The cause and foundation of the Son's dignities already listed is the Son's equality of honor with the Father. Return a little to what was said before, and recall it. Then you will understand the meaning of this saying precisely.
Thus, "He called God His own Father, making Himself equal with God" (v. 18). Then again He indicated Himself as equal in power to Him and as co-Creator, saying, "For whatever He does, the Son likewise does" (v. 19).
That He is also life and life-giver by nature, as is He who begot Him, He indicated by adding: "For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom He wills" (v. 21).
He also revealed that He will be the Judge of all, with the Father's good pleasure and cooperation in all things, in these words: "For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son" (v. 22).
What is the cause of this? What moved the Only-begotten to speak such words? "That all," He says, "may honor the Son, even as they honor the Father."
If He is everything the Father is, so far as divine dignity is concerned, should not He who lacks nothing in identity of essence be crowned with honors equal to His?
But what do those who "pervert all that is right," according to the word of the prophet Isaiah, say against this too (Mic 3:9; cf. Is 5:20)?
They say: "If, on the basis of the words, 'that all may honor the Son as they honor the Father,' you think that the Son must be magnified with honors equal to the Father, you do not know how far you depart from the truth.
For the word 'as,' kathos, does not necessarily indicate equality in the things of which it is used. Often it expresses only a certain likeness.
For example, they say, the Savior in one place gives this counsel: 'Be merciful, as your heavenly Father is merciful' (Lk 6:36). Because of this 'as,' kathos, can we be merciful as the Father is?
Again, Christ says to His Father concerning the disciples: 'You have loved them as You have loved Me' (Jn 17:23). Because of this 'as,' kathos, we cannot admit that the disciples are loved as the Son is loved.
Why, then, do you contrive and forcibly insert blasphemy into a saying which contains no necessity for the hearers to honor the Son equally with the Begetter?"
What shall we say in answer? The fighters against God bark harsh words at us. But "beware of dogs," as Paul says (Phil 3:2). Beware of evil workers. Beware of the mutilation of the right faith.
We are sons of the truth and children of light (Eph 5:8). Therefore we glorify the Only-begotten together with God the Father, not with any difference, but in equality of honor and glory.
We glorify Him as God from God, Light from Light, and Life from Life.
Although it is often unsafe to subject what is received by faith to excessive analysis, we must examine the meaning of this "as," kathos, so that our adversaries may not think highly of themselves.
When the word "as" is applied to things unlike by nature, it certainly does not indicate perfect equality. It indicates only likeness and representation, as you yourselves admitted in the previous objection.
But if it is used of things wholly like one another, it expresses equality in all things, likeness, and everything else equivalent to this.
For example, I can say: the sun shines in heaven, and silver shines in a similar way on earth. Yet the nature of the things named is different.
Or let us suppose that some rich man on earth says to his household servants, "Let the silver shine as the sun." By this we certainly do not assert that earthly matter attains a brilliance equal to the sun.
We assert only a certain likeness and resemblance, although this "as" is used of it.
But let us take Peter and John as an example, the holy disciples who lacked no exact likeness to one another in nature and in piety toward God. Let someone use this "as" of them in this sentence: let John be honored by all as Peter also is.
Will this "as" again indicate that equal honor should not be given to both? I think no one will say this, for he will see no obstacle to their complete equality of honor.
According to this reasoning, when this "as" is used of the Son and the Father, why should we shrink from crowning both with equal honor?
As God, He foresaw what was to come and anticipated the slanderous contradiction of your ignorance. Therefore He did not use this "as" simply and without its proper explanation.
He first strengthened it with the necessary assurances and showed beforehand that He is God by nature. Thus He declared God to be His own Father.
He also first revealed that He is truly God, Creator, and Life. In a word, He set Himself forth beforehand as shining with the properties of God the Father.
Then, at the fitting time, He adds: "That all may honor the Son, as they also honor the Father."
What obstacle, then, can appear at last? What forbids that He in whom the properties and prerogatives of the Begetter are essentially present should rise to an equal measure of honor with Him?
For we shall be honoring the nature of God the Father, which is wholly reflected in the Son. This is why He says afterward: "He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him."
Thus the guilt of dishonoring the Son and blaspheming Him must be referred to none other than the true Father Himself, who sent forth the Son as from the source of His own nature.
Yet throughout all Holy Scripture He is shown to be eternally present with Him.
The adversary says: "Let the guilt of not honoring the Son touch whatever you please. Let it even be referred to God the Father Himself.
He will certainly be indignant, and quite justly. Yet this is not because His nature is insulted in the Son, according to the reasoning just given by us.
Rather, since the Son is His image and impress, perfectly imaged according to His divine and ineffable nature, He is justly indignant and refers the insult wholly to Himself.
