Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume IV/Origen/Origen Against Celsus/Book VI/Chapter LXIV

Chapter LXIV.

Celsus, again, brings together a number of statements, which he gives as admissions on our part, but which no intelligent Christian would allow.&#160; For not one of us asserts that &#8220;God partakes of form or colour.&#8221;&#160; Nor does He even partake of &#8220;motion,&#8221; because He stands firm, and His nature is permanent, and He invites the righteous man also to do the same, saying:&#160; &#8220;But as for thee, stand thou here by Me.&#8221; &#160; And if certain expressions indicate a kind of motion, as it were, on His part, such as this, &#8220;They heard the voice of the God walking in the garden in the cool of the day,&#8221; we must understand them in this way, that it is by sinners that God is understood as moving, or as we understand the &#8220;sleep&#8221; of God, which is taken in a figurative sense, or His &#8220;anger,&#8221; or any other similar attribute.&#160; But &#8220;God does not partake even of substance.&#8221; &#160; For He is partaken of (by others) rather than that Himself partakes of them, and He is partaken of by those who have the Spirit of God.&#160; Our Saviour, also, does not partake of righteousness; but being Himself &#8220;righteousness,&#8221; He is partaken of by the righteous.&#160; A discussion about &#8220;substance&#8221; would be protracted and difficult, and especially if it were a question whether that which is permanent and immaterial be &#8220;substance&#8221; properly so called, so that it would be found that God is beyond &#8220;substance,&#8221; communicating of His &#8220;substance,&#8221; by means of office and power, to those to whom He communicates Himself by His Word, as He does to the Word Himself; or even if He is &#8220;substance,&#8221; yet He is said be in His nature &#8220;invisible,&#8221; in these words respecting our Saviour, who is said to be &#8220;the image of the invisible God,&#8221; while from the term &#8220;invisible&#8221; it is indicated that He is &#8220;immaterial.&#8221;&#160; It is also a question for investigation, whether the &#8220;only-begotten&#8221; and &#8220;first-born of every creature&#8221; is to be called &#8220;substance of substances,&#8221; and &#8220;idea of ideas,&#8221; and the &#8220;principle of all things,&#8221; while above all there is His Father and God.