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130 Pages
Page 99
In S: 4 on the force of with God. [617] "Note with admiration the exact appropriateness of every single word. It is not said The Word was in God.' It runs was with God.' This is to set forth the proper character of the hypostasis. The Evangelist did not say in God,' to avoid giving any pretext for the confusion of the hypostasis. That is the vile blasphemy of men who are endeavouring to confound all things together, asserting that Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, form one subject matter, and that different appellations are applied to one thing. The impiety is vile, and no less to be shunned than that of those who blasphemously maintain that the Son is in essence unlike God the Father. The Word was with God. Immediately after using the term Word to demonstrate the impassibility of the generation, he forthwith gives an explanation to do away with the mischief arising in us from the term Word. As though suddenly rescuing Him from the blasphemers' calumny, he asks, what is the Word? The Word was God. Do not put before me any ingenious distinctions of phrase; do not with your wily cleverness blaspheme the teachings of the Spirit. You have the definitive statement. Submit to the Lord. The Word was God."
Homily XXIV., against the Sabellians, Arians, and Anomoeans, repeats points which are brought out again and again in the De Spiritu Sancto, in the work Against Eunomius, and in some of the Letters.
Arianism is practical paganism, for to make the Son a creature, and at the same time to offer Him worship, is to reintroduce polytheism. Sabellianism is practical Judaism,--a denial of the Son. [618] John i. 1, xiv. 9, 7, xvi. 28, and viii. 16 are quoted against both extremes. There may be a note of time in the admitted impatience of the auditory at hearing of every other subject than the Holy Spirit. The preacher is constrained to speak upon this topic, and he speaks with the combined caution and completeness which characterize the De Spiritu Sancto. "Your ears," he says, "are all eager to hear something concerning the Holy Ghost. My wish would be, as I have received in all simplicity, as I have assented with guileless agreement, so to deliver the doctrine to you my hearers. I would if I could avoid being constantly questioned on the same point. I would have my disciples convinced of one consent. But you stand round me rather as judges than as learners. Your desire is rather to test and try me than to acquire anything for yourselves. I must therefore, as it were, make my defence before the court, again and again giving answer, and again and again saying what I have received. And you I exhort not to be specially anxious to hear from me what is pleasing to yourselves, but rather what is pleasing to the Lord, what is in harmony with the Scriptures, what is not in opposition to the Fathers. What, then, I asserted concerning the Son, that we ought to acknowledge His proper Person, this I have also to say concerning the Holy Spirit.
[617] pros ton Theon.
[618] cf. ccx. p. 249.
Reference address : https://elpenor.org/basil/life-works.asp?pg=99
