Bad Advertisement?
Are you a Christian?
Online Store:Visit Our Store
| Chapter XIII. The Catholic Doctrine of the Trinity and the Incarnation explained.
PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP 
Chapter XIII.
The Catholic Doctrine of the Trinity and the Incarnation
explained.
[36.] In these ways then
do these rabid dogs, Nestorius, Apollinaris, and Photinus, bark against
the Catholic faith: Photinus, by denying the Trinity; Apollinaris, by
teaching that the nature of the Word is mutable, and refusing to
acknowledge that there are two substances in Christ, denying moreover
either that Christ had a soul at all, or, at all events, that he had a
rational soul, and asserting that the Word of God supplied the place of
the rational soul; Nestorius, by affirming that there were always or at
any rate that once there were two Christs. But the Catholic Church,
holding the right faith both concerning God and concerning our Saviour,
is guilty of blasphemy neither in the mystery of the Trinity, nor in
that of the Incarnation of Christ. For she worships both one Godhead in
the plenitude of the Trinity, and the equality of the Trinity in one
and the same majesty, and she confesses one Christ Jesus, not two; the
same both God and man, the one as truly as the other.468
| 468 Unum Christum Jesum
non duos, eundemque Deum pariter atque Hominem confitetur. Compare the
Athanasian Creed, “Est ergo fides recta et credamus et
confiteamur, quia Dominus Noster Jesus Christus. Dei Filius, Deus
pariter et Homo est.” | One Person indeed she believes in Him,
but two substances; two substances but one Person: Two substances,
because the Word of God is not mutable, so as to be convertible into
flesh; one Person, lest by acknowledging two sons she should seem to
worship not a Trinity, but a Quaternity.
[37.] But it will be well to unfold this same doctrine
more distinctly and explicitly again and again.
In God there is one substance, but three Persons;
in Christ two substances, but one Person. In the Trinity, another and
another Person, not another and another substance (distinct Persons,
not distinct substances);469
| 469 In Trinitate alius
atque alius, non aliud atque aliud. In Salvatore aliud atque aliud, non
alius atque alius. | in the Saviour
another and another substance, not another and another Person,
(distinct substances, not distinct Persons). How in the Trinity another
and another Person (distinct Persons) not another and another substance
(distinct substances)?470
| 470 Aliud atque aliud, non
alius atque alius. | Because there is
one Person of the Father, another
of the Son, another of the Holy
Ghost;471
| 471 Quia scilicet alia
est Persona Patris, alia Filii, alia Spiritus Sancti sed tamen Patris
et Filii et Spiritus Sancti non alia et alia sed una cadunque natura.
So the Athanasian Creed, “Alia est enim Persona Patris, alia
Filii, alia Spiritus Sancti, sed Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti una
est Divinitas, etc.” The coincidence between the whole of this
context and the Athanasian Creed is very observable, though the
agreement is not always exact to the very letter. | but yet there is not another and another
nature (distinct natures) but one and the same nature. How in the
Saviour another and another substance, not another and another Person
(two distinct substances, not two distinct Persons)? Because there is
one substance of the Godhead, another of the manhood. But yet the
Godhead and the manhood are not another and another Person (two
distinct Persons), but one and the same Christ, one and the same Son of
God, and one and the same Person of one and the same Christ and Son of
God, in like manner as in man the flesh is one thing and the soul
another, but one and the same man, both soul and flesh. In Peter and
Paul the soul is one thing, the flesh another; yet there are not two
Peters,—one soul, the other flesh, or two Pauls, one soul, the
other flesh,—but one and the same Peter, and one and the same
Paul, consisting each of two diverse natures, soul and body. Thus,
then, in one and the same Christ there are two substances, one divine,
the other human; one of (ex) God the Father, the other of (ex) the
Virgin Mother; one co-eternal with and co-equal with the Father, the
other temporal and inferior to the Father; one consubstantial with his
Father, the other, consubstantial with his Mother, but one and the same
Christ in both substances. There is not, therefore, one Christ God, the
other man, not one uncreated, the other created; not one impassible,
the other passible; not one equal to the Father, the other inferior to
the Father; not one of his Father (ex), the other of his Mother (ex),
but one and the same Christ, God and man, the same uncreated and
created, the same unchangeable and incapable of suffering, the same
acquainted by experience with both change and suffering, the same equal
to the Father and inferior to the Father, the same begotten of the
Father before time, (“before the world”), the same born of
his mother in time (“in the world”),472
| 472 Idem ex Patre ante
sæcula genitus, Idem in sæculo ex matre generatus. Compare
the Athanasian Creed, “Deus est ex substantia Patris ante
sæcula genitus; Homo ex substantia Matris in sæculo
natus.” See Appendix I. | perfect God, perfect Man. In God supreme
divinity, in man perfect humanity. Perfect humanity, I say, forasmuch
as it hath both soul and flesh; the flesh, very flesh; our flesh, his
mother’s flesh; the soul, intellectual, endowed with mind and
reason. There is then in Christ the Word, the soul, the flesh; but the
whole is one Christ, one Son of God, and one our Saviour and Redeemer:
One, not by I know not what corruptible confusion of Godhead and
manhood, but by a certain entire and singular unity of Person. For the
conjunction hath not converted and changed the one nature into the
other, (which is the characteristic error of the Arians), but rather
hath in such wise compacted both into one, that while there always
remains in Christ the singularity of one and the self-same Person,
there abides eternally withal the characteristic property of each
nature; whence it follows, that neither doth God (i.e., the divine
nature) ever begin to be body, nor doth the body ever cease to be body.
The which may be illustrated in human nature: for not only in the
present life, but in the future also, each individual man will consist
of soul and body; nor will his body ever be converted into soul, or his
soul into body; but while each individual man will live for ever, the
distinction between the two substances will continue in each individual
man for ever. So likewise in Christ each substance will for ever retain
its own characteristic property, yet without prejudice to the unity of
Person.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
|
