Heinrich Schmid · 21 of 78

§ 19. The Doctrine is a Mystery. · Part 2

“II. That not only the Father, but also the Son and Holy Ghost, are true and eternal God.”

“III. That the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are not three gods, but one God.”

GRH. (I, 194): “The general theory will be comprised under the following heads: (1) That there is one undivided essence of these three persons. (2) That these three persons are truly and really distinct from each other. (3) That they are distinguished by their own personal properties.”

[12] We must carefully distinguish triune from threefold, which signifies: composed of three. GRH. (III, 254): “We say that God is triune, but we are forbidden, by the Christian religion, to say that He is threefold.”

[13] Essence: ουσια, also substance, φυσις, nature. GRH. (III, 251): “Moreover, they preferred to use the name essence rather than substance (a) to indicate that God is an ουσια υπερουσιος [an essence superior to essence], not included in the categories among which substance is first; (b) because God, unlike the essences of created things, does not exist beneath (substat) accidents, but His attributes are His very essence; (c) because the name substance is ambiguous, for it is sometimes put for ουσια, and sometimes for υποστασις.”

HOLL. (284): “The word essence, ουσια, is not indeed found in Holy Scripture in just so many letters, but nevertheless is derived from it by easy inference. For (a) in the Old Testament God is called יהוה essentiator; therefore he has an essence, and that, too an independent essence, etc.; (b) in the New Testament God is named ο ων, Rev. 1:8, from which ουσια, or essence, is derived; (c) a synonym of divine essence is φυσις θεια, divine nature, 2 Pet. 1:4.”

[14] GRH. (III, 239): “A great, yea an infinite distinction presents itself in the predicates, when I predicate of three human individuals, humanity, or human nature, and when I predicate of the three persons of the Godhead, a divine nature, or essence. The essence of men is a universal term which does not actually exist per se, but is only inferred in thought and conceived of by the intellect. But essence, in that which is divine, is not an imaginary something, as genus or species, but actually exists, although it is communicable.” CHMN. (Loc. Th., I, 39): “Therefore the Church understands by the term essence not a universal term, as philosophers name human essence, but a divine nature truly existing, which is communicable and common to three persons, and is entire in each. But what this is with respect to the definition of the matter, I say is not known, unless we say that the attributes given in the definition of God are the very essence of God.” “The essence with respect to divine persons (α) is not a species, because the persons of the Trinity do not share essence in the manner that individuals share a common nature, which diffuses itself in no way beyond that of which it is a part, as it were; as, man is a species of animal, and Peter is an individual of the human species. (β) It is not predicated of many individual differing in numerical essence, as three men are said to differ in number. (γ) It is not predicated in the plural form of individuals, for the first three persons are not three gods or three divine essences, as Peter, Paul, etc. (δ) Neither does it belong to either more or less than three persons; while human essence is not restricted to a determinate number of persons. Of a man I cannot say that all humanity is in him, but of a person of the Godhead I can correctly affirm that all the fulness of the Godhead is in Him. The reason rests upon the infinity of the divine essence. In three human individuals the essence is one, not in number, but one only in species; but in the three persons of the Godhead, there is an essence one in number and absolutely undivided. Human person are distinguished by substance, time, will, accidents of mind and body, etc. Thus, the substance of Peter is different from that of Paul; . . . but in the Trinity persons are not thus distinguished, for the Son is ομοουσιως, ομοιωνιας, συναιδιος with the Father. . . . Of human persons it cannot be said that the one is in the other; but of Himself and His Father, Christ says (John 14:10): ‘I am in the Father,’ etc. Of human persons it cannot be said that, because of their common nature, where the one persons is, there also is the other; because they are locally distinct: but of Himself and the Father, Christ declares (John 8:29): ‘The Father hath not left me alone.’ Of human persons it cannot be said that, because of their common nature, he who honors the one honors also the other, nay rather one can be honored while the other is treated with contempt; but of Himself and the Father, Christ says (John 5:23): ‘He that honoreth not the Son, honoreth not the Father that hath sent Him.’”

