The Likeness of Sinful Flesh

May your spirit, and the soul, and the body be preserved blamelessly in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ. For how can anyone have the body entirely sanctified and completely, if the body is not capable of being sanctified, it not being by nature evil? If indeed this is evil by nature, it is not receptive to sanctification; but if it receives the good, it is clear that it is not evil by nature, being receptive to the good. For that which is evil by nature is not receptive to the good, just as that which is good by nature is not receptive to evil.

The same Apostle writes to certain people in another Epistle: 'Let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of flesh and spirit, accomplishing holiness in the fear of God' (2 Cor 7:1), showing also by this word how the flesh is able to be cleansed of the defilements of sin that attach to it. But also the spirit and the soul; for if the flesh were evil in essence, and the spirit were good in essence, then neither would the spirit have defilement, nor would the flesh be cleansed from defilement. But he protects both the clean from defilement, saying also the manner of the cleansing. For, he says, accomplishing holiness in the fear of God. And it is well said: 'In the fear of God,' showing that they have obedience, and not out of necessity. If, accomplishing holiness in the fear of God, we cleanse our own flesh from defilement and the spirit, it is clear that this happens when sanctification approaches us; for just as the soul of ignorance and of the unrighteous is cleansed by the presence of knowledge and righteousness—for the avoidance of evil works out the entrance of virtue from the opposite—so the flesh is cleansed of defilement and the spirit by the presence of sanctification.

And in these things, 'spirit' means the soul, just as in the Acts of the Apostles, Stephen the apostle, being left behind and about to die, said while praying: 'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit' (Acts 7:59). For he was not saying anything else as his spirit in these things, except the soul. If, therefore, through many things—sometimes of sin, sometimes of sanctification, and having them for the purpose of glorifying God—the flesh and the spirit are spoken of, none of these is evil or good by nature; but they are each, by their own will, receptive; or rather, according to the use of the one possessing them, they receive, at times, to be of sin, and at times, to be of sanctification. And if, even while being ignorant of the explicit meaning, from which is brought...

They think that flesh is the sin of sin; but we, having established the whole matter, will make the reasoning clear. It is thus: God, having sent His Son in a likeness of sinful flesh, judged sin in the flesh through the sin.

What he says is such: The flesh of all men has its being from union, apart from the first-formed one whom the Savior took up. For no human body would come to be otherwise than if the male were joined to the female. Since, therefore, the Savior took a body from the Virgin alone, not having the beginning from union, He called the Lord's flesh a likeness of the flesh that comes from union. For He did not say at all that He has a likeness of flesh, but a likeness of sinful flesh. And the likeness of sinful flesh is flesh, lacking only in this from the other three kinds of flesh: that it has had its existence without a man. For it was necessary that he coming for the salvation of men should not take a body from union. Nor should he take it from outside the succession of men, like the first man, so that his body might not be considered heterogeneous. For if he himself had also been joined from the earth, as the leader of the human race, those introducing the opinion through fantasy would have had the suspicion that he did not bring a human body according to truth. Again, if he had taken a body from union, not having the sin passed over, he himself would have been considered responsible for that sin, through which all those from Adam exist in succession. If they were to say: 'If the flesh born from the union of man and woman is the flesh of sin, then marriage is evil'; let them hear that before the arrival of the Savior, who took away the sin of the world, all men, just as they practiced all other things with wickedness, also had marriage sinfully. Because of this, the bodies born from marriage must be understood correctly. And so, since the conjunction of Adam and Eve happened after the sin, for this reason it is called the flesh of sin. For being incorruptible before the transgression, it became corruptible through transgression; and so the succession has the corruptible. The Savior, therefore, had a likeness of this flesh, even if His flesh did not see corruption. But, as the arrival of the Savior has occurred, as a removal of sin from other things has happened, so also from...