which appellation is also common to the Son of God, as John teaches: 'These things,' he says, 'I write to you, that you may not sin. But if anyone should sin, we have a Paraclete as advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the just' (1 John 2:1). For the Lord Himself too, when He says to the apostles, 'The Father will send you another advocate,' surely, when He names another Paraclete, thereby also manifests Himself as a Paraclete. But neither is this name of Paraclete foreign to the Father: for it is a name of beneficence, not of nature. Paul, finally, writes to the Corinthians: 'Blessed be God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation, who consoles us' (2 Cor. 1:3); which in Greek is said 'Paraclete.'
And when the Father is called consoler, and the Son consoler, and the Holy Spirit consoler, yet one consolation of the Trinity is bestowed on us. 'But you have been washed,' he says, 'and sanctified and justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God' (1 Cor. 6:11). But perhaps these gentle and good things do not rouse the soul to understand the power of the Holy Spirit; let us bring forward a few of the terrible things. Ananias had sold a possession, as it is written in the Acts of the Apostles, and the disciple had reserved for himself a suppressed part of the money; the rest he laid down before the feet of the apostles as if it were the whole. He offended the Holy Spirit, whom he had thought he was escaping. But what did most blessed Peter say to him at once?
'Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart, that you should lie to the Holy Spirit?' (Acts 5:3) And at once he says: 'You have not lied to men, but to God.' And thus, struck by the power of Him to whom he had wished to lie, he expired. What here does blessed Peter wish the Holy Spirit to be understood to be? And surely it is clear when he says: 'You have not lied to men, but to God.' It is manifest, therefore, that he who lies to the Holy Spirit lies to God; and he who believes in the Holy Spirit believes in God. So too the wife of Ananias, who had been an accomplice in the falsehood, was made a partner in death. Something similar, nay, stronger, the Lord shows in the Gospel, saying: 'Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven to men;'
but whoever shall speak blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world nor in the world to come' (Matt. 12:32; Mark 3:28-29; Luke 12:10). A terrible sentence! He says that the sin is irremissible for him who has blasphemed against the Holy Spirit. Compare with this sentence that which is written in the book of Kings: 'If a man sinning shall sin against a man, they shall pray for him; but if he shall sin against God, who shall pray for him?' (1 Sam. 2:25) Therefore, because to sin against the Holy Spirit and to sin against God is the same inexpiable crime, they will now be able to observe how great is the majesty of the Holy Spirit; against whom if anyone shall stand in rebellion, he shall be thrust into perpetual punishments.
I could bring forward more testimonies from the divine Scriptures which would manifest, according to the sacrament of baptism, the Trinity of one operation and power. But because in these too the understanding is full for the wise, I pass over many. I will therefore make a recapitulation, and say: if the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father; if He frees; if He sanctifies; if He is Lord, as the Apostle said; if He was with the Father and the Son; if He gives life; if He has foreknowledge, as the Father and the Son have; if He reveals; if He is everywhere; if He fills the whole world; if He dwells in the elect; if He reproves the world; if He judges; if He is good; if He is right; if of Him it is cried, 'Thus says the Holy Spirit'; if He appoints prophets; if He sends apostles;
if He is consoler; if He washes and justifies; if He slays those who tempt Him; if he who has blasphemed against Him has no remission, neither in this world nor in the world to come — which surely is proper to God; if these things are so, nay rather because they are true, why is it asked of me that I should say what the Holy Spirit is, since through the greatness of His works He manifests what He Himself is? Surely He is not a stranger to the sanctity of the Father and the Son, who is not a stranger to the power of their works:
in vain is the name of divinity denied to Him whose power cannot be denied; in vain am I forbidden to venerate Him together with the Father and the Son, whom by very truth I am compelled to confess together with the Father and the Son. If He confers on me, together with the Father and the Son, remission of sins, confers sanctification and eternal life, I shall be too ungrateful and impious if I do not render Him glory together with the Father and the Son. Or if He is not to be worshipped together with the Father and the Son, then neither is He to be confessed in baptism. But if He must by every means be confessed, according to the word of the Lord and the tradition of the apostles, lest the faith be half-full and imperfect, who shall be able to restrain me from His religion and veneration? For in whom I am bidden to believe, Him too I shall devoutly supplicate.