[15] GRH. (I, 194): “The essence of the three persons of the Godhead is one and undivided. . . . For, if there are three persons of the Godhead, and, nevertheless, the true God is only one, it follows thence that there is one essence of the three persons of the Godhead. If there were one essence of the Father, another of the Son, another of the Holy Ghost, one of the two alternatives would undoubtedly follow, viz.: either that there is not one true God, or that the Son and Holy Ghost are excluded from the true Godhead.”

GRH. (III, 238): “The word (ουσια), used of God, signifies an essence common to the three persons of the Godhead, one in number and undivided, which does not exist partially in the three persons, so that a part of it is in the Father, a part in the Son, and a part in the Holy Ghost; but, because of infinity and immateriality, is entire in the Father, entire in the Son, and entire in the Holy Ghost.”

CHMN. (Loc. Th., I, 43) cites as different modes of expression employed with reference to the unity of God, the following: “One and indistinguishable nature; one and the same substance; simple, one and undivided divinity; one and indifferent essence; in essence there is unity; there are three persons, co-eternal and co-equal; three persons, of one substance and inseparable equality, one God; the divinity of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, is one; their glory, equal; their majesty, co-eternal; in this Trinity nothing is before, nothing after, nothing greater or less, but the entire three persons are co-equal and co-eternal to each other. . . . John 10:30: ‘I and my Father are one,’ viz., in essence, will, power, and work.” On the other hand, he notes as false, the expressions: “In essence, He is singular; there are three, eternal, immense, etc.; three Gods, three Lords; essence is distinguished into Father, Son, and Holy Ghost: in divinity, there is before and after, that is greater and less.”

[16] GRH. (III, 257): “There are three, to each of whom belongs the name of Jehovah and God, and likewise, truly divine attributes, works, and glory, viz., the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” Therefore, essence is thus defined: BR. (217): “By the name, essence or ουσια, there is meant the divine nature, as it is absolutely in itself, all of which, with its attributes, is most simply one and singular, and, thus, also of the three persons the essence is only one; so, indeed, that there is also one intellect of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, by which they understand; one will of the three, by which they wish; and one power, by which they operate outside of the divine essence.”

QUEN. (I, 321): “The divine essence itself is that pertaining to God, by which God is what He is.”

HOLL. (284): “The essence of God is God’s spiritual and independent nature, common to the three divine persons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.”

[17] HFRFFR. (48): “Plurality in the unity of divinity is not accidental, for God is most absolute and simple, and no accidents occur in Him. Therefore, since there are no accidents, no plurality can arise hence.”

[18] HFRFFR. (48): “Plurality in unity of the divinity is hypostatic, i.e., of persons, for the essence, indeed, of the divinity is one, but the persons are plural; and, therefore, in the mystery of the divinity there are, indeed, distinct persons, but not distinct things. For the person of the Father is one, and the person of the Son, another, and the person of the Holy Ghost, another; yet they are not different things, but the essence of all the persons is one.”

By person, υποστασις, there is understood, “an individual, intelligent, incommunicable substance, which is not sustained, either upon another or from another.” Thus CHMN., (Loc. Th., I, 39). This definition is thus explained by SELN. (I, 76): “A substance is said to be individual and peculiar, in order to distinguish it from accident, and to remove the error of those who have thought that person signifies only a distinction of employments. It is said to be incommunicable, on account of the distinction of persons, because the Father does not communicate His hypostasis to the Son, or Holy Ghost, but each person has His own peculiar subsistence and being; although essence itself is said to be communicable” (“the subsistence of one persons cannot be communicated to another person, for the reason that each person possesses a peculiar and ultimate act of subsistence, so that it cannot be farther determined by another person.”) HOLL. (284): “Not sustained by another, excludes the opinion of those who think that as there are two natures in Christ, so also there are two persons.”

HOLL. (284): “An intelligent suppositum: a stone, a tree, a horse, are, indeed, called supposita, but not persons, because they are without intellect.”

