Chapter 2 (12): In What Sense Christ Is Said To Have Been Conceived And Born Of
Distinction IV | 15 them?"—SOLUTION. "Or is it that, when one of the three is named with reference to any work, the Trinity is understood to work everything? This is truly the case, and it can be taught by examples.'"* You have heard the question being stated and its exposition.
Chapter 2 (12)
IN WHAT SENSE CHRIST IS SAID TO HAVE BEEN CONCEIVED AND BORN OF
THE HOLY SPIRIT.—AUGUSTINE, IN THE ENCHIRIDION. "But we must not dwell on this too long. For the other question urges us: how Christ is said to have been 'born of the Holy Spirit,' since he is not in any way the son of the Holy Spirit. ... Are we then to say that the Holy Spirit is the father of Christ the man, so that God the Father would have begotten the Word, and the Holy Spirit would have begotten the man? And that, from these two substances, there was one Christ, on the one hand, Son of God the Father according to his being Word, and, on the other hand, son of the Holy
Spirit according to his being man, because the Holy Spirit, as it were his father, had begotten him from the Virgin Mother? Who shall dare to say this, since it is so absurd that believers' ears are not able to bear it? And so,
... Since we profess that Christ was born of the Holy Spirit from the Virgin Mary, it is difficult to explain how he is not the son of the Holy Spirit, but is the son of the Virgin, even though he was born of the one and the other.
Undoubtedly, he was not born from him as from a father, but he was from her as from a mother."!
2. THAT WHATEVER IS BORN OF SOME THING IS NOT NECESSARILY
CALLED ITS SON. "But it is not to be granted that whatever is born of some thing is necessarily to be called the son of that thing. I pass over the fact that a son is born of a man otherwise than a hair, a louse, a worm in the stomach is, and none of these is a son. I pass over this because it is unsuitable to compare them to the great matter under consideration; but, surely, no one would rightly call those who are born from water and the Holy Spirit' the sons of water, but they are called sons of God the Father and of Mother Church. In the same way, Christ was born of the Holy
Spirit, and yet he is not the son of the Holy Spirit. (NOR ARE ALL THOSE
WHO ARE CALLED SOMEONE'S SONS NECESSARILY BORN OF HIM.) Con-
versely, it does not necessarily follow that all who are called someone's sons are also to be said to be born of him, like those who are adopted.
"Augustine, Enchiridion, c38.
'Augustine, Enchiridion, c38.
OP Ge Oe
16 | THE SENTENCES, BOOK 3
Some are even called sons of hell,' not because they are born from it, but because they are prepared for it.'* 3. "And so, one thing may be born of another, and yet not so as to be its son; on the other hand, everyone who is called a son is not born of the one whose son he is called: it is clear that this manner in which Christ is born, of Mary as son and of the Holy Spirit not as son, indicates to us the grace of God. By this grace, a man, without any preceding merits, at the very beginning of his human existence, was joined to the Word of God into such unity of person that the same was the Son of God who was son of man, and the son of man who was Son of God; and that, in the taking up of human nature, that grace became in some way natural to that man and by it he was not able to commit any sin. This grace is signified by the Holy Spirit because he is specifically God in such a way as to be also Gift of God."*°—* And so, through the fact that Christ's nativity is said to be of the Holy Spirit, what else is shown than that grace itself,"' by which man, "in a wonderful and ineffable manner, is joined with the Word of God"'* and formed and corporeally filled with divine grace.'
4. ANOTHER REASON WHY HE IS SAID TO BE BORN OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.
—AUGUSTINE, IN THE ENCHIRIDION. Christ can also be said to have been born of the Holy Spirit in respect to his humanity "because he made him: for as the Apostle says,'° insofar as he was man, he was also made."!!—
JEROME IN THE EXPOSITION OF THE CATHOLIC FAITH. And so he is said to have been conceived and born of the Holy Spirit not because the Holy
Spirit stood "in the place of the seed''' to the Virgin: for what was born did not take seed from the substance of the Holy Spirit; but because, by the grace of God and the operation of the Holy Spirit, what was united to the Word was taken from the flesh of the Virgin.
5. AMBROSE. Also, in the Gospel, according to this understanding, we read of Mary that she was found to be with child of the Holy Spirit.'*
Indicating the reason for this statement, Ambrose, in On the Holy Spirit, book 2, says: "What is from something is either from its substance or from its power. From substance, like the Son who proceeds from the Father, and the Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son;
Ci; Mt23415:
"Augustine, Enchiridion, c39.
°Cf. Acts 8, 20.
°Augustine, Enchiridion, c40.
Ibid., c37.
'Ibid., c41.
"Cf Col. 2,9, Rom. 1, 3.
'' Augustine, Enchiridion, ¢38. eae Libellus fidei ad Innocentium Papam, n4.
Lic feel ley,