De spiritu sancto

Fifth Theological Oration: On the Holy Spirit. Such, then, is the discourse concerning the Son; and thus it has escaped the stoners, passing through the midst of them. For the word is not stoned, but stones, when it wishes, and slings wild beasts, words that approach the mountain wickedly. But what would you say, they ask, concerning the Holy Spirit? Whence do you introduce to us a foreign and unwritten god? This is already the case even with those who are moderate concerning the Son. For what is found in the case of roads and rivers, that they separate from each other and converge into each other, this also happens here because of the wealth of impiety, and those who are at variance in other things agree in others, so that it is not even possible to know clearly what is consistent or what is contradictory. Now the discourse concerning the Spirit has some difficulty, not only because, in the discourses concerning the Son, men, having grown weary, wrestle more hotly with the Spirit—for they must necessarily be impious in some way, or life is not even livable for them—but also because we, worn out by the multitude of questions, suffer the same as those with poor appetites, who, when they have become disgusted with some food, are similarly disgusted with every argument, just as they are with food. Nevertheless, let the Spirit grant, and the discourse will proceed, and God will be glorified.

Now, to examine carefully and distinguish in how many ways either "Spirit" or "Holy" is understood and spoken in divine Scripture, together with the testimonies suitable for the theory, and what beyond these is the peculiar character of the combination of both—I mean the Holy Spirit—we shall leave to others, who have philosophized these matters for themselves and for us, just as we have done for them. But we ourselves shall turn to what follows in the discourse.

Some, then, who are displeased as though we were introducing some foreign and spurious god, the Holy Spirit, and who are vehemently fighting for the letter, let them know that they fear a fear where there is no fear, and let them clearly recognize that their love of the letter is a cloak of impiety, as will be shown a little later, when we refute their objections to the best of our ability. But we have such confidence in the divinity of the Spirit, which we profess, that we shall even begin our theology from this point, applying the same terms to the Trinity, even if it seems to some too bold. The true light, which illumines every man coming into the world, was the Father. The true light, which illumines every man coming into the world, was the Son. The true light, which illumines every man coming into the world, was the other Paraclete. It was, and it was, and it was; but it was one. Light, and light, and light; but one light, one God. This is what David earlier envisioned, saying: "In your light we shall see light." And now we both have beheld and proclaim, from the light of the Father comprehending the Son in the light of the Spirit, a concise and unadorned theology of the Trinity.

Let the rejecter reject, let the lawless one act lawlessly; we proclaim what we have understood. We shall ascend a high mountain and shout, if we are not heard from below. We shall exalt the Spirit, we shall not be afraid. But if we are afraid, it will be in silence, not in proclamation. If there was a time when the Father was not, there was a time when the Son was not. If there was a time when the Son was not, there was a time when the Holy Spirit was not either. If the one was from the beginning, so were the three. If you cast down the one, I dare to say, do not set up the two above. For what benefit is there from an incomplete divinity? Or rather, what divinity is there if it is not complete? And how is it complete, if something is lacking for its completion? And it lacks something, if it does not have the Holy; but how could it have it, if it does not have this? For holiness is something else besides this; and let someone say what this is conceived to be. Or if it is the same, how is it not from the beginning? As if it were better for God to be at some time incomplete, and without the Spirit. If it was not from the beginning, it is ranked with me, and even if a little before me. For in time we are separated from God. If it is ranked with me, how does it make me God, or how does it join me to divinity? Rather, I will philosophize to you about it a little from the beginning. For we have previously discussed the Trinity. The Sadducees thought that the Holy Spirit did not exist at all; for they did not believe in angels either, nor in resurrection; I do not know how they spat upon the many testimonies about it in the Old Testament. But the more theological among the Greeks, and those who approached us more closely, imagined it, as it seems to me; but they differed concerning the name, calling it the mind of the universe, and the external mind, and such things.

Among our own wise men, some have taken this to be an energy, others a creature, others God, and others have not known which of these it is, out of reverence for Scripture, as they say, because it has clearly indicated neither. And for this reason they neither honor nor dishonor it, but are disposed toward it in some middle way, or rather in a very wretched state. And of those who have taken it to be God, some are pious only in thought, while others dare to be pious also with their lips. I have heard of others, wiser ones, who measure divinity, who agree with us that the objects of thought are three, but have separated them from each other to such an extent that one is indefinite in both substance and power, another in power but not in substance, and the third is circumscribed in both, imitating in another way those who name the creator, the co-worker, and the servant, and think that the order and grace of the names correspond to the order of the realities.

