Origen states the problem most clearly in his Dialogue with Heraclides,
where he speaks of' two Gods'. The expression is new for Christians,
although Justin and others had used the phrase ' let us make' (Gen. i:
26) to prove plurality within the godhead.
ORIGEN: While being distinct from the father is the son himself also God?
HERACLIDES: He himself is also God.
ORIGEN: And do two Gods become a unity?
HERAGLIDES: Yes.
ORIGEN: DO we confess two Gods?
HERAGLIDES: Yes. The power is one.
Origen proceeds to show 'in what sense they are two and in what sense
the two are one God'. Adam and Eve became one flesh and he who is joined to the
Lord is one Spirit (1 Cor. 6:17). When the scriptures speak about the one and
only God (Isa. 43:10; Deut. 32:39), they do not mean the father without the
son.' In these utterances we are not to think that the unity applies to the God
of the universe... in separation from Christ, and certainly not Christ in
separation from God. Let us rather say that the sense is the same as that of
Jesus' saying, "I and my father are one".' Elsewhere, Origen replies
to Celsus that there is no difficulty in the father and the son being one God,
since unity of mind is possible between many minds and, indeed, the first
Christians were of one heart and mind. (Eric Osborn, The Emergence of
Christian Theology [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993], 4-5)
