'When He shall begin to teach you as God, all that He shall teach you, He will show that He has of mine.' For what is proper to God to teach, except both to bestow understanding on the ignorant, and to inspire fortitude and confidence in the timid? which indeed that Spirit truly does, who is naturally the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, of counsel and fortitude. Whence also in the book of the Acts of the Apostles it is said of the believers, that 'they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and spoke the word of God with confidence' (Acts 4:31). But because the Father is the natural origin of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, therefore the Son, assigning all to the Father, says: 'All that the Father hath are mine; therefore said I, that He shall receive of mine' (John 16:15).
How well did Truth itself preserve the truth of its own teaching! For if He had not said this, He would have shown the Spirit to be only His own; but by saying, 'All that the Father hath are mine; therefore said I, that He shall receive of mine,' He showed that same Holy Spirit to be one, both the Father's and His own. The tenor of which understanding He preserved also in an earlier place, saying: 'But the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, He shall teach you all things whatsoever I have said unto you' (John 14:26). The Father sends, but sends in the name of the Son; the Spirit, sent by the Father, teaches, but the Son speaks. This is also shown in that place where the Lord says:
'But when the Paraclete shall come, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceedeth from the Father' (John 15:26). Behold, here the Paraclete whom the Father sends in the name of the Son, the Son Himself sends from the Father: but He sends from the Father the Spirit of truth: He sends therefore from the Father His own Spirit, because He Himself is the Truth. For the Father sends in the name of the Son, because there is one Spirit of the Father and of the Son: the Son sends Him from the Father, because He proceeds from the Son just as He proceeds from the Father: the same Spirit also of the Father, who is the Spirit of Truth. From the Son, therefore, He received, and all that the Father hath are the Son's, which the Holy Spirit received;
because He proceeds not from the Father alone, nor from the Son alone, but at once from both. But this term of procession is found granted to no creature; so that this property of procession may be shown to be of the natural essence alone. For we read that the Son was begotten of the Father, and although in the fact that He is called Only-begotten the natural generation is demonstrated to be in Him alone, yet on account of the grace of adoption God the Father also begat us willingly by the word of truth (James 1:18). The Only-begotten, therefore, is the one and only Son born of the essence of the Father: but we also, through adoption, are both called sons of God and born of God, the blessed evangelist saying: 'But as many as received Him, He gave them power to be made sons of God,
to those who believe in His name; who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God' (John 1:12, 13). Since therefore it is shown by the divine oracles that we are both sons of God, and begotten of God, and born of God, yet the term of procession from God no one can teach to have been conceded to any creature. Why so, except because the natural nativity could show the Only-begotten Son to be true God; and demonstrate Him without doubt to be not adoptive, nor of a diverse nature, but consubstantial with the Father? But no creature is said to proceed from God, so that He who proceeds from the Father and the Son may be believed to be God in the same way as the Father and the Son are.
For this property of procession from the Father and the Son belongs to the Holy Spirit alone, whose nature is common with the Father and the Son. For He proceeds from the Father and the Son, but does not depart: nor is He in any respect lesser, or subject, who from the immense Father and from the immense Son inseparably proceeds both one and whole. Thus therefore what He speaks cannot be commanded of Him, just as what He wondrously works cannot be commanded of Him. For one and the same Spirit works all things, dividing to each severally as He wills (1 Corinthians 12:11). The Holy Spirit therefore does not do anything at the command of another's power, but works all things by the choice of His own will.
