Chapter XVIII.132    According to Pamelius, ch. xxvi.  Argument.—Moreover Also, from the Fact that He Who Was Seen of Abraham is Called God; Which Cannot Be Understood of the Father, Whom No Man Hath Seen at Any Time; But of the Son in the Likeness of an Angel.

Behold, the same Moses tells us in another place that “God was seen of Abraham.”133    Gen. xii. 7. And yet the same Moses hears from God, that “no man can see God and live.”134    Ex. xxxiii. 20. If God cannot be seen, how was God seen? Or if He was seen, how is it that He cannot be seen? For John also says, “No man hath seen God at any time;”135    1 John iv. 12. and the Apostle Paul, “Whom no man hath seen, nor can see.”136    1 Tim. vi. 16. But certainly the Scripture does not lie; therefore, truly, God was seen. Whence it may be understood that it was not the Father who was seen, seeing that He never was seen; but the Son, who has both been accustomed to descend, and to be seen because He has descended. For He is the image of the invisible God, as the imperfection and frailty of the human condition was accustomed sometimes even then to see God the Father in the image of God, that is, in the Son of God. For gradually and by progression human frailty was to be strengthened by the image to that glory of being able one day to see God the Father. For the things that are great are dangerous if they are sudden. For even the sudden light of the sun after darkness, with its too great splendour, will not make manifest the light of day to unaccustomed eyes, but will rather strike them with blindness.

And lest this should occur to the injury of human eyes, the darkness is broken up and scattered by degrees; and the rising of that luminary, mounting by small and unperceived increments, gently accustoms men’s eyes to bear its full orb by the gentle increase of its rays. Thus, therefore, Christ also—that is, the image of God, and the Son of God—is looked upon by men, inasmuch as He could be seen. And thus the weakness and imperfection of the human destiny is nourished, led up, and educated by Him; so that, being accustomed to look upon the Son, it may one day be able to see God the Father Himself also as He is, that it may not be stricken by His sudden and intolerable brightness, and be hindered from being able to see God the Father, whom it has always desired.137    [This leading up and educating of humanity to “see God” is here admirably put. Heb. i. 3.] Wherefore it is the Son who is seen; but the Son of God is the Word of God:  and the Word of God was made flesh, and dwelt among us; and this is Christ. What in the world is the reason that we should hesitate to call Him God, who in so many ways is acknowledged to be proved God? And if, moreover, the angel meets with Hagar, Sarah’s maid, driven from her home as well as turned away, near the fountain of water in the way to Shur; asks and learns the reason of her flight, and after that offers her advice that she should humble herself; and, moreover, gives her the hope of the name of mother, and pledges and promises that from her womb there should be a numerous seed, and that she should have Ishmael to be born from her; and with other things unfolds the place of his habitation, and describes his mode of life; yet Scripture sets forth this angel as both Lord and God—for He would not have promised the blessing of seed unless the angel had also been God. Let them ask what the heretics can make of this present passage. Was that the Father that was seen by Hagar or not?  For He is declared to be God. But far be it from us to call God the Father an angel, lest He should be subordinate to another whose angel He would be. But they will say that it was an angel.  How then shall He be God if He was an angel? Since this name is nowhere conceded to angels, except that on either side the truth compels us into this opinion, that we ought to understand it to have been God the Son, who, because He is of God, is rightly called God, because He is the Son of God. But, because He is subjected138    [De subordinatione, etc.: Bull, Defensio, etc., vol. v. pp. 767, 685. The Nicene doctrine includes the subordination of the Son.] to the Father, and the Announcer of the Father’s will, He is declared to be the Angel of Great Counsel.139    [Isa. ix. 6, according to the Seventy.  