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DOGMATIC THEOLOGY
II
THE
DIVINE TRINITY
A DCXIMATIC TREATISE
BY
THE REVEREND JOSEPH POHLE, PH.D., D.D.,
FORMERLY PROFESSOR OF FUNDAMENTAL THEOLOGY IN THE
CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA, NOW PROFESSOR
OF DOGMA IN THE UNIVERSITY OF BRESLAU
~h
A UTHORIZED ENGLISH VERSION WITH SOME ABRIDG- MENT AND NUMEROUS ADDITIONAL REFERENCES
BY
ARTHUR PREUSS
ST. LOUIS, MO., 1912
Published by B. Herder 17 South Broadway
FREIBURG (i./B.) I LONDON, W. C.
Germany I 68| Great Russell Street
C . ' :
THE NEW YORK |
PUBLIC LIBRARY
<>
3
AST
ENOX ANO
TILDEN FOUNDAflONS
R 1916 L
NIHIL OBSTAT. Sa Ludodcl, die 10. Nov., 1911 F. G. HOLWECK.
Ceruor Lihromm,
IMPRIMATUR. Sa. Ludovid, die 13. Nov., 1911
f Joannes/. Glennon.
Archiepiscofius SU. Ludovid,
Copyright, 1911,
hy
JOSEPH GUMMERSBACH.
Bboktold Pbizttino akd Book Mro. Oo.
8T. LOUIS, MO., U. 8. A.
i
[
\.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS i
Part I. The Holy Trinity in Unity, or the Threefold
Personauty of God 9
Ch. I. God's Threefold Personality Proved from Sacred
Scripture 10
§ I. The Threefold Personality of God Foreshadowed
in the Old Testament 11
§ 2. The Threefold Personality of God as Taught in the New Testament — Texts Treating of the
Three Divine Persons Together 22
§ 3. New Testament Texts Treating of the Divine
Persons Severally 43
Art. I. Of God the Father 44
Art. 2. Of God the Son 49
A. Christ's Divine Sonship 49
B. The Divinity of Christ 63
C. The Logos 88
Art. 3. Of God the Holy Ghost 96
A. The Personality of the Holy Ghost ... 97
B. The Hypostatic DiflFerence Between the Holy
Ghost and the Father and the Son . . .101 C The Divinity of the Holy Ghost . . . .104
Ch. n. The Blessed Trinity in Tradition 113
§ I. The Antitrinitarian Heresies and Their Condem- nation by the Church . 114
Art. I. Crass Monarchianism 115
Art. 2. The Modalism of Sabellius 120
Art. 3. The Subordinationism of Arius and Mace-
donius 123
i 2. The Positive Tradition of the First Four Cen- turies 132
• • •
in
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGB
Art. I. The Holy Trinity in the Official Liturgy of the Early Church and the Private Prayers
of the Faithful 133
Art. 2. The Ante-Nicene Fathers 139
Art. 3. The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers . . 153
Ch. III. The Principle of the Blessed Trinity, or the Doctrine of the Immanent Processions in the
Godhead 161
§ I. The Procession of the Son from the Father by
Generation 162
S 2. The Procession of the Holy Ghost from the
Father and the Son 168
Art. I. The Heresy of the Greek Schism and its
Condemnation by the Church .... 168 Art. 2. The Positive Teaching of Revelation . . 173
Ch. IV. The Speculative Theological Development of the
Dogma of the Trinity 192
S I. The Dogma in its Relation to Reason .... 194 § 2. Generation by Mode of Understanding and Spira-
tion by Mode of Will 202
S 3. The Divine Relations — Divine Personality . . 220 S 4. The Trinitarian Properties and Notions . . . 236 § 5. The Divine Appropriations and Missions . . . 244
Part II. Unity in Trinity, or the Triunity of God . . 253
Ch. I. Oneness of Nature, or the Consubstantiality of
the Three Divine Persons 255
§ I. Tritheism and the Church 255
§ 2. The Teaching of Revelation 264
Ch. II. Oneness of External Operation of the Three
Divine Persons 275
Ch. III. The Unity of Mutual Inexistence, or Perichore-
sis 281
IV
THE DIVINE TRINITY
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS
I. It belongs to the first treatise of Dogmatic Theology {De Deo Uno) to show that God is one and personal. The pantheistic fiction of an impersonal God is sufficiently exploded by the Almighty's own solemn declaration (Gen. Ill, 14) : "I am Who am." '
Whether the infinite personality of God must be con- ceived as simple or multiplex, is a matter which human reason cannot determine unaided. On the strength of the inductive axiom, " Quot sunt naturae, tot sunt per- sonae!* we should rather be tempted to attribute but one personality to the one Divine Nature. Positive Revelation tells us, however, that there are in God three really distinct persons: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. This fundamental dogma, which essentially differentiates the Christian from the Pagan, from the Jewish, and from the Mohammedan conceptions of God, is designated in the technical Latin of the Church as '* Trinitas," a term first used, so far as we know, by Theophilus of Antioch* and Tertullian,* and which later became cur-
1 Cfr. Pohle-Prettss; God: His Autolycum, see Bardenhewer-Shahan,
Knotuability, Essence, and Attri- Patrology, pp. 66 sq., Freiburg and
butes, St. Louis 191 1. St. Louis 1908. On the word rpids^
2Ad Autolyc, 11, 15: ** Tpiddos c^i^* Newman, Athanasius, II, 473
Tou $€0V Kal X670V Kal rris eo<t>lai sq., 9th ed., London 1903.)
airov" (On the three books Ad sDe Pudicitia, c. 21: "Trinitas
2 THE DIVINE TRINITY
rent in ecclesiastical usage and was embodied in the Creeds.* In the private symbolum of St. Gregory Thaiunaturgus mention is made of a "perfect Triad" (rpia? TcAcia). Didymus the Blind, Cyril of Alexandria, Hilary, Ambrose, and Augustine have written separate treatises " On the Trinity."
2. Unity, simplicity, and unicity are as essen- tial to the mystery of the Blessed Trinity as the concept of triunity itself. Hence it is not sur- prising that all these momenta were equally em- phasized by the early Fathers.
Thus we read in the Athanasian Creed:* *' Ita ut per omnia . . . et unitas in Trinitate, et Trinitas in unitate veneranda sit — So that in all things . . . the Unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity is to be worshipped." The first canon of the Lateran Council held under Pope Martin the First® reads thus: "Si quis secundum sanctos Patres non confitetur proprie et veraciter Patrem, et Filium, et Spiritum Sanctum, Trinitatem in unitate et unitatem in Trinitate . . . con- demnatus sit — If any one does not with the Holy Fathers profess properly and truly the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost, Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity, let him be anathema."^ If we pay special regard to the note of threeness, the Trinity presents itself mainly as a threefold personality in one Divine Nature. If, on the other hand, we accentuate the note of unity, the Trinity presents itself as Triunity (triuni-
unius divinitaHs, Pater et FUius et 6 Quoted by Denzinger-Bannwart,
Spiritus Sanctus,** L c, n. 39.
4 Denzinger-Bannwart, Enchiridi- « A. D. 649.
on Symbolorum, ed. 10, nn. 213, 7 Quoted by Denzinger-Bannwart,
232, Friburgi Brisgoviae 1908. n. 254.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 3
tas),^ a term which expresses the numeric unity of the Gk)dhead common to all three Divine Hypostases. Both points of view are not only legitimate in themselves, but demanded by the nature of the mystery and the heret- ical distortions to which it has been subjected. As against those Antitrinitarians who (like the Monarchians, the Sabellians, and the Subordinationists) exaggerate the notion of unity so as to deny a true and immanent Trinity in the Godhead, Dogmatic Theology has to prove the existence of three really distinct Persons. In re- futing the opposite heresy of Tritheism, which exag- gerates the notion of threeness and postulates three sep- arate divine natures, substances, or essences, it is neces- sary to show that the Divine Trinity is a Triunity.
3. Antitrinitarianism in both of its antithetical forms is by no means a thing of the past, but under various guises still has numerous adher- ents.
Whilst the few remaining partisans of Giinther's the- ological system continue to teach a sort of veiled Trithe- ism, present-day Socinians, Unitarians, and Rationalists move entirely within the circle of the heretical notions of Sabellius. Kantian Rationalism debases the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity by treating it as a mere symbol indicative of the power, wisdom, and love of God. The school of Hegel pantheistically explains the Father as '^ das Ansichsein des Absoluten" the Son as "das Anderssein des Absolut en in der Welt," and the Holy Ghost as "die RUckkehr des Absoluten zu sich selber im menschlichen Selbstbewusstsein " — for the meaning of which obscure phrases we must refer the
8 Cfr. Isidor, Hispal., Etymol., VII, 4.
4 THE DIVINE TRINITY
reader to the learned author of The Secret of Hegel, Schleiermacher does not deny the Trinity, but according to him it is such an unessential "mode of existence of the Divine Being " that he has acted wisely in relegating it to the appendix of his Glaubenslehre. The position of liberal Protestant theology at the present day is well stated by Adolph Harnack when he says:* "Already in the second century Christ's [natural] birth into this world assumed the rank of a supernatural, and later on that of an eternal generation, and the fact of being begotten, or passive generation itself, became the char- acteristic note of the second Person [in the Blessed Trinity]. Similarly, in the fourth century the promised [temporal] * mission ' of the Holy Ghost assumed the character of an ' eternal mission * and became the dis- criminating badge of the third Person within the Holy Triad. Nowhere have we a more characteristic example of what the imagination is capable of doing when it undertakes to evolve ideas." With the exception of the relatively few champions of Lutheran orthodoxy, whose number is, moreover, constantly dwindling, mod- ern Protestantism no longer holds the Christian idea of the Blessed Trinity. Liberal theology is everywhere triumphing over orthodoxy. The demand, which is con- stantly growing louder and more widespread, even in this country, that no specific creed be imposed upon the members of any denomination, ultimately strikes at the dogma of the Holy Trinity and that of the Divinity of Christ. Among German divines Kriiger confesses this quite openly.^** Catholic theology, which alone upholds the banner of true Christian belief, in asserting and de- fending the dogma of the Trinity finds it necessary above
0 Dogmengeschichte, 3rd ed., Vol. 10 In his book, Dreifaltigkeii und
II, p. 281, Freiburg 1894. GoUmenschheit, Leipzig 1905.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 5
all to demonstrate by the modern scientific method that this dogma is truly and clearly revealed by Gk)d, that it is solidly founded in Christian Tradition, and that it does not, as unbelievers allege, involve a contradiction.
4. Since theistic philosophy is unable to estab- lish this dogma on the basis of unaided human reason, the Catholic theologian is compelled to adhere closely to the teaching of the Church. He must first believe; then he may inquire.
The most perfect and complete Trinitarian formula that has come down to us from Patristic times is that composed by the Eleventh Council of Toledo, A. D. 675.^^ We prefer to base our exposition on the briefer and more perspicuous formula contained in the Athanasian Creed, which has the additional advantage of being vested with the primary authority due to an ancient Chris- tian symbol. The dogma of the Most Holy Trinity is there set forth in the following terms : ^^ '' Fides ca- tholica haec est, ut unum Deum in Trinitate, et Trinitatem in unitate veneremur; neque confundentes personas, neque substantiam separantes; alia est enim persona Patris, alia Filii, alia {et) Spiritus Sancti; sed Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti una est diznnitas, aequalis gloria, coaeterna maiestas. . . . Pater a nullo est f actus nee creatus nee genitus. Filius a Patre solo est, non
11 Denzinger-Bannwart, Enchiri' distinction. In later times the
dion, nn. 275 sqq. This symbol first dogma received a more distinct for-
treats of the Three Divine Persons mulation only in two points, both
in succession; then, in three further directed against most subtle forms
sections, it develops and sets forth of separation and division in God.
the general doctrine, vis.: (i) the Cfr. Wilhelm-Scannell, A Manual of
true unity of substance; (2) the real Catholic Theology Based on Schee-
Trinity of the Persons; (3) the in- ben's " Dogmatik" Vol. I, p. 262,
separable union of the Three Divine London 1899.
Persons, demanded by their very 12 Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 40.
6 THE DIVINE TRINITY
factus nee ereatus, sed genitus. Spiritiis Sanctus a Patre et Filio, non factus nee ereatus nee genitus, sed proeedens — The Catholic faith is this, that we wor- ship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, neither confounding the Persons, nor dividing the Substance. For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost is all one, the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal. . . . The Father is made of none, neither created, nor be- gotten. The Son is of the Father alone; not made, nor created, but begotten. The Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son : neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding." ^*
The chief points of our dogma may therefore be sum- marized thus: In essence, substance, and nature there is but one God. However, the Divine Nature does not subsist in one single Person or Hypostasis, but in three distinct Persons, i. e,. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, who do not coalesce after the manner of mere logical momenta, but are really distinct from one another, so much so that the one is not the other. They are not distinct in virtue of their nature, which is numerically the same in all three, but solely in virtue of the relative opposition by which the Son is begotten by the Father, while the Holy Ghost proceeds alike from the Father and the Son. The mystery peculiar to this sublime dogma arises from the mutual relations of the two principal concepts — " Nature " and " Per- son." Within the domain of human experience every
18 The full English text of the Encyclopedia, s. v. — Cfr. Pohle-
Athanasian Creed, together with a Preuss, God: His Knowahility, Es-
critical account of its proyenance sence, and Attributes, p. 318, note
and probable authorship, may be 6; F. J. Hall, The Trinity, pp. 18
found in Vol. II of the Catholic sqq.. New York 1910.
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 7
complete nature is at the same time a separate hypos- tasis; in other words, every rational nature is eo ipso a distinct person. Hence the axiom, " Tot sunt hy^ postases, quot sunt naturae/' But this axiom has no metaphysical value, and cannot be applied to God, since Revelation expressly teaches that ** Nature " and " Person " do not coincide either in reality or in con- ception. As we acknowledge three Persons in the one Divine Nature, so conversely we believe that there are in Christ two complete natures, the one divine, the other human, both subsisting in one and the same person, i. e,, the Divine Person of the Logos-Son. This revealed truth compels Catholic philosophy to draw a sharp dis- tinction between " Nature " and " Person," as we shall show more fully further down.
Since the essence of the mystery consists in this that *Ve w^orship one God in Trinity, and Trinity^ in Unity," w^e may consider the Blessed Trinity first as Trinity in Unity (Trinitas in Unit ate), or threefold personality; and, secondly, as Unity in Trinity {Unit as in Trinitate) or Triunity. We shall accordingly divide the sub- ject-matter of this treatise into tw^o parts.
General Readings: — Above all St. Aug., De Trinit. 11. XV (translated into English by A. W. Haddan in Dods's Works of Aurelius Augustine, Vol. VII, Edinburgh 1873) J and, by way of commentary, Th. Gangauf, Des hi Augustinus spekulative Lehre von Gott dem Dreieinigen, 2nd ed., Ratisbon 1883. — The Monologium S. Anselmi and Petr. Lomb., Sent,, i, dist. I sqq. — Rich, a S. Victore, De Trinitate 11. VI, takes a rather independent attitude. — Besides St. Bonaventure {Comment, in Libros Sent., I) cfr. *St. Thomas, S. TheoL, la, qu. 27-43 (Bon-
8 THE DIVINE TRINITY
joannes-Lescher, Compendium, pp. 71 sqq.) and Contr, Gent, IV, 1-26, together with the various commentaries on these great works. — A very good treatise is *Ruiz, De Trinit., Lugd. 1625. — The student will also find it profitable to consult Greg, de Valentia, De Trinit. 11. V ; and Ysambert, De Mysterio Trinitatis; Wilhelm-Scannell, A Manual of Catholic Theology Based on Scheeben*s *' Dogmatik," Vol. I, pp. 257-354, 2nd ed., London 1899; S. J. Hunter, S. J., Outlines of Dogmatic Theology, Vol. II, pp. 145-215, 2nd ed., London and New York s.a.; F. J. Hall (Anglican), The Trinity, New York 1910.
The teaching of the Fathers can be studied in the copious quotations extracted from their works by Petavius, Dogm., t. II, and Thomassin, Dogm., t. III.
In addition to the various manuals of special dogmatic the- ology, consult particularly *Kuhn, Christliche Lehre von der gottlichen Dreieinigkeit, Tiib. 1857; Franzelin, De Deo Trino, ed. 3, Romae 1883; Regnon, Etudes sur la Ste Triniti, 4 vols., Paris 1872-1898; L. Janssens, De Deo Trino, Friburgi 1900; Stentrup, De SS, Trinitatis Mysterio, Oeniponte 1898; Lepicier, De SS. Trinitate, Parisiis 1902; Souben, Theologie Dogmatique, II: "Les Personnes Divines," Paris 1903; Newman, Select Treatises of St. Athanasius, Vol. II, pp. 315 sqq. — Further references in the text. — For the history of the dogma, see Newman, " Causes of the Rise and Successes of Arianism " (Tracts Theological and Ecclesiastical, new ed., London 189S, pp. 139-299) ; Adrian Fortescue, The Orthodox Eastern Church, pp. no, 135 sqq., London 1907; Idem, The Greek Fathers, passim, London 1908. — Bardenhewer-Shahan, Patrology, pp. ^, 65, 185, 210, 259, 281, 291, 300, 308. — *J. Lebreton, S. J., Les Origines du Dogme de la TrinitS, Vol. I, Paris 1910; J. Tixeront, His- tory of Dogmas (English tr.). Vol. I, pp! 33, 68, 83, 92, 107, 115 sqq., 122, 134, 17s, 215, 221, 233, 247, 263, 303, 310 sqq., 327 sqq., 381 sq., 383, 389, 416 sq., 421, St. Louis 1910.
* The asterisk before an author's neyer means that we consider his
name indicates that his exposition work in any way inferior to that
of the subject is especially clear of others. There are vast stretches
and thorough. As St. Thomas is of dogmatic theology which be
invariably the best guide, the omis- scarcely touched, sion of the asterisk before his name
PARTI
THE HOLY TRINITY IN UNITY, OR THE THREEFOLD PER- SONALITY OF GOD'
Both the fact that (on €(ttlv), and the intrinsic reason why (BvoTi ecTTLv) there are Three Persons in God, is positively revealed to us in the doctrine of the inner- divine processions (Filiation and Spiration). They form part of the immediate deposit of the faith, and consti- tute the dogma of the Divine Trinity. We have first to prove the fact of the threefold personality of God from Sacred Scripture (Chapter I) and Tradition (Chapter II) ; then (Chapter III) we shall enter into a dogmatic consideration of the cause of this fact, vis.: the mys- terious vital processes immanent in the Godhead which are called " Filiation " and " Spiration." In a conclud- ing Chapter (IV) we shall discuss the speculative the- ological development of the dogma.
1 Cfr. Newman, Select Treatises Holy Trinity in Unity," pp. 315- of St, Athanasius, Vol. II (Being 325, Qth ed., London 1903. an Appendix of Illustrations), "The
CHAPTER I
god's threefold personality proved from
sacred scripture
There are traces of the dogma in the Old Testament, but they are rather indefinite and obscure unless viewed in the light of the New Testament. It is upon the latter, therefore, that the Scriptural argument is almost exclusively based. After briefly rehearsing the Old Testa- ment intimations (§i), we will marshal the Trinitarian texts contained in the New Testa- ment in a double series, first citing those which treat of all three Divine Persons together (§2), and secondly those which refer to only one of the three Divine Persons without mentioning the other two (§3). The dogma of the Holy Trinity is immutably grounded in the Unity of the Divine Essence. Accordingly, throughout the triple argument upon which we are about to enter for the purpose of tracing out the hy- postatic differences of the Three Divine Persons, it will be important not to lose sight of the mono- theistic foundation on which alone this dogma
can be built up.
10
k
SECTION I
THE THREEFOLD PERSONALITY OF GOD FORESHAD- OWED IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
I. Primitive Intimations of the Dogma. — Some theologians take the plural form of several of the names attributed to Jehovah ^ in the Old Testament as an obscure intimation of the dogma of the Trinity.
We are not inclined to press this argument. Neither do we attach much importance to the theory of Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Augustine, who point to the expression Tl^K^fena in Gen. I, i as a proof for the
Logos, explaining " in principio *' to mean " in Verbo, i. e., Filio/' Upon close scrutiny this niore than doubtful interpretation turns out to be of later origin and ex- egetically unsupported.^ In Gen. I, 26 sq., however, we come upon what appears to be a definite allusion to the mystery of the Divine Trinity: " Faciamus hominem ad imaginem et similitudinem nostram. . . . Et creavit Deus hominem ad imaginem suam — Let us make man to our image and likeness. . . . And God created man to his own image." The hortatory subjunc- tive plural which heads verse 26, and is followed by an indicative verb in the singular in verse 27, cannot be
2 Cfr. Pohle-Preuss, God: His 8 Cfr. Patrizi, De Interpret, Script,
Knowability, Essence , and Attri- Sacrae, 1. II, qu. 2. butes, pp. 134 sqq.
II
2
12 OLD TESTAMENT INTIMATIONS
taken as a pluralis maiestaticus, nor yet as addressed to the angels ; for man was not created to the image of the angels, but to that of God Himself.
There is a similar passage in Gen. XI, 7 sq. : " Come ye, therefore, let us go down, and there confound their tongue. . . . And so the Lord scattered them." * Many theologians in this connection recall the liturgical bless- ing of the priests. Num. VI, 24 sqq., which they regard as a parallel to the Christian formula, " In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." This Old Testament benediction, dictated by Yahweh Himself to Moses, is as follows : " The Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord show his face to thee, and have mercy on thee. The Lord turn his countenance to thee and give thee peace."
The clearest allusion to the mystery of the Blessed Trinity in the Old Testament is probably the so-called Trisagion of Isaias (VI, 3) : " Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God of Hosts, all the earth is full of his glory," which is rightly made much of by many Fathers and not a few theologians. This triple " Holy " refers to an ecstatic vision of the Godhead, by which Isaias was solemnly called and consecrated as the Prophet of the Incarnate Word, an office which won for him the title of the " Evangelist " among the four major prophets.*
2. The Angel of Jehovah in the The- OPHANiES. — The various apparitions commonly know^n as theophanies, in w^hich Yahw^eh figures both as sender and messenger, mark the grad-
4 For the Patristic interpretation of this passage consult Petayius, De Trinitate, II, 7.
5 Cfr. John XII, 41.
THE ANGEL OF JEHOVAH 13
ual breaking of the dawn in the history of our dogma.
The God who is sent is called T\)n] ^8?0, i. e,. mes-
senger, Angelus Domini, the word angelus being here employed in its literal sense of ayycAo?, from dyycAActv, to send. Since the " Angel of Jehovah " is described as t])n^^ i. e,, true God, we have in these theophanies
two distinct persons, both of them Yahweh, the one "sending" and .the other "sent/* An apparition of this character was the angel who spoke words of com- fort to Hagar shortly before the birth of her son Ismael • in the desert. According to Gen. XVHI, i sqq., " the Lord [»1}'?1] appeared to [Abraham] in the vale of
Mambre," in order to announce to him the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha."^
Probably the most familiar of the Old Testament theophanies is the apparition of the Angel of Jehovah in the Burning Bush. Exod. HI, 2: " Apparuit ei nin^
?|8p? in flantma ignis de medio rubi — And the Lord ap- peared to him [Moses] in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush." It is to be noted that the Lord who appears to Moses is Jehovah Himself. Exod., IH, 14: "God said to Moses: I am who am." Viewing this apparition in the light of the New Testament Revela- tion, the appearing God can be none other than the Logos, or Son of God, because the Father cannot be " sent." True, the Holy Ghost may also be " sent ; " but He cannot have appeared in the bush to Moses because the prophets expressly identify the " Angel of Jehovah " with the future Messias (f. e., Christ). Cfr. Is. IX, 6
« Gen. XVI, 7 sqq. general, H. P. Liddon, The Divin-
7 On this passage, cfr. Newman, ity of Our Lord and Sai/iour Jesus
Select Treatises of St, Athanasius, Christ, pp. 78 sqq., London 1867.
