Section CLXXXVII

Of these heads of doctrine there is not even one which is not abundantly confirmed by the testimony and suffrage of the Church of Pontus. For, to take my beginning from Gregory, the first bishop of Neocaesarea, who¹, on account of the signs and miracles which he accomplished with great glory to the churches, was called Thaumaturgus: even if I set aside the most splendid things² which are available from his doubtful works³, from that panegyrical oration alone—

—which⁴ he delivered when a great assembly had been convoked, with Origen himself also present, and which the martyr Pamphilus had appended to those books⁵ which he wrote in defense of Origen, things are contained which not without cause seem capable of sufficing. For, describing the Only-begotten by a circumlocution, he hands down⁶ that he is τὸν πάντων δημιουργὸν καὶ κυβερνήτην, the founder and governor of all, and indeed also τὸν προστάτην τῶν ἡμετέρων ψυχῶν καὶ σωτῆρα, the protector and savior of our souls; and, not content with these things, he calls him both τὸν τῆς μεγάλης βουλῆς ἄγγελον, the angel of the great counsel, and τὸν κοινὸν πάντων σωτῆρα, the common savior of all. But these things are so constituted that, circumscribed by no limits, they manifest the universal amplitude of reparation.

The things found in Caesarius, brother of Gregory Nazianzen, manifest this much more splendidly still. Caesarius was honored with his brother’s praises⁷, and is to be heaped with praises more ample on this account also: that he prescribed for himself this law of thinking and writing⁸: οὐκ οἰκεῖά τινα ἢ αὐτοσχέδια φράζων, ἀλλ᾽—

—ὅσα τῶν ἀοιδίμων καὶ μακαρίων πατέρων τοὺς λειμῶνας ἐπελθών, τῆς ἐκείνων ῥοδωνιᾶς συνήγαγον, “not setting forth certain things properly my own or trifling, but whatsoever, traversing the meadows of the renowned and blessed Fathers, I gathered from their rose-garden.”

From this rose-garden he plucked this first and most sweet flower: that God is more vehemently delighted by no endowment and no ornament than by merciful long-suffering. “Since,” says Caesarius⁹, “ἡ παντελὴς ἀρετὴ Θεὸς ὑπάρχει, εἰκότως μακρόθυμος προσαγορεύεται, ὡς μακρὰν ὑπάρχων θυμοῦ, God is all-embracing virtue, he is rightly called long-suffering, as one who stands far distant from anger.” But although innumerable effects of this merciful long-suffering are numbered, that effect must be considered second to none by which God, far from casting away man lost through fault, instead recalled him to life and safety. Caesarius describes¹⁰ the ruin of man, represents the accusations of the devil which followed, and then continues¹¹:

Ἀλλ᾽ ὅμως ὁ φιλάνθρωπος Θεὸς ἀτρέπτως κατὰ τὸν διαβληθέντα γενόμενος, ἐπεφοίτησεν ἡμῖν τὸν πολέμιον χειρώσασθαι, ἐν θέᾳ τοῦ ἀπατηθέντος ἀληθῶς γενόμενος, ἵνα μὴ δῷ φάσκειν τὸν ἐχθρόν, ὅτι βροτοῖς πολεμήσας ὑπὸ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἥττημαι, αὐτὸς βροτὸς γίνεται μένων Θεός, καὶ ἥκει πολεμῶν ὑπὲρ βροτῶν. Nevertheless God, the lover of the human race, being in no way changed toward him who had been accused, came to us that he might subdue the enemy, being truly born in the form of the one who had been deceived. And lest he give the enemy occasion to say, “Fighting against mortals, I have been conquered by God,” he himself becomes mortal while remaining God, and comes to fight on behalf of mortal men.

This had already been foretold five hundred years before¹² by that prophet and author of divine songs, David: “Blessed,” he says, “is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” Who is he, divine prophet? “The Lord¹³ is God, and he has appeared to us.” But for whose sake does—

—God become mortal, my David? Τοῦ καταλῦσαι ἐχθρόν, φησίν, καὶ ἐκδικητὴν τὸν διάβολον, “In order,” he says, “to destroy the enemy and exactor, the devil.”

Nevertheless he so destroyed him that he did not will the occasion of merit and praise to be taken away from us. For to one asking¹⁴, “If the Lord removed the enemy, who attacks any one of us and involves him in unforeseen temptations and sins?” Caesarius replies¹⁵:

Although God could have brought about his complete extinction and removal, nevertheless he did not will this, διὰ τὸ μὴ ἀγέραστους ἡμᾶς καταλειφθῆναι ἐν τῇ μελλούσῃ ἀϊδίῳ ζωῇ, μὴ ὄντος ἡμῖν ἐνταῦθα τινὸς ἀντιπάλου, πρὸς ὃν ἀγωνιζομένους οἱονεὶ ἐν σταδίῳ τῇ παρούσῃ ζωῇ, ἐν τῇ ἀμείψει ταύτης στεφάνων ἐπιτυχεῖν, lest we should be left without honor in the future eternal life if there were no adversary here against whom, contending as in the stadium of the present life, we might attain crowns at the time of recompense.

