The original Greek of the following translation is available in Hugo Laemmer’s Scriptorum Graeciae Orthodoxae Bibliotheca Selecta, tomus primus (Freiburg-im-Breisgau, 1866), pp. 557-586.
Epigraph VIII
Since, when some people hear that the Holy Spirit exists and fountains and emanates from the Son, they give the strange explanation that it is not the divine nature of the Spirit which springs forth and fountains from the divine substance and nature of the Son, but rather a spiritual gift which comes to those who are worthy — because, when the indwelling of the omnipotent Godhead of the Holy Spirit comes about in them in a relational way, they take such a gift as though it were to be understood as something divided and disjoined from the Spirit’s divine substance — the present patristic citations have been gathered, from which it is possible to discern [558] that the indwelling which comes about in the saints is the relational indwelling of the Holy Spirit, who indwells in a manner surpassing speech and reason. But since it is where his divine nature relationally indwells that the gifts of the Spirit are shed forth, it is clear that it is the Holy Spirit himself, one of the Trinity and he who completes it and who is himself a divine nature and perfect God, just like the Father and the Son, who is meant when one says that the Holy Spirit emanates and fountains and exists from the Son.
St. Cyril, in his Dialogue with Hermias, book VII, says:
“And in fact Our Lord Jesus Christ speaks, I think, concerning every faithful and good man, when he says, ‘I and my Father will come and make our abode in him’ (Jn 14:23), and ‘In this we know that he is in us, from the Spirit which he has given us’ (cf. 1 Jn 4:13). For if someone received substantially his Spirit, he would be enriched with God, God existing by nature and in reality, dwelling and abiding within him, not something foreign and disjoined, but [559] that which is from him and in him and proper to him, and which bears equal lordship, as directed towards the same thing.”
8:1 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus vii; PG 75, 1093 A; SC 246, pp. 170, 172.
And a little after this:
“He sent us the Comforter from heaven, through whom and in whom he abides with us and in us, not as though he were pouring forth upon us one who is a stranger to him, but the Spirit who is proper to his own substance and that of the Father.”
8:2 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus vii; PG 75, 1093 B-C; SC 246, p. 172.
The same father in the seventh book of his Dialogue with Hermias says:
“For since God is holy by nature, the Spirit is essentially holy, and it is through him and in him that one may participate in what is holy.”
Hermias replies:
“They say it is not as though it were proper to him, but, because he possesses sanctification extrinsically, as it were, he transmits it from God to the creature.”
The saint replies:
“Accordingly, the Spirit, having been sanctified beforehand, sends upon the creatures a sanctification which is not his own, if in fact we say that it is true that, for everything considered a transmitter of something, what passes through it for others [560] is entirely different and other than itself.”
Hermias answers:
“True.”
The saint:
“Therefore, if the Spirit in us is not holy by nature, let these people say what nature it is that has fallen to his lot. And if they don’t wish to attribute to him the holy nature, doesn’t their argument in every way risk falling into unavoidable blasphemy?”
Hermias:
“So it seems. Nevertheless they say this, that Christ said concerning the Spirit, ‘He shall receive of mine and shall declare it to you’ (John 16:14). Therefore, they say, the Spirit is a participant of the Son’s.”
The saint:
“Not in the least; to my thinking, this misses the point completely. For how might that which is from him and in him and is properly his own ever ‘participate’ in him, and be sanctified by this relationship in the same way as those are who are external? And how will he be by nature foreign to him, to whom he is said to be proper?”
8:3 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus vii; PG 75, 1120 A-C; SC 246, p. 218.
[561] The same father in the third book of his Dialogue with Hermias says:
“How is it not utterly obvious that the Son is by nature truly God and from the essence of God the Father, if in fact it is as God and not some other kind of thing that his Spirit makes his abode in us?”
8:4 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus iii; PG 75, 840 B; SC 237, p. 102.
