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Book
II.
1. Believers have
always found their satisfaction in that Divine utterance, which our
ears heard recited from the Gospel at the moment when that Power, which
is its attestation, was bestowed upon us:—Go now and teach all
nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I
command you; and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the
world556
. What element
in the mystery of man’s salvation is not included in those
words? What is forgotten, what left in darkness? All is
full, as from the Divine fulness; perfect, as from the Divine
perfection. The passage contains the exact words to be used, the
essential acts, the sequence of processes, an insight into the Divine
nature. He bade them baptize in the Name of the Father, and of
the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, that is with confession of the
Creator and of the Only-begotten, and of the Gift. For God the
Father is One, from Whom are all things; and our Lord Jesus Christ the
Only-begotten, through Whom are all things, is One; and the Spirit,
God’s Gift to us, Who pervades all things, is also One.
Thus all are ranged according to powers possessed and benefits
conferred;—the One Power from Whom all, the One Offspring through
Whom all, the One Gift Who gives us perfect hope. Nothing can be
found lacking in that supreme Union which embraces, in Father, Son and
Holy Spirit, infinity in the Eternal, His Likeness in His express
Image, our enjoyment of Him in the Gift.
2. But the errors of heretics and blasphemers
force us to deal with unlawful matters, to scale perilous heights, to
speak unutterable words, to trespass on forbidden ground. Faith
ought in silence to fulfil the commandments, worshipping the Father,
reverencing with Him the Son, abounding in the Holy Ghost, but we must
strain the poor resources of our language to express thoughts too great
for words. The error of others compels us to err in daring to
embody in human terms truths which ought to be hidden in the silent
veneration of the heart.
3. For there have risen many who have given
to the plain words of Holy Writ some arbitrary interpretation of their
own, instead of its true and only sense, and this in defiance of the
clear meaning of words. Heresy lies in the sense assigned, not in
the word written; the guilt is that of the expositor, not of the
text. Is not truth indestructible? When we hear the name
Father, is not sonship involved in that Name? The Holy
Ghost is mentioned by name; must He not exist? We can no more
separate fatherhood from the Father or sonship from the Son than we can
deny the existence in the Holy Ghost of that gift which we
receive. Yet men of distorted mind plunge the whole matter in
doubt and difficulty, fatuously reversing the clear meaning of words,
and depriving the Father of His fatherhood because they wish to strip
the Son of His sonship. They take away the fatherhood by
asserting that the Son is not a Son by nature; for a son is not of the
nature of his father when begetter and begotten have not the same
properties, and he is no son whose being is different from that of the
father, and unlike it. Yet in what sense is God a Father (as He
is), if He have not begotten in His Son that same substance and nature
which are His own?
4. Since, therefore, they cannot make any
change in the facts recorded, they bring novel principles and theories
of man’s device to bear upon them. Sabellius, for instance,
makes the Son an extension of the Father, and the faith in this regard
a matter of words rather than of reality, for he makes one and the same
Person, Son to Himself and also Father. Hebion allows no
beginning to the Son of God except from Mary, and represents Him not as
first God and then man, but as first man then God; declares that the
Virgin did not receive into herself One previously existent, Who had
been in the beginning God the Word dwelling with God, but that through
the agency of the Word she bore Flesh; the ‘Word’ meaning
in his opinion not the nature of the pre-existent Only-begotten
God557
, but only the sound of an uplifted
voice. Similarly certain teachers of our present day assert that
the Image and Wisdom and Power of God was produced out of nothing, and
in time. They do this to save God, regarded as Father of the Son,
from being lowered to the Son’s level. They are fearful lest this birth
of the Son from Him should deprive Him of His glory, and therefore come
to God’s rescue by styling His Son a creature made out of
nothing, in order that God may live on in solitary perfection without a
Son born of Himself and partaking His nature. What wonder that
their doctrine of the Holy Ghost should be different from ours, when
they presume to subject the Giver of that Holy Ghost to creation, and
change, and non-existence. Thus do they destroy the consistency
and completeness of the mystery of the faith. They break up the
absolute unity of God by assigning differences of nature where all is
clearly common to Each; they deny the Father by robbing the Son of His
true Sonship; they deny the Holy Ghost in their blindness to the facts
that we possess Him and that Christ gave Him. They betray
ill-trained souls to ruin by their boast of the logical perfection of
their doctrine; they deceive their hearers by emptying terms of their
meaning, though the Names remain to witness to the truth. I pass
over the pitfalls of other heresies, Valentinian, Marcionite, Manichee
and the rest. From time to time they catch the attention of some
foolish souls and prove fatal by the very infection of their contact;
one plague as destructive as another when once the poison of their
teaching has found its way into the hearer’s thoughts.
