41

a pious, complete transformation. For nothing so represents the work of your divine priesthood as a zeal according to God, tempered with reverence and unyielding, and the innate reason in us which both contains and ignites it, preparing us to do, and wisely guiding, those things which He who is first by nature commands, for our ascent to Him, and the perfect restoration through holy deeds and good doctrines; and the avoidance and turning away from those things that make us miss this sacred ascent.

And what else violently dissolves this and, as it were, walls it off—I mean the journey to the Word—other than the terrible betrayal of Him by those who have now risen up against those who travel the royal road of the divine and patristic dogmas, and who know (73) no deviation to either side into the unfortunate pits of confusion and ravines of division? or who wish to know at all, by the grace of the all-holy Spirit who wisely guides and leads by the hand, into the perfect, face-to-face knowledge and initiation of the great God and Savior of all, Christ, those who according to their prayers hasten through sincere and orthodox faith. For it is a betrayal, the alteration of the pious doctrine of Him and about Him, selling Him out by the reception of the confession and teaching of the heterodox, for the destruction of His all-holy flesh from us; or rather, for the overthrow of the entire economy; and a betrayal so much heavier than that which happened in the first place, when the Word was with us in the flesh, by as much as the knowledge of His divinity, and the truth of His humanity, have been made more perfectly manifest to all; reaching the ends of the earth through the great voice of the holy Fathers who proclaimed it. For since it is firmly confessed by all everywhere, and orthodoxly believed, according to the exposition of them, I mean of the divinely chosen teachers, that the one of the holy and consubstantial Trinity, the only-begotten Son, being perfect God by nature, became perfect man by will, having truly assumed flesh consubstantial with ours from the holy Theotokos and Ever-Virgin, animated with a rational and intellectual soul, and having properly and inseparably united it to Himself hypostatically, He is one with it just as He was before; except not simple in hypostasis, even if simple in nature; since He remained God and consubstantial with the Father; and again, twofold as He became flesh; so that by the duality of nature, He might be akin in essence to the extremes, and preserve the natural difference of His proper parts with respect to each other; and by the oneness of person, having the perfect identity in the parts, He might possess the personal difference with respect to the extremes, as one and only; and by the unimpaired natural and essential identity with them (I mean, the extremes), He might be perfect in both; the same one, at once God and man; they introduce Him as imperfect, and as having suffered the loss of what is natural, who impiously dogmatize a diminution of what naturally belongs to Him. For if He does not unimpairedly preserve the property of each nature, apart from sin alone, according to the divine Fathers, of which and in which the incarnate Word properly is, even after the union, He is an incomplete God; if indeed as a man He possesses a diminution of natural properties.

Therefore, one must not, on the pretext of a so-called union that harms nothing, but only binds things together into one hypostasis, corrupt their existence by the abolition of both the natural will (76) and the essential energy. For whether, as if something whole from parts, we happen to melt down and fuse by composition the two essential wills and the equal number of natural energies into one will and one energy, such a thing is mythical, and entirely foreign and alien to the Father and to us

41

εὐσεβῶς ὁλικήν μεταποίησιν. Οὐδέν γάρ οὕτω τῆς κατά σέ θείας ἱερωσύνης εἰκονίζει τό ἔργον, ὡς ὁ κατά Θεόν εὐλαβείᾳ σύγκρατος καί ἀνένδοτος ζῆλος, καί ὁ τούτου συνεκτικός ἅμα καί ἐξαπτικός ἐν ἡμῖν ἔμφυτος λόγος, ἐκεῖνο δρᾷν παρασκευάζων, καί σοφῶς οἰακίζων, ἅπερ ὁ φύσει καί πρῶτος διακελεύεται, πρός τήν ἡμῶν ἄνοδον εἰς αὐτόν, καί τελείαν δι᾿ ἔργων ὁσίων καί δογμάτων ἀγαθῶν ἀποκατάστασιν· ἀποφυγήν δέ καί ἀποστροφήν, τῶν ταύτης ἡμᾶς ποιούντων διαμαρτεῖν τῆς ἱερᾶς ἀναβάσεως.