A still more accurate distinction is made between persons, regarded materially, or in the concrete, and person, considered formally, or in the abstract. HOLL. (ib.): “A person, considered materially, is an intelligent suppositum. But a suppositum is a υφισταμενον, or a subsistence, singular, incommunicable, not sustained by another (a singular subsistence, not a singular substance; for persons, considered in the concrete sense, is not a substance, but a υφισταμενον, a singular subsistence, which consists of substance and an ultimate mode of subsisting. We call a person a singular υφισταμενον, and not an individual; because the latter implies a logical reference to a particular species, which is predicated of the individual. But God is not predicated of the divine persons, under the mode of species, nor do these differ in essences, diverse in number, just as do individuals). But formally or abstractly considered, a person is an independent and communicable subsistence of singular, complete, and intelligent substance.”

The meaning of this distinction will be more clearly apparent from the definitions of υποστασις that we shall presently cite from QUEN.: In the latter case, that is made particularly prominent which constitutes the one person a person, in distinction from the other; while, in the former case, the intention is not so much to indicate this distinction as rather to assert the personality of the Divine Essence. The term, person, is employed abstractively, if I say the Father is αγεννητος, for then I mention that which distinguishes Him from the other persons; it is employed concretively, if I say the Father is almighty; for in that case it is, indeed, also asserted that God is a person, and the hypostatical character of the person is asserted also in the word Father, yet in the statement I am more concerned to assert something concerning the Divine Essence, and not so much concerned to give prominence to the personal distinction.

The term υποστασις is employed in doctrinal writings as synonymous with person, but strictly speaking there is still a difference between them. HOLL. (285): “According to the testimony of Damascenus, the Fathers called the same thing hypostasis and person. Nevertheless, person differs from hypostasis, in this, that hypostasis is common to an intellectual nature, and to one destitute of reason; but person is affirmed only of an intellectual nature.”

QUEN. (I, 320): “υποστασις is received either in the concrete, or materially, when it implies, at the same time, an object itself and the mode of the object, and marks an essence, distinguished by a hypostatic character, i.e., a person, in the sense in which Christ is said to be χαρακτηρ της υποστασεως, Heb. 1:3; or, abstractly and formally, when it designates personality or substance itself, which is an act, mode, or ultimate degree, in which an intelligent nature subsists completely and incommunicably. In this signification the word υποστασις is not employed in Scripture, yet can be correctly inferred from its material signification; but, in this mystery, υπαρξις is the same as υποστασις.”

The Greek and Latin Fathers did not at once agree in the usage of the terms here employed and in the distinction between υποστασις and ουσια. It was only from the time of Athanasius that the expressions were uniformly used in the sense above given.

BR. (216): “Although the Greeks and Latins contended for awhile with each other (for the former thought that by the name, person, there was designated among the Latins an occupation or external habit, and on this account, three persons did not imply or express the real distinction of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; but the Latins thought that υποστασις, in the nominative case, denoted the essence itself, so that if three υποστασις are admitted, three essences must be affirmed), nevertheless, afterwards, when they understood each other better, it came to pass that the Greeks spoke of τρια προσωπα, and the Latins of three hypostases.”

[19] CHMN. (Loc. Th., I, 39): “Thus, in the Church, the term υποστασις, or person, is used in a different sense from the usage of common speech. Among men we know what a person is; among angels we understand what it is. Peter, Paul, and John are three persons to whom one human nature is common. But they differ very much, (1) in substance, because one entirety is distinct from another (totus a toto), (2) in time, (3) in will, (4) in power, (5) in work. . . . But in the Trinity Persons are not thus distinguished, as an angel from an angel, and a man from a man (nor do they differ in time, will, power, work; but, in the persons of the Trinity, there is co-eternity, one will, one power, one working). Likewise in creatures, it does not follow that where one person is, there, because of their common nature, the others also are. And this distinction must necessarily be observed; for the mystery at which even the angels are astonished, would not be so great, if the one essence were three persons, in the manner that Michael, Gabriel, Raphael are three persons, to whom one angelic nature is common and equally belongs.”