II, 367 sq.; on the theophanies in
14 OLD TESTAMENT INTIMATIONS
(in the version of the Septuagint) : " McyoAry? fiovXij^ ayycAos, Magni consilii angelus; " Mai. Ill, i : " Angelus testamentH* The interpretation here adopted is com- mon to all the Fathers. Thus St. Hilary teaches: " Deus igitur est, qui et angelus est, quia qui et angelus Dei est, Deus est ex Deo natus. Dei autem angelus ob id dictus, quia magni consilii est angelus. Deus autem idem postea demonstratus est, ne qui Deus est esse angelus [creatus] crederetur." ®
It is quite another question whether in these theoph- anies the Logos directly appeared as God in visible form, or through the intermediate agency of an angel. In the latter case the apparitions might with equal propriety be styled " angelophanies." St. Augustine took this view, without, however, denying the theophanic character of such angelophanies. He held that a created angel visibly appeared as the representative of God in such a manner that the words he spoke must be understood as coming not from the actual speaker but from Jehovah himself. This opinion was shared by Athanasius, Basil, Cyril of Alexandria, Eusebius, Chrysostom, Jerome, Gregory the Great, and others.® The great majority of the Schoolmen espoused it mainly for the reason that the Second Person of the Most Holy Trinity had never appeared visibly upon earth prior to His Incarnation.^® The first immediate theophany of the Logos, they argued, coincided with the Incarnation; therefore in the Old Testament theophanies He must have employed angels as His representatives.
%De Trinit,, IV, n. 24. — Cfr, mat., t. II, third ed., p. 262, Fri- Ncwman, "Causes of the Rise and burgi 1906; — Newman, /. c; Lid- Successes of Arianism," in Tracts don, op, cit,, 85 sq. Theol, and Ecclesiastical, pp. 212 10 Cfr. Hebr. I, i sqq.; II, i sqq., sq., new ed., London 1895. et passim,
• Cfr. Chr. Pesch, Praelect. Dog-
THE MESSIANIC PSALMS 15
3. The Future Messias as True Gk)D. — ^The Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament were primarily designed to emphasize the Divinity of the future Messias. Hence Christ Himself and His Apostles justly appealed to them to prove not only the divine mission but likewise the Di- vinity of the Saviour and the fact that He was truly the Son of God.
Among the prophets Isaias speaks most clearly and emphatically. Not only does he refer to the Messias as " the Wonderful, the Counsellor, the Prince of Peace," but also as " God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come." ^^ He styles Him " Emmanuel," u e,, God with us." It is expressly said of Him that " God himself will come and will save you." ^^ And again : " Prepare ye the way of the Lord. . . . Behold, the Lord God shall come with strength." ^* " His name shall be called God." ^^ In Zach. XII, 10, God prophesies His own cru- cifixion: " Et adspicient ad me, quern confixefrunt et plangent eum — And they shall look upon me, whom they have pierced ; and they shall grieve over him." ^®
The Messianic Psalms complete the picture outlined by the prophets; nay, they go far beyond the lat- ter both in emphasizing the difference of persons by a contra-position of the pronouns " I " and " thou," and also by indicating that the relation existing between the First and the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity is a relation of Father to Son, based upon Filiation. At the same time they do not omit to accentuate the
Ills. IX, 6; cfr. Luke I, 32. 14 Is. XL, 3, 10; cfr. Mark I, 3.
12 Is. VII, 14; cfr. Matth. I, 23. 16 Is. IX, 6.
l» Is. XXXV, 4; cfr. Matth. XI, 5. i« Cfr. John XIX, 37.
i6 OLD TESTAMENT INTIMATIONS
undivided nature of both Divine Persons, which they express by the word niiT. Thus especially Ps. II, 7:
'^ Dominus [niiT] dixit ad me: Filius mens es tu, ego
hodie genui te — The Lord hath said to me : Thou art my son, this day I have begotten thee." ^^ Similarly Ps. CIX, 1-3: ''Dixit Dominus Domino meo [^^lifcO niiT] :
sede a dexteris meis; , . . ex utero ante luciferum genui te — The Lord said to my Lord: Sit thou at my right hand . . . from the womb before the day star I begot thee." ^^ If the future Messias is the " Son of God," and at the same time Jehovah, it is obvious that there must also be a " Father " who is Jehovah. Consequently, there must be two Divine Persons in one Divine Nature. This notion was so familiar to the Jews that Jesus, in order to prove His Divinity, had merely to advert to the fact that He was the Son of God to pro- voke them to anger and blasphemy.^* They well knew that to admit His Divine Sonship was tantamount to recognizing His Divinity.^®
4. The Teaching of the Sapiential Books. — A great step towards the complete unfolding of the mystery is made by the Sapiential Books.^^ There we find the notion of Hypostatic Wisdom closely blended with that of Filiation, and are given to understand that the Filiation which takes place within the Godhead is a purely spirit- ual process, and that He Who is ''begotten by
17 Cfr. Hebr. I, 5. For further information on this
18 Cfr. Math. XXII, 42 sqq. point, see tn/ra^ i 3.
19 Cfr. John V, 18; X, 33. 21 Prov. VIII; Wisd. VII sqq.;
20 Cfr. John I, 32 sqq.; I, 49; IX, Ecclus. XXIV. 35 sqq*: Luke I, 35 sqq., et passim.
THE SAPIENTAL BOOKS 17
God'' must be essentially conceived as "Begotten Wisdom" (Logos).
The Sapiential Books speak of Uncreated, Divine Wis- dom in a manner which leaves no doubt that they mean more than a personified attribute. The following texts read like parallel passages to certain verses of St. John's Gospel. Prov. VIII, 24 sqq. " Nondum erant abyssi et ego [i. e., sapientia] iam concepta erant: . . . ante colles [f. e., ab aeterno] ego parturiebar, . . . Cum eo [scil, Deo] eram, cuncta componens et delec- tabar per singulos dies, ludens coram eo omni tempore, hidens in orbe terrarum, et deliciae meae esse cum filiis hominum — The depths were not as yet, and I [Wis- dom] was already conceived . . . before the hills I was brought forth. ... I was with him [God] forming all: and was delighted every day, playing before him at all times: and my delights [were] to be with the children of men." The subject of this passage is obviously not a divine attribute, but a Divine Person, who is called " Conceived Wisdom." The expression, " I was with him," 22 has a parallel in John I, i : " The Word was with God" {Verbum erat apud Deum; irpb^ rov 0€ov). The Book of Wisdom,^^ in designating Divine Wisdom as " a vapor of the power of God " (vapor virtutis Dei), "a certain pure emanation of glory" (emanatio clari- tatis), "the brightness of eternal light" (candor lucis), " the unspotted mirror of God's majesty " (speculum maiestatis), "the image of his goodness" (imago boni- tatis) , reminds one of the manner in which St. Paul char- acterizes Christ's relationship to God the Father ,2* i. e., as
2i*'Cufn eo eram'*; the Septua- 23 Wisd. VII, 25 sqq.
gint has: jjfiriy vap* airt^i the 24Hebr. I, 3.
Hebrew: ^^yjj ,
i8 OLD TESTAMENT INTIMATIONS
" the brightness of his glory, and the figure of his sub- stance " (splendor gloriae et figura substantiae eius) . The following sentence,^* " And thy wisdom with thee, which knoweth thy works, which then also was present when thou madest the world — Et tecum (/Acra aov) sapientia tua, quae novit opera tua, quae et affuit tunc, quum orbem terrarum facer es (irdpovaa ore hroiei^ rbv Koafiov)/* is again distinctly Johannine in style and sentiment. The same impression is conveyed by Ecclus. XXIV, S : "I came out of the mouth of the most High [as the Word], the firstborn before all creatures." *•
In view of this striking concordance between the Sapiential Books of the Old Testament and the Gospel of St. John, it is not astonishing that certain learned Jewish rabbis at a later period elaborated an independ- ent theory of the "Word of God," called Memrah," by which they endeavored to explain the Old Testa- ment teaching regarding Wisdom without any reference to Christ.^® It is easy to see, too, why the Fathers of the Nicene epoch appealed to the Sapiential Books of the Old Testament to prove the Consubstantiality and con- sequent Divinity of Christ. The Arians, on their part, quoted the Sapiential Books in support of their heretical tenet that the Logos was a creature.^®
5. The Holy Ghost. — ^The Old Testament references to the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity are neither as plain nor as definite as
26Wi8d. IX, 9. chiefly in the writings of the Tar-
26 " Ego ex ore altissimi prodivi gumim and Onkelos. Cfr. The Jew- [ut Verbutn], primogenita ante om- ish Encyclopedia,
nem creaturam/* 20 Cfr. Newman, The Arians of
27 A Chaldaic word for Wisdom. the Fourth Century, pp. 202 sqq. ; Cfr. J, Lebreton, Les Origines du Idem, Select Treatises of St, Athana-
gme de la Triniti, pp. 145 sqq. sius, II, 337 sqq. iCfr. also Chapter
This theory is incorporated II, § 2, Art. 3, infra.
THE HOLY GHOST 19
the texts relating to the Son. ''It is natural to expect more references to the Son than to the Holy Ghost in the Old Testament, because it prepares and announces the coming and mani- festation of the Son in the Incarnation." ^^ The Old Testament references to the Holy- Ghost can nearly all of them be explained as per- sonifications. ''Spiritus Dei" may merely mean a breath of the Divine Omnipotence,^^ or the supernatural effects of the spirit of God, which, according to, Ps. GUI, 30, "renews the face of the earth.'' The Fathers in their exeget- ical works quote a number of Old Testament texts in which they profess to find references to the Holy Spirit as a Person.®^ But their inter- pretation of these and similar passages is in- spired by, and owes its impressiveness to the light derived from, the New Testament. It is in this light, too, that we must regard Wisd. IX, i sqq., the only Old Testament passage in which the Three Divine Persons are mentioned together: ''Deus patrum meorum, . . . qui fecisti omnia Verho tuo, . . . da mihi sedium tuarum assistri- cent sapientiam. . . . Sensum autem tuum quis sciet, nisi tu dederis sapientiam et miseris Spi- rit um Sanctum tuum de altissimisf — God of my fathers, . . . who hast made all things with thy
80 Wilhelm-Scannell, Man«a/, Vol. 82 Joel H, 28; Job XXXIII, 4; I, p. 283. Wisd. I, 7; Is. LXI, I, etc.
81 Cfr. Gen. I, 2.
20 OLD TESTAMENT INTIMATIONS
word, . . . give me wisdom, that sitteth by thy throne . . . Who shall know thy thought, except thou give wisdom, and send thy Holy Spirit from above ?''
It cannot therefore be seriously maintained that the mystery of the Divine Trinity was clearly revealed in the Old Testament. Aside from cer- tain specially enlightened individuals, such as Abraham, Moses, Isaias, and David, the Jews could not, from the more or less enigmatic hints scattered through their sacred books, have ob- tained a sufficiently distinct knowledge of the Blessed Trinity to make it appear as an article of faith.
Nevertheless it remains true that the Trinity was not announced in the New Testament sud- denly and without preparation. On the contrary, the great mystery of the Godhead was fore- shadowed from the very beginning of the Jewish Covenant and assumed more definite and lumi- nous proportions during and after the time of David, until at last it stood fully revealed in the mystery of the Incarnation,^^ and the mission of the Holy Ghost on Pentecost Day.
Readings : — Drach, De VHarmonie entre Tl^glise et la Syn- agogue, Paris 1844.— P. Scholz, Theologie des A. B., Vol. I, §§ 20 sqq., Ratisbon 1861.— Scheeben, Dogmatik, Vol. I, § no, Freiburg 1875 (Wilhelm-Scanneirs Manual, I, pp. 283 sqq.).
asMatth. I, 18 sqq.; Luke I, 35. etc.
k
THE HOLY GHOST 21
— *Heinrich, Dogmat Theologie, 2nd ed.. Vol. Ill, §§ 214-218, Mainz 1883. — Franzelin, De Deo Trino, thes. 6 and 7, Romae 1881.
On the "Angel of Jehovah," cfr. A. Rohling in the Tubinger Quartalschrift, 1866, pp. 415 sqq., 527 sqq. — *L. Reinke, Beitrdge 2ur Erkldrung des A. T., Vol. IV, pp. 355 sqq.; J. Lebreton, Les Origines du Dogtne de la Triniti, pp. 89 sqq., Paris 1910.
On the Messias, cfr. *K6nig, Theologie der Psalmen, Freiburg 1857; L. Reinke, Messianische Psalmen, 2 vols., Giessen 1857- 1858; H. Zschokke, Theologie der Propheten, Freiburg 1877; H. P. Liddon, The Divinity of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, London 1867; A. J. Maas, S. J., Christ in Type and Prophecy, 2 vols., New York 1893-5.
On the Sapiential Books of the Old Testament cfr. *Fr. Klasen, Die alttestamentliche Weisheit und der Logos der jiidisch' alexandrinischen Philosophie, 1878; also J. Reville, Le Logos d'aprds Philon d' Alexandria, Paris 1877; Zschokke, Der dog- matisch-ethische Lehrgehalt der alttestamentlichen Weisheits- biicher, Wien 1889; E. Krebs, Der Logos als Heiland im ersten Jahrhundert, Freiburg 1910 ; J. Lebreton, Les Origines du Dogtne de la Trinite, 89 sqq., 441 sqq., Paris 1910.
SECTION 2
THE THREEFOLD PERSONALITY OF GOD AS TAUGHT
IN THE NEW TESTAMENT ^TEXTS TREATING
OF THE THREE DIVINE PERSONS
TOGETHER
Though the exact terms in which the Church has formally defined the dogma of the Blessed Trinity ('rpi^^ = trinitas^ ovcrla = substantia^ vtto- (TTacrvs = personay^ of^oovmo's = consubstantialis) are not in the Bible, and may, therefore, in a sense be called unscriptural ; yet materially, that is in substance, they correctly express the teaching of the New Testament, which, like the Church, ex- plicitly acknowledges three real Persons in one Divine Nature, in which precisely the dogma of the "Trinity in Unity" consists.
As we are here dealing with a fundamental dogma of Christianity, the material correspondence of the New Testament doctrine with the formally defined teaching of the Church must be carefully and stringently demon- strated. We therefore proceed to a minute critical in- vestigation of the various texts that are apt to throw light on the subject. Let us begin with those in which
1 Cfr. Hebr. I, 3, where j;ir6o'rao'(S is used as synonymous with sub-
22
THE GOSPELS 23
the threefold personaHty of God is distinctly and form- ally enunciated.
I. The Gospels. — Four such texts occur in the Gospels. Though their combined effect is sufficiently compelling, they are not all of equal weight. The most convincing is the passage em- bodying the form of Baptism.
a) The first brief intimation of the functioning of Three Divine Persons is given in the Annunciation: '' Spiritus Sanctus superveniet in te, et virtus Altissimi obumbrabit tibi; ideoque et quod nascetur ex te sanctum, vocabitur Filius Dei — The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." ^ Here all three Divine Persons are distinctly mentioned: first, the Son who is to be born, second, the Holy Ghost, and third, the " Most High," who stands in the relation of a Father to Him of whom it is said a few verses farther up : ^ '' Hie erit magnus et Filius Altissimi vocabitur — He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High." Where there is a Son of God, there must also be a Di- vine Father. The relative opposition between the terms Father and Son forbids the welding of both persons into one. This is sufficient evidence that we have here not merely three different names for one Divine Person, but three really distinct Hypostases, of which one is not the other. Nor can it have been the intention of the sacred writer merely to personify certain absolute at- tributes of the Deity. The Son of God, who is to be made flesh (Christ), manifestly represents a real Person.
2 Luke I, 35. 3 Luke I, 32.
24 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Moreover, the strict monotheism of the Bible necessitates the assumption that the three Divine Persons mentioned in the text must be consubstantial, i. e., absolutely iden- tical in essence.
b) The most glorious external manifestation of the Blessed Trinity occurred in connection with the Bap- tism of Christ.* Christ, the Son of God, is standing in the Jordan; the Holy Ghost descends upon Him in the form of a dove, and the voice of the Father calls from Heaven : " This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." Here, too, the hypostatic difference be- tween the three Persons, and the impossibility of blending them into one, is quite apparent. The " beloved Son " and the Father expressing His pleasure are clearly differ- entiated, while the Person of the Holy Ghost is em- blemed by the dove, a symbolic figure which would be unsuited to any absolute attribute of the Godhead.' Though the identity of Nature of the three Divine Per- sons is not expressly enunciated in the above-quoted pas- sages, it may, as a matter of course, be presumed.
c) In His famous farewell discourse delivered after the last Supper,® Christ announced that He was " going to the Father" and would ask Him to send the Para- clete. The distinction here made between the three Di- vine Persons is as obvious as it is real. No one can be father and son under the same aspect, nor can any one send himself. When Christ says, for instance: ''Ego rogdbo Patrem, et alium Paraclitum dabit vobis, ut maneat vobiscum in aeternum, Spiritum veritatis — I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Paraclete, that he may abide with you forever, the Spirit of truth," ^
4Matth. Ill, is.sqq.; Mark I, 9 6 Cfr. T. J. Gerrard, The Way-
.-eqQ.l Luke III, 21 sqq.; cfr. Job I, farer's Vision, pp. 200 sqq, 3a. e John XIV-XVI.
7 John XIV, 16 sq.
THE GOSPELS 25
He distinguishes between His own Person, that of the Father, and that of the " other Paraclete " and clearly identifies the latter with the " Spirit of truth." *
The threefold personality of the Godhead appears still more distinctly from John XV, 26 : '* Quum autem venerit Paraclitus, quern ego mittam vobis a Patre, Spi- ritum veritatis, qui a Patre procedit, ille testimonium per- hibebit de me — But when the Paraclete cometh, whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceedeth from the Father, he shall give testimony of me." The absolute consubstantiality of Father and Son is taught in John XVI, 15: "Omnia, quaecumque habet Pater, mea sunt — All things whatsoever the Father hath, are mine," and it is no less true of the Holy Ghost.
d) The baptismal form, "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost," enunciates all the essential elements of the Holy Trinity.® "Euntes ergo docete omnes gentes, haptizantes eos in nomine Patris et Filii et
Spirit us Sancti (^PoLirri^ovTe^ avTovs €ts to Svofia rev Trarpos icat rov vlov kol tov ay iov TTVcv/Aaros^ '* The hy- postatic difference between Father and Son is brought out by the relative opposition, in virtue of which they exclude each other as begetting and begotten. For no one can be his own father or his own son. To admit such an ab- surdity would be to deny the principle of con- tradiction and thereby to subvert right reason. Hence there is a real difference between the
S Paraclitus ^ Spiritus Sanctus. 0 Cfr. Matth. XXVIII;, 19.
'
a6 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Father and the Son. As to the Holy Ghost, the co-ordination involved in the use of et — et ('^a^' — «a*) forbids us to confound Him with either of the other two Persons. Consequently He must be an independent third Person, coequal and con- substantial with the other two. It should be noted that the Johannine text does not say: "In the name of the Father, or the Son, or the Holy Ghost,'' but "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost (^o^ irarph^ koX tov vlov KaX TOV aylov -nrcvfuiTos)/' The particle '^°'^ with I
the definite article marks off the three Divine Persons very sharply from one another, despite the unity implied between them. For this rea- son "Holy Ghost'' can not be taken as an at- tribute determining the concept "Son."
In attempting to answer the question, "What kind of unity is it by which the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are one?" we must pay special attention to the words "In the name." It makes no difference whether we follow the text of the Latin Vulgate, "/n nomine," or the Greek text with its «« ovo^a. Both €ts 6voim and ev ovoimri., as wcll as ^'rt tw ovofMTi ^^ occur in the original Greek text, and for our present purpose they are equally conclusive. For man to be baptized in the name of the Most Holy Trinity can have no other meaning than that through
10 Acts II, 38.
THE GOSPELS 2y
baptism he obtains forgiveness of his sins in vir- tue and by the authority of the three Divine Per- sons; while to baptize c^« Sj'o/xa of the Blessed Trin- ity signifies the devotion with which the person baptized is expected to consecrate himself to and to seek his last end and aim in the ''Deity." ^^ In either case Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are certainly identical with the Deity itself, because no one can expect forgiveness of his sins from, or seek his final end in, a mere creature, without making himself guilty of idolatry. If the three Persons mentioned are identical with the God- head, they cannot be three Gods, but must be the One God taught by both Testaments.^'*
The essential identity of the three Divine Persons follows further from the singular form in nomine^ because throughout the Bible nomen Domini" signifies God's power, majesty, and essence.^^ As the Three have but one name, so They have but one essence, one nature, one substance. St. Augustine beautifully observes: ''Iste unus Deus, quia non in nominibus Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti, sed in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti. Ubi unum nomen audiSy unus est Deus — This is one God, for it is not in the names of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, but in the name of the
11 Cfr. Rom. VI, 3 sqq.; i Cor. KnowabilUy, Essence, and Attri- I, 12 sqq.; Ill, 4 sqq.; Gal. Ill, 27. butes, pp. 212 sqq.
12 Cfr, Pohle-Preuss, God: Hit iz" Nomen est numen."
3
28 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Where thou hearest one name, there is one God/' "
2. The Epistles. — ^The Apostolic Epistles con- tain four texts in which the three Divine Persons are mentioned together. Most prominent among them is the much-discussed Comma loanneitm ( i John V, 7).
a) The prologue to the first Epistle of St. Peter reads: '* Petrus . . . electis . . . secundum praescientiam Dei Patris, in sanctificationem Spiritus, in obedientiam et as- persionem sanguinis lesu Christi: gratia vobis et pax mul- tiplicetur — Peter ... to the . . . elect, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, unto the sancti- fication of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ : Grace unto you and peace be multiplied." Here we have a Trinitarian form of bene- diction in which the omniscient Father, the sanctifying Spirit, and Jesus Christ, our Redeemer by the " sprink- ling of blood," appear on a par. Consequently the Three are one true God. Though this isolated text is not suffi- cient to estabHsh a real distinction between the three Divine Persons (for the sanctifying Spirit might possibly be conceived as a mere attribute of the Father or of Jesus Christ), the teaching of the New Testament in many other places makes it quite certain that Jesus Christ is the ** Son of God " who differs hypostatically from the Father, as the Holy Ghost differs hypostatically from both the Father and the Son.
