsi non nominatum.

[3] therefore one God the Father, and apart from him there is no other: when he himself asserts this, he does not deny the Son but another god; moreover, the Son is not “another” than the Father. finally, inspect the sequents of pronouncements of this kind, and you will find that their definition pertains almost always to the makers and worshipers of idols, so that the unity of divinity may drive out the multitude of false gods—yet having the Son, inasmuch as he is individual and inseparable from the Father, therefore to be reckoned in the Father even if not named.

[4] atquin si nominasset illum separasset, ita dicens, Alius praeter me non est visi filius meus: alium enim etiam filium fecisset quem de aliis excepisset. puta solem dicere, Ego sol, et alius praeter me non est nisi radius meus: nonne denotasses vanitatem, quasi non et radius in sole deputetur? itaque praeter semetipsum non esse alium deum, hoc propter idololatriam tam nationum quam Israelis: etiam propter haereticos, qui sicut nationes manibus ita et ipsi verbis idola fabricantur, id est alium deum et alium Christum.

[4] But indeed, if he had named him, he would have separated him, thus saying, "There is no other besides me except my son"; for he would have made even the son another, whom he had excepted from the others. Suppose the sun to say, "I am the sun, and there is no other besides me except my ray": would you not have denoted vanity, as if the ray too were not accounted in the sun? And so that there is no other god besides himself is on account of the idololatry both of the nations and of Israel; also on account of the heretics, who, just as the nations with their hands, so they themselves with words fabricate idols—that is, another god and another Christ.

[5] igitur et cum se unum pronuntiabat filio pater procurabat, ne ab alio deo Christus venisse credatur sed ab illo qui praedixerat, Ego deus et alius absque me non est, qui se unicum sed cum filio ostendit cum quo caelum solus extendit.

[5] therefore even when he was pronouncing himself one, the Father was procuring on behalf of the Son, lest Christ be believed to have come from another god, but from the one who had foretold, "I am God and there is no other apart from me," who showed himself unique, yet with the Son, with whom he alone stretched out heaven.

CAPUT 19.

CHAPTER 19.

[1] Quin et hoc dictum eius in argumentum singularitatis arripient: Extendi, inquit, caelum solus: quantum ad ceteras virtutes, solus, praestruens adversus coniecturas haereticorum, qui mundum ab angelis et potestatibus diversis volunt structum, qui et ipsum creatorem aut angelum faciunt aut ad alia quae extrinsecus, ut opera mundi, ignorantem quoque subornatum.

[1] Nay rather, they will even snatch up this saying of his as an argument for singularity: “I extended,” he says, “the heaven alone”: as regards the other powers, alone, pre-structuring against the conjectures of the heretics, who want the world to have been structured by angels and diverse powers, who also make the Creator himself either an angel, or as ignorant—and even suborned—with regard to other things that are external, such as the works of the world.

[2] aut si sic solus caelum extendit, quomodo isti praesumunt in perversum haeretici quasi singularis non admittatur sophia illa dicens, Cum pararet caelum ego aderam illi? et si dixit, Quis cognovit sensum domini et quis illi consilio fuit? utique praeter sophiam ait quae illi aderat.

[2] or if he thus alone stretched out the heaven, how do these heretics presume perversely, as though that singular Sophia who says, “When he was preparing the heaven, I was present with him,” were not admitted? And if he said, “Who has known the sense of the Lord, and who has been his counselor?” surely he says it with the exception of Sophia, who was with him.

in ipso tamen et cum illo universa compingebat non ignorante quid faceret. Praeter sophiam autem Praeter filium dicit, qui est Christus sophia et virtus dei, secundum apostolum, solus sciens sensum patris: quis enim scit quae sunt in deo nisi spiritus qui in ipso est?—non qui extra ipsum. erat ergo qui non solum deum faceret, nisi a ceteris solum.

yet in him and with him he was compacting the universe, he not being ignorant of what he was doing. But “besides sophia,” that is, besides the Son, he says, who is Christ, the sophia and power of God, according to the apostle, alone knowing the sense of the Father: for who knows the things that are in God except the Spirit who is in him?—not one who is outside him. There was therefore someone, so that God should not be acting “alone,” except as “alone” apart from the rest.

[3] sed et evangelium recusetur quod dicat omnia per sermonem a deo facta esse et sine eo nihil factum. nisi enim fallor et alibi scriptum est: Sermone eius caeli firmati sunt, et spiritu eius omnes virtutes eorum. et sermo autem, virtus et sophia, ipse erit dei filius.

[3] but let even the Gospel be refused which says that all things were made through the Sermon by God, and that without him nothing was made. for unless I am mistaken, it is written elsewhere too: By His Sermon the heavens were made firm, and by His Spirit all their powers. and the Sermon, moreover—Power and sophia—he himself will be the Son of God.

[4] ita si per filium omnia, caelum quoque per filium extendens non solus extendit, nisi illa ratione qua a ceteris solus. atque adeo statim de filio loquitur: Quis alius deiecit signa ventriloquorum et divinationes a corde, avertens sapientes retrorsum et consilium eorum infatuans, sistens verba filii sui?—dicendo scilicet, Hic est filius meus dilectus, hunc audite.

[4] thus, if through the Son all things [were made], then, in extending the heaven too through the Son, he did not extend it alone, except in that respect in which he is alone in relation to the rest. and indeed he immediately speaks about the Son: “Who else cast down the signs of the ventriloquists and the divinations from the heart, turning the wise backward and infatuating their counsel, establishing the words of his Son?”—namely by saying, “This is my beloved Son, hear him.”

[5] ita filium subiungens ipse interpretator est quomodo caelum solus extenderit, scilicet cum filio solus, sicut cum filio unum. proinde et filii erit vox, Extendi caelum solus, quia sermone caeli confirmati sunt. quia sophia in sermone adsistente paratum est caelum, et omnia per sermonem sunt facta, competit et filium solum extendisse caelum quia solus operationi patris ministravit.

[5] thus, by subjoining the Son, he himself is the interpreter of how he extended heaven alone—namely, alone with the Son, just as with the Son one. Accordingly the voice will also be the Son’s, I extended heaven alone, because by the sermon the heavens have been confirmed. Because with Sophia assisting in the sermon the heaven was prepared, and all things were made through the sermon, it is congruent also that the Son alone extended heaven, because he alone ministered to the operation of the Father.

[6] idem erit dicens, Ego primus, et in superventura ego sum, primum scilicet omnium sermo: In principio erat sermo, in quo principio prolatus a patre est. ceterum pater, non habens initium, ut a nullo prolatus, ut innatus, non potest videri: qui solus fuit semper, ordinem habere non potuit.

[6] the same will be the one saying, I am first, and in what is to come I am, namely the Word first of all: In the beginning was the Word, in which beginning he was uttered by the Father. moreover the Father, not having a beginning, as brought forth by no one, as unbegotten, cannot be deemed: he who alone has always been could not have order.

[7] igitur si propterea eundem et patrem et filium credendum putaverunt ut unum deum vindicent, salva est unio eius qui, cum sit unus habet et filium, aeque et ipsum eisdem scripturis comprehensum. si filium nolunt secundum a patre reputari ne secundus duos faciat deos dici, ostendimus etiam duos deos in scriptura relatos et duos dominos:

[7] therefore, if for that reason they have thought that the same one must be believed both Father and Son, in order to vindicate one God, the union is safe of him who, although he is one, also has a Son—and that Son likewise is comprehended in the same Scriptures. if they are unwilling that the Son be reckoned second after the Father, lest the second make it that two gods be said, we have shown also two gods related in Scripture and two lords:

[8] et tamen ne de isto scandalizentur, rationem reddimus qua dei non duo dicantur nec domini sed qua pater et filius duo, et hoc non ex separatione substantiae sed ex dispositione, cum individuum et inseparatum filium a patre pronuntiamus, nec statu sed gradu alium, qui etsi deus dicatur quando nominatur singularis, non ideo duos deos faciat sed unum, hoc ipso quod et deus ex unitate patris vocari habeat.

[8] and yet, lest they be scandalized about this, we render a reason whereby gods are not said to be two, nor lords, but whereby the Father and the Son are two; and this not from a separation of substance but from a disposition, since we pronounce the Son to be individual and inseparate from the Father, another not in status but in grade, who, although he is called God when he is named singularly, does not for that reason make two gods but one, by this very fact that he also is to be called God from the unity of the Father.

CAPUT 20.

CHAPTER 20.

[1] Sed argumentationibus eorum adhuc retundendis opera praebenda est si quid de scripturis ad sententiam suam excerpent, cetera nolentes intueri quae et ipsa regulam servant, et quidem salva unione divinitatis et monarchiae sonitu. nam sicut in veteribus nihil aliud tenent quam, Ego deus et alias praeter me non est, ita in evangelio responsionem domini ad Philippum tuentur, Ego et pater unum sumus, et Qui me viderit vidit et patrem, et Ego in patre et pater in me.

[1] But effort must still be offered to blunt their argumentations, if they excerpt anything from the Scriptures for their opinion, unwilling to look at the rest which themselves also keep the rule, and indeed with the sound of the union of the divinity and of the monarchy kept safe. For just as in the Old [Scriptures] they hold nothing else than, "I am God, and besides me there is no other," so in the Gospel they uphold the Lord’s response to Philip, "I and the Father are one," and "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father," and "I in the Father and the Father in me."

[2] his tribus capitulis totum instrumentum utriusque testamenti volant cedere, cum oporteat secundum plura intellegi pauciora.

[2] by these three chapters they want the whole instrument of both Testaments to yield, whereas it ought that the fewer be understood according to the more.

[3] sed proprium hoc est omnium haereticorum. nam quia pauca sunt quae in silva inveniri possunt, pauca adversus plura defendunt et posteriora adversus priora suscipiunt. regula autem omni rei semper ab initio constituta in prioribus et in posteriora praescribit, utique et in paucioribus.

[3] but this is the proper trait of all heretics. For because few are the things that can be found in the forest, they defend the few against the many and take up the posterior against the prior. But the rule of every matter, always from the beginning constituted, both stands in the priors and prescribes for the posteriors—assuredly also in the fewer.

CAPUT 21.

CHAPTER 21.

[1] Aspice itaque quanta praescribant tibi etiam in evangelio ante Philippi consultationem et ante omnem argumentationem tuam. et in primis ipsa statim praefatio Ioannis evangelizatoris demonstrat quid retro fuerit qui caro fieri habebat: In principio erat sermo et sermo erat apud deum et deus erat sermo ; hic erat in principio apud deum; omnia per ipsum facta sunt et sine ipso factum est nihil.

[1] Therefore look how much they prescribe to you even in the gospel, before Philip’s consultation and before all your argumentation. And in the first place the preface itself at once of John the evangelist shows what he who was going to become flesh had previously been: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God ; this one was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him nothing was made.