The same father, in the same book, says:
“That which makes us, here on earth, golden with the glory of sonship—I mean the Holy Ghost—will work the adoption of sons in the case of some, since he belongs to the Son, but will be inactive in the case of anyone who has not been granted admission by the one whose Spirit he is. Nor has he come forth from elsewhere, but he exists as his substantially, and through him he is shed forth upon those who are worthy of obtaining him, according to the Father’s good pleasure.”
8:5 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus iii; PG 75, 840 A-B; SC 237, pp. 100, 102.
The same father, in the same book, says:
“The divinely-voiced John says, ‘Of his fulness all of us have received’ (John 1:16). Would anything else, according to your own view, [562] be ‘a good giving and a perfect gift’ (Jas 1:17) apart from the participation of the Holy Spirit?”
Hermias:
“Not at all.”
The saint:
“Then observe even by way of these things that the Son, out of his own fulness, puts forth the Holy Spirit who is proper to him and naturally in him (this is incontestable), and through him is every good gift.”
8:6 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus iii; PG 75, 841 D – 844 A; SC 237, p. 108.
The same father, in the seventh book of his Dialogue with Hermias, says:
“But, on the subject of the Spirit, he says to his holy disciples: ‘But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me’ (John 15:26). Is he not manifestly God, therefore, he who is known by us and dwells within us as God, not as a creature and generate and, like us, subject to servitude, but free by nature, and existing as the Spirit of the Truth itself—and Christ is the Truth—or rather being itself the very Truth by reason of that union which he has with the Son according to the Scriptures?”
8:7 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus vii; PG 75, 1104 B-C; SC 246, p. 190.
[563] The same father in the third book of his Dialogue with Hermias says:
“But if ‘every perfect gift is from above and from the Father’ (Jas 1:17), the Son works the distribution of these gifts, not in the manner of a servant, but rather with authority befitting God. How, then, will he stand apart so as not to be by nature whatever his begetter is, that is to say, true God?”
8:8 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus iii; PG 75, 844 A-B; SC 237, p. 108.
The same father in his address to the Emperor Theodosius says:
“He said that Jesus would baptize with fire, not as though Jesus would send the Spirit upon the baptized in a way befitting a servant and an underling, but, as God with authority from on high, he would send the Spirit, who is from him and is proper to him.”
8:9 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De recta fide ad Theodosium 37; PG 76, 1188 A-B. See also Cyril of Alexandria, De incarnatione unigeniti; PG 75, 1240 C.
The same father in his exposition of the Gospel of John, on the text, “not of blood” (John 1:13), says:
“If the Spirit is God and is from God according to nature, and we are in fact made worthy to participate in him through faith in Christ, we are termed ‘gods,’ because we already have God in [564] ourselves according to the text, ‘I will dwell in them and will walk among them’ (cf. 2 Cor 6:16; Rev 21:3; Lev 26:11f.). For in what way are we God’s temples, if the Spirit is not God by nature?”
8:10 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, In Ioannis evangelium, lib. 1, cap. 9; PG 73, 157 A-B; P. E. Pusey, ed., Cyrilli … in D. Joannis evangelium, vol. i (Oxford 1872), p. 136, line 27 to p. 137, line 7 (slightly abridged).
The same father, on the text, “He shall bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you” (John 14:26), says:
“Therefore, knowing all things that are in the will of the Only-begotten, the Spirit reports them to us. He does not have this knowledge through learning, lest he should be seen as occupying the position of a servant; but he has it as his Spirit, who knows, without being taught, all things that belong to him from whom and in whom he is: just as, for instance, we believe that the human mind knows the volitions of that soul to which it belongs, and believe that the mind is not other than it by nature, but is, so to speak, a portion that completes the whole, existing in it and sprouting up out of it.”
8:11 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, In Ioannis evangelium, lib. 10; PG 74, 301 B-C; P. E. Pusey, ed., Cyrilli … in D. Joannis evangelium, vol. ii (Oxford 1872), p. 506, line 28 to p. 507, line 10.
