Letter 139: On the text: "Why do you see the speck in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log in your own?

To Athanasius. On the text, "He did not consider equality with God a thing to be seized." "He did not consider equality with God a thing to be seized" [Philippians 2:6]: so the divine Apostle [Paul] writes to the Philippians, who were superstitious men, champions and guardians of the doctrines of the Greeks [i.e. the pagans], and who, because of their preoccupation with those teachings, were unreceptive to the preaching of the Gospel. For since, thinking as Greeks do, they had learned that their own god, who had become supreme ruler, had cut off the generative organs of his own father out of fear that there might come to be other sons sharing in the kingdom, and had learned of seizures of divinity and of strifes and wars over it, they disbelieved that the Son of God, having come here below, was made flesh, leaving behind the heavenly realms, and that he did so without fearing any transfer of his power. This ignorance, then, of theirs, or rather this folly, the divine [...] correcting it, the man and teacher of things unspeakable says: "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider equality with God a thing to be seized, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant" [Philippians 2:5-7]; that is, it was not a divinity and a kingdom that he had seized, but one that he possessed innate before the ages, nor did he suppose it could be taken from him, but, being Master of things heavenly and things earthly and things beneath the earth, he did not even abandon the things above, yet he came to us; and further, he visited even Hades, so that, by coming to be in all places, he might from every quarter rescue all things: on earth, renewing those who are living and those who will live; beneath the earth, snatching away those held fast by the tyranny of death.

Εἰς τὸ, «Οὐχ ἁρπαγμὸν ἡγήσατο τὸ εἶναι ἴσα Θεῷ.» «Οὐχ ἁρπαγμὸν ἡγήσατο τὸ εἶναι ἴσα Θεῷ,» Φιλιππησίοις γράφει ὁ θεῖος Ἀπόστολος, ἀνθρώποις καὶ δεισιδαίμοσι καὶ τῶν Ἑλληνικῶν δογμάτων [«Ἑλλήνων (34)] προμάχοις καὶ φύλαξι, καὶ ἐκ τῆς πρὸς ἐκεῖνα σχολῆς ἀπαραδέκτως πρὸς τὸ κήρυγμα ἔχουσι τοῦ Εὐαγγελίου. Ἐπειδὴ γὰρ ἔμαθον Ἑλληνίζοντες τὸν θεὸν αὐτῶν καὶ ὕπατον γεγονότα ἐκτεμόντα τῶν γεννητικῶν ὀργάνων τὸν ἑαυτοῦ πατέρα, δέει ὑπάρξεως ἑτέρων υἱῶν, καὶ τῆς βασιλείας κοινωνῶν, καὶ ἁρπαγὰς θεότητος καὶ ἔρεις καὶ πολέμους περὶ ταύτης, ἠπίστουν εἰ Υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ δεῦρο ἐπιφοιτήσας σεσάρκωται καταλιπὼν τὰ οὐράνια, καὶ μὴ δεδιὼς τινα τοῦ κράτους μετάθεσιν, Ταύτην τοίνυν αὐτοῖς τὴν ἄγνοιαν, καὶ μᾶλλον ἄνοιαν, ὁ θεῖος ἄν. αὐτὸν ἄνθρωπος καὶ τῶν ἀπορρήτων διδάσκαλος διορθούμενος φησι· «Τοῦτο φρονείσθω ἐν ὑμῖν, ὃ καὶ ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ, ὃς ἐν μορφῇ Θεοῦ ὑπάρχων, οὐχ ἁρπαγμὸν ἡγήσατο τὸ εἶναι ἴσα Θεῷ, ἀλλ᾽ ἑαυτὸν ἐκένωσε μορφὴν δούλου λαβών, » τουτέστιν, ἣν ἥρπασε θεότητα, καὶ βασιλείαν, ἀλλ᾽ ἔμφυτον ἔσχε πρὸ τῶν αἰώνων, οὐδὲ ἀφαιρεθῆναι ὑπέλαβεν, ἀλλὰ Δεσπότης ὑπάρχων, καὶ τῶν ἐπουρανίων, καὶ τῶν ἐπιγείων καὶ τῶν καταχθονίων, οὐδὲ τὰ ἄνω κατέλιπε, καὶ πρὸς ἡμᾶς παρεγένετο· ἔτι καὶ τῷ ᾄδει ἐπιφοιτήσας, ἵνα διὰ πάντων γενόμενος, πάντοθεν τὰ πάντα ἀνασώσηται· ἐπὶ γῆς μὲν, τοὺς ζῶντας καὶ ζησομένους ἀνανεούμενος· ὑπὸ γῆν δὲ τοὺς κρατουμένους τῆς τοῦ θανάτου τυραννίδος ἀφαιρούμενος.