But there is one will of the Holy Trinity, and one power, whose divinity is by nature one. FROM BOOK VIII. ON THE MISSION OF THE SON AND OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. FRAGMENT XXVIII. The Trinity has one speech and one will. The Holy Spirit is not sent as the angels are: He is one, and immense. Baptism is given also in His name. He does not depart from those who ask that He be sent to them. What the Church asks when it asks for the Holy Spirit. Nor is the Spirit therefore a betrayer of the divine secret, because what He says, He says by His own will. For the one Holy Trinity ever has one speech, just as it has through all things one will:
and in the fact that the Holy Spirit hears from the Father and the Son what He speaks, it is an indication of origin alone, not of any inequality whatsoever. By this indeed is shown not to whom He, being subject, obeys, but whence He, being exalted, proceeds. But you would in no way esteem the mission of the Holy Spirit to be like the missions of the angels, if with a humble heart you were inquiring these things, and did not, proud, leap forth into insult against the Holy Spirit. For desiring to inquire this, you ought to have investigated what the divine Scripture said of the Holy Spirit: and first, whether it asserted many, or one: then, whether it called Him local, or immense:
lastly, considering His works, you ought to have recognized whether they belong to divinity alone, or can also be suited to any creature: so that from all these things a right understanding concerning the mission of the Holy Spirit might be able to support you. And so I do not believe that you doubt in any degree that, just as there is one Father and one Son, so also one Holy Spirit is everywhere proclaimed by the divine oracles; the blessed Apostle saying: 'Now there are diversities of graces, 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 worketh all things in all' (1 Corinthians 12:4, 5, 6). And a little after (verse 11):
'But all these things one and the same Spirit worketh, dividing to each severally as He wills.' But lest here you should be unwilling to accept the Holy Spirit as the one dividing each thing, and should suspect for yourself another Spirit, hear what is said in the Epistle to the Hebrews: 'God bearing witness by signs and wonders, and by various powers, and by distributions of the Holy Spirit according to His own will' (Hebrews 2:4). In another place also the same blessed Apostle says: 'One body, and one Spirit, as you are called in one hope of your calling' (Ephesians 4:4). Where to the one Spirit he immediately joined one Father, and coupled also one Son, adding:
'One Lord'—signifying, namely, Christ—'one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in us all' (Ephesians 4:5, 6). In another place also he says: 'For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Gentiles, whether bond or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit' (1 Corinthians 12:13). For our Saviour also showed the Holy Spirit to be one, saying: 'Go, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit' (Matthew 28:19). But the prophet, recognizing the immensity of this Spirit, and understanding Him to be through all things ever wholly present, says to God the Father:
'Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit? or whither shall I flee from Thy face? If I ascend into heaven, Thou art there; and if I descend into hell, Thou art present' (Psalm 138:7, 8). Where indeed he signified that God with His Spirit is everywhere always, from whom he said he could in no wise flee. Here perhaps you contend that the Spirit of God is one, and the Holy Spirit another: where you must at once be overcome by the divine oracles. For that the Holy Spirit Himself is He who is the Spirit-God, the blessed prophet attests, saying: 'Cast me not away from Thy face, and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me' (Psalm 51:11). And since one Holy Spirit was given to the apostles and the prophets—as the blessed Apostle attests, saying:
'But having the same Spirit of faith, as it is written: I believed, for which cause I have spoken; we also believe, for which cause we also speak' (2 Corinthians 4:13); showing without doubt that the same Spirit of God is the Holy Spirit, he says: 'He therefore that despiseth these things, despiseth not man, but God, who also hath given His Holy Spirit in us' (1 Thessalonians 4:8). On the day of Pentecost also, when the Holy Spirit had come upon the apostles—that same Paraclete, namely, whom the Lord promised and sent to them—the blessed Peter showed by the prophetic word that He is the Spirit of God, saying that this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: 'And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith the Lord, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh' (Acts
13:160
II 16, i7). Etpaulopost (v. 18) : Etquidemsuperservosmees, etsuperancillasmeas, indiebusilliseffundamdeSpiritumeo, etprophetabunt. HujusitaqueuniusSpiritusimmensilatem, quamsolapotestveranaturaliterhabere, imoquamsolanaturaliterhabetveradivinitas, nonsolumbeatusDavidostendit, verumetiamJoelprophetaindubitanterasseruit, ineoquodaitexpersonaDeidicentis : EffundamdeSpiritumeosuperomnemcarnem (Joel, II, 28). HincestquodetiaminlibroSapientiæ 615 dicitur : QuoniamSpiritusDominireplevitorbemterrarum, ethocquodcontinetomniascientiamhabetvocis (Sap. i, 7).
2:16, 17). And a little after (verse 18): 'And on my servants indeed and on my handmaids in those days will I pour out of my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.' The immensity, therefore, of this one Spirit—which the true divinity alone by nature can have, nay, which the true divinity alone by nature has—not only blessed David showed, but the prophet Joel also asserted without doubt, in that he said in the person of God speaking: 'I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh' (Joel 2:28). Hence it is that also in the book of Wisdom it is said: 'For the Spirit of the Lord hath filled the whole earth, and that which containeth all things hath knowledge of the voice' (Wisdom 1:7).
