Annotatio CXLIII

”Didst thou, after thy rising, command the daybreak?” — Job 38:12

Gregory, at the beginning of book 29 on Job, undertaking the explanation of this passage, indicates that it cannot rightly be said that the Son of God is always begotten by the Father and always being born,¹ writing thus: “The Lord God Jesus, in that which he is the virtue and wisdom of God, was born of the Father before the ages — or rather, because he neither began to be born nor ceased, let us say more truly: [he is] always born; but we cannot say [he is] always being born, lest he seem to be imperfect. Yet, that he may be able to be designated eternal, let us say [he is] both perfect and always born — inasmuch as ‘born’ pertains to perfection, and ‘always’ to eternity. Although, by this very [word] which we say, ‘perfect,’ we deviate much from the expression of that truth — because what is not made cannot properly be called perfect; but, stammering as we can, let us echo the excellencies of God, [seeing that] the Lord, condescending to the words of our infirmity, says, ‘Be perfect, as your heavenly Father also is perfect.’”²

These things Gregory: against whom Origen seems to cry out, in the second homily on Jeremiah, showing that the Son of God is perpetually born, in these words: “Our Savior is the wisdom of God; the wisdom is the splendor of eternal light; our Savior therefore is the splendor of charity. But the splendor is not born once and ceases: rather, as often as the light from which the splendor arises has arisen, so often does the splendor of charity also arise. So therefore the Savior is always born. Whence he says in the book of Wisdom, ‘Before all the hills the Lord begets me’ — not, as some read badly, ‘he begot me.’”³

Peter Lombard, in the first book of the Sentences, distinction 9, settles a controversy of this kind, speaking in this manner: “But, lest such great authors seem to contradict themselves in so great a matter, let us interpret those words of Gregory benignly. ‘The Lord Jesus,’ he says, ‘was born of the Father before the ages — or rather, because he neither began to be born nor ceases, let us say more truly: he is always born.’ But how is this said more truly — namely, that the Son is always born — than that [other], that he was born of the Father before the ages? For the sincere and catholic faith holds and preaches that [latter], as [it does] this. Why then does he say ‘let us say more truly,’ since both are equally true, unless because he wished this to be understood as said unto a greater evidence and expression of the truth than that? For by these words all approach is barred to heretics of every calumnious turn, by which [words] Christ, according to [his] deity, is shown to be a generation without beginning and without end, and perfect; whereas the truth is not so openly manifested when it is said, ‘The Son was begotten of the Father before the ages,’ or ‘The Son is always born of the Father.’ And therefore Gregory said that we cannot say ‘he is always being born’ — not, I say, so conveniently, not so congruously to the explanation of the truth. Yet it can be said, if it be soundly understood: for the Son is always born of the Father, as Origen says — not that that generation is repeated daily, but because it always is; therefore he is always born, that is, his nativity is eternal.”