{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/009/0090244.htm","path":"chr/ecf/009/0090244.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/009/0090244.htm","text":"5. He (This One) Was in the Beginning with God.\nTo those who fail to distinguish with care the different propositions of the context the Evangelist may appear to be repeating himself. \u201cHe was in the beginning with God\u201d may seem to add nothing to \u201cAnd the Word was with God.\u201d We must observe more carefully. In the statement \u201cThe Word was with God\u201d we are not told anything of the when or the where; that is added in the fourth axiom. There are four axioms, or, as some call them, propositions, the fourth being \u201cHe was in the beginning with God.\u201d Now \u201cThe Word was with God\u201d is not the same thing as \u201cHe was,\u201d etc.; for here we are told, not only that He was with God, but when and where He was so: \u201cHe was in the beginning with God.\u201d The \u201cHe,\u201d too, used as it is for a demonstration, will be considered to refer to the Word, or by a less careful enquirer, to God. What was noted before is now summed up in this designation \u201cHe,\u201d the notion of the Logos and that of God; and as the argument proceeds the different notions are collected in one; for the notion God is not included in the notion Logos, nor the notion Logos in that of God. And perhaps the proposition before us is a summing up in one of the three which have preceded. Taking the statement that the p. 328 Word was in the beginning, we have not yet learned that He was with God, and taking the statement that the Word was with God it is not yet clear to us that He was with God in the beginning; and taking the statement that the Word was God, it has neither been shown that He was in the beginning, nor that He was with God.\nNow when the Evangelist says, \u201cHe was in the beginning with God,\u201d if we apply the pronoun \u201cHe\u201d to the Word and to God (as He is God) and consider that \u201cin the beginning\u201d is conjoined with it, and \u201cwith God\u201d added to it, then there is nothing left of the three propositions that is not summed up and brought together in this one. And as \u201cin the beginning\u201d has been said twice, we may consider if there are not two lessons we may learn. First, that the Word was in the beginning, as if He was by Himself and not with any one, and secondly, that He was in the beginning with God. And I consider that there is nothing untrue in saying of Him both that He was in the beginning, and in the beginning with God, for neither was He with God alone, since He was also in the beginning, nor was He in the beginning alone and not with God, since \u201cHe was in the beginning with God.\u201d","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol IX: Epistle to Gregory and Origen's Commentary on the Gospel of John.: Chapter V","type":"page"}