Who Am I?

On the Incarnation of the Word 10 – Like a King

Posted: September 2nd, 2009 | Author: | Filed under: Incarnation of the Word | Tags: , , , , , | Comments Off on On the Incarnation of the Word 10 – Like a King

Athanasius explores Scripture today in which you find what he has taught. But first, he uses a parable of a king to further illustrate the point.

For if a king, having founded a house or city, if it be beset by bandits from the carelessness of its inmates, does not by any means neglect it, but avenges and reclaims it as his own work, having regard not to the carelessness of the inhabitants, but to what beseems himself; much more did God the Word of the all-good Father not neglect the race of men, His work, going to corruption: but, while He blotted out the death which had ensued by the offering of His own body, He corrected their neglect by His own teaching, restoring all that was man’s by His own power.

The Word blotted out death, but he also taught us. His teaching can overcome our neglect and carelessness toward ourselves and creation. His teaching restores to us all that was ours. It is for our good that Jesus instructed us to obey his commands.

Read the full section. I daresay you may encounter some interpretation of Scripture you perhaps have not encountered before. But I’ll close with the following one.

For by the sacrifice of His own body, He both put an end to the law which was against us, and made a new beginning of life for us, by the hope of resurrection which He has given us. For since from man it was that death prevailed over men, for this cause conversely, by the Word of God being made man has come about the destruction of death and the resurrection of life; as the man which bore Christ saith: “For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive:” and so forth. For no longer now do we die as subject to condemnation; but as men who rise from the dead we await the general resurrection of all, “which in its own times He shall show,” even God, Who has also wrought it, and bestowed it upon us.