14 Auc\i9t«» TracU %n loa., VI» n. Homilies on the Gospel according to 0, Browne** translation in the Li- St. John, p. 87, Oxford 1848. brary Qf IA# Fathers, Vol. I of the
THE EPISTLES 29
b) The epilogue of St. Paul's second Epistle to the Corinthians contains a similar form of blessing : '^ Gratia Domini nostri lesu Christi et charitas Dei [scil. Patris] et communicatio Sancti Spiritus sit cum omnibus vobis — The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the charity of God [the Father], and the communication of the Holy Ghost be with, you all." ^'^ As grace and charity are supernatural gifts which only the Godhead can dis- pense, there can be no question that here again the Three Dispensers are One God. But does the text oblige us to postulate three really distinct Persons ? We think it does ; for the Greek original ^® puts the " grace of our Lord Jesus Christ " on a par with the " charity of God " and the " communication " (Kotvwna) of the Holy Ghost." It is improbable that the " God of charity " should be personally identical either with our Lord Jesus Christ or the Holy Ghost.
c) St. Paul's teaching on the spiritual gifts and the charismata ^^ is rightly held to have a special bearing on the doctrine of the Most Holy Trinity. Exegetes de- duce from the threefold nature of the effect (xapio-ftara, SuiKoviai, evepyrjfjLara) the existence of a threefold hyposta- tic principle (irvevfuif Kvpio^, ^cds). But, since a little further down in St. Paul's text^® all these gifts are ap- propriated to " the same Spirit," that which was at first divided returns to its original unity, and consequently Spirit, Lord, and God are not three gods, but one God. The somewhat involved passage is as follows: '* Divir siones vera gratiarum (xapto-fwiTwv) sunt, idem autem
16 2 Cor. XIII, 13. scheid {Novum Testanientum, p.
10 The Greek text has: ^ X^P'^ 3^'» Friburgi 1901) correctly trans-
rov KvpLov *It}(TOv Xpurrov, Kal ^ lates: ** Gratia . . , et charitas,"
dydinj rov Qeov Kal ^ KOivavla 17 i Cor. XII, 4 sqq.
rov &ylov irP€(ffiaTos which Brand- 18 i Cor. XII, xi.
i
30 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Spiritus (nTcvfui) ; [cfr. verse 3 : iv Ttvevfuin ayiw] '» ^^ dizHsiones ministrationum sunt (8taicovu5v = ministries, ecclesiastical offices), idem autem Dominus (6 icvptos = Christ) ; et divisiones operationum sunt (evtpyrifidTtav == miracles), idem vero Deus (6 avrb^ ©eo^), qui operatur omnia in omnibus — Now there are diversities of graces, but the same Spirit; and there are diversities of ministries, but the same Lord ; and there are diversi- ties of operations, but the same God, who worketh in all." *• It is plain from the context that, on the basis of three supernatural operations, St. Paul here means to distinguish three separate Divine Persons: Spiritus, Dominus, and Deus. That he does not mean to assert the existence of three Gods appears from verse 11: " Haec autem omnia operatur unus atque idem Spiritus (to tv Kci TO avTo TTvevfia), dividens singulis, prout vult — But all these things one and the same spirit worketh, dividing to every one according as he will."
A similar change of subject, by which the same ex- ternal operation is ascribed now to this Divine Per- son and now to that, occurs in many other places in Holy Scripture, e. g., in the vision of Isaias.^^ The au- thorship of this vision is in the original Hebrew referred to the Divinity in general (^fi^), in John XII, 40, to
Christ, and in Acts XXVIII, 25 sqq., to the Holy Ghost. Except on the assumption of a numerical oneness of nature and essence these expressions are absolutely un- intelligible.**
d) The Comma Ioanneum. — If its textual authenticity could be established, the famous
19 I Cor. XII, 4 iqq. beiden Brief e on dU Korinther, pp.
80 Is. VI, 9 sq. 244 sqq., Munster 1903.
SI Cfr. Al. Schifer, BrklSrung der
THE COMMA lOANNEUM 31
Comma loanneum (i John V, 7), or text of the three heavenly Witnesses, would be of equal dog- matic value with the form of Baptism. As it stands, it is a pregnant and clear textus per se dogmaticus, outweighing, e. g., St. Paul's entire Epistle to Philemon, and enforcing the dogma of the Divine Trinity more perfectly than any other passage in the Bible.
It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that, should it ever become necessary to sacrifice the Comma loanneum, the Biblical argument for the dogma of the Blessed Trinity would suflfer essential impairment. The whole of our present chapter goes to show the con- trary. Yet no one will blame the Catholic theologian for utilizing, in spite of certain critical misgivings, a text which has been received into the liturgy of the Church, and for many centuries ^^ formed part and parcel of the Latin Vulgate. Aside from questions of textual criticism, it is plain that the dogmatic authenticity of i John V, 7, cannot be questioned without endorsing the heretical view that a proposition received into the Sacred Text under the vigilant eye of the Church may contain dogmatic errors. In this purely dogmatic sense, there- fore, the Comma loanneum is undoubtedly authentic and may be used as an argument, even though, so long as its textual authenticity has not been securely established, the demonstration based upon it cannot claim to be a strictly Biblical proof.
In perfect conformity with the well-known views of St. John the Evangelist, the Comma loanneum enu- merates the three Witnesses "who give testimony in
22 Prestimably since about the year 800.
32 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
heaven/' as "the Father, tlie Word, and the Holy Ghost," and expressly declares that " these three are one." ^* Since the three Witnesses of whom the Apos- tle speaks are " in heaven," they seem to be the three Di- vine Persons, and they must be really distinct from one another, because they are expressly referred to as ol rpeh. Inasmuch as they are "one" (cv, unum), there must exist between them a communication of nature, that is to say, their unity is not merely *' unitas in testificando/' but clearly also ** identitas in essendo," It is true St. John in the following verse also says of the three other witnesses who " give testimony on earth," viz.: " the spirit, and the water, and the blood," that " et hi ires unum sunt/' But he does not say : ev cto-tv, but cts t6 Iv cto-tv = in unum sunt, that is, they are one only in so far as they testify, not identical in substance.^*
3. The Authenticity of the Comma Ioan- NEUM. — On January 13, 1897, the Sacred Con- gregation of the Holy Office, with the approba- tion of His Holiness Pope Leo XIH, published the subjoined doctrinal decision :^^ ''Ad propo- sitionem, utrum tuto negari an in dubium vocari possit, esse authenticum textum i loa. V, y. . . . Eminentissimi Cardinales respondendum man- darunt: Negative — ^The doubt was proposed: *Can it be safely denied, or at least doubted, that the text of i John V, 7 ... is authentic?' . . .
28 1 John V, 7: ""On rpeis Word, and the Holy Ghost. And
elffip ol fiapTvpovvres iv T<a oitpavia^ these three are one."
b irariip, 6 \6yos Kal t6 dyiov 24 Cfr. Franzelin, De Deo Trino,
irvevfjLa • Kal oiroi ol rpels iv elaiv thes. 5.
— And there are three who give' 26 Analect, Eccles,, 1897, pp. 99
testimony in heaven, the Father, the sq.
'THE COMMA lOANNEUM
33
and the Most Eminent Cardinals answered, Nor
a) As soon as this decree became known, the opinion was expressed, even by Catholic scholars, that it meant a definitive decision in favor of the authenticity of the Comma loanneum, which could not henceforth be doubted or denied without caUing in question the Church's defined right and duty to watch over and authoritatively deter- mine all questions connected with Sacred Scripture. Those who took this view forgot that a decree of the Holy Office, even when approved by the Pope ''in forma communi/' does not partake of the nature of an infallible decision. That this is so, is manifest from the action of the same Congregation against Galilei, A. D. 1633.2® The religious assent with which Catholics are bound to receive the decisions of the Holy Office,^^ is a duty growing out of Catholic respect for authority, and imposed by obedience. But it would be wrong to interpret it as forbidding deeper research into the soundness or unsoundness of a decision which does not per se claim to be infallible. The respect and obedience we owe to the Church will prompt us not to refuse our assent until it is positively certain, or at least highly probable, that the Sacred Congregation has made a mis- take. The Pope in his capacity of supreme teacher can-
26 On the decision against Galilei, see Adolf Muller, S. J., Der Gali- lei-Prozess (1632-1633) nach Ur- sprung, Verlauf und Folgen, Frei- burg 1909, pp. 191 sqq. This excel- lent work, together with the same author's Galileo Galilei und das ko- pernikanische Weltsystem, Freiburg 1909, is far and away the best ac- count of this much-mooted historic^
incident. We hope both will soon find an English translator.
27 See the letter addressed by Pius IX to the Archbishop of Mu- nich, under date of Dec. 21, 1863 (Denzinger-Bannwart, Enchiridion, n. 1684). Cfr. P. A. Baart, The Roman Court, pp. iii sq.. New York 1895,
34 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
not delegate his infallibility to any man or body of men ; hence his approval of a congregational decree does not invest that decree with infallibility, unless indeed the Sovereign Pontiff sees fit, by an approbation "in fornia solemni/' to raise it to the rank of an ex cathedra deci- sion solemnly binding all the faithful. This was not done in the present instance.
For the rest, it is well to remember that the decrees and decisions of the different Roman Congregations are as a rule disciplinary rather than doctrinal. They are for the most part designed to warn Catholic scholars against adopting doubtful theories until the reasons for and against have been thoroughly sifted. Thus it was in the early days of the Church in respect of the moot question regarding the existence of antipodes. Like value should be attached to the ecclesiastical de- cisions against the system of Copernicus, which has emerged victoriously from the violent conflict waged about it. Perhaps the decision of the Holy Office on the Comma loanneum belongs to the same category. In these parlous days, when Protestant and Rational- ist critics are sapping the very foundations of sound Biblical science, and in their eagerness to frame new hypotheses are trotting out a horde of critical monsters which forthwith proceed to devour one another, there is danger that Catholic savants may venture too far along slippery paths, losing sight completely of the firm ground of ecclesiastical Tradition.^® An immediate authorita- tive intervention in the controversy raging round the Comma loanneum seemed all the more advisable be- cause a definitive solution of the problem on purely scientific grounds could hardly be expected for a long time to come. Though it seems at present a highly im-
28 Take, for example, the case of the unfortunate Abb6 Loisy.
THE COMMA lOANNEUM 35
probable event, yet some ancient Greek or Latin palimp- sest may yet be unearthed, containing the Comma in an undoubtedly genuine and original form. The absence of the passage from so many New Testament codices could then be satisfactorily explained by an oversight of the copyists. G. Schepss has lately found the mooted text cited in a work of Priscillian's newly discovered in 1889. At the present stage of the controversy, however, there is no blinking the fact that the critical arguments against the authenticity of the Comma loanneum considerably outweigh those adduced in its favor.
b) The most weighty objection raised against the authenticity of i John V, 7 is based on the circumstance that the text is missing in all the older Greek codices without exception. Not until the fifteenth century does it begin to make its appearance in the manuscript copies of St. John's First Epistle. Moreover, not one of the Greek Fathers who combated Arianism ever cited this strong passage, which would have dealt a death blow to the heresy of Subordinationism. In fact, when we observe how eagerly the Greek Fathers of the Nicene and Post-Nicene period conned their Bible for texts with which to refute the Arians, without ever lighting upon I John V, 7, the only rational explanation is that the Comma loanneum was not there. Nor were the Latin Fathers (if we disregard a few faint and doubtful traces) acquainted with the text of the three heavenly Witnesses. St. Augustine, e, g., fails to cite it in his great work De Trinitate, in which with his customary ingenuity he turns to account practically all the Trin- itarian texts found in the whole Bible.^® He repeatedly quotes I John V, 8, but never once i John V, 7. What
29 The Speculum Augustini "Audi Israhel" is spurious. Cfr. Barden- hewer-Shahan, Patrology, p. 505,
36 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
is still more remarkable is that Leo the Great, in his dogmatic Epistula ad Flavianum (A. D. 451), quotes as Scriptural the verses that immediately precede, and sev- eral that follow the passage called Comma loanneum, but never alludes to the Comma itself. Nor was the Comma known to St. Jerome, who restored the Vulgate text by order of Pope Damasus. If the editors of the official edition, prepared under Pope Sixtus V and his predecessors, had recognized the spuriousness of the pseudo-Hieronymian prologue to the Catholic Epis- tles, now so apparent to all, the Comma would probably never have been incorporated in the Vulgate. The most ancient manuscript codices of the Vulgate — among them the Codex Fuldensis, the Codex Amiatinus, and the Codex Harleianus — and the oldest extant copies of the Greek Testament, do not contain the much discussed passage, which made its way very gradually since the eighth century. In England it was unknown to Saint Bede, who died in the year 735.
But how did the text of the three heavenly Witnesses find its way into the Vulgate? All explanations that have been advanced so far are pure guesswork. The cir- cumstance that in certain manuscript codices the Comma occurs sometimes before and sometimes after verse 8, has suggested the hypothesis that it was originally a marginal note, which somehow crept into the text. Some think that a misunderstood remark by St. Cyprian first led to its reception. This would explain the early occurrence of the Comma in the African Church. St. Cyprian (+258) writes in his treatise De Unitate Ecclesiae, c. 6: ** Dicit Dominus: ego et Pater unum sumus, et iterum de Patre et Filio et Spiritu Sancto scriptum est: et tres unum sunt — The Lord sayeth: I and the Father are one; and again it is written of the
i
THE COMMA lOANNEUM
37
Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost : And the Three are one." Of this passage, as Al. Schafer points out, only the words " et tres unum sunt " can be looked upon as a quotation from Sacred Scripture, and they may have been borrowed from the genuine eighth verse of the fifth chapter of St. John's First Epistle.^® Facundus of Hermiane ( + about 570) , who had no inkling of the existence of the famous Comma, ^actually formulated this surmise : " Tres sunt qui testimonium dant, spiritus, aqua et sanguis, et hi tres unum sunt . . . quod loannis testimonium B, Cyprianus de Patre, Filio et Spiritu Sancto intelligit" ^^ TertuUian (born about 160) has a passage in his Contra Praxeam which sounds somewhat like the Comma,^^ but we may fairly doubt whether it is intended for a citation or merely expresses the author's personal opinion.
c) Against such arguments as these it is difficult to defend the authenticity of the Comma loanneum,^^ which undeniably did not find its way into the Vulgate until the ninth century, while the Greek codices contain no trace of it prior to the fifteenth century.^* All that can be said for the other side is that since the apographs
30 Schafer, Einleitung in das N, 7"., p. 340, Paderborn 1898.
31 Defens. Trium CapituL, I, 3.
32 Contr. Prax., 25. The passage reads: " Ita connexus Patris in Filio et Filii in Paracleto tres effi- cit cohaerentes, alterum ab altera, qui tres unum sunt, nan unus,"
33 But few attempts at such a de- fense have been made in English since Dr. Wiseman published his well-known Letters on i John V, 7; e. g., by Lamy, in the American Ecclesiastical Review, 1897, pp. 449 sqq. Cfr. also Ch. Forster, A New Plea for the Authenticity of the Text of the Three Heavenly Wit-
nesses, Cambridge 1867. J. Lebre- ton gives a brief and impartial sum- mary of the present status of the controversy in an appendix (pp. 524-531) of his work Les Origines du Dogme de la Trinite, Paris 19 10. 34 Of the Greek uncials every one that contains the First Epistle of St. John is without the Comma loanneum. Of the cursive MSS. of the Greek New Testament about one hundred and ninety do not include the passage, while only four contain it, and these four as text-witnesses are worthless. Cfr. W. L. Sullivan in the New York Review, Vol. II, (1906), No. 2, p. 180.
38 THE TRINITY IX THE NEW TESTAMENT
of the earliest period are nearly all lost, there remains a bare possibility that the Comma loanneum may have occurred in one or the other of the most ancient, es- pecially African, codices. Some importance attaches to the fact that as early as 380 the Spanish heresiarch Pris- cillian cites as Scriptural the verse : '' Et tria sunt, quae testimonium dicunt in coelo, Pater, Verbum et Spiritus, et haec tria unum sunt" •* The main argument for the authenticity of the Comma is based upon a passage in the " Libellus Fidei/' which the Catholic Bishops ^' who were cited by Hunneric, King of the Vandals, to meet the Arians in conference on Feb. i, 484,^^ sub- mitted in defense of their faith. The passage is as fol- lows: '^ Et ut adhuc luce clarius unius divinitatis esse cum Patre et Filio Spiritum Sanctum doceamus, loannis Evangelistae testimonio comprobatur. Ait namque: Tres sunt, qui testimonium perhibent in coelo: Pater, Verbum et Spiritus Sanctus, et hi tres unum sunt," ^' St. Fulgentius (468-533), Bishop of Ruspe, in the Afri- can province of Byzazena, undoubtedly knew of the verse and, rightly or wrongly, ascribed a knowledge of it to St. Cyprian: " Beatus loannes Apostolus testatur dicens: Tres sunt, qui testimonium perhibent in coelo, Pater, Verbum, et Spiritus Sanctus, et tres unum sunt; quod etiam B. martyr Cyprianus in epistola de unitate ecclesiae conHtetur." ^^ The defense can also claim the
85 Lib, Apologet., IV, ed. Schepss, p. 6. Schepss, as we have already intimated, discovered this lost work of Priscillian's in the Wurzburg University Library in 1889.
86 They included Victor of Vita (cfr. his Hist, PersecuL, II, 56) and Vigilius of Tapsus.
8T Cfr. Alzog, Manual of Univer- tai Church History, Vol. II, p. 28
sq. Cincinnati 1899; Sullivan in the New York Review, II, 2, 185 sq.
88 Quoted by Hardouin, Cone, t, ii, p. 863.
89 Resp, ad Ohiect, Arianorum, 10. The passage of St. Cyprian's, to which Fulgentius here refers, occurs in the sixth chapter De Unitate Ec- clesiae and reads as follows: " Dicit Dominus, ego et Pater unum sumus;
THE COMMA lOANNEUM 39
authority of Cassiodorus, who, about the middle of the sixth century, with many ancient manuscripts at his elbow, revised the entire Vulgate of St. Jerome, espe- cially the Apostolic Epistles, and deliberately inserted i John V, 7, which St. Jerome had left out. If we con- sider all these facts, in connection with the passage quoted above from TertuUian, which bears the earmarks of a direct citation from Holy Scripture, we are justified in assuming that the Comma loanneum was perhaps found in copies of the Latin Bible current in Africa as early as the third century.
d) The dogmatic authenticity of i John V, 7, is quite another matter. It can be satisfactorily established by a purely theological process of reasoning. The Comma loanneum played a prominent part at the Fourth Lateran Council, A. D. 121 5, where Abbot Joachim of Flora adduced it in favor of his tritheistic vagaries. In the Caput " Damnamus/* which solemnly condemns his errors, we read: ^'Non enim (ait loachim) fideles Christi sunt unum, i. c, quaedam una res, quae com- munis sit omnibus, sed hoc modo sunt unum, i. e., una ecclesia, propter catholicae iidei unitatem . . . quemad- modum in canonica loannis Apostoli epistula legitur: 'quia tres sunt, qui testimonium dant in coelo, Pater et Filius [sic!\ et Spiritus Sanctus, et hi tres unum sunt/ Statimque subiungitur: Et tres sunt, qui testimonium dant in terra, spiritus, aqua et sanguis, et hi tres unum sunt: sicut in quibusdam codicibus invenitur/' *® Though we have here the express testimony of a council of the
et iterum de Patre et FiKo et Spiritu text which contained the " Comma ";
Sancto scriptum est: et tres unum and if it did, it would by no means
sunt/' It is, as Tischendorf has follow that the verse was written by
rightly observed, by far the weight- St. John. Cfr. Sullivan in the New
iest proof for the Comma loanneum. York Review, II, 2, pp. 182 sq.
But it does not prove decisively that 40 Quoted by Denzinger-Bannwart,
St. Cyprian used a New Testament Enchiridion, n. 431.
40 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Church that the Comma occurs only in certain codices, it is to be noted that this council does not reject the text of the three heavenly witnesses as apocryphal or spurious, or as having been smuggled into the Bible.
The strongest dogmatical argument, according to Franzelin*^ and Kleutgen,*^ is that drawn from the Tridentine decree De Canonicis Scripturis: '^ Si quis libros integros cum omnibus suis partibus, prout in ecclesia catholica legi consueverunt et in veteri vulgata latina editione habentur, pro sacris et canonicis non susceperit, , . . anathema sit J' *^ Franzelin and Kleut- gen argue that since the Comma loanneum, being an important " dogmatic text," must be regarded as an in- tegral part of Sacred Scripture, and as it undoubtedly formed part of the ancient Latin Vulgate, its canonical authenticity is fully covered by the Tridentine decree.
If this claim were well founded, the whole discus- sion would have been irrevocably closed in the six- teenth century. But Franzelin and Kleutgen overshoot the mark. The Tridentine decree settles nothing either for or against the authenticity of the Comma loanneum. For, as Schafer points out,** the decree is distinctly limited by the phrases "prout in ecclesia catholica legi consueverunt/' and " et in veteri vulgata latina editione habentur." Of these limitations the former does not fully apply to the Comma loanneum, and the latter can not affect the official edition of the Vulgate is- sued in 1592. Of the earlier editions many were no- toriously without the Comma. Consequently, the clause " omnibus suis partibus " is not strictly applicable to i John V, 7. This argument is strengthened by the testimony
41 De Deo Trino, thes. 4. 44 Einleitung in das Neue Testa-
42 De Ipso Deo, pp. 519 sqq. tnent, pp. 341 sqq., Paderborn 1898.
43 Denzinger-Bannwart, Enchiridi- on, n. 784,
THE COMMA lOANNEUM 41
of the Fourth Lateran Council, which we have already quoted, to the eifect that in the 13th century the Comma loanneum was found only in a few codices ("in quibus- dam codicibus invenitur"). The fact that there still ex- ist over fifty ancient manuscript codices of the Vulgate which lack the Comma loanneum is too remarkable to be brushed aside as irrelevant. The scientific aspect of the problem, therefore, is not touched by the Tridentine decree at all, and the Comma itself remains a doubtful text. Franzelin in another treatise admits this conten- tion in principle.*®
For the rest, it is plain that Rome does not wish to bolt the door to further critical research. Very soon after the Inquisition had promulgated its decree of Jan. 13, 1897, Cardinal Vaughan replied to a query from Mr. Wilfrid Ward : " I have ascertained from an ex- cellent source that the decree of the Holy Office on the passage of the * Three Witnesses,' which you refer to, is not intended to close the discussion on the authenticity of that text; the field of Biblical criticism is not touched by this decree." Availing himself of the liberty thus granted. Professor Karl Kiinstle, of the University of Freiburg in Baden, has lately attempted to throw new light on the origin of the Comma, and has succeeded in making it appear extremely probable that it was formulated by Priscillian, about A. D. 380, in the heretical wording: " Et haec tria unum sunt in Christo lesu" in support of his Sabellian Pan-Christism, and that it was recast in an orthodox mould by some
45 De Script, et Trad., ed. 4, p. iextum ita admittit vel non admittit,
489, Romae 1896: "Si de aliquo tali prout exstat vel non exstat in veteri
textu posset demonstrari, non esse vulgata editione, quae longo saecU'
ex veteri vulgata editione," he says, lorum usu in ecclesia probata est,
It
" eius conformitas cum Scriptura is nihil agit contra decretum Con- primitiva non posset diet per decre- cilii,* turn Concilii declarata. Qui ergo
42 THE TRINITY IX THE NEW TESTAilENT
Catholic theologian** (possibly pseado-Vigilitxs of Tap- sus) and inserted into the text of St John's First Epis- tle by one " Peregrinus," who was probably a monk named Bachiarius. It is probably of Spanish origin.*^
Readings: — *Sdiccbcn, Dogmatik, VoL I, §107 (Wilhclinr- Scanncll, Manucd, I, pp. 265 sqq,). — Oswald, Dogwuxtiscke The- ologie, VoL II: Trmititslehre, §3, Paderbom 1888. — J. Lcbre- ton, Les Origines du Dogme de la Trinite, pp. 207 sqq., 524 sqq., Paris 191a Other Inbliographkal references in die text.