Ex. xxiii. 20. See Bull, Defensio, etc., vol. v. p. 30. Comp. Hippol., p. 225, supra; Novatian, p. 632, infra.] Therefore, although this passage neither is suited to the person of the Father, lest He should be called an angel, nor to the person of an angel, lest he should be called God; yet it is suited to the person of Christ that He should be both God because He is the Son of God, and should be an angel because He is the Announcer of the Father’s mind. And the heretics ought to understand that they are setting themselves against the Scriptures, in that, while they say that they believe Christ to have been also an angel, they are unwilling to declare Him to have been also God, when they read in the Old Testament that He often came to visit the human race. To this, moreover, Moses added the instance of God seen of Abraham at the oak of Mamre, when he was sitting at the opening of his tent at noon-day. And nevertheless, although he had beheld three men, note that he called one of them Lord; and when he had washed their feet, he offers them bread baked on the ashes, with butter and abundance of milk itself, and urges them that, being detained as guests, they should eat. And after this he hears also that he should be a father, and learns that Sarah his wife should bring forth a son by him; and acknowledges concerning the destruction of the people of Sodom, what they deserve to suffer; and learns that God had come down on account of the cry of Sodom. In which place, if they will have it that the Father was seen at that time to have been received with hospitality in company with two angels, the heretics have believed the Father to be visible. But if an angel, although of the three angels one is called Lord, why, although it is not usual, is an angel called God? Unless because, in order that His proper invisibility may be restored to the Father, and the proper inferiority140    [De subordinatione, etc.: Bull, Defensio, etc., vol. v. pp. 767, 685. The Nicene doctrine includes the subordination of the Son.] be remitted to the angel, it was only God the Son, who also is God, who was seen by Abraham, and was believed to have been received with hospitality. For He anticipated sacramentally what He was hereafter to become. He was made a guest of Abraham, being about to be among the sons of Abraham. And his children’s feet, by way of proving what He was, He washed; returning in the children the claim of hospitality which formerly the Father had put out to interest to Him. Whence also, that there might be no doubt but that it was He who was the guest of Abraham on the destruction of the people of Sodom, it is declared: “Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrha fire and brimstone from the Lord out of heaven.”141    Gen. xix. 24. For thus also said the prophet in the person of God: “I have overthrown you, as the Lord overturned Sodom and Gomorrha.”142    Amos iv. 11.  Therefore the Lord overturned Sodom, that is, God overturned Sodom; but in the overturning of Sodom, the Lord rained fire from the Lord.  And this Lord was the God seen by Abraham; and this God was the guest of Abraham, certainly seen because He was also touched. But although the Father, being invisible, was assuredly not at that time seen, He who was accustomed to be touched and seen was seen and received to hospitality. But this the Son of God, “The Lord rained from the Lord upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire.” And this is the Word of God. And the Word of God was made flesh, and dwelt among us; and this is Christ. It was not the Father, then, who was a guest with Abraham, but Christ. Nor was it the Father who was seen then, but the Son; and Christ was seen. Rightly, therefore, Christ is both Lord and God, who was not otherwise seen by Abraham, except that as God the Word He was begotten of God the Father before Abraham himself. Moreover, says the Scripture, the same Angel and God visits and consoles the same Hagar when driven with her son from the dwelling of Abraham. For when