A Source Book for Ancient Church History - Mirrors

333the Logos and Wisdom. Afterward He willed to create us, thenHe made a certain one and named Him Logos and Wisdom andSon, in order that by Him He might create us. He says, therefore,that there are two wisdoms, one proper to, and existing togetherwith, God; but the Son came into existence by that wisdom,and was made a partaker of it and was only named Wisdom andLogos. For Wisdom existed by wisdom and the will of God'swisdom. So, he says, that there is another Logos besides theSon in God, and the Son partaking of that Logos is again namedLogos and Son by grace.… There are many powers; and thereis one which is by nature proper to God and eternal; but Christ,again, is not the true power of God, but is one of those whichare called powers, of whom also the locust and the caterpillar arecalled not only a power but a great power [Joel 2:2], and thereare many other things like to the Son, concerning whom Davidsays in the Psalms: “The Lord of Powers”; 101 likewise the Logosis mutable, as are all things, and by His own free choice, so far [304]as He wills, remains good; because when He wills He is ableto change, as also we are, since His nature is subject to change.Then, says he, God foreseeing that He would be good, gave byanticipation to Him that glory, which as a man He afterward hadfrom His virtue; so that on account of His works, which Godforesaw, God made Him to become such as He is now.(e) Council of Alexandria, A. D. 320, Epistula encyclica, inSocrates, Hist. Ec., I, 6. (MSG, 67:45.) Cf. Kirch, nn. 353 ff.The encyclical of the Council of Alexandria under Alexander,in which Arius and his sympathizers were deposed, waspossibly composed by Athanasius. It is commonly found inhis works, entitled Depositio Arii. It is also found in the101 Psalm 24:10; Hebrew, The Lord of Hosts; LXX, The Lord of Powers.