The following comes from Cyril of Alexandria, Letter to the Monks of Egypt (Spring 429). What stood out is the use of 1 John 2:20, 27 which are, funnily enough, “proof texts” for a very low ecclesiology (something Cyril would condemn as heresy!):
10. Nonetheless one might say that
the name ‘Christ’s is not just applicable to the Emmanuel for we can find it
attributed to others. For somewhere God says in regard to those elected and sanctified
in the Spirit: ‘Do not touch my Christs, and do no harm to my prophets’ (Ps.
104.15). Indeed, when Saul was anointed as King by God at the hands of
Samuel the divine David called him the ‘Christ of the Lord’ (1 Sam. 24.7).
What does this mean? Well, is it not perfectly clear, for anyone who wishes to
see, that those who have been justified by faith in Christ, and sanctified in
the Spirit, are honoured with this designation? In any case the prophet Habakkuk
announced the mystery of Christ and the salvation that comes through him long
in advance when he said: ‘You came forth for the salvation of your people, to
save your Christs’ (Hab. 3.13). And so, the name Christ is not
attributable solely and properly, as I have said, to the Emmanuel, but also to
everyone, whoever it might be, who has been anointed with the grace of the Holy
Spirit. The name originates from what it signifies, for the term ‘Christ’ comes
from the verb to anoint. The wise John confirms that we too are thus enriched
with this wonderful and truly desirable grace, when he says: ‘And you too have
an anointing from the Holy One’ (1 Jn. 2.20), and again: ‘You do not
need anyone to teach you, for his anointing teaches you’ (1 Jn 2.27).
But it is written of the Emmanuel: ‘Jesus from Nazareth, how God anointed him
with the Holy Spirit and with power’ (Acts. 10.38). And indeed the
divine David says to him: ‘You have loved justice and hated iniquity, and this
is why God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your
fellows (Ps. 44.8). In that case what pre-eminence would one see
in the holy virgin behold other women, even if one says that she gave birth to
Emmanuel? For it would not be silly, in fact, to call the mothers of each and
every person who has been so anointed ‘Mother of Christ’.
11. But there is a vast distinction
that separates with irreconcilable differences the glory and transcendence of
our Saviour from our human condition; for we are servants, but he is Lord and
God by nature, even if he did come with us economically and in our condition.
And this is why the blessed Paul called him Christ, when he said: ‘Understand this
closely, for no fornicator or impure man or any rapacious idolator shall have
an inheritance in the Kingdom of God’ (Eph.5.5). And so, while others,
as I have said, may quite rightly be Christs on account of being anointed, the
Emmanuel is the only Christ who is true God. and while one does not err from
the truth if one should choose to say that these mothers of the other ones are ‘Mothers
of Christ’, they are certainly not ‘Mothers of God’. But in comparison with
them, only the holy virgin can be said to be both Mother of Christ and Mother
of God, for she did not give birth to a mere man like us, but rather to the Word
of God the Father made flesh and made man. Even we are called ‘gods by grace’;
but the Son is not God in this way, but rather in nature and in truth, even if
he did become flesh. (John McGuckin, Saint Cyril of Alexandria and the
Christological controversy Crestwood, N.Y.: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press,
2004], 250-51)