I will therefore adore the Father, I will adore the Son, I will adore the Holy Spirit, with one and the same veneration. But if anyone thinks this hard, let them hear how David exhorts the faithful to the worship of God: 'Adore,' he says, 'the footstool of His feet, for it is holy' (Ps. 98:5). If the footstool of the Lord's feet is to be adored out of religion, how much more will it be an act of religion if His Spirit be adored? That Spirit, surely, whom blessed Peter proclaimed in such sublimity, saying: 'They have preached to you the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, into whom the angels desire to look' (1 Pet. 1:12). If the angels desire to gaze upon Him, how much more ought we mortal men not to despise Him? lest perhaps it be said of us also as it was said to the Jews:
'You have always resisted the Holy Spirit, as also did your fathers' (Acts 7:51). Since even these things, so great and of such a kind, do not incline the soul to venerate the Holy Spirit, receive still something stronger. For thus Paul instructs the prophets of the Church, in whom and through whom surely the Spirit Himself was speaking: 'If,' he says, 'all prophesy, and there enter some unbeliever or unlearned man, he is convinced by all, he is examined by all, the hidden things of his heart are also made manifest. And then, falling on his face, he will adore God, declaring that God is truly among you' (1 Cor. 14:24-25).
Surely he meant the Holy Spirit to be understood, who was speaking in the prophets. If then unbelievers fall on their faces and adore the Holy Spirit, they adore terrified, and confess, though unwilling, on account of the greatness of the works, that is, the abundance of spiritual grace; how much more is it fitting for the faithful to adore the Holy Spirit willingly and out of affection! But the Spirit is adored, not as if separately after the manner of the heathen; just as neither is the Son adored separately, because He is at the right hand of the Father; but when we adore the Father, we believe that we faithfully adore both the Son and the Holy Spirit equally: because when we invoke the Son, we believe that we invoke the Father;
and when we ask the Father, we believe that we are heard by the Son, as the Lord Himself promises: 'Whatever you shall ask the Father in My name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.' So too when the Spirit is adored, He surely is adored whose the Spirit is. But that no one is ignorant of this, that nothing can be either added to or diminished from the divine majesty by human supplications: but each single person, according to the purpose of his will, either acquires glory for himself by faithfully venerating, or confusion by obstinately resisting. For it is certain that both contention and pride beget damnation; while honour-giving awaits the fruit of devotion.
But why should the faithful not honour wholly the Trinity, to which they trust that they belong, by whose name they glory to have been reborn, by whose title they glory to be named? For just as from the name of God the Father men are called men of God — as Elijah was called a man of God, and Moses a man of God, as Timothy was called by Paul a man of God — so from Christ Christians are named; so also from the Spirit they are called spiritual. If therefore you are called a man of God, and are not a Christian, you are nothing. Equally, if you are called a Christian, and are not spiritual, do not confide too much in your salvation. Let there be for us, then, according to the baptism of the Saviour, the confession, the faith of the entire Trinity, one devotion of piety:
let us not, after the manner of the heathen, imagine diversities of powers, or suspect a creature in the Trinity. But neither let us succumb to the scandal of the Jews, who deny the Son of God, who do not adore the Spirit; but rather, adoring and magnifying the perfect Trinity, as in the mysteries we say with our mouth, 'Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth,' so let us hold in our conscience. And this: one holy, surely the Spirit; one God, Jesus Christ in the glory of God the Father; one omnipotence, because one also is the religion of the Trinity. And thereafter, following peace and love, let us ever abound in good works: and let us hear from the Apostle, as the Corinthians heard in the first Epistle:
'The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.' Here ends the work of Saint Nicetas the bishop, On the Power of the Holy Spirit. Here begins a treatise of the same, On the diverse appellations befitting our Lord Jesus Christ. In the holy Scriptures are found many names and many appellations that befit our Lord Jesus and our Saviour. He is called the Word; He is called Wisdom, Light, Power, Right Hand, Arm, Angel; He is called Man; He is called Lamb, Sheep, Priest, Way, Truth, Life; He is called Vine, Justice, Redemption; Bread, Stone, Physician, Fountain of living water, Peace, Judge, Door He is called.
All these He is called, and you will find many other titles in the holy Scriptures concerning Christ; since one and the same is the Son of God, our God, so that the reason of His power and of His dispensation may be known. You have heard the appellations; now hear the significations of the appellations. He is called the Word, either because He was begotten impassibly from God the Father, or because His generation came to be without any diminution of the paternal substance. For not even man seems to suffer any diminution when he utters a word.
