Channels, Fall 2016

Channels • 2016 • Volume 1 • Number 1 Page 15 lead him to error. This final tie is important to note. Irenaeus is primarily concerned with refuting an understanding of God that allows for the divine nature to be governed by deceitful passions. He is rejecting the ascription of such human passions to God. This does not, however, apply to all emotionally colored terms, nor does it imply that Irenaeus’ God is static. Second, Irenaeus argues for impassibility by tying it to immutability and incorruptibility. He argues that the ignorance and damaging passion displayed by Sophia must attach to the entire pleroma because they are all of the same nature. He then denies that such things could be ascribed to the divine nature when he concludes, “so all these . . . must either be naturally impassible and immutable, or they must all, in common with the light of the Father, be passible, and are capable of varying phases of corruption.” 89 This passage makes a startlingly clear connection between immutability and impassibility. Claiming that the Father is passible implies that the Father would be capable of corruption or negative change. In contrast, Irenaeus firmly believes that God is immutable. He then views impassibility as a natural outworking of immutability. How could an unchanging God go through changing emotional states? In the specific example of Sophia, how could the divine nature be corrupted and changed to the point of going astray if God is immutable? Irenaeus makes this same point in a slightly different way by tying impassibility to perfection in Against Heresies 2.17.7. The Father is perfect and impassible, and any being of the same substance as him must be perfect and impassible. Here the idea seems to be that a perfect being would not be ensnared in passions, contra the ensnarement of Sophia taught by the Gnostics. The denial of passions and lust in God’s character safeguards his immutability by preventing him from being subject to shifting passions. It also safeguards his perfection by preventing him from falling into disturbances that lead to error. In summary, Irenaeus upholds the impassibility of God in order to safeguard his role as the one and only creator: 90 simple, perfect, and immutable. Irenaeus does so by denying directly anthropomorphic descriptions of God and by denying the Gnostic claim that the divine nature can fall prey to misleading passions. He does this similarly to the apologists by describing what God is not. This understanding of God does not mean that Irenaeus believed in a static and uncaring God. In fact, several elements of his writings clearly demonstrate that this interpretation of Irenaeus’ thinking would be false. First, Irenaeus explicitly describes God as active rather than static. He states, “God is all mind, all reason, all active spirit, all light, and always exists one and the same.” 91 God is an active God: a God who thinks and speaks. 92 His activity is a fundamental part of how we describe him. However, this active spirit is also one who never changes. These two 89 Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 2.17.5 90 His rejection of any God but the creator is consistent throughout Against Heresies, but is especially explicit in 2.19.8-9 91 Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 2.28.4. This claim is made in the context of affirming the unity of God and the fact that the division of operations cannot be ascribed to Him and the Gnostic division and production of Aeons, such as Nous and Logos, is flawed. 92 Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 2.28.5.