5. Their treason involves us in the
difficult and dangerous position of having to make a definite
pronouncement, beyond the statements of Scripture, upon this grave and
abstruse matter. The Lord said that the nations were to be
baptized in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost. The words of the faith are clear; the heretics do
their utmost to involve the meaning in doubt. We may not on this
account add to the appointed form, yet we must set a limit to their
license of interpretation. Since their malice, inspired by the
devil’s cunning, empties the doctrine of its meaning while it
retains the Names which convey the truth, we must emphasise the truth
which those Names convey. We must proclaim, exactly as we shall
find them in the words of Scripture, the majesty and functions of
Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and so debar the heretics from robbing
these Names of their connotation of Divine character, and compel them
by means of these very Names to confine their use of terms to their
proper meaning. I cannot conceive what manner of mind our
opponents have, who pervert the truth, darken the light, divide the
indivisible, rend the scatheless, dissolve the perfect unity. It
may seem to them a light thing to tear up Perfection, to make laws for
Omnipotence, to limit Infinity; as for me, the task of answering them
fills me with anxiety; my brain whirls, my intellect is stunned, my
very words must be a confession, not that I am weak of utterance, but
that I am dumb. Yet a wish to undertake the task forces itself
upon me; it means withstanding the proud, guiding the wanderer, warning
the ignorant. But the subject is inexhaustible; I can see no
limit to my venture of speaking concerning God in terms more precise
than He Himself has used. He has assigned the Names—Father,
Son and Holy Ghost,—which are our information of the Divine
nature. Words cannot express or feeling embrace or reason
apprehend the results of enquiry carried further; all is ineffable,
unattainable, incomprehensible. Language is exhausted by the
magnitude of the theme, the splendour of its effulgence blinds the
gazing eye, the intellect cannot compass its boundless extent.
Still, under the necessity that is laid upon us, with a prayer for
pardon to Him Whose attributes these are, we will venture, enquire and
speak; and moreover—it is the only promise that in so grave a
matter we dare to make—we will accept whatever conclusion He
shall indicate.
6. It is the Father to Whom all existence owes its
origin. In Christ and through Christ He is the source of
all. In contrast to all else He is self-existent. He does
not draw His being from without, but possesses it from Himself and in
Himself. He is infinite, for nothing contains Him and He contains
all things; He is eternally unconditioned by space, for He is
illimitable; eternally anterior to time, for time is His
creation. Let imagination range to what you may suppose is
God’s utmost limit, and you will find Him present there; strain
as you will there is always a further horizon towards which to
strain. Infinity is His property, just as the power of making
such effort is yours. Words will fail you, but His being will not
be circumscribed. Or again, turn back the pages of history, and
you will find Him ever present; should numbers fail to express the
antiquity to which you have penetrated, yet God’s eternity is not
diminished. Gird up your intellect to comprehend Him as a whole;
He eludes you. God, as a whole, has left something within your
grasp, but this something is inextricably involved in His
entirety. Thus you have missed the whole, since it is only a part
which remains in your hands; nay, not even a part, for you are dealing
with a whole which you have failed to divide. For a part implies
division, a whole is undivided, and God is everywhere and wholly
present wherever He is. Reason, therefore, cannot cope with Him,
since no point of contemplation can be found outside Himself and since
eternity is eternally His. This is a true statement of the
mystery of that unfathomable nature which is expressed by the Name
‘Father:’ God invisible, ineffable, infinite.
Let us confess by our silence that words cannot describe Him; let sense
admit that it is foiled in the attempt to apprehend, and reason in the
effort to define. Yet He has, as we said, in ‘Father’
a name to indicate His nature; He is a Father unconditioned. He
does not, as men do, receive the power of paternity from an external
source. He is unbegotten, everlasting, inherently eternal.
To the Son only is He known, for no one knoweth the Father save the Son
and him to whom the Son willeth to reveal Him, nor yet the Son save the
Father558
. Each has perfect and complete
knowledge of the Other. Therefore, since no one knoweth the
Father save the Son, let our thoughts of the Father be at one with
the thoughts of the Son, the only faithful Witness, Who reveals Him to
us.
7. It is easier for me to feel this
concerning the Father than to say it. I am well aware that no
words are adequate to describe His attributes. We must feel that
He is invisible, incomprehensible, eternal. But to say that He is
self-existent and self-originating and self-sustained, that He is
invisible and incomprehensible and immortal; all this is an
acknowledgment of His glory, a hint of our meaning, a sketch of our
thoughts, but speech is powerless to tell us what God is, words cannot
express the reality. You hear that He is self-existent; human
reason cannot explain such independence. We can find objects
which uphold, and objects which are upheld, but that which thus exists
is obviously distinct from that which is the cause of its
existence. Again, if you hear that He is self-originating, no
instance can be found in which the giver of the gift of life is
identical with the life that is given. If you hear that He is
immortal, then there is something which does not spring from Him and
with which He has, by His very nature559
| 559 Reading a
se, instead of alter. | , no contact;
and, indeed, death is not the only thing which this word
‘immortal’ claims as independent of God560
| 560 This is merely a
verbal paradox, to illustrate the inadequacy of language to treat of
God. God is ex hypothesi author of all things, and
contains all things in Himself. But the negative term
‘immortal’ excludes death, and its concomitants of disease,
pain, &c., from God’s sphere. | . If you hear that He is
incomprehensible, that is as much as to say that He is non-existent,
since contact with Him is impossible. If you say that He is
invisible, a being that does not visibly exist cannot be sure of its
own existence. Thus our confession of God fails through the
defects of language; the best combination of words we can devise cannot
indicate the reality and the greatness of God. The perfect
knowledge of God is so to know Him that we are sure we must not be
ignorant of Him, yet cannot describe Him. We must believe, must
apprehend, must worship; and such acts of devotion must stand in lieu
of definition.