4« " Wltethier tite criebrated pos- > • . be gmtxiiie or not, wxj3 Newman, ** it is f eiicxtotxsir descrip- tire of tIte Ante-Xicene tradition. . . .** Tracts TluoL mnd EccUt^ p.
47 K. Konstlc, Das " Commaloas^ neuim " auf seine Herknnft nnter' suck*, FreStmrg 1905; somiiiarized by W. L. Snniran, C S. P., in tbc New York Review, Vol. 11 (1906), No. 2, pp. ijS'tSS, Cfr. also Clir.
Pmrh, S. J., PraeUct, Dognust^ 3rd td^ t. n, pp. 2S5 sqq., Friborsi iQod. Konstle's sappostion that the Coirnma was inrented by Priscillian himself is combatted by E. C Babot, PriscilJien et le PrisciUiamisme, pp. 367 sqq., Paris 1909. Otiier refer- ences may be foond in Gim^y's Introd. in Vtrinsqne Testamenti Li- bras Sacros, VoL m, ppi. 668 sqq., Paris 1886.
SECTION 3
NEW TESTAMENT TEXTS TREATING OF THE DIVINE
PERSONS SEVERALLY
In demonstrating the dogma of the Most Holy- Trinity from those texts of Sacred Scripture which treat of the Divine Persons severally, we shall have to establish three distinct truths: ( I ) The reality of each Divine Person in contra- distinction to mere personification; (2) the non- coincidence of each Person with the others, in contradistinction to the Sabellian heresy which confuses them; and (3) the Divinity of each Person, in opposition to the Arian and Mace- donian doctrine that the Son or the Holy Ghost is a creature.
As " Logos " IS manifestly synonymous with Son of God, and " Paraclete " with Holy Ghost, there cannot be five Divine Persons, but only three. To establish the hypostatic difference of these three is the purpose of the first two members of this argument, while the third shows forth the absolute unity of the Divine Nature possessed by the three Persons of the Blessed Trinity in common.
The most important part of our task in this Section IS to establish the true Divine Sonship of Jesus Christ,
43
4
I
44 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
a conception which fully harmonizes with the dogma of the Blessed Trinity and sets forth with great clearness its two fundamental marks, vi2.: Trinity and Unity. For, as Gossler pertinently observes, " Belief in, and knowledge of, the Triune God is conditioned upon be- lief in, and knowledge of, the Son of God." ^ The combined results of exegetical research ultimately lead to the dogma of a real Trinity of Persons in one divine and indivisible Monad.
ARTICLE I
OF GOD THE FATHER
I. God's Fatherhood in the Figurative Sense of the Term. — ^The Biblical use of the name "Father'* indicates that He to whom it is applied is a real person. It also proves His Divinity. But it does not necessarily argue that He is a father in the strict sense of the term, or that He is the "first" in a group of three Divine Persons.
There is a human fatherhood which is merely analog- ical and figurative.^ Similarly Holy Scripture often re- fers to the Godhead, i. e,, the whole Blessed Trinity, as " Father " in a purely moral or metaphorical sense. Thus God is in a certain sense the Father of His creatures by the act of creation and the fact of His Divine Providence. Cfr. Job XXXVHI, 28: "God . . . the father of rain" ("pater pluviae," i, e., auctor
1 Lehrb. d, kath, Dogmatik, 1, 2, denoted by such terms as stepfather^ p. 133, Ratisbon 1874. father confessor, father of the
2 Take for example the relation Church.
GOD THE FATHER 45
pluviae). Hebr. XII, 9: "The father of spirits (pater spirituum).*' He is called in a special manner "Father of men," or Father of the human race, because He created humankind out of pure benevolence and with paternal solicitude provides for their needs.^ In the Old Testament Jehovah's relation to His Chosen People formed the basis of a particularly cordial and intimate kinship, which might well be styled fatherhood. Cfr. Deut. XXXII, 6: " Numquid non ipse est Pater tuns, qui possedit te et fecit et creavit te — Is not he thy father, that hath possessed thee, and made thee, and created thee ? " Jer. XXXI, 9 : " Quia f actus sum Israeli Pater et Ephraim primogenitus meus est — For I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my first-born." It is a proof of the depth of feeling and the keen insight which distinguishes the Aryan nations that, though deprived of the benefits of supernatural Revelation, they fixed upon fatherhood as the characteristic note of God. Such appellations as the Sanskrit Dyaus Pitar, the Greek Zeus iraTTjp, and the Latin lupiter, indicate that God impressed them above all else as the Father of men.
God's supernatural fatherhood with regard to man is related to the natural fatherhood of which we have just spoken, as light is related to shadow, or as being to nothingness. From the purely natural point of view God is our master rather than our father, and we are His slaves rather than His children.* But sanctifying grace elevates us to the supernatural rank of "children of God," inasmuch as it gives us " power to be made the sons of God," if we " believe in his name " and are
8 Cfr. Pohle-Preuss, God: His Knowability, Essence, and Attributes, pp. 260 sqq. 4 Cfr. Gal. IV, 7.
46 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
"born of GoA"' Rom. VIII, 15: '* Non enim acce- pistis spiritum servitutis iterum in timore, sed accepistis spiritum adoptionis Uliorum, in quo clamamus: Abba, Pater — For you have not received the spirit of bondage again in fear, but you have received the spirit of adop- tion of sons, whereby we cry: Abba (Father)." i Cor. VIII, 6: "Yet to us there is but one God, the Father (cIs ©cos, o war^p).'* It is in this sense that we daily pray : " Our Father, who art in Heaven." •
2. God's Fatherhood in the Strict Sense OF THE Term. — Besides and above the figurative paternity of God, there is peculiar to Him an- other and higher fatherhood. This is based not on His (natural or supernatural) relations to His creatures, but on a mysterious vital process immanent in the Deity. Revelation tells us that God has from all eternity begotten a Son of the same substance with Himself, the '^unigenitus Filius, qui est in sinu Patris/''' This phys- ical, or, more correctly speaking, metaphysical, divine Sonship must have for its necessary cor- relative in the Godhead a true Fatherhood in the proper sense of the term. Hence the name ^Tather*^ is applied to God as a nomen pro- prium, or proper name, and it follows with logical necessity that there is a First Person in the Godhead. For, being a pure spirit, God the Father can have a natural, coessential son
5 John I, xa tq. " Father " is used merely as a
• Matth. VI, 9. In this as well as nomen appellativum s, commune. la many other Scriptural passages, 7 John I, x8.
GOD'S FATHERHOOD 47
(filius naturalis) only in so far as, by virtue of eternal generation, He communicates the fulness of His Divine Nature to a Second Person, who must in consequence be the true Son of God, and therefore Himself God. Cfr. 2 Pet. I, 17: ''Ac- cipiens enim a Deo Patre honorem et gloriam, voce delapsa ad eum huiuscemodi a magniiica gloria: Hie est Filius mens dilectus, in quo mihi complacuij ipsum audite — For he received from God the Father honor and glory: this voice coming down to him from the excellent glory: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him." No one felt the force of this argument more keenly than the unbe- lieving Jews. Cfr. John V, 18: ''Propterea ergo magis quaerebant eum ludaei interficere, quia non solum solvebat sabbatum, sed et Patrem suum dicebat Deum, aequalem se faciens Deo
(irarlpa Ihiov lAcyc rov 0cov, laov kavrov iroviav r^ ©c^)
Hereupon therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he did not only break the sab- bath, but also said God was his Father, making himself equal to God."
The sacred writers frequently emphasize God's peculiar and singular Paternity, and quite consist- ently depict it as the pattern and exemplar of all creatural fatherhood. Cfr. 2 Cor. I, 3 : ''Bene- dictus Deus et Pater Domini nostri lesu Christi — Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord
48 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Jesus Christ." Eph. Ill, 14 sq. : "Flecto genua mea ad Patrem Domini nostri lesu Christi, ex quo \sciL Patre] omnis pat emit as in coelis et in terra nominatur — I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom all paternity in heaven and earth is named."
This inner-divine Paternity cannot be predi- cated of the Divine Nature or Essence as such — for the Divine Essence neither begets nor is be- gotten. Hence it must consist in a relative op- position between the Father and the Son. Conse- quently, the Father is a Person distinct from the Son; and inasmuch as paternity is notionally prior to sonship, He is the First Person of the Blessed Trinity.
It is to be noted that the Antitrinitarians never denied that the Father is a real person, or that He is true God. What they disputed was that the Father is the First Person of the Godhead. And in this they were quite consistent; for had they admitted that proposition, they would have been forced to admit also that there is a Second Person, namely, the Divine Son. It is this truth we now proceed to demonstrate from Holy Scripture.
Readings: — On the theology of the Father, cfr. Heinrich, Dogmat. Theologie, 2nd ed., Vol. IV, pp. 139 sqq., Mainz 1885; Oswald, Trinitdtslehre, § 4; Simar, Dogmatik, 4th ed.. Vol. I, pp. 228 sqq., Freiburg 1899; Fr- H. Chase, The Lord's Prayer
the Early Church, Cambridge 1891. Also S. Thorn., S, TheoL, qu. 33 (Bonjoannes-Lescher, Compendium, pp. 84 sq.).
1
GOD THE SON 49
ARTICLE 2
OF GOD THE SON
In the sublime text John I, 14: "Kol 6 Aoyo? aap$ cyiveTo — And the Word was made flesh/' the dogma of the Blessed Trinity and the dogmatic teaching of the Church in regard to Jesus Christ run together into one. For this reason nearly all Scriptural passages that can be cited in proof of Christ's being the Only-begotten Son of God likewise offer solid arguments for the dogma that He is both the true Son of God and the Divine Logos, and consequently the Second Person of the Godhead. It will be sufficient to show, therefore, in this division of our treatise, (i) that Christ is the true Son of God, (2) that He is very God, and (3) that He is the Divine Logos. There is no need of a special demonstration to prove that Christ is a real per- son and not a mere personification.
A. Christ's Divine Sonship
I. The Term "Son of God" as Used in a Metaphorical Sense. — If, as we have shown, God can assume towards His rational creatures the relation of a father, these creatures must be capable of becoming, in a certain sense, sons or children of God.
50 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
a) Taking the term in a higher sense, man can be- come a son of God only in the supernatural order, as we shall show in the treatise on Grace, where we speak of Justification. Cf r. Matth. V, 9 : " Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God." But, as Holy Scripture clearly intimates, this supernatural sonship of the creature is not a sonship in the strict sense of the term; it is based on adop- tion.® Though this filiatio adoptiva is sharply con- trasted with natural sonship,^ inasmuch as the Bible traces it to the fact of the creature's " regeneration of God," ^® nay, even calls it a participation iii the Divine Nature," it is to be remarked that the last-mentioned two notions never lose their accidental and analogous character, because they are conditioned by sanctifying grace, of which the filiatio adoptiva is the chief formal effect.
b) The important question we have here to solve is whether " Son of God " is applied to Christ merely as an analogous term. In that case, though He would still out- rank God's other adopted children, Jesus would be no more than a primus inter pares. That He outranks all other men appears clearly enough from the fact that He alone is called in Holy Scripture, o vlos rov ®€ov, — the Son of God. There are texts in which mere creatures are referred to as " sons of God," but in all these texts the subject is either in the plural,^^ or it is a col-
sAdopfio fiUorum, vloOeala' On ii Cfr. 2 Pet. I, 4: ** Oelas Koc-
supernatural adoption, see Sollier in ywvol fpiaewt.** the Catholic Encyclopedia, I, 148 12 Cfr. Job I, 6: " Filii Dei/'
»q<l- Hebr. tj^rif)^^ ; Rom. VIII, 15:
9 Filiatio naturalis, * *•*:
10 Regeneratio, Gr. iroXt77€»'C(r^a. " Accepistis spiritum adoptionis filio- Cfr. J. Pohle, s. v. " Wiederge- rum Dei — You have received the burt," in Herder's Kirchenlexikon, spirit of adoption of sons.'*
XII, 1468 sqq., Freiburg 190 1.
CHRIST'S DIVINE SONSHIP 51
lective term," or an indefinite singular really amount- ing to a plural.^* The only passage which seems to offer an exception is 2 Kings VII, 15: "Ego ero ei [scil. Salomoni] in pair em, et ipse erit mihi in filium — I will be to him [Solomon] a father, and he shall be to me a son," but St. Paul expressly interprets this passage as referring typically to Christ: '' Cui dixit aliquando angelorum: . . . Ego ero illi in pair em, et ipse erit mihi in filium? — For to which of the angels hath he said at any time: ... I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son ? " ^* In the light of these texts no one can deny that Christ is the Son of God in a higher sense than any angel or man. But there still remains a doubt as to whether Filius Dei is applied to Him as a proper name, or merely as an appellative ; that is to say, whether He is the Son of God in the strict or merely in a figurative sense, i. e., by adoption.
2. Christ the Son of God in the Strict Sense of the Term. — The Socinians and the Rationalists, Hugo Grotius among others, allege that Filius Dei is merely an official title of the Messias, bearing no intrinsic relation to any di- vine filiation ; in other words, that Christ, in vir- tue of His supernatural birth from the Blessed Virgin Mary,^® is called "Son of God" in a higher, though not in an essentially different sense than other rational creatures. The French Abbe Al- ia Exod. IV, 22 : " Filius meus as the obedient son of the most primogenitus J^ra^/ — Israel is my High." son, my firstborn." 16 Heb. I, 5.
14 Ecclus. IV, X X : ** Et eris tu 16 Modern Rationalists notoriously
[scil, misericors} velut filius altis- also deny the Virgin Birth. simi obediens -^ And thou shalt be
52 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
fred Loisy adopts this Rationalist error when he writes: ^'The title 'Son of God' was accepted by the Jews, by the Disciples, and by the Saviour Himself as a synonym for 'Messias/ '' ^'^ True, "Son of God" was the official title of the Mes- sias ; but it was a title based upon a reality, i. e., Christ's Divine Sonship in the strict sense of the term. It is a mistake on the part of some Cath- olic theologians to concede the assertion of Ra- tionalist exegetes that, while the true Divine Sonship of Jesus appears clearly enough from the Apostolic Letters and the Fourth Gospel, it cannot be proved from the Synoptics. The conduct of the Jews and our Saviour's own re- iterated declarations, as recorded in the Gospels of St. Matthew, St. Mark, and St. Luke, clearly prove the contrary.
a) Though the Jews knew, and could not help knowing from their own sacred writings, that the future Messias would be God Himself, they were not accustomed to refer to Him of their own accord as '*God," or ''Son of God." They called Him either "son of David," ^® or "King of Israel," ^* or "the Prophet," ^^ or "the Messias," that is Christ (D''?^ =xp"^<>s). Nevertheless
IT L'^vangile tt V^glise, p. 62, especially pp. 320 sqq. as bearing on
Paris 1902. Against Loisy see M. the point here under consideration, Lepin's scholarly work Christ and 18 Cf r. Matth. IX, 27', XII, 23;
thi Gospel, or Jesus the Messiah XX, 30; XXI, 9; Mark XI, 10. and Son of God, Authorized Eng- 10 Matth. XXVII, 42.
lish edition, Philadelphia 1910. See 20 John I, 21: VI, 14; VII, 40.
k
CHRIST'S DIVINE SONSHIP 53
they logically concluded from Christ's repeated references to Himself as Son of God, that He claimed consubstantiality with the Godhead, in other words, true Divinity.^ ^ Similarly the Synoptics, by weaving into their story sayings that can apply to none other than the Son of God in the strictest sense of the term, or by accom- panying their profession of faith in the "true Son of God'' with a latreutic act of adoration, plainly demonstrate that they mean to apply the name to Jesus in its proper, not in a figurative, sense. When He was baptized in the Jordan,^^ *^there came a voice from heaven, saying: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." The Greek text has i Ovtos icTtv 6 vl6s /lov 6 dyamyTo?, re- peating the definite article to emphasize the unique role of the Son. Before the institution, or, more correctly, before the promise of the primacy, Peter had first to profess his faith in the Divine Sonship of Jesus. Matth. XVI, 15 sqq. : **Whom do you say that I am? Simon Peter answered and said: Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God (ov cl 6 XpLaro^, 6 vtos tov ®cov Tov fwvTo?)." Like the other Apostles, Peter had long before believed in the Messianic mission and dignity of his Master; hence his profession of faith as recorded in Matth. XVI, 16, can only
21 John V, 18; X, 33.
22 Matth. Ill, 13 sqq.; Mark I, 9 sqq.; Luke III, 21 sqq.
54 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
mean: ^Thou art not only the Christ, i. e., the Messias, but likewise the true Son of God/* This view is confirmed by our Saviour's reply: '^Beatus es, Simon Bar lona, quia caro et san- guis non revelavit tibi, sed Pater meus, qui in coelis est — Blessed art thou, Simon Bar- Jona, because flesh and blood [i. e., human rea- son] hath not revealed it to thee, but my Father who is in heaven." That is to say, Peter's knowledge and his profession of faith in Christ's Divine Sonship was owing to a direct revelation and the grace of faith.^^ When the Disciples '*in the midst of the sea" saw Jesus stretching out His hand and saving Peter, who at His Mas- ter's bidding had ventured upon the angry waves, they were overpowered by the glorious miracle and "adored Him, saying: Indeed thou art the son of God." 2*
b) This argument is supported by Christ's own testimony. The Synoptics tell us as distinctly as do SS. John and Paul, that not only did He always and everywhere assert His Divine Son- ship, but He finally sealed it with His blood. When Caiphas adjured Him by the living God, saying: "Tell us if thou be the Christ the son of God," ^^ Jesus solemnly replied : "Thou hast
28 Cfr. Schanz, Kommentar Uber raverunt eum dicentes: Vere Filius
das Evangelium des hi. Matthaus, Dei es (.dXriOCii Geou vlbi el)"
p. 375. Mainz 1879. 26 E/ ab el 6 XptarSs, 6 vlbs tow
24Matth. XIV, 33: "Qui autem Qeoif, in navicula erant, venerunt et ado-
CHRIST'S DIVINE SONSHIP
55
said it." ^® And when, in confirmation of His oath, the Saviour significantly assured His ques- tioner that he would yet see Him sitting on the right hand of the power of God, and coming in the clouds of heaven to judge mankind, "the high priest rent his garments, saying: He hath blasphemed." ^'^ In asserting His Divine Son- ship, therefore, Christ asserted His Divinity, and the Sanhedrin, regarding this assertion as blasphemous, acted with perfect consistency when they condemned Him to an ignominious death. According to the Gospel of St. Luke, they "brought him into their council, saying : If thou be the Christ, tell us — Si tu es Christus, die nobis,'' ^^ and when Jesus had assured them that He would sit "on the right hand of the power of God," they asked Him: "Art thou then the Son of God? (<^ oiv d 6 vto9 rov ©cov) ?** and He firmly
and definitely answered: "You say that I am (v/Act9 AcycTc, oTt cyw ct/At)/' Whereupon He was led
to Pilate, and they accused Him of claiming that He was "Christ the king," ^® and that "He made Himself the Son of God." ^^ It is not too much to say, therefore, that Christ laid down His life for the truth of His solemn affirmation that He was really and truly "the Son of God." The
2«2^ eliroyYes. 27Matth. XXVI, 63 sqq. 28 Luke XXII, 66 sq.
2»Luke XXIII, 2: "Dixit se Christum regent esse,"
80 John XIX, 7: "Filium Dei se fecit/*
56 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT !
Fourth Gospel and the Epistles of St. Paul verify, j
continue, and complete the story of the Synop- tics."
3. The Teaching of St. John and St. Paul ON Christ's Divine Sonship. — The Saviour's favorite disciple, the meek and gentle John, both in character and temperament differed radically from the fiery Paul ; yet their teaching in regard to Christ agrees in every essential detail, and it may be truly said that the Johannine Christology is characterized by a Pauline depth of thought, while the teaching of St. Paul has a distinctly Johannean tinge. Both Apostles are at one in affirming that the Divine Sonship of Christ is a true sonship in the strict sense of the term, and therefore essentially different from the sonship predicated of angels and men.
a) The epithets applied to Jesus by both SS. John and Paul are with quite evident intent so chosen as to exclude absolutely the ''sensus im- proprius/'
Both call Christ His Heavdnly Father's " own Son " (Filius proprius, iStos vtos). Rom. VHI, 32: ''Qui propria Filio suo (rov *Siov viov) non pepercit — He spared not even his own Son." John V, 18 : " Patrem suum liraTcpa t&ov) dicebat Deum, aequalem se faciens Deo — Jesus also said God was his Father, making himself
81 Cfr. B. Bartmann, Das Him' 1904; M. Lepin, Christ and the mtlreich und sein Konig nach den Gospel, pp. 394 sqq. Synoptikern, pp. 107 sqq., Paderborn
CHRIST'S DIVINE SONSHIP 57
equal to God." He is the Father's " beloved Son," into whose kingdom we are translated.^^ He is "the only begotten Son, Who is in the bosom, of the Father — Unigenitus Filius (6 /xovoyevrj^ vtds), qui est in sinu Pa- tris," ®^ the Son begotten by the eternal Father.^* This note of unicity, which is especially accentuated by St. John, plainly implies that the Father has no other son but Christ.^** Consequently Christ is truly the Son of God in precisely the same sense in which God is " true God." Cfr. I John V, 20: " Scimus quoniam Filius Dei (o vtos rov ®€ov) venit, et dedit nobis sensum, ut cogno- scamus verum Deum {tov akqOivov ®€6v) et simus in vera Filio eius — And we know that the Son of God is come : and he hath given us understanding that we may know the true God, and may be in his true Son."
b) These texts appear still more significant if collated with certain other Scriptural passages, wrhich expressly declare that the Divine Sonship of Christ is a sonship in the strict and proper sense of the term.
If there existed any higher beings who, as " sons of God," might claim precedence of Christ, they would certainly be the angels of Heaven. Now we have the distinct teaching of St. Paul that the angels are bound to adore Christ as " the Son of God " and " the first- born of the Father." Hebr. I, 5 sq. : '' Cui enim dixit aliquando angelorum: Filius meus es tu, ego hodie genui te? . , , Et cum iterum introducit primogenitum (tt/woto-
32 Cfr. Col. I, 13: "Qui nos 83 John I, x8; cfr. Lepin, op, ciU,
transtuHt in regnum Filii dilectionis pp. 330 sqq.
suae** (a Hebraism for: "Filii di- 84 Hebr. V, 5. Cfr. Pt. II, 7.
lecti sui**; cfr. 2 Pet. I, 17). 86 Cfr. John I, 14; III, 16, 18; z
John IV, 9.