6 For us, there is no argument with those who have taken it not even to exist, or with those who babble among the Greeks. For we would not anoint our discourse with the oil of sinners. But to the others we will speak thus. The Holy Spirit must be placed either among the things that subsist in themselves, or among those that are contemplated in another. Of these, the former is called substance by those skilled in these matters, the latter accident. If, then, it is an accident, it would be an energy of God. For what else, or of what? For this somehow avoids composition. And if it is an energy, it will clearly be energized, not energize, and will cease together with being energized. For such is energy. How then does it energize, and speak thus, and define, and grieve, and become angry, and do all the things that clearly belong to a mover, not to a motion?

But if it is some substance, not one of those that are about the substance, it will be taken either as a creature or as God. For something intermediate between these, either partaking of neither or composed of both, not even those who fashion goat-stags could conceive. But if it is a creature, how do we believe in it, or how are we perfected in it? For believing in something and believing about it are not the same. The former pertains to divinity, the latter to any matter. But if it is God, and not a creature, nor a product, nor a fellow servant, nor any of the lowly names at all. Here the argument is yours: let the slings be sent forth, let the syllogisms be woven. It is either unbegotten or begotten. And if unbegotten, there are two unoriginate things. But if begotten, subdivide again: either this is from the Father or from the Son. And if from the Father, there are two sons and brothers. And you may fashion twins for me, if you wish, or one older and the other younger, since you are very fond of the corporeal. But if from the Son, then, he says, a grandson God has appeared to us—what could be more paradoxical than this? These things, then, are from those wise in doing evil, but unwilling to write good things. But I, if I saw the division to be necessary, would accept the realities, not fearing the names. For not because the Son is Son according to some higher relation, since we were unable to indicate the origin from God and the consubstantiality otherwise than in this way, must one already think it necessary to transfer all the lower names, and those of our own kinship, to the divine. Or perhaps you would even suppose God to be male for us, according to

This argument, that God is called Father, and that the deity is something feminine, as far as the names go; and that the Spirit is neuter, because it is not generative; and if this too is played with, that God by his own will consorted with himself, according to the old nonsense and myths, to beget the Son, then there was introduced to us a god of Marcion and Valentinus, androgynous, who fashioned the new aeons. Since we do not accept your first division, which assumes nothing intermediate between unbegotten and begotten, immediately your brothers and your grandchildren will depart with your solemn division, dissolved together as if some intricate bond were broken when the first principle was dissolved, and they will withdraw from theology. For where will you place the Procession, tell me, which has appeared in the middle of your division, and is introduced by a theologian better or greater than you, our Savior? Unless you have removed that saying from your Gospels, because of your third testament: "The Holy Spirit, which proceeds from the Father." Which, insofar as it proceeds from there, is not a creature; insofar as it is not begotten, it is not a Son; insofar as it is between unbegotten and begotten, it is God. And thus, having escaped the nets of your syllogisms, it has appeared as God, stronger than your divisions. What then is the Procession? You tell the unbegottenness of the Father, and I will give a physical account of the generation of the Son and the Procession of the Spirit, and we will both be mad, peeping into the mysteries of God. And who are these?

Those who cannot even know what lies at their feet, nor count the sand of the seas, the drops of rain, or the days of eternity, let alone explore the depths of God and give an account of a nature so ineffable and beyond reason. "What then," it is said, "is lacking in the Spirit for it to be a Son? For if something were not lacking, it would be a Son." We say nothing is lacking; for God is not deficient. But the difference in the manner of manifestation, so to speak, or of their relation to one another, has made their appellation different as well. For neither does the Son lack anything to be a Father—for sonship is not a deficiency—yet he is not for that reason a Father. Or, on this reasoning, the Father would also lack something to be a Son, for the Father is not a Son. But these things are not due to any deficiency, nor to any diminution in essence; rather, it is the fact of not being begotten, of being begotten, and of proceeding that has named one the Father, another the Son, and this one what is called the Holy Spirit, so that the distinctness of the three hypostases may be preserved in the one nature and dignity of the Godhead. For the Son is not the Father—for the Father is one—but he is what the Father is; nor is the Spirit a Son, because it is from God—for the Only-begotten is one—but it is what the Son is. The three are one in divinity, and the one is three in properties, so that the one may not be Sabellian, nor the three that of the evil division now current.