8. We have now exchanged the perils of a
harbourless coast for the storms of the open sea. We can neither
safely advance nor safely retreat, yet the way that lies before us has
greater hardships than that which lies behind. The Father is what
He is, and as He is manifested, so we must believe. The mind
shrinks in dread from treating of the Son; at every word I tremble lest
I be betrayed into treason. For He is the Offspring of the
Unbegotten, One from One, true from true, living from living, perfect
from perfect; the Power of Power, the Wisdom of Wisdom, the Glory of
Glory, the Likeness of the invisible God, the Image of the Unbegotten
Father. Yet in what sense can we conceive that the Only-begotten
is the Offspring of the Unbegotten? Repeatedly the Father cries
from heaven, This is My beloved Son in Whom I am well
pleased561
. It is no
rending or severance, for He that begat is without passions, and He
that was born is the Image of the invisible God and bears witness,
The Father is in Me and I in the Father562
. It is no mere adoption, for He is
the true Son of God and cries, He that hath seen Me hath seen the
Father also563
. Nor did He
come into existence in obedience to a command as did created things,
for He is the Only-begotten of the One God; and He has life in Himself,
even as He that begot Him has life, for He says, As the Father hath
life in Himself, even so gave He to the Son to have life in
Himself564
. Nor is there
a portion of the Father resident in the Son, for the Son bears witness,
All things that the Father hath are Mine565
, and
again, And all things that are Mine are Thine, and Thine are
Mine566
| 566 Ib.
xvii. 10. The
words which follow, “and Whatsoever the Father hath He Hath
given to the Son,” printed in the editions as a Scriptural
citation, are evidently a gloss which has crept into the text.
The words do not occur in Scripture, but are used by Hilary in §
10 of this Book. | , and the Apostle
testifies, For in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead
bodily567
; and by the nature
of things a portion cannot possess the whole568
. He is the perfect Son of the
perfect Father, for He Who has all has given all to Him. Yet we
must not imagine that the Father did not give, because He still
possesses, or that He has lost, because He gave to the Son.
9. The manner of this birth is therefore a secret
confined to the Two. If any one lays upon his personal incapacity
his failure to solve the mystery, in spite of the certainty that Father
and Son stand to Each Other in those relations, he will be still more
pained at the ignorance to which I confess. I, too, am in the
dark, yet I ask no questions. I look for comfort to the fact that
Archangels share my ignorance, that Angels have not heard the
explanation, and worlds do not contain it, that no prophet has espied
it and no Apostle sought for it, that the Son Himself has not revealed
it. Let such pitiful complaints cease. Whoever you are that
search into these mysteries, I do not bid you resume your exploration
of height and breadth and depth; I ask you rather to acquiesce
patiently in your ignorance of the mode of Divine generation, seeing
that you know not how His creatures come into existence. Answer
me this one question:—Do your senses give you any evidence that
you yourself were begotten? Can you explain the process by which
you became a father? I do not ask whence you drew perception, how
you obtained life, whence your reason comes, what is the nature of your
senses of smell, touch, sight, hearing; the fact that we have the use
of all these is the evidence that they exist. What I ask
is:—How do you give them to your children? How do you
ingraft the senses, lighten the eyes, implant the mind? Tell me,
if you can. You have, then, powers which you do not understand,
you impart gifts which you cannot comprehend. You are calmly
indifferent to the mysteries of your own being, profanely impatient of
ignorance concerning the mysteries of God’s.
10. Listen then to the Unbegotten Father,
listen to the Only-begotten Son. Hear His words, The Father is
greater than I569
, and I and the
Father are One570
, and He that hath
seen Me hath seen the Father also571
, and The
Father is in Me and I in the Father572
,
and I went out from the Father573
, and Who
is in the bosom of the Father574
, and
Whatsoever the Father hath He hath delivered to the Son575
| 575 The citation which is
interpolated in § 8, where see the note, and cf. St. Matt. xi. 25. | , and The Son hath life in Himself, even
as the Father hath in Himself576
. Hear
in these words the Son, the Image, the Wisdom, the Power, the Glory of
God. Next mark the Holy Ghost proclaiming Who shall declare
His generation577
?
Note578
the Lord’s assurance, No one
knoweth the Son save the Father, neither doth any know the Father save
the Son and He to whom the Son willeth to reveal Him579
. Penetrate into the mystery,
plunge into the darkness which shrouds that birth, where you will be
alone with God the Unbegotten and God the Only-begotten. Make
your start, continue, persevere. I know that you will not reach
the goal, but I shall rejoice at your progress. For He who
devoutly treads an endless road, though he reach no conclusion, will
profit by his exertions. Reason will fail for want of words, but
when it comes to a stand it will be the better for the effort made.
11. The Son draws His life from that Father
Who truly has life; the Only begotten from the Unbegotten, Offspring
from Parent, Living from Living. As the Father hath life in
Himself, even so gave He to the Son also to have life in
Himself580
. The Son is
perfect from Him that is perfect, for He is whole from Him that is
whole. This is no division or severance, for Each is in the
Other, and the fulness of the Godhead is in the Son.
Incomprehensible is begotten of Incomprehensible, for none else knows
Them, but Each knows the Other; Invisible is begotten of Invisible, for
the Son is the Image of the invisible God, and he that has seen the Son
has seen the Father also. There is a distinction, for They are
Father and Son; not that Their Divinity is different in kind, for Both
are One, God of God, One God Only begotten of One God Unbegotten.
