Τοῦ ἁγίου Ἱππολύτου ἐπισκόπου Πόρτου ἤγουν τοῦ λιμένος Ῥώμης καὶ μάρτυρος τῆς ἀληθείας ἐκ τοῦ κατὰ Βήρωνος καὶ Ἡλίκονος τῶν αἱρετικῶν περὶ θεολογίας κ

 Τοῦ αὐτοῦ ἐκ τοῦ αὐτοῦ λόγου. βʹ Γέγονεν οὖν ἀληθῶς κατὰ τὰς γραφὰς μὴ τραπεὶς ὁ τῶν ὅλων θεὸς ἄνθρωπος ἀναμάρτητος, ὡς οἶδεν αὐτὸς μόνος, ὑπάρχων τεχ

 [Τοῦ αὐτοῦ] ἐκ τοῦ αὐτοῦ λόγου. γʹ. Κἀμοὶ γάρ, ἵνα τρανώσω παραδείγματι τὸ περὶ τοῦ σωτῆρος λεχθέν, ὁ φυσικός μου λόγος συγγενής ἐστι καὶ κατάλληλος ὄ

 Τοῦ αὐτοῦ ἐκ τοῦ αὐτοῦ λόγου. δʹ. Τὸ γὰρ μυστήριον τῆς θείας σαρκώσεως ἀποστόλοις τε καὶ προφήταις καὶ διδασκάλοις διττὴν καὶ διάφορον ἔχον διέγνωσται

 Τοῦ αὐτοῦ ἐκ τοῦ αὐτοῦ λόγου. εʹ. Βήρων γάρ τις ἔναγχος μεθ' ἑτέρων τινῶν τὴν Βαλεντίνου φαντασίαν ἀφέντες χείρονι κακῷ κατεπάρησαν, λέγοντες τὴν μὲν

 Τοῦ αὐτοῦ ἐκ τοῦ αὐτοῦ λόγου. Ϛʹ. Εὐσεβὲς κεκύρωται δόγμα Χριστιανοῖς, κατ' αὐτήν τε τὴν φύσιν καὶ τὴν ἐνέργειαν καὶ πᾶν ἕτερον αὐτῷ προσφυὲς ἴσον ἑαυ

 Τοῦ αὐτοῦ ἐκ τοῦ αὐτοῦ λόγου. ζʹ. Εἰ δὲ τῆς αὐτῆς αὐτῷ μὴ γέγονε φύσεως, οὐδὲ τῆς αὐτῆς αὐτῷ ποτε γενήσεται φυσικῆς ἐνεργείας, ἵνα μὴ δειχθῇ τῇ φύσει

 Τοῦ αὐτοῦ ἐκ τοῦ αὐτοῦ λόγου. ηʹ. Εἰς ταύτην δὲ τὴν πλάνην κατήχθησαν κακῶς πεισθέντες, ἰδίαν γενέσθαι τῆς σαρκὸς τὴν δι' αὐτῆς ἐκφανθεῖσαν ἐν τοῖς θα

Against Beron and Helix.

Fragments of a discourse, alphabetically divided, on the Divine Nature and the Incarnation, against the heretics Beron and Helix, the beginning of which was in these words, “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth, with voice never silent the seraphim exclaim and glorify God.”

Fragment I.