58 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
roxor) in orbem terrae, dicit: Et adorent turn [sc, Christum] omnes angeli Dei — For to which of the an- gels hath he said at any time: Thou art my Son, to- day I have b^otten thee. . . . And again, when he bringeth in the first b^otten into the world, he saith: And let all the angek of God adore him." Among the many favored children of grace, especially the prophets and the Lord's anointed, whom Sacred Scripture some- times calls " sons of God,'* or even " gods," because of their exalted dignity, in the opinion of the Jews and of St. Paul none was greater than Jehovah's favorite servant, Moses.** And yet St. Paul, comparing him with Christ, says that Moses is merely a " faithful servant in the house of God," while Jesus is "as the Son in his own house." *^ It is only in the light of these facts that we are able fully to appreciate the further teach- ing of SS. John and Paul, that, as the heavenly Father- hood of God is the prototype of all created paternity, so the Divine Sonship of Christ is the exemplar of all de- rived or adoptive sonship. Cfr. John I, 12: " Dedit eis potestatem filios Dei fieri, his qui creduni in nomine eius [sciL unigeniti a Patre] — He gave them power to be made the sons of God, to them that believe in his name " (i. e,, in the name of the Only-begotten of the Father. John I, 14) . Gal. IV, 4 sq. : '* Misit Deus Filium suum (t6v v&v oOtov) . , . ut adoptionem filiarum (ttjv viodc cUlv) reciperemus — God sent his son , . . that we might receive the adoption of sons."
c) The teaching of St. John culminates in the notion of the Divine Logos; that of St. Paul in
se Cfr. Deut. XXXIV, 10; Heb. [sc, Deil iamquam famulus (dif
nil I iqq. $€pdiriay)t • • • Christus vero tam<
87 Heb. Ill, 5 iq.! " Et Moyses quam Filius in domo sua (4»f i/l&f
quidtm fidtUs trat in iota domo tins M rhv oIko¥ a^roG)*"
CHRISrS . DIVINE SONSHIP 59
the cognate conception of Christ as the image of God and splendor of His glory. Cfr. 2 Cor. IV, 4: ''Imago Dei (^tKiLv Q>€ov)f Col. I, 15: ''Imago Dei invisibilis." With an unmistakable allusion to St. John's teaching on the Divine Logos, the Apostle of the Gentiles defines this "image of the invisible God'' as splendor gloriae (^airavyaafia t^9 So^s) and as Hgura substantiae eius (xapaKT^/3 T^s vTToo-Tao-ccos avTov) — "the brightness of the glory of God" and "the figure of his sub- stance.'' ^®
Of these two terms the former expresses the con- substantiality (homoousia), the latter the personal self- existence of the Son side by side with the Father. Both these truths are also taught in the Fourth Gospel : ^* " The Word was God " and " the Word was with God/' That St. Paul *® employs the phrases " brightness of his glory " and " figure of his substance " not in any crea- tural sense, but absolutely, is made manifest by the second part of the sentence in which they occur.*^ There he ascribes to Christ none but divine attributes: " Portansque omnia verbo virtutis suae, purgationem peccatorum faciens, sedet ad dexter am maiestatis in ex- celsis — Upholding all things by the word of his power, making purgation of sins, [Christ] sitteth on the right hand of the majesty on high."*^ Therefore Christ is the *' image of the Divine Substance " in so far as He is strictly and truly the ** Son of God," which further
88Heb. I, 3. x^'pO'i^T'iip^ cfr. Lebreton, Les Ori-
89 John I, I. gines du Dogme de la Triniti, p.
40Heb. I, 3* 348'
41 On the terms dna^a^fia and 42 Heb. I, 3.
5
6o THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
appears from Heb. I, 2: " Diehus istis [Deus] locutus est nobis in Filio, . . . per quern fecit et saecula — In these days [God] hath spoken to us by his Son, . . . by whom he also made the world."" While the term airavyaafw. t^s 80^ represents the Father as " light," and the Son as the reflection of this light (for this reason He is called lumen de lumine as well as Deus de Deo),^^ the locution \apaKTT]p t^s wrocTao-ccos avTov complements the former by emphasizing the independent subsistence of the Son of God {i. e., Christ) in His relative opposition to God the Father, — a point which the Fathers of the Church did not fail to insist upon in their early conflicts with Photinus and Sabellius.
d) The Scriptural teaching so far developed furnishes us with a key for interpreting those numerous texts which speak of the primogeniture of Christ.
The " only begotten Son " {unigenitus, ftovoycv^s) alone is and always remains the " firstborn " (primogenitus, irpuiTOTOKO's) .^^ No creature can claim to be His equal in birth or dignity. St. Paul's teaching on this head is most clearly developed in his Epistle to the Colossians. There he distinguishes in Christ a twofold " right of the firstborn " : the one divine, the other human ; the former based upon the title of creation, redemption, and final
48 Cfr. John I, lo, 3. never read there of the First-born
44 Cfr. W. Humphrey, S. J., of God, or of the Father; but First-
" His Divine Majesty/* pp. 433 sq., born of the creation, whether the
London 1897. original creation or the new." —
^B " UptardroKos is not an exact Newman, " Causes of the Rise and
translation of Primogenitus, though Successes of Arianism ** in Tracts
Homer, as Petavius says, may use TheoL and Eccles., p. 204 n., Lon-
tIktu) for gigno» It is never used don 1895. in Scripture for Only-begotten. We
CHRIST'S DIVINE SONSHIP 6i
end; the latter on Christ's prerogative as the mystic head and reconciler of His Church, which consists of sinful men. From the first-mentioned viewpoint He is " primogenitus omnis creaturae {irptaTOTOKo^ ^racnys KTtVcws)"; from the point of view mentioned in the second place, He is '^ primogenitus ex mortuis {irptoTOTOKo^ Ik twv v€KpQ}v) ." *^ In both respects Christ is no mere creature, but very God. For like unto the Hypostatic Wisdom of the Old Testament,*^ He possesses, as " the firstborn of every creature,'* an eternal, divine existence, and is equipped with creative power, whereby He has created and upholds the universe together with the realm of angels.*® As the " firstborn from the dead," on the other hand. He is '* the head of the body [of] the church," absolute " beginning," the one " who holds in all things the primacy," the possessor of "the fullness of all per- fection," and lastly " the reconciling mediator through the blood of His cross, of the things that are on the earth and the things that are in heaven," — all of which can be true only on the supposition that Christ as the Firstborn is at the same time the true and genuine Son of God, and therefore Himself God.*® According to St. Paul, therefore, Christ's human primogeniture is based upon His divine primogeniture, which in turn coincides with His unigeniture {primogenitus = unigenitus).'^^
4. The Consubstantiality of the Son of God with God. — In the Scriptural texts we
*6 Col. I, 13 sqq. On the term 48 Col. I, 15-17.
vpuTdroKOS see Lebreton, op, ciU, 49 Col. I, 18-20.
pp. 302 sqq. 50 Cf r. Hcb. I, s SQQ' 5 Apoc. I, 5.
47 Cf r. Ecclus. XXIV, 5 : " FW- Cf r. J. Lebreton, Les Origines du
mogenita ante omnem creaturam — Dogme de la TrinitS, pp. 302 sqq..
Wisdom, the firstborn before all 397 sqq. creatures."
62 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
have cited, the Divinity which is communicated to the Son by His divine y^yyn<^t^ from the Father is not founded upon Ditheism, or the existence of two coequal gods, but on the numerical iden- tity of the Divine Nature.
This conclusion, which flows so manifestly from the monotheistic character of both the Old and the New Testament, is expressly confirmed in the Epistle to the Philippians,*^ where St. Paul draws a neat distinction between the " form of a servant " {forma servi, yuop^A) hovXov) and the " form of God " (forma Dei, fJMp<fnf ®tov). By the former he means the truly human, and by the latter the truly divine nature of Jesus Christ, in the possession of which the Son of God is con- substantial or coequal with God (aequalis Deo, lo-a ®«4')* '^0"* [scil, Christus] cum in forma Dei esset, non rapinam arbitratus est, esse se aequalem Deo, sed semetipsum exinanivit formam serin accipiens . . . et habitu inventus ut homo — Christ Jesus, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant . . . and in habit found as a man." — "Forma servi'' in this context can mean nothing else than the human na- ture which the Son of God " assumed," ^^ and in virtue of which He was " found as a man." " Forma Dei," on the other hand, plainly signifies the Divine Nature, which Christ possessed before he " took the form of a servant " and before He " emptied Himself," and which to claim He did not need to think robbery, f. e., unjust usurpation. It is immaterial whether we take "rapina"
61 Phil. II, 5 tqq. was made flesh, and dwelt among
62 John I, 14: "And the Word us."
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 63
in Its active sense as " acttis rapiendi," or objectively as " res rapta/' ^^
B. The Divinity of Christ
If Christ is truly the Son of God, no special argument is required to show that He is Divine. Yet as Holy Scripture, aside from those pas- sages which prove Christ's Divine Sonship, also contains a number of texts which expressly as- sert His Divinity, it will be well to study these separately and to show how they confirm our thesis. We shall divide them into three distinct groups.
I. The Divine Attributes of Christ. — ^A being that possesses divine attributes and per- forms divine acts, is truly divine. Christ, ac- cording to the New Testament Revelation, pos- sesses divine attributes and performs divine acts. Consequently He is true God. The major premise of this syllogism, being merely a descrip- tive definition of God, needs no proof. From out of the profusion of Scriptural texts which can be cited in support of tlje minor, we select the following.
58 Cfr. St. Chrysostom, Horn, in an die Philipper, Freiburg 1899. —
Philip,, 7, n. 2 : " Hoc, inquam. The dogma of Christ's Divine Son-
esse aequalem Deo, non ex rapina ship is ably defended against the
habuit, sed a natura, quamobrem attacks of the Modernists by M.
seipsum exinanivit/* For a full Lepin, Christ and the Gospel (£ng<
elucidation of Phil. II, 5 sqq., see Hsh tr.), pp. 263 sqq., Philadelphia
K. J. Muller, Brief des hi, Paulus 19 10.
64 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
a) The New Testament predicates self-existence, which is the fundamental attribute of the Godhead, in the same terms of Christ in which the Old Testament predicates it of Jehovah. Jesus said to St. John : ^^ " Noli timere, ego sum primus et novissimus (6 tt/jwto^ koI 6 eaxaro's) et vivus et fui mortnus — Fear not, I am the first and the last, and alive, and was dead." ^^ As causa prima the avTovo-tos is per se and by intestine necessity the finis ultimus of all creation. Now Christ says of Him- self : "* " Ego sum a et w, primus et novissimus, prin- cipium et finis — I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end." Similarly St.
Paul : *^ " Tct irdvTa 8t* avTOV Kai cts avrov licTtcrTat — All
things were created by him and in him."
Because of His aseity God is incomprehensible to the created intellect. Christ shares in this incomprehensi- bility. On the other hand He possesses a truly compre- hensive knowledge of the Father. Cfr. Matth. XI, 27: "Nemo novit (cVtytvwo-Kct) Filium nisi Pater, . . . neque Patrem quis novit (cVtytvcoc/cct) nisi Filius, et cui voluerit Filius revelare — No one knowcth the Son but the Father: neither doth any one know the Father but the Son, and he to whom it shall please the Son to reveal him." Note that the verb cTriytvaxTxctv is stronger than simple ytvwo-Kctv; it denotes that comprehensive knowl- edge which is proper to the infinite God.^*
b) Chief among God's transcendental attributes of being is His absolute truth. Now Christ is the abso- lute, living Truth, as He Himself testifies : " Ego sum via et Veritas et vita {rj aXqOeia koX yj fwr/) — I am the
64 Apoc. I, 17 sqq. — I the Lord, I am the first and the
85 Cfr. Apoc. II, 8. For compari- last." son also read Is. XLI, 4: "Ego Be Apoc. XXII, 13.
mn^ prtwiMj et novissimus ego sum 57 Col. I, 16.
V - 68 Cfr. I Cor. XIII, la
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 65
way, and the truth, and the life."*^* This (truth-) Hfe is communicated to Him in virtue of His eternal generation by the Father; hence it is a divine life, and as such self-existent in character. John V, 26: " Sicut enim Pater habet vitam in semetipso (cv cavrw), sic dedit [i, e., generando communicavit] et Filio habere vitam in semetipso (cv kavr^) — For as the Father hath life in himself, so he hath given to the Son also to have life in himself." This process of communication, there- fore, results in a differentiation, not of nature or es- sence, but of persons only. Cfr. i John I, 2: "An- nuntiamus vobis vitam aeternam (t^v ^wtjv t^v atwvtov), quae erat apud Patrem (irpb^ rov iraripa) et apparuit nobis — We declare unto you the life eternal, which was with the Father, and hath appeared to us." As the living truth, the Saviour must also be the author of life,®® especially in the supernatural order of grace. Cfr. John XI, 25: "Ego sum resurrectio et vita (^ fw^) ; qui credit in me, etiam si mortuus fuerit, vivet — I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, although he be dead, shall live." Again, " Qui habet Filium, habet vitam {rrjv Cmjv) — He that hath the Son, hath life." «^
God's attributes of veracity and fidelity are rooted in His absolute truth. In this absolute sense Christ, too, is veracity itself ; for He " testifieth " only " what he hath seen and heard" of His father in Heaven. Cfr. John III, 31 sq. : '' Qui de coelo venit, super omnes est. Et quod vidit et audivit, hoc testatur — He that cometh from heaven, is above all. And what he hath seen and heard, that he testifieth." John VIII, 26: *' Qui me
5» John XIV, 6. killed, whom God hath raised from
60 Acts III, 15: "But the author the dead." of life (6 <lpx'77^J 'ifS f«^s) yo« ®i » John V, 12.
€<
66 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
misit, verax (aXrjOr]^) est; et ego, quae audivi ab eo, haec loquor in mundo — He that sent me is true: and the things I have heard of him, these same I speak in the world."
For this reason, too; He is absolute fidelity. Cfr. Matth. XXIV, 35 : " Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." Apoc. XIX, 1 1 :
Fidelis et verax — Faithful and true." Apoc. Ill, 14:
Haec dicit Amen, testis fidelis et verax, qui est princi- pium creaturae Dei — These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, who is the beginning of the creation of God."
Christ's substantial sanctity coincides with His eth- ical goodness and is based on His Divine Sonship. Cfr. Luke I, 35 : " Quod nascetur ex te Sanctum, vocabitur Filius Dei — The Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." ®^ In virtue of the Hypostatic Union His divine sanctity overflows into the human race. Cfr. Heb. VII, 26: '' Talis enim dece- bat, ut nobis esset pontifcx, sanctus, innocens, impollutus, segregatus a peccatoribus et excelsior coelis f actus — For it was fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, and made higher than the heavens." ®^
c) Among God's categorical attributes of being is omnipotence, which in the natural order manifests itself in the creation and preservation of the universe, while in the supernatural sphere it works miracles by its own power. In both respects Christ has given irrefragable proofs of His Divinity. He is, in the first place, the creator and preserver of the universe. Col. I, 16 sq. :
62 Cfr. Apoc. Ill, 7: "Sanctus 63 This subject will be treated at
et verus — The Holy one and the length in Christology. True one."
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 67
"In ipso (iv avT(o) condtta sunt universa in coelis et in terra, visibilia et invisibilia, sive throni sive domina" tiones sive principatus sive potestates: omnia per ipsum (8t* avTov) et in ipso (cts avrov) creata sunt, et ipse est ante omnes {irpb Trdvr^av) et omnia in ipso constant — For in him were all things created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or domina- tions, or principalities, or powers : all things were created by him and in him, and he is before all, and by him all things consist." This text contains three separate and distinct propositions: (i) All things were created in the Son; that is to say, according to the counsels of Christ and in virtue of His omnipotence. (2) All things were made through the Son (per ipsum), i. e,, the Son was not merely the instrument of creation, but its true creative cause.** (3) All things were made in reference to the Son (cw avrov) y that is to say, He is the final end of the whole created universe. Consequently He is true God, and as such " before all " {ante omnes) i. e,, eternal, and at the same time the preserver of the universe. Heb. I, 3: " Portans omnia verbo virtutis suae — Upholding all things by the word of his power." Holy Scripture throughout both Testaments regards the working of signs and miracles in one's own name and by one's own power as a sure proof of omnipotence. The miracles of Christ proceed from His own omnipotence, not from any derived or communicated power ; — except in this sense that God the Father has communicated this power to Him as His Son by a truly divine ycvn/o-w from everlasting. Cfr. John V, 19 : '' Non potest Filius a se facer e qiddquam, nisi quod viderit Patrem facientem; quaecumque enim ille fecerit, haec et Filius similiter facit
64 Cfr. Heb. I, « : " Per quern made the world." Cfr. also Heb. fecif et saecula — By whom also he I, lo.
68 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
— The Son cannot do any thing of himself, but what he seeth the Father doing: for what things soever he doth, these the Son also doth in like manner." In this sense Christ possesses the power of raising the dead. John V, 21 : " Sicut Pater suscitat mortuos et vivificat, sic et Filius, quos vult, vivificat — For as the Father raiseth up the dead and giveth life: so the Son also giveth life to whom he will." Therefore He is able to say: *' Et ego resuscitabo eum (amo-T^o-w avrov cyw) in novissimo die — And I will raise him up in the last day." ®^ When the leper adored him, Christ did not object. Matth. VIII, 2 sqq. : '' Et ecce leprosus veniens adorabat eum (irpoaeKvvei, aurw), dicens: Domine, si vis, potes me mun- dare, Et extendens lesus manum, tetigit eum dicens: Volo, mundare — And behold a leper came and adored him, saying: Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. And Jesus stretching forth his hand, touched him, saying: I will, be thou made clean." Christ's om- nipotence is the source of the universal sovereignty to which He lays claim. As God alone is Lord of life and death, heaven and hell, so Christ holds " the keys of death and of hell." Apoc. I, i8: " Et habeo claves mortis et inferni" ®® He is the TravroKpartop ®^ to whom all creatures, including the angels, are subject,®^ and as such is " the Lord of lords, and King of kings." Apoc. XVII, 14 : *' Agnus vincet illos, quoniam dominus dominorum est et rex regum*' ^^ As we have but one God the Father, so we have but one Lord Jesus Christ. I Cor. VIII, 6: ''Nobis tamen unus est Deus Pater, ex quo omnia et nos in ilium, et unus Dominus {th Kvpto^) lesus Christus, per quem omnia et nos per ipsum (81' o{> ret
66 John VI, 40.
M Cfr. also Apoc. Ill, 7.
67 Apoc. I, 8.
68 I Pet. Ill, 22,
69 Cfr. also Apoc. XIX, 16.
k
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 69
irdvra Kal rjfuU 8t* avTov) — Yet to US there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we unto him ; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him."
Two other divine attributes not shared by any crea- ture are absolute immutability, and eternity which flows therefrom. Both of these are ascribed by Holy Scripture to Christ. What the Psalmist says of the im- mutability of Jehovah,^*^ " Ipsi peribunt, tu autem per- manes — They shall perish, but thou remainest," St. Paul applies without limitation to Jesus."^^ That Christ is eternal can be deduced from the Scriptural teaching that He existed before time. John the Baptist confessed : ^^ " He was before me (ttpoItos iiov ^v)," and Christ Himself confirmed this assertion by His solemn declaration : ^* " Antequam Abraham fieret, ego sum {irplv 'APpa^fi, yeveadai, cyw ct/xt) — Before Abraham was made, I am." St. Augustine commentates this text as follows : '' Non dixit: antequam Abraham esset, ego eram, sed: antequam Abraham fieret, qui nisi per me non fieret, ego sum. Neque hoc dixit: antequam Abraham fieret, ego factus sum. In principio enim fecit Deus caelum et terram; nam in principio erat Verbum, Antequam Abraham fieret, ego sum, Agnoscite ere at or em, disc emit e crea- turam — He said not. Before Abraham was, I was ; but, Before Abraham was made (and he could not be made but by Me), I am. Neither said he this: Before Abraham was made, I was made. For, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth: namely, in the begin- ning was the Word. Before Abraham was made, I am. Acknowledge the Creator, discern the creature." ^* Cfr.
70 Ps. CI, 27 sqq. 73 John VIII, 58.
71 Hcb. I, 10 sqq. 74 Tractatus in loa., 43, xu 17,
72 John I, 15. Browne's translation, I, 586.
70 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
also the famous passage in Christ's prayer for His dis- ciples : ^'^ '' Et nunc clarifica me tu, Pater, apud te- metipsum claritate, quam habui prius, quam mundus es-
set, apud te {ry Sdfi/, rj d\ov irpo rov rov Koafiov uvax, irapa
aoi) — And now glorify thou me, O Father, with thy- self, with the glory which I had, before the world was, with thee." As Cardinal Toletus pertinently observes, this passage has reference to the divine glory which Christ enjoyed as God together with His Father from all eternity. Therefore His Ascension was merely a return to " where he was before," ^* or, more correctly, where "He always is." Cfr. John III, 13: "Nemo ascendit in caelum, nisi qui descendit de coelo, Filius hominis, qui est in coelo — And no man hath ascended into heaven, but he that descendeth from heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven." ^^ Hence for Christ to be " in Heaven " means to be •" in the bosom of the Father," /. e,, to be the true Son of God from all eter- nity. Eternity for Him is merely the past, present, and future combined in an unchanging life. Heb. XIII, 8: " lesus Christus heri et hodie, ipse et in saecula — Jesus Christ, yesterday, and to-day, and the same for ever." In His relation to space, and to the world of pure spirits, Christ is endowed with omnipresence, and partic- ularly with that power of indwelling in the souls of the just which is peculiar to God. St. Paul probably means to emphasize His omnipresence when he says : ^* " Qui descendit, ipse est et qui ascendit super omnes coelos, ut impleret omnia (tva irX-qpuicrQ ret iravra) — He that de- scendeth is the same also that ascended above all heavens, that he might fill all things;" — unless indeed
TBjohn XVII, 5. TTCfr. also John XVI, 28; I, 18.
76 John VI, 63: "£7W $ra* 78 Eph. IV, 10.
prius"
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 71
the phrase to " fill all things " is meant to indicate the fulfilment of the prophecies relating to Christ's Ascen- sion. Cfr. John XIV, 23: ^ Pater meus diliget eum, et ad eum veniemus et mansionem apud eum {yuovqv trap* avTo>) faciemus — My Father will love him, and we will come to him, and will make our abode with him." No mere creature could, without committing blasphemy, thus put himself on a level with God, and promise to in- dwell with God in the souls of the just; and none but God Himself could solemnly promise: '' Et ecce ego vobiscum sum omnibus diebus usque ad consummationem saeculi — And behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.^*^ Only a believer in the Divinity of Jesus can exclaim with St. Paul : " Vivit vero in me Christus — But Christ liveth in me." ®®
d) Among the operative attributes of God the most im- portant is probably omniscience. As God alone can ade- quately comprehend His own Essence, so likewise only a truly divine Son can adequately comprehend the divine Father. Cfr. John X, 15: " Sicut novit (ytvwcricct) me Pater, et ego agnosco (ytvwcricft)) Patrem — As the Father knoweth me, I know the Father." And again: "Ego scio eum (cyw oI8a avrov), quia ab ipso sum (wap* avTov elfu), et ipse me misit — I know him, because I am from him, and he hath sent me."®^ This argues an intimate knowledge such as no creature can. pos- sess. John VI, 46 : " Non quia Patrem vidit quisquam, nisi is qui est a Deo (tl firj 6 mv wapa rov ©cov), hie vidit Patrem (ovtos lu)paK€ rov iraripa) — Not that any man hath seen the Father; but he who is of God, he hath seen the Father." This intuitive vision has its source in
79 Matth. XXVIII, 20. Cfr. also 80 Gal. II, 20,
John XIV, 16; XV, 5 sqq.; XVI, 13 si John VII, 29.