Nowhere, therefore, is He absent, but everywhere He is wholly immense, who is declared both to fill the whole earth and to contain all things. For therefore is it asserted that He contains all things, lest, while He is said to fill the whole earth, He should be esteemed absent from the heavenly beings. Whom, however, a little above the divine Scripture names the Holy Spirit, saying: 'For the Holy Spirit of discipline will flee the deceitful, and will withdraw Himself from thoughts that are without understanding' (ibid., 5). For it is in this that the natural immensity of the Holy Spirit is recognized, in that throughout the whole earth, just as in the name of the Father and of the Son, so men are baptized in the name of the Holy Spirit.
And lest anyone perhaps should suppose that the name of the Holy Spirit is indeed everywhere named in baptism, but that His presence is not nevertheless everywhere always at hand, the Apostle says to the faithful: 'Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, in whom you are sealed unto the day of redemption' (Ephesians 4:30); and in another place: 'Now He that confirmeth us with you in Christ, and that hath anointed us, is God, who also hath sealed us, and given the pledge of the Spirit in our hearts' (2 Corinthians 1:21, 22). And again: 'Now He that maketh us for this very thing is God, who hath given us the pledge of the Spirit' (2 Corinthians 5:5). In another place also he says: 'In whom also believing you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the pledge of our inheritance' (Ephesians 1:13, 14).
By which words he shows the Holy Spirit to be not only naturally immense, but also true God, whom he asserted to be the pledge of our inheritance. Since indeed there is no part of our inheritance except the Lord God, of whom the whole Church says: 'The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and of my cup' (Psalm 16:5), it therefore appears that the Holy Spirit is naturally immense; and that He not only does not locally subsist in a place, but cannot even pass from place to place. For all the rational spirits indeed which God created, although they are not locally in places, yet they pass from places to places: which assuredly they would not do, unless, by leaving the place in which they had been, they came to a place in which they had not been.
For who does not know that the angel Gabriel then came into the temple when he appeared to Zechariah, and departed from the temple after he had fulfilled the office of his annunciation, and while he was in the temple was not elsewhere? Because there is no creature which can fill the whole creation at once by its presence, which belongs to the Trinity alone: whose natural immensity is as much without term, as its eternal divinity is without beginning. Whence those same holy angels also, of whom blessed Peter says that they desire to look into the Holy Spirit, would by no means desire to look into Him, if they did not have that same Holy Spirit within themselves.
For they desire to look into Him by charity, because no one desires that which he does not love: but the charity by which they love the Holy Spirit they received only through the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who is given to us (Romans 5:5). And by that same Spirit is charity poured forth in the hearts of men, by whom it is poured forth in the minds of angels. Immense, therefore, is the Holy Spirit, who one and the same fills the whole earth, and fills also the spirits of the heavenly angels.
For He is, as the Scripture says, the Spirit of understanding, holy, unique, manifold, subtle, mobile, eloquent, without defilement, clear, wholesome, loving that which is good, keen, whom nothing hinders, and doing good, humane, steadfast, sure, secure, having all power, foreseeing all things, and penetrating through all intelligible, pure, subtle spirits (Wisdom 7:22, 23). The works also of the Holy Spirit—who does not see that they befit only the supreme Deity? For by the word of the Lord the heavens were established, and all their power by the Spirit of His mouth (Psalm 33:6). In which the Lord Jesus manifests that He casts out demons:
And the power of signs and wonders, which Paul says are wrought by Christ through him, he affirms to be wrought in the power of the Holy Spirit, saying: 'For I dare not speak of any of those things which Christ has not accomplished through me, unto the obedience of the nations, by word and deeds, in the power of signs and wonders, in the power of the Holy Spirit' (Rom. 15:18, 19). Hence too, when to one is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith in the same Spirit, and the rest that the text of the apostolic eloquence contains, all these things, as we have recalled above, one and the same Spirit works, dividing to each as He wills (1 Cor. 12:11).
In His name believers are baptized, and in Him they are sealed. He descended upon the baptized Jesus and remained. That He was upon Him, and that with Him He was anointed, and by Him He was sent, the Lord Christ shows through Isaiah, saying: 'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me; He has sent me to preach the Gospel to the poor' (Isa. 61:1). Whence, when in the synagogue He read over this passage of the prophetic volume, He said to the Jews: 'This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears' (Luke 4:21). And after the Spirit had descended upon Him at His baptism, the Evangelist said: 'And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan' (Luke 4:1).
