John 1:14

And the word was made flesh. This word, or Son of God, who was in the beginning, from all eternity, at the time appointed by the divine decrees, was made flesh, i.e. became man, by a true and physical union of his divine person, (from which the divine nature was inseparable) to our human nature, to a human soul, and a human body, in the womb, and of the substance, of his virgin Mother. From the moment of Christ's incarnation, as all Christians are taught to believe, he that was God from eternity, became also true man. In Jesus Christ, our blessed Redeemer, we believe one divine Person with two natures, and two wills; the one divine, the other human: by which substantial union, one and the same Person became truly both God and man; not two persons, or two sons, as Nestorius, the heretic, pretended. By this union, and a mutual communication of the proprieties of each nature, it is true to say, that the Son of God, remaining unchangeably God, was made man; and therefore that God was truly conceived and born of the virgin Mary, who, on this account, was truly the Mother of God: that God was born, suffered, and died on the cross, to redeem and save us. The word, in this manner made man, dwelt in us, or among us, by this substantial union with our human nature, not morally only, nor after such a manner, as God is said to dwell in a temple; nor as he is in his faithful servants, by a spiritual union, that the same person is truly both God and man. --- And we saw his glory, manifested to the world by many signs and miracles; we in particular, who were present at his transfiguration. (Matthew xvii.) --- Full of grace and truth. These words, in the construction, are to be joined in this manner: the word dwelt in us, full of grace and truth; and we have seen his glory, &c. This fulness of grace in Christ Jesus, infinitely surpassed the limited fulness, which the Scripture attributes to St. Stephen, (Acts vi. 8.) or to the blessed virgin Mother: (Luke i. 28.) they are said to be full of grace, only because of an extraordinary communication and greater share of graces than was given to other saints. But Christ, even as man, his grace and sanctity were infinite, as was his person. --- As of the only begotten of the Father. [3] If we consider Christ in himself, and not only as he was made known to men by outward signs and miracles, St. John Chrysostom and others take notice that the word as, no ways diminisheth the signification; and that the sense is, we have seen the glory of him, who is truly from all eternity the only begotten Son of the Father: who, as the Scriptures assure us, is his true, his proper Son, his only begotten, who was sent into the world, who descended from heaven, and came from the Father, and leaving the world, returned where he was before, returned to his Father. We shall meet with many such Scripture texts, to shew him to be the eternal Son of his eternal Father; or to shew that the Father was always his Father, and the Son always his Son: as it was the constant doctrine of the Catholic Church, and as such declared in the general council of Nice, that this, his only Son, was born or begotten of the Father before all ages... God from God, the true God from the true God. It was by denying this truth, "that the Son was the Son always, and the Father always, and from all eternity, the Father;" that the blaspheming Arius began his heresy in his letter to Eusebius of Nicomedia, against his bishop of Alexandria, St. Alexander. See the letter copied by St. Epiphanius, Hær. 69. p. 731. Ed. Petavii. (Witham) --- Dwelt among us. In a material body, like ours, clothed with our nature. He is become mortal, and like us in every thing, but sin and concupiscence. The Greek literally translated, is, he has pitched his tent amongst us, like a stranger and passenger, who makes no long stay in one place. The body in Scripture, is sometimes called a tent or tabernacle, in which the soul dwells, as 2 Peter i. 14. (Calmet)

[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

Gloriam quasi Unigeniti, Greek: os monogenous. St. John Chrysostom says, the word quasi, Greek: os, does no ways here diminish, be even confirms and increases the signification; as when we say of a king, that he carries himself like a king. Greek: To de os entauthen ouch omoioseos estin, alla bebaioseos.