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Hymns on Faith

St Ephrem the Syrian, tr. Morris, 1847; selections

29. Rhythm the Twenty-ninth

God in His mercies called mortals gods through grace; but they by their scrutinizing have set limits to Him who is God, as though he were man. This Body of yours which He put on, Cherubim bare up and Seraphim are awed before it, Angels are still before it¹; but yet ye that are despicable have made light of the generation of the Glorious One. For unto that weak body which He came down and clad Himself with, His names and operations were assimilated. And as it was needful² for Him to be hungry, thus also it was needful for Him to pray, and as that hunger belonged wholly to the body, so His lacking³ belonged wholly to the body. Do not ye die by means of the names wherewith the Living One veiled Himself that He might quicken all!

For the Mighty One clad Himself with names which fell short of Him in His pity for you by reason of the body. On which of them will ye fix as true, honourable, and glorious! True is the Name of the Father, Faithful is the Name of the Son, and to be loved is He as being a Pardoner, and to be feared is He as being Judge. Because the Son of man, he was bounded, without bound was He, because His Nature is God⁴. Weak clay hath dared to go down and feel into the properties of the sea⁵. It hath scrutinized the floods thereof to make himself acquainted with the place whence they come up and where they settle⁶. That vile one that prieth cannot even find out from what place the hand which fashioned him took himself and gave him measures which he⁷ yet scorns. Who ever saw dust which dared to assay the power of the winds with questioning? The daring shall die in scrutinizing Him whose Breath quickeneth the dead.⁸

Cedars are rooted up, thickets are bared, and yet the chaff cometh to pry into the Nature of the Holy Wind⁹; and from¹⁰ the blast of His Breath against the furnace-door, lo! it is scattered! The Lord and the Father, whom no man ever saw, who also judgeth¹¹, put the scrutinizers to shame, that they might not pry into that Son by whose hand they are and were created. For the clay cannot search into the potter; he maketh lifeless vessels, a work for his uses: the¹² Maker who made you to be endued with reason and knowledge, Him have ye rejected.

Notes

See above, p. 158, n. c. The Catholic doctrine is thus given by St. John Damasc. F. O. iv. 3. “The Flesh of Christ in its own nature indeed, if you come to nice mental distinctions of the visible from the intelligible, is not to be adored as being created, but when united to God the Word through Him and in Him is adored.” Possibly St. E. wished to give a blow to Apollinarianism by the way: St. Ath. c. Apoll. i. 6. “It is not a creature which we worship, O insensate men! Why is it that ye do not reflect that the Body of the Lord, made though it be, yet doth not obtain the worship of a creature? for it hath become the Body of the Word uncreate. To Him then Whose Body it hath become, to Him offer ye worship.” Cyril Thes. p. 196. b. though speaking against the Eunomian notion, (p. 194.) that the glorification of Christ implied a nature less perfect antecedently to such glorification, has the following: ‘The Word of God, as God, is most Highest evermore, but has been lifted up on high as Man. Lacking nothing as God, He is as Man said to receive. He was worshipped by all creatures as God, now He receives worship as Man.’ Vide Dial. ix. p. 728. e. Petav. de Inc. iv. 14. §. 9. (where he quotes the Council of Ephesus as prescribing that the Whole Christ is to be worshipped with the Body, but not in respect of the Body;) and more at length, xv. 3. As the ‘two whole and perfect Natures are never to be divided,’ of course where the Body is, there we creatures are to adore. It may be right to add another passage of St. E. here. Vol. i. p. 261. c. “That rod of Aaron which out of all the rods alone budded, is a type of the adorable Body of Immanuel, Who, though in all things connatural with corruptible creatures, yet remained in the Sepulchre incorruptible; and when capable of unblameable passions (the ἀδιάβλητα πάθη of Chrysostom and others. V. Anastas. Sin. p. 116. Gretser.) in Him alone were seen the mysteries of incorruption and impassibility and immortality.” From the passages given p. 19. and 20, n. m. and p. 146, n. d. 147, n. f. and 148, n. h. there can be no doubt that St. E. would regard the Body of Christ as that which gave men the right to be called ‘gods.’ Upon this name, see further on R. xlvi. §. 6.
As it was needful, i. e. only so far as He willed; He chose to submit to the laws of human nature: He could at pleasure suspend them. See on R. xxx. §. 3.
p. 210, n. b.
This passage might be added to those which Petavius adduces, de Incarn. x. 7. in confutation of the Eutychian tenet of the Ubiquists, who maintained the Deification of Christ’s Flesh in so literal a sense, as to suppose the attributes of His human Nature to be annihilated by the Hypostatic Union, and that Christ as Man is Omnipresent. See on Athan. p. 477, n. a.
p. 87, n. i. p. 144, n. g.
This (and perhaps R. xxxvi. §. 6.) seems to allude to the story of Aristotle mentioned by St. J. Martyr. p. 34. and St. Greg. Naz. c. Jul. 3. p. 79, b. according to which he is made to meet his death by a fool-hardy attempt to discover the cause of the ebb and flow of the Euripus. The origin of this story is unknown, though it doubtless came from some heathen source. Compare Stahr, Aristotelia, i. p. 155. The Fathers commonly regarded the Anomœans as the disciples of Aristotle, (p. 106, n. a.) and St. E. may fairly use the current stories about him as at least typifying a truth in regard to human philosophy, even if in themselves ill authenticated.
Eccles. 11, 5.
Ez. 37, 1. &c.
S. Spirit, or wind.
Ps. 29, 5.
See 1 Pet. 1, 17. which seems to contradict John 5, 22. But the Fathers held that Christ is Judge, because He is Son: that His eternal generation communicated to Him all His Father’s attributes. See on Athan. p. 404. and Petav. de Inc. xii. 10. who cites principally Greek authorities. Ambr. de Fide ii. §. 100. Dedit utique judicium generando non largiendo. Hil. de Trin. xi. §. 12. Dum judicium datur, Nativitas non tacetur.
Rom. 9, 20. 21.