And then, after the devil, having finished the temptation, had departed from Him for a season, the holy Evangelist says: 'And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee' (Luke 4:14). Consider therefore all the things that have been recalled by us, and you will recognize the Holy Spirit: that He is one even as the Father and the Son, immense, filling every creature, and doing works which the Godhead alone does; for which reason this same one cannot be sent from place to place, who is naturally taught to be immense; nor is anything commanded Him as though He were a subject, for He of His own will did and does those works which none but God can do. Wherefore the mission of the Holy Spirit is to be wisely considered:
who is by no means sent as an angel is, whose office it is to discharge the duty of servitude; but as God, whose it is to bestow of His own free goodness the gifts of sanctification and of holy operation. For the Holy Spirit (as we taught above) fills the whole world; which is never said of any angel, but of God alone, to whom blessed Azarias, set in the furnace, says: 'Blessed art Thou, O Lord God of our fathers, and praiseworthy and glorious is Thy name for ever' (Dan. 3:26); and a little after he says: 'And let them know that Thou alone art the Lord God in all the world' (Dan. 3:45). Wherein indeed he taught that He is truly the Lord God who is in all the world.
But whoever does not fill the world cannot be in the world, and thus is not the Lord God. It is necessary therefore that we confess the Holy Spirit to be the Lord God, of whom Scripture says that 'the Spirit of the Lord has filled the world' (Wisd. 1:7). I could say many things concerning the Holy Spirit, which with the intention of bringing this work to a close I pass over. Yet this I would have you say: what necessity is there that the sacrament of baptism be given not in the name of the Father alone, nor only in the name of the Father and the Son, but in the name of the whole Trinity, that is, of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, if the Holy Spirit is not of the same nature and power as the Father and the Son?
What does the single commemoration of the name mean in the sacrament of baptism, if there is not there one operation of the Trinity? What need is there that a man in baptism cannot be saved without the name of the Holy Spirit, if the Holy Spirit did not create man? Or attend rather to that which is greater: why did He come upon the Son of God, if He is created, not creator? Or how did He fill Him, if He is not to be believed equal, but lesser? Since surely His operation would not be necessary for the renewal of man, if He did not make man; nor would the Spirit come upon Christ, whom you say the Father made through the Son; nor would He fill Him, to whom He could not be equal.
But you, who raise anew the question of the mission of the Holy Spirit, and say that the Holy Spirit is taught to be sent and directed like an angel and a minister, recall what has been said by us above, and you will find that the Holy Spirit is not sent as an angel is. For the latter is sent from place to place, and thus is sent thither where he was not. But the Holy Spirit, who fills all things and is nowhere absent, deigns to be sent by the Father through His grace to that place where He is always present through His immense divinity, and comes thither by the bestowal of a gift, whence He is never absent by the greatness of His deity. Not therefore, as you have answered yourself according to your own will in my name, is the mission of the Holy Spirit to be called His appearing:
for He was then sent by a visible manifestation, when, in order to signify His grace, His mission had to be intimated to the faithful in such a way that from what they beheld visibly with their eyes they might come to know the gifts of invisible grace. But it has seemed to you, from the prayer whereby at the time of the sacrifice the coming of the Holy Spirit is besought, that you would show His mission to be local. But you will then be able to think worthily of the Holy Spirit, if you do not follow the prudence of the flesh, which is an enemy to God (Rom. 8:7). For this is first to be attended to, which blessed Paul says to the faithful: 'Know you not that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?' (1 Cor. 3:16). And that he might say this, he had regard to the promise of our Savior, who said:
'I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you for ever; the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it sees Him not, neither knows Him: but you know Him, for He abides with you, and shall be in you' (John 14:16, 17). Behold, the Lord Jesus gave the Holy Spirit to His faithful ones, that He might be with them for ever, and abide in them. And if the promise of the Savior is true—which no Christian doubts—then it is necessary that the Holy Spirit not depart from the faithful: He who is taken away only from those whom God has cast from before His face. Wherefore blessed David says: 'Cast me not away from Thy face, and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me' (Ps. 51:11).