They are not two Gods, but One of One; not two Unbegotten, for the Son
is born of the Unborn. There is no diversity, for the life of the
living God is in the living Christ. So much I have resolved to
say concerning the nature of their Divinity; not imagining that I have
succeeded in making a summary of the faith, but recognising that the
theme is inexhaustible. So faith, you object, has no service to
render, since there is nothing that it can comprehend. Not so;
the proper service of faith is to grasp and confess the truth that it
is incompetent to comprehend its Object.
12. It remains to say something more
concerning the mysterious generation of the Son; or rather this
something more is everything. I quiver, I linger, my powers fail,
I know not where to begin. I cannot tell the time of the
Son’s birth; it were impious not to be certain of the fact.
Whom shall I entreat? Whom shall I call to my aid? From
what books shall I borrow the terms needed to state so hard a
problem? Shall I ransack the philosophy of Greece?
No! I have read, Where is the wise? Where is the enquirer of
this world581
? In this matter, then,
the world’s philosophers, the wise men of paganism, are
dumb: for they have rejected the wisdom of God. Shall I
turn to the Scribe of the law? He is in darkness, for the Cross
of Christ is an offence to him. Shall I, perchance, bid you shut
your eyes to heresy, and pass it by in silence, on the ground that
sufficient reverence is shown to Him Whom we preach if we believe that
lepers were cleansed, the deaf heard, the lame ran, the palsied stood,
the blind (in general) received sight, the blind from his birth had
eyes given to him582
| 582 The healing of the
blind man, St. John ix.
1 ff., is treated as a
special case distinct from more ordinary cases of blindness. | , devils were
routed, the sick recovered, the dead lived. The heretics confess
all this, and perish.
13. Look now to see a thing not less
miraculous than lame men running, blind men seeing, the flight of
devils, the life from the dead. There stands by my side, to guide
me through the difficulties which I have enunciated, a poor fisherman,
ignorant, uneducated, fishing-lines in hand, clothes dripping, muddy
feet, every inch a sailor. Consider and decide whether it were
the greater feat to raise the dead or impart to an untrained mind the
knowledge of mysteries so deep as he reveals by saying, In the
beginning was the Word583
. What
means this In the beginning was? He ranges backward over
the spaces of time, centuries are left behind, ages are
cancelled. Fix in your mind what date you will for this
beginning; you miss the mark, for even then He, of Whom we are
speaking, was. Survey the universe, note well what is written of
it, In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth584
. This word beginning fixes
the moment of creation; you can assign its date to an event which is
definitely stated to have happened in the beginning. But
this fisherman of mine, unlettered and unread, is untrammelled by time,
undaunted by its immensity; he pierces beyond the beginning. For
his was has no limit of time and no commencement; the uncreated
Word was in the beginning.
14. But perhaps we shall find that our
fisherman has been guilty of departure from the terms of the problem
proposed for solution585
. He has set
the Word free from the limitations of time; that which is free lives
its own life and is bound to no obedience. Let us, therefore, pay
our best attention to what follows:—And the Word was with
God. We find that it is with God that the Word, Which
was before the beginning, exists unconditioned by time.
The Word, Which was, is with God. He Who is absent
when we seek for His origin in time586
| 586 Reading a
cognitione temporis. | is present
all the while with the Creator of time. For this once our
fisherman has escaped; perhaps he will succumb to the difficulties
which await him.
15. For you will plead that a word is the
sound of a voice; that it is a naming of things, an utterance of
thoughts. This Word was with God, and was in the beginning; the
expression of the eternal Thinker’s thoughts must be
eternal. For the present I will give you a brief answer of my own
on the fisherman’s behalf, till we see what defence he has to
make for his own simplicity. The nature, then, of a word is that
it is first a potentiality, afterwards a past event; an existing thing
only while it is being heard. How can we say, In the beginning
was the Word, when a word neither exists before, nor lives after, a
definite point of time? Can we even say that there is a point of
time in which a word exists? Not only are the words in a
speaker’s mouth non-existent until they are spoken, and perished
the instant they are uttered, but even in the moment of utterance there
is a change from the sound which commences to that which ends a
word. Such is the reply that suggests itself to me as a
bystander. But your opponent the Fisherman has an answer of his
own. He will begin by reproving you for your inattention.
Even though your unpractised ear failed to catch the first clause,
In the beginning was the Word, why complain of the next, And
the Word was with God? Was it And the Word was in God
that you heard,—the dictum of some profound philosophy? Or
is it that your provincial dialect makes no distinction between
in and with? The assertion is that Which was in the
beginning was with, not in, Another. But I will not
argue from the beginning of the sentence; the sequel can take care of
itself. Hear now the rank and the name of the Word:—And
the Word was God. Your plea that the Word is the sound of a
voice, the utterance of a thought, falls to the ground. The Word
is a reality, not a sound, a Being, not a speech, God, not a
nonentity.
16. But I tremble to say it; the audacity
staggers me. I hear, And the Word was God; I, whom the
prophets have taught that God is One. To save me from further
fears, give me, friend Fisherman, a fuller imparting of this great
mystery. Show that these assertions are consistent with the unity
of God; that there is
no blasphemy in them, no explaining away, no denial of eternity.
