Works 7 part 10/12

by not saying 'and the Holy Spirit,' he makes clear that the Spirit is not to be pronounced together with the Father and the Son, but with the universality. For God's servant Moses also says: 'The Lord rained from the Lord out of heaven brimstone and fire' (Gen. XIX, 24), and he does not mention the Holy Spirit. And Paul, having learned from him, also writes concerning Onesiphorus to Timothy: 'May the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord in that day' (II Tim. I, 18). And likewise in Exodus it is written: 'And the Lord said to Moses: How long do you refuse to obey my commandments, and to observe my law? Has not the Lord God given you this day of the sabbath? Therefore he has given you the bread of two days' (Exod. XVI, 28).

And here, when he had made mention of the Father and the Son, he was silent concerning the Holy Spirit. Finally, the prophet Zechariah also says: 'And the Lord said to the devil: The Lord rebuke you, O devil' (Zach. III, 2). Where now is the Holy Spirit even in this man's words? But who will not be moved by the instruction of the sacrament? As the Lord professes: 'And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent' (Joan. XVII, 3), when he had said nothing of the Spirit. Likewise Paul, when he had learned the sacrament of the faith, handed it down, writing thus: 'But to us there is one God the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him: and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him' (I Cor. VIII, 6).

Therefore everywhere the divine Scriptures, mentioning the Father and the Son, do not also commemorate the Holy Spirit. To whom we answer in this manner: If, then, you hear Moses saying: 'You shall adore the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve' (Deut. VI, 13). Or if you hear God saying in Isaiah: 'Before me there was no other God, and after me there shall be none' (Isai. XLIII, 10), where do you place the Son? Or if you hear him again in Isaiah saying: 'I am God, and there is none that saves besides me' (Isai. XLIII, 11). Therefore neither is God the Saviour — now for the fifth time according to you — said to be the Son of God in the confession. Or if you hear the same one again saying: 'You are my witnesses, whether there is a God besides me' (Isai. XLIV, 8); not declaring the Son to be God.

And again: 'I am the first God, and I am hereafter, and besides me there is no God' (Isai. XLIV, 6). And again: 'But you have not known me, that I am the Lord God, and there is no other besides me. I am the Lord, and there is no more God besides me, and you have not known me: that they may know, both those who are from the rising of the sun, and those who are from the west, that there is none besides me. I am the Lord God, and there is no more' (Isai. XLV, 4). But if you hear God saying in Joel: 'And you shall know that I am in the midst of Israel. I am the Lord your God, and there is no other besides me' (Joel II, 27); and when you hear other innumerable professions of this kind in the divine Scriptures, you certainly do not doubt that the Son is numbered with God.

And those Scriptures to which you have previously assented as having spoken of the Father and the Son — will you now say that these same things are contrary? Or perhaps these are not the words of the Scriptures? Do the divine Scriptures contradict themselves according to these things? God forbid. For although the saints speak singly with mention of one name, that is, of the Father, or of the Son, or of the Holy Spirit; yet in the one name they are known to pronounce the Trinity: which we have most recently proved. For just as these professions do not exclude the Son from the unity of the Father, but rather contain the Holy Spirit also numbered with the Father and the Son, as we have shown in the holy Scriptures, so neither, when the Scriptures name the Father and the Son, do they number the Spirit with the universality as though created.

Besides, how is it that you speak of the Father and the Son, or claim that the Scriptures make mention of them, while supposing that the Holy Spirit is not to be numbered together with the Father and the Son? And if you hear the Scriptures making mention of God and of the Spirit, what will you do then? The prophet Haggai indeed says: 'Therefore I am with you, says the Lord almighty, and my Spirit stands in the midst of you' (Haggai 2:5-6). Consider, then, where you would place the Son: for behold, the Almighty and the Spirit are signified. Or if you hear Isaiah saying: 'Woe to you, apostate children, says the Lord. You have made a plan, but not through me; and a pact, but not through my Spirit, to heap sins upon sins' (Isaiah 30:1). And again:

'The wild deer met one another, and beheld each other's faces; they passed by in their number, and not one of them perished. None sought another, for the Lord commanded them, and his Spirit gathered them' (Isaiah 34:15-16). Hearing these things, then, where do you look for the Son? Or if you hear the prophet Zechariah saying: 'Where are your fathers and the prophets? says the Lord. Will they live forever? Yet receive my words and my statutes, which I command in my Spirit to my servants the prophets, for they laid hold of your fathers' (Zechariah 1:5). Or if you hear David saying to God: 'Where shall I go from your Spirit, and where shall I flee from your face?' (Psalm 138:7) — what will you then think concerning the Son?

But if the apostle Paul also writes to the Corinthians: 'Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?' (1 Corinthians 3:16) — will you grant that the Father and the Spirit are numbered together, yet place the Son among the things that are wrought through the Spirit? By no means, I beg you; nor let this ever enter your minds, you devout men. But just as you have said that Paul wrote: 'Grace to you and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ' (Romans 1:7), and you suppose that he made no mention of the Spirit — so again hear him writing to the Corinthians in his second Epistle: 'The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all' (2 Corinthians 13:14).

And just as here he said 'the love of God,' so also to the Romans: 'Now I beseech you, brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, that you strive together with me in your prayers for me to God' (Romans 15:30). And when Paul had affirmed the communion of the Spirit with you, John says: 'That our communion may be with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ' (1 John 1:3). And the apostle Paul says: 'God is faithful, by whom you were called into the communion of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord' (1 Corinthians 1:9). In the first Epistle to the Corinthians too it is needful to hear Paul once more proclaiming the Trinity; for he says: 'Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit;

and there are diversities of ministries, but the same Lord; and there are diversities of operations, but the same God who works all in all' (1 Corinthians 12:4-6). And when he had said that God works all in all, and had professed the gifts that are bestowed upon the Church through the Spirit, he added: 'But all these the one and the same Spirit works, dividing to each one as he wills' (ibid., 11). Teaching that the operation of God is the operation of the Holy Spirit, did Paul depart from the Trinity? Did he subtract the Spirit from God and the Son? And just as he wrote to the Thessalonians: 'May the very God of peace sanctify you wholly' (1 Thessalonians 5:23), so likewise to the Corinthians in the first Epistle:

'But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God' (1 Corinthians 6:11). Do you observe that throughout the Scriptures the Holy Spirit is numbered together with the Father and the Son? The Son indeed is clearly to be heard in the prophet Isaiah, proclaiming himself, and the Father, and the Holy Spirit; for thus he says: 'Hear me, O Jacob and Israel, whom I call: I am the first, and I am unto eternity, and my hand founded the earth, and my right hand established the heaven. I will call them all, and they shall stand together, and all shall be gathered, and they shall hear: who has announced such things to them? Loving you, I have done your will in Babylon, that I might take away the seed of the Chaldeans:

I have spoken, I have called, I have brought him in, and made his way prosperous. Draw near to me, and hear these things not from the beginning: in secret I have spoken these things when they came to pass; and now the Lord has sent me, and his Spirit' (Isaiah 48:12-16). And again: 'I am he who blots out iniquities; declare your iniquities first, that you may be justified. Your fathers before you and their princes acted unjustly against me, and the princes profaned my holy things; and I gave up Jacob to destruction, and Israel to reproach' (Isaiah 43:25-28). 'But now hear, O Jacob my servant, and Israel whom I have chosen; for I will give water in the thirst to those who have made their way in the dry land; I will lay my Spirit upon your seed, and my blessings upon your children' (Isaiah

44:1-3). And Isaiah himself, proclaiming the Trinity, says: 'Behold, the name of the Lord comes after a long time, burning with wrath, with the glory of his lips, his word full of wrath, and his wrath like fire of fury; and his Spirit, like water in a valley sweeping along, shall come up to the neck' (Isaiah 30:27-28). And hear also Zechariah proclaiming the Trinity; for he says: 'Thus says the Lord almighty: execute true judgment, and show mercy and compassions every man to his brother; and do not oppress the widow and the orphan and the stranger and the poor by your power, and let none of you remember in your hearts the malice of his brother.

But they refused to give heed, and turned their back foolishly, and made their ears heavy, so that they would not hear my law and my words which the Lord almighty sent in his Spirit by the hand of the former prophets' (Zechariah 7:11-12). And the angel of the Lord said to Zechariah: 'This is the word of the Lord in the hand of Zerubbabel, saying: Not by great might, nor by strength, but by my Spirit, says the Lord almighty' (Zechariah 4:6). Let us hear Micah too, proclaiming the Trinity; for he himself says: 'Thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who lead my people astray, and bite with their teeth, who proclaim peace over them — yet no peace was given in their mouth — and they stirred up war against them.