in the desert she had exposed the infant, because the water had fallen short from the pitcher; and when the lad had cried out, and she had lifted up her weeping and lamentation, “God heard,” says the Scripture, “the voice of the lad from the place where he was.”143    Gen. xxi. 17, etc. Having told that it was God who heard the voice of the infant, it adds:  “And the angel of the Lord called Hagar herself out of heaven,” saying that that was an angel144    [See note 2, p. 628, supra.] whom it had called God, and pronouncing Him to be Lord whom it had set forth as an angel; which Angel and God moreover promises to Hagar herself greater consolations, in saying, “Fear not; for I have heard the voice of the lad from the place where he was. Arise, take up the lad, and hold him; for I will make of him a great nation.”145    Gen. xxi. 18. Why does this angel, if angel only, claim to himself this right of saying, I will make of him a great nation, since assuredly this kind of power belongs to God, and cannot belong to an angel? Whence also He is confirmed to be God, since He is able to do this; because, by way of proving this very point, it is immediately added by the Scripture: “And God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of running water; and she went and filled the bottle from the well, and gave to the lad: and God was with the lad.”146    Gen. xxi. 20. If, then, this God was with the Lord, who opened the eyes of Hagar that she might see the well of running water, and might draw the water on account of the urgent need of the lad’s thirst, and this God who calls her from heaven is called an angel when, in previously hearing the voice of the lad crying, He was rather God; is not understood to be other than angel, in like manner as He was God also. And since this cannot be applicable or fitting to the Father, who is God only, but may be applicable to Christ, who is declared to be not only God, but angel also,147    [See vol. i. p. 184.] it manifestly appears that it was not the Father who thus spoke to Hagar, but rather Christ, since He is God; and to Him also is applied the name of angel, since He became the “angel of great counsel.”148    Isa. ix. 6, LXX. And He is the angel, in that He declares the bosom of the Father, as John sets forth. For if John himself says, that He Himself who sets forth the bosom of the Father, as the Word, became flesh in order to declare the bosom of the Father, assuredly Christ is not only man, but angel also; and not only angel, but He is shown by the Scriptures to be God also. And this is believed to be the case by us; so that, if we will not consent to apprehend that it was Christ who then spoke to Hagar, we must either make an angel God, or we must reckon God the Father Almighty among the angels.149    [Among the apparitions are noted Gen. xxxii. 24; Ex. iii.; Num. xxii. 21; Josh. v. 13; 1 Kings xxviii. 11.]

CAPUT XVIII. al. XXVI. Inde etiam, quod Abrahae visus legatur Deus: quod de Patre nequeat intelligi, quem nemo vidit umquam; sed de Filio in Angeli imagine.

0918D

Ecce idem Moyses refert alio in loco, quod Abrahae 0919A visus sit Deus (Gen. XII, 7). Atquin idem Moyses audit a Deo, quod nemo hominum Deum videat et vivat (Exod. XXXIII, 20). Si videri non potest Deus, quomodo visus est Deus? Aut si visus est, quomodo videri non potest? Nam et Joannes, Deum nemo (inquit) vidit umquam (I Joan. IV, 12). Et apostolus Paulus: Quem vidit hominum nemo, nec videre potest (I Tim. VI, 16). Sed non utique Scriptura mentitur: ergo vere visus est Deus. Ex quo intelligi potest, quod non Pater visus sit, qui numquam visus est; sed Filius, qui et descendere solitus est, et videri quia descenderit. Imago est enim invisibilis Dei, ut mediocritas et fragilitas conditionis humanae Deum Patrem videre aliquando jam tunc assuesceret in imagine Dei, hoc est, in Filio Dei. Gradatim enim 0919B et per incrementa fragilitas humana nutriri debuit per imaginem ad istam gloriam, ut Deum Patrem videre possit aliquando. Periculosa sunt enim quae magna sunt, si repentina sunt. Nam etiam lux solis subita post tenebras, splendore nimio insuetis oculis non ostendet diem, sed potius faciet caecitatem.

