In the Body and Everywhere at Once

For he was not, as one might imagine, shut up within the body. Nor, while he was present in the body, was he absent everywhere else; nor, while he moved the body, was the universe left empty of his working and his providence. Rather, and this is the most wonderful thing of all, being the Word, he was not contained by anything at all; instead he himself contained all things. He is present in the whole of creation, and yet he is distinct in his being from the universe, while present in all things by his own power. He gives order to all things, reveals his own providence over all and in all, and gives life to each thing and to all things together. He contains the whole without being contained by it, and he is wholly and in every respect in his own Father alone. And just so, even while he was present in a human body and was himself giving it life, he was, without any contradiction, giving life to the universe as well. He was in every process of nature, and he was outside the whole. And while he was known from the body by his works, he was no less made plain by the working of the universe as well. [a]

Now it belongs to the soul to look even at what is outside its own body, by acts of thought; but it does not work outside its own body, or move by its presence things far away from the body. A man never moves or shifts things at a distance by thinking about them. If a man sat in his own house and reasoned about the heavenly bodies, he would not by that fact move the sun or make the heavens turn. He sees that they move and exist, but he has no power to affect them. But the Word of God in his human nature was not like that. He was not bound to his body; rather, he himself was wielding it. So he was not only in it, but was actually in everything; and while he was outside the universe, he remained in his Father alone. And this was the wonderful thing: at one and the same time he was walking as a man, he was giving life to all things as the Word, and he was dwelling with his Father as the Son. So not even when the Virgin bore him did he undergo any change, nor was his glory dimmed by being in the body. On the contrary, he made the body holy as well. For not even by being in the universe does he share in its nature. On the contrary, all things are given life and held together by him.

Think of the sun, which he made and which we see as it circles in the heavens. It is not defiled by touching the bodies on earth, and it is not put out by darkness; instead it lights them up and cleanses them as well. Much less, then, was the all-holy Word of God, Maker and Lord of the sun too, defiled by being made known in the body. On the contrary, being incorruptible, he gave life to the body, mortal as it was in itself, and cleansed it too. “He committed no sin,” as Scripture says, “nor was any deceit found in his mouth.”