Lest men should fall away from these crowns, God never failed them with his graces and his doctrine, and never denied them necessary aid. Caesarius teaches this while expounding the parable employed by Christ¹⁶: “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a prudent woman received and hid in three measures of flour, until the whole was leavened,” saying¹⁷:

By the leaven, the Lord seems to me to compare doctrine and faith in himself; but by the woman, his Church, which he also loved¹⁸. By the three measures of flour, however, the three sons of Noah … from whom alone after the flood proceeded all the nations, which are now gathered in the Church: οἷς ἡ καθήγησις τοῦ κηρύγματος, καὶ ἡ πίστις, οἱονεὶ ζύμη ἐμφυραθεῖσα, τὸ ὅλον τῶν ἐθνῶν ἀλεύρων, τὸ ἐκ τοῦ Νῶε τριῶν σάτων λογικῶν, ἐζύμωσε πρὸς τὴν θεοσέβειαν, among whom the doctrine of preaching and faith, mixed in as leaven, leavened unto the worship of God the whole flour of the nations, which consists of Noah’s three rational measures—

—He teaches the same thing in more explicit words when he adds this explanation¹⁹ to another parable²⁰, “The sower went out to sow”:

Ἐξῆλθεν ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς ὁ Χριστός, ὁ πρὸ αἰώνων Θεός· οὗτος γὰρ ὑπάρχει ὁ σπορεὺς τῶν σωτηρίων ἡμῶν· σπέρμα δὲ αὐτοῦ, θεῖος καὶ ζωοποιὸς λόγος· ἄρουρα δέ, ἡ ἀνθρωπότης πᾶσα. Christ, God before the ages, went out from the Father. For he is the sower of our salvation. His seed is the divine and life-giving word; the field is all humanity.

Nor could the field be narrower: “For the same sower,” Caesarius continues²¹, “the same potter of our mass, Christ, πρὸ σαρκώσεως μὲν ἡμᾶς ἐκ μὴ ὄντων δημιουργήσας· ῥυπωθέντας δέ, καὶ τοῦ χείρονος γενομένους δεκτικούς, διὰ θανάτου συντρίψας πάλιν ἀναπλάττει, καὶ διὰ τὸ μένειν τοῦ λοιποῦ κακίας ἀπαραδέκτους, who before the incarnation indeed created us from nothing, but, after we had been contaminated and thereby made capable of the worse, having broken us through death, fashions us anew, and through perseverance thereafter makes us incapable of any malice.” But although we are fashioned anew only by the death of Christ, nevertheless its benefits did not first begin with that death, but always accompanied the human race. “For he was not incarnate²² on account of those present so as to benefit them alone, ἀλλὰ καὶ τοὺς προκοιμηθέντας θανάτῳ ἀνέστησε, καὶ ἡμῶν τοῖς ἐπιγόνοις ἐλπίδα ἀναστάσεως ἐδωρήσατο καὶ ζωήν, but he also raised from death those who had fallen asleep before and bestowed upon our posterity the hope of resurrection and life.” Therefore upon all past, present, and future men the hope of salvation shone, shines, and will shine; and on account of Christ’s reparation all had, have, and will have the power of acquiring life and felicity. For²³:

Ἐνταῦθα ὑπάρχει τὰ τῆς ἰατρείας, ἐκεῖ τὰ τῆς ἀπολογίας· ἐνταῦθα τὰ τῆς ὑγιείας, ἐκεῖ τὰ τῆς τιμωρίας· ἐνταῦθα τὰ τῆς θείας μακροθυμίας, ἐκεῖ τὰ τῆς ἀκλώους δικαιοκρισίας, here is the time—

—of medicine; there, of rendering an account. Here is the time of health; there, of punishment. Here is the time of divine long-suffering; there, of inevitable and just judgment.

In accordance with this law of government, which God benignly established for himself, although while the guilty live as mortals he could punish them inexorably, nevertheless he does not will to do so, but sustains them and calls them to better counsels. Caesarius most openly proclaims this²⁴ when, investigating the signification of the accursed fig tree²⁵, he says:

Through it Christ willed to teach that God could even punish the opposing synagogue of the Jews, ἀλλ᾽ ὡς ἀγαθός, οὐ βούλεται, but as good does not will to do so… Τιμωρεῖται οὖν ἡ ἄψυχος, ἵνα καρποφορήσῃ πίστιν ἡ ἄθεος. Therefore the inanimate fig tree is punished, that the impious synagogue may bring forth the fruit of faith.

But Christ selected this image chiefly with this intention²⁶: “That he might show ὅτι οἷός τε ὑπάρχει, καὶ ἐν τῷ παρόντι τοὺς πονηροὺς τιμωρεῖσθαι, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπέχει τέως τὴν δύναμιν, ἐνδιδοὺς ἑκάστῳ πρὸς μετάγνωσιν, that he is able even in the present life to afflict the wicked with punishment, but still restrains his power, granting to each one time for a change of mind.”

Then²⁷, that by his desire for sensible fruits he might show νοητῶς, intelligibly, “that he hungers and has chiefly at heart τὴν πάντων σωτηρίαν, ἐξαιρέτως δὲ Ἰουδαίων, the salvation of all, but especially of the Jews.”