Quod ne in damnum humanorum contingat oculorum, paulatim disruptis et dissipatis tenebris, ortus luminaris istius mediocribus incrementis fallenter assurgens oculos hominum sensim assuefacit ad totum orbem suum ferendum per incrementa radiorum. Sic ergo et Christus, id est, imago Dei et Filius Dei, ab hominibus inspicitur, qua poterat videri. Et ideo fragilitas et mediocritas sortis humanae per ipsum alitur, producitur, educatur; ut aliquando Deum quoque ipsum 0919C Patrem, assueta Filium conspicere, possit, ut est, videre; ne majestatis ipsius repentino et intolerabili fulgore percussa intercipi possit, ut Deum Patrem quem semper optavit, videre non possit. Ex quo Filius est hic qui videtur; Dei autem Filius, Dei Verbum est; Dei autem Verbum caro factum est et habitavit in nobis: hic autem Christus est. Quae, malum, ratio est ut dubitetur Deus dici, qui tot modis Deus intelligitur approbari? Ac si et Agar (Gen. XVI, 7), ancillam Sarae de domo ejectam pariter et fugatam Angelus convenit apud fontem aquae in via Sur, fugae causas interrogat atque accipit; et post haec humilitatis consilia porrigit; spem praeterea illi materni nominis facit, quodque ex utero ejus multum semen esset futurum spondet atque promittit, et quod Hismael ex illa 0919D nasci haberet, et cum caeteris aperit locum habitationis ipsius, actumque describit: hunc autem Angelum, 0920A et Dominum Scriptura proponit et Deum: (nam nec benedictionem seminis promisisset, nisi Angelus et Deus fuisset) quaerant quid in praesenti loco haeretici tractent. Pater fuit iste qui ab Agar visus est, an non? quia Deus positus est. Sed absit Deum Patrem Angelum dicere: ne alteri subditus sit, cujus Angelus fuerit. Sed Angelum dicent fuisse: quomodo ergo Deus erit, si Angelus fuit? cum non sit hoc nomen Angelis umquam concessum; nisi quoniam ex utroque latere nos veritas in istam concludit sententiam ; quia intelligere debeamus Dei Filium fuisse: qui quoniam ex Deo est, merito Deus, quia Dei Filius, dictus sit : quoniam Patri subditus et annuntiator paternae voluntatis est, magni consilii Angelus pronuntiatus est. Ergo si hic locus neque 0920B personae Patris congruit, ne Angelus dictus sit: neque personae Angeli, ne Deus pronuntiatus sit: personae autem Christi convenit ut et Deus sit, quia Dei Filius est; et Angelus sit, quoniam paternae dispositionis annuntiator est; intelligere debent contra Scripturas se agere haeretici; qui Christum cum dicant se et Angelum credere, nolint illum etiam Deum pronuntiare, quem in Veteri Testamento ad visitationem generis humani legunt saepe venisse. Adhuc adjecit Moyses (Gen. XVIII, 1), Abrahae visum Deum apud quercum Mambre, sedente ipso ad ostium tabernaculi sui meridie: et nihilominus, cum tres conspexisset viros, unum ex illis Dominum nuncupasse; quorum cum pedes lavisset, cineritios panes cum butyro, et ipsius copia lactis offert, et ut hospites 0920C retenti vescerentur, hortatur. Post quae et quod pater futurus esset, audit: et quod Sara uxor ejus paritura ex ipso filium esset, ediscit: et de exitu Sodomitarum, quae merebantur pati, recognoscit: et quod propter clamorem Sodomorum Deus descendisset, addiscit. Quo in loco in Patrem volunt videri tunc fuisse cum Angelis duobus hospitio receptum, Patrem visibilem haeretici crediderunt: si autem Angelum, cum ex Angelis tribus unus Dominus nuncupatur: cur, quod non solet, Angelus Deus dicitur? nisi quoniam, ut Deo Patri invisibilitas propria reddatur, et Angelo propria mediocritas remittatur, non nisi Dei Filius, qui et Deus est, Abrahae visus, et hospitio receptus esse . credetur. Quod enim erat futurus, meditabatur in sacramento, Abrahae factus hospes apud 0920D Abrahae filios