The same father in the seventh book of his Dialogue with Hermias, in a part of the dialogue, has these things to say:
The saint:
“The one who [565] engraves in us the divine image and, after the manner of a seal, forms in us the supermundane beauty—is he not the Spirit?”
Hermias:
“But he does this, we say, not as God, but as one who ministers divine grace.”
The saint:
“Then it is not he himself who is indicated, but the grace which is through him?”
Hermias:
“So it appears.”
The saint:
“It would then be necessary that man be called the image of grace rather than the image of God. And look to this thing, for the argument, I think, is clear and straightforward. In the beginning, the animal-nature was created, God molding it and honoring it, according to the Scriptures, as if it were formed by his own hand. And when it had been brought into being, it was shaped more like God, when the breath of life was breathed into it. But after it had forfeited its sanctification through its turning aside to worthlessness, the ancient beauty it had in the beginning was brought back again; Christ renewed its primeval lustre, restoring it to its divine, noetic image. And he did this in no other way than [566] he did in the beginning. For he breathed upon the holy Apostles, saying, ‘Receive ye the Holy Ghost’ (John 20:22). Or again, if anyone be in Christ, is he not a new creature (cf. 2 Cor 5:17)?”
Hermias:
“Yes.”
The saint:
“Therefore it is true to say—or rather, it is necessary to hold—that if decrepitude and the mode of corruption so sickened the image that is in sanctification that it was sold, by the renovation and the return to its original state which come by Christ there is received the likeness with God? Will we not concede this?”
Hermias:
“Most certainly.”
The saint:
“But if grace, which is through the Spirit, were something divorced from the Spirit’s essence, why didn’t the blessed Moses say that, when the animal-nature had been brought into being, then the Creator of all things breathed into it grace, the grace, namely, that came through the Spirit of life? And why didn’t Christ say to us, ‘Receive a grace,’ the grace that comes through the ministry of the Holy Spirit? But, in the one case, it was named by him ‘the breath of life.’ For the nature of the Godhead is life, if in fact it is [567] true that in it we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28). And, in the other case, it is the Holy Spirit himself, in truth, whom the Savior, by his speaking, causes to indwell the souls of the faithful and who is sent; and through him and in him the Savior reshapes us into the form that was at the beginning, that is, into himself, or into his own likeness through sanctification. Thus also he brings us back to the archetype of the image, that is, to the imprint of the Father. For the true imprint, understood according to all possible exactitude of resemblance, is the Son; and the pure and natural likeness of the Son is the Spirit, unto which we, taking shape through sanctification, are reconfigured after the very form of God. But the Apostle’s word will persuade us of these things; for he has said, ‘Little children, of whom I travail in birth again, until Christ be formed in you’ (Gal 4:19). But Christ is formed through the Spirit reconfiguring us, through himself, unto God. When therefore we are formed unto Christ, he also is properly signified [568] and imaged in us, through the Spirit who is naturally similar to him. The Spirit, therefore, is God, not by a ministerial grace, but as himself bestowing participation in the divine nature upon those who are worthy. But that the Spirit is the true likeness of the Son, hear the blessed Paul who has written that ‘those whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son; them also he called’ (Rom 8:29f.). For we are formed again into the imaging which is unto the Holy Spirit, and indeed unto God, through faith and sanctification and a relationship with him. And it is clear that, if we are called ‘partakers of the divine nature’ (2 Pet 1:4), it is so, in our case, by way of participation and accidentally.”
8:12 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus vii; PG 75, 1088 B – 1089 C = SC 246, pp. 162-166.
Theodore, presbyter of Raïthu, in his second discourse Concerning the Uncircumscribed, which begins, “The treacherous tongue dares all,” says:
“Let’s see what sort of things they are allowed to say about God. They say that God is in everything by way of energy, but is nowhere [569] by way of essence. But while they call ‘energy’ the effect which comes forth from the energy, as for me, I would say that God’s energy is indivisible from his nature.”
