By Water & Blood

Chapter 2: How “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways” and what follows are to be understood, and how Marcellus transferred the same to the Saviour’s flesh

These things, then, Wisdom says concerning herself in the Proverbs. I have set out the whole passage deliberately and of necessity, to show that it is one person who says these things—the very passage which he [Marcellus] transferred wholesale to the Saviour’s flesh—with no change of speaker taking place in between. Wisdom, then, is shown to be teaching these things about herself. And here, first, one must observe that she is named “Wisdom” absolutely. For she says, “I, Wisdom, have dwelt with counsel,” and it is not said, “the wisdom of God.” Just as in the evangelist, “In the beginning was the Word” was written absolutely, and again, “the Word was with God,” and it was not said, “the Word of God,” so that no one should suppose that he is spoken of as one of the things that are relative (τῶν πρός τι), nor as an accident (συμβεβηκός) in God, but as subsisting and living (which is why he adds, “and the Word was God,” not saying, “and the Word was God’s”)—so also in the case of Wisdom.

For God the Word and Wisdom were one and the same. Therefore she is named absolutely in the Proverbs, both in the sayings set out above and also in those where it is said in this manner: “Blessed is the man who has found wisdom,” and “God by wisdom founded the earth,” and “Say that wisdom is thy sister,” and “Proclaim wisdom, that understanding may follow thee,” and “For wisdom is better than costly stones,”

and “Wisdom hath builded herself a house, she hath set up seven pillars,” and whatever other sayings akin to these are found in the same book. In none of them is she named “wisdom of God,” but indefinitely “Wisdom,” so that we should not think her to be some attribute (σύμβαμα) about God, as knowledge is in a knowing man, but a subsisting and living Wisdom, being the same as the Son of God. But if anyone should suppose that the wisdom spoken of here is a wise disposition (ἕξις) in God, according to which we think of God as wise, let him listen to the Scripture saying, “Say that wisdom is thy sister.” Who would be so mad as to suppose that the God who is over all, and the wise disposition in him, is called the sister of those among men who live uprightly?

But if you take what is said as referring to the Christ of God (for “Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God”), nothing will stand in the way of the sense, since he does not refuse even brotherhood with us, through the surpassing greatness of his love for mankind. But if God and the Wisdom introduced in the Proverbs were one and the same—Wisdom being a wise disposition conceived in him, according to which God is wise—what prevented “God” from being written in place of “Wisdom”? Then “Wisdom hath builded herself a house, she hath set up seven pillars,” and what is joined to it, would have been said in place of “God hath builded himself a house,” and so on; and again

“Say that wisdom is thy sister” would have been said in place of “Say that God is thy brother.” But you see how such an expression strikes the ear, having no harmony. If, however, you take the oracles as referring to the Son (for he himself was Wisdom), everything will flow smoothly for you, with no impious notion standing in the way; and the apostle Paul bears witness as well, who with a clear voice named our Saviour and Lord Jesus Christ “Wisdom,” saying, “Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.”

These points being established somewhat in this way, it follows that, together with all that was set out before, “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works” was also spoken from the same person. And if he says that he was created, he would not say this as one who passed from non-being into being, nor as one who himself came into being out of nothing like the rest of the creatures, as some have wrongly supposed, but as one who subsists and lives, who exists before and pre-exists the constitution of the whole world, and who has been appointed by the Lord, his own Father, to rule over the universe—“created” being said here in place of “appointed” or “established.”

Expressly, at any rate, the apostle named human rulers and governors “creation” (κτίσις) when he said, “Submit yourselves to every human creation for the Lord’s sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him.”

And the prophet who said, “Prepare to call upon thy God, O Israel. For behold, I am he that strengthens the thunder, and creates spirit, and announces to men his Christ,” and the saying, “Let this be written for another generation, and the people that is being created shall praise the Lord”—these did not take “creating” of what comes into being out of non-existence. For God did not create the Spirit at the time when he proclaimed his Christ to all men through it; for there is nothing “new under the sun.”

Rather, it was and pre-existed, but was sent at the time when the apostles were gathered together, when, like thunder, “there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind,” and they were filled “with the Holy Spirit,” and so proclaimed the Christ of God to all men, in accordance with the prophecy that said, “For behold, I am he that strengthens the thunder, and creates spirit, and announces to men his Christ”—“creating” being said in place of “sending down” or “appointing,” while the thunder signifies, in another manner, the proclamation of the gospel. And he who says, “Create in me a clean heart, O God,” did not say this as one who had no heart, but prayed that his mind might be made clean.

