The Aim of the Incarnation
“I would wish to speak about a more subtle and profound topic to the best of my ability. Wherefore, listen attentively to me. The infinite, inaccessible and uncreated God has assumed a body, and on account of His immense and ineffable kindness, if I may say it, He diminished Himself, lessening His inaccessible glory so as to be able to be united with His creatures, so they can be made participators of divine life [2 Peter 1:4]. God who transcends all limitations and far exceeds the grasp of our human understanding, through His goodness has diminished Himself and has taken the members of our human body which He surrounded with inaccessible glory. And through His compassion and love for mankind, taking upon Himself a body, He mingles Himself and becomes “one spirit” [1 Corinthians 6:17] with them, according to Paul’s statement. He becomes a soul, if I may so say it, in a soul, substance in substance so that the soul may live in God, and sense the immortal life and become a participator in eternal glory.”
— St Macarius the Great (Homily 4, 9-10)
