Chapter 1

§ 1.

For in no other way could we learn the things of God, except our Master, being the Word, had been made Man. Because no other but His own Word could declare unto us the things of the Father.¹ For who besides hath known the mind of the Lord? or who besides hath been made His counsellor?

And on the other hand, neither could we learn any other way, than by seeing our teacher, and discerning His voice by our hearing:² that so we might have communion with Him, becoming both imitators of His deeds, and doers of His words; receiving growth from Him Who is perfect, and Who is before the whole creation: we, I say, who are now but lately made, by Him Who alone is most excellent and good;—made by Him Who hath power to give incorruption, to be after His own likeness; first pre-ordained to be, when as yet we were not, according to the foreknowledge of the Father; afterwards made, at such time as we received the beginning of our creation, in the season before appointed, by the ministration of the Word, Who is perfect in all things; in that He Who is the mighty Word, and true Man, redeeming us by His blood, by a reasonable service, gave Himself to be a ransom for those who were led into captivity.

And because Apostasy was ruling unrighteously over us, and we who by nature belonged to God Almighty, were thereby alienated contrary to nature, and made disciples to the same [Apostasy]; the Word of God, Who is Mighty in all things, and faileth not in His own righteousness, did also righteously set³ Himself against the aforesaid Apostasy, ransoming from it the things which are His own:⁴ not with violence, as it ruled over us originally, seizing insatiably what did not belong to Him; but in a way of persuasion, as it became God to take to Him what He would by persuading, and not using force: that so neither that which is just might be broken through, nor God’s old Creation utterly perish.

Thus,⁵ the Lord having redeemed us with His own Blood, and given His soul for our souls, and His own Flesh for our Flesh, and pouring out the Spirit of the Father for the union and communion of God and man;—both bringing down God unto man by the Spirit, and again bringing in⁶ man unto God by His Incarnation, and in might and in truth, by His coming, bestowing upon us incorruption, by our Communion with Him:—all the doctrines of the Heretics are come to nought.

§ 2.

Thus, they are vain, who say that He appeared but in fancy⁷: for these things took place, not in fancy⁸, but in substance of truth. But if, not being Man, He appeared Man, neither did He continue that which He was in reality, a Divine Spirit, (because the Spirit is invisible); nor was there any truth in Him, for He was not those things which He appeared to be.

And we said before,⁹ that Abraham and the other Prophets saw Him prophetically, by their sight prophesying what was afterwards to be. Now if in the present instance also He appeared in such sort, not being that which He seemed to be, it was a sort of prophetic vision happening unto men, and we must even expect another coming of His, wherein He shall be such as He is now prophetically seen.

And we have shewn that it is the same thing to say that He appeared but in fancy¹⁰,¹¹ and that He took nothing of Mary. For He could not have had even flesh and blood in reality, (whereby He redeemed us,) except by gathering up into Himself that old creation of Adam. Vain therefore are they of Valentinus’ part, who hold this doctrine, that they may cast out the life of the flesh, and cast away the Creation of God.

§ 3.

Again, the Ebionites too are vain, not receiving by faith into their soul the union of God and Man,¹² but abide in the old leaven of their [natural] generation¹³: and will not understand that the Holy Ghost came upon Mary, and the power of the Highest overshadowed her;¹⁴ wherefore also that which is born¹⁵ is holy, even the Son of the Most High God, the Father of all, Who wrought His Incarnation, and exhibited a new sort of generation: that as by the former generation we inherited death, so by this generation we might inherit life.¹⁶ These therefore reject the infusion of the Heavenly Wine, and will have it to be earthly water alone, not receiving God into that which they mingle, but abiding in him who was overcome, and cast out of Paradise, even in Adam. They do not consider, that, as from the beginning of our formation in Adam, the inspiration of life which was of God, being united to that which He had moulded animated¹⁷ man, and exhibited him a rational animal; so in the end the Word of the Father, and the Spirit of God, being united to the old substance of Adam’s formation, wrought out a living and perfect Man, comprehending the perfect Father: so that as in the Animal we are all dead, so in the spiritual we are all made alive.¹⁸ For at no time did Adam escape from under the Hands of God, to which Hands the Father was speaking when He said,¹⁹ Let us make man after our image and likeness. And therefore in the end,²⁰ not of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of the good pleasure of the Father, did His Hands work out a Living Man, to be an Adam, after the Image and Likeness of God.