So also “that he might create in himself of twain one new man” is said in place of “that he might gather together.” Consider whether such also is “Put on the new man, which after God is created,” and “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation,” and whatever other expressions of the same kind one might find in searching the divinely inspired Scripture. Do not marvel, then, if in “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways” the word “created” is likewise said metaphorically, in place of “established” or “appointed to rule.” For in the Gospels also, when our Saviour says, “I confess (ἐξομολογοῦμαι) to thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes,” we do not say that the Saviour means the confession of sins (in the sense in which it is said elsewhere, “Confess your faults one to another”), but thanksgiving on account of the babes—“confess” being said in place of “I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth.”

One who searched at leisure would find countless things said in the metaphorical manner throughout the whole of divine Scripture, and others having a sense of many meanings, and still others predicated homonymously of different things. To go through these would be a long task and not for the present occasion. So, then, here too “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works” is said in place of “He appointed me to rule over his works.” That is why it is not said simply “He created me,” but with the addition “the beginning of his ways for his works.”

This the Hebrew wording establishes above all. If, at any rate, one should inquire precisely into the true sense of the divinely inspired Scripture, he would find that the Hebrew reading does not contain “he created me”; which is why none of the other translators has used this word either. Aquila, for instance, has said, “The Lord acquired (ἐκτήσατο) me as the head (κεφάλαιον) of his ways”; Symmachus, “The Lord acquired me as the beginning of his ways”; and Theodotion, “The Lord acquired me as the beginning of his way.”

And this rendering would have good reason. For he himself was the head of the constitution and salvation of all things that have come into being, visible and invisible—he whom the Father begot as only-begotten Son, and, having begotten him, appointed Saviour of the universe, summing up (ἀνακεφαλαιούμενος) in him and through him the ordering of the whole, as the divine apostle taught when he said, “to sum up all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth.” Thus not only did all things come to subsist through him, proceeding from non-being into being, but he also took up the providence of the government of the universe, inasmuch as he is Word and Wisdom and Life and the fullness of everything noble and good, so that through him all things are steered and preserved.

This he himself also set forth through the oracles quoted above, in which he said, “By me kings reign, and princes decree righteousness; by me great men are magnified, and by me monarchs rule the earth.” By the ineffable principles (λόγοι) of the universal wisdom and providence of the Son of God, then, all things are governed. These things he taught through what was set out before, and he urged men to hold fast to him, saying, “I love those who love me, and those who seek me shall find me”; and he turned them away from the opposite road by what he added: “And I have hated the perverse ways of the wicked.” And when the Son of God (for he himself was Wisdom) had laid down these things and those akin to them, he next hands on to those who had first been benefited by them the mystical knowledge concerning himself, saying, “If I declare to you the things that come to pass day by day, I will remember to recount the things that are from everlasting.”

“For if I am to teach,” he says, “the things done by me day by day, I must also remember my works from the beginning of the whole age, and show that the Father who begot me appointed me for this purpose: to rule the universe, and to lead the way in his ways and in the works made by him through me.” Therefore he consistently adds, “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works,” or “The Lord acquired me,” according to the rendering given above.

For the only-begotten Son was the great possession (κτῆμα) of God: inasmuch as he had been begotten from him, being his Son; and inasmuch as he was established as of common benefit and saving for all, being and being called the greatest and most precious possession of the Father. For nothing could be a more precious possession to a father than a son. Hence also the first-formed Adam, when he acquired the first son among men, it was said of him too, “I have acquired a man through God,” the Hebrew word containing, for “I have acquired,” kanithi;

while “he acquired” is pronounced kana among the Hebrews. So, then, of Abraham it is said, “the field which Abraham acquired,” where the Hebrew has kana; and the same word stands among the Hebrews also in “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works.” For here too, since the word kana stands there, all the translators have rendered in agreement “he acquired”; whereas “he created” is expressed by another word among the Hebrews, which does not stand in the present Scripture. And there would be the greatest difference between “he created” and “he acquired,” in that creation, in the more common sense, signifies passage from non-being into being, while acquisition signifies the special belonging (οἰκειότης) of something pre-existing to the one who acquires it. When, therefore, the Son of God says, “The Lord acquired me the beginning of his ways for his works,” he made known at once both his pre-existence and his special belonging to the Father, and at the same time the usefulness and necessity of his own providence and government over the Father’s works.

