Section 844
I. The first century, in which the Evangelists and Apostles lived
What their sentiments were concerning this doctrine, is abundantly manifest from their writings. The persons in this age who opposed the divine and eternal Son-ship of Christ were,
1st, Simon Magus, father of heresies, as he is justly called; he first vented the notion afterwards imbibed by Sabellius, of one person in the Godhead; to which he added this blasphemy, that he was that person that so is. Before he professed himself a Christian he gave out that he was some great one; he afterwards said, he was the one God himself under different names, the Father in Samaria, the Son in Judea, and the holy Spirit in the rest of the nations of the world;[4387] or as Austin[4388] expresses it, he said that he in mount Sinai gave the law to Moses for the Jews, in the person of the father; and in the time of Tiberius, he seemingly appeared in the person of the Son, and afterwards as the holy Ghost, came upon the apostles in tongues of fire. And according to Jerom[4389] he not only said, but wrote it; for it seems, according to him, he wrote some volumes, in which he said, "I am the Word of God, that is, the Son of God." Menander his disciple took the same characters and titles to himself his master did.[4390]
2dly, Cerinthus is the next, who was contemporary with the apostle John, of whom that well known story is told,[4391] that the apostle being about to go into a bath at Ephesus, and seeing Cerinthus in it, said to those with him, "Let us flee from hence, lest the bath fall upon us in which Cerinthus, the enemy of truth is:" he asserted that Christ was, only a man, denying his deity,[4392] and in course his divine and eternal Sonship; he denied that Jesus was born of a virgin, which seemed to him impossible; and that he was the son of Joseph and Mary, as other men are[4393] of their parents. Jerom says,[4394] at the request of the bishops of Asia, John the apostle wrote his gospel against Cerinthus and other heretics, and especially the tenets of the Ebionites, then rising up, who asserted that Christ was not before Mary hence he was obliged plainly to declare his divine generation; and it may be observed, that he is the only sacred writer who in his gospel and epistles speaks of Christ as the begotten and only begotten Son of God, at least speaks mostly of him as such.
3dly, Ebion. What his sentiment was concerning Christ, may be learned from what has been just observed, about the apostle John's writing his gospel to refute it; and may be confirmed by what Eusebius[4395] says of him, that he held that Christ was a mere man, and born as other men are: and though he makes mention of another sort of them, who did not deny that Christ was born of a virgin, and of the Holy Ghost, nevertheless did not own that he existed before, being God the Word and Wisdom. Hence Hilary calls[4396] Photinus, Ebion, because of the sameness of their principles, and Jerom[4397] says. Photinus endeavoured to restore the heresy of Ebion; now it is notorious that the notion of the Photinians was the same with the Socinians now, who say, that Christ was not before Mary; and so Alexander bishop of Alexandria[4398] observes of Arius and his followers, who denied the natural sonship and eternal generation of Christ, that what they propagated were the heresy of Ebion and Artemas.
Besides the inspired writers, particularly the apostle John, who wrote his gospel, as now observed, to confute the heresies of Ebion and Cerinthus, and in vindication of the deity of Christ, and his divine and eternal generation, there are very few writings if any in this century extant. There is an epistle ascribed to Barnabas, contemporary with the apostle Paul, in which are these words,[4399] having made mention of the brazen serpent as a figure of Jesus, he adds, "what said Aliases again to Jesus the son of Nave, putting this name upon him, being a prophet, that only all the people might hear that the Father hath made manifest all things concerning his Son Jesus in the son of Nave, and he put this name upon him, when he sent him to spy the land—because the Son of God in the last days will cut up by the roots the house of Amalek: behold again Jesus, not the son of man, but the Son of God, manifested in the flesh by a type—Likewise David said the Lord said to my Lord —See how David calls him Lord, and the Son of God:" by which it appears that he believed that Christ was the Son of God before he was manifested in the flesh or became incarnate; and that he was the Son of God according to the divine nature, as well as the Son of David according to the human nature, which he also expresses in the same paragraph. And elsewhere he says,[4400] " For this end the Son of God came in the flesh, that the full sum might be made of the sins of those who persecuted the prophets," so that according to him Christ was the Son of God before he came in the flesh or was incarnate.
