Trinity; from which it may clearly appear, how far it either agreeth or
disagreeth with the _Christian_. First, therefore, though some of the
later Platonists have partly misunderstood, and partly adulterated that
ancient _Cabala_ of the Trinity, as was before declared, confounding
therein the _differences_ between God and the Creature, and thereby
laying a foundation for infinite Polytheism; yet did _Plato himself_ and
some of his genuine followers, (_though living before Christianity_,)
approach so near to the doctrine thereof, as in some manner to
correspond therewith.” ... “From whence it may be concluded, that as
_Arianism_ is commonly supposed to approach nearer to the truth of
Christianity than Photinianism, so is _Platonism_ undoubtedly more
agreeable thereunto than Arianism, it being a certain middle thing,
betwixt that and Sabellianism, _which in general_ was that mark that the
Nicene Council also aimed at.”
This is more fully explained in the next extract:—
“Athanasius in sundry places still further supposes those _three divine
hypostases_ to make up one entire divinity, after the same manner as the
_Fountain_ and the _Stream_ make up one entire _river_; or the _root_,
and the _stock_, and the _branches_, one entire tree. And in this sense
also is the whole Trinity said by him to be one Divinity, and one
Nature, and one Essence, and one God. And accordingly, the word
Homoousios (Consubstantial) seems here to be taken by Athanasius in a
further sense besides that before mentioned; not only for things
agreeing in one common and general essence, as _Three individual men_
are co-essential with one another; but also for such as concurrently
together, make up one entire thing, and are therefore jointly essential
thereunto.—In all which doctrine of his there is nothing but what a true
and genuine Platonist would readily subscribe to. From whence it may be
concluded, that the right Platonic Trinity differs not so much from the
doctrine of the Ancient Church, as some late writers have
supposed.”—(_Intellec. Sys._ p. 591, 608, 619-20.)[494]
“But here it will be asked, perhaps, what was the doctrine of the Nicene
Fathers, and what did they mean by Consubstantiality. It is impossible
to answer this question without using logical and metaphysical terms.
“By the word _Consubstantial_, they meant not of the same numerical, or
individual substance, but of the same generical substance or
subsistence. As, amongst men, a son is _consubstantial_ with his father;
so, in their opinion, the Son of God is consubstantial with the Father,
that is, of the same divine nature.
“By this word therefore they intended to express _the same kind of
nature_, and so far, _a natural equality_. But according to them, this
natural equality excluded not a relative inequality; a _majority_ and
_minority_, founded upon the everlasting difference between _giving_ and
_receiving_, _causing_, and being _caused_.
“They had no notion of distinguishing between _person_ and _being_,
between an _intelligent agent_, and an intelligent active substance,
subsistence, or entity.
“When they said that the Father was _God_, they meant that he was God of
_himself, originally, and underived_.
“When they said that the Son was _God_, they meant that he was God by
_generation_ or _derivation_.
“The Unity of God they maintained, and they defended it, first, by
considering the Father as the First Cause, the only underived and
self-existing; secondly, by supposing an intimate, inseparable, and
incomprehensible union, connection, indwelling, and co-existence, by
which the Father was in the Son, and the Son in the Father; and thirdly,
by saying that in the Father and the Son there was an unity of will,
design, and consent, and one divine power and dominion, originally in
the Father, and derivatively in the Son.
“In process of time, Christians went into a notion that the Son was ‘of
the same individual substance with the Father, and with the Holy
Spirit,’ and they seem to have done this with a view to secure the
doctrine of the _Unity_.
“The schoolmen took up the subject, and treated it in their way, which
they call _explaining_, and which men of sense call _impenetrable
jargon_.”—(_Jortin, Eccles. Hist._ vol. ii. p. 202.)
You will observe, that so far no mention had been made of the separate
deity of the Holy Spirit. The original Nicene Creed is silent upon the
subject. It was a question that grew out of the deity of Christ. The
philosophy of the times, no less than the reluctance to be deemed the
followers of a crucified man, led to the deification of Jesus, and
afterwards, from the personifications of the Holy Spirit, in such
expressions as “I will send unto you the Comforter, even the Spirit of
Truth,” and from its frequent connection with the name and mission of
Christ, arose the idea of a separate divinity, a third person in the
Trinity. The Platonic Trinity would indeed have naturally led the early
Fathers to the conception of a third principle, and in some of the
Anti-Nicene Writers this conception appears; but the Controversy was
carried on with almost exclusive reference to the deity of Christ, which
independent of the general burden of their writings, clearly appears
from the fact, that when defending themselves against the charge of
violating the Unity of God, they always state the objection, so as to
show that the accusation against them was that they were “introducing a
_second_ God.”
