Section XCII

Accordingly, Athanasius, whose name is an encomium, after he observed¹ that the human race would altogether have perished εἰ μὴ ὁ πάντων δεσπότης καὶ σωτὴρ τοῦ θεοῦ υἱὸς παρεγέγονει πρὸς τὸ τοῦ θανάτου τέλος, unless the Son of God, the Lord and Savior of all, had come to bring death to an end, immediately adds²:

But this truly great work πρέπει μάλιστα τῇ ἀγαθότητι τοῦ θεοῦ, was especially becoming to the divine goodness.

For if an emperor by no means abandons a house or city built by himself and afterward attacked by robbers through the negligence of its citizens, but defends and protects it as his own work, regarding not the citizens’ inertia but what is becoming to himself, πολλῷ πλέον ὁ τοῦ παναγάθου θεοῦ λόγος πατρὸς εἰς φθορὰν κατερχόμενον τὸ δι᾽ αὐτοῦ γενόμενον τῶν ἀνθρώπων γένος οὐ παρεῖδεν· ἀλλὰ τὸν μὲν συμβεβηκότα θάνατον ἀπήλειψε διὰ τῆς προσφορᾶς τοῦ ἰδίου σώματος, τὴν δὲ ἀμέλειαν αὐτῶν διωρθώσατο τῇ ἑαυτοῦ διδασκαλίᾳ, πάντα τὰ τῶν ἀνθρώπων διὰ τῆς αὐτοῦ δυνάμεως κατορθώσας, much more did God the Word of the all-good Father not abandon the nature of men as it went into corruption through him; but by the offering of his own body he destroyed the death into which they had fallen, corrected their negligence by his instruction, and restored by his power all things that belonged to men.

Nor does he affirm these things alone, but he proceeds³ to prove them with arguments, saying:

Whoever has read the writings of the theologians, the disciples of the Savior, will be able to confirm these things by their authority, where they say⁴: “For the charity of Christ presses us, judging this, that if one died for all, therefore all died; and he died for all”⁵, “that we might no longer live for ourselves, but for him who died for us and rose from the dead, our Lord Jesus Christ.” And again⁶: “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels”⁷, “crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, that by the grace of God he might taste death for all.”

Afterward the same man gives the reason why it was fitting that no one other than God the Word should become man: “For it became him,” he says⁸, “for whom are all things and through whom are all things, who had brought many sons into glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through suffering.” By these words he signifies that it belonged to no one other than God the Word, by whom men were created in the beginning, to recall them from the corruption which had arisen. And that the Word himself therefore took a body to himself, that it might become a victim for like bodies, they also declare in this manner⁹: “Since therefore the children shared in flesh and blood, he likewise partook of the same, that through death he might destroy him who had the empire of death, that is, the devil, and deliver those who through fear of death were subject to servitude throughout their whole life.” For by immolating his own body, he placed an end upon the law enacted against us and renewed for us the beginning of life, hope of rising again having been given. For since death had received its power over men from men, hence through God the Word made man came the dissolution of death and the resurrection of life, as the man full of Christ says¹⁰: “For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead.”

“For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. Οὐκέτι γὰρ νῦν ὡς κατακρινόμενοι ἀποθνῄσκομεν, ἀλλ᾽ ὡς ἐγειρόμενοι περιμένομεν τὴν κοινὴν πάντων ἀνάστασιν, ἣν καιροῖς ἰδίοις δείξει ὁ καὶ ταύτην ἐργασάμενος καὶ χαρισάμενος θεός. For we no longer die now as those who are to be condemned, but, as those who are to be raised from the dead, we await the common resurrection of all, which God, its author and giver, will manifest in its proper times.”

Whence he concludes¹¹: αἰτία μὲν δὴ πρώτη τῆς ἐνανθρωπήσεως τοῦ σωτῆρος αὕτη, “This, therefore, is the first cause for which the Savior assumed humanity.”