He continues, He was in the beginning with God. This He
was in the beginning removes the limit of time; the word God
shows that He is more than a voice; that He is with God proves
that He neither encroaches nor is encroached upon, for His identity is
not swallowed up in that of Another, and He is clearly stated to be
present with the One Unbegotten God as God, His One and Only-begotten
Son.
17. We are still waiting, Fisherman, for
your full description of the Word. He was in the beginning, it
may be said, but perhaps He was not before the beginning. To this
also I will furnish a reply on my Fisherman’s behalf. The
Word could not be other than He was; that was is
unconditional and unlimited. But what says the Fisherman for
himself? All things were made through Him. Thus,
since nothing exists apart from Him through Whom the universe came into
being, He, the Author of all things, must have an immeasurable
existence. For time is a cognisable and divisible measure of
extension, not in space, but in duration. All things are from
Him, without exception; time then itself is His creature.
18. But, my Fisherman, the objection will be
raised that you are reckless and extravagant in your language; that
All things were made through Him needs qualification.
There is the Unbegotten, made of none; there is also the Son, begotten
of the Unborn Father. This All things is an unguarded
statement, admitting no exceptions. While we are silent, not
daring to answer or trying to think of some reply, do you break in
with, And without Him was nothing made. You have restored
the Author of the Godhead to His place, while proclaiming that He has a
Companion. From your saying that nothing was made without
Him, I learn that He was not alone. He through Whom the work
was done is One; He without Whom it was not done is Another: a
distinction is drawn between Creator and Companion.
19. Reverence for the One Unbegotten Creator
distressed me, lest in your sweeping assertion that all things were
made by the Word you had included Him. You have banished my fears
by your Without Him was nothing made. Yet this same
Without Him was nothing made brings trouble and
distraction. There was, then, something made by that Other; not
made, it is true, without Him. If the Other did make
anything, even though the Word were present at the making, then it is
untrue that through Him all things were made. It is one
thing to be the Creator’s Companion, quite another to be the
Creator’s Self. I could find answers of my own to the
previous objections; in this case, Fisherman, I can only turn at once
to your words, All things were made through Him. And now I
understand, for the Apostle has enlightened me:—Things visible
and things invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or
powers, all are through Him and in Him587
.
20. Since, then, all things were made
through Him, come to our help and tell us what it was that was made not
without Him. That which was made in Him is life.
That which was made in Him was certainly not made without
Him; for that which was made in Him was also made through
Him. All things were created in Him and through Him588
. They were created in
Him589
, for He was born as God the
Creator. Again, nothing that was made in Him was made without
Him, for the reason that God the Begotten was life, and was born as
Life, not made life after His birth; for there are not two elements in
Him, one inborn and one afterwards conferred. There is no
interval in His case between birth and maturity. None of the
things that were created in Him was made without Him, for He is the
Life which made their creation possible. Moreover God, the Son of
God, became God by virtue of His birth, not after He was born.
Being born the Living from the Living, the True from the True, the
Perfect from the Perfect, He was born in full possession of His
powers. He needed not to learn in after time what His birth was,
but was conscious of His Godhead by the very fact that He was born as
God of God. I and the Father are One590
,
are the words of the Only-begotten Son of the Unbegotten. It is
the voice of the One God proclaiming Himself to be Father and Son;
Father speaking in the Son and Son in the Father. Hence also
He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father also591
; hence All that the Father hath, He hath
given to the Son592
; hence As the
Father hath life in Himself so hath He given to the Son to have life in
Himself593
; hence No one
knoweth the Father save the Son, nor the Son save the
Father594
; hence In Him
dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily595
| 595 Col. ii. 9. The argument of
§§ 18–20 is not easy. They begin with the
possible objection to All things were made through Him, that
this would include the Father among the Son’s creations.
The answer is found in the following words, Without Him was not
anything made. These show that the Son was not alone in His
work; the Father is co-existent. But they raise another
difficulty. What if the Father were the sole agent in creation,
the Son only His inseparable Companion, yet taking no share in the
work? The answer is found in the preceding words, All things
were made through Him, amplified and explained by St. Paul when He
says that it was through Him and in Him. In Him, because
when the Son, the future Creator, was born, the world was potentially
created; in Him also because He is Life, and thus the condition
of all existence. Again, the truth of the words, All things
were made through Him, is shewn by the manner of His birth.
It was instantaneous, and He was born endowed with all His
powers. We may say therefore that He was the author of His own
existence; All things were made through Him, with the necessary
exception of the Father. | .
21. This
Life is the Light of men, the Light which lightens the darkness.
To comfort us for that powerlessness to describe His generation of
which the prophet speaks596
, the Fisherman
adds, And the darkness comprehended Him not597
. The language of unaided reason was
baffled and silenced; the Fisherman who lay on the bosom of the Lord
was taught to express the mystery. His language is not the
world’s language, for He deals with things that are not of the
world. Let us know what it is, if there be any teaching that you
can extract from his words, more than their plain sense conveys; if you
can translate into other terms the truth we have elicited, publish them
abroad. If there be none—indeed, because there are
none—let us accept with reverence this teaching of the fisherman,
and recognise in his words the oracles of God. Let us cling in
adoration to the true confession of Father and Son, Unbegotten and
Only-begotten ineffably, Whose majesty defies all expression and all
perception. Let us, like John, lie on the bosom of the Lord
Jesus, that we too may understand and proclaim the mystery.