Therefore night shall be to you instead of vision, and darkness shall be to you instead of divination; and the sun shall set upon the prophets, and the day shall be darkened over them; and those who see dreams shall be confounded, and the diviners shall be mocked, and all these shall murmur against them, because there is none who hears them. But as for me, I am full of power and in the Spirit of the Lord, with judgment and might, to declare to Jacob his iniquities, and to Israel his sins' (Micah 3:6-8). Let them therefore hear the saints fittingly proclaiming the Trinity, and never numbering the Holy Spirit with the created universe that was made through the Son, but confessing him together with the Father and the Son. But if the Savior's instruction, as they say, moves them, when he says:

'And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent' (John 17:3), and that he does not add 'that they may know the Holy Spirit' — they will be satisfied when they hear the Lord our Savior himself speaking also of the Spirit: 'If you love me, keep my commandments, and I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Paraclete, that he may abide with you forever: the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see him, nor know him; but you know him, for he abides with you, and shall be in you' (John 14:15-17). Let them mark, then, that the apostles indeed know both the Spirit, and the Son, and the Father;

but the world is wretched, because it has not known the Father, nor the Son, nor the Spirit, the Lord saying that they have not known the Father, nor me (John 16:3). And again: 'the Paraclete, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see, nor know him.' And the Lord pointedly said that the Holy Spirit is 'another Paraclete,' since he himself also is a Paraclete, as John says in his Epistle: 'These things I write to you, that you may not sin; but if any of us sin, we have a Paraclete with the Father, Jesus Christ, and he is the propitiation for our sins' (1 John 2:1-2). This was that we might be taught the equality of the Spirit with the Son.

Yet how does the Lord not strike fear into them, who, when delivering the sacrament of the faith to the apostles, says: 'Go now, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit' (Matthew 28:19)? And likewise that great and blessed confession of faith — indeed, the very faith of the saints, and the covenant which we have set down toward the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, when coming to the sacred laver of regeneration we thus confessed: 'I believe in God the Father almighty, and in Jesus Christ his only-begotten Son, and in the Holy Spirit.' And although the Lord said: 'You believe in God, believe also in me' (John 14:1), and did not say:

'Believe in the Holy Spirit,' nevertheless the apostles taught the Churches of the whole world to believe in the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Therefore let them say whether there is salvation for those who believe in the Father and the Son, but do not believe in the Holy Spirit — but God forbid! For neither do those believe in God who do not believe in the Holy Spirit. Finally, Paul, having found certain disciples and asked them whether they had received the Holy Spirit when they believed, and they having answered that they had not even heard whether there was a Holy Spirit, said: 'Into what then were you baptized?' (Acts 19:2-3) — proving that those who are not baptized in the name of the Holy Spirit are not baptized even in the name of the Father and the Son. Thus indeed we also acknowledge the Holy Spirit to be Creator.

Otherwise, if the Spirit is not Creator, and we were created from the beginning without him, why are we not regenerated without him in our regeneration? Or does our regeneration perhaps restore us to that ancient state which existed before the transgression of Adam? Since indeed, as you say, we were created without the Holy Spirit, how is it that here, in our regeneration, he is taken up without cause? But to say this is irreligious. Or is it that man, as though created without him, was the greater and more secure, and yet fell away, and therefore the Spirit is taken up in our regeneration for a surer protection? But this too is utterly impious, even to enter into anyone's thought.

Let them say, then, how the Spirit is taken up into our regeneration, if he did not create us from the beginning — supposing indeed that he did not create us. Perhaps you will say: that he may sanctify those who come to the laver of regeneration? For the Holy Spirit is indeed one who sanctifies the holy, yet not a Creator: all things were created from God through the Son, according to Paul who says: 'But to us there is one God the Father, of whom are all things, and one Lord of ours, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him' (1 Corinthians 8:6). Here, however, he said nothing of the Holy Spirit. To them we reply: Was the creature made holy through the Son, or not holy? And indeed it is unlawful to say that what was created by the Lord is unholy.