[2] nam si haec non aliter accipi licet quam quomodo scripta sunt, indubitanter alias ostenditur qui fuerit a principio, alias apud quem fuit: alium sermonem dei, alium deum—licet et deus sermo, sed qua dei filius non qua pater—alium per quem omnia, alium a quo omnia.

[2] For if these things may not be received otherwise than as they are written, it is indubitable that one is shown who was from the beginning, another with whom he was: another the Word of God, another God—granted also that the Word is God, but as Son of God, not as Father—one through whom are all things, another from whom are all things.

[3] alium autem quomodo dicamus saepe iam edidimus. quo alium dicamus, necesse est non eundem autem non quasi separatum, dispositione alium non divisione. hic ergo factus est caro, non ipse cuius erat sermo.

[3] but how we say “another” we have often already set forth. In what sense we say “another,” it must be “not the same” however not as if separated, other by disposition, not by division. He therefore was made flesh, not the very one of whom the Word was.

huius gloria visa est tanquam unici a patre, non tanquam patris. hic unicus sinum patris disseruit, non sinum suum pater: praecedit enim, Deum nemo vidit unquam.

his glory was seen as that of the Only-begotten from the Father, not as that of the Father. This Only-begotten expounded the bosom of the Father, not the Father his own bosom; for it is preceded, “No one has ever seen God.”

[4] inde et si agnus dei ab Ioanne designatur, non ipse cuius est dilectus. certe filius dei semper, sed non ipse cuius est filius. hoc eum Nathanael statim sensit, sicut et alibi Petrus: Tu es filius dei.

[4] hence also, if the Lamb of God is designated by John, not he himself of whom he is the beloved. Certainly always the Son of God, but not the very one of whom he is the Son. This Nathanael immediately sensed, just as elsewhere Peter: You are the Son of God.

hoc et ipse recte sensisse illos confirmat, Nathanaeli quidem respondens, Quia dixi Vidi te sub ficu, ideo credis; Petram vero beatum adfirmans cui non caro neque sanguis revelasset quod et patrem senserat, sed pater qui in caelis est.

This too he himself confirms, that they had rightly perceived it, answering Nathanael indeed, “Because I said ‘I saw you under the fig tree,’ therefore you believe;” but declaring Peter blessed, to whom neither flesh nor blood had revealed it—he had perceived the Revealer to be the Father—but the Father who is in the heavens.

[5] quo dicto utriusque personae constituit distinctionem, et filii in terris, quem Petrus agnoverat dei filium, et patris qui in caelis, qui Petro revelaverat quod Petrus agnoverat, dei filium Christum.

[5] by this statement he established the distinction of each person, both of the Son on earth, whom Peter had recognized as the Son of God, and of the Father who is in the heavens, who had revealed to Peter what Peter had recognized—Christ, the Son of God.

[6] cum in templum introiit, aedem patris appellat, ut filius. cum ad Nicodemum dicit, Ita, inquit, dilexit deus mundum ut filium suum unicum dederit, in quem omnis qui crediderit non pereat sed habeat vitam sempiternam: et rursus, Non enim misit deus filium suum in mundum ut iudicet mundum, sed ut salvus sit mundus per eum; qui crediderit in illum non iudicatur; qui non crediderit in illum iam iudicatus est, quia non credidit in nomine unici filii dei.

[6] when he entered into the temple, he calls it the Father’s temple, as son. when he says to Nicodemus, “Thus,” he says, “God loved the world so that he gave his only son, that everyone who has believed in him should not perish but should have sempiternal life:” and again, “For God did not send his son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through him; whoever has believed in him is not judged; whoever has not believed in him has already been judged, because he has not believed in the name of the only son of God.”

[7] Ioannes autem cum interrogaretur quid de Iesu cum tingeret, Pater, inquit, dilexit filium et omnia tradidit in manu eius; qui credidit in filium habet vitam aeternam; qui non credidit in filio dei non videbit deum sed ira dei manebit super eum.

[7] But John, when he was being asked about Jesus while he was baptizing, said, "The Father loved the Son and has delivered all things into his hand; he who has believed in the Son has eternal life; he who has not believed in the Son of God will not see God, but the wrath of God will abide upon him."

[8] quem vero Samaritidi ostendit? si Messiam qui dicitur Christus, filium utique se, non patrem, demonstravit, quia et alibi Christus dei filius, non pater, dictus est.

[8] But whom did he show to the Samaritan woman? If the Messiah, who is called Christ, he certainly demonstrated himself to be the Son, not the Father, because elsewhere too Christ is called the Son of God, not the Father.

[9] exinde discipulis, Meum est, inquit, ut faciam voluntatem eius qui me misit, ut consummem opus eius. et ad Iudaeos de paralytici sanitate, Pater meus usque modo operatur et ego operor: Pater et ego, filius dicit. denique propter hoc magis Iudaei illum interficere volebant, non tantum quod solveret sabbatum sed quod patrem suum deum diceret, aequans se deo.

[9] Thereupon, to the disciples, "It is mine," he says, "to do the will of him who sent me, that I may consummate his work." And to the Jews, concerning the healing of the paralytic: "My Father works until now, and I also work"; "the Father and I," the Son says. Finally, on account of this the Jews all the more wanted to kill him, not only because he was breaking the sabbath, but because he called God his own Father, equaling himself with God.

[10] tunc ergo dicebat ad eos, Nihil filius facere potest a semetipso nisi videat patrem facientem; quae enim ille facit eadem et filius facit: pater enim diligit filium, et omnia demonstravit illi quae ille fecit, et maiora istis opera demonstrabit illi, ut vos miremini; quomodo enim suscitat mortuos et vivificat, ita et filius quos vult vivificat. neque enim pater iudicat, sed omne iudicium dedit filio, uti omnes honorent filium sicut honorant patrem: qui non honorat filium, non honorat patrem qui filium misit.

[10] then therefore he was saying to them, The son can do nothing from himself unless he sees the father doing; for the things that that one does, the same also the son does: for the father loves the son, and has demonstrated to him all the things that he himself has done, and he will demonstrate to him works greater than these, so that you may marvel; for just as the raises the dead and vivifies, so also the son vivifies whom he wills. for neither does the father judge, but he has given all judgment to the son, so that all may honor the son just as they honor the father: he who does not honor the son does not honor the father who sent the son.

[11] amen amen dico vobis, quod qui audit sermones meos et credit ei qui me misit habet vitam aeternam, et in iudicium non veniet sed transit de morte in vitam.

[11] amen, amen I say to you, that whoever hears my sermons and believes him who sent me has eternal life, and will not come into judgment but passes from death into life.

[12] amen dico vobis, quod veniet bora qua mortui audient vocem filii dei et cum audierint vivent: sicut enim pater habet vitam aeternam a semetipso, ita et filio dedit vitam aeternam habere in semetipso, et iudicium dedit illi facere in potestate quia filius hominis est— per carnera scilicet, sicut et filius dei per spiritum eius.

[12] amen I say to you, that an hour will come in which the dead will hear the voice of the son of god, and when they have heard, they will live: for just as the father has eternal life from himself, so also he gave to the son to have eternal life in himself, and he gave to him to execute judgment in power, because he is the son of man— namely through the flesh, just as he is the son of god through his spirit.

[13] adhuc adicit, Ego autem habeo maius quam Ioannis testimonium; cum tingeret opera enim quae pater mihi dedit consummare, illa ipsa de me testimonium perhibent quod me pater miserit; et qui me misit pater, ipse testimonium dixit de me.

[13] he adds still, But I have a testimony greater than John’s; while he was baptizing—for the works which the Father gave to me to consummate, those very works bear testimony about me that the Father has sent me; and the Father who sent me, he himself has spoken testimony about me.

[14] subiungens autem, Neque vocem eius audistis unquam neque formam eius vidistis, confirmat retro non patrem sed filium fuisse qui videbatur et audiebatur.

[14] but subjoining, "Neither have you ever heard his voice nor seen his form," he confirms formerly that it was not the Father but the Son who was being seen and heard.

[15] denique dicit, Ego veni in patris mei nomine et non me recepistis—adeo semper filius erat in dei et regis et domini omnipotentis et altissimi nomine.

[15] finally he says, I have come in my father's name and you did not receive me—so much so the son was always in the name of god and king and lord omnipotent and most high.

[16] interrogantibus autem quid facete debeant respondit, Ut credatis in eum quem deus misit.

[16] however, to those asking what they ought to do he responded, That you should believe in him whom God sent.

[17] panem quoque se adfirmat quem pater praestaret de caelo; ergo omne quod ei daret pater ad se venire, nec reiecturum se, quia de caelo descendisset non ut suam sed ut patris faceret voluntatem; voluntatem autem patris esse uti qui viderit filium et crediderit in eum vitam et resurrectionem consequatur; neminem porro ad se venire posse nisi quem pater adducat; omnem qui a patre audisset et didicisset, venire ad se: Non quasi patrem aliquis viderit, adiciens et hic, ut ostenderet patris esse sermonem per quem docti fiant.

[17] he also affirms that he is the bread which the Father would furnish from heaven; therefore everything which the Father would give to him would come to him, and that he would not reject it, since he had descended from heaven not to do his own will but the will of the Father; and that the will of the Father is that whoever has seen the Son and has believed in him should obtain life and resurrection; moreover that no one can come to him unless the Father draws him; everyone who has heard from the Father and has learned comes to him: Not as though anyone has seen the Father, adding this here too, to show that it is the Father’s sermon through which they are made instructed.

[18] at cum discedunt ab eo multi et apostolis suis offert si velint discedere et ipsi, quid respondit Simon Petrus? Quo discedimus? verba vitae habes, et nos credimus quod tu sis Christus: patrem illum esse an patris Christum?

[18] but when many depart from him and he offers to his apostles whether they too wish to depart, what did Simon Peter answer? To whom shall we depart? you have the words of life, and we believe that you are the Christ: whether that one is the Father or the Father’s Christ?

CAPUT 22.

CHAPTER 22.

[1] Cuius autem doctrinam dicit ad quam mirabantur? suam an patris? aeque ambigentibus inter se ne ipse esset Christus, utique non pater sed filius, Meque scitis, inquit, unde sim, et non veni a me ipso, sed est verus qui me misit, quem vos non nostis; ego novi illum, quia apud illum sum.

[1] But whose doctrine does he say it is, at which they marveled? his own or the Father’s? as they were equally wavering among themselves whether he himself was the Christ, assuredly not the Father but the Son, “And you know me,” he says, “ whence I am, and I have not come from myself, but he is true who sent me, whom you do not know; I know him, because I am with him.”