What then? Is the Spirit God? Certainly. Is it then consubstantial? If it is God. "Give me then," he says, "from the same source one being son and the other not son, yet consubstantial, and I accept God and God." Give me also another God and a nature of God, and I will give you the same Trinity with the same names and realities. But if God is one, and the supreme nature is one, how shall I present the likeness to you? Or do you again seek it from lower things and from things around you? It is very shameful, and not only shameful but also quite futile, to take the likeness of higher things from lower things, and of the immovable from the flowing nature, and, as Isaiah says, to seek the living among the dead. Nevertheless, I will try, for your sake, to give some assistance to the argument from this source as well. I think I will pass over the other matters, though I could say many things from the history of animals, some familiar to us, some to the few, concerning the devices nature has contrived in the generation of animals. For it is said that not only are the same things born from the same things, nor different things from different things, but also the same things from different things, and different things from the same things. And if the account is credible to anyone, there is also another mode of generation, something being consumed by itself and

born. There are also those that in some way depart from themselves, changing and transforming from one kind of animal into another, by the ambition of nature. And even in the same being, one part is not an offspring, the other is an offspring, yet they are consubstantial; this somewhat resembles the present case. Having mentioned one of our examples, which is familiar to all, I will move on to another argument.

11 What then was Adam? A creation of God. And what was Eve? A portion of that creation. And what was Seth? An offspring of both. Does it then seem to you that creation, portion, and offspring are the same? How could they not be? And are these consubstantial, or what? How could they not be? It is therefore agreed that things which have come into being in different ways can be of the same substance. I say these things not to apply creation, or division, or anything bodily to the divinity—let none of the word-battlers attack me again—but to contemplate, as on a stage, the things understood through these examples. For none of the images can fully and purely reach the whole truth. And what of these, they say? For in the one, one part is an offspring, the other is something else. What then? Are Eve and Seth not from the same Adam? From whom else? Or are both offspring? Not at all. But what? One is a portion, the other an offspring. And yet both are the same as each other: for they are human; no one will deny it. Will you then cease fighting against the Spirit, as if it must either be an offspring or not consubstantial, and not God, and take from human matters what is possible for our understanding? I think it is well for you, unless you are too fond of contention and fight against the obvious. But who has worshipped the Spirit, he says? Who among the ancients or the moderns? And who has prayed?

Where is it written to worship or pray to the font? And from where have you taken this? We will give the more complete reason later, when we discuss the unwritten. For now, it will suffice to say this: it is the Spirit in which we worship and through which we pray. For God is Spirit, it says, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. And again: For we do not know what we will pray, as we ought, but the Spirit itself intercedes for us with ineffable groans. And, I will pray to the Spirit, and I will also pray to the mind, that is, in mind and spirit. Therefore, to worship or pray to the Spirit seems to me to be nothing other than to offer the prayer and worship to itself. Which of the inspired, and of those who know well that the worship of the one is the worship of the three, because of the equal honor of rank and divinity in the three, would not praise this? And indeed, I will not fear that saying that all things came to be through the Son, as if the Holy Spirit were one of all things. For it is said, all things that have come to be, not simply all things; for neither the Father, nor those things that have not come to be. Show, then, that it has come to be, and then give it to the Son, and number it among creatures. But as long as you do not show this, the inclusive term does not help you toward impiety. For if it has come to be, it is certainly through Christ; I myself will not deny this. But if it has not come to be, how is it either one of all things, or through Christ?

