Attendee-"[The Nestorians] might admit this but really they do not want the title Christ applied to the Word born of God the Father, since in his own nature, as God, he was never anointed. They would also maintain that this is one of those name which we cannot use about the Holy Spirit or the Father Himself."
St. Cyril-"The logic behind this is not very clear. It would be a good thing if you could explain it."
Attendee-"Well, listen. There are many varied titles which the inspired Scriptures apply to the Son. He is called: God, Lord, Light, and Life, as well as King, Lord of Hosts, Holy One, and Lord of All. If someone wished to apply all these titles to the Father himself, or to the Holy Spirit, he could do so without error. This is because in a single nature there can only be one excellence of dignities. They argue from this that is the title Christ is truly appropriate to the Only Begotten, then it should be, like the other titles, equally applicable without distinction to the Father himself and to the Holy Spirit. Given that it is entirely inappropriate to apply this title to the Father or to the Holy Spirit, then neither can it be right to apply it to the Only Begotten, and on the contrary, they say, it ought in fact to be attributed to the one who is of the line of David, for in our arguments and discourses we can quite properly attribute to him an anointing by the Holy Spirit."
St. Cyril – “We ourselves also admit that the titles of the divine perfections are common to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and we crown the Begetter with equal glories to the One Begotten from him, and the Holy Spirit too. Nonetheless, dear friends, I would say that that the title of Christ, and that which it signifies (that is, an anointing) really do apply to the Only Begotten, after the manner of his self-emptying. It indicates quite clearly to those who hear it that he has undergone an incarnation, for it signifies wonderfully well that he has been anointed in being made man. If we were not considering this issue of the economy of the flesh, but rather were to direct our thoughts to the Only Begotten Word of God considered outside all the limitations of the self-emptying, then yes, it would indeed be entirely unfitting to name him Christ when he has not been anointed. Since the divine and sacred scripture says that he has become flesh, however, even the anointing is appropriate for him, referring to the incarnation which is his own. The all-wise Paul puts it this way: ‘For the Sanctifier and the sanctified all have the same origin. This is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers when he says: I will announce your name to my brethren” (Heb. 2:11-12; Ps. 44:7-8). He was sanctified along with us when he became like us. The divine David also testifies that the one who is truly Son was also anointed in accordance with his becoming flesh, which is to say perfect man, when he addresses these words to him: ‘Your throne O God is from age to age; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of your kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness, and so God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above all who participate in you’ (Ps. 45:6-7 LXX). Take note, then, that while David calls him God and attributes to him an eternal throne, he also says that he has been anointed by God, evidently the Father, with a special anointing above that of his participants, which means us. The Word who is God has become man, therefore, but has retained all the while the virtues of his proper nature. He is perfection itself, and as John says: ‘full of grace and truth’ (Jn. 1:14), and while he himself has everything that is fitting to the deity, we on our part ‘have all of us received from his fullness’ as it is written (Jn. 1:16). Nonetheless he made the limits of the manhood of his own, called Christ even though he cannot be thought of as anointed when we consider him specifically as God or when we speak about his divine nature. How else could we consider that there is one Christ, One Son and Lord, if the Only Begotten had disdained the anointing and had never come under the limitations of the self-emptying?”
Attendee – “But they move along completely different lines to us, and interpret the holy mystery foolishly. They maintain that God the Word assumed a perfect man who was of the line of Abraham and David, as the scriptures say, and who was of the same nature as his ancestors, a man complete in his nature, composed of a rational soul and human flesh. They say that this man, of our nature, was fashioned by the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the virgin and ‘was born of a woman, born under the law, so that he could redeem us all’ (Gal. 4:4-5) from the law’s slavery as we received the sonship long destined for us. They say that God the Word conjoined the man to himself in an entirely new way, bringing him to death as is the law among men, but raising him from the dead and taking him up to heaven and sitting him at the right hand of God so that he was ‘above every Principality and Authority, every Power and Dominion, and every name that can be named, not only in this age but even the age to come’ (Eph. 1:21). They say that he received the worship of all the creation insofar as he had an inseparable conjunction with the divine nature, as all creation rendered its worship to him with intellectual reference to God. It is for this reason that one does not speak of two Sons or two Lords because God the Word, the Only Begotten Son of the Father, is the Son by nature, and this man connected with him and participates in him and thereby shares in the very title and honor of the son. The Lord, who by nature is God the Word, communicates the honor to this man who is conjoined with him, and this is why we do not speak of two Sons or two Lords since it is obvious that he who is Lord and Son by nature has, for the sake of salvation, assumed a man into inseparable conjunction with himself which thereby elevates him to the title and honor of both Son and Lord.”
St. Cyril – “My goodness. I cannot imagine how stupid and intellectually superficial they must be who hold to such a conception. The whole thing is faithlessness and nothing else. It is the novelty of wicked inventions, the overthrowing of the divine and sacred kerygma which has proclaimed One Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, truly the word of God the Father who was made man and incarnated so that the same one is equally God and man, and that to him alone apply all the divine and human characteristics. For he who is and exists from all eternity, as he is God, underwent birth from a woman according to the flesh. This means that it pertains to one and the same both to exist and subsist eternally, and also have been born after the flesh in these last times. He who as God was holy by nature has been sanctified along with us in terms of his manifestation as man, for it befits man to be sanctified. Both he who exists in lordly glories, and he who took the form of a slave as his own, calls God his Father. He who as God is Life and Life-Giver is manifestation as man. This is why all these characteristics pertain to him. He did not disdain the economy which even God the father had praised, if what Paul taught is true, who said somewhere, ‘He made him who knew not sin into sin for our sake so that in him we might become the righteousness of God’ (2 Cor. 5:21); and in another place, ‘He did not spare his own Son but gave him up for the sake of all so that with him he might grant us all things’ (Rom. 8:32). Surely our exposition follows the mind of the scriptures?
Attendee – “Most certainly.”
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