“We may by this means solve the doubts which terrify many men, who
pretend to great piety, and who are afraid of making two Gods, and,
through this, fall into vain and impious opinions; denying that the
nature of the Son is different from that of the Father, and who
acknowledge that he is God in name only; or denying the divinity of the
Son, and then maintaining that his nature and essence is different from
that of the Father. For we must tell them that he who is _God of
himself_, is THE God, as the Saviour states in his prayer to the Father,
‘that they may know thee, THE only true God;’ but that whosoever becomes
divine by partaking of his divinity, cannot be styled THE God, but _a_
God, among whom _especially is the first born of all creatures_.”[479]
_Novatian_, _A.D._ 251.
“He, although he was in the form of God, did not think of the robbery of
being equal with God. For though he knew that he was God, from God the
Father, he never likened or compared himself with God the Father,
remembering that he was from the Father, and that he had what he had
because the Father had given it to him.”[480]
_Lactantius_, _A.D._ 310.
“He showed his fidelity to God, in that he taught that there is ONE GOD,
and that he alone ought to be worshipped. Nor did he ever say that he
himself was God. For he would not have preserved his fidelity if, being
sent to take away a number of gods, and to assert ONE GOD, he had
introduced another besides that one. Wherefore, because he was so
faithful, because he arrogated nothing to himself, that he might fulfil
the commands of Him who sent him, he _received_ the dignity of perpetual
priest, and the honour of Supreme King, the power of a judge, and the
title of God.”[481]
And not inconveniently to multiply evidence, let us come at once to the
very orthodox Athanasius himself, and we shall find how little this
Father knew of the nice adjustments of that Creed which now passes under
his name.
_Athanasius_, _A.D._ 325.
“For there is one God, and there is not another besides Him. When it is
said that the Father is the only God, that he is one God, ‘I am the
FIRST,’ and ‘I am the LAST,’ it is well said. This is not said, however,
to take away from the Son; for he also is _in_ THE ONE, FIRST, and ONLY
ONE, as being the only _Logos_, Wisdom, and Effulgence of him who is THE
ONE, and THE ALONE, and THE SUPREME.”[482]
“And Athanasius himself, who is commonly accounted the very Rule of
Orthodoxality in this point, when he doth so often resemble the Father
to the _Sun_, or the _original Light_; and the Son to the _splendour or
brightness of it_, (as likewise doth the Nicene Council and the
Scripture itself,) he seems hereby to imply some dependence of the
Second upon the First, and subordination to it. Especially when he
declareth, that the _Three Persons_ of the _Trinity_ are not to be
looked upon as _Three Principles_, nor to be resembled to _Three Suns_,
but to the _Sun_, and its splendour, and _its derivative light_.”[483]
Now I may sum up the impression of these passages in the words of the
very learned Cudworth:—“But particularly as to their gradual
subordination of the _Second Hypostasis_ to the _First_, and of the
_Third_ to the _First and Second_, our Platonick Christian doubtless
would therefore plead them the more excusable, because the generality of
_Christian Doctors_, for the first three hundred years after the
Apostles’ times, plainly asserted the same; as Justin Martyr,
Athenagoras, Tatianus, Irenæus, the Author of the Recognitions,
Tertullian, Clemens Alexandrinus, Origen, Gregorius Thaumaturgus,
Dionysius of Alexandria, Lactantius, and many others. All whose
testimonies, because it would be too tedious to set down here, we shall
content ourselves with one of the last mentioned;—‘Both the Father and
Son is God: but he as it were an exuberant fountain, this as a stream
derived from him: He like to the sun, this like to a ray extended from
the sun.’ And though it be true, that Athanasius, writing against the
Arians, does appeal to the tradition of the antient Church, and amongst
others cites Origen’s testimony too; yet this was only for the Eternity
and Divinity of the Son of God, but not at all for such an absolute
_co-equality_ of him with the Father as would exclude all _dependence_,
_subordination_, and _inferiority_;[484] those antients so unanimously
agreeing therein, that they are by Petavius therefore taxed for
