1. Some others are secretly introducing another doctrine, who have become disciples of one Noetus, who was a native of Smyrna, (and) lived not very lo

 2. Now they seek to exhibit the foundation for their dogma by citing the word in the law, “I am the God of your fathers: ye shall have no other gods b

 3. In this way, then, they choose to set forth these things, and they make use only of one class of passages just in the same one-sided manner that T

 4. Let us, as I said, see how he is confuted, and then let us set forth the truth. Now he quotes the words, “Egypt has laboured, and the merchandise o

 5. But what is meant, says he, in the other passage: “This is God, and there shall none other be accounted of in comparison of Him?” That said he righ

 6. Let us look next at the apostle’s word: “Whose are the fathers, of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever.

 7. If, again, he allege His own word when He said, “I and the Father are one,” let him attend to the fact, and understand that He did not say, “I and

 8. Many other passages, or rather all of them, attest the truth. A man, therefore, even though he will it not, is compelled to acknowledge God the Fat

 9. There is, brethren, one God, the knowledge of whom we gain from the Holy Scriptures, and from no other source. For just as a man, if he wishes to b

 10. God, subsisting alone, and having nothing contemporaneous with Himself, determined to create the world. And conceiving the world in mind, and will

 11. And thus there appeared another beside Himself. But when I say another ,

 12. Acting then in these (prophets), the Word spoke of Himself. For already He became His own herald, and showed that the Word would be manifested amo

 13. Now Jeremiah says, “Who hath stood in the counsel of the Lord, and hath perceived His Word?”

 14. These things then, brethren, are declared by the Scriptures. And the blessed John, in the testimony of his Gospel, gives us an account of this eco

 15. But some one will say to me, You adduce a thing strange to me, when you call the Son the Word. For John indeed speaks of the Word, but it is by a

 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

 17.  These testimonies are sufficient for the believing who study truth, and the unbelieving credit no testimony. For the Holy Spirit, indeed, in the

 18. Thus then, too, though demonstrated as God, He does not refuse the conditions proper to Him as man,

17.  These testimonies are sufficient for the believing who study truth, and the unbelieving credit no testimony.95    [A noble aphorism. See Shedd, Hist. of Theol., i. pp. 300, 301, and tribute to Pearson, p. 319, note. The loving spirit of Auberlen, on the defeat of rationalism, may be noted with profit in his Divine Revelations, translation, Clark’s ed., 1867.] For the Holy Spirit, indeed, in the person of the apostles, has testified to this, saying, “And who has believed our report?”96    Isa. liii. 1. Therefore let us not prove ourselves unbelieving, lest the word spoken be fulfilled in us.  Let us believe then, dear97    μακάριοι. brethren, according to the tradition of the apostles, that God the Word came down from heaven, (and entered) into the holy Virgin Mary, in order that, taking the flesh from her, and assuming also a human, by which I mean a rational soul, and becoming thus all that man is with the exception of sin, He might save fallen man, and confer immortality on men who believe on His name. In all, therefore, the word of truth is demonstrated to us, to wit, that the Father is One, whose word is present (with Him), by whom He made all things; whom also, as we have said above, the Father sent forth in later times for the salvation of men. This (Word) was preached by the law and the prophets as destined to come into the world. And even as He was preached then, in the same manner also did He come and manifest Himself, being by the Virgin and the Holy Spirit made a new man; for in that He had the heavenly (nature) of the Father, as the Word and the earthly (nature), as taking to Himself the flesh from the old Adam by the medium of the Virgin, He now, coming forth into the world, was manifested as God in a body, coming forth too as a perfect man.  For it was not in mere appearance or by conversion,98    κατὰ φαντασίαν ἢ τροπήν. but in truth, that He became man.

[17] αὐτάρκεις αὗται αἱ μαρτυρίαι πιστοῖς ἀλήθειαν ἀσκοῦσιν: οἱ δὲ ἄπιστοι οὐδενὶ πιστεύουσιν. καὶ γὰρ τὸ πνεῦμα πανάγιον ἐκ προσώπου τῶν ἀποστόλων διεμαρτύρατο λέγον, Κύριε, τίς ἐπίστευσεν τῇ ἀκοῇ ἡμῶν; ὥστε μὴ γενώμεθα ἄπιστοι, μήποτε ἐφ' ἡμῖν τελεσθῇ τὸ εἰρημένον. πιστεύσωμεν οὖν, μακάριοι ἀδελφοί, κατὰ τὴν παράδοσιν τῶν ἀποστόλων ὅτι Θεὸς Λόγος ἀπ' οὐρανῶν κατῆλθεν εἰς τὴν ἁγίαν παρθένον Μαρίαν, ἵνα σαρκωθεὶς ἐξ αὐτῆς, λαβὼν δὲ καὶ ψυχὴν τὴν ἀνθρωπείαν, λογικὴν δὲ λέγω, γεγονὼς πάντα ὅσα ἐστὶν ἄνθρωπος ἐκτὸς ἁμαρτίας, σώσῃ τὸν πεπτωκότα Ἀδὰμ καὶ ἀφθαρσίαν ἀνθρώποις παράσχῃ τοῖς πιστεύουσιν εἰς τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ. ἐν πᾶσιν οὖν ἀποδέδεικται ἡμῖν τῆς ἀληθείας λόγος, ὅτι εἷς ἐστιν ὁ Πατήρ, οὗ πάρεστι Λόγος, δι' οὗ τὰ πάντα ἐποίησεν: ὃν ὑστέροις καιροῖς, καθὼς εἴπαμεν ἀνωτέρω, ἀπέστειλεν ὁ Πατὴρ πρὸς σωτηρίαν ἀνθρώπων. οὗτος διὰ νόμου καὶ προφητῶν ἐκηρύχθη παρεσόμενος εἰς τὸν κόσμον. καθ' ὃν οὖν τρόπο[ν] ἐκηρύχθη κατὰ τοῦτον καὶ παρών, ἐφανέρωσεν ἑαυτὸν ἐκ παρθένου καὶ ἁγίου πνεύματος, καινὸς ἄνθρωπος γενόμενος: τὸ μὲν οὐράνιον ἔχων τὸ πατρῷον ὡς Λόγος, τὸ δὲ ἐπίγειον ὡς ἐκ παλαιοῦ Ἀδὰμ διὰ παρθένου σαρκούμενος. οὗτος προελθὼν εἰς κόσμον Θεὸς ἐνσώματος ἐφανερώθη, ἄνθρωπος τέλειος προελθών: οὐ γὰρ κατὰ φαντασίαν ἢ τροπήν, ἀλλὰ ἀληθῶς γενόμενος ἄνθρωπος.