Novatian, On the Trinity 25
They argue that if Christ is not merely a man but also God, and yet Scripture reports that he died and rose again for us, then Scripture teaches us to believe that God died. Alternatively, if God cannot die, but Christ is reported to have died, then Christ cannot be God, since God cannot be conceived as having died. If they ever understood—or had ever understood—what they read, they would never speak so dangerously. But error is always marked by a sudden, reckless madness, and it is no surprise that those who have abandoned the legitimate faith descend into such dangerous statements.
After all, if Scripture presented Christ as God alone, with no admixture of human frailty, their twisted syllogism—"If Christ is God, and Christ died, therefore God died"—would carry some weight. But since Scripture constitutes Christ as both God and man, as we have shown repeatedly, it follows that what is immortal and incorruptible remains untouched. Who does not grasp that divinity is impassible, while human frailty is passible? Therefore, since Christ is understood to be a union of both the divine and the human—"the Word became flesh and dwelled among us" (John 1:14)—who cannot recognize without any teacher or interpreter that it was not the divine element in Christ that died, but the human?
Consider: if the divinity in Christ does not die, but only the substance of his flesh is extinguished, this parallels every other human being. We are not flesh alone, but flesh and soul; the flesh alone suffers the onset of death, while the incorrupt soul is seen to lie outside death's jurisdiction. The Lord himself confirmed this when he urged us to martyrdom and contempt for all human power: "Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul" (Matthew 10:28). If an immortal soul cannot be killed or destroyed in anyone else, even though the body and flesh alone can be killed, how much more certainly could the Word of God—who is God in Christ—never be killed at all, since only his flesh and body were slain?
If the soul possesses the nobility of immortality in every human being, rendering it unkillable, how much more does the nobility of the Word of God possess the power not to be killed? If human power is insufficient to kill the sacred power of God, and human cruelty fails to kill the soul, it must fail all the more to kill the Word of God. Since the soul itself—made through the Word of God—is not killed by men, the Word of God must all the more be believed indestructible. And if human cruelty can do no more against human beings than kill the body, how much more certainly will it prevail no further in Christ than to kill his body alone? The conclusion drawn from these facts is that only a man was killed in Christ, showing that the argument about mortality is misplaced.
Consider Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, acknowledged as mere men. Yet it is clear they live: "All of them live to God" (Luke 20:38), and death does not destroy the soul in them, which merely releases their bodies. Death could exercise its right over their bodies, but not over their souls; one element in them was mortal and therefore died, another was immortal and therefore is understood not to be extinguished. For this reason they are declared to live to God. How much more certainly, then, could death prevail against Christ only regarding the material of his body, and not against the divinity of his Word? For the power of death is broken wherever the authority of immortality intervenes.
Latin
Ergo, inquiunt, si Christus non homo est tantum sed et deus, Christum autem refert scriptura mortuum pro nobis et resuscitatum, iam docet nos scriptura credere deum mortuum: aut si deus non moritur, Christus autem mortuus refertur, non erit Christus deus, quoniam deus non potest accipi mortuus. si umquam intellegerent aut intellexissent quod legunt, numquam tam periculose omnino loquerentur. sed erroris semper est abrupta dementia; et non est nouum si usque ad periculosa descendunt, qui fidem legitimam reliquerunt. si enim scriptura proponeret Christum tantummodo deum, et nulla in illo fragilitatis humanae sociatio esset permixta, merito illorum hic aliquid ualuisset sermo contortus, ‘si Christus deus, Christus autem mortuus, ergo mortuus est deus.’ sed cum non tantummodo illum, ut ostendimus iam frequenter, deum sed et hominem scriptura constituat, consequens est, quod immortale est, incorruptum mansisse teneatur. quis enim non intellegat, quod impassibilis sit diuinitas, passibilis uero sit humana fragilitas? cum ergo tam ex eo quod deus est, quam etiam ex illo quod homo est, Christus intellegatur esse permixtus et esse sociatus,—verbum enim caro factum est, et habitauit in nobis—quis non sine ullo magistro atque interprete ex sese facile cognoscat, non illud in Christo mortuum esse quod deus est, sed illud in illo mortuum esse quod homo est? quid enim si diuinitas in Christo non moritur, sed carnis solius substantia exstinguitur, quando et in ceteris hominibus, qui non sunt caro tantummodo, sed caro et anima, caro quidem sola incursum interitus mortisque patiatur, extra leges autem interitus et mortis anima incorrupta cernatur? hoc enim et ipse dominus, hortans nos ad martyrium et ad contemptum omnis humanae potestatis, aiebat: ne timueritis eos qui corpus occidunt, animam autem occidere non possunt. quod si anima immortalis occidi aut interfici non potest in quouis alio, licet corpus et caro sola possit interfici, quanto magis utique uerbum dei deus in Christo interfici omnino non potuit, cum caro sola et corpus occisum sit? si enim hanc habet generositatem immortalitatis anima in quouis homine, ut non possit interfici, multo magis hanc habet potestatem generositas uerbi dei, ut non possit occidi. nam si potestas hominum ad interficiendam sacram dei potestatem, et si crudelitas humana ad interficiendam animam deficit, multo magis ad dei uerbum interficiendum deficere debebit. nam cum ipsa anima, quae per dei uerbum facta est, ab hominibus non occiditur, multo magis utique uerbum dei perimi non posse credetur. et si plus non potest hominum cruenta saeuitia aduersus homines, quam ut tantummodo corpus occidat, quanto magis utique in Christo non ualebit, quam ut item tantummodo corpus occidat: ut, dum per haec colligitur non nisi hominem in Christo interfectum, appareat ad mortalitatem sermonem in loco non esse deductum. nam si Abraham, et Isaac, et Iacob, quos homines tantummodo constat fuisse, manifestum est uiuere—ommnes enim, inquit, illi uiuunt deo, nec mors in illis animam perimit, quae corpora ipsa soluit; ius enim suum exercere potuit in corpora, in animas exercere non ualuit: aliud enim in illis mortale, et ideo mortuum, aliud in illis immortale, et ideo intellegitur non exstinctum, ob quam causam uiuere deo pronuntiati et dicti sunt,—multo magis utique mors in Christum aduersum solam materiam corporis potuit ualere, aduersus diuinitatem sermonis non potuit se exercere. frangitur enim potestas mortis, ubi intercedit auctoritas immortalitatis.