Platonism, and having by that means corrupted the purity of the
Christian Faith, in this article of the Trinity. Which how it can be
reconciled with those other opinions, of Ecclesiastic Tradition being a
Rule of Faith, and impossibility of the visible Churches erring in any
fundamental point, cannot easily be understood. However, this general
Tradition, or Consent of the Christian Church, for three hundred years
together after the Apostles’ times, though it cannot justify the
Platonists in anything discrepant from the Scripture, yet may it in some
measure doubtless plead their excuse, who had no Scripture Revelation at
all to guide them herein; and so at least make their error more
tolerable or pardonable.”[485]
We come now to a time when these floating and indefinite conceptions
were to assume more fixed forms. It is apparent that so far the
Christian Fathers fluctuated between their desire to exalt Jesus into
the Logos of God, and the restraining fear of adopting ideas or
expressions not reconcilable with the strict unity of the Deity. “The
suspense and fluctuation,” says Gibbon, “produced in the minds of the
Christians by these opposite tendencies, may be observed in the writings
of the theologians who flourished after the end of the apostolic age,
and before the origin of the Arian controversy. Their suffrage is
claimed with equal confidence by the orthodox and by the heretical
parties; and the most inquisitive critics have fairly allowed that if
they had the good fortune of possessing the Catholic Verity, they have
delivered their conceptions in loose, inaccurate, and sometimes
contradictory language.” Ideas so naturally irreconcilable, as Jesus
when contemplated as the Son of God, and Jesus when contemplated as the
Wisdom of God (Logos), with personality attached to it, were certain
sooner or later to betray their inconsistency, and to stand out from one
another in opposing attitudes. They could be held in combination only so
long as two very strong but opposite influences, (a desire to meet the
conceptions of the prevalent Philosophy, and a desire at the same time
to preserve unviolated the Jewish and Christian doctrine of the Unity of
God,) operated together to prevent theologians looking too closely into
their Faith, or attempting too strictly to harmonize its elements.
The elements of a necessary separation existed in that confused system
by which the earlier Fathers brought together Jesus the Christ, and the
Logos of the purer Platonists, into the same conception; some of them
inclining to the idea of the Son of God being an eternal emanation from
the Father, like light from the sun, veiling the difficulty of a Son
being co-eternal with his Father under the unmeaning phrase,
‘everlasting generation’—and some adopting the lower view that he was
only the highest emanation from the origin of all Spirits, the first of
created Beings, and the instrument of God in all the other works of
Creation. “These speculations,” says Gibbon, “became the most serious
business of the present, and most useful preparation for a future life.
A theology which it was incumbent to believe, which it was impious to
doubt, and which it might be dangerous and even fatal to mistake, became
the familiar topic of private meditation and popular discourse.[486] The
cold indifference of philosophy was inflamed by the fervent spirit of
devotion; and even the metaphors of common language suggested the
fallacious prejudices of sense and experience. The Christians, who
abhorred the gross and impure generation of the Greek mythology, were
tempted to argue from the familiar analogy of the filial and paternal
relations. The character of _Son_ seemed to imply a perpetual
subordination to the voluntary author of his existence; but as the act
of generation in the most spiritual and abstracted sense, must be
supposed to transmit the properties of a common nature, they durst not
presume to circumscribe the powers or the duration of the Son of an
eternal and omnipotent Father.—Their tender reverence for the memory of
Christ, and their horror for the profane worship of any created being,
would have engaged them to assert the equal and absolute divinity of the
_Logos_, if their rapid ascent toward the throne of heaven had not been
imperceptibly checked by the apprehension of violating the unity and
sole supremacy of the great Father of Christ and of the Universe.”
