And after this, he again brings forward a second proof, saying, “I indeed baptize you in water: but He shall baptize you in the Holy Spirit and in fire.” And this too is of great importance for the proof and demonstration that Jesus is God and Lord. For it is the sole and peculiar property of the Substance That transcends all, to be able to bestow on men the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and make those who draw near unto It partakers of the divine nature. But this exists in Christ, not as a thing received, nor by communication from another, but as His own, and as belonging to His substance: for “He baptizes in the Holy Spirit.” The Word therefore That became man is, as it appears, God, and the fruit of the Father's substance. But to this, it may be, those will object who divide the one Christ into two sons,—those I mean who, as Scripture says, are “animal, and dividers, and not having the Spirit,”—that He Who baptizes in the Holy Spirit is the Word of God, and not He Who is of the seed of David. What answer shall we make, then, to this? Yes! we too affirm, without fear of contradiction, that the Word being God as of His own fullness bestows the Holy Spirit on such as are worthy: but this He still wrought, even when He was made man, as being the One Son with the flesh united to Him in an ineffable and incomprehensible manner. For so the blessed Baptist, after first saying, “I am not worthy to stoop down and loose the thong of His shoes,” immediately added, “He shall baptize you in the Holy Spirit and in fire;” plainly while having feet for shoes. For no one whose mind was awake would say, that the Word, while still incorporeal, and not as yet made like unto us, had feet and shoes, but only when He had become a man. Inasmuch, however, as He did not then cease to be God, He wrought even so works worthy of the Godhead, by giving the Spirit unto them that believe in Him. For He, in one and the same person, was at the same time both God and also man.
“But how then,” they object, “was He baptized, and received also the Spirit?” To which we reply, that He had no need of holy baptism, being wholly pure and spotless, and holy of the holy. Nor had He need of the Holy Spirit: for the Spirit That proceeds from God the Father is of Him, and equal to Him in substance. We must now therefore at length hear what is the explanation of the economy. God in his love to man provided for us a way of salvation and of life. For believing in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and making this confession before many witnesses, we wash away all the filth of sin, and are enriched by the communication of the Holy Spirit, and made partakers of the divine nature, and gain the grace of adoption. It was necessary therefore that the Word of the Father, when He humbled Himself unto emptiness, and deigned to assume our likeness, should become for our sakes the pattern and way of every good work. For it follows, that He Who in every thing is first, must in this also set the example. In order therefore that we may learn both the power itself of holy baptism, and how much we gain by approaching so great a grace, He commences the work Himself; and, having been baptized, prays that you, my beloved, may learn that never-ceasing prayer is a thing most fitting for those who have once been counted worthy of holy baptism.
Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on Luke 10, 11
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