8:13 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De incircumscripto. In J. B. Pitra, Anastasiana (Rome 1866), pp. 76-79. PG 89, 1331 B-C.
And a little further on:
“And since the divine nature is living, possessing also living energies, and, in the absence of essence, it is impossible for energy to come forth, where the energy appears, the essence from which it comes is contemplated along with it.”
8:14 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De incircumscripto; PG 89, 1331 C-D.
And a little further on:
“If the energy surrounds the universe, and the essence remains indivisible from the energy, then around the universe and in the universe is the essence of God.”
8:15 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De incircumscripto; PG 89, 1332 A-B.
And a little further on:
“Therefore not only is God present to things by energy, but also by essence. For it has been demonstrated that, without essence, there is no energy.”
8:16 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De incircumscripto; PG 89, 1332 C.
And a little further on:
“How then will the statement be true, that says that the Spirit of the Lord has filled the whole world (cf. Isa 11:9)? As God is essence, all beings have been filled with the divine essence, and it is in all things.”
8:17 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De incircumscripto; PG 89, 1333 B.
And a little further on:
“But the energy does not come forth without the essence, and it is in all things. The essence, therefore, is in all things according [570] to the declaration of the prophet, ‘Do not I fill heaven and earth? saith the Lord’ (Jer 23:24).”
8:18 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De incircumscripto; PG 89, 1333 C.
The same presbyter in his dogmatic address that begins, “I think it absurd, and I think so with good reason,” quite a long ways after this says:
“The Son, since he is Word, exhibits along with himself the Spirit. For there is no word without spirit (breath), just as there is no mind without word (reason). And we call the Father Mind, the Mind of the Word, in whom is the Word, with whom is the Holy Spirit, who is titled the ‘breath of the mouth’ of God (Ps 33:6). For the mouth of the Father is the Son.”
8:19 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De SS. Trinitate, 12; PG 89, 1317 C.
The same author in the same discourse says:
“… and again, the Holy Spirit, who appears together with the Father and the Son, as with Mind and Word. And in fact the Lord, showing that he exists out of himself, said, when breathing upon the disciples, ‘Receive ye the Holy Ghost’ (John 20:22); and when these latter prayed with the imposition of their own hands, they supplied him to those who believe. From these things it is possible to [571] discern what a difference there is between servitude and equality of honor. For the Apostles, by entreating and supplicating as to their master, bring about his dwelling in those who are worthy of his own visitation; but our Savior, out of himself, as from some treasury, supplies the Spirit to those who, through purity of life, have become fit to receive his energy.”
8:20 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De SS. Trinitate, 27; PG 89, 1328 A.
Basil the Great, in his aphoristic concepts concerning the Spirit, says:
“ ‘Holy Spirit’ is his principal and distinguishing appellation, a name which especially applies to everything bodiless and purely immaterial and without parts.”
8:21 ❖ Basil of Caesarea, De Spiritu sancto 9.22; PG 32, 108 A-B.
The same:
“For we shall not be in possession of something of no significance for knowing that the Spirit exists from God, when we hear him called ‘the breath of his mouth’ (Ps 33:6), but this name also suffices for showing his existence from God.”
8:22 ❖ Ps.-Basil of Caesarea, Adversus Eunomium V; PG 29, 733 C.
Chrysostom in his homily On the Holy Spirit says:
“The Savior says to the Apostles, ‘Tarry ye in Jerusalem [572], until ye be endued with power from on high’ (Luke 24:49), for ‘ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you’ (Acts 1:8). And even if it is power that is supplied, it is the Spirit that is the supplier; for ‘all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will’ (1 Cor 12:11).”
8:23 ❖ [Not found]
The same father in his Discourse on Pentecost says:
“Ten days ago Christ ascended to his royal throne, and today the Holy Spirit descended to our nature. Christ carried up our own first fruit, and brought down the Holy Spirit. Another Lord it is who distributes these gifts: for, indeed, the Spirit is Lord.”
