if each Hypostasis is therefore still a (
Greek characters) (the one
(Greek characters)) yet the(Greek characters) is not one but three Hypostases.
The words retain their old sense (connotation) yet
have received a new sense in a new relation. It is
obvious that this is the phenomenon to which Severus
referred. Catholics would add that in the Incar-
nation conversely two natures are one hypostasis.
Thus the meanings of (Greek characters) (abstract (Greek characters)) and
(Greek characters) (subsistent (Greek characters),(Greek characters) or (Greek characters)-
((Greek characters)) in the Holy Trinity were a common pos-
session; and all agreed further that in the created
universe there cannot exist a nature which does not
subsist, there is no such thing as a (Greek characters).
((Greek characters)) But Catholics hold the Human Nature of
Christ considered in itself to be (Greek characters), to have no
human (Greek characters), but that the second Person of the
Holy Trinity is its (Greek characters). As the infinity of the
Divine Nature is capable of a threefold subsistence,
so the infinity of the Hypostasis of the Word is able
to be the Hypostasis of the Human Nature assumed
as well as of the Divine. The union in Christ is not
a union of two natures directly with one another, but
a union of the two in one hypostasis; thus they are
distinct yet. inseparable, and each acts in communion
with the other. ((Greek characters)) The Nestorians argued thus:
There are, according to the Fathers, two natures in
Christ; but since every nature is a hypostasis, the
Human Nature in Christ is a hypostasis. In order to
make one Christ, they tried (in vain) to explain how
two hypostases could be united in one person ((Greek characters)). They did not mean to divide Christ, but their
prosopic union leaked at every seam; it was difficult
to express it or argue about it without falling into
heresy. The Antiochenes were glad to drop such
inadequate formulae, for it was certain that "person"
in the Holy Trinity was only another name for "hy-
postasis". The Cyrillians were shocked, and could
not be induced to believe (though St. Cyril himself
did) that the Nestorianizers did not really mean two
Christs, two Sons. ((Greek characters)) Conversely, starting from
the same proposition that every (Greek characters) is a (Greek characters),
the Monophysites argued that as Christ is one Person,
one Hypostasis, so He is one Nature, and they pre-
ferred "is one nature" to the equivalent "has one
nature". They alleged high authority for their
formula, not only St. Cyril, but behind him St. Atha-
nasius, Pope St. Julius, and St. Gregory the Wonder-
worker. These authorities, however, were but Apol-
linarian forgeries; the favourite formula of St. Cyril,
the (Greek characters), had been borrowed un-
wittingly from an Apollinarian source, and had been
meant by its original inventor in a heretical sense.
Nay, the "one nature" went back to the Arians, and
had been used by Eudoxius himself to express the
incompleteness of the Human Nature of Christ.
Yet the Monophysites were far from being Apol-
linarians, still less were they Arians; they were careful
from the beginning to explain that Christ is perfect
Man, and that He assumed a complete Human Nature
like ours. Dioscurus is emphatic on this point in his
letter to Secundinus (Hist. Mi.sc, III, i) and with
need, since he had acquitted Eutyches who had de-
nied our Lord's "consubstantiality with us".
Ælurus is just as clear in the letters by which he re-
futed and excommunicated Isaias of Hermaopolis and
Theophilus as "Eutychians " (Hist. Mi.sc, IV, xii),
and Severus had an acute controversy with Sergius
the Grammarian on this very point. They all de-
clared with one voice that Christ is (Greek characters), but
(Greek characters), that His Divine Nature is combined
with a complete Human Nature in one hypostasis,
and hence the two have become together the One
Nature of that one hypostasis, howbeit without
mixture or confusion or diminution. Ælurus insists
that after union the properties of each nature remain
unchanged; but they spoke of "the divine and human
things", divina el humana, not natures; each nature re-
mains in its natural state with its own characteristics
(Greek characters) Kara, ((Greek characters)) yet not as a unity but
as a part, a quality ((Greek characters)), not as a (Greek characters).
All the qualities of the two natures are combined into
one (Greek characters) and form the one nature of
that one hypostasis. So far there is no heresy in in-
tention, but only a wrong definition: — that one hy-
postasis can have only one nature.
But however harmless the formula "one nature"
might look at first sight, it led in fact immediately
to serious and disastrous consequences. The Divine
Nature of the Word is not merely specifically but
numerically one with the Divine Nature of the Son and
the Holy Ghost. This is the meaning of the word
(Greek characters) applied to the Three Persons, and if Har-
nack were right in supposing that at the Council of
Constantinople in 381 the word was taken to imply
only three Persons of one species, then that Council
accepted three Gods, and not three distinct but in-
separable Persons in one God. Now if the Divine and
Human Natures are united in the Word into one
Nature, it is impossible to avoid one of two conclu-
sions, either that the whole Divine Nature became
man and suffered and died, or else that each of the
three Persons had a Divine Nature of His own. In
fact the Monophysites split upon this question,
Ælurus and Severus seem to have avoided the diffi-
culty, but it was not long before those who refused
the latter alternative were taunted with the necessity
of embracing the former, and were nicknamed The-
opaschites, as making God to suffer. Vehemently
Severus and his school declared that they made the
Divinity to suffer not as God, but only as man; but
this was insufficient as a reply. Their formula was
not "The Word made flesh", "the Son of God made
man", but "one Nature of the Word made flesh";
— the Nature became flesh, that is the whole Divine
Nature. They did not reply: "We mean hypostasis
when we say nature, we do not mean the Divine
Nature (which the Word has in common with the
Father and the Holy Ghost) but His Divine Person,
which in the present case we call His (Greek characters), for the
(Greek characters), before the word (Greek characters) has
been added, is in the sphere of "theology" not of "the
economy", and its signification could not be doubted.
Just as there were many "Eutychians" among the Monophysites who denied that Christ is consubstan- tial with us, so there were found many to embrace boldly the paradox that the Divine Nature has be- come incarnate. Peter Fullo added to the praise of the Trinity the words "who was crucified for us", and refused to allow the natural inference to be explained away. Stephen Niobes and the Niobites expressly denied all distinction between the Human and the Divine Natures after the union. The Actistetæ de- clared that the Human Nature became "uncreated" by the union. If the greatest theologians of the sect, Severus and Philoxenus, avoided these excesses, it was by a refusal to be logically Monophysite.
It was not only the orthodox who were scandalized
by these extreme views. An influential and very
learned section of the schism rebelled, and chose the
second of the two alternatives, — that of making the
Divine Nature itself threefold, in order to ensure that
the Human Nature in Christ was made one with the
Nature of the Son alone and not with the whole Divine
Nature. John Philoponus, the Aristotelian commen-
tator, therefore taught that there are in the Trinity
three partial substances ((Greek characters)) and one com-
mon substance ((Greek characters)), thus falling into Polythe-
ism, with three, or rather four, gods. This Tritheistic
party was treated with leniency. It split into sections.
Though they were excommunicated at Alexandria, the
Patriarch Damian held ,a view not far different. He so
distinguished between the Divine (Greek characters) and the three
Hypostases which partake ((Greek characters)) in it, that he
conceded the (Greek characters) to be existent of Itself ((Greek characters))
