that the Apostle Paul did not say, '* Who Jesus Christ in His own time.'' For the
a2 THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN. |Boox I.
Lord of lords; that is, the One and only and true God, the Trinity itself.
Son is not of the same substance with the Father, then He isa substance that was made: and if He is a substance that was made, then all things were not made by Him; but "'all things were made by Him," therefore He is of one and the same substance with the Father. And so He is not only God, but also very God. And the same John most expressly affirms this in his epistle: '' For we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know the true God, and that we may be in His true Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal lifesta*
11. But perhaps what follows may interfere with this meaning; because it is said, '*Whom no man hath seen, nor can see:" although this may also be taken as belonging to Christ according to His divinity, which the Jews did not see, who yet saw and crucified Him in the flesh; whereas His divinity can in no wise be seen by human sight, but is seen with that sight with which they who see are no longer men, but beyond men. Rightly, therefore, is God Himself, the Trinity, understood to be the '' blessed and .only Potentate,'' who ''shows the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in His own time.'' For the words, ''Who only hath immortality," are said in the same way as it is said, *' Who onl doeth wondrous things.''5 And I should be glad to know of whom they take these words to be said. If only of the Father, how then is that true which the Son Himself says,
10. Hence also it follows by consequence, that the Apostle Paul did not say, '* Who alone has immortality,'' of the Father merely; but of the One and only God, which is the Trinity itself. For that which is itself eternal life is not mortal according to any changeableness; and hence the Son of God, because
''He is Eternal Life,'' is also Himself understood with the Father, where it is said, ''Who only hath immortality.'' For we, too, are made partakers of this eternal life, and become, in our own measure, immortal. But the eternal life itself, of which we are made partakers, is one thing; we ourselves, who, by partaking of it, shall live eternally, are another. For if He had said, '' Whom in His own time the Father will show, who is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords; who only hath immortality;'"? not even so would it be necessarily understood that the Son is excluded. For neither has the Son separated the Father from Himself, because He Himself, speaking elsewhere with the voice of wisdom (for He Himself is the Wisdom of God),? says, ''I alone compassed the circuit of heaven.''3 And therefore so much the more is it not necessary that the words, '' Who hath immortality,' should be understood of the Father alone, omitting the Son; when they are said thus: '' That thou keep this commandment without spot, unrebukeable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ: whom in His own time He will show, who is the blessed and only Poteritate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords; who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honor and power everlasting. Amen.''?4 In which words neither is the Father specially named, nor the Son, nor the Holy Spirit; but the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and
For what things soever the Father doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise?'' Is there any, among wonderful works, more wonderful than to raise up and quicken the dead? Yet the same Son saith, ''As the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom He will." °® How, then, does the Father alone ''do wondrous. things," when these words allow us to understand neither the Father only, nor the Son only, but assuredly the one only true God, that is, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit ?7 12. Also, when the same apostle says,
But to us there is but 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,''*® who can doubt that he speaks of all things which are created; as does John, when he says, °° All things were made by Him''? I ask, therefore, of whom he speaks in another place: '* For of Him, and through Him, and in Him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.'?9 For if of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, so as to assign each clause severally to each person: of Him, that is to say, of the Father; through Him, that is to say, through the Son; in Him, that is to say, in the Holy Spirit,—it is manifest that the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit is one God, inasmuch as the words continue in the singular number, ''To whom" be glory for ever."
S Ps, Ixxii. 18. 6 John v. 19, 21. 7 [Nothing is more important, in order to a correct interpretation of the New Testament, than a correct explanation of the term God. Sometimes it denotes the 'lrinity, and sometimes a person of the Trinity. The context always shows which it is. The examples given here by Augustin are only a few out of many.--W.
John v. 20. ; 2 2 1 Cor. i. 24. 3 Ecclus. xxiv. 5. 4« Tim. vi. 14-16. 4
9.) 8 x Cor, viii. 6. 9 Kom, xi.°36. 10 Ipsi.