8:24 ❖ [Not found]
In his homily On the Holy Spirit, which begins, “Yesterday, O lovers of Christ, the visitation of the holy and worshipful Spirit was hymned to us,” the same father says:
“But it is needful to continue with our exposition of the holy and worshipful Spirit, and to say something clearer about his holy and [573] glorious power, not out of our own ratiocinations, but out of the things which we are taught. The Holy Spirit is the indivisible nature, inasmuch as he comes forth from the indivisible and inseparable nature, and his name is Holy Spirit, Spirit of Truth, Spirit of God, Spirit of the Lord, Spirit of the Father, Spirit of the Son, Spirit of Christ, and it is in this manner that the divine Scripture calls him, or rather, how he calls himself, both Spirit of God and Spirit who is from God.”
8:25 ❖ Ps.-John Chrysostom = Severian of Gabala, De Spiritu Sancto 1; PG 52, 813. [Text of this sermon found in PG 52, cols. 813-826.]
And a little after this:
“Thus he is called ‘Holy Spirit,’ for this is the principal and first appellation, the one which gives the most salient idea, and brings to mind the nature of the Holy Spirit.”
8:26 ❖ Ps.-John Chrysostom = Severian of Gabala, De Spiritu Sancto 1; PG 52, 813-814.
And a little after this:
“He is therefore the Spirit of God, and the Spirit from (ek) God the Father, and he proceeds from (para) the Father. What does this mean, ‘he proceeds’? It does not say, ‘he is begotten.’ For those things which have not been written we ought not to think. The Son is begotten from the Father, the Spirit proceeds from the Father. Shall you ask me what is the real difference between these? When you learned that he was [574] begotten, you learned, and also understood, the manner. Since therefore he is preached to be Son, you understood the mode of begetting. Names are honored by faith and observed by pious reasoning. But what is the force of ‘he proceeds’? So that Scripture might pass by the name ‘begetting,’ so that it might not call him a Son, it says ‘the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from the Father’ (John 15:26). It introduces him as water, bursting forth from a fountain, according to what is said about paradise, ‘and a river proceeds from Eden’ (LXX Gen 2:10), proceeds and fountains.”
8:27 ❖ Ps.-John Chrysostom = Severian of Gabala, De Spiritu Sancto 1; PG 52, 814-815.
And a little after this:
“Spirit of God, Spirit who is from God, Spirit of the Father, Spirit who proceeds from the Father, Spirit of the Lord, Spirit of the Son. The Apostle says, ‘And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father’ (Gal 4:6). Behold, this same Spirit of the Son Paul elsewhere again calls the ‘Spirit of Christ,’ saying, ‘But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of Christ dwell in you’ (Rom 8:9).”
8:28 ❖ Ps.-John Chrysostom = Severian of Gabala, De Spiritu Sancto 2; PG 52, 815.
