Chapter 1.
That Christ, who is God and man in the unity of Person, sprang from Israel and the Virgin Mary according to the flesh.
That divine teacher of the Churches when in writing to the Romans he was reproving or rather lamenting the unbelief of the Jews, i.e., of his own brethren, made use of these words: I wished myself, said he, to be accursed from Christ, for my brethren, who are my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as of children, and the glory, and the testaments, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises: whose are the fathers, of whom is Christ according to the flesh, who is over all things, God blessed forever. O, the love of that most faithful Apostle, and most kindly kinsman! Who in his infinite charity wished to die — as a kinsman for his relations, and as a master for his disciples. And what then was the reason why he wished to die? Only one; viz., that they might live. But in what did their life consist? Simply in this, as he himself says, that they might recognize a Divine Christ born according to the flesh, of their own flesh. And therefore the Apostle grieved the more, because those who ought to have loved Him the more as sprung from their own stock, failed to understand that He was born of Israel. Of whom, said he, is Christ according to the flesh, who is over all things, God blessed forever. Clearly he lays down that from them according to the flesh, was born that Christ who is over all, God blessed forever. You certainly cannot deny that Christ was born from them according to the flesh. But the same Person, who was born from them, is God. How can you get round this? How can you shuffle out of it? The Apostle says that Christ who was born of Israel according to the flesh, is God. Teach us, if you can, at what time He did not exist. Of whom, he says, is Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God. You see that because the Apostle has united and joined together these, God cannot possibly be separated from Christ. For just as the Apostle declares that Christ is of them, so he asserts that God is in Christ. You must either deny both of these statements, or you must accept both. Christ is said to be born of them according to the flesh: but the same Person is declared by the Apostle to be God in Christ. Whence also he says elsewhere: For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself. It is absolutely impossible to separate one from the other. Either deny that Christ sprang from them, or admit that there was born of the virgin God in Christ, who is, as he says, over all, God blessed forever.
Chapter 2.
The title of God is given in one sense to Christ, and in another to men.
The name of God would for the faithful be amply sufficient to denote the glory of His Divinity, but by adding over all, God blessed, he excludes a blasphemous and perverse interpretation of it, for fear that some evil-disposed person to depreciate His absolute Divinity might quote the fact that the word God is sometimes applied by grace in the Divine economy temporarily to men, and thus apply it to God by unworthy comparisons, as where God says to Moses: I have given you as a God to Pharaoh, or in this passage: I said you are Gods, where it clearly has the force of a title given by condescension. For as it says I said, it is not a name showing power, so much as a title given by the speaker. But that passage also, where it says: I have given you as a God to Pharaoh, shows the power of the giver rather than the Divinity of him who receives the title. For when it says: I have given, it thereby certainly indicates the power of God, who gave, and not the Divine nature, in the person of the recipient. But when it is said of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, who is over all, God blessed for ever, the fact is at once proved by the words, and the meaning of the words shown by the name given: because in the case of the Son of God the name of God does not denote an adoption by favour, but what is truly and really His nature.
Chapter 3.
He explains the apostle’s saying: If from henceforth we know no man according to the flesh, etc.
And so the same Apostle says: From henceforth we know no man according to the flesh, and if we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him so no longer. Admirably consistent are all the writings of the sacred word with each other, and in every portion of them: even where they do not correspond in the form of the words, yet they agree in the drift and substance. As where he says: And if we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him so no longer. For the witness of the passage before us confirms that quoted above, in which he said: Of whom is Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. For there he writes: Of whom is Christ according to the flesh; and here: if we have known Christ according to the flesh. There: who is over all, God blessed for ever; and here: yet now we no longer know Christ according to the flesh. The look of the words is different, but their force and drift is the same. For it is the same Person whom he there declares to be God over all born according to the flesh, whom he here asserts that he no longer knows according to the flesh. And plainly for this reason; viz., because Him whom he had known as born in the flesh, he acknowledges as God for ever; and therefore says that he knows him not after the flesh, because He is over all, God blessed for ever; and the phrase there: who is over all God, answers to this: we no longer know Christ according to the flesh; and this phrase: we no longer know Christ according to the flesh implies this: who is God blessed forever. The declaration of Apostolic teaching then somehow rises, as it were to greater heights, and though it is self-consistent throughout, yet it supports the mystery of the perfect faith, with a still more express statement, and says: And though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him so no longer, i.e., as formerly we knew Him as man as well as God, yet now only as God. For when the frailty of flesh comes to an end, we no longer know anything in Him except the power of Divinity, for all that is in Him is the power of Divine Majesty, where the weakness of human infirmity has ceased to exist. In this passage then he has thoroughly expounded the whole mystery of the Incarnation, and of His perfect Divinity. For where he says: And if we have known Christ according to the flesh, he speaks of the mystery of God born in flesh. But by adding yet now we know Him so no longer, he manifests His power when weakness is laid aside. And thus that knowledge of the flesh has to do with His humanity, and that ignorance, with the glory of His Divinity. For to say we have known Christ according to the flesh: means as long as that which was known, existed. Now we no longer know it, after it has ceased to exist. For the nature of flesh has been transformed into a spiritual substance: and that which formerly belonged to the manhood, has all become God’s. And therefore we no longer know Christ according to the flesh, because when bodily infirmity has been absorbed by Divine Majesty, nothing remains in that Sacred Body, from which weakness of the flesh can be known in it. And thus whatever had formerly belonged to a twofold substance, has become attached to a single Power. Since there is no sort of doubt that Christ, who was crucified through human weakness lives entirely through the glory of His Divinity.