22. This faith, and every part of it, is
impressed upon us by the evidence of the Gospels, by the teaching of
the Apostles, by the futility of the treacherous attacks which heretics
make on every side. The foundation stands firm and unshaken in
face of winds and rains and torrents; storms cannot overthrow it, nor
dripping waters hollow it, nor floods sweep it away. Its
excellence is proved by the failure of countless assaults to impair
it. Certain remedies are so compounded as to be of value not
merely against some single disease but against all; they are of
universal efficacy. So it is with the Catholic faith. It is
not a medicine for some special malady, but for every ill; virulence
cannot master, nor numbers defeat, nor complexity baffle it. One
and unchanging it faces and conquers all its foes. Marvellous it
is that one form of words should contain a remedy for every disease, a
statement of truth to confront every contrivance of falsehood.
Let heresy muster its forces and every sect come forth to battle.
Let our answer to their challenge be that there is One Unbegotten God
the Father, and One Only-begotten Son of God, perfect Offspring of
perfect Parent; that the Sun was begotten by no lessening of the Father
or subtraction from His Substance, but that He Who possesses all things
begot an all-possessing Son; a Son not emanating nor proceeding from
the Father, but compact of, and inherent in, the whole Divinity, of Him
Who wherever He is present is present eternally; One free from time,
unlimited in duration, since by Him all things were made598
, and, indeed, He could not be confined
within a limit created by Himself. Such is the Catholic and
Apostolic Faith which the Gospel has taught us and we avow.
23. Let Sabellius, if he dare, confound
Father and Son as two names with one meaning, making of them not Unity
but One Person. He shall have a prompt answer from the Gospels,
not once or twice, but often repeated, This is My beloved Son, in
Whom I am well pleased599
. He shall
hear the words, The Father is greater than I600
,
and I go to the Father601
, and Father, I
thank Thee602
, and Glorify Me,
Father603
, and Thou art
the Son of the living God604
. Let Hebion
try to sap the faith, who allows the Son of God no life before the
Virgin’s womb, and sees in Him the Word only after His life as
flesh had begun. We will bid him read again, Father, glorify
Me with Thine own Self with that glory which I had with Thee before the
world was605
, and In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was
God606
, and All things were made through
Him607
, and He was in the world, and the world
was made through Him, and the world knew Him not608
. Let the preachers whose apostleship
is of the newest fashion—an apostleship of Antichrist—come
forward and pour their mockery and insult upon the Son of God.
They must hear, I came out from the Father609
and The Son in the Father’s
bosom610
, and I and the
Father are One611
, and I in the
Father, and the Father in Me612
. And
lastly, if they be wrath, as the Jews were, that Christ should claim
God for His own Father, making Himself equal with God, they must take
the answer which He gave the Jews, Believe My works, that the Father
is in Me and I in the Father613
. Thus
our one immovable foundation, our one blissful rock of faith, is the
confession from Peter’s mouth, Thou art the Son of the living
God614
. On it we can base an answer to every
objection with which perverted ingenuity or embittered treachery may
assail the truth.
24. In what remains we have the appointment of the
Father’s will. The Virgin, the birth, the Body, then the
Cross, the death, the visit to the lower world; these things are our
salvation. For the sake of mankind the Son of God was born of the Virgin
and of the Holy Ghost. In this process He ministered to Himself;
by His own power—the power of God—which overshadowed her He
sowed the beginning of His Body, and entered on the first stage of His
life in the flesh. He did it that by His Incarnation He might
take to Himself from the Virgin the fleshly nature, and that through
this commingling there might come into being a hallowed Body of all
humanity; that so through that Body which He was pleased to assume all
mankind might be hid in Him, and He in return, through His unseen
existence, be reproduced in all. Thus the invisible Image of God
scorned not the shame which marks the beginnings of human life.
He passed through every stage; through conception, birth, wailing,
cradle and each successive humiliation.
25. What worthy return can we make for so great a
condescension? The One Only-begotten God, ineffably born of God,
entered the Virgin’s womb and grew and took the frame of poor
humanity. He Who upholds the universe, within Whom and through
Whom are all things, was brought forth by common childbirth; He at
Whose voice Archangels and Angels tremble, and heaven and earth and all
the elements of this world are melted, was heard in childish
wailing. The Invisible and Incomprehensible, Whom sight and
feeling and touch cannot gauge, was wrapped in a cradle. If any
man deem all this unworthy of God, the greater must he own his debt for
the benefit conferred the less such condescension befits the majesty of
God. He by Whom man was made had nothing to gain by becoming Man;
it was our gain that God was incarnate and dwelt among us, making all
flesh His home by taking upon Him the flesh of One. We were
raised because He was lowered; shame to Him was glory to us. He,
being God, made flesh His residence, and we in return are lifted anew
from the flesh to God.