Christ, when viewed as the Wisdom or Logos of God, was by a natural
transition of thought placed within the effulgence of the divine glory;
but when viewed not as an Attribute but as a Person, the Son and Messiah
of the Father, this dim idea would pass away, and the distinction
between God and Christ become too visible to be confused. In this state
of opinion two parties naturally appeared, separating the two ideas that
entered into the prevalent conception of Christ, each taking up one of
them as representing _the whole_ truth respecting his nature and person.
The Arians, alarmed at the idea of two Gods, inclined to that part of
the conception which represented Jesus as the Son and Messenger of the
Father, but at the same time elevating him above all other created
beings, and giving him an existence before the worlds were. The
Athanasians, on the other hand, inclined to that part of the conception
which represented him as the Logos of the Deity, and under the reaction,
and the necessity for more strictly defining the hidden sense of
doctrines, produced by the Arian Creed, attempted to conquer the
difficulty of his Sonship by representing him as an eternal emanation
from the very substance of the Deity, and exalted him into an equality
with God, though at the same time they described it as a derived and
subordinate equality. It is unavoidable in describing these views to
make use of contradictory words. The ideas are irreconcilable, and were
only saved from plainly appearing so by being involved in a cloud of
mystical or rather no meaning words; for words must either be
significant of ideas, or no-sense. This then was the subject of the
great Arian and Trinitarian Controversy, which in the fourth Century
shook the peace of the world. It turned upon this point, whether Christ
was of the same essence as the Father, and therefore not created but
begotten or emanating; or whether he was as the Arians thought, made out
of nothing, and therefore a created Being. Neither of them contemplated
him as independent of the Supreme Deity, but the Athanasians regarded
him as a con-substantial and co-eternal emanation; the Arians, though
assigning him the highest rank, regarded him as created like other
beings. Such are the great questions of a metaphysical and dogmatical
religion. Such are the mysteries on which Synods and Councils have
legislated. Such are the subjects in which Ecclesiastics have shown more
interest than in the spirit of the life of Christ, and the moral hopes
and preparations of Immortality. Such are the subject matter of Creeds,
the dry husks of doctrine, the spiritless formulas on which souls are
starved, the bread of Christ converted into a stone, and yet in the eyes
of many, superior to practical discipleship, to Charity and the Love of
God, to the spirit of Brotherhood and the trustful faith of Duty.
It was to settle this dispute that the first general Council of the
Church was assembled at Nice A. D. 325. The Emperor Constantine attended
in person. He had previously remonstrated with the contending parties,
and entreated them not to disturb the peace of the Empire and of the
Church, for matters the most insignificant and small.[487] But he did
not know the temper of Controversialists; nor what things become
important in their eyes.[488] The Athanasians prevailed, and “the
con-substantiality of the Father and the Son was established by the
Council of Nice.” Under this word however lurked future Controversies,
and by con-substantiality the Council of Nice meant, not the present
doctrine of three persons in one God, but merely sameness of nature or
kind, such a sameness as three men may possess who are generically the
same but numerically different; and this is openly admitted by the
highest authorities, Petavius, Cudworth, Le Clerc, Jortin. “The
majority,” says Gibbon, “was divided into two parties, distinguished by
a contrary tendency to the sentiments of the Tritheists, and of the
Sabellians. But as those opposite extremes seemed to overthrow the
foundations either of natural or revealed religion, they mutually agreed
to qualify the rigour of their principles; and to disavow the just, but
invidious, consequences which might be urged by their antagonists. The
interest of the common cause inclined them to join their numbers, and to
conceal their differences; their animosities were softened by the
healing counsels of toleration, and their disputes were suspended by the
use of the mysterious _Homoousion_ (Consubstantial), which either party
was free to interpret according to their peculiar tenets. The Sabellian
sense, which about fifty years before had obliged the Council of Antioch
to prohibit this celebrated term, had endeared it to those theologians
who entertained a secret but partial affection for a nominal Trinity.