Clemens Romanus was bishop of Rome in this century, and though the book of Recognitions, ascribed to him, are judged spurious, yet there is an epistle of his to the Corinthians[4401] thought to be genuine: in which, after speaking of Christ our Saviour, and the high priest of our oblations, and the brightness of the magnificence of God, and of his haying a more excellent name than the angels, observes, that the Lord thus says of his own Son, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee; thereby declaring his belief, that Christ is the proper Son of God, and begotten by him. Ignatius was bishop of Antioch in this century, after the first bishop of that place Evodius, and was early in it, if any truth in these reports that he was the child Christ took in his arms, when he rebuked his disciples; and that he saw Christ after his resurrection; but though these are things not to be depended on, yet it is certain that he lived in the latter end of the first century, and suffered martyrdom in the beginning of the second. Several epistles of his are extant, in which, as well as by words, he exhorted the saints to beware of heresies then springing up among them, and abounding, as Eusebius observes;[4402] meaning the heresies of Ebion arid Cerinthus about the person of Christ: and says many things which shew his belief, and what was their error. In one of his epistles[4403] he exhorts to decline from some persons, as beasts, as ravenous dogs, biting secretly, and difficult of cure; and adds, "there is one physician, carnal and spiritual, begotten and unbegotten. God made flesh, in a true and immortal life, who is both of Mary and of God." In a larger epistle to the same,[4404] thought by some to be interpolated, though it expresses the same sentiment; "our physician is alone the true God, the unbegotten and invisible Lord of all, the Father and begetter of the only begotten one; we have also a physician, or Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son before the world, and the word, and at last man of the virgin Mary; " and afterwards in the same[4405] epistle still more expressly, "the Son of God, who was begotten before the world was, and constitutes all things according to the will of the Father, he was bore in the womb by Mary, according to the dispensation of God, of the seed of David by the Holy Ghost." And a little farther,[4406] "be ye all in grace by name, gathered together in one common faith of God the Father, and of Jesus Christ his only begotten Son, and the first-born of every creature: according to the flesh indeed of the family of David: ye being guided by the Comforter." A plain account, as of the divine Sonship and Humanity of Christ, so of the doctrine of the Trinity. In another epistle[4407] of his, he speaks of Jesus Christ, "who was with the Father before the world was, and in the end appeared," that is, in human nature in the end of the world; and exhorts all to "run to one temple of God, as to one altar, as to one Jesus Christ, who came forth from one Father, and being in him and returning to him." And a little lower he adds, "there is one God, who hath manifested himself by Jesus Christ his Son, who is his eternal word." And father on he says, "study to be established in the doctrines of the Lord, and of the apostles, that whatsoever ye do may prosper, in flesh and spirit, in faith and love, in the Son, and in the Father, and in the Spirit." A full confession of the Trinity, one of the principal doctrines he would have them be established in. All which is more fully expressed in the larger epistle[4408] to the same persons: speaking of Christ, he says, "who was begotten by the Father before the world was; God the Word, the only begotten Son, and who remains to the end of the world, for of his kingdom there is no end. " Again, "there is one God omnipotent, who hath manifested himself by Jesus Christ his Son, who is his Word; not spoken, but essential, not the voice of an articulate speech, but of a divine operation, begotten substance, who in all things pleased him that sent him." And father on, "but ye have a plerophory in Christ, who was begotten by the Father before all worlds, afterwards made of the virgin Mary without the conversation of men." And in the larger epistle[4409] of his to other persons, he thus speaks of some heretics of his time; "they profess an unknown God, they think Christ is unbegotten, nor will they own that there is an holy Spirit: some of them say the Son is a mere man, and that the Father, the Son and the holy Spirit, are the same—beware of such, lest your souls be ensnared." And in an epistle to another people[4410] be says, "there is one unbegotten God the Father, and one only begotten Son, God the Word and man, and one comforter the Spirit of truth." And in an epistle[4411] ascribed unto him he has these words, "there is one God and Father—there is also one Son, God the Word—and there is one comforter, the Spirit—not three Fathers, nor three Sons, nor three Comforters, but one Father, and one Son, and one Comforter; therefore the Lord, when he sent his apostles to teach all nations, commanded them to baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; not in one of three names, nor into three that are incarnate, but into three of equal honor and glory." Lucian, that scoffing, blasphemous heathen, lived in the times of Trajan, and before, as Suidas says, wrote a dialogue[4412] in derision of the Christian religion, particularly of the doctrine of the Trinity: which dialogue, though it is a scoff at that doctrine, is a testimony of it, as held by the Christians of that age; and among other things, he represents them as saying that Christ is the eternal Son of the Father. I go on,