15. If they really conceive of a kind of degradation of the Son in relation to the Father, as though He were in a lower place, so that the Father sits above, and the Son is thrust off to the next seat below, let them confess what they mean. We shall have no more to say. A plain statement of the view will at once expose its absurdity. They who refuse to allow that the Father pervades all things do not so much as maintain the logical sequence of thought in their argument. The faith of the sound is that God fills all things;  8  Eph. iv. 10. but they who divide their up and down between the Father and the Son do not remember even the word of the Prophet: “If I climb up into heaven thou art there; if I go down to hell thou art there also.”  9  Ps. cxxxix. 7, P.B. Now, to omit all proof of the ignorance of those who predicate place of incorporeal things, what excuse can be found for their attack upon Scripture, shameless as their antagonism is, in the passages “Sit thou on my right hand”  10  Ps. cx. 1. and “Sat down on the right hand of the majesty of God”?  11  Heb. i. 3, with the variation of “of God” for “on high.” The expression “right hand” does not, as they contend, indicate the lower place, but equality of relation; it is not understood physically, in which case there might be something sinister about God,  12  I know of no better way of conveying the sense of the original σκαῖος than by thus introducing the Latin sinister, which has the double meaning of left and ill-omened. It is to the credit of the unsuperstitious character of English speaking people that while the Greek σκαῖος and ἀριστερός, the Latin sinister and lævus, the French gauche, and the German link, all have the meaning of awkward and unlucky as well as simply on the left hand, the English left (though probably derived from lift=weak) has lost all connotation but the local one. but Scripture puts before us the magnificence of the dignity of the Son by the use of dignified language indicating the seat of honour. It is left then for our opponents to allege that this expression signifies inferiority of rank. Let them learn that “Christ is the power of God and wisdom of God,”  13  1 Cor. i. 24. and that “He is the image of the invisible God”  14  Col. i. 15. and “brightness of his glory,”  15  Heb. i. 3. and that “Him hath God the Father sealed,”  16  John vi. 27. by engraving Himself on Him.  17  The more obvious interpretation of ἐσφράγισεν in John vi. 27, would be sealed with a mark of approval, as in the miracle just performed. cf. Bengel, “sigillo id quod genuinum est commendatur, et omne quod non genuinum est excluditur.” But St. Basil explains “sealed” by “stamped with the image of His Person,” an interpretation which Alfred rejects. St. Basil at the end of Chapter xxvi. of this work, calls our Lord the χαρακτὴρ καὶ ἰσότυπος σφραγίς, i.e., “express image and seal graven to the like” of the Father. St. Athanasius (Ep. i. ad Serap. xxiii.) writes, “The seal has the form of Christ the sealer, and in this the sealed participate, being formed according to it.” cf. Gal. iv. 19, and 2 Pet. i. 4.

Now are we to call these passages, and others like them, throughout the whole of Holy Scripture, proofs of humiliation, or rather public proclamations of the majesty of the Only Begotten, and of the equality of His glory with the Father? We ask them to listen to the Lord Himself, distinctly setting forth the equal dignity of His glory with the Father, in His words, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father;”  18  John xiv. 9. and again, “When the Son cometh in the glory of his Father;”  19  Mark viii. 38. that they “should honour the Son even as they honour the Father;”  20  John v. 23. and, “We beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father;”  21  John i. 14. and “the only begotten God which is in the bosom of the Father.”  22  John i. 18. “Only begotten God” is here the reading of five mss. of Basil. The words are wanting in one codex. In Chapter viii. of this work St. Basil distinctly quotes Scripture as calling the Son “only begotten God.” (Chapter viii. Section 17.) But in Chapter xi. Section 27, where he has been alleged to quote John i. 18, with the reading “Only begotten Son” (e.g., Alford), the ms. authority for his text is in favour of “Only begotten God.” OC is the reading of א.B.C. TC of A. On the comparative weight of the textual and patristic evidence vide Bp. Westcott in loc. Of all these passages they take no account, and then assign to the Son the place set apart for His foes. A father’s bosom is a fit and becoming seat for a son, but the place of the footstool is for them that have to be forced to fall.  23  cf.Ps. cx. 1.