[2] non dixit, Quia ipse sum, et, Ipse me misi, sed, Ille me misit. item cum misissent ad invadendum eum pharisaei, Modicum adhuc tempus, ait, vobiscum sum, et vado ad eum qui me misit. at ubi se negat esse solum—Sed ego, inquit, et qui me misit pater—nonne duos demonstrat, tam duos quam inseparatos? immo totum erat hoc quod docebat, inseparatos duos esse:

[2] he did not say, Because I myself am, and, I myself sent myself, but, He sent me. Likewise, when the Pharisees had sent to seize him, “For a little while yet,” he says, “I am with you, and I go to him who sent me.” But where he denies that he is alone—“But I,” he says, “and the father who sent me”—does he not show two, as much two as inseparable? Nay rather, this was entirely what he was teaching: that the two are inseparable:

[3] siquidem et legem proponens duorum hominum testimonium confirmantem, subiungit, Ego testimonium dico de me, et testimonium dicit de me qui me misit pater. quodsi unus esset, dum idem est et filius et pater, non citeretur legis patrocinio fidem imponentis non unius testimonio sed duorum.

[3] indeed, also setting forth the law confirming the testimony of two men, he subjoins, “I speak testimony about myself, and the Father who sent me declares testimony about me.” But if he were one and the same, inasmuch as he would be both Son and Father, the patronage of the law—which imposes credence not by the testimony of one but of two—would not be cited.

[4] item interrogatus ubi esset pater, neque se neque patrem notum esse illis respondens, duos dixit ignotos, quod si ipsum nossent patrem nossent: non quidem quasi ipse esset pater et filius, sed quia per individuitatem neque agnosci neque ignorari alter sine altero potest.

[4] likewise, when interrogated where the father was, responding that neither himself nor the father was known to them, he said two were unknown, because if they knew him, they would know the father: not indeed as if he himself were both father and son, but because through indivisibility neither can the one be recognized nor be ignored without the other.

[5] Qui me, ait, misit verax est, et ego quae ab eo audivi ea et loquor in mundum: interpretante extrinsecus scriptura non cognovisse illos quod de patre dixisset, cum scilicet cognoscere debuissent sermones patris in filio esse, legendo apud Hieremiam, Et dixit mihi dominus, Ecce dedi sermones meos in os tuum ; et apud Esaiam, Dominus dat mihi linguam disciplinae ad cognoscendum quando oporteat dicere sermonem; sicut ipse rursus, Tunc, inquit, cognoscetis quod ego sim, et a memetipso nihil loquar, sed sicut me docuit ita et loquor, quia et qui me misit mecum est. et hoc ad testimonium individuorum duorum.

[5] “He who sent me,” he says, “is veracious, and I speak into the world the things which I have heard from him”: with Scripture, interpreting from without, [saying] that they did not know that he had spoken about the Father, whereas indeed they ought to have recognized that the Father’s words are in the Son, by reading in Jeremiah, And the Lord said to me, Behold, I have put my words in your mouth ; and in Isaiah, The Lord gives to me the tongue of discipline to know when it behooves to speak a word; as he himself again says, Then, he says, you will know that I am, and I will speak nothing from myself, but just as he taught me, so also I speak, because both he who sent me is with me. And this unto the testimony of the indivisible two.

[6] item in altercatione Iudaeorum, exprobrans quod occidere eum vellent, Ego, inquit, quae vidi penes patrem meum loquor, et vos quod vidistis penes patrem vestrum id facitis; et nunc vultis occidere hominem veritatem vobis locutum quam audivit a deo: et, Si deus esset pater vester dilexissetis me; ego enim ex deo exivi et veni (et tamen non separantur, licet exisse dixerit, ut quidam arripiunt huius dicti occasionem exivit autem a patre ut radius ex sole, ut rivus ex fonte, ut frutex ex semine): , Ego daemonium non habeo, sed honoro patrem meum: et, Si ego me ipse glorificem, nihil est gloria mea; est qui me glorificet pater, quem vos dicitis deum esse vestrum nec nostis illum; est ego novi eum, et si dicam Non novi, ero similis vestri mendax; sed novi illum et sermonem eius servo.

[6] likewise, in the altercation of the Jews, upbraiding them because they wished to kill him, he said, I speak what I have seen with my Father, and you do what you have seen with your father; and now you want to kill a man who has spoken the truth to you, which he heard from God: and, If God were your Father you would have loved me; for I went forth from God and have come (and yet they are not separated, although he said that he went forth, as certain seize an occasion from this saying; however, he went forth from the Father as a ray from the sun, as a stream from a fountain, as a shoot from a seed): , I do not have a demon, but I honor my Father: and, If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing; there is one who glorifies me—the Father, whom you say is your God and you do not know him; and I know him, and if I say I do not know, I shall be a liar like you; but I know him and I keep his word.

[7] at cum subiungit, Abraham diem meum vidit et laetatus est, nempe demonstrat filium Abrahae retro visum, non patrem. item super caecum illum patris opera dicit se facere oportere: cui post restitutionem luminum, Tu, inquit, credis in filium dei? et interroganti quis esset iste, ipse se demonstrans utique filium demonstravit quem credendum esse dixerat.

[7] but when he subjoins, “Abraham saw my day and rejoiced,” he surely demonstrates that the Son was seen by Abraham back then, not the Father. likewise, concerning that blind man he says that he ought to do the works of the Father: to whom, after the restitution of the lights, “Do you,” he says, “believe in the Son of God?” and when he asked who this might be, he, showing himself, of course showed the Son whom he had said ought to be believed.

[8] dehinc cognosci se profitetur a patre et patrem a se, et ideo se diligi a patre quod animam suam ponat, quia hoc praeceptum accepisset a patre.

[8] thereafter he professes that he is known by the Father and that the Father is known by him, and that for this reason he is loved by the Father, because he lays down his soul, since he had received this precept from the Father.

[9] et interrogatus a Iudaeis si ipse esset Christus (utique dei, nam usque in hodiernum Iudaei Christum dei, non ipsum patrem, sperant, quia nunquam Christus pater scriptus est venturus), Loquor, inquit, vobis et non ereditis; opera quae ego facio in nomine patris, ipsa de me testimonium dicunt. quod testimonium? ipsum scilicet esse de quo interrogabant, id est Christum dei.

[9] and when he was interrogated by the Jews whether he himself was the Christ (of God, of course; for to this very day the Jews hope for the Christ of God, not the Father himself, because never has the Father been written as the Christ about to come), "I speak," he says, "to you, and you do not believe; the works which I do in the name of the Father, these themselves speak testimony about me." What testimony? That he himself is, of course, the very one about whom they were asking, that is, the Christ of God.

[10] de ovibus etiam suis, quod nemo illas de manu eius eriperet, Pater enim, , quod mihi dedit maius est omnibus; et, Ego et pater unum sumus. hic ergo iam gradum volunt figere stulti, immo caeci, qui non videant, primo, Ego et pater, duorum esse significationem; dehinc in novissimo, Sumus, non ex unius esse persona, quod pluraliter dictum est; tum quod Unum sumus, non Unus sumus .

[10] about his sheep also, that no one would snatch them from his hand, For the Father, , what he has given to me is greater than all; and, I and the Father are one. Here therefore the foolish—nay, the blind—want to fix their step, who do not see, first, I and the Father to be a signification of two; then, in the last word, We are, not from the persona of one, since it is said plurally; then that he We are One (Unum sumus), not We are One (Unus sumus).

[11] si enim dixisset Unus sumus, potuisset adiuvare sententiam illorum: unus enim singularis numeri significatio videtur. adhuc cum duo masculini generis unum dicit neutrali verbo—quod non pertinet ad singularitatem, sed ad unitatem, ad similitudinem, ad coniunctionem, ad dilectionem patris qui filium diligit, et ad obsequium filii qui voluntati patris obsequitur—Unum sumus, dicens, ego et pater, ostendit duos esse quos aequat et iungit.

[11] for if he had said We are One, he could have aided their opinion: for one seems to be a signification of the singular number. further, when he says one of two of the masculine gender with a neuter word—which pertains not to singularity, but to unity, to similitude, to conjunction, to the dilection of the Father who loves the Son, and to the obedience of the Son who obeys the will of the Father—We are one, saying, I and the Father, he shows that there are two whom he makes equal and joins.

[12] adeo addit etiam multa se opera a patre ostendisse, quorum nihil lapidari mereretur. et ne putarent ideo se illum lapidare debere quasi se deum ipsum, id est patrem, voluisset intellegi quia dixerat Ego et pater unum sumus, qua filium dei deum ostendens, non qua ipsum deum, Si in lege, inquit, scriptum est, Ego dixi Vos dii estis, et non potest solei scriptura, quem pater sanctificavit et misit in mundum vos eum blasphemare dicitis quia dixerat, Filius dei sum? si non facio opera patris mei, nolite credere; si vero facio et mini credere non vultis, vel propter opera credite, et scitote quod ego in patre sim et pater in me.

[12] to such a degree he adds that he has also shown many works from the Father, for none of which he deserved to be stoned. And lest they should think that therefore they ought to stone him as if he had wished himself to be understood as God himself, that is, the Father, because he had said, I and the Father are one, showing the Son of God to be God, not himself God, If in the Law, he says, it is written, I said, You are gods, and the Scripture cannot be dissolved, do you say that he whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world is blaspheming because he said, I am the Son of God? If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe; but if I do them and you do not wish to believe me, at least believe because of the works, and know that I am in the Father and the Father in me.

[13] per opera ergo erit pater in filio et filius in patre, et ita per opera intellegimus unum esse patrem , adeo totum hoc perseverabat inducere, ut duo tamen crederentur in una virtute, quia aliter filius credi non posset nisi duo crederentur.

[13] through works, therefore, the Father will be in the Son and the Son in the Father, and thus through works we understand the Father to be one; to such a degree did he persevere in inducing this whole thing, that nevertheless two would be believed in one power, because otherwise the Son could not be believed unless two were believed.

CAPUT 23.

CHAPTER 23.

[1] Post haec autem Martha filium dei eum confessa non magis erravit quam Petrus et Nathanael: quanquam et si errasset statim didicisset. ecce enim ad suscitandum fratrem eius a mortuis ad caelum et ad patrem dominus suspiciens, Pater, inquit utique filius, gratias ago tibi quod me semper exaudias; propter istas turbas circumstantes dixi, ut credant quod tu me miseris.

[1] After these things, however, Martha, confessing him the son of God, did not err any more than Peter and Nathanael: although even if she had erred, she would have learned at once. For behold, in order to raise her brother from the dead, the Lord, looking up to heaven and to the Father, said—“Father,” indeed says the Son—“I give thanks to you that you always hear me; on account of these crowds standing around I said this, that they may believe that you have sent me.”