Or certainly He is called the Word, because through Him God the Father has ever spoken both to the angels and to men. He is called Wisdom, because through Him all things were wisely ordered in the beginning. He is called Light, because He Himself both illumined the first darkness of the world, and by His coming put to flight the nights of human minds. He is called Power, because no creature can overcome Him. He is called Right Hand and Arm, because through Him all things were created, and by Him all things are held together. He is called the Angel of great counsel, because He is the messenger of the paternal will. He is called the Son of Man, because for us men He deigned to be born a man. He is called Lamb on account of His singular innocence. He is called Sheep, that His passion might be shown forth.
He is called Priest, either because He offered His own body as an oblation and sacrifice to God the Father for us, or because He deigns to be offered for us on each single day. He is called the Way, because through Him we pass to salvation. He is called the Vine, because, extending the branches of His arms upon the cross, He furnished to the world the great fruit of sweetness. He is called Justice, who justifies sinners through faith in His own name. He is called Redemption, because once He redeemed us, who were lost, by the price of His own blood. He is called Bread, because He restored the hunger of the nations through His Gospel. He is called Stone, because the serpent left no trace upon Him, and to us He Himself furnished a defence. He is called Physician, because He healed our infirmities and wounds by His own visitation.
He is called the Fountain of living water, because through the laver of regeneration he both washes and gives life to sinners. He is called Peace, because he gathers into one those who are at variance, and reconciled them to God the Father. He is called Resurrection, because he himself will raise up all bodies from the tombs. He is called Judge, because it is he who will judge both the living and the dead. He is called the Door, because through him entrance into the kingdom of heaven is opened to the faithful. 2. Therefore, since the common Lord is addressed by such names and titles, have confidence, faithful one, and set your hope in him with all your strength. For that you may know the Father, he himself is your Word. If you wish to be truly wise, seek him, for he is Wisdom. If your understanding suffers any darkness, seek Christ, for he is Light. Are you weak?
you have a refuge, for he is both physician and strength. Do you wish to know by whom the world was created and by whom all things are held together? Believe in him, for he is called the arm and the right hand. Do you endure some dread? In all things he will be present to you like an angel. If it is hard for you to draw near by sight to so great a majesty of the Only-begotten, do not despair, for he was also made man, that humanity might have easy access to him. If you are innocent, he will associate himself with you as a lamb. If some heathen persecution saddens you, take confidence, for he too was sacrificed as a sheep; and as a priest he will receive you to be offered to the Father. If you do not know the way of salvation, seek Christ, for he himself is the path of souls.
If you wish to know truth, hear him, for he is Truth. Fear death not at all, for Christ is the life of believers. Does the sweetness of the world delight you? Rather turn to the cross of Christ, that you may be refreshed by the sweetness of his vine, which hung upon the cross. Are you a lost sinner? You ought to hunger for justice, to thirst for the Redeemer, who is Christ: for he satisfies, since he is Bread. If you waver in anything, make your step firm in him, for he is Rock, and he will render you fortified. Are you infirm and weak? Seek the remedy from him, for he is Physician. Do you suffer the burning of sins, you above all, whoever is a catechumen? Run to the fountain of life, that your burning may be extinguished and your soul may attain eternity.
If dissension racks and agitates you, draw near to Christ, for he is Peace, that you may both be reconciled to the Father, and may love every man, judging him worthy to be loved as yourself. If you fear the fall of the body, and shudder at the death of this life, remember that he is Resurrection; he can raise up again what has fallen. If the pleasure of sin allures you, and the vices of the flesh provoke you, think beforehand that he is a just judge, a severe examiner, the preparer of eternal fire; and it will never delight you to sin. Finally, brother, if some despair enters you concerning the reward of justice, concerning the expectation of heavenly grace, with believing mind presume him to be the Door;
for through him, raised from the dead, you shall penetrate the secrets of heaven and attain the fellowship of the angels: and you shall hear that longed-for voice: 'Well done, good and faithful servant; because you have been faithful, enter into the joy of your Lord; possess the kingdom which was prepared for you from the foundation of the world' — he freely granting it, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns through all ages of ages (Matt. 25:23). Amen. 1. He who believes in Christ and follows him as he leads to true life — just as the people of Israel, following Moses, entered the land of promise — this man, trusting in Christ his leader, renounces the enemy and his angels, and all magical curiosity, which subsists through the angels of Satan.