Cease, then, from dishonoring the Father against the Only-begotten—for it is a bad honor to give a creature while depriving the Son of what is more honorable—and the Son against the Spirit. For the Creator is not of a fellow-slave, but is glorified together with one of equal honor. Place nothing of yourself alongside the Trinity, lest you fall from the Trinity. Cut off nothing from the one nature, equally venerable, since whatever of the three you remove, you will have destroyed the whole, or rather, you will have fallen from the whole. It is better to take a small impression of the union than to dare a complete impiety. Our discourse has now come to the very point; and I groan, because a question long dead and yielded to faith is now revived; yet it is necessary to stand against the word-spinners, and not to be condemned in default, having a word and pleading for the Spirit. If God, they say, and God, and God, how are there not three gods? Or how is what is glorified not a polyarchy? Who are these? Those more perfect in impiety, or also those of the second party, I mean those somehow well-disposed concerning the Son? For my argument is common to both, but specific to these. The argument to these, then, is as follows. What do you say to us tritheists, you who worship the Son, if you have also stood away from the Spirit? Are you not ditheists? For if you deny the worship of the Only-begotten as well, you are clearly ranked with the opponents; and why do we deal kindly with you as not altogether dead? But if you worship, and are thus disposed up to this point in a saving manner, we will ask you: what is the reason for your ditheism, if you are accused of this? If there is a reason of understanding, answer, give us also a path of answer.

For with whatever arguments you repel ditheism, these same will suffice for us against tritheism. And thus we conquer, using you, our accusers, as advocates—what could be more noble? And what is our common struggle and argument against both? For us, there is one God, because there is one divinity; and the things from him have their reference to the one, even if three are believed. For one is not more God and another less; nor is one prior and another posterior; nor is it divided by will, nor separated by power, nor does it possess any of the things that belong to divisible beings, even if these are to be taken here; but the divinity is undivided in divided things, to speak concisely—like a single fusion of light in three suns holding together. So when we look toward the divinity, the first cause, and the monarchy, what appears to us is one; but when we look toward the things in which the divinity resides, and those which exist from the first cause timelessly and with equal honor, the objects of veneration are three. What then, would they say, is there not also among the Greeks, as those who philosophize more perfectly among them hold, one divinity, and among us one humanity, the whole race? Yet there are many gods, and not one, just as there are many men? But there, the commonality has the one only as conceivable in thought; while the individuals are for the most part separated from each other both in time and in passions and in power. For we are not only composite, but also opposed both to each other and to ourselves, not remaining the same purely for a single day, let alone for an entire life, but ever flowing and changing in both bodies and souls.

I do not know whether even angels and every higher nature after the Trinity, even if they are simple and more firmly fixed toward the good by their proximity to the ultimate good.

As for the gods and demons honored by the Greeks, as they themselves call them, they have no need of accusers from us, but are caught by their own theologians, as being subject to passions, as factious, as full of evils and changes, and as being opposed not only to one another but also to the first causes, whom they call Oceans, Tethyses, Phanetes, and I know not what names; and finally a certain god who is child-hating because of love of power, swallowing all the others out of insatiability, so that he might become father of all men and gods, with the others being wretchedly eaten and vomited. But if these are myths and some hidden meanings, as they themselves say, escaping the shame of the account, what will they say to the phrase "All things have been divided three ways," and to one thing ruling over another of the beings, with them being divided both in matter and in rank? But ours is not such; "this is not the portion of Jacob," says my theologian; but each one of them has no less a relation to the composite than to itself, by the identity of essence and power. And this is the account of unity, as far as we have comprehended. If then this account is strong, thanks be to God for the contemplation; if not, let us seek the stronger one.

I do not know whether to say that your arguments are made in jest or in earnest, by which you do away with our unity. For what is the argument? Things that are homoousios are counted together, you say—meaning by "counted together" their reduction to a single number—but things that are not homoousios are not counted together. So you will not escape speaking of three gods according to this argument, while we run no risk at all, for we do not say they are homoousios. You have thus freed yourself from difficulties with a single phrase, and have won a shameful victory, doing something like those who hang themselves for fear of death. For in order to avoid laboring to uphold the monarchy, you have denied divinity and betrayed to the enemies what is at issue. But I, even if I must labor, will not betray what is worshipped. And here I do not even see what the labor is.