[2] sed et in conturbatione animae: Et quid dicam? pater, salvum me fac de ista hora? atquin propter hoc veni in istam horam ; verum, pater, glorifica nomen tuum.

[2] but also in the perturbation of the soul: And what shall I say? father, save me from this hour? Nay rather, for this I came into this hour ; truly, father, glorify your name.

in quo erat filius: Ego, inquit, veni in patris mei nomine.

in whom was the Son: "I," he says, "have come in the name of my Father."

[3] inde—scilicet suffecerat filii ad patrem vox—ecce ex abundantia respondet de caelo pater filio contestatus, Hic est filius meus dilectus in quo bene sensi, audite illum: ita et in isto, Glorificavi, et glorificabo rursus.

[3] thence—of course the son’s voice to the Father had sufficed—behold, out of abundance the Father responds from heaven, attesting to the Son, This is my beloved Son in whom I have been well-pleased; hear him: so also in this, I have glorified, and I will glorify again.

[4] quot personae tibi videntur, perversissime Praxea, nisi quot et voces? habes filium in terris, habes patrem in caelis. non est separatio ista, sed dispositio divina.

[4] How many persons do there seem to you, most perverse Praxeas, if not as many as the voices? you have the Son on earth, you have the Father in heaven. This is not separation, but divine disposition.

ceterum scimus deum etiam intra abyssos esse et ubique consistere, sed vi et potestate filium quoque, ut individuum, cum ipso ubique. tamen in ipsa oeconomia pater voluit filium in terris haberi, se vero in caelis. quo et ipse filius suspiciens et orabat et postulabat a patre quo et nos erectos docebat orare, Pater poster qui es in caelis, cum sit et ubique.

Moreover, we know that God is even within the abysses and stands everywhere; but in force and in power the Son also, as undivided, is with him everywhere. Yet in the very economy the Father willed the Son to be held as on earth, but himself in the heavens. To which end the Son himself, looking up, both prayed and petitioned from the Father—by which he also taught us, having been raised up, to pray, “Our Father who art in the heavens,” although he is everywhere as well.

hanc sedem suam voluit pater: <Caelum, inquit, mihi thronus. hinc et>

the Father willed this seat as his own: <Heaven, he says, is my throne. hence also>

[5] minoravit filium modico citra angelos ad terram dimittendo, gloria tamen et honore coronaturus illum in caelos resumendo. haec iam praestabat illi dicens, Et glorificavi et glorificabo.

[5] he diminished the Son by a little beneath the angels by sending him down to the earth, yet intending to crown him with glory and honor by taking him back up into the heavens. he was already granting these things to him, saying, “And I have glorified and I will glorify.”

[6] postulat filius de terris, pater promittit a caelis. quid mendacem facis et patrem et filium? si aut pater de caelis loquebatur ad filium cum ipse esset filius apud terras, aut filius ad patrem precabatur cum ipse esset pater apud caelos, quale est ut filius item postularet a semetipso postulando a patre si filius erat pater, iterum pater sibi ipse promitteret promittendo filio si pater erat?

[6] the son petitions from the earth, the father promises from the heavens. Why do you make both father and son liars? If either the father was speaking from the heavens to the son while the son himself was upon the earth, or the son was praying to the father while the father himself was in the heavens, what sort of thing is it that the son likewise should request from himself by requesting from the father, if the son was the father; and again that the father should promise to himself by promising to the son, if he was the father?

[7] ut sic duos divisos diceremus quomodo iactitatis, tolerabilius erat duos divisos quam unum deum versipellem praedicare. itaque ad istos nunc dominus pronuntiavit, Non propter me ista vox venit sed propter vos, ut credant et hi et patrem et filium in suis, quemque nominibus et personis et locis,

[7] so that we would thus say two divided, as you have boasted, it was more tolerable to proclaim two divided than one versipellous, shape‑shifting god. therefore to those men the Lord now pronounced, Not for my sake did this voice come but for your sake, so that these too may believe both the Father and the Son in their own, each with his own names and persons and places,

[8] sed adhuc exclamat Iesus et dicit, Qui credit in me, non in me credit sed in eum credit qui me misit, quia per filium in patrem creditur et auctoritas credendi filio pater est: Et qui conspicit me conspicit eum qui me misit:

[8] but still Jesus cries out and says, He who believes in me does not believe in me but believes in him who sent me, because through the Son it is believed in the Father, and the authority for believing the Son is the Father: And he who beholds me beholds him who sent me:

[9] quomodo? quoniam scilicet, A memetipso non sum locutus, sed qui me misit pater ipse mihi mandatum dedit quid dicam et quid loquar—Dominus enim dat mihi linguam disciplinae ad cognoscendum quando oporteat dicere—sermonem quem ego loquor, sicut mihi pater dixit ita et loquor.

[9] how? since, of course, I have not spoken from myself, but the Father who sent me himself gave me a mandate what I should say and what I should speak—for the Lord gives me a tongue of discipline for knowing when it is fitting to speak—the discourse that I speak, just as the Father said to me, so also I speak.

[10] haec quomodo dicta sunt, evangelizator et utique tam carus discipulus Ioannes magis quam, Praxeas noverat: ideoque ipse de suo sensu, Ante autem sollemnitatem paschae, inquit, sciens Iesus omnia sibi tradita a patre esse, et se ex deo esse et ad deum vadere.

[10] how these things were said, the Evangelist and surely the so dear disciple John knew better than Praxeas: and so he himself, from his own sense, says, Before, however, the solemnity of the Pasch, Jesus, knowing that all things had been handed over to him by the Father, and that he was from God and was going to God.

[11] sed Praxeas ipsum vult patrem de semetipso exisse et ad semetipsum abisse, ut diabolus in cor Iudae non filii traditionem sed patris ipsius inmiserit: nec diabolo bene nec haeretico, quia nec in filio bono suo diabolus operatus est traditionem. filius enim traditus est dei qui erat in filio hominis, sicut scriptura subiungit: Nunc glorificatus est filius hominis et deus glorificatus est in illo.

[11] but Praxeas wants the Father himself to have gone out from himself and to have gone back to himself, so that the Devil injected into Judas’s heart not the tradition/handing over of the Son but of the Father himself: it goes well neither for the Devil nor for the heretic, since not even in his good Son did the Devil effect the tradition/handing over. For the Son of God was delivered up—he who was in the Son of Man—as Scripture subjoins: Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him.

[12] quis deus? utique non pater, sed sermo patris qui erat in filio hominis, id est in carne: in qua et glorificatus iam, virtute vero et sermone, et ante Iesus, Et deus, inquit, glorificabit illum in semetipso—id est pater filium, quem in semetipso habens etsi porrectum ad terram, mox per resurrectionem morte devicta.

[12] Which God? Assuredly not the Father, but the Word of the Father who was in the Son of Man, that is, in the flesh: in which also he was already glorified, indeed in power and in word, and previously Jesus, “And God,” he says, “will glorify him in himself”—that is, the Father [will glorify] the Son, whom, having in himself, although stretched out to the earth, soon through the resurrection with death vanquished.

CAPUT 24.

CHAPTER 24.

[1] Erant plane qui et tunc non intellegerent: quoniam et Thomas aliquamdiu incredulus, Domine, inquit, non scimus quo eas, et quomodo viam novimus? et Iesus, Ego sum via, veritas et vita; nemo venit ad patrem nisi per me; si cognovissetis me cognovissetis et patrem; sed abhinc nostis illum et vidistis illum.

[1] There were indeed those who even then would not understand: since even Thomas for some time unbelieving, Lord, he says, we do not know where you are going, and how do we know the way? and Jesus, I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me; if you had known me you would have known the Father as well; but from now on you know him and have seen him.

[2] et pervenimus iam ad Philippum, qui spe excitatus videndi patris nec intellegens quomodo visum patrem audisset, Ostende, inquit, nobis patrem, et sufficit nobis: et dominus, Philippe, tanto tempore vobiscum sum et non cognovistis me? quem dicit cognosci ab illis debuisse ? hoc enim solum discuti oportet. quasi patrem an quasi filium? si quasi patrem, doceat Praxeas tanto tempore Christum cum eis conversatum patrem aliquando non dico intellegi verum vel aestimari potuisse.

[2] and we have now come to Philip, who, stirred by the hope of seeing the Father and not understanding how he had heard the Father to be seen, says, Show us the Father, and it suffices for us: and the Lord, Philip, for so long a time I have been with you, and you have not known me? whom does he say ought to have been known by them? for this alone must be examined. as Father or as Son? if as Father, let Praxeas show that Christ, having been conversant with them for so long a time, could ever—I do not say be understood, but even be esteemed—to be the Father.

[3] nobis omnes scripturae et veteres Christum dei et novae filium dei praefiniunt. hoc et retro praedicabatur, hoc et ab ipso Christo pronuntiabatur, immo iam et ab ipso patre coram de caelis filium profitente et filium glorificante: Hic est filius meus ; et, Glorificavi et glorificabo. hoc et a discipulis credebatur, hoc et a Iudaeis non credebatur: hoc se volens credi ab illis omni hora patrem nominabat et patrem praeferebat et patrem honorabat,

[3] all the Scriptures, both the ancient and the new, predefine—the former, Christ as God, and the latter, the Son of God. This too was preached in former times, this too was proclaimed by Christ himself, nay now even by the Father himself, openly from the heavens, professing the Son and glorifying the Son: This is my Son; and, I have glorified and I will glorify. This too was believed by the disciples, this too was not believed by the Jews: desiring this to be believed by them, he at every hour named the Father and set forth the Father and honored the Father,

[4] si ita est, ergo non patrem tanto tempore secum conversatum ignoraverant sed filium: et dominus, eum se ignorati exprobrans quem ignoraverant, eum utique agnosci volebat quem tanto non agnosci tempore exprobraverat, id est filium. et apparere iam potest quomodo dictum sit, Qui me videt videt et patrem: scilicet quo et supra, Ego et pater unum sumus.

[4] if it is so, therefore they had not been ignorant of the Father, who had conversed with them for so long a time, but of the Son: and the Lord, reproaching that he himself had been unknown—the very one whom they had been ignorant of—was assuredly wishing that he be recognized, the very one whom he had reproached as not being recognized for so long a time, that is, the Son. And now it can appear how it was said, He who sees me sees also the Father: namely as also above, I and the Father are one.

[5] quare? quia, Ego ex deo exivi et veni; et, Ego sum via, nemo ad patrem venit nisi per me; et, Nemo ad me venit nisi pater eum adduxerit; et, Omnia mihi pater tradidit; et, Sicut pater vivificat, ita et filius; et, Si me cognovistis et patrem cognovistis.

[5] why? because, I went forth out of God and came; and, I am the way, no one comes to the Father except through me; and, No one comes to me unless the Father has brought him; and, The Father has handed over all things to me; and, Just as the Father vivifies, so also the Son; and, If you have known me you have also known the Father.