Then he renounces his evil works, and the cult, idols, lots, and auguries, pomps, and theaters, fornications, drunkennesses, dances, and lies. These, and other serpentine things, are what bind the souls of men and lead them to the prison of hell. Freeing himself, therefore, from these evils, casting these chains behind his back as into the face of the enemy, he now pronounces with sincere voice: 2. I believe in God the Father almighty. The confession rightly begins with belief, for so blessed Paul expressed it. 'With the heart,' he says, 'one believes unto justice, but with the mouth confession is made unto salvation' (Rom. 10:10). You believe, therefore, in God the Father almighty: the unbegotten God, who arose from none, who began from none:
the invisible God, whom no eye of flesh is able to see: the incomprehensible God, who comprehends all things: the immutable God, who is not changed by the seasons, nor grows old with age, but is ever the same: who did not begin to live in time, but, ever living, suffers no successor: the good and just God, Creator of heaven and earth. This one you confess as God; but it is necessary that you confess the same one also as Father of the Son: for no one is a Father without a Son. The Father, therefore, is through the Son, having indeed a Son of whom he is Father. And this is the pious confession in God: that you not only know him as God, but also recognize him as Father — Father of the living Word, of his own proper power and wisdom:
who before all ages, before the beginning of all things, before absolutely all time, begot from himself the Son, Spirit from Spirit, God from God; in whom were founded all things that are in the heavens, and that are on the earth, visible and invisible, as Paul teaches (Col. 1:16), and John confirms: 'all things were made through him, and without him was made nothing' (John 1:3). 3. Believing therefore in God the Father, you shall at once confess that you believe also in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the Son of God, Jesus Christ; Jesus, which interpreted in the Hebrew tongue is understood as Savior; Christ indeed is an appellation of royal dignity: as Savior and King, one and the same, Christ Jesus.
He, for our salvation, descended from the Father from the heavens, and took a body like ours. Born of the Holy Spirit and of the Virgin Mary without any operation of man: a body was generated from a body by the power of the Holy Spirit; remaining God, he was made man, that he might be able, for men, to be both for their sight and for the doctrine of salvation; for otherwise the divinity could not be borne by men unless made visible by the assumption of a body. 4. Born, therefore, of the holy and uncontaminated Virgin, that he might grant us the beginning of a holy birth. He was born according to what had been foretold through the prophet: 'Behold, a virgin shall conceive in the womb, and shall bear a Son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel: which is interpreted, God with us' (Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23).
Believe, then, that this one, who was born of the Virgin, is God with us; God from the Father before the ages; man from the Virgin for the sake of men. Truly incarnate, not seemingly, as certain erroneous heretics, blushing at the mystery of God, say that the Lord's incarnation was made in phantasm: because what was seen was not truly there, but deceived the eyes of men. Which be far off altogether from the truth of God. For if the incarnation is false, false also will be the salvation of men. But if salvation is truly in Christ, the incarnation is equally true. In him both are present: man, in that which was seen; God, in that which was not seen. Eating as man, and feeding five thousand men with five loaves, because God.
Sleeping as man in the boat, but commanding the winds and the sea, because God. Fixing his hands to the cross as man, but granting paradise to the thief who confessed him, because God. At last undergoing death, laying down his body for a little while, as man; but raising a four-days-dead man from the tomb, because God. Christ, therefore, is to be believed as both, God and man: for as he is recognized as man from his sufferings, so he is manifested as God from his divine works. You have, then, whereby you may reject the masters of falsehood. If anyone attempts to whisper in your ears that Christ was only a man, say that he was made man through the things aforesaid; whom I have already come to know from his powers and professions, the Savior himself saying to the Jews:
'If you will not believe me, at least believe the works. And know that I am in the Father, and the Father in me' (John 10:38). 5. It follows that you believe in the Lord's passion, and confess that Christ suffered, crucified by the Jews, according to the predictions of the prophets. And see that you be not ashamed at the passion of your Lord. If perhaps the unbelief of the Jews, or the folly of the gentiles, should wish to blaspheme concerning the magnificent cross of Christ, remember always the Lord's saying: 'Whoever shall confess me before men, I also will confess him before my Father who is in heaven' (Matt. 10:32). Nor indeed is there any cause for you to be confounded, if you understand in what mystery Christ suffered. He suffered not in his divinity, but in his flesh. For God is ever impassible.
But he suffered in the flesh, as the Apostle teaches (1 Pet. 4:1), that by his wound salvation might come to the human race, as also the prophet Isaiah had foretold. 'And he,' he says, 'suffered for our sins, and by his wound we are all healed' (Isa. 53:5). For Christ suffered for our sin, that justice might be given to us. Under Pontius Pilate, therefore, he suffered. The time is thereby designated, in which Pontius Pilate was governor of Syria and Palestine. And this is set down cautiously for this reason, that some of the heretics, deceived by demoniacal frauds, prattle of various christs. You, then, are also taught the time of the passion, so that you may confess him who truly suffered under Pontius Pilate for the salvation of the world to be the Christ, and not confess some other as the one who suffered.
