Page:Complete Works of Count Tolstoy - 13.djvu/293

 himself the human flesh, but only coexternally became consubstantial with Christ who was born of a woman. On the other hand, if for us suffered and died on the cross not the Son of God, with his flesh taken up by him into a union with his hypostasis, but a simple man, Christ, who had only a moral union with the Son of God,—then there could not have taken place our redemption, because man, no matter how holy he may be, on account of his limitations, is not able to bring sufficient satisfaction to the infinite justice of God for the sins of the whole human race. And, by tearing down the mystery of the incarnation and the mystery of the redemption, the Nestorian heresy tore down the whole structure of the Christian faith.” (pp. 85 and 86.)

Thus it turns out that what cannot be comprehended or even expressed, what cannot be thought of otherwise than by learning it by heart and repeating these words, is precisely what the whole structure of the Christian faith is reared on. In connection with the disclosure of this dogma one involuntarily comes to the conclusion that the dogma of the Trinity and those of the redemption, of grace, of incarnation,—that the more monstrous and senseless they are, the more important they turn out to be in the opinion of the church and the more controversies there have been in regard to them.

Have there been so many controversies because the dogma is monstrous, or has the dogma turned out to be so monstrous because it is the outgrowth of controversy and malice? I think both have happened. A dogma which by its nature is monstrous causes controversy, and the controversy makes the dogma still more monstrous. Another remarkable thing is that the more important a dogma is regarded to be by the church, the more controversies and malice and executions there have been, and the less meaning or possibility of moral application it has. The dogmas of the emanation of the Spirit, of the essence