It remains that we inquire what is the image of His goodness; and here, I think, we must understand the same thing which we expressed a little ago, in speaking of the image formed by the mirror. For He is the primal goodness, doubtless, out of which the Son is born, who, being in all respects the image of the Father, may certainly also be called with propriety the image of His goodness. For there is no other second goodness existing in the Son, save that which is in the Father. And therefore also the Saviour Himself rightly says in the Gospel, There is none good save one only, God the Father, that by such an expression it may be understood that the Son is not of a different goodness, but of that only which exists in the Father, of whom He is rightly termed the image, because He proceeds from no other source but from that primal goodness, lest there might appear to be in the Son a different goodness from that which is in the Father. Nor is there any dissimilarity or difference of goodness in the Son. (Book I, Chapter 2, Part 13)

In the Republic, Plato writes - and Socrates says - "You'll be willing to say, I think, that the sun not only provides visible things with the power to be seen but also with coming to be, growth, and nourishment, although it is not itself coming to be."—"How could it be?"—"Therefore, you should also say that not only do the objects of knowledge owe their being known to the Good, but their being is also due to it, although the Good is not being, but superior to it in rank and power."

I understand Origen to argue, Jesus Christ owes his being to the Good and his being is the Good. There is no meaningful distinction between being and the Good.

There is a seductive intellectual coherence to all this. But in the process it seems to brush away the very humanness of Jesus.

In the gospels we perceive Jesus growing, changing, struggling in a manner that is, at least, in considerable tension with Jesus eternally being a complete manifestation of unchanging perfection.

Either the gospels tell us something about God that is very non-Platonic - or -the Good is not being, but superior to it in rank and power.