On the True Faith, to the Princesses Arcadia and Marina · §39

God and man economically; living God; blood of Christ cleanses; trampling the Son

So Christ is God and human: God by nature, and the same one human as we are economically, when he came to be from a woman according to the flesh.

“See to it, brothers, that there not be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in falling away from the living God.” By denying Christ we fall away from the living and true God; by remaining in faith toward him we in no way make that apostasy. How, then, is Christ not God?

“For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling those who have been defiled, sanctify for the purity of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the Holy Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” If Christ is not true God, what is the benefit through his blood? Or how will he cleanse our conscience from dead works? What more does the blood of a common human have than the blood of goats? Nothing at all — except that one is of an irrational animal and the other of a rational one. But since the one who is from God by nature took flesh and laid down his own blood for all, by that very fact he can cleanse those who believe in him, free them from dead works, and lead them into worship of God.

“Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has counted the blood of the covenant a common thing, and has insulted the Spirit of grace by which he was sanctified?” The one who insults — that is, sets aside — a divine law does not face a charge equal to sinning against a human, but one far heavier.

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About this text

Cyril’s court treatise on right faith for Arcadia and Marina (CPG 5219). One Son, Word made flesh — not two Christs. English from Pusey’s Greek.

English follows Pusey’s 1877 Greek of De recta fide ad Arcadiam et Marinam. OCR of that print was cleaned section by section before Pass A/B. This is a reading translation for study, not a new critical edition.

Witnesses

  • Copy-text Pusey, De recta fide ad reginas (Oxford, 1877) (Greek · CPG 5219 §§1–100)

English is newly prepared for study from the stated edition. It is not a complete critical edition.