26. But lest perchance fastidious minds be
exercised by cradle and wailing, birth and conception, we must render
to God the glory which each of these contains, that we may approach His
self-abasement with souls duly filled with His claim to reign, and not
forget His majesty in His condescension. Let us note, therefore,
who were attendant on His conception. An Angel speaks to
Zacharias; fertility is given to the barren; the priest comes forth
dumb from the place of incense; John bursts forth into speech while yet
confined within his mother’s womb; an Angel blesses Mary and
promises that she, a virgin, shall be the mother of the Son of
God. Conscious of her virginity, she is distressed at this hard
thing; the Angel explains to her the mighty working of God, saying,
The Holy Ghost shall come from above into thee, and the power of the
Most High shall overshadow thee615
. The Holy
Ghost, descending from above, hallowed the Virgin’s womb, and
breathing therein (for The Spirit bloweth where it
listeth616
), mingled Himself
with the fleshly nature of man, and annexed by force and might that
foreign domain. And, lest through weakness of the human structure
failure should ensue, the power of the Most High overshadowed the
Virgin, strengthening her feebleness in semblance of a cloud cast round
her, that the shadow, which was the might of God, might fortify her
bodily frame to receive the procreative power of the Spirit. Such
is the glory of the conception.
27. And now let us consider the glory which
accompanies the birth, the wailing and the cradle. The Angel
tells Joseph that the Virgin shall bear a Son, and that Son shall be
named Emmanuel, that is, God with us. The Spirit foretells
it through the prophet, the Angel bears witness; He that is born is God
with us. The light of a new star shines forth for the Magi; a
heavenly sign escorts the Lord of heaven. An Angel brings to the
shepherds the news that Christ the Lord is born, the Saviour of the
world. A multitude of the heavenly host flock together to sing
the praise of that childbirth; the rejoicing of the Divine company
proclaims the fulfilment of the mighty work. Then glory to God
in heaven, and peace on earth to men of good will is
announced. And now the Magi come and worship Him wrapped in
swaddling clothes; after a life devoted to mystic rites of vain
philosophy they bow the knee before a Babe laid in His cradle.
Thus the Magi stoop to reverence the infirmities of Infancy; its cries
are saluted by the heavenly joy of angels; the Spirit Who inspired the
prophet, the heralding Angel, the light of the new star, all minister
around Him. In such wise was it that the Holy Ghost’s
descent and the overshadowing power of the Most High brought Him to His
birth. The inward reality is widely different from the outward
appearance; the eye sees one thing, the soul another. A virgin
bears; her child is of God. An Infant wails; angels are heard in
praise. There are coarse swaddling clothes; God is being
worshipped. The glory of His Majesty is not forfeited when He
assumes the lowliness of flesh.
28. So was it also during His further life on
earth. The whole time which He passed in human form was spent upon the works of
God. I have no space for details; it must suffice to say that in
all the varied acts of power and healing which He wrought, the fact is
conspicuous that He was man by virtue of the flesh He had taken, God by
the evidence of the works He did.
29. Concerning the Holy Spirit I ought not
to be silent, and yet I have no need to speak; still, for the sake of
those who are in ignorance, I cannot refrain. There is no need to
speak, because we are bound to confess Him, proceeding, as He does,
from Father and Son617
| 617 Qui Patre et Filio
auctoribus confitendus est; A comparison with dum et usum
et auctorem eius ignorant in § 4 makes this appear the
probable translation. It might, of course, mean confess Him on
the evidence of Father and Son. | . For my own
part, I think it wrong to discuss the question of His existence.
He does exist, inasmuch as He is given, received, retained; He is
joined with Father and Son in our confession of the faith, and cannot
be excluded from a true confession of Father and Son; take away a part,
and the whole faith is marred. If any man demand what meaning we
attach to this conclusion, he, as well as we, has read the words of the
Apostle, Because ye are sons of God, God hath sent the Spirit of His
Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father618
,
and Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, in Whom ye have been
sealed619
, and again, But
we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit which is
of God, that we may know the things that are given unto us by
God620
, and also But ye are not in the flesh but
in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God is in you. But if
any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is not His621
, and further, But if the Spirit of Him
that raised up Jesus from the dead dwelleth in you, He that raised up
Christ from the dead shall quicken also your mortal bodies for the sake
of His Spirit which dwelleth in you622
. Wherefore since He is, and is
given, and is possessed, and is of God, let His traducers take refuge
in silence. When they ask, Through Whom is He? To what end does
He exist? Of what nature is He? we answer that He it is through Whom
all things exist, and from Whom are all things, and that He is the
Spirit of God, God’s gift to the faithful. If our answer
displease them, their displeasure must also fall upon the Apostles and
the Prophets, who spoke of Him exactly as we have spoken. And
furthermore, Father and Son must incur the same displeasure.
30. The reason, I believe, why certain people
continue in ignorance or doubt is that they see this third Name, that
of the Holy Spirit, often used to signify the Father or the Son.
No objection need be raised to this; whether it be Father or Son, He is
Spirit, and He is holy.
31. But the words of the Gospel, For God
is Spirit623
, need careful
examination as to their sense and their purpose. For every saying
has an antecedent cause and an aim which must be ascertained by study
of the meaning. We must bear this in mind lest, on the strength
of the words, God is Spirit, we deny not only the Name, but also
the work and the gift of the Holy Ghost. The Lord was speaking
with a woman of Samaria, for He had come to be the Redeemer for all
mankind. After He had discoursed at length of the living water,
and of her five husbands, and of him whom she then had who was not her
husband, the woman answered, Lord, I perceive that Thou art a
prophet. Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and ye say that
in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship624
. The Lord replied, Woman, believe
Me, the hour cometh when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem,
shall ye worship the Father. Ye worship that which ye know not;
we worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews.