[6] secundum haec enim vicarium se patris ostenderat, per quem pater et videretur in factis et audiretur in verbis et cognosceretur in filio facta et verba patris administrante: quia invisibilis pater, quod et Philippus didicerat in lege et meminisse debuerat—Deum nemo videbit et vivet. et ideo suggillatur patrem videre desiderans quasi visibilem, et instruitur visibilem eum in filio fieri ex virtutibus non ex personae repraesentatione,

[6] for according to these things he had shown himself the vicar of the Father, through whom the Father both would be seen in deeds and would be heard in words and would be known, with the Son administering the deeds and words of the Father administering: because the Father is invisible, which also Philip had learned in the Law and ought to have remembered—No one will see God and live. and therefore he is taunted for desiring to see the Father as if visible, and he is instructed that he becomes visible in the Son through virtues, not through a representation of the person,

[7] denique si patrem eundem filium vellet intellegi dicendo, Qui me videt patrem videt, quomodo subicit, Non credis quia ego in patre et pater in me? debuerat enim subiunxisse, Non credis quia ego sum pater? aut quo exaggeravit, si non illud manifestavit quod voluerat intellegi, se scilicet filium esse? porro dicendo, Non credis quia ego in patre et pater in me, propterea potius exaggeravit ne, quia dixerat, Qui me vidit et patrem vidit, pater existimaretur: quod nunquam existimari se voluit, qui semper se filium et a patre venisse profitebatur.

[7] finally, if he had wished the Father to be understood as the same as the Son by saying, He who sees me sees the Father, how does he subjoin, Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me? for he ought to have subjoined, Do you not believe that I am the Father? or to what did he exaggerate, if he did not make manifest that which he wished to be understood, namely, that he is the Son? moreover, by saying, Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me, he the more rather heightened it lest, because he had said, He who has seen me has seen the Father, he be thought to be the Father: which he never wished to be thought about himself, who always was professing himself to be the Son and to have come from the Father.

[8] igitur et manifestam fecit duarum personarum coniunctionem, ne pater seorsum quasi visibilis in conspectu desideraretur et ut filius repraesentator patris haberetur. et nihilominus hoc quoque interpretatus est, quomodo pater esset in filio et filius in patre: Verba, inquit, quae ego loquor vobis non sunt mea—utique quia patris—pater autem manens in me facit opera,

[8] therefore he also made manifest the conjunction of two persons, lest the Father be desired separately as if visible to sight, and that the Son be considered the representer of the Father. And nonetheless he also interpreted this too, how the Father was in the Son and the Son in the Father: “The words,” he says, “which I speak to you are not mine—assuredly because they are the Father’s—but the Father abiding in me does the works,”

[9] per opera ergo virtutum et verba doctrinae manens in filio pater, per ea videtur per quae manet et per eum in quo manet, ex hoc ipso apparente proprietate utriusque personae dum dicit, Ego sum in patre et pater in me. atque adeo Credite ait. quid? me patrem esse?

[9] therefore, through works of virtues and words of doctrine, the Father, abiding in the Son, is seen through those things by which he abides and through him in whom he abides, from this very fact the property of each person appearing while he says, I am in the Father and the Father in me. and so, Believe, he says. what? that I am the Father?

non puto scriptum esse, sed, Quia ego in patre et pater in me, si quo minus vel propter opera credite, ea utique opera per quae pater in filio non visu sed sensu videbatur.

I do not think it is written, but: “Because I am in the Father and the Father in me; if not, then at least on account of the works, believe,” namely those works through which the Father in the Son was seen not by vision but by sense.

CAPUT 25.

CHAPTER 25.

[1] Post Philippum et totam substantiam quaestionis istius, quae in finem evangelii perseverant in eodem genere sermonis, quo pater et filius in sua proprietate distinguuntur. paracletum quoque a patre se postulaturum, cum ascendisset ad patrem, et missurum repromittit, et quidem alium. sed iam praemisimus quomodo alium.

[1] After Philip, the whole substance of this question, which to the end of the Gospel perseveres in the same genus of discourse by which the Father and the Son are distinguished in their own property. He also promises that he will ask the Father for the Paraclete, when he shall have ascended to the Father, and that he will send him—indeed, another. But we have already premised in what way “another.”

ceterum, De meo sumet, inquit, sicut ipse de patris. ita connexus patris in filio et filii in paracleto tres efficit cohaerentes alterum ex altero. qui tres unum sunt, non unus, quomodo dictum est, Ego et pater unum sumus, ad substantiae unitatem non ad numeri singularitatem.

However, “He will take from what is mine,” he says, “just as he himself from the Father’s.” Thus the connexion of the Father in the Son and of the Son in the Paraclete makes three cohering, the one from the other. These three are one (unum), not one (unus), just as it is said, “I and the Father are one,” with reference to the unity of substance, not to the singularity of number.

[2] percurre adhuc, et invenies quem patrem credis vitem patris dictum et patrem agricolam, usi quem in terra tu putas fuisse hunc rursus in caelis a filio agnosci cum illuc respiciens discipulos suos patri tradidit. sed etsi in isto evangelio non est revelatum, Deus meus ad quid me dereliquisti? et, Pater in tuis manibus depono spiritum meum, tamen post resurrectionem et devictae gloriam mortis, exposita necessitate omnis humilitatis, cum iam patrem se posset ostendere tam fideli feminae, ex dilectione non ex curiositate nec ex incredulitate Thomae tangere eum adgressae, Ne, inquit, contigeris me, nondum ascendi ad patrem meum, vade autem ad fratres meos (quin et in hoc filium ostendit, filios enim appellasset illos si pater fuisset) et dices eis, Ascendo ad patrem meum et patrem vestrum, deum meum et deum vestrum.

[2] run through further, and you will find him whom you believe to be the Father called the vine of the Father, and the Father the husbandman; and the one whom you think to have been on earth, this one in turn in the heavens to be acknowledged by the Son, when, looking thither, he handed over his disciples to the Father. but even if in this Gospel it is not revealed, “My God, to what end have you forsaken me?” and, “Father, into your hands I deposit my spirit,” nevertheless, after the resurrection and the glory of death conquered, with every necessity of humility laid aside, when now he could show himself as Father to so faithful a woman—who approached to touch him out of love, not out of curiosity nor out of the incredulity of Thomas—“Do not,” he says, “touch me; I have not yet ascended to my Father; but go to my brothers (indeed even in this he showed himself the Son, for he would have called them sons if he had been the Father) and you shall say to them, I ascend to my Father and your Father, my God and your God.”

[3] pater ad patrem et deus ad deum? an filius ad patrem et sermo ad deum?

[3] father to father and god to god? or son to father and word to god?

[4] ipsa quoque clausula evangelii propter quid consignat haec scripta nisi, Ut credatis, inquit, Iesum Christum filium dei? igitur quaecunque ex his putaveris ad demonstrationem eiusdem patris et filii proficere tibi posse, adversus definitivam evangelii sententiam niteris: non ideo enim scripta sunt ut patrem credas Iesum, Christum, sed ut filium.

[4] the very closing clause of the gospel—why does it consign these writings except, “That you may believe,” it says, “Jesus Christ the Son of God”? therefore whatever of these you think can profit you for a demonstration of the same Father and Son, you are striving against the definitive sentence of the gospel: for they were not written for this, that you should believe Jesus Christ to be the Father, but to be the Son.

CAPUT 26.

CHAPTER 26.

[1] Propter unum Philippi sermonem et domini responsionem ad eum videmur Ioannis evangelium decucurrisse; ne tot manifeste pronuntiata et ante et postea unus sermo subvertat, secundum omnia potius quam adversus omnia, etiam adversus suos sensus, interpretandus.

[1] On account of a single discourse of Philip and the Lord’s response to him we seem to have run through John’s Gospel; lest one discourse overturn so many things plainly pronounced both before and after, it must be interpreted according to all things rather than against all things—even against its own sense.

[2] ceterum ut alia evangelia non interponam quae nativitate dominica fidem confirmant, sufficit eum qui nasci habebat ex virgine ab ipso annuntiari angelo filium dei determinatum: Spiritus dei superveniet in te et virtus altissimi obumbrabit te, propterea quod nascetur ex te sanctum vocabitur filius dei.

[2] moreover, in order that I not interpose other gospels which by the Lord’s nativity confirm the faith, it suffices that he who was to be born from a virgin is announced by the angel himself as the Son of God determined: The Spirit of God will supervene upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you, therefore the holy one that will be born from you shall be called the Son of God.

[3] volent quidem et hic argumentari, sed veritas praevalebit. nempe, inquiunt, filius dei deus est, et virtus altissimi altissimus est: nec pudet illos inicere quod, si esset, scriptum fuisset. quem enim verebatur ut non aperte pronuntiaret, Deus superveniet et altissimus obumbrabit te? dicens autem, Spiritus dei, etsi spiritus deus, tamen non directo deum nominans portionem totius intellegi voluit quae cessura erat in filii nomen.

[3] they indeed are willing even here to argue, but truth will prevail. “To wit,” they say, “the Son of God is God, and the power of the Most High is the Most High”: nor are they ashamed to insinuate that, if it were so, it would have been written. For whom was he fearing, that he should not openly pronounce, “God will come upon you and the Most High will overshadow you”? But by saying, “the Spirit of God,” although spirit is God, yet by not directly naming God he wished a portion of the whole to be understood, which was going to pass over into the name of the Son.

[4] hic spiritus dei idem erit sermo. sicut enim Ioanne dicente, Sermo caro factus est, spiritum quoque intellegimus in mentione sermonis, ita et hic sermonem quoque agnoscimus in nomine spiritus. nam et spiritus substantia est sermonis et sermo operatio spiritus, et duo unum sunt.

[4] this Spirit of God will be the same as the Word. For just as, with John saying, “the Word was made flesh,” we also understand “spirit” in the mention of the Word, so too here we recognize the Word also in the name “spirit.” For the spirit is the substance of the Word and the Word the operation of the spirit, and the two are one.