Things that are homoousios are counted together, you say; but things that are not so have a monadic designation. Where do you get this, and from what dogmatists or mythologists? Or are you ignorant that every number is indicative of the quantity of the subjects, not of the nature of the things? I am so old-fashioned, or rather so ignorant, that I call three things those that are three in number, even if they differ in nature; and one, and one, and one, otherwise the same number of units, even if they are united in substance, looking not so much to the things themselves as to the quantity of the things over which the counting is made. But since you are excessively fond of the letter, even though you war against the letter, take your proofs from there. There are three in the Proverbs that go well together: a lion, a goat, and a rooster; and a king haranguing a people is the fourth.

not to mention the other tetrads counted there, but divided in nature. And I find the two cherubim of Moses counted as units. How then are those three, according to your technicality, so separated from each other in nature, or these units, so consubstantial and composed with each other? For if I were to speak of God and Mammon as two lords counted as one, being so far apart from each other, I would perhaps be even more ridiculed for the counting.

19 But to me, he says, those things are said to be counted together, and of the same substance, whose names are correspondingly pronounced together; for example, three men, and three gods, not three of this and that. For what is the reciprocity? This is the work of one who legislates for names, not one who speaks the truth. Since for me, Peter, Paul, and John are not three, nor consubstantial, unless they are called three Peters, three Pauls, and as many Johns. For what you have observed in the case of the more generic names, we too will demand in the case of the more specific names according to your reconstruction. Or will you do injustice, not giving what you have received? And what of John, who says in the Catholic Epistles that the Spirit, the water, and the blood are three witnesses? Does he seem to you to be talking nonsense, first because he dared to count together things that are not consubstantial, which you grant to consubstantial things—for who would say these are of one substance?—and second because he did not answer correspondingly, but having set forth the three in the masculine, he brought in the three in the neuter, contrary to your rules and the laws of your grammar?

And yet what difference does it make, whether you set forth three and then add one and one and one, or, saying one and one and one, you call them not three but three? Which you yourself disallow in the case of the Godhead. And what of the crab—the animal, the instrument, and the star? And what of the dog—the land-dog, the sea-dog, and the celestial dog? Do they not seem to you to be called three crabs and three dogs? Certainly. Are they therefore also consubstantial? Who among the sensible would say so? Do you see how your argument about co-numbering has collapsed, refuted by so many examples? For if neither are consubstantial things always co-numbered, nor are non-consubstantial things co-numbered, and the pronunciation of the names is the same in both cases, what more have you than what you have dogmatized?

I consider also this, and perhaps it is not beside the point. Does not one and one combine into two? And are not two resolved into one and one? Clearly. If, then, according to your argument, the things combined are consubstantial, and the things divided are heteroousial, what follows? That the same things are both consubstantial and heteroousial. I laugh at your pre-numberings and your

You enumerate and then sub-enumerate, in which you take great pride, as if the realities were placed in the order of the names. For if this is so, what prevents, by the same reasoning, since the same things are both enumerated and sub-enumerated in divine Scripture on account of the equality of nature, that they should be more honorable and less honorable than themselves? The same argument applies to me concerning the terms God and Lord; and further concerning the prepositions from which, through which, and in which, with which you craftily contrive the divine for us, assigning one to the Father, another to the Son, and another to the Holy Spirit. For what would you have done, if each of these were firmly assigned to each, when all are coordinated with all, as is clear to the diligent, do you introduce through these such inequality both of dignity and of nature? This suffices for those not utterly lacking in understanding. But since you are among the difficult, having once attacked the Spirit, you cannot be restrained from your course, but, like the more reckless of swine, you persist to the end and thrust yourself against the sword, until you receive the whole wound within, come, let us consider what argument still remains for you. Again and again you rehearse to us the unwritten. That this is not foreign nor imported, but known and partially revealed both to the ancients and to the moderns, has already been shown by many of those who have treated this subject, who have not carelessly or superficially encountered the divine Scriptures, but have pierced the letter and looked within, and have been deemed worthy to see the hidden beauty and have been illuminated by the light of knowledge.