And a little later:
“ ‘Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ’ (Rom 8:9) — [575] and indeed, he ought to have said, ‘If any man have not the Spirit of God’; but he said ‘of Christ’; he said ‘Spirit of God,’ and then added ‘the Spirit of Christ.’ ‘Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.’ But he said this in order to show that if Christ is also Spirit, and it is equivalent for Christ to be present and for the Spirit to be present, then it is also equivalent to say ‘the Spirit of God’ and ‘the Spirit of Christ.’ These are the names of the holy and immaculate power of the holy and worshipful Spirit. But there are other names which pertain, not to the nature, but to the activity. Profound is the subject, and demanding of an attentive and steadfast and faithful hearing. Again, he calls the Spirit ‘the Spirit of life.’ Because the Savior says, ‘I am the truth, and the life’ (John 14:6). He is called, therefore, Spirit of life, as Paul also says: ‘For the law of the Spirit of life…’ (Rom 8:2). These are the names of the authority itself, of the nature itself. But there are other names, which are not ascribed to the Holy Spirit, but to his power and activity: e.g., his gifts. I say this, and I will go on to clarify the idea, and adduce testimony. When the Holy Spirit is bestowed at the [576] prayers of the saints, a hallowing either of me or of some other Christian, and I receive a gift, so as to keep my body and soul holy, the gift which is given to me is called a spirit of holiness, that is to say, a charism. If the Holy Spirit should give a gift to one not having wisdom, not having knowledge, but should give to him faith alone—just as there are many people who have the charism of solely believing in the Scriptures, who, although they do not understand the Scriptures, nevertheless believe in them—such a gift is called a spirit of faith. If someone receives from the Holy Spirit the gift and power to believe in the promise of good things to be bestowed in the future, he has received a spirit of promise. If one should receive a gift of wisdom, the gift is called a spirit of wisdom. In short, all the charisms of the Spirit are called ‘spirits.’ Now attend closely to the type, as we make somewhat clearer the contemplations. Whenever someone has charisms of love, it is said that this person has a spirit of love. Whenever someone receives charisms of martyrdom, such a person is said to have a spirit of power, [577] that is, a charism. Since indeed the things which is given is the Holy Spirit. And both the thing which is given is called Holy Spirit, and the gift is called by the same name as the giver.”
8:29 ❖ Ps.-John Chrysostom = Severian of Gabala, De Spiritu Sancto 2; PG 52, 815-816.
And a little later:
“Thus also the blessed Isaiah says, ‘A rod shall come forth out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall arise out of it, and the Spirit of God shall rest upon him’ (LXX Isa 11:1f.). Here is the name of the Spirit’s own nature. After it are the charisms: ‘a spirit of wisdom and understanding, a spirit of counsel and might, a spirit of knowledge, a spirit of piety, a spirit of the fear of God’ (LXX Isa 11:2f.).”
8:30 ❖ [Not found]
And a little after this:
“The one who was teaching received a spirit of wisdom, the one who was being taught, a spirit of understanding, so that he might understand. For this reason Isaiah ascribes wisdom to the speaker, understanding to the listener, and he says, ‘a wise master builder’ and ‘an understanding hearer.’ A spirit of counsel is given to an adviser, a spirit of might to one who receives advice.”
8:31 ❖ [Not found]
And after some other things in the extract:
“I repeat, then, the names of the ineffable nature: Spirit of God, Spirit [578] who is from God, Spirit of the Lord, Spirit of the Father, Spirit of the Son, Spirit of him who raised up Christ, Spirit of life, Spirit of truth. And then, the charisms: spirit of power, spirit of love, spirit of self-control, spirit of promise, spirit of faith, spirit of revelation, spirit of adoption.”
8:32 ❖ [Not found]
Athanasius the Great, in his Letter to Serapion which begins, “The letter of your holy disposition,” says:
“Say then if anywhere in Scripture the Holy Spirit is found called simply ‘spirit’ without it being said in addition ‘of God’ or ‘of the Father,’ or that it is ‘of my Christ,’ and ‘of the Son,’ or ‘from me,’ that is, ‘from God,’ or with the definite article, so that he might not simply be called a Spirit, but the Spirit — or this very thing, ‘the Holy Spirit,’ or ‘the Paraclete,’ or ‘of truth,’ that is, of the Son, who says, ‘I am the truth’— so that, when we hear, we should not suspect the Holy Spirit to be simply ‘a spirit.’”
8:33 ❖ Athanasius of Alexandria, Epistola ad Serapionem 1.4; PG 26, 536 C – 537 A.
[579] Theodore the presbyter of Raïthu, in those things he writes as a preparation and training for those who wish to know what is the manner of the divine incarnation (a work which begins, “I think it absurd, and I think this with good reason”), a long ways after the beginning says:
“You will not find another spirit spoken of in this way, as entirely holy; but, as I said earlier, God is called ‘Spirit,’ and God is called ‘Holy’; but when both names are assigned together to one who is called this in a particular manner, they accord with the Holy Spirit, just as the appellation ‘Father’ accords with the cause, and the appellation ‘Son’ accords with him who is immediately from the cause.”