But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall
worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh
such to worship Him. For God is Spirit, and they that worship Him
must worship in the Spirit and in truth, for God is Spirit625
. We see that the woman, her mind full
of inherited tradition, thought that God must be worshipped either on a
mountain, as at Samaria, or in a temple, as at Jerusalem; for Samaria
in disobedience to the Law had chosen a site upon the mountain for
worship, while the Jews regarded the temple founded by Solomon as the
home of their religion, and the prejudices of both confined the
all-embracing and illimitable God to the crest of a hill or the vault
of a building. God is invisible, incomprehensible, immeasurable;
the Lord said that the time had come when God should be worshipped
neither on mountain nor in temple. For Spirit cannot be cabined
or confined; it is omnipresent in space and time, and under all
conditions present in its fulness. Therefore, He said, they are
the true worshippers who shall worship in the Spirit and in
truth. And these who are to worship God the Spirit in the Spirit
shall have the One for the means, the Other for the object, of their
reverence: for Each of the Two stands in a different relation to
the worshipper. The words, God is Spirit, do not alter the
fact that the Holy Spirit has a Name of His own, and that He is the
Gift to us. The woman who confined God to hill or temple was told that
God contains all things and is self-contained: that He, the
Invisible and Incomprehensible must be worshipped by invisible and
incomprehensible means. The imparted gift and the object of
reverence were clearly shewn when Christ taught that God, being Spirit,
must be worshipped in the Spirit, and revealed what freedom and
knowledge, what boundless scope for adoration, lay in this worship of
God, the Spirit, in the Spirit.
32. The words of the Apostle are of like
purport; For the Lord is Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord
is, there is liberty626
. To make his
meaning clear he has distinguished between the Spirit, Who exists, and
Him Whose Spirit He is Proprietor and Property, He and
His are different in sense. Thus when he says, The Lord
is Spirit he reveals the infinity of God; when He adds, Where
the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty, he indicates Him Who
belongs to God; for He is the Spirit of the Lord, and Where the
Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. The Apostle makes
the statement not from any necessity of his own argument, but in the
interests of clearness. For the Holy Ghost is everywhere One,
enlightening all patriarchs and prophets and the whole company of the
Law, inspiring John even in his mother’s womb, given in due time
to the Apostles and other believers, that they might recognise the
truth vouchsafed them.
33. Let us hear from our Lord’s own
words what is the work of the Holy Ghost within us. He says, I
have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them
now627
. For it is expedient for you
that I go: if I go I will send you the Advocate628
. And again, I will ask the
Father and He shall send you another Advocate, that He may be with you
for ever, even the Spirit of truth629
. He shall guide you into all
truth, for He shall not speak from Himself, but whatsoever things He
shall hear He shall speak, and He shall declare unto you the things
that are to come. He shall glorify Me, for He shall take of
Mine630
. These words
were spoken to show how multitudes should enter the kingdom of heaven;
they contain an assurance of the goodwill of the Giver, and of the mode
and terms of the Gift. They tell how, because our feeble minds
cannot comprehend the Father or the Son, our faith which finds
God’s incarnation hard of credence shall be illumined by the gift
of the Holy Ghost, the Bond of union and the Source of
light.
34. The next step naturally is to listen to
the Apostle’s account of the powers and functions of this
Gift. He says, As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these
are the children of God. For ye received not the Spirit of
bondage again unto fear, but ye received the Spirit of adoption whereby
we cry, Abba, Father631
; and again, For
no man by the Spirit of God saith anathema to Jesus, and no man can
say, Jesus is Lord, but in the Holy Spirit632
;
and he adds, Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same
Spirit, and diversities of ministrations, but the same Lord, and
diversities of workings, but the same God, Who worketh all things in
all. But to each one is given the enlightenment of the Spirit, to
profit withal. Now to one is given through the Spirit the word of
wisdom, to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit,
to another faith in the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings in
the One Spirit, to another workings of miracles, to another prophecy,
to another discerning of spirits, to another kinds of tongues, to
another interpretation of tongues. But all these worketh the One
and same Spirit633
. Here we
have a statement of the purpose and results of the Gift; and I cannot
conceive what doubt can remain, after so clear a definition of His
Origin, His action and His powers.
35. Let us therefore make use of this great
benefit, and seek for personal experience of this most needful
Gift. For the Apostle says, in words I have already cited, But
we have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit which is
of God, that we may know the things that are given unto us by
God634
. We receive Him, then, that we may
know. Faculties of the human body, if denied their exercise, will
lie dormant. The eye without light, natural or artificial, cannot
fulfil its office; the ear will be ignorant of its function unless some
voice or sound be heard; the nostrils unconscious of their purpose
unless some scent be breathed. Not that the faculty will be
absent, because it is never called into use, but that there will be no
experience of its existence. So, too, the soul of man, unless
through faith it have appropriated the gift of the Spirit, will have
the innate faculty of apprehending God, but be destitute of the light
of knowledge. That Gift, which is in Christ, is One, yet offered,
and offered fully, to all; denied to none, and given to each according
to the measure of his willingness to receive; its stores the richer,
the more earnest the desire to earn them. This gift is with us
unto the end of the world, the solace of our waiting, the assurance, by
the favours which He bestows, of the hope that shall be ours, the light
of our minds, the sun of our souls. This Holy Spirit we must seek
and must earn, and then hold fast by faith and obedience to the
commands of God.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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