Augustine in His Own Words (continued)
On the Trinity 281 what sort of thing it is, then that thing, in some way, exists. Thus, all these arguments are inseparably joined together, but the question does not take its name from all of them, but according to the intention of the questioner. Therefore, a discipline of life was necessary for human beings in which they might be imbued and in whose mode they might be formed. Now, as to what is accomplished in human beings by that discipline of life, are we to say that it does not exist or is not to be desired? But, first, we propose to know on what we may construct an argument and on what grounds we may remain. That is why a certain norm and rule of discipline first had to be demonstrated. This has been done through that dispensation of God's assuming of the human being, which is properly attributed to the Son, so that there follows through the Son both a knowledge of the Father, that is, the one principle from Whom all things come, and a certain interior and ineffable sweetness and delight of remaining in that understanding and of scorning all mortal things—a gift and function rightly attributed to the Holy Spirit. Thus, though all these operations occur with the most complete union and inseparability, they still had to be demonstrated distinctly, on account of our intellectual weakness through which we have lapsed from unity into multiplicity. For no one raises another to the place where he is, without stooping down a little to the place where the other is. You now have a letter that may not solve your difficulty on this point, but will perhaps set your own thoughts on a firm foundation, so that you may complete the argument with that genius, which I know so well, and continue with that devotion to which we must, above all, cling.21
The Divine Word vs. Human Words
In 393, while still a presbyter, Augustine was invited to address a council of bishops gathered in Hippo. His address, published as On Faith and the Creed (De fide et symbolo), is a remarkable work in many respects.22 That as a presbyter he was even allowed to lecture bishops on the Creed is remarkable. Early in his address, he meditates on the way Christians call Christ the "Word of God" and notes how Christ as the divine Word is generated in a way different from the way human beings generate words in their minds. Remember that Augustine was, by training, an orator and was exceptionally selfconscious about spoken words, their origin, nature, and performance. This comparison and contrast between human words and the divine Word is a commonplace in Augustine's works. From On Faith and the Creed:
21. Ep. 11.2–4 (CCL 31:26–29); my trans., based on Parsons, FOTC 12:26–29. See Ayres, Nicaea, esp. 366–72. 22. On the wording of the creeds found in Augustine's sermons and works, see the references cited on p. 146, n. 50, in Chapter 4.