[5] ceterum alium Ioannes profitebitur carnem factum, alium angelus carnem futurum, si non et spiritus sermo est et sermo spiritus. sicut ergo sermo dei non est ipse cuius est, ita nec spiritus, etsi deus dictus est, non tamen ipse est cuius est dictus. nulla res alicuius ipsa est cuius est. plane cum quid ex ipso est, et sic eius est dum ex ipso sit, potest tale quid esse quale et ipse ex quo est et cuius est:

[5] furthermore, John will profess one as made flesh, the angel another as about to be flesh, unless the Spirit also is the Sermon and the Sermon the Spirit. thus, just as the sermon of God is not the very one of whom it is, so neither is the spirit, although he is called God, nevertheless he is not the very one of whom he is said. no thing of someone is that person himself of whom it is. plainly, when something is from him, and thus is his so long as it is from him, it can be such a thing as he himself is, from whom it is and whose it is:

[6] et ideo spiritus deus et sermo deus, quia ex deo, non tamen ipse ex quo est. quodsi spiritus dei, tamquam substantiva res, non erit ipse deus sed hactenus deus qua ex ipsius dei substantia, qua et substantiva res est et ut portio aliqua totius, multo magis virtus altissimi non erit ipse altissimus, quia nec substantiva res est quod est spiritus, sicut nec sapientia nec providentia: et haec enim substantiae non sunt sed accidentia uniuscuiusque substantiae.

[6] and therefore the spirit is God and the Word is God, because (they are) from God, yet not the very one from whom they are. But if the spirit of God, as a substantive thing, will not be God Himself but will be God to this extent, in that (it is) from the very substance of God, in which respect it is both a substantive thing and, as it were, some portion of the whole, much more will the power of the Most High not be the Most High Himself, because it is not a substantive thing as the spirit is, just as neither wisdom nor providence are: for these are not substances but accidents of each and every substance.

[7] virtus spiritui accidit, nec ipsa erit spiritus. his itaque rebus, quodcunque sunt, spiritu dei et sermone et virtute, conlatis in virginem, quod de ea nascitur filius dei est.

[7] virtue befalls the spirit as an accident, nor will it itself be spirit. therefore, with these things—whatever they are—the spirit of God and the word and the virtue, having been brought together into the virgin, what is born of her is the Son of God.

[8] hoc se et in istis evangeliis ipse testatur statim a puero Non scitis, inquit, quod in patria mei me esse oportet? hoc et satanas cum in temptationibus novit: Si filius dei es. hoc et exinde daemonia confitentur: Scimus qui sis, filius dei. patrem et ipse adorat.

[8] he himself attests this also in these Gospels, right away from boyhood: Do you not know, he says, that it is necessary for me to be in my Father’s domain? this also Satan knows, in the temptations: If you are the Son of God. this also thereafter the daemons confess: We know who you are, the Son of God. the Father he himself also adores.

Christum se dei a Petro agnitum non negat. insultans in spiritu ad patrem, Confiteor, inquit, tibi pater quod absconderis haec a sapientibus.

He does not deny that he, the Christ of God, was acknowledged by Peter. Exulting in the Spirit to the Father, "I confess," he says, "to you, Father, that you have hidden these things from the wise."

[9] hic quoque patrem nemini notum nisi filio affirmat, et patris filium confessurum confessores et negaturum negatores suos apud patrem, inducens parabolam filii, non patris, in vineam missi post aliquot servos et occisi a malis rusticis et a patre defensi, ignorans et ipse diem et horam ultimam soli patri notam, disponens regnum discipulis quomodo et sibi dispositum dicit a patre, habens potestatem legiones angelorum postulandi ad auxilium a patre si vellet, exclamans quod se deus reliquisset, in patris manibus spiritum ponens, et post resurrectionem spondens missurum se discipulis promissionem patris, et novissime mandans ut tinguerent in patrem et filium et spiritum sanctum, non in unum: nam nec semel sed ter, ad singula nomina in personas singulas, tinguimur.

[9] here too he affirms that the Father is known to no one except to the Son, and that the Father’s Son will confess his confessors and deny his deniers before the Father, introducing the parable of the Son, not of the Father, sent into the vineyard after several servants and killed by wicked rustic tenants and defended by the Father, himself also not knowing the last day and hour, known to the Father alone, appointing a kingdom to the disciples as he says it has been appointed to himself by the Father, having the power to request legions of angels for aid from the Father if he willed, crying out that God had forsaken him, placing his spirit into the Father’s hands, and after the resurrection pledging that he would send to the disciples the promise of the Father, and at the last commanding that they should immerse into the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, not into one: for not once but thrice, at each name into each person, we are immersed.

CAPUT 27.

CHAPTER 27.

[1] Et quid ego in tam manifestis morabor, cum ea aggredi debeam de quibus manifesta obumbrare quaerunt? undique enim obducti distinctione patris et filii, quam manente coniunctione disponimus ut solis et radii et fontis et fluvii, per individuum tamen numerum duorum et trium, aliter eam ad suam nihilominus sententiam interpretari conantur, ut aeque in una persona utrumque distinguant, patrem et filium, dicentes filium carnem esse, id est hominem id est Iesum, patrem autem spiritum, id est deum id est Christum.

[1] And why should I linger over such manifest things, when I ought to address those matters about which they seek to overshadow the manifest? For on all sides they are overcast by the distinction of father and son, which, the conjunction remaining, we dispose as that of the sun and the ray and the fountain and the river, yet by the undivided number of two and three; nevertheless they try to interpret it otherwise to their own sentiment, so that equally in one person they distinguish both, father and son, saying that the son is flesh, that is man, that is Jesus, but that the father is spirit, that is God, that is Christ.

[2] et qui unum eundemque contendunt patrem et filium iam incipiunt dividere illos potius quam unare. si enim alius est Iesus alius Christus, alius erit filius alius pater, quia filius Iesus et pater Christus. talem monarchiam apud Valentinum fortasse didicerunt, duos facere Iesum et Christum.

[2] and those who contend that the Father and the Son are one and the same already begin to divide them rather than to unite them. For if Jesus is one and Christ another, the Son will be one and the Father another, since the Son is Jesus and the Father is Christ. Such a monarchy they perhaps learned from Valentinus, to make Jesus and Christ two.

[3] sed et haec iniectio eorum ex praetractatis iam retusa est, quod sermo dei vel spiritus dei et virtus altissimi dictus sit quem patrem faciunt: non enim ipse sunt cuius dicuntur, sed ex ipso et ipsius.

[3] but even this objection of theirs has already been blunted by the matters previously handled, namely that the Word of God or the Spirit of God and the Power of the Most High has been said—the one whom they make the Father: for they are not the very one of whom they are said, but from him and belonging to him.

[4] et aliter tamen in isto capitulo revincentur. ecce, inquiunt; ab angelo praedicatum est, Propterea quod nascetur sanctum vocabitur filius dei: caro itaque nata est, caro itaque erit filius dei. immo de spiritu dei dictum est.

[4] and otherwise, however, in this chapter they will be refuted. behold, they say; by the angel it was predicated, “Therefore, because the holy thing will be born, he will be called the son of God”: therefore flesh was born, therefore flesh will be the son of God. rather, it was said of the Spirit of God.

[5] certe enim de spiritu sancto virgo concepit, et quod concepit id peperit. id ergo nasci habebat quod erat conceptum et pariundum, id est spiritus, cuius et vocabitur nomen Emmanuel, quod est interpretatum Nobiscum deus. caro autem deus non est ut de illa dictum sit, Vocabitur sanctum filius dei, sed ille qui in ea natus est deus, de quo et psalmus, Quoniam deus homo natus est in illa et aedificavit eam voluntate patris.

[5] for indeed from the Holy Spirit the virgin conceived, and what she conceived, that she bore. therefore that had to be born which had been conceived and was to be brought forth, that is, spirit, and its name shall be called Emmanuel, which is interpreted God-with-us. but flesh is not God, so that it should be said of it, “The holy shall be called the Son of God,” but he who was born in her is God, of whom also the psalm [sings], “Since God-man was born in her and built her by the will of the Father.”

[6] quis deus in ea natus? sermo et spiritus qui cum sermone de patris voluntate natus est. igitur sermo in carne: dum et de hoc quaerendum, quomodo sermo caro sit factus, utrumne quasi transfiguratus in carne an indutus carnem.

[6] Which god was born in her? The Word, and the Spirit who with the Word was born from the Father’s will. Therefore, the Word in flesh: and furthermore it is to be inquired about this, how the Word was made flesh—whether as if transfigured into flesh or clothed with flesh.

immo indutus. ceterum deum inmutabilem et informabilem credi necesse est, ut aeternum.

nay rather, clothed. moreover, it is necessary that God be believed immutable and unformable, as eternal.

[7] transfiguratio autem interemptio est pristini: omne enim quodcunque transfiguratur in aliud desinit esse quod fuerat et incipit esse quod non erat. deus autem neque desinit esse neque aliud potest esse. sermo autem deus, et sermo domini manet in aevum, perseverando scilicet in sua forma.

[7] but transfiguration is the killing-off of the former: for every indeed whatever is transfigured into another ceases to be what it had been and begins to be what it was not. but God neither ceases to be nor can be other. but the Word is God, and the Word of the Lord abides forever, by persevering, namely, in his own form.

quem si non capit configurari, consequens est ut sic caro factus intellegatur dum fit in carne et manifestatur et videtur et contrectatur per carnem, quia et cetera sic accipi exigunt.

whom, if he does not admit to be configured, it follows that he is to be understood thus as made flesh, while he comes to be in flesh and is manifested and is seen and is handled through flesh, because the rest also demand to be taken thus.

[8] si enim sermo ex transfiguratione et demutatione substantiae caro factus est, una iam erit substantia Iesus ex duabus, ex carne et spiritu, mixtura quaedam, ut electrum ex auro et argento, et incipit nec aurum esse, id est spiritus, neque argentum, id est caro, dum alterum altero mutatur et tertium quid efficitur.

[8] for if the Word was made flesh from a transfiguration and demutation of substance, there will now be one substance of Jesus out of two, out of flesh and spirit, a certain mixture, like electrum from gold and silver; and it begins to be neither gold, that is, spirit, nor silver, that is, flesh, while the one is changed by the other and a third something is effected.

[9] neque ergo deus erit Iesus; sermo enim desiit esse, qui caro factus est: neque homo caro; caro enim non proprie est, quia sermo fuit. ita ex utroque neutrum est: aliud longe tertium est quam utrumque.

[9] nor, therefore, will Jesus be God; for the Word, which was made flesh, has ceased to be the Word: nor man—flesh; for the flesh is not properly so, since it was the Word. thus, out of both, it is neither: it is something far other, a third thing, than either.

[10] sed enim invenimus illum directo et deum et hominem expositum, ipso hoc psalmo suggerente, Quoniam deus homo natus est in illa aedificavit eam voluntate patris: certe usquequaque filium dei et filium hominis, cum deum et hominem sine dubio secundum utramque substantiam in sua proprietate distantem, quia neque sermo aliud quam deus neque caro aliud quam homo.

[10] but indeed we find him set forth directly as both God and man, this very psalm suggesting: “Since God, a man, was born in her; in her he built her by the will of the Father”: assuredly in every respect the Son of God and the Son of Man, being, without doubt, God and man, according to each substance, distinct in its own property, because neither is the Word anything other than God nor the flesh anything other than man.

