By Water & Blood

Book 2, Chapter 17: An interpretation of the true sense of the Word

Yet I think it fitting to hear the expression in no other way than by becoming disciples once more of the evangelist himself, who teaches what sort of Word he defined. And he showed clearly what sort of Word this was, joining on next and saying, “and the Word was God.” At any rate, though he could have said, “and the Word was the God,” with the addition of the article—if indeed he had held that the Father and the Son are one and the same, and that the Word himself is the God over all—he did not publish the Scripture in that way.

For he ought to have said either “and the Word was God’s” or “the Word was the God,” with the addition of the article, if he were making the Scripture agree with Marcellus’s thought. But as it is, he shows that the Word himself is also God, like the God with whom he was. For having first said, “and the Word was with God,” he goes on, saying, “and the Word was God,” all but teaching us more clearly first to regard as God the one beyond the universe, the Father himself of the Word, with whom the Word was; and then, after him, not to be ignorant that his Word also, the only-begotten Son, was not himself the God over all, but that he too was God.

For the conjunction “and” joins the Godhead of the Son to the Father. Wherefore he says, “and the Word was God,” in order that we may see that the God over all, with whom the Word was, is God; and hear that the Word himself is God as the image of God—and an image not as in lifeless matter, but as in a living Son, made like most exactly to the archetypal Godhead of the Father.

But since Marcellus saw fit to compare the Word of God with the human word, how much better, shall we say, it would be for one who uses the human word as an image to use rather this example and say that the father of the word among us is the mind, which is other than the word. For as for the mind—whoever and of what sort it is in its essence—no man has ever known it; but like a king seated within its secret chambers, it deliberates on what must be done. The word from it, however, as though begotten of a father from the innermost recesses of a sanctuary, becomes known to all who are outside.

Then some partake of the benefit of the word; but the hidden and invisible mind, the father of the word, no one has ever seen.

In the same way—or rather, beyond every image and example—the perfect Word of God the King of all, not composed of syllables and words and nouns like the uttered word of men, but as the only-begotten Son of God, living and subsisting, proceeds from the Father’s Godhead and kingdom, and waters the whole world with the supplies that come from him, overflowing upon all things that have come into being with a share of life and reason and wisdom and light and every good; while the Father and God of the universe is beyond, incomprehensible and uncontainable to all, after the manner of the hidden and invisible mind—for which reason he is also said to be “dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto.”

But the Father would be unapproachable and uncontainable to all, while the Son is nearer to all, inasmuch as he steers all things by the Father’s nod (wherefore it is said not concerning the Father but concerning the Son, “He was in the world, and the world was made by him”). And the one was beyond the universe and above all things, “dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto,” while the other pervades through all things and in all things with a guardian providence—so that in this respect alone the image of the human word may be compared with him. But now that these things have been demonstrated by us, it is likely that one of those eager to learn will ask: