Psalms 109:3

I could adduce ten thousand Scriptures of which not “one tittle shall pass away,” without being fulfilled; for the mouth of the Lord the Holy Spirit hath spoken these things. “Do not any longer,” he says, “my son, despise the chastening of the Lord , nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him.” O surpassing love for man! Not as a teacher speaking to his pupils, not as a master to his domestics, nor as God to men, but as a father, does the Lord gently admonish his children. Thus Moses confesses that “he was filled with quaking and terror” while he listened to God speaking concerning the Word. …

Now the Logos of God controls all these; the first begotten Child of the Father, the voice of the Dawn antecedent to the Morning Star. Afterwards just men were born, friends of God; and these have been styled prophets, on account of their foreshowing future events. And the word of prophecy was committed unto them, not for one age only ; but also the utterances of events predicted throughout all generations, were vouchsafed in perfect clearness. And this, too, not at the time merely when seers furnished a reply to those present; but also events that would happen throughout all ages, have been manifested beforehand; because, in speaking of incidents gone by, the prophets brought them back to the recollection of humanity; whereas, in showing forth present occurrences, they endeavoured to persuade men not to be remiss; while, by foretelling future events, they have rendered each one of us te …

16. And these indeed are testimonies bearing on the incarnation of the Word; and there are also very many others. But let us also look at the subject in hand, namely, the question, brethren, that in reality the Father’s power, which is the Word, came down from heaven, and not the Father Himself. For thus He speaks: “I came forth from the Father, and am come.” Now what subject is meant in this sentence, “I came forth from the Father,” but just the Word? And what is it that is begotten of Him, but just the Spirit, that is to say, the Word? But you will say to me, How is He begotten? In your own case you can give no explanation of the way in which you were begotten, although you see every day the cause according to man; neither can you tell with accuracy the economy in His case. …

In the cixth Psalm: “Before the morning star I begat thee. The Lord hath sworn, and He will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever, after the order of Melchizedek.” Also in the first book of Kings, God says to the priest Eli: “And I will raise up to me a faithful priest, who shall do all things which are in my heart: and I will build him a sure house; and he shall pass in the presence of my anointed ones for all days. And it shall be, whosoever shall remain in thine house, shall come to worship for an obolus of money, and for one loaf of bread.”

8. And His proper and peculiar, natural and excellent Sonship, St. Paul has declared, who thus speaks of God: “Who spared not His own Son, but for us,” who were not His natural sons, “delivered Him up.” For to distinguish Him from those who are not properly sons, He said that He was His own Son. And in the Gospel we read: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Moreover, in the Psalms the Saviour says: “The Lord hath said unto Me, Thou art my Son.” Where, showing that He is the true and genuine Son, He signifies that there are no other genuine sons besides Himself. …

3. Since those about Arius speak these things and shamelessly maintain them, we, coming together with the Bishops of Egypt and the Libyas, nearly a hundred in number, have anathematized them, together with their followers. But those about Eusebius have received them, earnestly endeavouring to mix up falsehood with truth, impiety with piety. But they will not prevail; for the truth prevails, and there is no communion betwixt light and darkness, no concord between Christ and Belial. …

5. “I write unto you, fathers.” Why first sons? “Because your sins are forgiven you through His name,” and ye are regenerated into a new life, therefore sons. Why fathers? “Because ye have known Him that is from the beginning:” for the beginning hath relation unto fatherhood. Christ new in flesh, but ancient in Godhead. How ancient think we? how many years old? Think we, of greater age than His mother? Assuredly of greater age than His mother, for “all things were made by Him.” If all things, then did the Ancient make the very mother of whom the New should be born. Was He, think we, before His mother only? Yea, and before His mother’s ancestors is His antiquity. The ancestor of His mother was Abraham; and the Lord saith, “Before Abraham I am.” Before Abraham, say we? The heaven and earth, ere man was, were made. Before these was the Lord, nay rather also is. …

7. “With Thee the beginning on the day of Thy power” ( ver. 3 ). What is this day of His power, when is there beginning with Him, or what beginning, or in what sense is there beginning with Him, since He is the Beginning?…

13. Therefore let them tell us, from what teacher or by what tradition they derived these notions concerning the Saviour? “We have read,” they will say, “in the Proverbs, ‘The Lord created me a beginning of His ways unto His works;’” this Eusebius and his fellows used to insist on, and you write me word, that the present men also, though overthrown and confuted by an abundance of arguments, still were putting about in every quarter this passage, and saying that the Son was one of the creatures, and reckoning Him with things originated. But they seem to me to have a wrong understanding of this passage also; for it has a religious and very orthodox sense, which had they understood, they would not have blasphemed the Lord of glory. For on comparing what has been above stated with this passage, they will find a great difference between them. …

21. Therefore if they, as the others, make an excuse that the terms are strange, let them consider the sense in which the Council so wrote, and anathematize what the Council anathematized; and then if they can, let them find fault with the expressions. But I well know that, if they hold the sense of the Council, they will fully accept the terms in which it is conveyed; whereas if it be the sense which they wish to complain of, all must see that it is idle in them to discuss the wording, when they are but seeking handles for irreligion. This then was the reason of these expressions; but if they still complain that such are not scriptural, that very complaint is a reason why they should be cast out, as talking idly and disordered in mind. And let them blame themselves in this matter, for they set the example, beginning their war against God with words not in Scripture. …

“Next, I may reasonably turn to those who divide and cut to pieces and destroy that most sacred doctrine of the Church of God, the Divine Monarchy, making it as it were three powers and partitive subsistences and god-heads three. I am told that some among you who are catechists and teachers of the Divine Word, take the lead in this tenet, who are diametrically opposed, so to speak, to Sabellius’s opinions; for he blasphemously says that the Son is the Father, and the Father the Son, but they in some sort preach three Gods, as dividing the sacred Monad into three subsistences foreign to each other and utterly separate. For it must needs be that with the God of the Universe, the Divine Word is united, and the Holy Ghost must repose and habitate in God; thus in one as in a summit, I mean the God of the Universe, must the Divine Triad be gathered up and brought together. …

24. But it is not so; for in truth much is said in the Old also about the Son, as in the second Psalm, ‘Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee;’ and in the ninth the title, Unto the ‘end concerning the hidden things of the Son, a Psalm of David;’ and in the forty-fourth, ‘Unto the end, concerning the things that shall be changed to the Sons of Korah for understanding, a song about the Well-beloved;’ and in Isaiah, ‘I will sing to my Well-beloved a song of my Well-beloved touching my vineyard. My Well-beloved hath a vineyard;’ Who is this ‘Well-beloved’ but the Only-begotten Son? as also in the hundred and ninth, ‘From the womb I begat Thee before the morning star,’ concerning which I shall speak afterwards; and in the Proverbs, ‘Before the hills He begat me;’ and in Daniel, ‘And the form of the Fourth is like the Son of God;’ and many others. …