futurus (Joan. XIII, 5); cujus filiorum pedes, ad probationem quod ipse esset, abluit; reddens 0921A in filiis jus hospitalitatis, quod aliquando illi feneraverat pater. Unde et ne qua esset dubitatio quin iste Abrahae hospes fuisset, in Sodomitarum exitu ponitur (Gen. XIX, 24): Quoniam pluit Dominus super Sodomam, et Gomorrham ignem et sulphur a Domino de coelo. Sic enim et Prophetes ex persona Dei: Subverti vos, inquit, sicut subvertit . Dominus Sodomam et Gomorrham (Amos IV, 11). Dominus ergo Sodomam subvertit, id est, Deus Sodomam subvertit: sed in subversione Sodomorum Dominus pluit ignem a Domino. Hic autem Dominus visus est Abrahae Deus: Deus autem hic hospes est Abrahae, visus utique quia tactus: sed cum Pater , quia invisibilis, nec tunc utique visus sit; visus est et hospitio receptus et acceptus est , qui solitus est tangi, et 0921B videri: hic autem Filius Dei, Dominus a Domino pluit super Sodomam et Gomorrham sulphur atque ignem. Hic autem Dei Verbum est: Verbum autem Dei caro factum est, et habitavit in nobis: hic autem Christus est. Non Pater igitur apud Abraham hospes, sed Christus fuit; nec tunc Pater visus est, sed Filius ; visus autem est Christus. Merito igitur Christus, et Dominus et Deus est, qui non aliter Abrahae visus est, nisi quia ante ipsum Abraham, ex Patre Deo Deus Sermo generatus est. Adhuc, inquit, idem Angelus et Deus eamdem Agar fugatam de domo Abrahae cum puero, consolatur et visitat. Nam cum illa in solitudine exposuisset infantem, quia aqua defecisset ex utre, cumque puer ille clamasset, fletum et planctum levasset (Gen. XXI, 17, 18, 19) , Et audivit, inquit 0921C Scriptura, Deus vocem pueri de loco ubi erat. Cum Deum esse qui vocem infantis audivit, retulisset; adjecit: Et vocavit Angelus Domini ipsam Agar de coelo; Angelum referens esse quem Deum dixerat, et Dominum pronuntians esse quem Angelum collocarat: quique Angelus et Deus adhuc ipsi Agar promittit majora solatia, dicendo: Ne timueris; exaudivi enim vocem pueri de loco ubi erat. Surge, sume puerum, et 0922A tene: in gentem enim magnam faciam eum. Hic Angelus, si Angelus tantum est, cur hoc sibi vindicat ut dicat: In gentem enim magnam faciam eum, cum hoc utique genus potentiae Dei sit, Angeli esse non possit? Ex quo etiam Deus confirmatur esse qui hoc potest facere: quoniam ut hoc ipsum comprobetur, adjicitur per Scripturam statim: Et aperuit Deus oculos ejus, et vidit puteum aquae vivae, et abiit, et implevit utrem de puteo, et dedit puero, et erat Deus cum puero. Si ergo hic Deus erat cum puero qui aperuit oculos Agar, ut videret puteum aquae vivae, et hauriret aquam propter urgentem sitis necessitatem; hic autem Deus coelo illam vocat Angelus dictus, cum superius vocem audiens clamantis pueri . Deus esset potius, non alius intelligitur quam Angelus esse pariter et 0922B Deus. Quod cum Patri competens et conveniens esse non possit, qui tantummodo Deus est: competens autem esse possit Christo, qui non tantummodo Deus, sed et Angelus pronuntiatus est; manifeste apparet, non Patrem ibi tunc locutum fuisse ad Agar, sed Christum potius, cum Deus sit, cui etiam Angeli competit nomen; quippe cum magni consilii Angelus factus sit (Isa. IX, 6): Angelus autem sit, dum exponit sinum Patris, sicut Joannes edicit (Joan. I, 18). Si enim ipse Joannes hunc eumdem qui sinum exponit Patris, Verbum dicit carnem factum esse, ut sinum Patris posset exponere: merito Christus non solum homo est , sed et Angelus; nec Angelus tantum, sed et Deus per Scripturas ostenditur, et a nobis hoc esse creditur: ne, si non Christum tunc locutum ad 0922C Agar voluerimus accipere; aut Angelum Deum faciamus, aut Deum Patrem omnipotentem inter Angelos computemus.