Andrew Louth - Syriac Christian Church

D
1053A
B
C
DIFFICULTY 5 173
of which he is the hypostasis, and his natural energies, of
which he is the true union in respect of both of the natures,
since he acts by himself congruently, monadically, even as
with a single form, and in everything displays without
separation the energy of his own flesh together with the divine
power. How can the same be by nature God and again by
nature man without having unfailingly what belongs to both
by nature? How can it be known what and who he is, unless it
is guaranteed by what the One who is unchangeable performs
naturally? How is it guaranteed in respect of one of the
natures, from which and in which and which he is, 16 that he
remains unmoved and inactive? Beyond being, therefore, he
has assumed being, having fashioned a beginning of
generation and another beginning of birth by nature, having
been conceived by the seed of his own flesh, having been born
and in his birth becoming the seal of virginity, and showing
that the contradiction of what cannot be mixed is true in his
case. For the same person is both virgin and mother,
instituting nature afresh by bringing together what is
opposed, since virginity and giving birth are opposed, and
no-one would have thought that naturally they could be
combined. Therefore the virgin is truly the Mother of God, 17
conceiving without seed in a way beyond nature, and giving
birth to the Word beyond being, since one who gave birth to
one engendered and conceived is properly mother.
And he does human things in a way transcending the
human, showing, in accordance with the closest union, the
human energy united without change to the divine power,
since the [human] nature, united without confusion to [the
divine] nature, is completely interpenetrated, and in no way
annulled, nor separated from the Godhead hypostatically
united to it. For the Word beyond being truly assumed our
being for our sake and joined together the transcendent
negation with the affirmation of nature and what is natural to
it, and became man, having linked together the way of being
that is beyond nature with the logos of being of nature, that he
might confirm the [human] nature in its new modes of being
without there being any change in its logos, and make known
the power that transcends infinity, recognized as such in the
coming to be of opposites. And by the authority of his intention 18
he made what we suffer something positive, but not as if we
were the results of natural necessity, and again, working
within what we are capable of, he passes through what we
suffer by nature, and by the authority of his intention he