[11] sic et apostolus de utraque eius substantia docet: Qui factus est; inquit, ex semine David—hic erit homo et filius hominis; Qui definitus est filius dei secundum spiritum—hic erit deus, et sermo dei filius: videmus duplicem statum, non confusum sed coniunctum, in una persona deum et hominem Iesum. de Christo autem differo. et adeo salva est utriusque proprietas substantiae, ut et spiritus res suas egerit in illo, id est virtutes et opera et signa, et caro passiones suas functa sit, esuriens sub diabolo, sitiens sub Samaritide, flens Lazarum, anxia usque ad mortem, denique et mortua est.

[11] thus also the apostle teaches concerning each of his substances: “Who was made,” he says, “from the seed of David”—here he will be man and son of man; “Who was defined Son of God according to spirit”—here he will be God, and the sermo of God the Son: we see a double status, not confused but conjoined, in one person God and man Jesus. but as for Christ, I defer. and to such a degree the property of each substance is intact, that both the Spirit did its own affairs in him, that is, virtues and works and signs, and the flesh performed its own passions—hungry under the devil, thirsty under the Samaritan woman, weeping for Lazarus, anxious even unto death, and finally it also died.

[12] quodsi tertium quid esset ex utroque confusum, ut electrum, non tam distincta documenta parerent utriusque substantiae; sed et spiritus carnalia et caro spiritalia egisset ex translatione, aut neque carnalia neque spiritalia sed tertiae alicuius formae ex confusione:

[12] but if some third thing existed, confused out of both, like electrum, not so distinct proofs would be produced of each substance; but both the spirit would have done carnal things and the flesh spiritual things by transference, or neither carnal nor spiritual, but of some third form from confusion:

[13] immo aut sermo mortuus esset aut caro mortua non esset, si sermo conversus esset in carnem; aut caro enim immortalis fuisset aut sermo mortalis. sed quia substantiae ambae in statu suo quaeque distincte agebant, ideo illis et operae et exitus sui occurrerunt.

[13] nay rather, either the Word would have been dead or the flesh would not have been dead, if the Word had been converted into flesh; for either the flesh would have been immortal or the Word mortal. But because both substances, each in its own status, were acting distinctly, therefore both their proper works and their proper outcomes befell them.

[14] disce igitur cum Nicodemo quia quod in carne natum est caro est, et quod de spiritu spiritus est. neque caro spiritus fit neque spiritus caro: in uno plane esse possunt. ex his Iesus constitit, ex carne homo ex spiritu deus, quem tunc angelus ex ea parte qua spiritus erat dei filium pronuntiavit, servans carni filium hominis dici.

[14] Learn therefore with Nicodemus that what is born in the flesh is flesh, and what is of the spirit is spirit. neither flesh becomes spirit nor spirit flesh: plainly they can be in one. from these Jesus consisted, from flesh man, from spirit God, whom then the angel, from that part in which he was spirit, proclaimed Son of God, reserving for the flesh to be called Son of Man.

[15] sic et apostolus etiam dei et hominum appellans sequestrem utriusque substantiae confirmavit. novissime, qui filium dei carnem interpretaris, exhibe qui sit filius hominis: aut numquid spiritus erit? sed spiritum patrem ipsum vis haberi, quia deus spiritus: quasi non et dei spiritus, sicut et sermo deus, et dei sermo..

[15] thus also the apostle, by calling him the mediator of God and of men, confirmed the sequestering of each substance. lastly, you who interpret the Son of God as flesh, produce who is the Son of Man: or will he perhaps be Spirit? but you wish the Father himself to be held the Spirit, because God is Spirit: as though there were not also the Spirit of God, just as the Word is God, and the Word of God..

CAPUT 28.

CHAPTER 28.

[1] Itaque Christum facis patrem, stultissime, qui nec ipsam vim inspicias nominis huius, si tamen nomen est Christus et non appellatio potius: unctus enim significatur. unctus autem non magis nomen est quam vestitus, quam calceatus, accidens nomini res. an tu, si ex aliquo argumento vestitus quoque vocaretur Iesus, quomodo Christus ab unctionis sacramento, aeque Iesum filium dei diceres, vestitum vero patrem crederes?

[1] And so you make Christ the Father, most foolish one, you who do not even inspect the very force of this name, if indeed “Christ” is a name and not rather an appellation: for “anointed” is signified. But “anointed” is no more a name than “clothed,” than “shod,” a thing accidental to the name. Or would you, if by some indication Jesus were also called “Clothed,” just as “Christ” from the sacrament of anointing, equally call Jesus the Son of God, but “Clothed” you would believe to be the Father?

[2] nunc de Christo. si pater Christus est pater unctus est, et utique ab alio: aut si a semetipso, proba. sed non ita docent Acta Apostolorum in illa exclamatione ecclesiae ad deum, Convenerunt enim universi in ista civitate adversus sanctum filium tuum quem unxisti; Herodes et Pilatus cum nationibus.

[2] now about Christ. If the Father is Christ the Father is anointed, and assuredly by another; or if by himself, prove it. But the Acts of the Apostles do not so teach in that exclamation of the church to God, They have assembled indeed all in this city against your holy Son whom you anointed; Herod and Pilate with the nations.

[3] ita et filium dei Iesum contestati sunt et filium a patre unctum: ergo Iesus idem erit Christus qui a patre unctus est, non pater qui filium unxit.

[3] thus they testified both Jesus as the Son of God and the Son anointed by the Father: therefore Jesus will be the same Christ who was anointed by the Father, not the Father who anointed the Son.

[4] sic et Petrus: Firmissime itaque cognoscat omnis domus Israel quod et dominum et Christum, id est unctum, fecerit eum deus, hunc Iesum quem vos crucifixistis.

[4] so also Peter: Therefore let the whole house of Israel know most firmly that God has made him both Lord and Christ, that is, Anointed, this Jesus whom you crucified.

[5] Ioannes autem etiam mendacem notat eum qui negaverit Iesum esse Christum, contra de deo natura omnem qui crediderit Iesum esse Christum: propter quod et hortatur ut credamus nomini filii eius Iesu Christi, ut scilicet communio sit nobis cum patre et filio eius Iesu Christo.

[5] John, moreover, also notes as mendacious him who has denied that Jesus is the Christ, conversely counts as of God by nature everyone who has believed Jesus to be the Christ: for which reason he also exhorts that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ, so that, namely, communion may be ours with the Father and his Son Jesus Christ.

[6] sic et Paulus ubique deum patrem ponit et dominum nostrum Iesum Christum: cum ad Romanos scribit, gratias agit deo per dominum nostrum Iesum Christum; cum ad Galatas, non ab hominibus se apostolum praefert nec per hominem, sed per Iesum Christum et deum patrem.

[6] so too Paul everywhere sets forth God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ: when he writes to the Romans, he gives thanks to God through our Lord Jesus Christ; when to the Galatians, he does not proffer himself as an apostle from men nor through a man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father.

[7] et habes totum instrumentum eius quae in hunc modum pronuntiant et duos proponunt deum patrem et dominum nostrum Iesum Christum filium patris, et Iesum ipsum esse Christum, in altero quoque nomine dei filium.

[7] and you have throughout his whole instrument those that pronounce in this manner and set forth the two: God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father; and that Jesus himself is the Christ, and, under the other name as well, the Son of God.

[8] nam exinde eo iure quo utrumque nomen unius est, id est dei filii, etiam alterum sine altero eiusdem est: et sive Iesus tantummodo positum est, intellegitur et Christus quia Iesus unctus est, sive solummodo Christus, idem est et Iesus quia unctus est Iesus. quorum nominum alterum est proprium quod ab angelo impositum est, alterum accidens quod ab unctione convenit, dum tamen Christus filius sit, non pater.

[8] for from that point, by the same right by which both names belong to one, that is, to the Son of God, either one without the other is likewise his: and whether Jesus alone is set down, Christ also is understood, because Jesus is anointed; or if only Christ, it is likewise Jesus, because Jesus is anointed. of which names, the one is the proper name, which was imposed by the angel, the other is accidental, which pertains from unction—provided, however, that Christ is the Son, not the Father.

[9] postremo quam caecus est qui nec in Christi nomine intellegit alium deum portendi si Christi nomen patri adscribat. si enim Christus pater deus est qui dicit, Ascendo ad patrem meum et patrem vestrum et deum meum et deum vestrum, utique alium patrem super se et deum ostendit. si item pater Christus est, alius est qui solidat tonitruum et condit spiritum et adnuntiat in homines Christum suum.

[9] finally how blind is he who not even in the name of Christ understands that another god is portended if he ascribes the name of Christ to the Father. For if Christ is the Father-God who says, “I ascend to my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God,” he surely shows another Father and God above himself. Likewise, if the Father is Christ, it is another who establishes the thunder and forms the Spirit and announces his Christ among men.

[10] et si Adstiterunt reges terrae et archontes congregati sunt in unum adversus Christum ipsius, alius erit dominus contra cuius Christum congregati sunt reges et archontes.

[10] and if The kings of the earth took their stand and the archons were gathered together into one against his Christ, there will be another Lord against whose Christ the kings and the archons were gathered.

[11] et si Haec dieit dominus domino meo Christo, alius erit dominus qui loquitur ad patrem Christum,

[11] and if These things the lord said to my lord Christ, there will be another lord who speaks to Christ the Father,

[12] et cum apostolus scribit, Ut deus domini nostri Iesu Christi det vobis spiritum sapientiae et agnitionis, alius erit deus Christi Iesu, charismatum spiritalium largitor.

[12] and when the apostle writes, That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ may give you the spirit of wisdom and of recognition, there will be another god of Christ Jesus, the bestower of spiritual charisms.

[13] certe, ne per omnia evagemur, qui suscitavit Christum, suscitaturus [est] et mortalia corpora nostra, tanquam alius erit suscitator quam pater mortuus et pater suscitatus, si Christus qui est mortuus pater est.

[13] surely, lest we wander off in all directions, he who raised Christ is going to raise also our mortal bodies, as though there were to be another raiser than the Father who died and the Father who was raised, if Christ, who is dead, is the Father.

CAPUT 29.

CHAPTER 29.

[1] Obmutescat, obmutescat ista blasphemia. sufficiat Christum filium dei mortuum dici, et hoc quia ita scriptum est. nam et apostolus, non sine onere pronuntians Christum mortuum, adicit Secundum scripturas, ut duritiam pronuntiationis scripturarum auctoritate molliret et scandalum auditori everteret.

[1] Let it be struck dumb, let that blasphemy be struck dumb. let it suffice that Christ, the Son of God, be said to have died, and this because thus it is written. for even the apostle, not without weight declaring Christ dead, adds According to the Scriptures, so that he might soften the hardness of the pronouncement by the authority of the Scriptures and overturn the scandal for the auditor.