In reference to the two terms, “essence” and “persons,” CHMN. remarks (Loc. Th., I, 39): “These are grammatical observations, not idle exhibitions of acuteness; but if they have no other, they yet have this use, that, with the foundations thoroughly known, we can speak very cheerfully with the Church for the sake of harmony. But, if any one would cavil that the terms essence and person are not sufficiently peculiar to designate this hidden mystery of unity and Trinity, he has this reply that Augustine gives: ‘Human language labors from its absolutely great poverty. Nevertheless the term, “three persons,” has been adopted not for the purpose of expressing this, but so as not to keep altogether silent concerning it. For, by this term, the eminence of the ineffable matter cannot be expressed.’”

[20] CHMN. (Loc. Th., I, 39). “The persons of the divinity do not differ essentially as in creatures, where each one has his own peculiarity, nor is there only a distinction of reason therein as Sabellius wished; but they are really distinguished, nevertheless in a manner incomprehensible and unknown to us.”

QUEN. (I, 326): “They are distinguished really, i.e., they are distinct from each other, even when all operation of the human intellect ceases.”

[21] CHMN. (Loc. Th., I, 42): “The persons are distinguished, not only by interior, but also by exterior marks, derived especially from revelation and their benevolent works in behalf of the Church.”

[22] QUEN. (I, 414): “Personal divine actions ad intra are those which are limited to God Himself, in such a manner that they, nevertheless, as a source of action, pertain to the divine essence, not in so far as it is common to all three persons, but as it has been determined by certain hypostatic characters and properties. Hence, these personal works ad intra have been divided, i.e., they are not common to three divine persons, but are peculiar to only one person or to two persons.”

As, in Note 20 above, the question was concerning the distinction between the single persons, so here the question is concerning the distinction between essence and person.

QUEN. (I, 326) answers: “A divine person is distinguished in one way from essence, and in another way from another person; from the former not in fact but in thought, with its foundation in fact; but from the latter actually, even when all operation of the human intellect ceases.” The former distinction is a distinction “not actually, or from the nature of the thing itself, nor modally, but in thought, which is proved as follows: for, if the relation of paternity, filiation, and procession were really distinguished from the divine essence, then something real would be superadded to it, and in the divine persons which are constituted by these relations, and, therefore, in God Himself, there would be a real compounding.” (I, 327) . . . “Thus divine essence and relations are actually one thing, and the former is separated from the latter in thought and the apprehension of the mind alone; or, in other words, by our mode of conception, yet in such a manner that the foundation and occasion of the distinction exists in fact.”

(Id.) (328): “The true and real distinction of the divine persons does not introduce a division or multiplication of the divine essence. For God is not divided into three persons, but the three persons, distinct from each other, undividedly share the essence, one in number undivided and infinite, in such a manner that each persons has the same essence, without its multiplication or division. For, in this mystery, several persons are considered hypostatically, not several things essentially. But these three really distinct persons are and remain ομοουσιοι.”

[23] QUEN. (I, 415): “External actions ad extra, or emanent and transient actions, are those which both relate to an object outside of God, and are performed outside of God, producing or leaving an effect outside of God.”

GRH. (I, 199): “These works are undivided, because in them the three persons are together and work together. . . . In God there is so great unity, and so great power of one and the same essence, that to individual persons individual and peculiar works, which are wrought separately in creatures, ought by no means to be assigned;” whence follows the statement: “By one person named in works ad extra, the entire Trinity is meant.” QUEN. (I, 328): “The reason of this rule is the unity of the divine essence, the common participation in the power to act, the equality of the operations, and the identity of the works of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; and, hence, there then follows an equality of denomination. Nevertheless, this clause must be added to the rule of Augustine: ‘The order and distinction of persons being preserved;’ for, inasmuch as the Father has an essence from Himself, therefore He also acts of Himself, the Son acts and works from the Father, and the Holy Ghost from both. John 5:19.”