Indeed, it would be the height of absurdity if one who insults divine images were not punished for sin against the prototype itself.
So too one who insults the images of earthly kings is undoubtedly punished as a criminal against the ruler himself.
We shall find a similar decree of God concerning ourselves in the words: 'Whoever sheds man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed, for I made man in the image of God' (Gen 9:6).
From this already," says the adversary, "you can see with all clarity that when an image is insulted, even if it is certainly not of divine nature, God the Father must be indignant, according to Scripture's thought.
Therefore Christ's words, 'He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father,' must be understood and interpreted in the same way."
But must the Only-begotten, together with us, be outside the essence of the Father? And how can He still be God, if He is wholly removed from the bounds of the Godhead?
Would He not then exist in some nature of His own, entirely different from that in which the Father abides?
Therefore we are mistaken when we bring the Holy Trinity up to the unity of the Godhead. For then we ought to worship the Father as God and give some separate glory to the Son and the Spirit.
This would follow if we divide Them into different natures and assign to each a separate mode of being.
But the Holy Scriptures proclaim to us one God, ranking the Son and the Spirit together with the Father. For the Holy Trinity rises to the unity of the Godhead through the most perfect identity of essence.
Therefore the Only-begotten is not alien to the nature of Him who begot Him. Nor could He be conceived as a wholly true Son if He did not shine forth from the essence of the Begetter.
This, and no other, is the definition and essence of true sonship among all. If there is no Son, then God must surely cease to be Father.
In that case, will Paul be right when he says of God, "From whom every fatherhood in heaven and on earth is named" (Eph 3:15)?
If the Son was not begotten from Him in a manner befitting God, how does the beginning of fatherhood in Him pass by imitation to the inhabitants of heaven and earth?
But God is true Father. Therefore the Only-begotten is Son by nature, and within the bounds of the Godhead.
For God must be born from God, as man is born from man. The Nature of God the Father, surpassing all things, cannot prove untrue by begetting a fruit unworthy of itself.
They impiously and senselessly assert that the nature itself of God the Father is not insulted in the Son, when the Son does not receive from some the glory belonging to Him.
Rather, they say, He is rightly indignant at the dishonor shown in Him to His own image. We must ask them in what sense they want the Son to be and be called the image of the Father.
Before their answer, however, we ourselves will present the kinds of image, as far as we can. In this way the answer to the question may be clearer and better considered.
One first kind of image is identity of nature in entirely identical properties, as Abel from Adam, or Isaac from Abraham.
Another consists only in likeness of outline and exact representation of outward appearance. Such is an image of a king on wood, or one made skillfully and artistically in some other way.
Another kind of image is taken with regard to morals, conduct, and inclination toward something good or evil. For example, one might say that the virtuous man is like Paul, and the evildoer like Cain.
The same vices or virtues justly give and supply each person with likeness.
There is yet another kind of image, consisting in dignity, honor, glory, and prerogative. For example, one may receive another's authority and do everything with power, as would be proper and fitting for that predecessor.
In general, there are also other kinds of images with respect to some other quality of a thing, or to quantity, outward appearance, and proportion.
Let the most exact investigators of the divine image now teach us what they think. Do they think that essential and natural likeness must be assigned to the Only-begotten?
Do they therefore affirm that the Only-begotten Word, who came forth from the Father, is the image of the Father, just as Abel came from Adam?
Does He preserve in Himself the whole nature of the Begetter and bear the whole being of manhood?
Or will they by no means agree to this, since they would be compelled to confess the Son as true God from God by nature?
Will they instead, according to their custom of opposing the truth, pass to the second kind of image, which is conceived only in representation, outline, and outward appearance?
I think they themselves will fear to say this. For no one, not even a very great talker, will suppose that the Godhead is quantitative, described by outward appearance, or measured by outline.
Nor will anyone suppose that the incorporeal is subject in general to the properties of bodies.
Will they say that He is formed according to the morals, life, and inclination of God? Will they not be ashamed to assign such an image to Him?
But then can He still be conceived as God by nature, if He has likeness to Him only in will, while He is in Himself something else and distinct?
For they must confess His existence. What, then, at last, will be more in Him than in a creature?
Must we not believe that the angels also strive to accomplish the divine will, while being something other than God by nature?
What shall we say when the same is applied to us? Does the Only-begotten teach us to strive unreasonably for what is above our nature and to desire the impossible?
For He says, "Be merciful, even as your heavenly Father is merciful" (Lk 6:36). Without doubt this means nothing other than that we should receive the image of the Father in identity of desires.
Paul too was an imitator of Christ, who is the image of the Father according only to desires, as they babble.
But they will probably withdraw even from these wretched reasonings. Inventing something apparently better and stronger, they will surely say the following.
THEOSIS