THE INCARNATION.
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sible, joined to the Divine Person in the Parsopa of the Word, that what the Humanity did, that the Divinity did, and yet in no such way or sense as that we should be necessitated to ascribe
Who is the Son and not the Father, and not the Holy Spirit, Which Person and no other, took man's nature, and this they called Parsopa.
The following creed drawn up by Yohanan bar Zöobi, an ancient eminent writer among the Nestorians, throws some light on this difficult subject:—"I believe in One God, Who is the everlasting, self-existent, subsisting in three Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The Father is Father from eternity; the Son is the Begotten from eternity; and the Spirit from eternity is Proceeding.—One Essence co-equal in its self-existence. These are united and not distinguishable in Essence or in their Persons; but the Persons are distinguishable the One from the other by their names and proprieties. There is no distinction in Essence, because the Essence is One, neither is there any distinction by or through the Persons because of infinity; since if you would distinguish the Person of the Father in order afterwards to adduce the Person of the Son, where will you find a place for it? And if there is no place which can contain the Persons of the Father and the Son, where will you place the Holy Spirit in order to distinguish It? Whereas myriads of worlds like ours would not suffice to contain One Person of the Self-Existent. The Father is God and an Essence because of His Person, The Son also is God, and an Essence because of His Person. And in like manner, the Holy Ghost is God and an Essence because of His Person. By this name of 'God' and 'Essence,' each is all and the whole, and they are not three Essences or three Gods. Hence they are not distinguishable in Essence or Person;23 but by the proprieties and the names of the Parsopas. The propriety of the Father is that He is Begetter and not Begotten, the Cause, and Paternity, which denote the name of His Person. The propriety of the Son is that He is Begotten and not Begetter, Filiation, and the Being caused, which denote the name of His Person. The propriety of the Holy Ghost is that He is neither Begetter nor Begotten, but Caused and Proceeding, which denote the name of His Person. The Father is Father, and not the Son or the Holy Spirit, and is distinguished from the Son and the Holy Spirit by the parsopa of Fatherhood. The Son, also, is Son, and not the Father or the Spirit, and is distinguished from the Father and the Spirit by the parsopa of Filiation. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit, and not the Son or the Father, and is distinguished from the Son and the Father, by the parsopa of Procession, There is no distinction between the Persons in the propriety of the Essence, for they are co-equal in the essential propriety general [to the Three Persons.] The propriety of the general Essence is spirit, eternity, nature, Divinity, Sovereignty, judgment, authority, infinity, creation, immortality, and so forth. The proprieties of the Persons, however, are those which are peculiar or proper to each of them. The proprieties of the Essence are general to all the Three Persons, and the equality subsisting in the Essence is of these proprieties of that Essence; so that the Father is not before the Son, nor the Son before the Holy Ghost; neither is the Father greater than the Son, nor the Son greater than the Holy Ghost. Let Arius and Sabellius, therefore, be confounded. A notion of priority, however, may arise in the pro-