By the addition of this clause: “the order and distinction of persons being preserved,” the canon, “the works ad extra are undivided,” is more accurately defined; for the Dogmaticians do not wish directly to call in question the statement that even in the works ad extra the distinction of persons may be recognized. Not without reason, do they believe that in the Scriptures a work ad extra is ascribed to the one person and not to another; and the difference which, notwithstanding all the oneness of essence, is yet indicated in the order which is assigned in the Scriptures to the single persons, and in accordance with which the Father is placed first, the Son second, etc., seems to them to indicate also a difference in the order and in the manner in which the single persons work. So CHMN. already states (Loc. Th., I, 42): “Works ad extra are considered, as Luther has remarked, in a twofold manner: First, absolutely, and thus they are without distinction, and are called works of the three persons in common. Secondly, relatively, when they are considered in the order in which the persons act, or with reference to what is the property of each person, and which person acts immediately.” The order in working and the relation in which the three persons stand to a work ad extra, the Dogmaticians find most clearly stated in Rom. 11:36, where they refer the εξ to the Father, the δια to the Son, and the εν to the Holy Ghost. CHMN. (Loc. Th., I, 42): “For, as the apostle speaks of works ad extra, he makes mention of one eternal essence; to Him be honor, not to them. And, nevertheless, as the essence is one, without confusion of persons, it performs works ad extra, common to the three persons, without confusion, but implying a distinction of persons, ‘of Him, and through Him, and to Him.’ . . . In fine, as we believe that there is unity of essence, and, nevertheless, ought not to admit a confusion of persons, we must understand also the rule, that works ad extra are common to the three persons, yet in such a manner that the distinctions and properties of the persons be not confounded.” The Dogmaticians remark, in general, that sometimes in the Scriptures there is predicated of one person an attribute or an act, from which, however, the other persons are by no means to be excluded, inasmuch as this attribute or act pertains to the Divine Essence and does not peculiarly belong to the one person. Whence they draw the inference that nevertheless this attribute must pertain to the one or to the other person in a more eminent sense, either because it belongs more especially to the one or the other person, in accordance with the order which we assign to the three persons, or because in a certain sense it more especially belongs to the mode of existence (τροπος υπαρξεως) of a particular person. The Dogmaticians say, in this case, that this occurs through appropriation. GRH. (I, 203). “Hence certain essential attributes are appropriated by the ecclesiastical writers to each person, although, because of the identity of essence, the essential attributes are common to the three persons.” Thus there is specially appropriated to the Father, power; to the Son, love; to the Holy Spirit, wisdom.

Still another case is mentioned by QUEN. (I, 415): “Personal actions ad extra are, in a certain respect and manner, also essential or common to all three persons, viz., by reason of efficiency or source, and inchoatively; but they are personal or peculiar to any one divine person by reason of their end, or terminatively, because they are terminated in a certain person. Thus, the Spirit appeared only in the visible form of a dove. The voice from heaven, ‘This is my beloved Son,’ belonged to the person of the Father alone, and the Son of God alone appeared under the form and habit of man, in the time of the Old Testament, and in that of the New Testament was born of the Virgin Mary, and was made flesh. But, nevertheless, the entire Trinity was operative, with regard to that flesh of the Son alone, and that voice of the Father alone, and that form of a dove of the Holy Ghost alone.”

[24] The Dogmaticians in part distinguish also between the hypostatical characteristics or personal qualities and the personal notations. By the former, they understand those peculiarities which one person possesses having distinct reference to another, and by the latter, the marks by which, in general, one person can be recognized as distinct from another. Thus QUEN. (I, 330): “Some personal properties are absolute, which have no relation to another person; such a property is αγεννησια, and the not being born (innascibilitas), with respect to the Father, likewise the not being breathed (inspirabilitas), with respect to Father and Son. Other personal properties are relative, which have respect to another person, and constitute an order of things producing and being produced, of which there are only three; paternity, filiation, and procession.”

