In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, One God. Amen.
My beloved, welcome to the third part of the second lecture on our deep dive into the understanding of the Eucharist through the mind of St. Cyril of Alexandria. If you've paid attention to the last couple of parts, you've seen us speak about how it is that death has entered into the world through the envy of the devil and how it is that sin has taken over. We've also spoken about the effects of the fall on humanity.
Today specifically, we are going to speak about this whole idea of the divine dilemma, the situation that God has found Himself in and the solution that He finds for the position that humanity finds itself in now.
So now, the question has to be asked: What is God supposed to do? And this is what they call the divine dilemma. The divine dilemma is what is God expected to do now, what does he do with this problem? He created us to be perfect, created us to have all of these beautiful gifts and graces that He's given to us, but instead, the human being can no longer be the human being that God created us to be. So St. Athanasius, he asks a good question, he says: What then was God to do? And he asks this question in his book On the Incarnation. So he says the following:
''What, then, was God to do in face of this dehumanising of mankind...? (St. Athanasius of Alexandria, On the Incarnation)
And I love that word: dehumanising... this idea of we can no longer be humans. What we are today in a state of death and corruption and disunion and separation from God, this is not what humanity is. I am not a human being if I... I'm dying; I'm not a human being if I am corruptible; I am not a human being if I'm separated from God. A real human being is what God had created us to be. So he says: What was then God to do in face of this dehumanising of mankind? And so St. Athanasius answers himself and says:
''What else could He possibly do, being God, but [to] renew His image in mankind, so that through it men might once more come to know him?'' (St. Athanasius of Alexandria, On the Incarnation)
God has to take this image inside us that was distorted because of sin ─ and by the way, the Church is very clear: we never lose the image of God; we never lose the image of God, but the image becomes distorted. And so the Church teaches us that like... the image is like painted on glass, but because of sin, what ends up happening is that the glass gets tinted; it
gets mucky because of the... because of the dirt, if you wish, of sin, because of this layer that is glazed on top of it. So the image is distorted; we can't see it properly. But when you clean it properly, you restore the image, you see the image for what it's supposed to be. ─ And so he says here that God's solution was to renew His image within us.
''And how could this be done save by [the] coming of the very image Himself, our Saviour Jesus Christ?'' (St. Athanasius of Alexandria, On the Incarnation)
What this means is that the only thing that could be done is for Him to send His only begotten Son who is the image of God, and St. Paul says this in the book of Colossians that He is the very image Himself, our Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ. Now St. Cyril of Alexandria, he takes this exact same idea a century and a half later and he says this and it says beautifully. he says:
''Was it (...) right that one who was created for life and immortality should be made mortal...?'' (St. Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on Luke, Part 2)
Was it right to see the human being who was meant to live eternally with God, in union with Him, in a state of incorruption, was it right for him now to be a mortal? Was it right for the human being to be condemned to death without power to escape? Was it right for the human being to be left in this state? Of course not! He actually says something very beautiful, he says:
''Must the envy of the devil be more unassailable and enduring than the will of God?'' (St. Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on Luke, Part 2)
Is it possible that the envy of the devil by which death entered into the world, will the envy of the devil be more powerful than the enduring mercy, than the enduring love of God, than the will of God who created us to be free, who created us to live, who created us to be immortal? Never! And so St. Cyril of Alexandria says:
''Not so. For it has been brought to nought.'' (St. Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on Luke, Part 2)
What has been brought to nought? The envy of the devil, this death that was introduced to the world.
''...it has been brought to nought and the clemency of the Creator has transcended the evil effects of his malignity.'' (St. Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on Luke, Part 2)
What he is saying here is that no, God has found a solution and He has fixed this problem. How is this problem fixed? Well, St. Athanasius says that the way that God has fixed this is by very clearly showing us that when he asked What, then, was God to do?, well, it was
through the incarnation. When the Lord Jesus Christ became man and walked among us, he showed us what we have forgotten; he reinstituted us into this state of being able to know who God was to reconcile us. And so, St. Athanasius says in his book Against the Heathen, he says:
''Who then, who can declare the Father by number, so as to discover the [power] of His Word? For like as He is the Father's Word and Wisdom, so too condescending to create things, He becomes, to impart the knowledge and apprehension of Him that begot Him, His very Brightness and very life, (...) the Door, (...) the Shepherd, (...) the Way, (...) [the] King (...) [the] Governor, and Savior over all, (...) [the] Light, and [the] Giver of Life, and [the] Providence [of] all.'' (St. Athanasius of Alexandria, Against the Heathen)
The Lord Jesus Christ now who is the Father's Word and Wisdom, He has come to declare to us the Father's, that's what he says: Who can declare the Father except for the Son? And because He is the Word, He is God the Father's Word and wisdom, He condescends, He comes down to our level... and this is what we read in the book of Philippians, chapter 2, that He did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but He condescended and became man and took on the form of a servant and was obedient until death, even to the obedience of the death of the cross. And so He says here:
''He becomes to impart the knowledge and [the] apprehension of Him that begot Him.'' (St. Athanasius of Alexandria, Against the Heathen)
He comes to show us what we have forgotten. He reveals to us the knowledge of the Father. And He does all of this by becoming our life, that door that he says that He is, the shepherd, the way, the king, the governor, the Saviour over all, the light, the giver of life and the providence over all things. It's the incarnation, through the incarnation that our Lord Jesus Christ fixes all of this.
St. Cyril, again, takes what St. Athanasius says and he packages it beautifully. He says... and here he is speaking on the mouth of the Lord Jesus as he gives his commentary on the Gospel of John, he says:
''I [He says] - [here the Lord Jesus Christ is the I] I was sent to bestow life on you, and I have come to remove death, which came by transgression, from human nature and patiently to bring back to God those who have fallen through sin.'' (St. Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on John, Volume 1)
And so it's through the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ that we now find a solution to everything that we have fallen into. And so now, the real question is: Okay, so the incarnation fixes all of these things, but what about the Eucharist? Well, if you remember, we talked about how it is that the tree of life was separated from us, that when humanity was kicked out
of paradise, when humanity separated and alienated itself from the presence of God, that there was a cherub that was placed to protect the tree of life. But God's intention is to reintroduce us to that tree of life.
And if you remember, we said that the tree of life is the Lord Himself who is the fruit that hangs on the tree. Him who was on that cross and offers His body that is broken for many, His blood which pours out of His body, and He gives it to us as His church, as His bride.
This is where we are going to begin to discuss the questions of where does the Eucharist fit into all of this. And God willing, what we are hoping to do as we continue to discuss the Eucharist in the mind of St. Cyril of Alexandria, next time, we will speak of the role of the Eucharist as an essential part of our restoration, how the Eucharist plays this major role of what restores us. And very specifically, we will begin to talk about how the Eucharist begins to solve one of the first problems, which is corruption, how the Eucharist takes us from a state of corruption into a state of incorruption. Until then, my beloved, I pray that the Lord keeps you safe.
To God be all glory now and forever and unto the ages of all ages. Amen. God bless you all.
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