III.  And great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them there, where the multitude was greater.  If He had abode upon His own eminence, if He had not condescended to infirmity, if He had remained what He was, keeping Himself unapproachable and incomprehensible, a few perhaps would have followed Him—perhaps not even a few, possibly only Moses—and He only so far as to see with difficulty the Back Parts of God.4    Exod. xx. 21; xxxiii. 20, 23.  For He penetrated the cloud, either being placed outside the weight of the body or being withdrawn from his senses; for how could he have gazed upon the subtlety, or the incorporeity, or I know not how one should call it, of God, being incorporate and using material eyes?  But inasmuch as He strips Himself for us, inasmuch as He comes down (and speak of an exinanition, as it were, a laying aside and a diminution of His glory), He becomes by this comprehensible.

Γʹ. Καὶ ἠκολούθησαν αὐτῷ ὄχλοι πολλοὶ, καὶ ἐθεράπευσεν αὐτοὺς ἐκεῖ, ἔνθα πλείων ἡ ἐρημία. Εἰ ἐπὶ τῆς ἰδίας ἔμεινε περιωπῆς, εἰ μὴ συγκατέβη τῇ ἀσθενείᾳ, εἰ ὅπερ ἦν ἔμεινεν, ἀπρόσιτον ἑαυτὸν φυλάττων καὶ ἀπερίληπτον, ὀλίγοι ἂν ἠκολούθησαν τυχόν: οὐκ οἶδα δὲ, εἰ καὶ ὀλίγοι, τάχα μόνος Μωϋτῆς, καὶ οὗτος τοσοῦτον, ὥστε μόλις ἰδεῖν Θεοῦ τὰ ὀπίσθια. Τὴν μὲν γὰρ νεφέλην διέσχεν, ἔξω τοῦ σωματικοῦ βάρους γενόμενος, ἢ συσταλεὶς ἀπὸ τῶν αἰσθήσεων: Θεοῦ δὲ λεπτότητα, ἢ ἀσωματότητα, ἢ οὐκ οἶδα ὅπως ἄν τις ὀνομάσειε, πῶς ἂν ἐθεάσατο σῶμά τε ὢν, καὶ αἰσθητοῖς ὀφθαλμοῖς προσβάλλων; Ἀλλ' ἐπειδὴ κενοῦται δι' ἡμᾶς, ἐπειδὴ κατέρχεται (κένωσιν δὲ λέγω τὴν τῆς δόξης οἷον ὕφεσίν τε καὶ ἐλάττωσιν), διὰ τοῦτο χωρητὸς γίνεται.