•qq.
72 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Christ's divine ycvnycrt?. Cfr. John I, i8: " Deum nemo vidit unquam; unigenitus Filius, qui est in sinu Patris, ipse enarravit — No man hath seen God at any time : the only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him." Christ's divine self- comprehension necessarily implies an adequate knowl- edge of all things external to the Godhead. For if, as St. Paul assures us, " in him dwelleth all the fulness of the' Godhead corporeally," ®^ it is evident that " in him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."*^ It is by this standard, therefore, that His knowledge of all things, even the most hidden, must be gauged. Thus He was able to assure Nathanael : " Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee." "* Whereupon the new Apostle, struck by Christ's wonderful knowledge, exclaimed : " Thou art the Son ef God, thou art the King of Israel." ^^
If cardiognosis is an exclusive prerogative of the Godhead,®® Christ is true God. For He applied to Himself the words of Jeremiah : " I am the Lord who search the heart," ®^ when He said : " All the churches shall know that I am he that searcheth the reins and hearts." *® More than once in fact did He demonstrate that He possessed this attribute of Divinity. Cfr. Luke IX, 47: "At lesus videns cogitationes cordis illorum
82 Col. II. 9: "In ipso inhabitat 0innis plenitudo divinitatis corporali- Ur iiv adr4^ KaroiKel vdv rb
ic«j)."
88 Col. II, 3: "In quo [Christo] sunt omnes thesauri sapientiae et scientiaf absconditi,"
84 John I, 48: " Priusquam tt Philippus vocaret, cum esses sub ficu, vidi te"
85 John I, 49: " Tu es Filius Dei, tu $s rex UraeV*
86 As we have shown in the first volume of this series, God: His Knowability, Essence, and Attri- butes, pp. 359 sqq.
87jer. XVII, 10: "Ego Domi- nus nin^ scrutans cor et probans
»»
renes,
88 Apoc. II, 23 : " Et scient om- nes ecclesiae, quia ego sum scrutans renes et cor da,**
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 73
((8a)v Tov SuikoyLo-fwv ttjs KapSias avTwv) — But Jesus seeing the thoughts of their heart." With vision wondrous clear He foresees free future events, as, e, g,, His be- trayal at the hands of Judas, Peter's denial, the flight of His disciples. His Passion, Resurrection, and As- cension, the destruction of Jerusalem, etc. His " Woe to thee, Corozain, woe to thee, Bethsaida " ®® shows that He also possesses the scientia futuribilium,^^
2. Christ's Title to Divine Honors. — No mere creature can claim divine honors without incurring the awful crime of idolatry. But Christ claims and receives divine honors. There- fore, He is true God. This syllogism rests on the supposition — which it is the business of apologetics to prove — that Christ was neither an impostor nor a megalomaniac, but, on the con- trary, a morally altogether superior and phys- ically normal being. We also assume it as a datum furnished by fundamental theology,®^ that His Apostles and Disciples were neither fools nor knaves, but men who knew the facts of Christ's career and who were sincere in wor- shipping Him as God.
a) Christ laid claim to divine honors.
John V, 22 sq. : "Pater . . . omne iudicium dedit Filio, ut omnes honorificent Filium, sicut honorificant
Patrem (tva TrdvTcs Tifjuoai TOV vtdv, KaOws riyJaai tov iraripa)
89 Matth. XI, 21 sqq. sence, and Attributes, pp. 361 sqq.
90 On the " scientia futurihilium," 91 Cfr. Pohle-Preuss, op, cit., pp. as a divine attribute, see Pohle- 7 sq.
Preuss, God: His Knowability, Es-
74 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
— The Father . . . hath given all judgment to the Son, that all men may honor the Son, as they honor the Father." Here Jesus plainly exacts for Himself, as Son, the same worship which He demands for His Father. The context proves that the adverb ica^ws is meant to ex- press not merely similitude but equality ; for in the same chapter of St. John's Gospel from which the passage is taken, Christ distinctly asserts and defends His coequality with the Father, and " the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he . . . said God was his Father, making himself equal to God." ®^ He never was known to refuse divine worship when offered to Him, but accepted it with- out protest.*^* His Apostles, too, particularly St. Paul and St. John, insist that Christ is entitled to divine honors. Rom. XIV, lo sq. : " O nines enim stabimus ante tribunal Christi; scriptum est enim: Vivo ego, dicit Dominus, quoniam mihi flectetur omne genu et otnnis lingua confitebitur Deo — We shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written: As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God." ®* This can only mean that all men will one day appear before the judgment seat of Jesus Christ and be compelled to worship Him as God. The same thought is expressed yet more effec tively in another Pauline text : ^^ " Donavit illi nomen, quod est super omne nomen, ut in nomine lesu omne genu flectatur coelestium, terrestrium et infernorum; et omnis lingua confiteatur, quia Dominus lesus Christus in gloria est Dei Patris — God hath given him a name which is above all names: that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in heaven, on
92 John V, 1 8. 84 Cfr. Is. XLV, 23 SQ.
93Cfr. Matth. XIV, 33; VIII, 2 95 Phil. II, 9 •QQ.
k
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 75
earth, and under the earth ; and that every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father/' »«
If Christ is true God, then the prayers directed to Him must be equally efficacious as those addressed to the Father. Holy Scripture plainly teaches that they are. John XIV, 13: '' Quodcunque petieritis Patrem in nomine meo, hoc faciam [not: faciei], ut glorificetur Pater in Filio — Whatsoever you shall ask the Father in my name, that will I do: that the Father may be glorified in the Son." John XIV, 14: "Si quid petieritis me in nomine meo, hoc faciam — If you shall ask me any thing in my name, that will I do." In the hour of death no man may, without grievous sin, commend his soul to any creature. Christ com- mends His into the hands of His Heavenly Father. Luke XXIII, 46 : " Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit." And the dying protomartyr Stephen un- hesitatingly cries out: " Domine lesu, suscipe spiritum meum — Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." **^
b) The Godhead is the sole formal object of the three theological virtues. But Holy Scrip- ture represents Christ as a Supreme Being, to whom all men owe faith, hope, and charity. Consequently, He is true God.
Jesus Himself requires men to believe in Him with the same faith which they have in God. In this connection it is well to remember that there is an important distinction between credere alicui and credere in aliquem. We may
96 On the adoration of the " slain Lamh/' t. e,, Christ in Heaven, cfr. Apoc. V, 11-13. 07 Acts Vn, 58.
6
76 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
believe a creature, but we believe in God alone. Cfr. John XIV, I : " Creditis in Deum, et in me credite
(tTIOTCVCTC CtS TOV 0COV, Kol CtS I/jA TTtOTCVCTc) YOU belieVe
in God, believe also in me." Faith in Christ is pro- ductive of eternal life. John VI, 47: "Amen, amen, dico vobis: qui credit in me (cts liU) habet vitam aeter- nam — Amen, amen I say unto you : He that believeth in me, hath everlasting life." For belief in Jesus Christ is nought else than faith in the true Son of God. I John IV, 15 : " Quisquis confessus fuerit, quoniam lesus est Filius Dei (6 vios rov 0co{5), Deus in eo manet et ipse in Deo — Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God abideth in him, and he in God."
Christ is also the object of theological hope, as the story of the Atonement clearly shows. If St. Paul calls himself " an apostle of Jesus Christ, . . . our hope," ^^ this is neither an empty phrase nor a hyper- bole. For, as St. Peter tersely says: " Non est in aliquo alio (cv oAAw ovSevi) salus; nee enim aliud nomen est sub coelo datum hominibus, in quo oporteat nos sal- vos fieri — Neither is there salvation in any other; for there is no other name under heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved." ®*
Christ is likewise the object of that theological charity ("amor super omnia") to which God alone can lay claim. Matth. X, 37 : " He that loveth father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me." Whatever inter- feres with the love of Christ is to be treated as an obsta- cle in the way of salvation. Luke XIV, 26: "Si quis venit ad me et non odit patrem suum et matrem et uxo- rem et filios et fratres et sorores, adhuc autem et ani-
08 X Tim. I, X : " Paulus, apo- formation on this point we must
stolus lesu Christi, . . . spei no- refer the student to the dogmatic
strae." treatise on Grace.
99 Acts IV, 13. For further in-
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST ^^
mam suam, non potest esse mens discipulus — If any man come to me and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own Hfe also, he cannot be my disciple." The Father rewards us with His love if we love Christ. Cfr. John XIV, 23 : " Si quis diligit me, . . . et Pater meus diliget eum, et ad eum veniemus et mansionem apud eum faciemus — If any one love me, . . . my father will love him, and we will come to him and make our abode with him." ^^^ St. Paul's anathema against all those who " love not our Lord Jesus Christ," ^®^ would be wantonly criminal if Christ were not true God. And it is only on this same assumption that the love of Christ can be called " a life in Christ." Phil. I, 21: '' Mihi enim vivere Christus est, et mori lucrum — For to me, to live is Christ: and to die is gain." 2 Cor. V, 14 sq. : " Caritas enim Chris ti urget nos, . . . ut et qui vivunt, iam non sibi vivant, sed ei, qui pro ipsis mortuus est et resurrexit — For the charity of Christ presseth us, . . . that they also who live, may not now live to themselves, but unto him who died for them and rose again." St. Paul boldly identifies "caritas Christi" with "caritas Dei," and says, nothing should separate us from it. Rom. VIII, 35 sqq. : " Quis ergo nos separabit a caritate Christif Tribulatio, an angustia, an fames, an nuditas, an peri- culum, an persecutio, an gladius? . . . Certus sum enim, quia neque mors neque vita neque angeli . . . neque creatura alia poterit nos separare a caritate Dei, quae est in Christo lesu Domino nostra — Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall
100 Cfr. also John XIV, 21. Christum, sit anathema — If any
101 1 Cor. XVI, 22 : " Si quis man love not our Lord Jesus Christ, Hon amat Dominum nostrum Itsum let him be anathema."
78 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
tribulation? or distress? or famine? or nakedness? or danger? or persecution? or the sword? . . . For I am sure that neither death nor life nor angels . . . nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord/' Con- sequently Christ and God are one.
c) Christ's adorableness, and consequently His Divinity, can be demonstrated also from the fact that Baptism is conferred in His name con- jointly with that of the Father and the Holy Ghost.
We shall not enter into the Scholastic controversy whether by a special privilege the Apostles baptized in the name of Christ only, instead of employing the Trinitarian formula which Jesus Himself gave to them, as recorded in the twenty-eighth chapter of St. Mat- thew's Gospel.^®* This and other similar questions do not concern us here. They belong to the dogmatic treatise on Baptism. The very fact that Baptism used to be called " Baptism in Christ's name " is proof that the early Christians believed in the Divinity of our Lord. Nor does it make the slightest difference whether the Sacrament was originally administered " iiri
rtfi ovofMTi lrj<TOV JLpia-Tov cts a<p€(Tiv afiapTuov, OT cv t(o
ovofMLTi Tov IrjfTov XpioTov," ^®* for both formulas clearly emphasize the authority and power of Christ to forgive sins ; — or " cw to ivoyua. tov Kvpiov 'Irjaov/* ^®* which par- ticularly accentuates the consecration and devotion of the
102 A brief account of this con* 108 Acts II, 38.
troversy will be found in Fr. Fan- 104 Acts X, 48.
ning** article on " Baptism " in the lOB Acts VIII, 16,
Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. II, p. 463.
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 79
baptized convert to Jesus as man's final end. In matter of fact no man could without committing idolatry allow himself to be baptized "in the name" of any creature; for no one but God can forgive sins and exact abso- lute subjection and divine worship. Cfr. i Cor. I, 13: " Numquid Paulus crucifixus est pro vobisf Aut in nomine Pauli baptizati estisf — Was Paul crucified for you? or were you baptized in the name of Paul? "
3. Holy Scripture Expressly Calls Christ "God." — Having demonstrated the Divinity of Christ, it will serve to confirm our argument to note that Holy Scripture in several places ex- pressly refers to Him as God.
a) If the Tetragrammaton 'IH- is God^s in- communicable proper name, which expresses His Divine Essence, *^^ then a Being that is identical with the Old Testament Yahweh must be true God. Now Jesus Christ is identical with the Old Testament Yahweh. Therefore He is true God.
In his Epistle to the Hebrews, St. iPaul says: " Et cum iterum introducit primogenitum [sc. Christum] in orbem terrae, dicit: Et adorent eum omnes angeli — And again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he saith: And let all the angels of God adore him."^®^ This text not only proves that Christ is true God; it also proves that He is Yahweh. For, in the passage which St. Paul here quotes,^®® the
106 See Pohle-Preuss, Ged: His 107 Heb. I, 6.
Knowability, Essence, and Attri- lOSPs. XCVI, 7.
butes, pp. 135 xiQ*
8o THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Psalmist describes how Jehovah appeared on earth for the purpose of founding a kingdom; how He re- appears as the terrible Judge; how the heavens declare His justice and all the people behold His glory, and how those are confounded who adore graven things and glory in their idols. Then there follows the ex- hortation (verse 7) : " Adore him (i. e., rnni ), all you
angels." Consequently Christ is the Jehovah of whom David speaks in this Psalm.
We read in the Messianic Psalm XLIV, which is ascribed to the sons of Core : *' Sedes tua, Deus ( D?^.fc< )
in saeculum saeculi — Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever." ^®* The Rationalist exegetes, who take the word Deus in this text for a nominative instead of a vocative, disregard both the dignity of God and Scrip- tural usage. If their interpretation were correct, the meaning of the text would be : Thy seat, or throne (i. e,, according to the Rationalist conception, the throne of an earthly king), is God Himself for ever and ever. Though Holy Scripture sometimes refers to creatures {e, g,, heaven and hell, angels and men) as the seat or throne of God, it nowhere designates God as the seat or throne of man, e, g,, of an earthly prince. This interpretation is positively untenable in the light of Heb. I, 8: ''Ad Filium [scil, Christum] autem dicit: Thronus tuus, Deus, in saeculum saeculi (6 6p6vo^ aov, 6 0COS, ets Tov ataJva tov atwvo?)," where the text Ps. XLIV, 7 is used to show Christ's superiority over the angels. That St. Paul intends 6 0cos for a vocative is plain from New Testament Greek usage, as the student may see from a comparison of such texts as Matth. XI, 26;
109 P8. XLIV, 7. On this pas- S. J., Christ in Typg and Prophecy, sage, and the whole Psalm of which Vol. II, pp. 36 sqq., New York it forms a part, cfr. A. J. Maas, 1895.
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 8i
Mark V, 41; Luke VIII, 54; John XIX, 3; Eph. VI, I ; Col. Ill, 18 ; Heb. X, 7 ; Apoc. VI, 10. Consequently Ps. XLI V, 7, can only mean : " Thy throne, O God D^'^^^<, stands for ever." Since the sons of Core never
• •
employ the term " Elohim " except when they wish to designate the true God, it follows that Christ bears the Divine Name D\n^N, f. e., tf€os = God.
The hardness of heart which the Jews manifested in spite of the many wonderful miracles wrought by our Saviour, St. John attributes to the prophecy of Isaias "® and adds: " Haec dixit Isaias, quando vidit gloriam eius et locutus est de eo — These things said Isaias, when he saw his glory and spoke of him [Christ].""^ Turning to the sixth chapter of Isaias, we read : " Vidi Dominum {"^p^) sedentem super solium excelsum. . . .
Seraphim clamabant alter ad alterum et dicebant: Sane- tus, Sanctus, Sanctus Dominus exercituum (fii^iy nin^) ,
plena est omnis terra gloria eius — I saw the Lord sit- tingvupon a throne high and elevated. . . . The seraphims . . . cried to one another: Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God of hosts, all the earth is full of his glory." ^^^ Hence, according to St. John, Christ is " God " {Domi- nus, ^oiK) and " Lord of hosts " {Dominus exercituum,
niNnvniiT).
It should also be noted that St. Mark, in the beginning of his Gospel,^^' refers the well-known exhortation of Isaias : ^^* " Parate viam Domini — Prepare ye the way of the Lord," to John the Baptist, as the precursor of the " Lord," thereby acknowledging the latter to be " Jehovah." In Mark I, 2, we have a citation from Malachias (attributed to Isaias), in which Jehovah
110 Is. VI, 9 sqq. 113 Mark I, 3.
111 John XII, 41. 114 Is. XL, 3.
112 1s. VI, X sqq.
82 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Himself is quoted as prophesying : " Ecce ego mitto an- gelum meum et praeparabit viam ante faciem meant — Behold I send my angel, and he shall prepare the way before my face." "** Now this angel is none other than John the Baptist, who, as a precursor, is to "prepare the way before the face of Jehovah," i. e., Christ. As Christ ^^® also applies this text to the Baptist, resp. to Himself, we have a double warrant for the assertion that the Jehovah of Malachias is identical with Jesus.
b) Christ is expressly called "God" in at least four New Testament texts. A fifth occurs in the prologue of St. John's Gospel, but we defer the discussion of it to the next Section, where we shall treat explicitly of the Logos.
a) The first of the four passages just alluded to is John XX, 28. The Evangelist describes how Christ reproached the incredulous Thomas for his unbelief, whereupon 'Thomas answered and said to Him: My Lord and my God — (o Kvptos fjiov Koi 6 ©cos fwv^ Dominus meus et Deus mens," Theodore of Mopsuestia and Nestorius represented this reply as a mere exclamation of surprise; but the text plainly says: ''dixit ei (Jttcv avTw) — [Thomas] said, to him." These words also exclude the Rationalist theory which asserts that the Apostle, in exclaiming "My Lord and my God !" did not address Jesus, who
lis Mai. Ill, I. On this proph- 116 Luke VII, 27 and Matth. XI,
ecy cfr. Maas, op» ciU, Vol. I> pp. 10. 43 S 8qq.
k
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 83
stood before him, but Almighty God in Heaven.
It is obvious from the context that Thomas desired to make a profession of faith not simply in the Resur- rection of Christ, but also in His Divinity, for which the Resurrection furnishes such a triumphant argument. It is in this sense that Christ replies to him : *' Quia vidisti me, Thoma, credidisti; beati, qui non viderunt et crediderunt — Because thou hast seen me, Thomas, thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed." ^^^
fi) Christ is again expressly called God in Tit. II, 13: "Exspectantes heat am spent et ad- ventum gloriae magni Dei et Salvatoris nostri
lesU Chvisti (tov /leydXov 0€ov icat ccor^pos ijftwv *Ii;aov
XpuTTov) — Looking for the blessed hope and com- ing of the glory of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.*'
St. Paul does not mean to distinguish two sepa- rate persons — the " great God," or Father, and " Our Saviour Jesus Christ." He is speaking solely of Christ, who is both "the great God" and "our Saviour;" else he would repeat the definite article and express
himself like this : Tov fieydiXov ®€0v koL tov oxor^po? "qfrnv *Irjaov Xpiarov. Whenever St. Paul wishes to distin- guish between the different Persons of the Most Holy Trinity, he always repeats the article. On the other hand, he never repeats the article when heaping several predi- cates on one and the same Person. Cfr. 2 Cor. I, 3: " EvAoyiyTos 6 ©cos icat ttot^p tov Kvptov — Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.""* The
117 John XX, 39. lis Cfr. also Eph. I, 3.
84 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Ethiopian translation has dropped the koI without in the least changing the signification of the text. But there is also a strong objective reason for applying the phrase "the great God" to Jesus Christ. For in speaking of the " coming of the glory of the great God," the Apos- tle can only mean Christ, because Holy Scripture tells us nothing of an epiphany of the Father, and we know that the second coming (parot^ia) of Christ will coincide with the Last Judgment.
y) An equally cogent argument can be con- strued from I John V, 20: ''Scimus quoniam Filius Dei venit et dedit nobis sensum, ut co- gnoscamus verum Deum et simus in vero Filio eius: hie est verus Deus et vita aeterna — And we know that the Son of God is come: and he hath given us understanding that we may know the true God, and may be in his true Son. This is the true God and life eternal." Here the Divinity of Christ, which is logically deducible from the fact that He is a true Son of the true God, is expressly reaffirmed in the concluding phrase: This is the true God — aXrjOivo^ ©cos.
It is contrary to the rules of logic and grammar alike to refer the phrase " This is the true God and life eternal," not to the immediately preceding word " Filio/* but to the more remote "verum Deum" (i. e,. Pair em). In that case tile — cVctvos should be the pronoun used, not hie — ovTo^, To refer the demonstrative pronoun hie — oiJtos to the determinative pronoun eius would offend against the idiom of the Latin language. If
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 85
Erasmus were right in his assumption that the phrase, ** The true God and life eternal " designates the Father, not the Son, St. John would have made himself guilty of an insufferable tautology, vis,: " Verus Deus est verus Deus." Moreover, the aim of St. John's First Epistle, which was written as a prologue to his Gospel, is not to demonstrate the Godhead of the Father, which no one denied, but the Divinity of the Son, who had appeared corporeally in Christ. It is furthermore to be noted that the "true God" whom St. John has in mind, is also called "eternal life"
(oiJto9 luTiv 6 oXyjOlvo^ ©COS KoX ^unj aiilivto^). Now St.
John never means the Father but invariably the Son when he uses the phrase " eternal life." Consequently Christ is as certainly "verus Deus" as is His Father. Cfr. I John I, 2: " Annuntiamus vobis vitam aeter- nam, quae erat apud Patrem et apparuit nobis — We declare unto you the life eternal, which was with the Father, and hath appeared to us." ^^^ 1 John V, 11: " Vitam aeternam dedit nobis Deus, et haec vita in Filio eius est. Qui habet Filium, habet vitam; qui * non habet Filium, vitam non habet — God hath given to us eternal life. And this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son, hath life. He that hath not the Son, hath not life." The last vestige of possible doubt is removed by the Greek text, which reads thus : " Kal Ict/acv cv
Tw akqOiv^ iv Tw vl<a avrov 'Irjaov XptOTw * outos €<ttlv 6
a\rj6Lvos ©£09 Kal fwr/ atwvto?." The demonstrative pronoun clearly points to Jesus Christ.
8) The ''crux Rationalist arum" is the famous doxology, Rom. IX, 5: ''Ex quibus [sciL Isra-
119 Cfr. also John I, 4; XI, 25; XIV, 6.
86 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
elitis] est Christus secundum carnem, qui est super omnia Deus benedictus in saecula (*«<" ^
&v 6 XptOTOf TO Kara adpKa 6 wv iirl iravrmv 0€O9 cv\oyi/ro9
€hs Tov? aaSvas)." Whocvcr Tcads this sentence without prepossession will unhesitatingly refer the predicate Deus super omnia (^^^ iravrwv ©co?) to Christ.