But the more fashionable saints of the Arian times, the intrepid
Athanasius, the learned Gregory Nazianzen, and the other pillars of the
Church, who supported with ability and success the Nicene doctrine,
appeared to consider the expression _of substance_ as if it had been
synonymous with that _of nature_; and they ventured to illustrate their
meaning, by affirming that three men, as they belong to the same common
species, are con-substantial or homoousian to each other. This pure and
distinct equality was tempered on the one hand by the internal
connection, and spiritual penetration, which indissolubly unites the
divine persons, and on the other by the pre-eminence of the Father,
which was acknowledged as far as it is compatible with the independence
of the son. Within these limits the almost invisible and tremulous ball
of Orthodoxy was allowed securely to vibrate. On either side beyond this
consecrated ground the heretics and the dæmons lurked in ambush to
surprise and devour the unhappy wanderer. But as the degrees of
theological hatred depend on the Spirit of the war, rather than on the
importance of the Controversy, the heretics who degraded, were treated
with more severity than those who annihilated the person of the
Son.”[489]
We are now arrived at that great period in the faith of the Church, when
the dignity of the Son was authoritatively settled by the Nicene
Council. Here is a brief account of its proceedings. “The Bishops began
by much personal dissension, and presented to the Emperor a variety of
written accusations against each other; the Emperor burnt all their
libels and exhorted them to peace and unity. They then proceeded to
examine the momentous question proposed to them. It was soon discovered
that the differences which it was intended to reconcile might in their
principle be reduced to one point, and that point might be expressed by
one _word_, and thus the question appears to have been speedily
simplified (as indeed was necessary that so many persons might come to
one conclusion on so mysterious a subject) and reduced to this—whether
the Son was or was not _consubstantial_ with the Father. Then arose
subtile disceptations respecting the meaning of the word, ‘about which
some conflicted with each other, dwelling on the term and minutely
dissecting it; it was like a battle fought in the dark; for neither
party seemed at all to understand on what ground they vilified each
other.’ However the result was perfectly conclusive; they finally
decided against the Arian opinions, and established respecting the two
first persons in the Trinity, the doctrine which the Church still
professes in the Nicene Creed.”[490]
This doctrine is as follows:—you will perceive that it is partly
Trinitarian, _and only partly_, a _derived_ deity being attributed to
the Son, _and no deity whatsoever_ attributed to the Holy Spirit.
Changes were afterwards introduced into this Creed to adapt it to the
growing orthodoxy of the times. I shall mention these in their proper
places; meanwhile I give the Nicene Creed of the Nicene Council:—
_The Nicene Creed_, _A.D._ 325.
“We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of all things visible
and invisible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten
and only begotten of the Father; that is of the substance of the Father,
God of (out of) God, Light of (from) Light, very God of very God,
begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father, by whom all things
were made both in heaven and in earth: who for us men, and for our
salvation, descended and was incarnate, and was made man, suffered, and
rose again the third day, ascended into the heavens, and will come to
judge the living and the dead. (We believe) also in the Holy Ghost.
“The holy Catholic and Apostolic Church anathematizes those who say that
there was a time when the Son of God was not, and that before he was
begotten he was not, and that he was made out of nothing, or out of
another substance or essence, and is created, changeable, or alterable.”
“Such,” says Jortin, “was the Nicene Creed, as it stood originally and
before it was interpolated by subsequent Councils. Our church hath
dropped the anathematizing clauses at the end, and one cannot help
wishing that the Nicene Fathers had done the same. The Christians in
times following were perpetually making anathematisms, even upon the
slightest and poorest occasions; and it is really a wonder that they did
not at last insert in their Litanies, ‘We beseech Thee to curse and
confound the Pelagians, Semi-pelagians, Nestorians, Eutychians,
Monothelites, Jacobites, Iconoclasts, and all heretics and
schismatics.’”[491]
The history of the fourth century is almost entirely taken up with the
persecutions of Consubstantialists against Arians, Arians against
Consubstantialists, and the minor strifes of the subdivisions of these
sects. After the death of Constantine, the Emperor Constantius sided
with the Arians, and then the persecuted became the persecutors, for
wherever a dogmatical Religion is held, wherever Creeds are the
Essentials of Salvation, of course no Charity can be learned in the
School of Suffering. There is an admirable passage contained in
Archdeacon Jortin’s most instructive remarks on Ecclesiastical History.