We have only touched cursorily on these proofs, because our object is to pass on to other points. You at your leisure can put together the items of the evidence, and then contemplate the height of the glory and the preeminence of the power of the Only Begotten. However, to the well-disposed hearer, even these are not insignificant, unless the terms “right hand” and “bosom” be accepted in a physical and derogatory sense, so as at once to circumscribe God in local limits, and invent form, mould, and bodily position, all of which are totally distinct from the idea of the absolute, the infinite, and the incorporeal. There is moreover the fact that what is derogatory in the idea of it is the same in the case both of the Father and the Son; so that whoever repeats these arguments does not take away the dignity of the Son, but does incur the charge of blaspheming the Father; for whatever audacity a man be guilty of against the Son he cannot but transfer to the Father. If he assigns to the Father the upper place by way of precedence, and asserts that the only begotten Son sits below, he will find that to the creature of his imagination attach all the consequent conditions of body. And if these are the imaginations of drunken delusion and phrensied insanity, can it be consistent with true religion for men taught by the Lord himself that “He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father”  24  John v. 23. to refuse to worship and glorify with the Father him who in nature, in glory, and in dignity is conjoined with him? What shall we say? What just defence shall we have in the day of the awful universal judgment of all-creation, if, when the Lord clearly announces that He will come “in the glory of his Father;”  25  Matt. xvi. 27. when Stephen beheld Jesus standing at the right hand of God;  26  Acts vii. 55. when Paul testified in the spirit concerning Christ “that he is at the right hand of God;”  27  Rom. viii. 34. when the Father says, “Sit thou on my right hand;”  28  Ps. cx. 1. when the Holy Spirit bears witness that he has sat down on “the right hand of the majesty”  29  Heb. viii. 1. of God; we attempt to degrade him who shares the honour and the throne, from his condition of equality, to a lower state?  