The Greek manuscript codices present the New Tes- tament text without punctuation marks, and it would seem to be the business of exegesis rather than of textual criticism to determine whether there should be a comma or a period after the word <ra/oica. If a comma, then the whole doxology plainly refers to Christ; if a period, it would be most natural to refer it to the Father or to the Deity in general. Similarly, in the Latin text of the Vulgate, the Rationalists place a period after " carnem '* and reconstruct the passage thus: ". . . ex quibus est Christus secuhdtim carnem. Qui est super omnia Deus [= Pater], benedictus [sit] in saecula." ^^^ But this punctuation is arbitrary. There is no intrinsic reason whatever for inserting such an abrupt hymn of praise in honor of the Father into a context which treats solely of the Son. Conversely, the Apostle had excellent rea- sons for connecting the doxology with the name of Christ, whose descent according to the flesh from the Jews he had accentuated immediately before. This in- terpretation of the passage is so natural and plausi- ble that the early writers were unanimous in referring the doxology to the Son and not to the Father. To the fifteen witnesses whom Petavius ^^^ was able to mar-
120 Thus Erasmus, Westen, Griesbach, and others.
121 De Trinitate, II, 7.
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST 87
shal in confirmation of this statement, Cardinal Fran- zelin^^^ added thirty others, while Hurter^^* enriched the list with fourteen more. This practically unanimous consent of the Fathers loses none of its force by the circumstance that some of them (in a very cor- rect sense) assert that the epithet 6 hrl irdvrwv ®€6^ be- longs solely to the Father, because the Father alone, as the First Person of the Blessed Trinity, is un- originate (avapxos) and at the same time the principle of the Son (apx^ t^s dpxn^)» Thus Athanasius,"* Basil,^^*^ and Gregory of Nyssa.^^® However, since these Fathers did not have in mind the Epistle to the Romans, but that to the Ephesians, in which St. Paul writes: " Untis Deus et Pater omnium qui est super omnes (6 cTTt iravTwv) — One God and Father of all, who is above all,""^ we can reasonably assume that they do not mean to contradict the other Fathers. This assump- tion is rendered still more probable by the fact that these same apparently dissentient Fathers elsewhere ex- pressly interpret the doxology as referring to Christ.^'* For the rest, such unsuspected witnesses as Rosen- miiller and the editor of the new edition of H. A. W. Meyer's voluminous commentary on the various books of Sacred Scripture, B. Weiss, admit that the Ra- tionalist interpretation involves a violation of the rules of Greek grammar. In fact it would be just as unnatural and ungrammatical to write 6 &v iirl iravnav ©eo^, instead of 6 ®€o« 6 c&v cVt TravTCDv, as it would be natural and gram-
122 De Verba Incarnato, thes. 9. 127 Eph. IV, 6. Cfr. Newman,
12s OpHscula Patrum, XVI, p. Athanasius, II, 348 sq., 9th ed.,
240, 2nd ed., Oeniponte 1895. London 1903.
12% Ad Strap,, Ep. x, n. 38. 128 Athanas., Ep, ad Epict, n. zo;
125 Ep., 38, n. 4. Basil, Contr, Eunom., IV, n. 2;
12« Contr, ApolU, n. 77. Greg. Nyss., Contr, Eunom,, L X.
88 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
matical to resume by 6 &v the immediately preceding subject, namely, 6 Xpurro':.
Be it noted in conclusion that Christ's standing epithet in the pages of the New Testament is not "God" (Deus, ®^o^), but rather "Lord" (Do- minus, Kv^io?)^ as can easily be gathered from a perusal of the Apostolic Epistles. But inasmuch as ''Dominiis" corresponds exactly to the Hebrew "\ni and V^??, the texts in which Jesus is called "Lord" prove His Divinity quite as cogently as those in which He is called "God."
C. The Logos
Whereas the Synoptics portray Christ mainly on His human side, St. Paul emphasizes the Godman, and St. John, who was the Saviour's favorite disciple, raising his eagle eye to the very Heavens, shows us Christ subsisting before all time in His Divine Nature as the "Word of God" (Verbum, 6 A6yo^). This term^^. is of the utmost importance for the proper understand- ing of the mystery of the Blessed Trinity.. The use of the term " Logos " is peculiar to St. John.^^® The at- tempt to trace the Johannine Logos to the teaching of the Jewish philosopher Philo has proved abortive. Aside
129 " Logos, verbum, being a term already used in the schools of heathen philosophy, was open to various misunderstandings on its ap- pearance in the theology of revealed teaching. In the Church it was both synonymous with and corrective of the term 'Son'; but heretics had almost as many senses of the term
as they had sects." — Newman, Athanasius, II, 337, 445 sqq., 9th cd., London 1903. Cfr. J. Lebre- ton, Les Origines du Dogme de la Trinite, Book i, Paris 191 o; £. Krebs, Der Logos als Heiland im erst en Jahrhundert, Freiburg 1910. 180 Cfr. John I, x sqq.; z John I, x; V> 7; Apoc XIX, 13.
THE LOGOS 89
from the name there is absolutely no similarity between the two conceptions; rather an irreconcilable opposition. It is far more reasonable to regard the teaching of St. John on the Logos as an inspired development of the doctrine of " Uncreated Wisdom " which is set forth in the Sapiential Books of the Old Testament. May we not also assume that St. John was directly enlightened by Him on whose bosom he was privileged to lean?^"
The most important portion of the Johannean Gospel, as bearing on the dogma of the Blessed Trinity, is the prologue, which distinctly asserts the personality, the hy- postatic difference, and the Divinity of the Logos, who is Christ, the Son of God made flesh.
I. The Logos a Real Person. — ^The Fourth Gospel begins thus : "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God (cV apx5 ¥
6 Aoyos Kol o Adyo? t]V ir/aos top ®€6v\/* InaSHlUCh aS
St. John distinguishes very clearly between the "Word'' and "God," the "Word with God'' (apud Deum) cannot be an absolute divine at- tribute, e. g., personified wisdom or omnipotence ; for wisdom and omnipotence are not "with God" but "in God." This is clearly apparent from the whole context of the prologue, especially I, 14: "And the Word was made flesh." It would be impossible for the Divine Nature, or for any one of its attributes, to "become flesh," because the Divine Nature, as such, is incapable of entering into union with a finite substance, and
181 John XIII, 33*
90 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
hence cannot form an undivided synthesis with human nature. Consequently the Logos is truly a person and not a mere personification.
2. The Logos as Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, Distinct From the Father. — That the Logos must be conceived as the Second Person of the Divine Trinity, appears from the opposition between ®co« and '^po^ 'rov ®€6v. The one is "God,'' the other is "with Go6!' as His Logos, and as such is Hkewise God.^^^ But the Evangelist continues: "He came unto his own («« '■a tBia)^ and his own (©^ *5«>*> i. e., the children of Israel) received him not." Whence it again appears, first, that the Logos is a real Person, and, secondly, that He cannot be the Father, because the Father never "came into this world." ^^^ Consequently, the Logos must be a diflferent Person from the Father. This conclu- sion is made certain by verses 14 and 18, in which the Logos is identified with the Son of God. John I, 14: ''Et Verbum {o Aoyo?) caro factum est et habitavit in nobis; et vidimus gloriam eius [scil. Verbi], gloriam quasi unigeniti a Patre (<*>« /Aovoycvov? napa irarpos^ — And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw his glory, the glory as it were of the only begotten of the Father/' John I, 18: ''Uni- genitus Filius (© /«)voycv^? vl6s)^ qui est in sinu
us John I, X. issjohn I, 9.
THE LOGOS 91
Patris, ipse enarravit — The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath de- clared him/' If the Logos is identically the same Person as the ''Son in the bosom of the Father," there is between the Logos and the Father the same relative opposition which exists be- tween the Son and the Father, and consequently the Logos cannot be identical with the Father. He must be an independent Hypostasis.
3. The Logos as a Divine Person, or God. — The fifth of the Scriptural texts ^^^ in which the Logos is expressly called "God,'' is John I, I : "In principio erat Verhum, et Verhum erat apud Deum, et Deus erat Verbum — In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.'* In the last clause of this sentence "Verhum" is the subject and "Deus" the predicate, as a glance at the Greek text: 1^ ®co? ^v 6 Adyo?, tells. Therefore the meaning of the clause is : 'The Logos was God." But why did St. John thus transpose subject and predicate? His reason for doing so appears from the context: *o Aoyo? ^v -^p^^ rov %€ovy KoX ©to's rjv 6 Aoyos. By bringing '''^^ ®€6v and ®co? into juxtaposition, the Evangelist desired to emphasize the consubstantiality of the Logos with God the Father, *'with" whom He was "from the beginning." Positively to exclude the
184 Cfr. supra, p. 82.
92 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
thought that the two might be identical in Per- son, St. John insists: ^^^ Ovto^: (i. e., o Aoyo?) ^v iv apxv 'rpos tov ©cdv; that is to Say, the Logos is indeed "God"; but He is likewise "with God.'' Even if the Logos were not expressly called "God," His Divinity could be inferred from the di- vine attributes ascribed to Him by the Evangelist.
a) The Logos is the Creator of all things without exception. John I, 3: ''Omnia per ipsum facta sunt, ct sine ipso factum est nihil, quod factum est — All things were made by him : and without him was made nothing that was made." John I, 10: "In mundo erat, et mundus (6 Koafio^) per ipsum f actus est — He was in the world, and the world was made by him." He who created the world must be God. " Peccatum quidem non per ipsum factum est," beautifully observes St. Augustine, ". . . et idolum non per Verbum factum est, sed . . . omnis omnino creatura ab angelo usque ad vermiculum. Quid praeclarius angelo in creaturisf Quid extremius vermiculo in creaturisf Per quem foe- tus est angelus, per ipsum f actus est vermiculus — Sin indeed was not made by the Word ... an idol too was not made by the Word, but . . . every created thing whatever, from an angel to a worm. What created being more excellent than an angel? What lower than a worm? Yet He who made the angel, the very same made the worm also." "® As Creator of the world the Logos is an uncreated Substance, ens a se. As if to refute the later Arian notion that the Logos who created the world was Himself a mere creature, St. John stresses
185 John I, s.
1S6 Tract, in loannem, 1, n. 13.
i
THE LOGOS 93
the fact that " all things were made by him " by add- ing : " And without him was made nothing that was made." ^^"^ If absolutely nothing was created without the Logos, the Logos Himself must either be increate, or His own creator, which would involve a contradiction. " Quo- modo potest fieri," says St. Augustine, " ut Verbum Dei factum sit, quando Deus per Verbum fecit omnia? Si et Verbum Dei ipsum factum est, per quod aliud Verbum factum est? . . . Non enim per se ipsum fieri potuit, per quod facta sunt omnia, Crede ergo Evangelistae. Poterat enim die ere: In principio fecit Deus Verbum, quomodo dixit Moyses: In principio fecit Deus caelum et terram — How could the Word of God be made, when by the Word God made all things? If the Word of God was itself also made, by what other Word was it made? . . . For that by which all things are made, could not be made by itself. Believe then the Evan- gelist. For he might have said: In the beginning God made the Word; just as Moses said: In the beginning God made the heavens and the earth." ^^®
b) The Logos is eternal. Cfr. John I, i sq. : " In the beginning (cV d/ox^) was the Word. . . . The same was in the beginning (cV dpx») with God." A pre- existence which antedates time and creation is equal to absolute eternity. To say that the Logos began to be " with God " at some certain time, would be tantamount to asserting that the Father began out of His own substance to beget " the only begotten Son in His bosom." "® Consequently the Son must be coeternal with the Father. This is further confirmed by a con-
187 John I» 3: Tidpra di* aOrov Card. Newman, Athanasius, II, 275
iyiverot Kal x^P^^ airov iyiver^ sqq.
oidk iy (n(7»7 =3 nothing whatever), 1Z8 Tract, in Joannem, I, n. xi.
$ yiyovty. On this passage, cfr. i8»John I, x8.
L
i
94 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
sideration of that attribute of the Divine Logos which may be designated as His divine immanence. By " Word of God " ( Verbum, Aoyos) we may under- stand either the external word of God (verbum oris s, \ externum), i, e.. Divine Revelation; or His internal,
immanent word (verbum mentis s. internum). The former, which is something impersonal, accidental, created, temporal, extra-divine, is not mentioned by St. John in the prologue of his Gospel. The Word of which he speaks is manifestly the internal Word, which, being an intrinsic product of generation, im- manent in the intellect of the begetting Father, forms part of the Divine Essence. Consequently the Logos is coetemal with the Essence of the Godhead.
c) Lastly, the Logos is the author of the Super- natural, and as such must be God. In Himself "the true light " "^ and " the life," "^ He is in His external manifestation "the light [that] shineth in the dark- ness,""^ and the principle of our adopted sonship.*" John I, 12: " Quotquot autem receperunt eum, dedit eis pot est at em filios Dei fieri (ISwkcv avroU l^owrlav rUva ®€ov yevicOai), his qui credunt in nomine eius (vm to ovofui avTov) — But as many as received him, he gave them power to be made the sons of God, to them that be- lieve in his name." Belief in the Logos is a necessary condition of salvation and eternal beatitude. Con- sequently the Logos is God. From the fulness of His grace we must all draw; it is from Him we receive grace and truth. Cfr. John I, 16 sq. : " Et de pleni- tudine eius nos omnes accepimus, et gratiam pro gratia; quia lex per Moysen data est, gratia et Veritas (7 x<*P«
140 John I, 4, 7, 9. 143 Cfr. the article " Adoption,
141 John I» 4. Supernatural," in the Catholic En-
142 John I, 5, 9. cyclopedia. Vol. I, pp. 148 sqq.
THE LOGOS 95
Kal i) ^XfjOeia) per lesum Christum facta est — And of his fulness we have all received, and grace for grace. For the law was given by Moses ; grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." The Logos is the author both of nature and of the Supernatural, and therefore very God. The Logos appeared corporeally on earth in Jesus Christ, for it is to Him and to Him alone that we can apply such Scriptural passages as : • " He came unto his own," "* " He was in the world," "» " John . . . gave testimony of [Him]," "® and, lastly,^*^ " The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." ^" This " Word made flesh," which is for the first time called "Jesus Christ" in John I, 17, is "the only begotten Son of God." ^*® Hence Christ is both the Logos and the Son of God. With John I, 15, therefore, begins the story of the life of Jesus Christ.**^®
Readings: — On the theology of the Son: J. E. Stadler, Uber die Identitdt der Idee der Weisheit mit der des Wortes, Miinster 1832 ; E. Bougaud, The Divinity of Christ (translated by Currie) New York 1906; *L. Atzberger, Die Logoslehre des h. Athanasius, Miinchen 1880; M. Beyr, Trinitatis in Unitate Dei Salus Mundi per lesum Christum Redempti, Graz 1875 ; K. Miillcr, Gottliches Wissen und gottliche Macht des johanneischen Christus, Freiburg 1882; *P. Keppler, Die Komposition des Johannesevan- geliums, Freiburg 1884; G. A. Miiller, Christus bei Josephus Flavius, 2nd ed., Innsbruck 1896 ; Simar, Theologie des h. Paulus, 2nd ed., Freiburg 1883 ; *Franzelin, De Verho Incarnato, thes. 2-9, cd. 4, Romae 1893 ; G. B. Tepe, Instit, Theolog., Vol. II, pp. 234 sqq., Parisiis 1895; J. B. Bartmann, Das Himmelreich und sein Konig nach den Synoptikern, Paderborn 1904; H. Schell, Jahwe
144 John I, IX. M, Johannes, Freiburg 1899; Belser,
145 John 1, 10. *' Der Prolog des Johannesevange- 146 John I, 6 sq. Hums" in the Theologische Quar-
147 John I, 6 sqq. talschrift of Tubingen, 1903, pp.
148 John I, 14. 483 sqq.; J. Lebreton» Les Origines
149 John I, 14, 18. du Dogme de la Triniti, pp. 382
150 Cfr. K. Weiss, Der Prolog des sqq., Paris 19 10.
96 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
und Christus, Paderborn 1905. An older work of special value on this subject is Prud. Maranus, De Divinitate Domini Nostri lesu Christi Manifesta in Scripturis et Traditione, Parisiis 1764. Cfr. also St. Thomas, Contr. Gent., IV, 7 (Rickaby, Of God and His Creatures, pp. 344 sqq., London 1905) ; Bellarmine, Contr ov, de Christo, 1. I; J. Perrone, De D. N. I. Chr. Divinitate adv, huius Aetatis Incredulos, Rationalistas et Mysticos, 3 Vols., Taurini 1870; H. P. Liddon, The Divinity of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, London 1867; H. J. Coleridge, S. J., The Preparation of the Incarnation, 2nd ed., London 1894 ; M. Lepin, Christ and the Gospel, or Jesus the Messiah and Son of God, Philadelphia 1910; A. J. Maas, S. J., Christ in Type and Proph- ecy, 2 vols., New York 1893-5.
ARTICLE 3
OF GOD THE HOLY GHOST
The term " Holy Ghost," or " Spirit of God,*' does not imply opposition so clearly as " Father " and " Son." In demonstrating this dogma, therefore, we shall have to emphasize the personality of the Holy Ghost and the fact that He is an independent Hypostasis, distinct from both the Father and the Son. His Divinity can be proved with comparative ease. Accordingly, this article will fall into three divisions. In the first division we shall demonstrate that the Holy Ghost is a real Person; in the second, that He is a Person distinct from the Father and the Son ; and in the third, that He is a truly Divine Person, or God Himself. Once these three points are established from Holy Scripture, no further proof will be needed to show the existence of a Third Person in the Godhead.
THE HOLY GHOST 97
A. The Personality of the Holy Ghost
I. The Word Ghost (Spirit) in its Imper- sonal Sense. — The Bible not infrequently uses the terms *'God "the Father'' and "sons of God'* in a figurative sense. Similarly it also employs the word "spirit of God" in a way that does not always suggest the idea of a real personality.
When we read, for instance, that "the spirit of God moved over the waters," ^^^ we understand that the sacred writer personifies the breath of divine omnipo- tence. At least there is no cogent reason for thinking that Moses here meant the Person of the Holy Ghost. In those texts, too, which tell of supernatural effects wrought by grace, or of the workings of the spirit, it is not always obvious that Holy Scripture means to describe something more than an external divine effect which might be figuratively termed " holy spirit." In the Fiftieth Psalm the words " Spiritum rectum innova in visceribus meis/' ^^^ and '^ Spiritu principali confirma me/' ^^^ evidently denote a supernatural spirit of rec- titude and self-control, i. e., a good disposition. " Et spiritum sanctum tuum ne auferas a me," ^^^ must like- wise be interpreted impersonally. The " holy spirit " here referred to is the spirit of sanctity. There are still other texts in which " spirit " does not designate a Per- son, but the absolute Divine Nature, which is essentially spiritual. Cf r. John IV, 24 : " God is a spirit (spiritus, TTvevfia), and they that adore him, must adore him in
151 Gen. I, 2, 153 " Strengthen me with a perfect
152 " Renew a right spirit within spirit." Ps. L, 14.
my bowels." Ps. L, la. 154 " Take not thy holy spirit
from me." Ps. L, 13.
98 THE TRINITY IX THE NEW TESTAMENT
spirit and in truth." In the eighth verse of the third chapter of St. John's Gospel, Christ Himself employs the word " spirit " in its original impersonal and material sense of " wind." For spiritus is derived from sfnrare, which means to blow, to breathe, as the Greek wvevfui is derived from wvtlv, which has the same meaning.^'*
2. The Word Spirit in its Hypostatic Sense. — Aside from the texts already quoted, there is a considerable number of other Scriptural passages in which the Holy Ghost is clearly de- scribed as a real and individual person.
a) There are in the first place certain epithets de- signed to restrict the concept of spirit and to show that it is not a mere impersonal abstraction. Holy Scrip- ture very frequently speaks not merely of the " spirit of God," but of the "Holy Spirit" (rh Sytov Tircv/ia), and this personal appellation in some texts is indi- vidualized even more strongly by the reduplication of the definite article to, as e. g. in John XIV, 26: to wvevfui TO ayiov. In some instances the Divine Spirit is spoken of as " the Spirit of the Father," or " the Spirit of the Son," or "the Spirit of Christ," which clearly intimates opposition to the Father and the Son.*^® i Cor. n, 12: ''Spiritus qui ex Deo est (to irvevfui to Ic Tov ®€ov) — The Spirit that is of God," distinctly recalls John I, I : '' Et Verbum erat apud Deum — And the Word was with God."
166 On the role of the Holy Ghost Les Origincs du Dogme de la
\\\ the Old Testament, see supra, p. Trinity, pp. 74 sqq.
18 sq. On the whole subject of 16« Acts XVI, 7; Cfr. Rom.
this subdivision, Newman, Athana- VIII, 9; Gal. IV, 6; Phil. I, 19.
sius, II, pp. 304 sqq.; Lebreton, i Pet. I, ix.
THE HOLY GHOST 99
b) The Holy Ghost is also called Paraclete (Paraclitus, vapoKXrfTo^^ , This term is as peculiar to St. John as the term Logos. Like Logos and Son of God, Paraclete and Holy Ghost denote one identical Person.
