The error of the soul's descent

He asks, "Is the place of Christ and the prophets a place of weeping?" A few among them attack him with slander, suggesting that Christ, while in the lower place, was "away by his own choice," as he says, "being in the lower place."." [17.5] He speaks as if addressing a man alone, no longer considering his divine nature, asserting that he descended to the lowest parts but by choice remained above, just as he neglects all other men.

For he said, "Thus even the prophets and Samuel, even if they descend to where the souls are below—they may be in the lower place, but they are not below by their choice." [17.6] Having filled the world with empty words, he fails to realize that everyone, no matter how much they have sinned, who has descended into Hades, has become 'away' by their own choice. Descended into Hades, they have become 'away' by their own choice.

For no one, whether righteous or unrighteous, would be content to always have the highest fellowship and to be deprived of the lower places. [17.7] If then all who descended into Hades will reach the heights by choice, even if some did not care much for a righteous life, what kind of value does this contradict the prophetic chorus? Why did he report the Lord's word as being identical for all? He spoke ignorantly, not understanding that the Word, being God, is present everywhere continuously, not by choice but by the virtue of divinity. [17.8]

Even if he permitted his most chosen temple to be dissolved and then raised again strangely after three days, [17.9] the soul of this human dwelling, having descended to the lowest parts of the earth, lifted up the gates there with a sudden rush and cast souls into those gates destroyed in that place. [17.10] Thus it has been strengthened by divine power through the union of God and the Word, so that it has authority everywhere. [18.]

But indeed I am convinced, and the evidence of this is clear: how he reached the low places of the underworld, and in the same way he brought the willful soul of the thief into paradise. For if through one man salvation has become the property of all men, it is evident that the soul redeems like-kind souls, at once descending into the low parts of chaos, and at once restoring to the most ancient paradise the intruder into the power of the unassailable kingdom.

Furthermore, before these things, the servant of God testified, saying: 'And no one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven' (John 3:13). Therefore, if it is established that the one moving from the human race ascended to heaven most uniquely of all, and descended again from there into this place, and having come here, walked in heaven, it is established that the man performed these things through the excellence of soul most extraordinarily.

For the holy soul of Christ, sharing with God both essence and Word, wanders all things together, but has ascended into the highest heaven, into which no other of men has ascended. But these things are suspended upon it, the human idea, which God carried and Word.

And since the servant of God is everywhere present at once, John has stood as witness even about this, being an ear to Christ, and crying out having risen, saying: 'No one has seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known' (John 1:18). And if Christ, being present here, provided for the body, and how he reported these words to John, and he, receiving these sayings of his, preached that he is in the bosoms of the Father while eating on earth with his body, how should we not conceive that he also stepped upon the heavens at that time, and how, dwelling within the bosoms and having stayed on earth in a God-befitting manner, he was present to all as a god?