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| There is a Double Rule for Understanding the Scriptural Modes of Speech Concerning the Son of God. These Modes of Speech are of a Threefold Kind.
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Chapter 1.—There is a Double Rule for Understanding
the Scriptural Modes of Speech Concerning the Son of God. These
Modes of Speech are of a Threefold Kind.
2. Wherefore, although we hold most
firmly, concerning our Lord Jesus Christ, what may be called the
canonical rule, as it is both disseminated through the Scriptures,
and has been demonstrated by learned and Catholic handlers of the
same Scriptures, namely, that the Son of God is both
understood to be equal to the Father according to the form of
God in which He is, and less than the Father according to the form
of a servant which He took;211
in which form He was found to be
not only less than the Father, but also less than the Holy Spirit;
and not only so, but less even than Himself,—not than Himself who
was, but than Himself who is; because, by taking the form of a
servant, He did not lose the form of God, as the testimonies of the
Scriptures taught us, to which we have referred in the former book:
yet there are some things in the sacred text so put as to leave it
ambiguous to which rule they are rather to be referred; whether to
that by which we understand the Son as less, in that He has taken
upon Him the creature, or to that by which we understand that the
Son is not indeed less than, but equal to the Father, but yet that
He is from Him, God of God, Light of light. For we call the Son God
of God; but the Father, God only; not of God. Whence
it is plain that the Son has another of whom He is, and to
whom He is Son; but that the Father has not a Son of whom He
is, but only to whom He is father. For every son is what he is,
of his father, and is son to his father; but no father is what
he is, of his son, but is father to his son.212
| 212 [Augustin here brings to view both
the trinitarian and the theanthropic or mediatorial subordination.
The former is the status of Sonship. God the Son is God of
God. Sonship as a relation is subordinate to paternity. But
a son must be of the same grade of being, and of the same nature
with his father. A human son and a human father are alike and
equally human. And a Divine Son and a Divine father are
alike and equally divine. The theanthropic or mediatorial
subordination is the status of humiliation, by reason of the
incarnation. In the words of Augustin, it is “that by which we
understand the Son as less, in that he has taken upon Him the
creature.” The subordination in this case is that of voluntary
condescension, for the purpose of redeeming sinful
man.—W.G.T.S.] |
3. Some things, then, are so put in
the Scriptures concerning the Father and the Son, as to intimate
the unity and equality of their substance; as, for instance, “I
and the Father are one;”213
and, “Who, being in the form of
God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God;”214
and whatever
other texts there are of the kind. And some, again, are so put that
they show the Son as less on account of the form of a servant, that
is, of His having taken upon Him the creature of a changeable and
human substance; as, for instance, that which says, “For my
Father is greater than I;”215
and, “The Father judgeth no man,
but hath committed all judgment unto the Son.” For a little after
he goes on to say, “And hath given Him authority to execute
judgment also, because He is the Son of man.” And further, some
are so put, as to show Him at that time neither as less nor as
equal, but only to intimate that He is of the Father; as, for
instance, that which says, “For as the Father hath life in
Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself;”
and that other: “The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He
seeth the Father do.”216
| 216 John v. 22, 27, 26,
19 | For if we shall take this to be
therefore so said, because the Son is less in the form taken from
the creature, it will follow that the Father must have walked on
the water, or opened the eyes with clay and spittle of some other
one born blind, and have done the other things which the Son
appearing in the flesh did among men, before the Son did them;217
in order
that He might be able to do those things, who said that the Son was
not able to do anything of Himself, except what He hath seen the
Father do. Yet who, even though he were mad, would think this? It
remains, therefore, that these texts are so expressed, because the
life of the Son is unchangeable as that of the Father is, and yet
He is of the Father; and the working of the Father and of the Son
is indivisible, and yet so to work is given to the Son from Him of
whom He Himself is, that is, from the Father; and the Son so sees
the Father, as that He is the Son in the very seeing Him. For to be
of the Father, that is, to be born of the Father, is to Him nothing
else than to see the Father; and to see Him working, is nothing
else than to work with Him: but therefore not from Himself, because
He is not from Himself. And, therefore, those things which “He
sees the Father do, these also doeth the Son likewise,” because
He is of the Father. For He neither does other things in like
manner, as a painter paints other pictures, in the same way as he
sees others to have been painted by another man; nor the same
things in a different manner, as the body expresses the same
letters, which the mind has thought; but “whatsoever things,”
saith He, “the Father doeth, these same things also doeth the Son
likewise.”218
He has said
both “these same things,” and “likewise;” and hence the
working of both the Father and the Son is indivisible and equal,
but it is from the Father to the Son. Therefore the Son cannot do
anything of Himself, except what He seeth the Father do. From this
rule, then, whereby the Scriptures so speak as to mean, not to set
forth one as less than another, but only to show which is of which,
some have drawn this meaning, as if the Son were said to be less.
And some among ourselves who are more unlearned and least
instructed in these things, endeavoring to take these texts
according to the form of a servant, and so misinterpreting them,
are troubled. And to prevent this, the rule in question is to be
observed whereby the Son is not less, but it is simply intimated
that He is of the Father, in which words not His inequality but His
birth is declared.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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