Let us also set forth, in passing, as far as possible, so as not to appear superfluous or more ambitious than is proper, building upon a foundation that is not our own. But if the fact that God is not written of very clearly nor often by name, just as the Father is earlier and the Son later, becomes for you a cause of blasphemy and of this excessive wordiness and impiety, we will resolve this harm for you, having philosophized a little about realities and names, especially according to the usage of Scripture. Of realities, some do not exist but are spoken of; some exist but are not spoken of; some neither exist nor are spoken of; some both exist and are spoken of. Do you demand proofs of these from me? I am ready to provide them. In Scripture, God sleeps and wakes, and becomes angry, and walks, and has a throne of cherubim; yet when did He become subject to passion? When have you heard that God is a body? This was fashioned as something that does not exist. For we have named, as far as is attainable for us, the things of God from our own things. That He is at rest from us, and so to speak unconcerned, for reasons He Himself knows, we call sleeping. For our sleeping is of this kind, inactive and inoperative. But that He suddenly does good by a change, we call waking. For the release from sleep is waking, just as attention is the release from turning away. That He punishes, we have made to be angry; for thus punishment comes from anger for us. That He now acts here, now there, we call walking. For the transition from one thing to another is walking. That He reposes among the holy powers and so to speak dwells there, we call sitting and being enthroned. And this is our usage. For the divine reposes in nothing so much as in the holy ones.

But the swift motion, flight; the oversight, face; the giving and receiving, hand; and some other of the powers or energies of God altogether depicted for us something else of the bodily things.

Again, from where have you taken the unbegotten, or the unoriginate, your strongholds, or we the immortal? Show these by name, or we will reject them, since they are not written, or we will erase them. And you have died by your own hypotheses, your names having been demolished, and the wall of refuge on which you relied. Or is it clear that they come from those things that imply them, even if they are not said? What are these? I am first and I am after these. And, Before me there is no other god and after me there will be none. For the whole "is" is mine; neither begun nor ceasing. Taking these, that there is nothing before him, nor any older cause, you have called unoriginate and unbegotten; and that he will not cease to be, immortal and indestructible. Now the first pairs are such, and so they stand. But what things neither are nor are said? The divine is evil, the sphere is square, the past is present, man is not composite. For whom have you ever known to have arrived at such a point of folly as to dare to think or declare such a thing? It remains to show what things both are and are said: God, man, angel, judgment; such syllogisms are vanity, and a subversion of faith, and an emptying of the mystery.

Such being the difference in names and things, how is it that you are so slavishly bound to the letter, and become a follower of Jewish wisdom, pursuing syllables while abandoning realities? If, when you said twice five, or twice seven, I understood ten, or fourteen from what was said; or from "rational, mortal animal" I understood man, would I then be considered to be talking nonsense? And how, when speaking your own words? For words belong not more to the speaker than to the one who compels the speaking. Just as here I would not look at what is said more than at what is meant, so too if I found something else not said, or not clearly, understood from scripture, I would avoid the utterance, fearing you as a slanderer of names. Thus we will stand against those who are only half reasonable. For you cannot even say this. For one who denies the titles of the Son, which are so clear and so many, would obviously not respect these either, even if you knew them to be much clearer and more numerous. And now I will also reveal the reason for the entire concealment, although you are wise, by briefly raising the argument.

Two notable changes of life have occurred in all of time, which are also called two covenants, and earthquakes of the earth, because of the notoriety of the matter: one from idols to the law, the other from the law to the gospel. And we proclaim a third earthquake, the departure from here to there, things no longer moved nor shaken. The two covenants have undergone the same thing. What is this? They were not changed all at once, nor at the first impulse of the undertaking. Why? For it is necessary to know. So that we might not be forced, but persuaded. For the involuntary is not lasting, just as things held by force among streams or plants; but the voluntary is more lasting and secure. And the one belongs to the one who forces, the other to us; and the one belongs to the gentleness of God, the other to tyrannical power. Therefore he did not think it right to do good to the unwilling, but to benefit the willing. For this reason, in a pedagogical and medical manner, he removes some of the ancestral practices and permits others, yielding a little to pleasure, just as physicians do with the sick, so that the remedy may be accepted, the medicine being sweetened by more pleasant things. For the change of things honored by custom and long time is not easy. What do I mean? The first covenant, having cut away idols, permitted sacrifices; the second, having removed sacrifices, did not forbid circumcision; then, once they had accepted the removal, they also yielded what had been permitted: the former, sacrifices; the latter, circumcision; and they became, instead of pagans, Jews; and instead of these, Christians, being drawn to the gospel by gradual changes.