By the omnipotent will of God all things are made, and the things that are made are also preserved, being maintained according to their several principles in perfect harmony by Him who is in His nature the omnipotent God and maker of all things,1    αὐτῷ τῷ…Θεῷ. His divine will remaining unalterable by which He has made and moves all things, sustained as they severally are by their own natural laws.2    τοῖς ἕκαστα φυσικοις διεξαγόμενα νόμοις. Anastasius makes it naturalibus producta legibus; Capperonnier, suis quæque legibus temperata vel ordinata. For the infinite cannot in any manner or by any account be susceptible of movement, inasmuch as it has nothing towards which and nothing around which it shall be moved. For in the case of that which is in its nature infinite, and so incapable of being moved, movement would be conversion.3    τροπὴ γὰρ τοῦ κατὰ φύσιν ἀπείρου, κινεῖσθαι μὴ πεφυκότος , ἡ κίνησις; or may the sense be, “for a change in that which is in its nature infinite would just be the moving of that which is incapable of movement?” Wherefore also the Word of God being made truly man in our manner, yet without sin, and acting and enduring in man’s way such sinless things as are proper to our nature, and assuming the circumscription of the flesh of our nature on our behalf, sustained no conversion in that aspect in which He is one with the Father, being made in no respect one with the flesh through the exinanition.4    μηδ᾽ ἑνὶ παντελῶς ὃ ταυτόν ἐστι τῷ Πατρὶ γενόμενος ταυτὸν τῇ σαρκὶ διὰ τὴν κένωσιν. Thus in effect Combefisius, correcting the Latin version of Anastasius.  Baunius adopts the reading in the Greek Codex Nicephori, viz., ἕνωσιν for κένωσιν, and renders it, “In nothing was the Word, who is the same with the Father, made the same with the flesh through the union:” nulla re Verbum quod idem est cum Patre factum est idem cum carne propter unionem. But as He was without flesh,5    δίχα σαρκὸς, i.e., what He was before assuming the flesh, that He continued to be in Himself, viz., independent of limitation. He remained without any circumscription. And through the flesh He wrought divinely6    θεϊκῶς. those things which are proper to divinity, showing Himself to have both those natures in both of which He wrought, I mean the divine and the human, according to that veritable and real and natural subsistence,7    Or existence, ὕπαρξιν.  Anastasius makes it substantia. (showing Himself thus) as both being in reality and as being understood to be at one and the same time infinite God and finite man, having the nature8    οὐσίαν. of each in perfection, with the same activity,9    ἐνεργείας. that is to say, the same natural properties;10    φυσικῆς ἰδιότητος. whence we know that their distinction abides always according to the nature of each, and without conversion. But it is not (i.e., the distinction between deity and humanity), as some say, a merely comparative (or relative) matter,11    κατὰ σύγκρισιν.  Migne follows Capperonnier in taking σύγκρισις in this passage to mean not “comparison” or “relation,” but “commixture,” the “concretion and commixture” of the divine and human, which was the error of Apollinaris and Eutyches in their doctrine of the incarnation, and which had been already refuted by Tertullian, Contra Praxeam, c. xxvii. that we may not speak in an unwarrantable manner of a greater and a less in one who is ever the same in Himself.12    Or, “for that would be to speak of the same being as greater and less than Himself.” For comparisons can be instituted only between objects of like nature, and not between objects of unlike nature. But between God the Maker of all things and that which is made, between the infinite and the finite, between infinitude and finitude, there can be no kind of comparison, since these differ from each other not in mere comparison (or relatively), but absolutely in essence. And yet at the same time there has been effected a certain inexpressible and irrefragable union of the two into one substance,13    υποστασιν. which entirely passes the understanding of anything that is made.  For the divine is just the same after the incarnation that it was before the incarnation; in its essence infinite, illimitable, impassible, incomparable, unchangeable, inconvertable, self-potent,14    αὐτοσθενές. and, in short, subsisting in essence alone the infinitely worthy good.

