The Son of God does not unite himself
with a man. In that case, the man—in Christ—would be someone other than God,
and this would leave human beings outside full communion with the divine person
and, through him, with the other persons of the Trinity. The union of the two
natures in him does not imply any confusion between the divine nature and human
nature, nor does human nature unite itself with the divine nature borne by each
divine person in his quality as bearer of the divine nature. In such a case,
man would no longer be given the possibility of being, as man, in communion with
God as son of God, through the fact that the Son of God became the Son of man.
Each divine person would be at the same time also a human person. (Dumitru Stǎniloae,
The Experience of God, 6 vols. [trans. Ioan Ionita and Robert Barringer;
Brookline, Mass.: Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 1994, 2002], 1:69)
Even during their earthly life the
saints share in a foretaste of the eternity of God. Saint Maximos the Confessor
says of Melchizedek, whom the Scripture presents as being “without father or
mother” and as one who “has neither beginning of days nor end of life” (Heb
7.3) that “he has raised himself above the time and nature and became worthy to
be likened to the Son of God, becoming as far as is possible through habit—that
is through grace—what we believe the giver of grace to be by nature.” For the
saints in general, “uniting themselves wholly with the whole God to the extent
possible for the natural power existing in them have had this quality of his imprinted
so much in them that, as in faultless mirrors, they are only recognized now from
him—having God’s image which can be seen in them and showing themselves in an unchanged
way through his features. For there remained in them not a single one of the
old features which displayed their humanity, but all these yielded to the
stronger, as light fills the air mixed with it.” (The Ambigua, PG
91.1137C-D, 1137B-C)
Saint Gregory Palamas, quoting Saint
Maximos, also says that one who has been deified becomes “without beginning”
and “without end.” (Third Letter to Akindynos 17, e.d. Christou, vol. 1,
p. 308.15-26) He also quotes Saint Basil the Great who says that “one shares in
the grace of Christ . . . shares in his eternal glory”; (The Holy Spirit 15.36,
PG 32.132B) and Saint Gregory of Nyssa who observes that the man who
participates in grace “transcends his own nature, he who was subject to corruption
in his mortality, becomes immune form it in his immortality, eternal from being
fixed in time—in a word a god from man.” (The Beatitudes, Homily 7, PG
44.1280C) (Dumitru Stǎniloae, The Experience of God, 6 vols. [trans.
Ioan Ionita and Robert Barringer; Brookline, Mass.: Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 1994,
2002], 1:154)
Justice and Mercy
These two attributes cannot be
separated in God’s relations with us. Justice towards creatures has its foundation
in the equality of the Trinitarian persons. But it is only by deigning to come
down that God creates creatures and makes them share in his happiness according
ot a justice which reflects the equality of the divine persons.
Gid is not just without being merciful
and is not merciful without being just. For it is through his free and merciful
descent to us that he is just towards us. “Vindicate me, O Lord, My God, according
to thy righteousness” says the Psalmist (Ps 35.24), or “my tongue shall tell of
thy righteousness” (Ps 38.28). But he also says: “For thy steadfast mercy is
before my eyes” (Ps 26.3), or “O continue thy steadfast mercy to those who know
thee and thy justice to the upright of heart!” (Ps 36.10).
If he were only
just, God would not be fully free; if he were only merciful God would have no
regard for human efforts nor would he encourage them. Human beings would be
reduced to the state of being passive receptacles of his mercy. The created
world would have no true and consistent reality and human beings could not grow
through their own effort.
In his justice God wishes, on the one
hand that all men might be equal among themselves, while on the other hand he
wishes to give them all as much of his own blessedness as they are able to
receive according to their own efforts. For he made them all capable of these
efforts when he himself had given them all capable of these efforts when he
himself had given them the capacity of being able to receive in the very
highest degree what it is that creatures can receive. Through justice God has
reference to us all, but he gives though to each one in a distinctive way
within the framework of all. Our yearning for justice begins to form a model or
an idea of justice and seeks its realization among all. God does not begin from
an idea of justice but from the reality of justice in himself. If sin had not
in part covered over our authentic human reality, we should not ourselves have
to start from an idea of justice but we could begin from the reality of justice
that is given within our own equalty. (Dumitru Stǎniloae, The Experience of
God, 6 vols. [trans. Ioan Ionita and Robert Barringer; Brookline, Mass.:
Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 1994, 2002], 1:215-16, emphasis added)