HOLL. (285) distinguishes: “Personal properties, i.e., relations founded upon a personal act, constituting a person in the being (esse) of a certain person, and, by relative opposition, introducing a distinction from another person” (of such he enumerates three: paternity, filiation, and procession), and “personal notations, i.e., modes of recognizing the divine persons and distinguishing them ad intra.” These, taken in a wider sense, and constitutively of each person, in the being (esse) of such person, comprehend the personal properties, and as such are regarded the five enumerated in the text. More strictly taken, however, or significatively, i.e., such as do indeed describe the divine persons and indicate the distinction between them, but still do not constitute a person, in the being of such person, they are distinct from the personal properties. Of these there are two, viz., αγεννησια and spiratio activa.

[25] QUEN. (I, 327): “From the real distinction of persons, arises their order, both in subsisting and in operating. Nevertheless, we must distinguish between the order of nature, of time, of dignity, of origin, and of relation. Among the divine persons, there is not an order of nature, because, they are ομοουσιοι [consubstantial]; nor of time, because they are co-eternal; nor of dignity, because they have the same honor. But there is among them an order of origin and relation, because the Father is of no one, the Son is of the Father, and the Holy Ghost is of both. An order among the divine persons in subsisting is proved from the procession or emanation of one person from the other. For if the Father proceeds from no one, but has His essence of Himself, as the fountain and source of the Holy Trinity, and the Son has His essence of the Father by eternal generation, and the Holy Ghost has the same of the Father and the Son, by eternal procession, it follows that the Father is the first, the Son the second, and the Holy Ghost the third person, and this order, both fixed in nature itself and unchangeable, is clearly shown in the formula of baptism. Matt. 28:19.” Concerning the order in working, which is recognized in the use of the diacritical particles εξ, δια, εν, we have already spoken in Note 23.

[26] GRH. (III, 243): “The term ομοουσιος embraces both ideas, viz., that the Son is of a distinct person from the Father, and that He is of the same essence with the Father.”

(Id.): “For the Father and the Son are not ετερουσιοι of different or diverse essence; they are not συνουσιοι, as men who have one common essence, nor only ομοιουσιος, of like substance, but ομοουσιος, having the same essence, eternity, will, work, power, and glory.”

[CHEMN. (I, 43): “By this term, the unity of the essence is signified, viz., that there is one eternity, one will, a common operation, and equal glory, and, at the same time, the distinction of persons is indicated.”]

[27] QUEN. (I, 328) further adds, as a consequence of ομοουσια: “The most perfect communion of all essential perfections, and the identity both of the divine works ad extra and the mode of action, so that they do the same things and in like manner; John 5:19, although not in the same order.” Concerning the latter, see below.

In the περιχωρησις the Dogmaticians usually also distinguish “π. essentialis, the absolutely unique immanence of one divine person in the other,” and “π. personalis, that inmost and ineffable permeation, by which the divinity of the λογος intimately permeates, inhabits, and perfects the assumed human nature.” The discussion of the latter does not belong here.

[28] HOLL. (301): “The name, ‘Father,’ is received here not ουσιοδος, or essentially, but υποστατικως, or personally. The name, Father, essentially taken, belongs not to the first person alone of the Godhead, but to all the divine persons equally; inasmuch as, received in this sense, it introduces a relation to creatures, of whom God is said to be the Father, both on account of creation, as the angels are regarded sons of God, Job 38:7, and on account of regeneration and adoption, as converted and regenerate men, by means of the merit of Christ, apprehended by faith, have obtained this εξουσια, power or dignity, to become the sons of God, John 1:12. But personally received, the name, Father, is peculiar to the first divine person, and introduces a relation to the consubstantial Son, whom He begat from His essence, as His image, whose ιδιος πατερ, own Father, He is called, John 5:18.”

[29] QUEN. (I, 332): “The characteristic of the Father ad extra is manifested in the work of creation, preservation, and of the government of the universe. For the work of creation is ascribed to the Father, in a peculiar manner, in the Holy Scriptures and the Apostles’ Creed, i.e., not exclusively, nor εξοχικως, or only particularly, much less as a principal cause, so that the Son is only an instrument, but on account of personal order, because the Father, through the Son and Holy Ghost, has created, preserves, and governs all things, Gen. 1:1, 2; Ps. 33:6; John 1:3, and because to God the Father power is ascribed, which especially shines forth in creation.”