Paraclete is not, however, predicated of the Holy Spirit so exclusively as Logos is applied to the Son. Thus, in the First Epistle of St. John, Christ is called Paraclete.^*^^ The Saviour Himself in the Fourth Gos- pel repeatedly refers to the Holy Ghost as the Para- clete. What, then, is the meaning of Paraclete? The word is used in three different senses, all derived from the root-verb irapaicaActv. The first and original sense is "advocate" {advocattis, from TrapoKakeiv^in au- xilium advocate). But the operations which Jesus as- cribes to the Paraclete manifestly cannot be brought within the limits of this definition. Some exegetes de- rive Paraclete from irapaKakelaOat (i. e,, consolari) and take it to mean "comforter" (consolator). But if that derivation were correct, the noun should spell TrapoKkrfTtap, not TrapaKkrjTo^. Moreover, it is plain from our Lord's discourse after the Last Supper,^*^® that the office of the Paraclete is far superior to that of a mere comforter. He is formally to take the place of the departing Son of God, and to represent Him in His Church in the same manner in which Christ had represented the Father. The Paraclete is to complete the work begun by the Saviour and to assist the newly founded Church unto the con- summation of the world, filling it with His sanctifying
167 I John II, I : "Si quis pec- have an advocate with the Father,
caverit, advocatum ivapi.KK'qTOv) Jesus Christ the just."
habemus apud Patrem, lesum Chri- 158 John XIV-XVI. '«^*^7
stum iustum — If any man sin, we ^^ 'J
100 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
power and with the spirit of truth. Paraclete may also mean " representative," from napoKOLXdv = aliquem in locum alterius accire}^^
From these verbal definitions it is clear that the " Para- clete " or " Holy Spirit " is not a mere personification but a real person.
c) The correctness of this interpretation is borne out by the characteristic description which Christ Himself has given of the Paraclete, His operations, and His relation to the Father and the Son. He is an "other" {alius, aWo^) than the Father v^ho "sends'' Him/®^ and He is also distinct from the Son, who sends Him "from the Father." '«'
Between Him who sends (mittens) and Him who is sent (missus) there is logically the same relative oppo- sition as between Father and Son. This distinction furnishes a safeguard against the modalistic error which conceives the Holy Spirit as a mere mode of manifestation of the Godhead. It is also useful in re- futing the Rationalist contention that the name Spiritus Sanctus merely shelters a poetical prosopopoeia or per- sonification. An impersonal being could not " teach all truth," " give testimony," " bring all things to [the Apostles'] mind," remind them of what Christ had told them, and so forth. There are many other texts of Sacred Scripture in which the Holy Spirit is described as possessing all the marks of a real personality. Thus He has a free will, for St. Paul speaks of Him as
189 Cfr. Oswald, Trinitatslehre, 160 John XIV, i6.
pp. 73 sqq., Paderborn i888. 161 John XV, 26,
THE HOLY GHOST loi
" Dividens singulis, prout vult — (the Spirit worketh), dividing to every one according as he will." ^®^ He ap-. points the bishops: " Attendite vobis et universo gregi, in quo vos Spiritus sanctus posuit episcopos regere eccksiam Dei, quam acquisivit sanguine suo — Take heed to yourselves and to the whole flock, wherein the Holy Ghost hath placed you bishops, to rule the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood." ^^^ He prays for us " with unspeakable groanings," ^^* like as Christ " always lives to make intercession for us." ^^^ Nay, He formally ascribes to Himself subsistent per- sonality by commanding : " Segregate mihi (ftot) Saulum et Barnabam in opus, ad quod assumpsi (ttposkckXt/zluu) eos — (The Holy Ghost said to them): Separate me Saul and Barnabas, for the work whereunto I have taken them." "«
jB. The Hypostatic Difference Between the Holy Ghost and the Father and the Son
I. St. Paul and the Disciples of John the Bap- tist AT Ephesus. — On one occasion, when St. Paul came to Ephesus, he found there about twelve disci- ples of John the Baptist, and thinking that they had already received Baptism, he asked them : " Have you received the Holy Ghost (wvevfia aytov) since ye be- lieved ? " They answered : " We have not so much as heard that there be a Holy Ghost (dAA* ou8c, ct wevfia aytov c<TTLv -qKovaa/iev) J* And when the Apostle queried further : " In what then were you baptized ? " they re- plied : " In John's baptism." ..." Having heard these
162 1 Cor. XII, 11. I6fi ** Semper vivit ad interpellan"
163 Acts XX, 28. dum pro nobis," Heb. VII, 25.
164 Rom. VIII, 26. 166 Acts XIII, 2.
102 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
things, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus." And when St. Paul "had imposed his hands on them, the Holy Ghost {to wevfui to ayiov) came upon them." "^ This account makes it certain beyond a per- adventure that Jesus and the Holy Ghost are two dis- tinct Persons. For the initial ignorance of the disci- ples of John the Baptist did not refer to the Godhead as such (concerning which they must have been suffi- ciently instructed), but to that particular Divine Per- son who, in contradistinction to Jesus, the Son of God, is called Holy Ghost. In accordance with this marked difference between the two Divine Persons, John's dis- ciples at Ephesus received two distinct sacraments, viz., Baptism (t. e., the Baptism of Jesus) and Confirmation.
2. Christ's Last Discourse. — In His dis- course to His Disciples after the Last Supper/*® Christ clearly distinguishes between the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost. ^'Ego rogabo Pair em et alium Paraclitum (oAXov irapaKkrjrov^ dabit vobis, tit maneat vobiscum in aeternum — I will ask the Father, and he shall give you another Paraclete, that he may abide with you for ever.** ^*® The ''alius'' so distinctly differentiates the Paraclete from both Christ Himself and the Father, that a blending of the Three Persons into one, or into two, is entirely out of question. The Father "gives'*; the Paraclete "is given**; and Christ "asks the Father to give** the Para- clete. It is futile to object that God may give
ler Acts XIX, 1-6. leo John XIV, 16.
XMjohn XIV-XVI.
THE HOLY GHOST 103
Himself to His creatures ; for the Father is asked by the Son to give to the Apostles, not Himself, nor His Son, but the Paraclete, or Holy Ghost. The hypostatic difference between the Three Per- sons of the Divine Trinity is still more clearly marked in John XIV, 26: ''Paraclitus autem Spiritus sanctus, quern mittet Pater in nomine meo^ ille vos docebit omnia ('O Bl irapdKkriro^^ t6
irvevfia to ayiov, o 7rcfi\j/€L 6 iraririp iv tw ovofiaTi fiov, tKeivos
[not: €^€tvo] vfia^ StSofci Trdvra) — But the Paracletc, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things." In this pas- sage, too, it is impossible to confound the Para- clete with the Father, because it is the Father who sends Him; or with Christ, because it is in Christ's name that He is sent. Consequently the Paraclete is a different Person than either the Father or the Son.
3. The Immanent Origin of the Holy Ghost. — ^The Holy Ghost is *'of God," and, like the Logos, Himself a Divine Person, who owes His Personality to His eternal procession from the Father. Sacred Scripture calls the Holy Ghost "the Spirit that is of God,'' "^ and dis- tinctly declares that He "proceedeth from the Father." "^ Consequently the Holy Ghost is a different Person from the Father. But is He
170 X Cor. n, 12: rb wweviia rb iTi JohnXV, 26: irapik rov rarpbt
iK Tov 6eoO. iKwopeCerat,
104 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
likewise personally distinct from the Son? The context plainly shows that that is what St. John means to inculcate. ''Cum autem venerit Parch clituSj quern ego mittam vobis a Patrej spiritum veritatis qui a Patre procedit (^o irv€v/*a r^ aXrjdeias^
o Trapa tov irarpos iKnopeverai^ ^ Hie testtmoniuffl perhi-
bebit de me — But when the Paraclete cometh, whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceedeth from the Father, he shall give testimony of me." "^ Here the Para- clete, or "Spirit of truth,'* who "proceedeth from the Father,'' and who cannot therefore be iden- tical with the Father, is sharply distinguished from the Son, who sends Him; for no one can send Himself. Besides, St. John distinctly af- firms that the Paraclete is sent to give testi- mony of Christ. From all of which it is as plain as the light of day that the Bible makes a sharp distinction between the Holy Ghost and the Father and the Son, and that each must therefore be a separate and distinct Hypostasis.
C. The Divinity of the Holy Ghost
Although the Divinity of the Holy Ghost is logically deducible from the texts already quoted, the Pneumatomachian and Socinian heresies de- mand a special refutation. In formulating the Scriptural argument for the Divinity of the
172 John XV, 26,
THE HOLY GHOST 105
Holy Ghost, we shall follow the same method which we employed in elaborating that for the Divinity of Christ.
I. The Divine Attributes of the Holy Ghost. — Sacred Scripture ascribes to the Holy Ghost divine attributes both of being and of Hfe. Therefore the Holy Ghost is God.
a) Of the transcendental attributes of being, truth is frequently ascribed to the Holy Ghost. He is called the substantial " Spirit of truth/' who " teaches all truth." John XVI, 13 : *' Cum cut em venerit ille Spiritus veri- tatis (to TTvevfia rrj^ aX-qOdas), docebit vos omnem verita- tern (iraaav ttjv oMjOculv) — But when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will teach you all truth." This sub- stantial Spirit of truth by virtue of His " procession from the Father " must be increate and divine ; else He could not be called the Inspirer of God's infallible word.^^^
A second characteristic prerogative of the Holy Ghost, which is indicated by His very name, is His substantial holiness or sanctity. The epithet sanctus (ayios) de- scribes the very essence of the Third Person of the Divine Trinity. Not as if the Father and the Son were not also substantially holy,^^* but the Holy Ghost pro- ceeds from Sanctity or Love as His principle, and is therefore Hypostatic Holiness or Personal Love.^^*^ It is for this reason that He is represented, per ap- propriationem, as "the Sanctifier," i. e,, the principle of all created holiness. Cfr. Rom. V, 5 : " Caritas Dei
178 2 Pet. I, 21. Preuss, God: His Knowability, Es-
174 God as such must be holy by settee, and Attributes, pp. 251 sqq. His very nature. — Cfr. Pohle- 176 Infra, Chapters III and IV.
io6 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
diffusa est in cordibus nostris per Spiritum Sanctum, qui datus est nobis — The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost, who is given to us."
The omnipotence of the Holy Ghost is more clearly defined in the supernatural sphere than in the domain of nature. St. Paul sublimely demonstrates it in his First Epistle to the Corinthians, where the Holy Ghost is eulogized as the author of the supernatural gifts of grace, such as wisdom, knowledge, the working of miracles, prophecy, " interpretation of speeches," etc.^^* The Holy Ghost wrought His own theophany (or visible manifestation) in the form of " parted tongues of fire " on Pentecost Day, when, as Sacred Scripture tells us, the Apostles ** were filled with the Holy Ghost, and . . . began to speak with divers tongues, according as the Holy Ghost gave them to speak." ^^^ But the great- est miracle of His omnipotence was the Incarnation, when the Blessed Virgin Mary "conceived [her Divine Son] of the Holy Ghost." "«
Omnipresence and indwelling are likewise distinctly divine attributes. Now, the Holy Ghost is everywhere in Sacred Scripture represented as the penetrating, trans- forming, purifying, sanctifying, and vivifying principle of supernatural life; so much so that the Nicaeno-Con- stantinopolitan Creed expressly designates Him as the Vivifier.^^* Cfr. John VI, 64: " Spiritus est, qui vivi- Heat — It is the Spirit that quickeneth." 2 Cor. Ill, 6: "To hi TTvevfia ^(oairoieL — But the Spirit quickeneth." This vivifying and sanctifying omnipresence implies the divine prerogative of indwelling in the souls of the just.
17$ I Cor. XII» 4-1 1. — That which is conceived in her,
177 Acts II, 4. is of the Holy Ghost."
178 Cfr. Matth. I, 20: " Quod in 170 Vivificator (^ci^oiroi6s)» »• *•/ €0 natum est, de Spiritu Sancto est He who gives life.
THE HOLY GHOST 107
The Saints are temples of the Holy Ghost. John XIV, 17 : " You shall know him ; because he shall abide with you, and shall be in you." i Cor. IH, 16 : " Know you not that you are the temples of the Holy Ghost, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you ? *' i Cor. VI, 19: "Know you not that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, whom you have from God?"
b) Of the attributes of divine life, omniscience be- longs to the Holy Ghost in the same measure as it belongs to the Logos. He is the " searcher of the deep things of God," which " no man knoweth, but the Spirit of God." I Cor. II, lo-ii : " Spiritus omnia scrutatur, etiam profunda Dei, Quis enim hominum scit, quae sunt hominis, nisi spiritus hominis, qui in ipso est. Ita et ea quae Dei sunt, nemo cognovit nisi Spiritus Dei — For the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, but the spirit of a man that is in him ? So the things also that are of God no man knoweth but the Spirit of God." In virtue of this Divine Knowledge He is the revealer of the mysteries of God. " Spiritu loqui- tur mysteria/' ^^^ Out of His perfect knowledge of the future free acts of rational creatures, the Holy Ghost inspires the prophets and predicts the future. John XVI, 13 : ^' Quae ventura sunt, annuntiabit vobis — The things that are to come, he shall shew you." ^®^
Besides these attributes, there are His external di- vine operations. Continuing the work of the Redemp- tion, the Holy Ghost is perpetually remitting sins in the Church. John XX, 22 sq. : " Accipite Spiritum Sanctum: quorum remiseritis peccata, remittuntur eis
180 X Cor. XIV, 2; cfr. 2 Pet. I, I8I Cfr. also i Pet. I, 10 sqq.; 2
2u Pet. I, 21.
8
io8 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
— Receive ye the Holy Ghost. Whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven them." — " The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Ghost," ^^^ and it is the Holy Ghost through whom the just are adopted as children of God. Rom. VIII, 14: " Quicumque enim Spiritu Dei aguntur, ii sunt filii Dei
— For whosoever are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God." He is, lastly, the seal of super- natural life stamped on our souls. Eph. I, 13 : " Cre^ denies signati estis Spiritu promissionis sanctv [i, e., Spiritu a Deo pramisso] — Believing, you were signed with the Holy Spirit of promise " (that is to say, with the Spirit promised by God).
2. The Holy Ghost Entitled to Divine Worship. — ^The Trinitarian form of benediction puts the Holy Ghost on a par with the Father and the Son. This general arg^ument for His adorability can be fortified by a special proof, drawn from the peculiar malice involved in blas- pheming the Person of the Holy Ghost.
Cfr. Matth. XII, 31-32: " Omne peccatum et bias- phemia remittetur hominibus; Spiritus autem blasphemia non remittetur. Et quicunque dixerit verbum contra Filium hominis [i. e., Christum] remittetur ei; qui autem dixerit contra Spiritum Sanctum, non remittetur ei neque in hoc saeculo neque in futuro — Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven men, but the blas- phemy of ^®* the Spirit shall not be forgiven. And
182 Rom. V, 5. renders it in The Four Gospels, A
188 Better, against, as Fr. Spencer New Translation, New York 1898.
THE DIVINITY OF THE HOLY GHOST 109
whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but he that shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in the world to come." Therefore blasphemy against the Holy Ghost is a more grievous offence than ordinary blasphemy; which could not be were not the Holy Ghost at least coequal in majesty and adorableness with the Father and the Son. As for Christ's dictum in the text just quoted, we need hardly say that it is only as man that He subordinates Himself to the Holy Ghost, in the same sense in which He elsewhere says : ^®* " The Father is greater than I." This argument is confirmed by all those Scriptural texts which contain the phrase " temple of the Holy Ghost," for a temple is reared for the worship of the Divinity.
3. The Name "Gk)D" Applied to the. Holy Ghost. — Although the Bible nowhere expressly calls the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity *'God/* the appellation occurs frequently in con- texts where "God" can be legitimately substituted for "Holy Ghost/'
a) To begin with, the Old Testament contains a num- ber of passages which are directly referred to the Holy Ghost in the New. Is. VI, 8-9, we read: " Et audivi vocem Domini (^^^) dicentis: . . . Vade et dices po-
pulo huic: audite audientes et nolite intelligere — And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: ... Go and thou shalt say to this people : Hearing, hear and understand not." Now St. Paul teaches : '^^^ " Bene Spiritus Sane- tus loctittis est per Isaiam prophetam: Vade et dices,
184 John XIV, a8. 185 Acts XXVIII. 25.
no THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
etc. — Well did the Holy Ghost speak to our fathers by Isaias the prophet, saying: Go to this people and say to them, etc" According to St. Paul, therefore, the Holy Ghost is identical with the Old Testament ^fi»i
that is to say, with the one true God, to whom alone this name is attributable as a quasi nomen proprium.^^ A similar substitution of names takes place whenever a prophecy is alternately ascribed to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.^®^ If the Father is God, and the Son is God, the Holy Ghost, too, must be God. b) In many passages of the New Testament the word " God " can be directly substituted for " Holy Ghost." Thus St. Peter addresses Ananias in these words: *' Cur tentavit Satanas cor tuum, mentiri te Spiritui Sancto. . . . Non es mentitus hominibus, sed Deo — Why hath Satan tempted thy heart, that thou shouldst lie to the Holy Ghost. . . . Thou hast not lied to men, but to God." ^®® By substitution we get the proposition : " The Holy Ghost is God." St. Paul, when he asks : ^«» " Nescitis quia templum Dei estis et Spiritus Dei habitat in vobis? — Know you not that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" — plainly intimates that the Holy Ghost dwelling in " the temple of God " is identical with God Him- self."® A comparison of John I, 13: "Ex Deo nati sunt — They are born of God," with John III, 5 : " Nisi quis renatus fuerit ex aqua et Spiritu Sancto — Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost," shows that " Holy Ghost " = " God." Finally StV Paul says in his Epistle to the Hebrews: " Multifariam
18C Compare Ps. XCIV, 8-11 with 180 x Cor. Ill, 16.
Hcb. Ill, 7-1 1. 100 Cfr. I Cor. VI, 19; 2 Cor. YI,
187 Vide supra, pp. 29 sq. i6«
188 AcU V, 3-4*
THE DIVINITY OF THE HOLY GHOST ni
multisque modis olitn Deus loquens patribus in prophetis — God ... at sundry times and in divers manners spoke in times past to the fathers by the proph- ets," ^^^ and St. Peter assures us : '^ Non enim volun- tate humana allata est aliquando prophetia, sed Spiritu Sancto inspirati locuti sunt sancti Dei homines — For prophecy came not by the will of man at any time: but the holy men of God spoke, inspired by the Holy Ghost" "«
The synthesis of the Three Divine Persons in the complete concept of the Trinity is most perfectly consummated in the so-called ordo subsist endij^^^ by virtue of which the Three ob- serve a constant order and follovyr one another in an immutable sequence. The members of this formula can not be transposed. The Father must be conceived strictly as the First, the Son as the Second, and the Holy Ghost as the Third Per- son of the Godhead. Yet this is not to be under- stood as implying a sequence of time or dignity, a before or after, a more or less; for in virtue of their absolute consubstantiality or homoousia all Three Divine Persons are coequal in rank, eternity, and power. ^®* The numerical sequence
191 Heb. I, X. " Ei in hoc Triniiate nihil prius aut
192 2 Pet I, 21. For a fuller posterius, nihil mains aut minus, sed elucidation of the topic of this para- totae tres personae coaeternae et graph, cfr. Heinrich, Dogmat, The- coaequales ^ Aad in this Trinity ologie, IV, % 22%\ Kleutgen, De Ipso none is afore or after other, none Deo, pp. 489-509. is greater or less than another, but
i»8 *AicoXoud/o jcotA r^v rd^iw, the whole Three Persons are co- 104 Cfr. the Athanasian Creed: eternal together, and co-equal."
SECTION I
THE ANTITRINITARIAN HERESIES AND THEIR CONDEMNATION BY THE CHURCH
There are two logical processes whereby the dogma of the Blessed Trinity can be essentially perverted; per defectum, i. e., by exaggerating the notion of unity and eliminating that of Trin- ity (Monarchianism) ; or per excessum, i. e., by exaggerating the concept of the Trinity, making it a Trinity of Divine Natures and thereby denying the unity of Persons (Tritheism). Tritheism will receive due consideration in the second part of this volume, in which we shall expound the doctrine of Unity in the Trinity {Unit as in Trinitate).
Monarchianism, or the doctrine of the Monorchia, as it is called by an assumption of exclusive orthodoxy like that which has led to the adoption of the term " Uni- tarianism " at the present day,^ denies the distinction of Persons in the Divine Nature. It is threefold: (i) crass Monarchianism, in its present-day form called Uni- tarianism, which denies all distinction of persons in God. (2) Modalism, so-called, which admits a Trinity of Persons, but holds that the difference between them
1 Cfr. Newman, The Arians of the Fourth Century, p. xift
114
MONARCHIANISM 115
is not real, but merely nominal or modal; this heresy is called Sabellianism from its chief champion, Sabellius. (3) Subordinationism, which, while it readily grants that the three Divine Persons are really distinct, insists that they are not coequal, but subordinate one to the other (Arianism, Macedonianism). This logical division of Monarchianism substantially coincides with the suc- cessive phases of its historic development.
Readings : — The various text-books of Church History, espe- cially Alzog (Pabisch-Byrne's translation), Vol. I, pp. 348 sqq., 5th ed., Cincinnati 1899; Funk-Cappadelta, A Manual of Church History, Vol. I, London 1910; *Hefele, A History of the Coun- cils of the Church, Vols. I sqq.; *Oswald, Trinitdtslehre, §§ 8-9, Paderborn 1888; H. Couget, La SS, Trinite et les Dogmes An- titrinitaires, Paris 1905; F. J. Hall, The Trinity, pp. 63 sqq.. New York 191a
ARTICLE I
CRASS MONARCHIANISM
I. The Heresy of Monarchianism. — This is an ancient heresy, the beginnings of which can be traced to the second century of the Chris- tian era. It is either Dynamistic or Patripassian. Dynamistic Monarchianism asserts that the Father alone is true Grod, and that the divine ele- ment in Christ was merely a power (Swo/u?) in- dwelling in Him as an impersonal divine spirit. Patripassian Monarchianism completely identifies the Son with the Father, asserting that the Per- son of the Father was made flesh and suffered on the Cross. The Patripassian is superior to the
ii6 THE TRINITY IN TRADITION
Dynamistic form of Monarchianism in so far as it acknowledges Christ to be a manifestation of the Divine Essence.
a) Dynamistic Monarchianism was championed by the Ebionites, the Cerinthians, and the Carpocratians, who all held that Christ was a mere man, though endowed with divine powers or energies, after the manner of the Old Testament prophets or the pagan soothsayers. The chief representatives of this heresy were Theodotus of Byzantium (about A. D. 192), a tanner by trade, and his pupil Theodotus the Younger. The latter, sur- named the Money-Changer, asserted that a divine power had indeed descended upon the man Jesus at his bap- tism, but that the same Divine Power (Xoyos, vid?) had appeared in Melchisedech, who had been media- tor and intercessor for the angels in the same sense in which Christ was for men, and whose followers were therefore called Melchisedechians.^ A somewhat later protagonist of this heresy was the notorious Paul of Samosata, an extremely clever man, who died as Bishop of Antioch, about A. D. 260. He taught that Christ, though supernaturally begotten and bom of a virgin, was nevertheless a mere man, and that the Di- vine Logos (i. e.f the impersonal wisdom of God) was not united to Him substantially, but simply as a quality or power; whence His deification was foreordained. Thus "the Logos was greater than Christ; the Logos was from above, Christ from below; Christ suffered in His nature and wrought miracles by grace." It was
2 Alzog, Universal Church HiS' the tanner, and his pupil the
tory, English tr., Vol. I, 350; money-changer, cfr. Eusebius, Hist.
Blunt's Dictionary of Sects, Here* Eccles., V, 28; Theodoretus, Haerei,
sies, etc., new impression, London Fab,, II, 5. X903, pp. 304 sq. On Theodotus
MONARCHIANISM
"2
only by means of divine grace and His own co-operation therewith, that Christ ultimately became God.^
^ kindred heresy was that of Photinus, Bishop of Sirmitmi (d. 366), who "increased the scandal, by ad- vocating, and with greater boldness, an almost Unitarian doctrine."* He taught that the Logos is the imper- sonal intellect, while the Holy Ghost is the impersonal power of God, in whom there is but one Person, viz,, the Father. Hence ©eo? = XoyoTdrtop. Christ, according to Photinus, was a simple man, in whom the Logos dwelt as efficient power (cvcpycia Spoorwc^), and who earned for himself the name of " God " by his obedience.
The main argument of all these heretics was this. If the Father were other than the Son, and each were nevertheless true God, it would be necessary to assume the existence of two Gods (Ditheism). Consequently Christ, though endowed with divine power (8wa/Ats), is a mere man. Paul of Samosata quoted in support of his heresy John XVII, 3; XIV, 28; Matth. XI, 27; Luke
n, 52.
b) The Patripassian form of Monarchianism, accord- ing to the Philosophoumena,^ seems to have had for its author Noetus of Smyrna, a philosopher of the school of HeracHtus. He denied the distinction of Per- sons in the Godhead and taught that the Father was born, suffered, and died in Christ.® Another leader of the
8 Cfr. Alzog, I, <