Two Gods, and one power

Heraclides said: Clearly he is of another, and being in that one's form he belongs to the one who created all things.

Origen said: So then the only-begotten Son of God, the firstborn of all creation, was God, the Son of God — and we need not be over-scrupulous in saying, in one respect, two Gods, and in another respect, one God?

Heraclides said: What you say is clear. But we say that God is the Almighty, God without beginning, without end, containing all things and not contained; and that his Word is the Son of the living God, God and man, through whom all things have come to be — God according to spirit, man according to his birth from Mary.

Origen said: What I asked, you do not seem to have answered. Make it clear, then; perhaps I did not follow. Is the Father God?

Heraclides said: Entirely.

Origen said: Is the Son other than the Father?

Heraclides said: How can he be a son, if he is also father?

Origen said: The Son, being other than the Father — is he also God?

Heraclides said: He too is God.

Origen said: And do the two become one?

Heraclides said: Yes.

Origen said: Do we confess two Gods?

Heraclides said: Yes; the power is one.

Origen said: But our brothers take offense at there being two Gods. So the wording must be tended with care, and we must show in what respect they are two, and in what respect the two are one God. The divine scriptures have taught that many twos are one — and not only two. Even some things more than two, and even things far more in number, they have taught to be one. The task before us now is not to take a problem and skip past it and string words together, but to chew it, for the simpler people, as if it were meat, and to put the word into the hearers' ears little by little.