Against Heresies: Book III
Chapter 17: The Apostles Teach that it was not Christ or the Savior, but the Holy Spirit, who Descended Upon Jesus. The Reason for this Descent
The apostles certainly had the power to declare that Christ descended upon Jesus, or that the so-called superior Savior came down upon the dispensational one, or that He who is from the invisible places descended upon him from the Demiurge; but they neither knew nor stated anything like that. If they had known it, they would certainly have stated it. What they did record was that the Spirit of God, like a dove, descended upon Him. This is the Spirit spoken of by Isaiah: "And the Spirit of God shall rest upon Him," as I have already mentioned.
And again: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me." This is the Spirit of whom the Lord declares, "For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you." And again, giving the disciples the power of regeneration into God, He told them, "Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." For God promised that in the last times, He would pour out the Spirit upon His servants and handmaids so that they might prophesy.
Therefore, the Spirit did descend upon the Son of God, who was made the Son of man, becoming accustomed through fellowship with Him to dwell among the human race, to rest with human beings, and to dwell within the works of God, carrying out the will of the Father in them and renewing them from their old ways into the newness of Christ.
David requested this Spirit for humanity, saying, "And strengthen me with Your all-governing Spirit;" and as Luke records, this Spirit descended on the day of Pentecost upon the disciples after the Lord’s ascension, having the power to admit all nations to the path of life and the opening of the new covenant.
Consequently, in unison and in all languages, they praised God, the Spirit uniting distant tribes and offering the Father the first-fruits of all nations.
Therefore, the Lord also promised to send the Comforter, who would join us to God.
Just as a compacted lump of dough cannot be formed from dry wheat without some liquid, nor can a loaf have unity, we too, being many, could not be united in Christ Jesus without the water from heaven. And just as dry earth does not produce unless it receives moisture, in the same way, we too, originally being a dry tree, could never have produced fruit for life without the voluntary rain from above. For our bodies have received unity through the washing that leads to incorruption; but our souls, through the Spirit.
Therefore, both are necessary, as both contribute to the life of God. Our Lord showed compassion to the erring Samaritan woman—who did not stay with one husband but engaged in immorality through multiple marriages—by indicating and promising her living water, so she would thirst no more, nor engage in labor to obtain refreshing water, having within herself water springing up to eternal life. The Lord, receiving this as a gift from His Father, also grants it to those who are partakers of Himself, sending the Holy Spirit across all the earth.
Gideon, the Israelite chosen by God to save the people of Israel from foreign powers, foresaw this gift and changed his request. He prophesied that there would be dryness upon the fleece of wool (representing the people), which initially had dew. This indicated that they would no longer have the Holy Spirit from God, as Isaiah says, “I will also command the clouds, that they rain no rain upon it.” However, the dew, representing the Spirit of God, which descended upon the Lord, would spread throughout the world: "the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and piety, the spirit of the fear of God." This Spirit was given to the Church, as the Comforter was sent from heaven across the globe, and from heaven, the Lord tells us, the devil was cast down like lightning. Therefore, we need the dew of God to protect us from being consumed by fire or becoming unfruitful, and so that where we have an accuser, we also have an Advocate. The Lord entrusted the Holy Spirit with His own man, who had fallen among thieves, whom He compassionately tended to, binding up his wounds and giving him two royal denaria. Thus, by receiving through the Spirit the image and inscription of the Father and the Son, we might make the entrusted denarium fruitful and render its increase to the Lord.
The Spirit, therefore, coming down according to the predestined plan, and the Son of God, the Only-begotten, who is also the Word of the Father, arriving in the fullness of time, having become incarnate as a man for the sake of humanity, and fulfilling all the conditions of human nature, our Lord Jesus Christ being one and the same, as He Himself the Lord testifies, as the apostles confess, and as the prophets announce—all the doctrines of those who have invented supposed Ogdoads and Tetrads, and imagined divisions of the Lord’s person, have been proven false.
These individuals actually set the Spirit aside altogether; they believe that Christ was one and Jesus another, and they teach that there was not one Christ, but many. And even if they speak of them as united, they still separate them: for they claim that one indeed underwent sufferings but that the other remained unaffected; that one truly ascended to the Pleroma, but the other stayed in an intermediate place; that one truly feasts and revels in invisible and supreme places, but that the other is seated with the Demiurge, emptying him of power.
It will, therefore, be necessary for you, and all others who pay attention to this writing and care about their own salvation, not to readily agree when they hear the speeches of these individuals: for, speaking things resembling the doctrine of the faithful, as I have already mentioned, not only do they hold opinions which are different, but absolutely contrary, and in all points full of blasphemies, by which they destroy those people who, because of the resemblance of the words, absorb a poison that disagrees with their nature, just as if someone, giving lime mixed with water for milk, should mislead by the similarity of the color; as someone superior to me has said, concerning all who in any way corrupt the things of God and adulterate the truth, “Lime is wickedly mixed with the milk of God.”