Let Paul persuade you of this, who advanced from circumcising and purifying to saying, “But I, brothers, if I preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted?” That belongs to the economy, this to perfection.

26 I have to compare this to the matter of theology, except insofar as it is from opposites. For there the transition was by subtractions; here the perfection is by additions. For it is thus: the Old Testament clearly preached the Father, the Son more dimly. The New Testament revealed the Son, and indicated the divinity of the Spirit.

Now the Spirit is being made at home among us, providing us a clearer manifestation of himself. For it was not safe, before the divinity of the Father was confessed, for the Son to be openly preached; nor, before the Son was accepted, for the Holy Spirit—to say something even bolder—to be burdened upon them; lest, as if weighed down by food beyond their strength, or exposing their still weaker eyes to the light of the sun, they should risk even what is within their power. But by partial additions, and, as David said, by ascents, and by advances and progressions from glory to glory, the light of the Trinity shines forth to the more radiant. For this reason, I think, he also visits the disciples in part, measured by the capacity of the recipients, at the beginning of the Gospel, after the passion, after the ascension, perfecting the powers, being breathed out, appearing in fiery tongues. And by Jesus he is gradually revealed, as you yourself will notice if you read more carefully: “I will ask the Father,” he says, “and he will send you another Paraclete, the Spirit of truth.

so that one might not seem to be an adversary of God and to be making arguments from some other authority. Then, "He will send," but "in my name." He omitted "I will ask" and preserved "He will send." Then, "I will send," his own dignity; then, "He will come," the authority of the Spirit.

27 You see illuminations shining upon us in part, and a order of theology, which it is better for us also to observe, neither revealing all at once nor concealing entirely. For the former is artless, the latter godless; and the former can strike outsiders, the latter can alienate our own. And what perhaps has already occurred to some others as well, but I take to be the fruit of my own thought, I will add to what has been said. There were some things, even if the disciples were filled with many teachings, which were said to be unable to be borne by the disciples at that time, for the reasons I have perhaps mentioned, and for this reason were concealed; and again, that we would be taught all things by the Spirit when it came to dwell among us. One of these I consider to be the very divinity of the Spirit, made clear later, since at that time the knowledge was already ripe and capable of being received, after the restoration of the Savior, no longer disbelieved because of the miracle. For what greater thing than this did he promise, or did the Spirit teach? If indeed one must consider something great and worthy of the magnificence of God, whether the promise or the teaching. I hold thus concerning these matters, and may I continue to hold them, and may anyone who is my friend—to reverence God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, three persons, one divinity, not divided in glory, honor, substance, and kingdom, as one of the recent God-bearing philosophers has taught.

or not see the morning star rising, as the scripture says, nor the glory of the brightness from there, whoever does not have this disposition, or goes along with the times, becoming one thing at one time and another at another, and deliberating unsoundly about the greatest matters. For if it is not to be worshipped, how does it deify me through baptism? But if it is to be worshipped, how is it not venerable? And if it is venerable, how is it not God? One depends on the other, a truly golden and salvific chain. And from the Spirit comes our regeneration; from regeneration, our re-formation; from re-formation, the recognition of the worth of the one who re-formed us.

29 Now, one might say these things on the hypothesis of unwritten tradition; but already the swarm of testimonies will come to you, from which, that the divinity of the Spirit is also very much written, will be shown to those who are not too perverse nor alien to the Spirit. Consider it thus: Christ is born, the Spirit precedes; he is baptized, the Spirit bears witness; he is tempted, the Spirit leads him up; he works miracles, the Spirit accompanies him; he ascends, the Spirit succeeds him. For what great thing, and what belongs to God, is the Spirit not capable of? And by what titles belonging to God is the Spirit not addressed, except unbegottenness and generation? For the properties must remain with the Father and the Son, so that there be no confusion in the divinity, which brings everything else into order and good order. For my part, I shudder at the wealth