He died, then, that he might dissolve the laws of death. 6. On the third day he rose alive from the dead, as the prophet says, 'free among the dead' (Ps. 87:6). Nor could Christ be held by death, who holds the whole power both of death and of life. He ascended into the heavens, whence he had also descended; for 'No one,' he says, 'ascends into heaven except him who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who was in heaven' (John 3:13). He sits at the right hand of the Father, according to what was said in David's psalms, in the person of God the Father to the Son: 'Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet' (Ps. 109:1).
Thence he shall come to judge the living and the dead. Believe that this same Christ our Lord shall come with the angels and their powers, to judge both the living and those long dead, that he may render to each according to their works: that is, that he may establish the just unto eternal life, but subject the impious to eternal punishment. 7. You believe also in the Holy Spirit. This Holy Spirit is one, sanctifying all things, who proceeds from the Father, alone searching the mysteries and depths of God, who came down in the likeness of a dove from the heavens upon Christ. This Holy Spirit is indeed one, but manifold in powers and in operations. He divides the gifts of graces to each as he wills (1 Cor. 12:11). He appointed the prophets, he filled the apostles;
and he himself, at the time of baptism, sanctifies the souls of believers and their bodies; without whose operation no creature can attain to eternity; into whose glory even the angels desire to look (1 Pet. 1:12). He also sanctifies by his majesty the thrones and dominions, and all the powers of the heavens. Against which Holy Spirit, if anyone shall blaspheme, he has no remission neither in this age nor in the age to come, as the Lord himself declared (Matt. 12:32). 8.
This faith of the Trinity, brothers, establish firmly in your hearts, believing in one God the Father almighty, and in his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, and in the Holy Spirit, the true light and sanctifier of souls, who is the pledge of our inheritance, who, if we shall be intent upon him, will lead us into all truth and will make us cleave to the heavenly things. For this rule of faith the apostles received from the Lord, that in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit they should baptize all believing nations (Matt. 28:19). May this faith remain in you; guard this deposit, most beloved, avoiding the profane novelties of words and the oppositions of false knowledge (1 Tim. 6:20). 9.
If the gentiles persuade you again to worship many fathers, hold fast your blessed profession, you who have confessed one God the Father; for neither does nature bear that one man should have several fathers. If a Jew persuades you not to believe Christ to be the Son of God, let him be to you as an enemy — either to be fought against, if you have such great knowledge of the Scriptures, or certainly to be avoided, if practice is lacking. If any heretic under the Christian name either hands over to you Christ as a creature, or persuades that the Holy Spirit is alien to the glory of the Father and the Son, let him be to you as a heathen and a publican; because he leads you to idolatry, when he persuades you to worship a creature.
And when he strives to entangle you with tortuous questions, run back to the wall of your faith, and say according to the Apostle: 'I am absolved, I am sanctified, I am justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of my God' (1 Cor. 6:11). I will pronounce nothing concerning this profession of the Trinity, lest I bring harm to my salvation and detriment to my faith. 10. After the confession of the blessed Trinity, you now profess to believe the holy Catholic Church. The Church — what else is it than the congregation of all the saints?
For from the beginning of the world, whether the patriarchs, or Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, or the prophets, or the apostles, or the martyrs, or the other just ones who have been, who are, and who shall be, they are one Church, because they are sanctified by one faith and manner of life, sealed by one Spirit, made one body: of which body the head is Christ, as is attested and written (Col. 1:18). I say yet more: even the angels, even the virtues and powers on high are confederated in this one Church, the Apostle teaching us that in Christ all things have been reconciled, not only those which are on earth, but also those which are in heaven (Col. 1:20).
Therefore, in this one Church, believe that you shall obtain the communion of saints. Know that this one Catholic Church is established in the whole world, whose communion you ought firmly to retain. There are indeed also other pseudo-churches, but you have nothing in common with them — such as those of the Manichaeans, the Cataphrygians, the Marcionists, or of the other heretics or schismatics — because these churches now cease to be holy: seeing that, deceived by demoniacal doctrines, they believe otherwise and act otherwise than Christ the Lord commanded and than the apostles handed down. You believe next in the remission of sins.