8.
Again, as is said through Solomon the Wise in the Proverbs, “He
was created;” and He is named “Beginning of
ways” The text of
Prov. viii.
22 in the LXX. is
κύριος
ἔκτισέ με
ἀρχὴν ὁδῶν
αὐτοῦ εἰς
ἔργα
αὐτοῦ. The rendering of
A.V. is “possessed,” with “formed” in the
margin.
The Hebrew verb occurs some eighty times in the Old
Testament, and in only four other passages is translated by possess,
viz., Gen. xiv. 19, 22, Ps. cxxxix.
13, Jer. xxxii. 15, and Zec. xi. 5. In the two former, though the
LXX. renders the word in the Psalms ἐκτήσω, it would have borne the
sense of “create.” In the passage under discussion
the Syriac agrees with the LXX., and among critics adopting the same
view Bishop Wordsworth cites Ewald, Hitzig, and Genesius. The
ordinary meaning of the Hebrew is “get” or
“acquire,” and hence it is easy to see how the idea of
getting or possessing passed in relation to the Creator into that of
creation. The Greek translators were not unanimous and Aquila
wrote ἐκτήσατο.
The passage inevitably became the Jezreel or Low Countries of the
Arian war, and many a battle was fought on it. The
depreciators of the Son found in it Scriptural authority for
calling Him κτίσμα,
e.g. Arius in the Thalia, is quoted by
Athanasius in Or. c. Ar. I. iii. § 9, and such
writings of his followers as the Letter of Eusebius of Nicomedia
to Paulinus of Tyre cited in Theod., Ecc. Hist. I. v., and
Eunomius as quoted by Greg. Nyss., c. Eunom. II. 10;
but as Dr. Liddon observes in his Bampton Lect. (p. 60,
ed. 1868), “They did not doubt that this created Wisdom was
a real being or person.”
ἔκτισεwas accepted by the
Catholic writers, but explained to refer to the manhood only,
cf. Eustathius of Antioch, quoted in Theod.,
Dial. I. The view of Athanasius will be found in his
dissertation on the subject in the Second Discourse against the
Arians, pp. 357–385 of Schaff & Wace’s
edition. cf. Bull, Def. Fid. Nic. II. vi.
8. of good news, which
lead us to the kingdom of heaven. He is not in essence and
substance a creature, but is made a “way” according to the
œconomy. Being made and being created signify the same
thing. As He was made a way, so was He made a door, a shepherd,
an angel, a sheep, and again a High Priest and an Apostle,
Heb. iii. 1. the names being used in other senses.
What again would the heretics say about God unsubjected, and about His
being made sin for us? cf.
2 Cor. v. 21. For it is
written “But when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then
shall the Son also Himself be subject unto Him that put all things
under Him.”
1 Cor. xv.
28.
i.e. Because the Son then shall be subjected, He is
previously ἀνυπότακτος, not as being “disobedient”
(1 Tim. i.
9), or
“unruly” (Tit. i. 6, 10), but as being made man, and
humanity, though subject unto Him, is not yet seen to be
“put under Him” (Heb. ii. 8). Are you not
afraid, sir, of God called unsubjected? For He makes thy
subjection His own; and because of thy struggling against goodness He
calls himself unsubjected. In this sense too He once spoke of
Himself as persecuted—“Saul, Saul,” He says,
“why persecutest thou me?”
Acts ix. 4. on
the occasion when Saul was hurrying to Damascus with a desire to
imprison the disciples. Again He calls Himself naked, when any
one of his brethren is naked. “I was naked,” He says,
“and ye clothed me;”
Matt. xxv.
36. and so when
another is in prison He speaks of Himself as imprisoned, for He Himself
took away our sins and bare our sicknesses. cf.
Isa. liii. 4 and Matt. viii. 17. Now one of our infirmities is not
being subject, and He bare this. So all the things which happen
to us to our hurt He makes His own, taking upon Him our sufferings in
His fellowship with us.