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Translated by W. Moore and H. A. Wilson
St Gregory of Nyssa Resources Online and in Print
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14 Pages
Page 8
But with regard to service and worship, and the other things which they so nicely calculate about, and bring into prominence, we say this; that the Holy Spirit is exalted above all that we can do for Him with our merely human purpose; our worship is far beneath the honour due; and anything else that in human customs is held as honourable is somewhere below the dignity of the Spirit; for that which in its essence is measureless surpasses those who offer their all with so slight and circumscribed and paltry a power of giving. This, then, we say to those of them who subscribe to the reverential conception of the Holy Spirit that He is Divine, and of the Divine nature. But if there is any of them who rejects this statement, and this idea involved in the very name of Divinity, and says that which, to the destruction of the Spirit's greatness, is in circulation amongst the many, namely, that He belongs, not to making, but to made, beings, that it is right to regard Him not as of a Divine, but as of a created nature, we answer to a proposition such as this, that we do not understand how we can count those who make it amongst the number of Christians at all. For just as it would not be possible to style the unformed embryo a human being, but only a potential one, assuming that it is completed so as to come forth to human birth, while as long as it is in this unformed state, it is something other than a human being; so our reason cannot recognize as a Christian one who has failed to receive, with regard to the entire mystery, the genuine form of our religion [1248] . We can hear Jews believing in God, and our God too: even our Lord reminds [1249] them in the Gospel that they recognize no other God than the Father of the Only-begotten, "of Whom ye say that he is your God." Are we, then, to call the Jews Christians because they too agree to worship the God Whom we adore? I am aware, too, that the Manichees go about vaunting the name of Christ. Because they hold revered the Name to which we bow the knee, shall we therefore number them amongst Christians? So, too, he who both believes in the Father and receives the Son, but sets aside the Majesty of the Spirit, has "denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel," and belies the name of Christ which he bears. The Apostle bids the man of God to be "perfect [1250] ." Now, to take only the general man, perfection must consist in completeness in every aspect of human nature, in having reason, capability of thought and knowledge, a share of animal life, an upright bearing, risibility, broadness of nail; and if any one were to term some individual a man, and yet were unable to produce evidence in his case of the foregoing signs of human nature, his terming him so would be a valueless honour. Thus, too, the Christian is marked by his Belief in Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; in this consists the form of him who is fashioned [1251] in accordance with the mystery of the truth. But if his form is arranged otherwise, I will not recognize the existence of anything whence the form is absent; there is a blurring out of the mark, and a loss of the essential form, and an alteration of the characteristic signs of our complete humanity, when the Holy Spirit is not included in the Belief. For indeed the word of Ecclesiastes says true; your heretic is no living man, but "bones," he says [1252] , "in the womb of her that is with child [1253] "; for how can one who does not think of the unction along with the Anointed be said to believe in the Anointed? "Him," says (Peter), "did God anoint with the Holy Spirit [1254] ."
[1248] ten alethe morphosin tes eusebeias
[1249] entithetai: suntithetai, "concedes to," would perhaps be better.
[1250] 2 Cor. xiii. 11. Cf. 1 Cor. xiv. 20.
[1251] Cf. 2 Tim. i. 13 (hupotuposin); Rom. ii. 20 (morphosin); vi. 17 (tupon), all referring to truth as contained in a formula. Cf. also Gal. iv. 19.
[1252] Reading kathos ekeinos phesin.
[1253] Eccles. xi. 5 (LXX.). ouk esti ginoskon tis he hodos tou pneumatos, hos osta en gastri kuophorouses
[1254] Acts x. 38. Cf. iv. 27.
Reference address : https://elpenor.org/nyssa/holy-spirit.asp?pg=8
