st. athanasius

Because I am reading Athanasius right now, here is a pertinent quote:

He accepted and bore upon the cross a death inflicted by others, and those others His special enemies, a death which to them was supremely terrible and by no means to be faced; and He did this in order that, by destroying even this death, He might Himself be believed to be the Life, and the power of death be recognised as finally annulled. A marvellous and mighty paradox has thus occured, for the death which they thought to inflict on Him as dishonour and disgrace has become the glorious monument to death's defeat. Therefore it is also, that he neither endured the death of John, who was beheaded, nor was He sawn asunder, like Isaiah: even in death He preserved his body whole and undivided, so that there should be no excuse hereafter for those who would divide the Church.

-On the Incarnation, Chapter IV