considering the titles, and how many names those who oppose the Spirit shamelessly misuse. It is called Spirit of God, Spirit of Christ, mind of Christ, Spirit of the Lord, the Lord itself; Spirit of adoption, of truth, of freedom; Spirit of wisdom, understanding, counsel, might, knowledge, piety, fear of God; for it is productive of all these; filling everything with its essence, containing everything; filling the world according to its essence, uncontained by the world according to its power; good, straight, governing, by nature not by position; sanctifying, not sanctified, measuring, not measured; participated in, not participating, filling, not filled, containing, not contained; inherited, glorified, counted, threatened; finger of God, fire as God, for emphasis, I think, of the consubstantial; Spirit that makes, that renews through baptism, through resurrection; Spirit that knows all, that teaches, that blows where and as it wills, guiding, speaking, sending, separating, being provoked, being tempted; revealing, illuminating, life-giving, rather self-light and life; temple-making, deifying, perfecting, so that it both anticipates baptism and is sought after baptism; doing all that God does, distributed in fiery tongues, dividing gifts, making apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers; intellectual, manifold, clear, distinct, unhindered, undefiled; which is equally powerful, most wise and manifold in its energies, and clarifying of all things, and making distinct, and self-determined, and unchangeable.

all-powerful, all-surveying, penetrating through all intelligent, pure, most subtle, angelic powers, I think, as also prophetic and apostolic, at the same time, and not in the same places, but with others distributed elsewhere, by which its unboundedness is manifested.

Those who say and teach these things, and who call it another god, as it were, another god, who know only blasphemy against it as unforgivable, who so fearfully denounced Ananias and Sapphira because they lied to the Holy Spirit, as having lied to God, not to a man—what do you think these men do, proclaim the Spirit as God, or something else? You are indeed very dense, and far from the Spirit, if you are at a loss about this, and need someone to teach you. So many and so animated are the titles. For why should I set before you the testimonies from the words? But whatever is said here more humbly—being given, being sent, being divided, the gift, the donation, the inspiration, the promise, the intercession, or anything else of the sort, that I may not speak of each—must be referred to the first cause, so that that from which it comes may be shown, and that three divided principles may not be admitted polytheistically. For it is equally impious to unite as Sabellius does and to separate as the Arians do, the one in person, the other in natures. For my part, after much consideration with myself in the curiosity of my mind, and after examining the account from all sides, and seeking some image of so great a matter, I have found nothing among things below to which to compare the divine nature.

Even if some small likeness is found, the greater part escapes me, leaving me below with the example. I conceived of an eye, a spring, and a river—for others have done so too—lest the Father be analogous to one, the Son to another, and the Holy Spirit to a third. For these are neither separated by time nor severed from each other in continuity, even though they seem in some way to be divided by three properties. But I feared, first, to admit some flow of divinity without stability; second, lest the one in number be introduced through this image. For an eye, a spring, and a river are one in number, differently configured. Again, I considered the sun, a ray, and light. But here too there was fear, first, lest some composition be conceived in the uncompounded nature, as of the sun and the things in the sun; second, lest we substantialize the Father but not substantialize the others, making them powers of God that inhere but do not subsist. For neither a ray nor light is another sun, but certain solar effluences and essential qualities. And at the same time we would grant both being and non-being to God in these, as far as the example goes, which is even more absurd than what has been said. I also heard someone describing a discourse of this sort: a certain solar sparkle flashing against a wall and quivering from the motion of waters, which the ray, taking up through the intervening air and then being checked by the resistant surface, became a vibration and a paradox. For it darts with many and frequent motions, being neither one more than many, nor many more than one, escaping capture by the eye through the speed of its convergence and divergence.

But it is not possible for me to adopt this either, for one reason, because what set it in motion is entirely clear; but nothing is older than God, so that there might be something that set him in motion. For he himself is the cause of all things, and he has no older cause. And second, because here too there is the same suspicion of composition, flux, and an unstable and not fixed nature, none of which is to be conceived concerning the Godhead. And in general, there is nothing that stops my mind when I contemplate the appearances in the examples, unless someone, taking one element of the image, out of good sense should discard the rest. So finally it seemed best to me to let the images and shadows go, as deceptive and falling far short of the truth, and to cling to the more pious conception, standing on a few words, using the Spirit as a guide, preserving to the end this illumination which I received from there, as a genuine companion and fellow traveler, to traverse this age cutting through it, and to persuade others as far as possible to worship Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the one divinity and power; because to him is all glory, honor, might, unto the ages of ages. Amen.