30  Mr. Johnston well points out that these five testimonies are not cited fortuitously, but “in an order which carries the reader from the future second coming, through the present session at the right hand, back to the ascension in the past.” Standing and sitting, I apprehend, indicate the fixity and entire stability of the nature, as Baruch, when he wishes to exhibit the immutability and immobility of the Divine mode of existence, says, “For thou sittest for ever and we perish utterly.”  31  Baruch iii. 3, lxx. Moreover, the place on the right hand indicates in my judgment equality of honour. Rash, then, is the attempt to deprive the Son of participation in the doxology, as though worthy only to be ranked in a lower place of honour.

[15] Εἰ δ' ὡς ἐν τόπῳ ὑποκειμένῳ ὑπόβασίν τινα τοῦ Υἱοῦ νοοῦσι πρὸς τὸν Πατέρα, ὥστε ὑπεράνω μὲν τὸν Πατέρα καθῆσθαι, πρὸς δὲ τὸ ἐφεξῆς εἰς τὸ κάτω τὸν Υἱὸν ἀπεῶσθαι, ὁμολογείτωσαν τοῦτο, καὶ ἡμεῖς σιωπήσομεν, τῆς ἐναργείας αὐτόθεν τὸ ἀπεμφαῖνον ἐχούσης. Οὐδὲ γὰρ τὸ ἐν τοῖς λογισμοῖς ἀκόλουθον διασῴζουσιν οἱ διὰ πάντων διήκειν τῷ Πατρὶ μὴ διδόντες, τῆς τῶν ὑγιαινόντων ἐννοίας τὰ πάντα τὸν Θεὸν πεπληρωκέναι πιστευούσης: οὐδὲ μέμνηνται τοῦ προφήτου λέγοντος: «Ἐὰν ἀναβῶ εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν, σὺ ἐκεῖ εἶ: ἐὰν καταβῶ εἰς τὸν ᾅδην, πάρει»: οἱ τὸ ἄνω καὶ κάτω εἰς Πατέρα καὶ Υἱὸν διαιροῦντες. Ἵνα δὲ τῆς ἀμαθείας τὸν ἔλεγχον σιωπήσω, τόπον ἐπὶ τῶν ἀσωμάτων ἀφοριζόντων, τί τὴν πρὸς τὰς Γραφὰς μάχην καὶ ἐναντίωσιν αὐτῶν οὕτως ἀναίσχυντον οὖσαν παραμυθήσεται, τό: «Κάθου ἐκ δεξιῶν μου», καὶ τό: «Ἐκάθισεν ἐν δεξιᾷ τῆς μεγαλοσύνης τοῦ Θεοῦ»; Τὸ γὰρ δεξιὸν οὐ τὴν κάτω χώραν δηλοῖ _ὡς ὁ τούτων λόγος_, ἀλλὰ τὴν πρὸς τὸ ἴσον σχέσιν: οὐ σωματικῶς τοῦ δεξιοῦ λαμβανομένου_οὕτω γὰρ ἄν τι καὶ σκαιὸν ἐπὶ τοῦ Θεοῦ εἴη_, ἀλλ' ἐκ τῶν τιμίων τῆς προσεδρείας ὀνομάτων τὸ μεγαλοπρεπὲς τῆς περὶ τὸν Υἱὸν τιμῆς παριστῶντος τοῦ λόγου. Λειπόμενον τοίνυν, αὐτοὺς τὸ τῆς ἀξίας ὑποδεὲς διὰ τῆς φωνῆς ταύτης δηλοῦσθαι λέγειν. Μανθανέτωσαν τοίνυν ὅτι Χριστὸς «Θεοῦ δύναμις, καὶ Θεοῦ σοφία», καὶ ὅτι «εἰκὼν τοῦ Θεοῦ τοῦ ἀοράτου», καὶ «ἀπαύγασμα τῆς δόξης», καὶ ὅτι τοῦτον ὁ Πατὴρ ἐσφράγισεν ὁ Θεός, ὅλον αὐτῷ ἑαυτὸν ἐντυπώσας. Ταύτας τοίνυν, καὶ ὅσαι ταύταις συγγενεῖς κατὰ πᾶσάν εἰσι τὴν Γραφὴν μαρτυρίαι, πότερον ταπεινωτικὰς εἶναί φαμεν, ἢ ὥσπερ τινὰς ἀναρρήσεις, τὸ μεγαλοπρεπὲς τοῦ Μονογενοῦς καὶ τὸ πρὸς τὸν Πατέρα ἴσον τῆς δόξης ἀνακηρύττειν; Ἀκουέτωσαν δὲ καὶ αὐτοῦ τοῦ Κυρίου σαφῶς ὁμότιμον ἑαυτοῦ τὴν δόξαν τῷ Πατρὶ παριστῶντος, ἐν τῷ λέγειν: «Ὁ ἑωρακὼς ἐμέ, ἑώρακε τὸν Πατέρα.» Καὶ πάλιν: «Ὅταν ἔλθῃ ὁ Υἱὸς ἐν τῇ δόξῃ τοῦ Πατρός.» Καὶ τό: «Ἵνα τιμῶσι τὸν Υἱὸν, καθὼς τιμῶσι τὸν Πατέρα.» Καὶ τό: «Ἐθεασάμεθα τὴν δόξαν αὐτοῦ, δόξαν ὡς Μονογενοῦς παρὰ Πατρός.» Καὶ τό: «Ὁ μονογενὴς Θεός, ὁ ὢν εἰς τὸν κόλπον τοῦ Πατρός.» Ὧν μηδὲν ὑπολογισάμενοι, τὴν τοῖς ἐχθροῖς ἀφωρισμένην χώραν προστιθέασι τῷ Υἱῷ. Κόλπος μὲν γὰρ πατρικός, Υἱῷ καθέδρα πρέπουσα: ἡ δὲ τοῦ ὑποποδίου χώρα, τοῖς ἐπιδεομένοις τῆς ὑποπτώσεως. Ἡμεῖς μὲν οὖν ἐφ' ἕτερα τὴν ὁρμὴν ἔχοντες, παρατρεχόντως τῶν μαρτυριῶν ἐφηψάμεθα: ἔξεστι δέ σοι κατὰ σχολὴν συναγαγόντι τὰς ἀποδείξεις, τὸ τῆς δόξης ὕψος καὶ τὸ τῆς δυνάμεως ὑπερέχον τοῦ Μονογενοῦς κατιδεῖν. Καίτοι εὐγνώμονι ἀκροατῇ οὐδὲ ταῦτα μικρά: εἰ μή τις σαρκικῶς καὶ ταπεινῶς ἐξακούοι τοῦ δεξιοῦ καὶ τοῦ κόλπου, ὥστε τόπῳ τε τὸν Θεὸν περιγράφειν καὶ ἀναπλάττειν σχῆμα καὶ τύπον καὶ θέσιν σωματικήν, ἃ παρὰ πολὺ τῆς ἐννοίας τοῦ ἁπλοῦ καὶ ἀπείρου καὶ ἀσωμάτου διώρισται: πλήν γε δὴ ὅτι τὸ τῆς ἐννοίας αὐτοῦ ταπεινόν, ἐπί τε Πατρὸς καὶ Υἱοῦ παραπλήσιον. Ὥστε οὐ καθαιρεῖ τοῦ Υἱοῦ τὴν ἀξίαν, ἀλλὰ προσλαμβάνει τὸ κρῖμα τῆς εἰς τὸν Θεὸν βλασφημίας ὁ τὰ τοιαῦτα διεξιών. Ἐν οἷς γὰρ ἂν κατατολμήσῃ τοῦ Υἱοῦ, ταῦτα ἀνάγκη αὐτῷ μετατιθέναι πρὸς τὸν Πατέρα. Ὁ γὰρ τῷ Πατρὶ τὴν ἄνω χώραν εἰς προεδρίαν ἀποδιδούς, τὸν δὲ μονογενῆ Υἱὸν ὑποκαθῆσθαι λέγων, πάντα ἀκολουθοῦντα ἕξει τὰ σωματικὰ συμπτώματα τῷ ἑαυτοῦ ἀναπλασμῷ. Εἰ δὲ ταῦτα οἰνοπλήκτων καὶ ἐκ φρενίτιδος παραφόρων τὸν νοῦν τὰ φαντάσματα, πῶς εὐσεβὲς τὸν τῇ φύσει, τῇ δόξῃ, τῷ ἀξιώματι συνημμένον μὴ μετὰ Πατρὸς προσκυνεῖν καὶ δοξάζειν τοὺς παρ' αὐτοῦ διδαχθέντας ὅτι: «Ὁ μὴ τιμῶν τὸν Υἱὸν οὐ τιμᾷ τὸν Πατέρα»; Τί γὰρ καὶ φήσομεν; τίνα ἕξομεν δικαίαν ἀπολογίαν ἐπὶ τοῦ φοβεροῦ καὶ κοινοῦ τῆς κτίσεως πάσης δικαστηρίου, εἰ τοῦ Κυρίου σαφῶς ἐπαγγελλομένου ἥξειν ἐν τῇ δόξῃ τοῦ Πατρός, καὶ Στεφάνου θεασαμένου «Ἰησοῦν ἑστῶτα ἐκ δεξιῶν τοῦ Θεοῦ», καὶ Παύλου ἐν Πνεύματι διαμαρτυρομένου περὶ Χριστοῦ, ὅτι «ἐστὶν ἐν δεξιᾷ τοῦ Θεοῦ», καὶ τοῦ Πατρὸς λέγοντος: «Κάθου ἐκ δεξιῶν μου», καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου Πνεύματος μαρτυροῦντος ὅτι ἐκάθισεν ἐν δεξιᾷ τῆς μεγαλοσύνης τοῦ Θεοῦ: ἡμεῖς τὸν σύνθρονον καὶ ὁμότιμον ἀπὸ τῆς πρὸς τὸ ἴσον σχέσεως ἐπὶ τὸ κάτω καταβιβάζοιμεν; Οἶμαι γὰρ τὴν μὲν στάσιν καὶ τὴν καθίδρυσιν τὸ πάγιον τῆς φύσεως καὶ πάντη στάσιμον ὑποφαίνειν, καθὸ καὶ ὁ Βαροὺχ τὸ ἀκίνητον καὶ ἀμετάθετον τῆς τοῦ Θεοῦ διεξαγωγῆς ἐνδεικνύμενος, ἔφη τό: «Σὺ καθήμενος εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα, καὶ ἡμεῖς ἀπολλύμενοι εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα»: τὴν δεξιὰν δὲ χώραν δηλοῦν τὸ τῆς ἀξίας ὁμότιμον. Πῶς οὖν οὐ τολμηρὸν τῆς κατὰ τὴν δοξολογίαν κοινωνίας ἀποστερεῖν τὸν Υἱόν, ὡς ἐν ἐλάττονι χώρᾳ τιμῆς τετάχθαι ἄξιον;