Eusebius of Caesarea · a new plain-English translation from the Greek
1| The inspired teaching declares that the highest of all goods, the very cause of all things, lies beyond all comprehension. It is therefore unutterable, unspeakable and unnameable, surpassing not only every word but every thought as well. It is not contained in any place, it does not exist in bodies, it is not in heaven or in the ether or in any part of the universe, but stands wholly outside all things, kept in store in the secret depths of knowledge. The divine oracles teach that this alone is to be known as the true God, separate from every bodily essence and remote from every subordinate administration. That is why the tradition holds that the universe came into being from him, but not through him.
2| He himself, like a king, dwells somewhere within, in places unutterable, inaccessible and untrodden, in light that no one can approach, and he legislates and commands everything by the power of his will alone. For whatever exists, exists because he wills it, and what he does not will does not exist; and he wills all things good, since in his very essence he is goodness itself. But the Word of God, through whom all things are, goes forth from on high, from the good Father as from an ever-flowing and boundless spring, pouring out in unutterable words like a river, overflowing wholly for the common salvation of the universe.
3| Take the example we find in ourselves. The mind within us is invisible and hidden, and no human being has ever known who or what it is in its essence. Like a king dwelling in secret within its own inner chambers, it alone deliberates on what is to be done. Then from it goes forth an only-begotten word, born as it were from the hidden recess of the father by an unutterable process and an unnameable power. This word becomes the first messenger of the father's thoughts to all; it proclaims openly what the father has resolved in secret, and it carries out his resolutions in deeds as it goes forth into the hearing of all,
4| and then some receive the benefit that comes from the word, while the hidden and invisible mind, the father of the word, no one has ever seen with the eyes. In the same way, or rather in a way that surpasses every image and example, the perfect Word of God, the King of all, as only-begotten Son of the Father, does not consist in a power of utterance. His nature is not built out of syllables, nouns and verbs, nor is he signified by a voice striking the air. He is the living and active Word of the God who is over all, subsisting in essence as God's power and God's wisdom. He goes forth from the Father's divinity and kingdom, and, being the good offspring of a good Father and the common Savior of all, he channels his streams to the whole universe, flooding all things from his own fullness with life, reason, wisdom, light, and every good thing. He waters not only what lies near and closest at hand but also what stands far off on land and sea, and whatever other portion there may be among the things that exist.
5| To all of these alike he assigns boundaries, regions, laws and allotments in the most just manner, distributing and supplying what suits each with royal authority. To some he appoints the vaults above the cosmos as their dwelling, to others heaven itself, to others the courts of the ether, to others the air, and to others the earth. Then he moves them from here to somewhere else again, judging very carefully the lives of each and rewarding the differences of their character and conduct. He takes care of the life and nourishment not only of rational beings but also of irrational animals, for the use of the rational,
6| granting to some the enjoyment of a mortal and temporary life and to others a share in life immortal. He himself, as the Word of God, works all things, present to all and passing through all things with rational power. Looking up to his own Father, he steers what lies below and after him in accordance with that Father's will, as the common Savior of all, standing somehow in the middle and drawing begotten essence together toward the unbegotten.
7| The Word of God stands in the middle as an unbreakable bond, joining what is separated and not allowing it to fall far apart. He is the providence that governs all things, the guardian and corrector of the whole, God's power and God's wisdom, the only-begotten God, the Word begotten from God. For the sacred voices of men who speak of God teach: "In the beginning the Word was; and the Word was in God's presence; and the Word was God. Through him all things came into being, and apart from him not one thing came into being that has come into being." He is the common planter of all things, through whom the essence of the universe grows and flourishes, watered always by the rains that come from him, and so supplying the whole with a freshness that never fades and a lovely bloom.
8| He who has taken hold of the reins steers straight, at his Father's nod, the great vessel of the entire world. Such a skilled craftsman, a craft-born only-begotten Son, did the God beyond all things bestow on this world as its greatest good, like a good father who has begotten a good fruit. He cast his own Word into the world as a soul into a lifeless body, into the irrational nature of bodies, and by the divine power of the Word he gave light and life to an essence that was shapeless, formless, lifeless and without figure. We must know and revere him: he dwells always among matter and the elements of bodies and gives life to all things, yet he is the same one who is light and an intelligent offspring of ineffable light. He is one in essence, as coming from one Father, yet he possesses many powers within himself.
9| For it is not to be supposed, merely because the world has many parts, that it therefore has many powers, nor, because many things have been made, that it is fitting to posit many gods on that account. Yet the children of those who believe in many gods, like infants in their souls, wandered in a dreadful error, making gods of the parts of the universe and dividing the one world into many,
10| as if someone, taking the eyes of a single living man by themselves, were to say that these were a man, and the ears in turn another man, and the head likewise, and so, breaking up the neck, chest, shoulders, feet, hands and the remaining limbs, and dividing the powers of the senses in his speech, were to claim that the one man was a great many men. He would gain nothing but ridicule for his folly among people of sense. Such a person would be the one who sets up for himself countless gods out of the parts of the one world, or who thinks that the world itself, which has come to be, is God, though it is made up of many parts, not knowing that the divine nature could never be composed of parts. If it were composite, it would need another to put it together; nor, being made of many parts, could it be divine. For how could it? It would be made of unlike differences, of worse and better elements. But being simple, without parts and uncompounded, it lies beyond every visible ordering of the world.