But if the Son created it holy, while sanctifying it now in the Spirit, then the sanctification which is given to it through the Holy Spirit is superfluous, and very feeble and empty — just as when the sun, at midday in its course, illumines the world that is under heaven, the splendor of a lamp is superfluous and feeble and empty. But since, they say, the creature did not deserve to be sanctified through the Son, therefore God enjoined this ministry upon the Spirit, that through him it might be sanctified. Therefore it deserved indeed to be created through the Son, but did not deserve to be sanctified. Which then is the greater: to be created or to be sanctified? Weigh it, then, in the balance of your mind, considering it, so that even thus you may be able to perceive that you yourselves, even unwillingly, confess the dignity of the Spirit.

Therefore the creature deserved indeed to be created through the Son, but to be sanctified through the Spirit, because the Son created it by no means unworthy of its sanctification. But it was necessary, they say, that it should first be sanctified through the Holy Spirit, so that it might thus deserve to receive sanctification through the Son and the Father. To whom we say: Then will you say that the Son did not create it holy? But God forbid! For neither does the Spirit sanctify without the Son, nor the Son without the Spirit or the Father — as you yourselves have said, and it is true what Paul, writing to the Thessalonians, says: 'May the very God and our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ sanctify you wholly' (1 Thessalonians 5:23). And to the Corinthians in the first Epistle:

'But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God' (1 Corinthians 6:11). Do you see the unity of sanctification, how the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit sanctify the creature? If therefore the holy creation was created, but was not sanctified without the Holy Spirit, then it is necessary that we all ought to confess the Holy Spirit also to be Creator. Otherwise, if you are unwilling to confess this, what then will you do, saying that the creation is not a holy creature, and then that it was sanctified through the Spirit?

But you fear the mark of irreligion, confessing in every way that the condition of the creature is holy, yet not altogether sanctified without the Spirit — so you have confessed the Spirit also to be Creator. If you know the Word of God to be his Son, hear David in the psalm saying: 'By the Word of God the heavens were established, and by the Spirit of his mouth all their power' (Psalm 32:6), and teaching us that the creature was not created without the Holy Spirit — whom the Word breathed with his bodily mouth into the face of the apostles, saying: 'Receive the Holy Spirit' (John 20:22). Nor did he have a mouth, since the Word is incorporeal, even as the Father of this Word. Otherwise, if from the beginning we were created without the Holy Spirit, how shall the resurrection of the dead be effected through him?

Now Paul says to the Romans: 'If the Spirit of him who raised up Jesus Christ from the dead dwells in you, he who raised up Jesus Christ from the dead will also quicken your mortal bodies through his Spirit that dwells in you' (Romans 8:11). And in agreement with this, David, singing to God, says concerning the creature: 'You will take away their spirit, and they shall fail and be turned into their dust. Send forth your Spirit, and they shall be created, and you shall renew the face of the earth' (Psalm 103:29-30). It is incongruous that the creature should be fashioned from the beginning in one way, and created in the last day in another. And so, even if you are unwilling, the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete who is sent from God, is nonetheless proclaimed by the saints to be Creator:

'You shall send forth your Spirit, and they shall be created, and you shall renew the face of the earth.' And as the Father and the Son are said in Scripture to have made, so the Holy Spirit too will be found to have made. For God says in Jeremiah that he led this Israel in the wilderness, saying to the people: 'And you did not say, Where is the Lord who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, who led us in the wilderness?' (Jeremiah 2:6). And Isaiah too, who is to be heard, says that the Holy Spirit led Israel in the wilderness, saying thus: 'He led them through the deep, as a horse through the wilderness, and they did not grow weary like beasts of burden through the field; the Spirit came down from the Lord, and led them' (Isaiah 63:13-14). And the law of God is also called the law of the Spirit.

Now concerning each one of the saints it is said in the thirty-sixth psalm: 'The law of his God is in his heart' (Psalm 36:31). And concerning himself Paul says: 'I became,' he says, 'to those who are without law, as though I were without law — although I was not outside the law of God, but was within the law of Christ — that I might gain those who are without law' (1 Corinthians 9:21). And again he writes to the Romans: 'For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has freed me from the law of sin and death' (Romans 8:2). So that the unity of the Trinity might be found in the Holy Scriptures: for the things that are of God, and of Christ, and of the Holy Spirit we find in them, even as the Lord said to the Jews: 'Render therefore the things that are Caesar's to Caesar, and the things that are God's to God' (Luke 20:25).