Cuap. VI.] ON THE TRINITY. 23
For at the beginning of the passage he does| 13. Similar evidence has been collected not say, "'O the depth of the riches both of|also concerning the Holy Spirit, of which the wisdom and knowledge'"' of the Father, | those who have discussed the subject before or of the Son, or of the Holy Spirit, but '' of | ourselves have most fully availed themselves, the wisdom and knowledge of God !"' '' How|that He too is God, and not a creature, But unsearchable are His judgments, and His|if not a creature, then not only God (for men ways past finding out! For who hath known| likewise are called gods °), but also very God; the mind of the Lord? or who hath been His| and therefore absolutely equal with the Father counsellor? Or who hath first given to Him} and the Son, and in the unity of the Trinity and it shall be recompensed unto him again?|consubstantial and co-eternal. But that the For of Him, and through Him, and in Him, | Holy Spirit is not a creature is made quite are all things: to whom be glory for ever. | plain by that passage above all others, where Amen."* But if they will have this to be un-| we are commanded not to serve the creature, derstood only of the Father, then in what way | but the Creator;7 not in the sense in which are all things by the Father, as is said here;|we are commanded to '' serve" one another and all things by the Son, as where it is said| by love,® which is in Greek dovdedew, but in to the Corinthians, ''And one Lord Jesus|that in which God alone is served, which Christ, by whom are all things,"? and as in|is in Greek Aarpedew. From whence they the Gospel of John, ''All things were made|are called idolaters who tender that service by Him?" For if some things were made by|to images which isduetoGod. For it is this the Father, and some by the Son, then all|service concerning which it is said, '' Thou things were not made by the Father, nor all|shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him things by the Son; but if all things were made| only shalt thou serve."° For this is found by the Father, and all things by the Son, then| also more distinctly in the Greek Scriptures, the same things were made by the Fatber and| which have Aatpedcers. Now if we are forby the Son. The Son, therefore, is equal|bidden to serve the creature with such a serwith the Father, and the working of the/vice, seeing that it is written, '' Thou shalt Father and the Son is indivisible. Because|worship the Lord thy God, and Him only if the Father made even the Son, whom cer-| shalt thou serve" (and hence, too, the apostle tainly the Son Himself did not make, then all| repudiates those who worship and serve the things were not made by the Son; but all|creature more than the Creator), then asthings were made by the Son: therefore He|suredly the Holy Spirit is not a creature, to Himself was not made, that with the Father| whom such a service is paid by all the saints; He might make all things that were made. |as says the apostle, '' For we are the circumAnd the apostle has not refrained from using|cision, which serve the Spirit of God," " the very word itself, but has said most ex-| which is in the Greek Aatpedovtes. For even pressly, '* Who, being in the form of God,|most Latin copies also have it thus, ''We thought it not robbery to be equal with|who serve the Spirit of God;" but all Greek God;"'3 using here the name of God specially | ones, or almost all, have it so. Although in of the Father;* as elsewhere, '' But the head|some Latin copies we find, not ** We worship of Christ is God.''s the Spirit of God," but, ''We worship God Pee . : in the Spirit." But let those who err in this case, om. xi. 33-36. 2 1 Cor. viii. 6. 3 Phil. ii. 6. i i 4 [It is not generally safe to differ from Augustin in trinitarian and refuse to give up to the pore weighty exegesis. Butin Phil. ii. 6 'God'? must surely denote the Diauthority tell us whether they find this text vine Essence, not the first Person of the Essence. St. Paul dessine 66 cribes '* Christ Jesus" as 'subsisting "' (smépxwyv) originally, that is also varied in the mss.: Know ye not that rior to incarnation, "'in a form of God"' (év nopo7 deov), and because your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost,
so subsisted, as being ''equal with God.'' The word popdy is anarthrous in the text: a form, not tke form; as the A.V. and R.V. | which is in you, which ye have of God?" Yet render, St. Paul refers to one of three '' forms "' of God--namely, that particular form of Sonship, which is peculiar to the second d h H what can be more senseless or more profane, person of the Godhead. Had the apostle employed the article. ' . . . a at € with Mopoy, the implication would be that there is only one than that uep aed Se et ake e y ; - form of God "—that is, only one person in the Divine Essence.| Members of Christ are the temple of one who,
If then deod, in this place, denotes the Father, as Augustin in their opinion is a creature inferior to 9 the Ne Se We he pid that the Father had more than one "form,'' or else (if wopdy be rendered with th ticle) that ; i the Logos subsisted in the '* form"' of the Father, pees nin place, ** Your bodies are members of Christ."
says, St. Paul would teach that the Logos subsisted '' in a form of 4 : Christ? For the apostle says in another is true. But if '' God,' in this place, denotes the Divine Essence, then St. Paul teaches that the unincarnate Logos subsisted in a parBut if the members of Sans gig rao. We ticular " form" of the Essence—the Father and Spirit subsisting} temple of the Holy Spirit, then the Holy in other '' forms"? of it.
ceesneereian A
The student will observe that Augustin is careful to teach Spirit is not a creature; ECAH SG se. RUS that the Logos, when he took on him 'a form of a servant," did Him, of whom our body is the not day aside ''a form of God." He understands the kenosis needs owe. to d d (exévwoe) to be, the humbling of the divinity by its «zon with the humanity; not the exinanition of it in the extremest sense of 6 Ps. lxxxii. 6. 7 Rom. i. 25. 8 Gal. v. 1 9 Deut, vi. 13. 3. 10 Phil. iii. 3 (Vulgate, etc.).
entirely divesting himself of the divinity, nor the less extreme ame - a totad non-use of it during the humiliation.—W.G.T.S. ]. COT. Xi. 3.