Therefore he next adds, “Before the age he founded me, in the beginning, before he made the earth, before the springs of the waters came forth, before the mountains were settled, and before all the hills he begets me”—through all of which he shows the benefit and necessity of himself for all things, teaching of necessity both that he was and pre-existed, and that he existed before the whole world and led it. For Moses, in the account of the making of the world, made no mention of the supramundane and invisible powers, on account of the immaturity of those whom he was schooling, but went through the constitution of the visible world. He mentioned four elements at the beginning—heaven and earth and abyss and water—and said that two were made by God (for he says, “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth”), but did not in the same way say of the water and the abyss that these also were things that had come into being; he said simply, “And darkness was upon the abyss, and the Spirit of God moved upon the water.” Of necessity, then, the Son of God teaches through the passage before us concerning these too, both that they came into being and that he himself was before all things and that all things had been made through him.

Therefore he says, “Before the age he founded me, in the beginning, before he made the earth, and before he made the depths, before the springs of the waters came forth.” Having mentioned these three—earth and abyss and water—he brings in the fourth last, keeping the better for the end: the heaven. Therefore he adds next, “When he was preparing the heaven, I was present with him.” These things, then, being plainly set forth by the divine Scripture, and having received from us a brief account, as in summary, let us hear how Marcellus, casting his understanding to the ground, insists that all of them were said concerning the flesh which the Saviour assumed, writing word for word in this manner (Nr. 10):

“This, then, being so, it follows that we should consider in our minds this heading spoken in the manner of a proverb: ‘The Lord created me the beginning of his ways.’ For our Master, God, truly created, having made what was not; for the flesh which the Word assumed was not existing, but he created it when it did not exist.”

And he adds (Nr. 17):

“Therefore, even if this new mystery appeared above all in the last times, so that for this reason it was foreordained before this age, the prophet fittingly said, ‘Before the age he founded me’—meaning, plainly, the flesh.”

And again he goes on, saying (Nr. 18): “Then he says, ‘In the beginning, before he made the earth.’ What earth is this, if not plainly our flesh, which after the disobedience became earth again? For ‘Earth thou art,’ he says, ‘and unto earth shalt thou return.’” You see how far he has gone astray, turning aside from the straight road and devising for himself one that is rough and hard to travel and, as it were, without an exit. Observe, at any rate, how he forced himself, enduring to utter any shameless and impudent word rather than confess that the Son of God himself is Wisdom.

Now “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works” he refers to the person of the Saviour, confessing that he is the one saying these things in the Proverbs. He says, then, in these very words (Nr. 11): “Fittingly, therefore, since the old things had passed away and all things were going to be new through the newness of our Saviour, our Master Christ cried out through the prophet, saying, ‘The Lord created me the beginning of his ways.’”

Having said this, he casts the sense down onto our Saviour’s flesh, adding next (Nr. 10): “For our Master, God, truly created, having made what was not; for the flesh which the Word assumed was not existing, but when it did not exist he ‘created’ it ‘the beginning of his ways.’” And the noble fellow does not understand that it is one single utterance, and one person, that said “I, Wisdom, have dwelt with counsel” and “The Lord created me”; so that if the one is referred to the flesh, the other must be too; and it will be Wisdom who says both.

But if, according to Marcellus, it is the flesh that says “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways,” then the flesh would be Wisdom; and it will be the flesh that says “By me kings reign” and “By me great men are magnified.” And how could the flesh say, “I will remember to recount the things that are from everlasting,” upon which follows, “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways”? But he also sets out what the ways are, saying next (Nr. 12): “For he has become for us, who are to live justly, a way of godliness—the beginning of all the ways after these.”

And he adds (Nr. 12):

“‘Beginning of ways’ he fittingly called our Master the Saviour for this reason: that he became the beginning also of the other ways which we have had after the first way.”

By this he means the traditions handed down through the holy apostles, who, “with lofty proclamation” according to the prophecy, proclaimed to us this new mystery. So much for Marcellus.