11| Therefore the herald of the truth cries out plainly, speaking somewhat as follows: the Word of God, who alone existed before all things, would be the savior of all rational beings, while the God beyond, the originator of the Word and the sole cause of all things, may properly be called the Father of the Word as his only-begotten, yet will not attribute to himself any higher cause. For this reason he alone is God, and from him the only-begotten comes forth, the Savior of the universe, the one Word of God who pervades all things. The perceptible world is like a many-stringed lyre made of unlike strings, high and low, slack, taut and middling, all of them well tuned by the musical art. In just this way this world, being made of many parts and many compounds, of the cold together with its opposite the hot, and of the moist and again its opposite the dry in essence, having come together into a single harmony, would be a great instrument, the handiwork of the great God. But the divine Word, no longer made of parts nor composed of opposites, being himself without parts and uncompounded, strikes the strings of the whole with skill and wisdom, rendering to his own Father and to the King of all things the melody that is owed and fitting to him. Just as in one body countless limbs, parts and inner organs are joined together, while a single invisible soul is spread through the whole and a single indivisible, incorporeal mind, one alone, so too in this case: one world is composed of many parts, and likewise the one Word of God, of many powers and all powers, reaching through all things and spread unseen over everything, must be the cause of everything in them.
12| Can you not see, with your own eyes, the whole world, how the one heaven encloses countless choirs of stars circling around it? Again, there is one sun and not several, and by the excess of its light it veils the brilliance of them all. So then, since the Father is one, his Word also must be one, good, of a good Father. And if someone complains that there are not more, it is time for him to find fault that more suns were not also established, and moons, and worlds, and countless other things, like a madman trying to distort what is right and sound in nature. But as among visible things the one sun lights up the whole perceptible world, so among intelligible things the one all-powerful Word of God, unseen and invisible to us, shines on the whole universe.
13| For in a human being too, one soul and one rational faculty can be the maker of very many things together. The same person, having learned many skills, may undertake farming, shipbuilding, steering and building; and one mind and one power of reasoning in a person may at some time take in the knowledge of countless subjects. The same man will do geometry and astronomy, teach the principles of grammar, rhetoric and medicine, and take charge both of studies and of manual work. Yet no one has ever supposed that there are several souls in one body, nor wondered at many essences in a person on account of the many branches of learning he has received.
14| Suppose someone found a shapeless lump of clay, softened it with his hands and gave it the form of a living creature, shaping with the plastic art the head in one form, the feet and hands in another, the eyes in yet another, the cheeks likewise, and the ears, mouth, nostrils, chest and shoulders. Even so, because many forms, parts and limbs have been fashioned in one body, one should not suppose that there are as many makers; rather one should praise only the one craftsman of the whole, who built the entire thing with a single plan and a single power. So too with this whole world: it is one, though made up of very many parts, and one should not suppose many creative powers or name many gods. One should speak in theology of a single power, all-wise and all-harmonious, in truth God's power and God's wisdom, reaching through all things by one power and one excellence, pervading the entire world, giving existence and life to everything, and supplying its varied provision from itself to all things universally and to bodies and elements individually.
15| In the same way the one and the same ray of the sun's light, all at once and in the same act, illuminates the air, gives light to the eyes, warms the sense of touch, enriches the earth, makes plants grow, establishes time, leads, circles round, brightens the world, and sets up in the universe a visible power of God; and it accomplishes all these things by one impulse of nature. The nature of fire likewise purifies gold, melts lead, dissolves wax, dries clay and scorches wood, producing so many effects by one burning power.
16| So too, then, the all-ruling Word of God, who has passed through all things, who is in all things and goes over all things, heavenly and earthly, steering the unseen and the seen, guides the sun itself, the heaven, and the whole world like a charioteer by ineffable powers. Present to everything with active power and pervading all things, he pours ever-flowing light from his own spring upon sun and moon and stars; and he has set up heaven as the most fitting image of his own greatness and holds it fast forever; and the powers beyond heaven and the world, angels and spirits, intelligent and rational essences, he fills from the treasures he keeps with him with life and light and wisdom, with every virtue, with all that is fair and good. With one and the same creative art he never ceases to supply the elements with their being, and bodies with their mixtures and blendings, their forms and shapes and figures; he embroiders countless qualities, now one way and now another, into animals and plants and souls rational and irrational, and he furnishes all things to all together by a single power. So he shows plainly that the world is no seven-stringed lyre, nor yet a many-stringed one, but one world of many harmonies, the work of one world-making Word.
Cite a passage by its number: every paragraph here has its own anchor (for example https://openscriptorium.com/read/eusebius/068-in-praise-of-constantine-chapter-12#p1), and the bracketed reference numbers link the same way.
← All of Eusebius of Caesarea: The Works of Eusebius of Caesarea