[2] quanquam cum duae substantiae censeantur in Christo Iesu, divina et humana, constet autem immortalem esse divinam, ut mortalem quae humana sit, apparet quatenus eum mortuum dicat, id est qua carnem et hominem et filium hominis, non qua spiritum et sermonem et dei filium. dicendo denique, Christus mortuus est—id est unctus—id quod unctum est mortuum ostendit, id est carnem.

[2] although, since two substances are reckoned in Christ Jesus, the divine and the human, and since it is established that the divine is immortal, while that which is human is mortal, it appears in what respect he says him to have died: that is, as flesh and as man and as the Son of Man, not as spirit and as sermon/Word and as the Son of God. By saying, finally, “Christ died”—that is, “the Anointed”—he shows that that which was anointed is dead, that is, the flesh.

[3] ergo, inquis, et nos eadem ratione dicentes qua vos filium non blasphemamus in dominum deum; non enim ex divina sed ex humana substantia mortuum dicimus. atquin blasphematis, non tantum quia mortuum dicitis patrem sed et quia crucifixum. maledictione enim crucifixi quae ex lege in filium competit, quia Christus pro nobis maledictio factus est, non pater, Christum in patrem convertentes in patrem blasphematis.

[3] therefore, you say, we too, speaking by the same reasoning as you, do not blaspheme against the Lord God with respect to the Son; for we say him to be dead not from the divine but from the human substance. And yet you do blaspheme, not only because you say the Father to be dead but also to be crucified. For by the malediction of the crucified—which by the Law pertains to the Son, since Christ became a malediction for us, not the Father—by converting Christ into the Father, you blaspheme against the Father.

[4] nos autem, dicentes Christum crucifixum, non maledicimus illum sed maledictum legis referimus, quia nec apostolus hoc dicens blasphemavit. sicut autem de quo quid capit dici sine blasphemia dicitur, ita quod non capit blasphemia est si dicatur.

[4] we, however, in saying Christ crucified, do not curse him but refer to the curse of the law, since not even the apostle, in saying this, blasphemed. and just as, concerning that of which something admits to be said, it is said without blasphemy, so what it does not admit, if it be said, is blasphemy.

[5] ergo nec compassus est pater filio. scilicet directam blasphemiam in patrem veriti, diminui eam hoc modo sperant, concedentes iam patrem et filium duos esse, si filius sic quidem patitur pater vero compatitur. stulti et in hoc.

[5] therefore the Father did not even co-suffer with the Son. Namely, fearing a direct blasphemy against the Father, they hope to have it diminished in this way, conceding now that the Father and the Son are two, if the Son indeed thus suffers, but the Father co-suffers. Fools in this too.

quid est enim compati quam cum alio pati? porro si impassibilis pater utique et incompassibilis; aut si compassibilis utique passibilis. nihil ei vel hoc timore tuo praestas.

For what is it to co-suffer (compati) but to suffer together with another? Furthermore, if the Father is impassible, then of course he is incompassible; or if he is compassible, then of course passible. You confer nothing upon him, even by this your fear.

[6] times dicere passibilem quem dicis compassibilem. tam autem incompassibilis pater est quam impassibilis etiam filius ex ea condicione qua deus est. sed quomodo filius passus est si non compassus est et pater?

[6] you are afraid to call passible him whom you call compassible. But the Father is just as incompassible as the Son also is impassible, in that condition whereby he is God. But how did the Son suffer, if the Father too did not suffer-with?

separatur a filio, non a deo. nam et fluvius si aliqua turbulentia contaminatur, quanquam una substantia de fonte decurrat nec secernatur a fonte, tamen fluvii iniuria non pertinebit ad fontem; et licet aqua fontis sit quae patiatur in fluvio, dum non in fonte patitur sed in fluvio non fons patitur sed fluvius qui ex fonte est.

He is separated from the Son, not from God. For even a river, if it is contaminated by some turbulence, although it flows down from the spring of one substance and is not separated from the spring, nevertheless the injury of the river will not pertain to the spring; and although it is the water of the spring that suffers in the river, since it does not suffer in the spring but in the river, it is not the spring that suffers but the river which is from the spring.

[7] ita et spiritus dei qui pati possit in filio? quia non in patre pateretur sed in filio, pater passus non videretur? sed sufficit nihil spiritum dei passum suo nomine: quia si quid passus est in filio quidem erat ut pater cum filio pateretur in carne.

[7] so too the Spirit of God, who could suffer in the Son? because, since he would suffer not in the Father but in the Son, the Father would not seem to have suffered? but it suffices that the Spirit of God suffered nothing in his own name: because if he suffered anything in the Son, it was indeed that the Father would suffer with the Son in the flesh.

quin hoc retractatum, nec quisquam negabit: quando nec nos pati pro deo possumus nisi spiritus dei sit in nobis, qui et loquitur de nobis quae sunt confessionis, non ipse tamen patiens sed pati posse praestans.

nay, with this reconsidered, nor will anyone deny: since not even we can suffer for God unless the spirit of God be in us, who also speaks for us the things that are of confession, yet he himself not suffering but granting the ability to suffer.

CAPUT 30.

CHAPTER 30.

[1] Alioquin si ultra perges, potero tibi durius respondere et te cum ipsius domini pronuntiatione committere, uti dicam, quid de isto quaeris? habes ipsum exclamantem in passione, Deus meus, deus meus, ut quid me dereliquisti? ergo aut filius patiebatur a patre derelictus, et pater passus non est qui filium dereliquit: aut si pater erat qui patiebatur, ad quem deum exclamabat?

[1] Otherwise, if you go further, I shall be able to answer you more harshly and to confront you with the pronouncement of the Lord himself, to wit: what are you asking about this? You have him himself crying out in the passion, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Therefore either the Son was suffering, forsaken by the Father, and the Father did not suffer, who forsook the Son; or, if it was the Father who was suffering, to which God was he crying out?

[2] sed haec vox carnis et animae, id est hominis, non sermonis nec spiritus, id est non dei, propterea emissa est ut impassibilem deum ostenderet qui sic filium dereliquit dum hominem eius tradidit in mortem.

[2] but this voice was of flesh and soul, that is, of the human, not of the Word nor of the Spirit, that is, not of God; for this reason it was emitted, to show the impassible God who thus forsook the Son while he handed over his man into death.

[3] hoc et apostolus sensit scribens, Si pater filio non pepercit. hoc et Esaias prior pronuntiavit: Et dominus cum tradidit pro delictis nostris. sic reliquit dum non parcit, sic reliquit dum tradit.

[3] this also the Apostle sensed when writing, If the Father did not spare the Son. This also Isaiah earlier proclaimed: And the Lord when he delivered him up for our delicts. Thus he forsook while he does not spare, thus he forsook while he delivers up.

[4] ceterum non reliquit pater filium, in cuius manibus filius spiritum suum posuit. denique posuit, et statim obiit: spirito enim manente in carne caro omnino mori non potest. ita relinqui a patre mori fuit filio.

[4] However, the Father did not leave the Son, into whose hands the Son placed his spirit. Indeed he placed it, and immediately he died: for with the spirit remaining in the flesh, the flesh cannot at all die. Thus, to be left by the Father was death for the Son.

filius igitur et moritur et resuscitatur a patre secundum scripturas. filius ascendit in superiora caelorum, qui et descendit in interiora terrae.

Therefore the Son both dies and is resuscitated by the Father according to the Scriptures. The Son ascends into the higher regions of the heavens, who also descended into the inner parts of the earth.

[5] hic sedet ad dexteram patris, non pater ad suam. hunc videt Stephanus, cum lapidatur, adhuc stantem ad dexteram dei, ut exinde sessurum donec ponat illi pater omnes inimicos sub pedibus suis. hic et venturus est rursus super nubes caeli talis qualis et ascendit.

[5] he sits at the right hand of the Father, not the Father at his own. this one Stephen sees, when he is being stoned, still standing at the right hand of God, so that from there he will be seated until the Father puts for him all enemies under his feet. this one too is going to come again upon the clouds of heaven, such as also he ascended.

hic interim acceptum a patre munus effudit spiritum sanctum, tertium nomen divinitatis et tertium gradum maiestatis, unius praedicatorem monarchiae sed et oeconomiae interpretatorem si quis sermones novae prophetiae eius admiserit, et deductorem omnis veritatis quae est in patre et filio et spiritu sancto secundum Christianum sacramentum.

here meanwhile, having received the gift from the Father, he poured out the Holy Spirit, the third name of divinity and the third grade of majesty, the preacher of the single monarchy and also the interpreter of the economy, if anyone has admitted the discourses of his new prophecy, and the guide of all truth which is in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit according to the Christian sacrament.

CAPUT 31.

CHAPTER 31.

[1] Ceterum Iudaicae fidei ista res, sic unum deum credere ut filium adnumerare ei nolis et post filium spiritum. quid enim erit inter nos et illos nisi differentia ista? quod opus evangelii, quae est substantia novi testamenti statuens legem et prophetas usque ad Ioannem, si non exinde pater et filius et spiritus, tres crediti, unum deum sistunt?

[1] But this is a matter of Judaic faith: to believe one God in such a way that you are unwilling to reckon to him the Son, and after the Son the Spirit. For what will there be between us and them except this difference? What is the work of the Evangel, which is the substance of the New Testament, establishing the Law and the Prophets up to John, if not that from thence the Father and the Son and the Spirit, believed as three, set forth one God?

[2] sic deus voluit novare sacramentum ut nove unus crederetur per filium et spiritum, ut coram iam deus in suis propriis nominibus et personis cognosceretur qui et retro per filium et spiritum praedicatus non intellegebatur.

[2] thus God willed to renew the sacrament, so that anew the One might be believed through the Son and the Spirit, so that now openly God might be known in his own proper names and persons, who also formerly, though proclaimed through the Son and the Spirit, was not understood.

[3] viderint igitur antichristi, qui negant patrem et filium: negant enim patrem dum eundem filium dicunt, et negant filium dum eundem patrem credunt, dando illis quae non sunt, auferendo quae sunt. qui vero confessus fuerit Christum filium dei, non patrem, deus in illo manet et ipse in deo. nos credimus testimonio dei quo testatus est de filio suo: Qui filium non habet, nec vitam habet.

[3] let the antichrists look to it, therefore, who deny the Father and the Son: for they deny the Father while they say he is the same as the Son, and they deny the Son while they believe he is the same as the Father, by giving to them things which are not, by taking away the things which are. But whoever shall have confessed Christ the Son of God, not the Father, God abides in him and he in God. We believe the testimony of God by which he testified concerning his Son: He who does not have the Son does not have life.

non habet autem filium qui eum alium quam filium credit.

does not have however the son who believes him to be other than the son.