Chapter XVIII.—The Mystery of the Assumption of Our Perfect Human Nature by the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. He is Here Called, as Often Elsewhere, the Spirit.

Now, that we may give a simpler answer, it was not fit that the Son of God should be born of a human father’s seed, lest, if He were wholly the Son of a man, He should fail to be also the Son of God, and have nothing more than “a Solomon” or “a Jonas,”248    Matt. xii. 41, 42.—as Ebion249    De Hebionis opinione. thought we ought to believe concerning Him.  In order, therefore, that He who was already the Son of God—of God the Father’s seed, that is to say, the Spirit—might also be the Son of man, He only wanted to assume flesh, of the flesh of man250    Hominis. without the seed of a man;251    Viri. for the seed of a man was unnecessary252    Vacabat. for One who had the seed of God. As, then, before His birth of the virgin, He was able to have God for His Father without a human mother, so likewise, after He was born of the virgin, He was able to have a woman for His mother without a human father. He is thus man with God, in short, since He is man’s flesh with God’s Spirit253    As we have often observed, the term Spiritus is used by Tertullian to express the Divine Nature in Christ. Anti-Marcion, p. 375, note 13.—flesh (I say) without seed from man, Spirit with seed from God. For as much, then, as the dispensation of God’s purpose254    Dispositio rationis. concerning His Son required that He should be born255    Proferendum. of a virgin, why should He not have received of the virgin the body which He bore from the virgin? Because, (forsooth) it is something else which He took from God, for “the Word” say they, “was made flesh.”256    John i. 14. Now this very statement plainly shows what it was that was made flesh; nor can it possibly be that257    Nec periclitatus quasi. anything else than the Word was made flesh.  Now, whether it was of the flesh that the Word was made flesh, or whether it was so made of the (divine) seed itself, the Scripture must tell us. As, however, the Scripture is silent about everything except what it was that was made (flesh), and says nothing of that from which it was so made, it must be held to suggest that from something else, and not from itself, was the Word made flesh.  And if not from itself, but from something else, from what can we more suitably suppose that the Word became flesh than from that flesh in which it submitted to the dispensation?258    Literally, “in which it became flesh.” And (we have a proof of the same conclusion in the fact) that the Lord Himself sententiously and distinctly pronounced, “that which is born of the flesh is flesh,”259    John iii. 6. even because it is born of the flesh.  But if He here spoke of a human being simply, and not of Himself, (as you maintain) then you must deny absolutely that Christ is man, and must maintain that human nature was not suitable to Him. And then He adds, “That which is born of the Spirit is spirit,”260    John iii. 6. because God is a Spirit, and He was born of God. Now this description is certainly even more applicable to Him than it is to those who believe in Him. But if this passage indeed apply to Him, then why does not the preceding one also? For you cannot divide their relation, and adapt this to Him, and the previous clause to all other men, especially as you do not deny that Christ possesses the two substances, both of the flesh and of the Spirit. Besides, as He was in possession both of flesh and of Spirit, He cannot possibly, when speaking of the condition of the two substances which He Himself bears, be supposed to have determined that the Spirit indeed was His own, but that the flesh was not His own. Forasmuch, therefore, as He is of the Spirit He is God the Spirit, and is born of God; just as He is also born of the flesh of man, being generated in the flesh as man.261    [A very perspicuous statement of the Incarnation is set forth in this chapter.]

CAPUT XVIII.

Nunc, ut simplicius respondeamus, non competebat 0783A ex semine humano Dei Filium nasci, ne si totus esset filius hominis, non esset et Dei filius, nihilque haberet amplius Salomone , et amplius Jona; et de Hebionis opinione credendus erat. Ergo, jam Dei Filius ex Patris Dei semine, id est spiritu, ut esset et hominis filius, caro ei sola erat ex hominis carne sumenda, sine viri semine. Vacabat enim viri semen , apud habentem Dei semen. Itaque, sicut nondum natus ex virgine, patrem Deum habere potuit sine homine matre ; aeque, cum de virgine nasceretur, potuit matrem habere hominem sine homine patre. Sic denique homo cum Deo, dum caro hominis cum spiritu Dei. Caro sine semine, ex homine; spiritus cum semine, ex Deo. Igitur si fuit dispositio rationis super Filium 0783B Dei ex virgine proferendum, cur non ex virgine acceperit corpus, quod de virgine protulit? Quia aliud est quod a Deo sumpsit. Quoniam, inquiunt, Verbum (Joan., I) caro factum est. Vox ista quid caro factum sit contestatur; nec tamen periclitatur, quasi statim aliud sit factum caro, et non Verbum. Si ex carne factum est verbum caro, aut si ex semine ipso factum est, Scriptura dicat. Cum Scriptura non dicat, nisi quod sit factum, non et unde sit factum; ergo ex alio, non ex semine ipso suggerit factum. Si non ex semine ipso , sed ex alio, jam hinc tracta, ex quo magis credere congruat, carnem factum Verbum, nisi ex carne, in qua et factum est, vel quia ipse Dominus sententialiter et definitive pronuntiavit (Joan., IV): Quod in carne natum est, 0783C caro est, quia ex carne natum est. Sed si de homine tantummodo dixit, non et de semetipso, plane nega hominem Christum, et ita defende non et in ipsum competisse. Atquin subjicit (ibid.): Et quod de spiritu natum est, spiritus est. Quia Deus spiritus est, et de Deo natus est. Hoc utique vel eo magis in ipsum tendit, 0784A si et in credentes ejus. Si ergo et hoc ad ipsum, cur non et illud supra? Neque enim dividere potes hoc ad ipsum, illud supra ad caeteros homines, qui utramque substantiam Christi, et carnis et spiritus, non negas. Caeterum, si tam carnem habuit, quam spiritum, cum de duarum substantiarum conditione pronuntiat, quas et ipse gestat, non potest videri de spiritu quidem suo, de carne vero non sua determinasse. Ita, cum ipse sit de spiritu Dei, et spiritus Deus est, et Deus ex Deo natus ipse est, et ex carne hominis, homo in carne generatus.