The Fall of Man and the Image of God.
After man's fall it became difficult to discern his original
features and to recognize in him the image of God. "Where is the soul's likeness
to God? Where is that which is not subject to corporeal suffering? Where is the
eternal life? Man is mortal, passionate, and ephemeral, and his soul and body
are inclined to passions of every kind." Similarity to God can only be seen in
attributes which are eternal. In these attributes the original Divine likeness
again shines forth so that we can recognize the original law of human life, the
law of hierarchy and proportion. Everything should be subordinate to the soul
and the intellect and express their dignity and perfection. This is the meaning
of impassivity, απαθεια. That which is impassive is
that which is in opposition to the passions. The true significance of the
state of passion is that in it the hierarchy is upset and overturned. That which
is superior in man becomes subordinate to that which is lowest in him and "the
baseness of matter is transmitted to the intellect itself." Impassivity entails
incorruptibility, αφθαρσια. When the hierarchy of
human nature is maintained, the life-giving rays of the Divinity are
communicated to man's entire being through his intellect. Before the fall this
protected man from mutability and ephemerality and gave him endurance and
stability, immortality and unending life.
In Gregory's understanding God's command to man at creation to
rule over the earth signifies not only that man is to have power over nature but
also that he is to reign over irrational beings. Reason is to control
irrationality as the culmination of the hierarchic and harmonious order of the
world as it was originally created. Man is called to be lord over nature and for
this reason he must be independent of it. This independence and freedom from the
instabilities of the cycles of nature will be realized in paradise when man will
experience spiritual bliss through participation in eternal life. Gregory does
not describe paradise with allegory or fables. He does not reject the world but
separates man from it and liberates him. Man has been summoned not to live in
the world but to live above it.
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