Hence before the child knows
good or evil, he will desert evil to choose the good. In other words,
before human beings reach puberty and have not yet arrived at maturity, the
time when respect is shown for good sense, they are completely unable to
discern what is bad and what is good; but when that age summons them to it, then
they exercise free will in their behavior. They divine nature in its loftiness,
not being in a condition like us but in its characteristic elevation that is
proper to it, never allows an approach of evil; it resists the forms of depravity,
is unaffected by them, is subject to no upheaval, being instead by nature and
essence intolerant of evil. It would be no different, in my view, from your
saying in reference to light that it does not tolerate darkness; it cannot
bring itself to experience what is not light. So he conveys the permanent attachment
of the divine nature to good by saying, He will desert evil to choose the
good. Now, this is also true of Christ himself, since he is born of the
holy Virgin according to the flesh, being God by nature and coming as the Word
from God, he was from the womb and before it—or, rather even before every age,
being holy in being God, and not forfeiting his proper prerogatives as a result
of his humanity; and on the other hand not failing in his human characteristics
as a result of the Incarnation. The purpose was to confirm that he was really
like us, and to hallow our very creation. (Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary
on Isaiah, 3 vols. [trans. Robert Charles Hill; Brookline, Mass.: Holy
Cross Orthodox Press, 2008], 1:169-70)