Paul also writes to the Philippians: 'For all seek their own things, not the things of Jesus Christ' (Philippians 2:21). And again to the Corinthians: 'But the natural man does not perceive the things that are of the Spirit of God; for it is folly to him' (1 Corinthians 2:14). And men indeed, our fathers, are called by the name of God: men of God; the disciples are called Christians by the name of Christ; and the spiritual are called by the name of the Holy Spirit. For that widow of Sarepta of Sidon must be heard, saying to Elijah the Tishbite: 'What have I to do with you, O man of God?' (1 Kings 17:18). And again: 'Now I know that you are a man of God' (ibid., 24). And that Shunammite woman, saying to her husband concerning Elisha: 'Behold, a great man of God comes to us' (2 Kings 4:9).

The Scripture of Kings itself also says: 'And a man of God came out of Judah, and prophesied against the altar of Bethel' (2 Kings 23:17). And likewise the title of the eighty-ninth psalm: 'A prayer of Moses the man of God' (Psalm 89:1). And Luke in the Acts of the Apostles says: 'And it came to pass that for a whole year they gathered together in the Church, and the disciples were first called Christians in the Church' (Acts 11:26). And Paul writes to the Corinthians: 'Now concerning spiritual things, brethren, I would not have you ignorant. You know that when you were Gentiles, you were led away, however it might be, to dumb idols; wherefore I make known to you that no one speaking in the Spirit of God says, Anathema to Jesus; and no one can say the Lord Jesus, except in the Holy Spirit' (1 Corinthians 12:1-3).

And again: 'The natural man does not perceive the things that are of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually discerned; but the spiritual man judges all things, while he himself is judged by no one. For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ' (1 Corinthians 2:14-16). Now the mind of Christ in its own substance the Apostle professed to be the Holy Spirit: 'For who knows the things that are of God, except the Spirit of God? Just as our spirit knows the things that are ours.' As the same Paul writes to the Corinthians: 'But to us God has revealed them through his Holy Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God:

for who among men knows the things of a man, except the spirit of the man which is in him? So also no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit which is of God' (1 Corinthians 2:10-12). And again: 'For I think that I too have the Spirit of God' (1 Corinthians 7:40). And Paul indeed says that he was called by God, writing to the Galatians: 'But when it pleased the Lord, who set me apart from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace, to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the Gentiles' (Galatians 1:15-16). But he says that the Romans were called by Christ, writing to them: 'Among whom you also are the called of Jesus Christ' (Romans 1:6).

And the Holy Spirit said that Paul and Barnabas were called by himself, that they might announce Christ to the Gentiles. And it is plainly wonderful that, although the Savior said to Paul in the temple: 'Go, for I will send you to the Gentiles afar off' (Acts 22:21); and Paul wrote to the Galatians: 'Paul, an apostle not from men, neither through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead' (Galatians 1:1) — yet the Holy Spirit sent Paul and Barnabas, approved, to preach Jesus Christ to the Gentiles. For the Scripture says thus:

'Now there were at Antioch, in the Church, prophets and teachers, among whom were Barnabas, and Simeon who is called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manaen also, who was foster-brother of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. And as they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said: Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. Then, fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them away; and they, sent by the Holy Spirit, went down to Seleucia, and from there sailed to Cyprus' (Acts 13:1-4). And so thereafter the preaching to the Gentiles, accomplished through Paul, is set forth. And there is indeed a time when the prophets speak in the person of the Father. So David says in the psalms:

'Once I have sworn by my holiness, that I will not lie to David: his seed shall abide forever, and his throne as the sun before me' (Psalm 88:36-37). And again: 'Of the fruit of your womb I will set upon my throne' (Psalm 131:11). As Peter also says: 'Since David was a prophet, and knew that God had sworn to him with an oath that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, Christ should sit upon his throne' (Acts 2:30). But when do they speak in the person of the Son? When Isaiah says: 'Thus says the Lord: For your sakes my name is continually blasphemed among the Gentiles; therefore my people shall know my name in that day, for I am he who spoke: behold, I am here' (Isaiah 52:5-6). And when do they speak in the person of the Holy Spirit?

As when the prophet Agabus says: 'Thus says the Holy Spirit: The man whose belt this is, so shall the Jews bind him in Jerusalem, and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles' (Acts 21:11). And Paul writes to Timothy: 'Now the Spirit manifestly says that in the last times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits' (1 Timothy 4:1), and to doctrines of demons, and so forth, through the prophets. For there is a time when the Father, and a time when the Son, and a time when the Holy Spirit speaks. Thus indeed the Father by himself says concerning the Savior: 'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased' (Matthew 3:17).