8:34 ❖ Anastasius of Antioch, De SS. Trinitate, 22; PG 89, 1325 B.
Gregory the great, the Theologian, in his antirrhetic oration On the Holy Spirit, says, as though by way of objection:
“What then, say they, is there lacking to the Spirit which prevents his being a Son? — for he would be a Son if there were not something lacking.”
He responds:
“We assert that there is nothing lacking, for God has no deficiency. But the difference of manifestation, if I may so express myself, or rather of their mutual relations one to another, has caused the difference of their names.”
8:35 ❖ Gregory of Nazianzus, Oratio 31.9; PG 36, 141 C.
[580] St. Cyril in his Exposition of the Gospel of John, on the statement, “The same was in the beginning with God” (Jn 1:2), says:
“When Divine Scripture puts forth nouns with the article prefixed, then it means some one thing which alone is properly and truly that which it is said to be; but when it does not prefix the article, it makes a more general declaration of every thing that is so called, as for example (for our discourse shall attain clear demonstration) many are called gods, but when God is spoken of with the article it signifies Him Who alone and properly is so; more simply and without the article, one perchance of those called hereto by grace. And again there are many men. But when the Saviour says with the article, The son of man, He signifies Himself as one picked out of ten thousand. Since then names have this character in Divine Scripture, how ought we to understand, In the beginning was the Word? For if every word of God is hereby meant as being in the beginning, let them show it, and it is we who are the triflers. But if the Evangelist prefixing the article, signifies some One, and one who, in the most proper sense, is, when he cries, In the beginning was the Word, why do they strive in vain, bringing in another besides, only that they may expel the Son from the Essence of the Father? But we ought, considering the absurdity herein, to refuse the uncounsel of those who think otherwise.”
8:36 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, In Joannis evangelium, lib. 1, cap. 4; PG 73, 69 D – 72 A; P. E. Pusey, ed., Cyrilli … in D. Joannis evangelium, vol. i (Oxford 1872), p. 59.
The same father says to Hermias, in Book VII of his Dialogues:
“Why not say, then, that man’s nature and generation was then taken up into a perfection for which it was suited only when, through the Spirit, it had become wealthy with the divine image in itself? [581] And this is not hard to see, if one bears in mind the fallenness of the nature and its subsequent reformation into a state of well-being. For because the living creature had inclined to misdoing and towards the inward working of sin, and had been made sick by its utter love of the flesh, the Spirit, which molds it into the divine image, and had been impressed upon it as a seal, was departing; thus, it showed itself as corrupt and without beauty — for what had it received except things alien and estranged? But since the Author of all desired to restore to its original state of firmness and good order that thing which had fallen into corruption and which, through the inward working of sin, had become counterfeit and ugly, he sent back into it the divine and holy Spirit which had departed from it, in this way splendidly recreating it so that it might again, in nature and power, show the supermundane image, by his refashioning us back again in his own likeness. The one then who preserves the creature for its well-being, and who beautifies its form by the relationship he has towards it, and who transforms the living creature into the likeness of God, shall we be disposed [582] to place him below the Creator, and, because of his entering into things foreign and estranged, shall we take away that splendor of perfection most appropriate to every being, which by him is given to the creatures? Or, affirming that one in nature and consubstantial with him is he who is from him and in him by nature, shall we, with the whole creation, honor him and ascribe as it were the whole activity upon created beings to him, an activity which brought to perfection through the Son in the Spirit?”
8:37 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus vii, PG 75, 1112D – 1113B = SC 246, pp. 206-208.