It extorts a smile to observe with what unconsciousness dogmatic
Theologians of all ages insult their fellow-disciples, in the name and
for the love of God, and close their acts of persecution with the words
of affection and blessing:—
“In the fourth century were held thirteen Councils against Arius,
fifteen for him, and seventeen for the Semiarians; in all
forty-five.[492]
“How could the Arians, in the time of Constantius and Valens, bring
themselves to such an un-christian persecuting temper? How could they
oppress their fellow-Christians, the Consubstantialists, who, supposing
them to have been in error, fell into it through a religious fear of
ascribing too little to their Redeemer, and of not paying him sufficient
honour? Can a man love his saviour, and hate his brother for a mistake
of this kind?
“And how could the Consubstantialists persuade themselves that an Arian,
who perhaps had suffered for professing Christianity in times of
distress, who believed Christ to be his Maker, his Saviour, his King,
and his Judge, would choose to detract from his dignity, and to offend
him in whom he placed all his hopes of salvation? Human nature is not
capable of this folly; and if the man were in an error, yet in such a
person the error must have been involuntary, a mere defect of the
understanding, and not a fault of the will.
“A Christian and a lover of peace, who lived in obscurity, and whose
name I cannot tell, stood up and said:—‘My brethren, the things to be
believed are few, the things to be done are many: but you behave
yourselves as if the reverse of this were true. St. Paul tells you, “The
grace of God that bringeth Salvation hath appeared to all men; teaching
us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly,
righteously, and godly, in this present world, looking for that blessed
hope, and the glorious appearance of the great God, and (of) our
Saviour, Jesus Christ.” Concerning the nature of _Jesus_ you can dispute
incessantly, and concerning the word _Grace_, you will probably dispute
no less; but the rest of the sentence you disregard as of small
consequence or importance. What, I beseech you, must the Jews and the
Pagans conceive of you and of your religion? And what do the holy angels
think, who look down upon your contentions? Those blessed and
compassionate spirits pity you, and think you mere children. But when
from contending you proceed to beating your fellow-servants, to
persecuting and destroying, they consider you as most malicious and
wicked children; their pity is changed into indignation, and they would
strike you dead, if the Supreme Governor did not stay their hand, and
remind them that such disorders must needs arise, and shall one day be
rectified.’
“So said this _Unknown_; but behold the consequence! The
Consubstantialists called him an Arian, and the Arians called him a
Consubstantialist.
“The Nicene Fathers having anathematized the Arians, the Emperor
seconded them, and banished Arius and the bishops who sided with him,
and ordered the books of Arius to be burnt; and added, ‘If any man be
found to have concealed a copy of those books, and not to have instantly
produced it and thrown it into the fire, he shall be put to death. The
Lord be with you all!’”[493]—(_Eccles. Hist._ vol. ii. p. 205.)
I shall now summon two authorities, the one Cudworth, the other Jortin,
to prove that the Nicene Fathers had no knowledge of the present
doctrine of the Trinity, and that they believed Christ to be the same
with God, not numerically, but as partaking of the same nature,
belonging to the same class of beings:—“Wherefore it seemeth to be
unquestionably evident, that when the ancient orthodox Fathers of the
Christian Church maintained against Arius, the Son to be Co-essential or
Consubstantial with the Father, though the word be thus interpreted, _of
the same essence or substance_, yet they universally understood thereby,
not a _sameness of singular and numerical_, but of common or universal
essence only; that is the generical or specifical Essence of the
Godhead; that the Son was no _Creature_, but truly and properly
God.” * * *