Τοῦ ἁγίου Ἱππολύτου ἐπισκόπου Πόρτου ἤγουν τοῦ λιμένος Ῥώμης καὶ μάρτυρος τῆς ἀληθείας ἐκ τοῦ κατὰ Βήρωνος καὶ Ἡλίκονος τῶν αἱρετικῶν περὶ θεολογίας καὶ σαρκώσεως κατὰ στοιχεῖον λόγου, οὗ ἡ ἀρχή: ”Ἅγιος, ἅγιος, ἅγιος κύριος σαβαὼθ” ἀσιγήτῳ φωνῇ βοῶντα τὰ σεραφὶμ τὸν θεὸν δοξάζουσιν. Ἀπειροδυνάμῳ γὰρ θελήσει τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ γέγονε πάντα καὶ σώζεται τὰ γενόμενα κατὰ τοὺς ἑαυτῶν εὐκρινῶς ἕκαστα συντηρούμενα λόγους, αὐτῷ τῷ κατὰ φύσιν ἀπειροδυνάμῳ θεῷ καὶ ποιητῇ τῶν ὅλων τῆς θείας αὐτοῦ θελήσεως, ᾗ τὰ πάντα πεποίηκέ τε καὶ κινεῖ τοῖς ἑαυτῶν ἕκαστα φυσικοῖς διεξαγόμενα νόμοις, ἀκινήτου συνδιαμενούσης. τὸ γὰρ ἄπειρον κατ' οὐδένα τρόπον ἢ λόγον ἐπιδέχεται κίνησιν, οὐκ ἔχον ὅπου καὶ περὶ ὃ κινηθήσεται. τροπὴ γὰρ τοῦ κατὰ φύσιν ἀπείρου κινεῖσθαι μὴ πεφυκότος ἡ κίνησις. διὸ καὶ καθ' ἡμᾶς ἀληθῶς γενόμενος ἄνθρωπος χωρὶς ἁμαρτίας ὁ τοῦ θεοῦ λόγος, ἐνεργήσας τε καὶ παθὼν ἀνθρωπίνως, ὅσα τῆς φύσεώς ἐστιν ἀναμάρτητα, καὶ φυσικῆς σαρκὸς περιγραφῆς ἀνασχόμενος δι' ἡμᾶς, τροπὴν οὐχ ὑπέμεινε, μηδενὶ παντελῶς. ὃ ταυτόν ἐστι τῷ πατρί, γενόμενος ταυτὸν τῇ σαρκὶ διὰ τὴν κένωσιν. ἀλλ' ὥσπερ ἦν δίχα σαρκός, πάσης ἔξω περιγραφῆς μεμένηκε καὶ διὰ σαρκὸς θεϊκῶς ἐνεργήσας, ἅπερ θεότητός ἐστιν, ἀμφότερα δεικνὺς ἑαυτόν, δι' ὧν ἀμφοτέρως, θεϊκῶς δή φημι καὶ ἀνθρωπίνως, ἐνήργησε, κατ' αὐτὴν τὴν ὄντως ἀληθῆ καὶ φυσικὴν ὕπαρξιν θεὸν ἄπειρον ὁμοῦ καὶ περίγραπτον ἄνθρωπον ὄντα τε καὶ νοούμενον, τὴν οὐσίαν ἑκατέρου τελείως τελείαν ἔχοντα μετὰ τῆς αὐτῆς ἐνεργείας ἤγουν φυσικῆς ἰδιότητος. ἐξ ὧν μένουσαν ἀεὶ κατὰ φύσιν δίχα τροπῆς τὴν αὐτῶν ἴσμεν διαφοράν, ἀλλ' οὐχ, ὥς τινές φασι, κατὰ σύγκρισιν, ἵνα μὴ τὸν αὐτὸν ἑαυτῷ κατὰ τὸ αὐτό, παρ' ὃ δεῖ, μείζονα καὶ μείονα λέγωμεν: ὁμοφυῶν γάρ, οὐχ ἑτεροφυῶν, αἱ συγκρίσεις. θεῷ δὲ ποιητῇ τῶν ὅλων ποιητόν, ἀπείρῳ τε περατόν, καὶ ἀπειρίᾳ πέρας κατ' οὐδένα συγκρίνεται λόγον, ἀεὶ κατὰ πάντα φυσικῶς ἀλλήλων, ἀλλ' οὐ συγκριτικῶς, διαφέροντα, κἂν ἄρρητός τις καὶ ἄρρηκτος εἰς μίαν ὑπόστασιν ἀμφοτέρων γέγονεν ἕνωσις, πᾶσαν παντὸς γεννητοῦ παντελῶς διαφεύγουσα γνῶσιν. τὸ γὰρ θεῖον, ὡς ἦν πρὸ σαρκώσεως, ἔστι καὶ μετὰ σάρκωσιν κατὰ φύσιν ἄπειρον, ἄσχετον, ἀπαθές, ἀσύγκριτον, ἀναλλοίωτον, ἄτρεπτον, αὐτοσθενὲς καὶ τὸ πᾶν εἰπεῖν ὑφεστὸς οὐσιῶδες μόνον ἀπειροσθενὲς ἀγαθόν.