Novatian — On the Trinity 14
XIV. 1. And yet the heretic still doubts to call Christ God, whom he notices approved as God by so many deeds and voices. 2. If Christ is man only, how is it that coming into this world he came unto his own, when a man has made no world? 3. If Christ is man only, how is the world reported made through him, when the world is not reported made through a man, but man instituted after the world? 4. If Christ is man only, how is Christ not from David’s seed only, but the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us? For although the first-formed was not from seed, yet the first-formed is not compacted from a joining of Word and flesh. For it is not that the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us in Adam. 5. If Christ is man only, how does he who comes from heaven testify what he has seen and heard, when it is settled that a man cannot come from heaven, because he cannot be born there? 6. If Christ is man only, how are visibles and invisibles, thrones, powers and dominions reported created through him and in him, when heavenly powers could not have been made through a man, which ought to have existed before man himself? 7. If Christ is man only, how is he present everywhere when invoked, when this is not man’s nature but God’s, that he can be present in every place? 8. If Christ is man only, why is a man invoked as mediator in prayers, when invocation of a man is judged ineffective for granting salvation? 9. If Christ is man only, why is hope placed in him, when hope in man is reported cursed? 10. If Christ is man only, why may Christ not be denied without destruction of the soul, when a fault committed against a man is reported able to be forgiven?
11. If Christ is man only, how does John the Baptist testify and say: he who comes after me has been made before me, because he was prior to me — when if Christ is man only, born after John he cannot be before John, unless because, insofar as he is God, he preceded him beforehand? 12. If Christ is man only, how does whatever the Father does the Son also do likewise, when a man cannot do works like God’s heavenly works? 13. If Christ is man only, how, as the Father has life in himself, so he has given the Son to have life in himself, when by the Father God’s example a man cannot have life in himself, since he is not glorious in eternity but made in the stuff of mortality? 14. If Christ is man only, how does he report: I am the bread of eternal life who came down from heaven — when a man can neither be the bread of life, being himself mortal, nor have come down from heaven, no stuff of frailty being set in heaven? 15. If Christ is man only, how does he say that no one has ever seen God the Father except he who is from God — this one has seen God? Because if Christ is man only, he could not have seen God, since no one among men has seen God. But if, while he is from God, he has seen God, he wished to be understood as more than man while he saw God. 16. If Christ is man only, why does he say: What if you see the Son of Man ascending there where he was before? But he ascended into heaven. Therefore he was there, while he returns there where he was before. 17. But if he was sent from heaven by the Father, he is not man only; for a man, as we have said, could not come from heaven. Therefore man was not there before, but he ascended there where he was not. But the Word of God descended, which was there — the Word of God, I say, and God through whom all things were made and without whom nothing was made. Therefore man did not thus come from the heavens from there, but the speech of God, that is God, descended from there.
Latin
XIV. 1. Et tamen adhuc dubitat haereticus Christum dicere esse Deum, quem Deum tot et rebus animaduertit et uocibus approbatum. 2. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo ueniens in hunc mundum in sua uenit, cum homo nullum fecerit mundum? 3. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo mundus per ipsum factus esse refertur, cum non per hominem mundus, sed post mundum homo institutus referatur? 4. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo non ex semine tantum Dauid Christus, sed uerbum caro factum est et habitauit in nobis? Nam etsi protoplastus non ex semine, sed tamen protoplastus non est ex uerbi et carnis coniunctione concretus. Non est enim uerbum caro factum, et habitauit in nobis. 5. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo qui de caelo uenit, quae uidit et audit testificatur, cum constet hominem de caelo, quia ibi nasci non possit, uenire non posse? 6. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo uisibilia et inuisibilia, throni, uirtutes et dominationes per ipsum et in ipso creata esse referuntur, cum uirtutes caelestes per hominem fieri non potuerint, quae ante hominem ipsum esse debuerint? 7. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo adest ubique inuocatus, cum haec hominis natura non sit, sed Dei, ut adesse omni loco possit? 8. Si homo tantummodo Christus, cur homo in orationibus mediator inuocatur, cum inuocatio hominis ad praestandam salutem inefficax iudicetur? 9. Si homo tantummodo Christus, cur spes in illum ponitur, cum spes in homine maledicta referatur? 10. Si homo tantummodo Christus, cur non licet Christum sine exitio animae negari, cum in hominem commissum delictum referatur posse dimitti?
11. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo Ioannes Baptista testatur et dicit: qui post me uenit, ante me factus est, quia prior me fuit, cum si homo tantummodo Christus, post Ioannem natus ante Ioannem esse non possit, nisi quoniam illum, qua Deus est, ante praecessit? 12. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo quae Pater facit, et Filius facit similiter, cum homo caelestibus operibus Dei similia opera facere non possit? 13. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo sicut Pater in se uitam habet, ita dedit Filio uitam habere in semetipso, cum exemplo Patris Dei homo in se uitam habere non possit, cum non in aeternitate sit gloriosus, sed in materia mortalitatis effectus? 14. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo refert: Ego sum panis uitae aeternae qui de caelo descendi, cum neque panis uitae homo esse possit ipse mortalis nec de caelo descenderit nulla in caelo constituta materia fragilitatis? 15. Si homo tantummodo Christus, quomodo dicit quia Patrem Deum nemo uidit umquam, nisi qui est a Deo, hic uidit Deum? Quoniam si homo tantummodo Christus, Deum uidere non potuit, quia Deum nemo hominum uidit. Si autem dum ex Deo est, Deum uidit, plus se quam hominem, dum Deum uidit, intellegi uoluit. 16. Si homo tantummodo Christus, cur dicit: Quid si uideritis Filium hominis ascendentem illuc ubi ante erat? Ascendit autem in caelum. Ibi ergo fuit, dum illuc redit ubi prius fuit. 17. Quodsi de caelo missus a Patre est, non utique homo tantum est; homo enim, ut diximus, de caelo uenire non potuit. Non igitur ibi ante homo fuit, sed illuc ascendit ubi non fuit. Descendit autem Dei uerbum, quod ibi fuit, uerbum, inquam, Dei et Deus per quem facta sunt omnia et sine quo factum est nihil. Non igitur homo inde sic de caelis uenit, sed Dei sermo, id est Deus, inde descendit.