Basil the Great, in one of his chapters, bearing the title, “That the Spirit is a divine nature,” says:
“Along with the living Word, the Spirit has been appointed to the task of creating; he is a living power, and a divine nature, ineffable, having been spoken from an ineffable mouth; in an ineffable way, by the inbreathing, he was sent upon man; according to a type, he was received by Christ in bodily manner; then, once again, he was restored to us by way of inbreathing. For it must be that our present renewal should agree with the newness that was at the beginning. Now, by breathing in, the Lord expressed this agreement; he [583] was not other than him who breathed in at the beginning; rather, he was himself the same one through whom God gave the inbreathing, at the former time breathing the Spirit in along with the soul, at the present time breathing the Spirit into the soul.”
8:38 ❖ Ps.-Basil of Caesarea, Adversus Eunomium V; PG 29, 728 D – 729 A.
St. Cyril, in Book VII of his Dialogues with Hermias, says:
“Thus, the reshaping and the return of what is corrupted towards renovation and reformation would be the work, in all likelihood (and rightly as it seems to me), of that same nature and operation by which it would appear that, in an ineffable way, it was fashioned in the beginning.”
8:39 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus vii; PG 75, 1109 B = SC 246, p. 200.
Athanasius the Great in his Letter to Serapion concerning the Holy Spirit (which begins, “I encountered also the letter newly written by Your Reverence”) says:
“Of course, as the Father sends the Spirit, the Son, by breathing upon them, gives the Spirit to the disciples, since all things whatsoever the Father has belong to the Son.”
8:40 ❖ Athanasius of Alexandria, Epistola ad Serapionem 4.3; PG 26, 641 B.
St. Cyril in the fourth book of his Dialogue with Hermias:
“For simultaneously, at the unspoken behest of the [584] master builder, the nature of man was brought into existence, and, by its relationship with the Spirit, it was made beautiful. For he breathed into his face the Spirit of life, as in no other way, I think, would the living creature have been capable of the clarity found in holiness and familiarity with God if it were not made beautiful by the communion of the Holy Spirit. For that very reason, also, when the Only-begotten has become man, finding the nature of man bereft of its ancient and primordial good, he instills this as from the fountain of his own fullness, and says, ‘Receive ye the Holy Spirit’; and by the more visible insufflation through the flesh he gave a very apt outline of the nature of the Spirit.”
8:41 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, De SS. Trinitate dialogus iv; PG 75, 908 C-D = SC 237, pp. 222-224.
The same author in his book the Thesaurus:
“So just as, since the Son is the most accurate image of the Father, he who has received him possesses also the Father: in the same way, the analogy keeping to the same pattern, he who has received the image of the Son, that is, the Spirit, possesses through him the Son completely, and the Father who is in him.”
8:42 ❖ Cyril of Alexandria, Thesaurus 33; PG 75, 572A.
In part of the exposition of the first general epistle of John which a certain Metrophanes, Metropolitan of Smyrna, composed, there stands a passage which goes like this:
[585] “’Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit’ (1 Jn 4:13). He shows here that the thearchic and blessed Trinity is related to itself by a natural interdependence, and, by the visitation and indwelling of one hypostasis upon anyone, naturally there comes about a co-visitation of both of the others through the divine and primal simplicity of the supersubstantial nature which surpasses all things, and indeed also through the oneness and singularity of the [divine] working and power and will. For thus Paul, the great Apostle, says: ‘Ye are the temple of God’ (2 Cor 6:16), and the Spirit of God dwells in you, [586] as though by the indwelling of the Spirit there indwell also God the Father and the Only-begotten Son, who consort and abide together in pure souls.”
8:43 ❖ [Not mentioned in the TLG. See the article on him by R. Janin, “Métrophane de Smyrne,” DThC X (Paris 1928), 1627-1628. Metrophanes was a leader of the bishops who remained loyal to St. Ignatius after his deposition by St. Photius. He was imprisoned, then exiled, by Michael III, and was one of the bishops who attended the anti-Photian council of 869. Janin notes Bekkos’s citation here in the following terms: “Jean Veccos, dans sa VIIIe Épigraphe …, cite le début de son commentaire sur la première épître de saint Jean.”]
De unione ecclesiarum 