Καί τί γε ἄλλο διαλύει ταύτην σφοδρῶς, καί οἷον ἀποτειχίζει· φημί δέ τήν πρός τόν Λόγον πορείαν, πλήν τῆς αὐτοῦ φοβερᾶς προδοσίας τῶν νῦν ἐπιφυέντων τοῖς τήν βασιλικήν ὁδόν τῶν θείων καί πατρικῶν δογμάτων ὁδεύουσι· καί μηδεμίαν τῶν παρ' ἑκατέρα δυστυχῶς φερομένων ἐν βαράθροις συγχύσεως καί φάραγξι διαιρέσεως παρεκτροπήν (73) γινωσκόντων; ἤ γνῶναι καθοτιοῦν βουλομένων, χάριτι τοῦ σοφῶς ὁδηγοῦντός τε καί χειραγωγοῦντος παναγίου Πνεύματος, εἰς τήν πρόσωπον πρός πρόσωπον τελείαν ἐπίγνωσίν τε καί μύησιν αὐτοῦ τοῦ μεγάλου Θεοῦ καί Σωτῆρος τῶν ὅλων Χριστοῦ, τούς κατ᾿ εὐχάς δι᾿ εἰλικρινοῦς καί ὀρθοδόξου πίστεως ἐπειγομένους. Πρόδοσις γάρ ἐστι, ἡ τῆς εὐσεβοῦς αὐτοῦ τε καί περί αὐτοῦ δόξης παραλλαγή, τῇ προσλήψει τῆς τῶν ἑτεροδόξων ὁμολογίας καί διδαχῆς ἀπεμπολοῦσα αὐτόν, εἰς ἀναίρεσιν τῆς ἐξ ἡμῶν παναγίας αὐτοῦ σαρκός· μᾶλλον δέ τῆς ὅλης οἰκονομίας ἀνατροπήν· καί προδοσία τῆς ἐν πρώτοις, ὅτε σαρκί μεθ᾿ ἡμῶν ὑπῆρχεν ὁ Λόγος, γεγενημένης, βαρυτέρα τοσοῦτον, ὅσῳ τελειωτέρα τοῖς πᾶσιν ἥ τε τῆς θεότητος αὐτοῦ γνῶσις, καί τῆς κατ᾿ αὐτόν ἀνθρωπότητος ἡ ἀλήθεια προδήλως γεγένηται· τά πέρατα τῆς οἰκουμένης διαλαβοῦσα τῇ μεγαλοφωνίᾳ τῶν αὐτήν κηρυττόντων ἁγίων Πατέρων. Πᾶσι γάρ πανταχοῦ βεβαίως ὁμολογουμένου, καί ὀρθοδόξως πιστευομένου, κατά τήν αὐτῶν, φημί δή τῶν θεοκρίτων ὑφήγησιν διδασκάλων, ὡς ὁ εἷς τῆς ἁγίας καί ὁμοουσίου Τριάδος, ὁ μονογενής Υἱός, τέλειος κατά φύσιν ὑπάρχων Θεός, τέλειος κατά θέλησιν ἄνθρωπος γέγονε, σάρκα τήν ἡμῶν ὁμοούσιον ἐκ τῆς ἁγίας Θεομήτορος Ἀειπαρθένου κατ᾿ ἀλήθειαν προσλαβών, λογικῶς τε καί νοερῶς ἐψυχωμένην, καί καθ᾿ ὑπόστασιν ἑαυτῷ κυρίως ἀδιασπάστως ἑνώσας, εἷς τε μετ᾿ αὐτῆς ὑπάρχει καθά καί πρότερον· πλήν οὐκ ἀσύνθετος τήν ὑπόστασιν· εἰ καί τήν φύσιν ἁπλοῦς· ἅτε διαμείνας Θεός καί τῷ Πατρί ὁμοούσιος· καί αὖθις διπλοῦς ὡς γενόμενος σάρξ· ἵνα τῷ μέν διττῷ τῆς φύσεως, συγγενής ᾗ κατ᾿ οὐσίαν τοῖς ἄκροις, καί τήν πρός ἄλληλα φυσικήν τῶν οἰκείων μερῶν σώζῃ διαφοράν· τῶ δέ μοναδικῷ τοῦ προσώπου, τήν ἐν τοῖς μέρεσι τελείαν ἔχων ταυτότητα, καί τήν πρός τά ἄκρα προσωπικήν, ὡς εἷς καί μόνος, κέκτηται διαφοράν· καί τῷ ἀνελλιπεῖ τῆς πρός αὐτά (φημί δέ τά ἄκρα) φυσικῆς καί οὐσιώδους ἀπαραλλαξίας, τέλειος ᾖ τά ἑκάτερα· Θεός ὁμοῦ καί ἄνθρωπος ὁ αὐτός· ἀτελῆ τοῦτον εἰσάγουσι, καί τῶν κατά φύσιν παθόντα τήν ἔκπτωσιν, οἱ τήν τῶν προσόντων αὐτῷ φυσικῶς ἀπομείωσιν ἀσεβῶς δογματίζοντες. Εἰ γάρ ἑκατέρας φύσεως ἀνελλιπῶς οὐ φυλάττει τήν ἰδιότητα, χωρίς μόνης ἁμαρτίας, κατά τούς θείους Πατέρας, τῶν ἐξ ὧν καί ἐν αἷς κυρίως ἐστίν ὁ σαρκωθείς Λόγος καί μετά τήν ἕνωσιν, ἐλλιπής ὑπάρχει Θεός· εἴπερ ὅλως ἄνθρωπος μείωσιν τῶν φυσικῶν κεκτημένος.

Οὐ χρή τοιγαροῦν προφάσει δῆθεν ἑνώσεως μηδενί λυμαινομένης, ἀλλά μόνον εἰς ἕν καθ᾿ ὑπόστασιν συνδεούσης τά πράγματα, τήν ὕπαρξιν αὐτῶν παραφθείρειν, τῇ ἀναιρέσει τοῦ τε φυσικοῦ θελήματος (76) καί τῆς οὐσιώδους ἐνεργείας. Εἴτε γάρ ὡς ἐκ μερῶν ὅλον τι, τά τε οὐσιώδη δύο θελήματα καί τάς ἰσαρίθμους φυσικάς ἐνεργείας κατά σύνθεσιν εἰς ἕν θέλημα καί μίαν ἐνέργειαν ἐκτήξομεν τυχόν καί χωνεύσομεν, μυθικόν τό τοιοῦτον, καί τῆς πρός τόν Πατέρα καί ἡμᾶς ξένον τε πάντη καί ἀλλότριον