Since therefore in those who rightly worship God the Holy Spirit rests by an altogether eternal dwelling, how do they ask that He be sent to them? Because indeed they would not stand worthily to offer sacrifice, if they did not have the Holy Spirit within them. In whom also the holy Apostle admonishes us to pray, saying: 'Praying at all times in the Spirit, and watching in Him with all perseverance and supplication' (Eph. 6:18). How then do they ask that He be sent to them, whom they are not ignorant to have been given them from God and to abide in them continually? Or perhaps before holy men pour out their prayer, the Holy Spirit rests in them, and when He perceives them about to pray, forthwith departs? But if it were so, it would have been better that holy men should never pray,
and continually have the Holy Spirit within them, than that He should ever forsake them when about to pray: whence consequently that would be found to be not profitable but harmful which the Evangelist says, that 'we ought always to pray' (Luke 18:1). He commands it at all times. But who of sound mind would say that he does not have the Spirit in himself who prays in the Spirit? Or perhaps at the time when sacrifice is offered, do you suppose that the Holy Spirit is indeed in those who pour out prayer, but is not in the very place where the sacrifice is set? But who thinks thus, save one who is out of his senses?
Or who would suppose the coming of the Holy Spirit to be local, save one who, possessed by carnal thought and therefore shut out from spiritual thought, wills so to think of divine things as he thinks of human things; and thinks of the Spirit of God, who fills the world, just as he can think of a human or angelic spirit? Whereas that Holy Spirit so fills the whole creation that He Himself, being one, is always everywhere whole and entire. Recognize therefore what is done in the offering of sacrifices, that you may thence understand why the coming of the Holy Spirit is there besought. For surely that is fulfilled in the offering of sacrifices which the blessed Apostle testifies our Savior Himself commanded, saying:
'For the Lord Jesus, on the night in which He was betrayed, took bread, and giving thanks broke it, and said: This is my body which shall be delivered for you; do this in remembrance of me. In like manner also the cup, after He had supped, saying: This cup is the new testament in my blood; do this, as often as you shall drink, in remembrance of me. For as often as you shall eat this bread and drink the cup, you shall show forth the death of the Lord until He come' (1 Cor. 11:23ff.). Therefore the sacrifice is offered, that the death of the Lord may be shown forth, and that there may be a remembrance of Him who laid down His soul for us. And He Himself said: 'Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends' (John
15:13). Since therefore Christ died for us out of charity, when at the time of sacrifice we make the remembrance of His death, we ask that charity be granted us through the coming of the Holy Spirit: humbly imploring this, that through that very charity by which Christ deigned to be crucified for us, we too, having received the grace of the Holy Spirit, may hold the world crucified and be crucified to the world; and imitating the death of our Lord, that even as Christ, in that He died to sin, died once—but in that He lives, He lives to God (Rom. 6:10)—so we too may walk in newness of life (Rom. 6:4); and having received the gift of charity, may die to sin and live to God (Rom. 6:11).
For the charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who is given to us (Rom. 5:5). For that very participation in the body and blood of the Lord, when we eat His bread and drink the cup, instills this into us: that we should die to the world, and have our life hidden with Christ in God, and crucify our flesh with its vices and concupiscences. Thus it comes to pass that all the faithful, who love God and their neighbor, even if they do not drink the cup of bodily passion, yet drink the cup of the Lord's charity: inebriated by which, they mortify their members which are upon the earth, and having put on the Lord Jesus Christ, make no provision for the flesh in its desires;
nor should they contemplate the things that are seen, but the things that are not seen. For thus is the cup of the Lord drunk, so long as holy charity is kept; without which, though a man deliver his body to be burned, it profits him nothing. And by the gift of charity this is conferred upon us, that we may be in truth what we mystically celebrate in the sacrifice. Wherefore that which the Apostle says, 'Since we, being many, are one bread, one body,' he added for this reason: 'all we who partake of one bread' (1 Cor. 10:17). And that we should ask for this at the time of sacrifice, we have the most salutary example of our Savior, who willed that we should seek in the commemoration of His death that which He Himself, the true High Priest, near to death, besought for us, saying among other things:
'Holy Father, keep in Thy name those whom Thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we also are' (John 17:11); and a little after: 'And I pray not for these only, but for those also who through their word shall believe in me; that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us, and the world may believe that Thou hast sent me. And the glory which Thou hast given me, I have given to them, that they may be one, as we also are one. I in them, and Thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one' (John 17:20ff.). This therefore we ask for ourselves, when we offer the body and blood of Christ, which He asked for us when Christ deigned to offer Himself for us.