Accordingly it was after the Council at Nice, when the deity of the Son
was established, that orthodoxy took a second and consequent step, and
proceeded to establish the deity of the third person in the
Trinity.[495]
This was effected towards the close of the fourth century, A.D. 381, by
the Second General Council, that of Constantinople, when the following
addition was made to the previously deficient orthodoxy of the Nicene
Creed. The Nicene Creed had simply stated, “We believe in the Holy
Ghost.” The Council of Constantinople rectified the error thus: “We
believe in the Holy Ghost, _the Lord and Giver_ of life; who proceedeth
from the Father; who with the Father and Son together is worshipped and
glorified; who spake by the prophets.” Still, however, the adjustments
were not correct, nor the formula of perfect orthodoxy. It occurred to
the Church, centuries after, that the Holy Spirit was described in the
Scriptures as being dependent not upon the Father alone, but as being
“sent” by the Son; and that therefore the Third Person must hold that
relation to the Second which the Second did to the Third, and must
therefore be derived not from the Father alone, but from the Father and
Son together.[496] Accordingly this new idea, essential to Salvation,
was included in the formula so long in this respect defective, with what
fatal consequences we are not told; and at last, in the ninth century, a
perfectly accurate and saving description of the procession of the Holy
Spirit from the Father and the Son was embodied in the Nicene Creed,
some five hundred years after its first construction. So slowly did the
“unimproved and unimprovable revelation” of dogmatic divines advance to
its perfection. Yet we are gravely told of the faith of the Church,—a
faith human all over; and of the traditions of Christian
antiquity,—traditions whose origin we can trace at a great distance from
apostolic times, and whose constant increase, in proportion as we recede
from those times, would seem to imply that the further Councils of the
Church were removed from the Apostles the more they knew about them—the
accuracy of inspired Tradition differing, as of course it should, from
common Memory and common History, by being in an inverse ratio to the
distance. This is no subject for ridicule; but only the sacred feelings
and high themes that are necessarily associated with such extravagance,
have so long saved it from the most merciless exposure. Those solemn
themes, the awe and loveliness of which Ecclesiastical History has done
its best to lower and degrade, have yet repaid the disservice by
dropping something of their own solemnity on its unworthy pages, and by
taking every thing that is associated with God and Christ within the
protection of the sentiment of reverence, have shielded Ecclesiastical
History from that unsparing criticism which perhaps would have been more
serviceable to Truth, and productive of a reverence higher and more
profitable towards both Christ and God.
In the history of the doctrine of the Trinity, the settlement of one
Controversy always gave birth to another, in the progressive attempt to
make mysteries intelligible. The deity of Christ naturally gave rise to
some curiosity respecting the humanity of Christ. Hitherto all parties,
Arians, Athanasians, and Unitarians, according to their respective
views, had for the most part agreed that the Christ consisted of one
body and one spirit; and their controversies related simply to the rank
and nature of that spirit. The Arians believed the soul of Jesus to be
the first of created intelligences, the highest Emanation from God. The
Platonic Christians thought that the Logos used instrumentally the body
of Jesus, and supplied the place of a human soul. When the Council of
Nice, however, established that the spirit of Jesus was _consubstantial_
with that of God, the idea naturally presented itself that, since Jesus
expired upon the cross, this was to represent the divine nature as
capable of suffering and death. Now those who were the most orthodox,
whose views and language receded to the extremest distance from those of
the heretical Arians, would necessarily fall into modes of conception
and expression which implied this revolting extravagance. Accordingly
Apollinaris, one of the most zealous Athanasians, and the bitter enemy
of Arius, freely, and unconscious of heresy, followed out his principles
with perverse consistency, and openly spoke of the Logos of God
supplying the place of a human soul in the body of Christ; and, of
course, undergoing all that a spirit, so situated, could suffer.[497]
But so narrow is the way of orthodoxy, that the zealous Father was made
quickly to discover that by starting aside from one heresy, only a
little too sharply, he had immediately fallen into another; for the
pitfalls of damnable error lie upon each side of the hair-breadth way of
Salvation. By pursuing too exclusively the deity of Christ, Apollinaris
overlooked his humanity, and taught the heresy of “one incarnate
nature,” and the consequent sufferings and death of God. This impious
extreme, being condemned by the Asiatic Church, though popular in Egypt,
orthodoxy naturally took a rebound; and Apollinaris, having confused the
two natures into one, Nestorius separated them into two, to such an
extent, as virtually to destroy the mystical union. Here was another and
an opposite heresy equally fatal to the orthodoxy of the Church and the
salvation of mankind; for if such was the loose connection of the two
natures, then, God being incapable of suffering, only the human nature
of Jesus underwent crucifixion and death. But, on the other hand, if
this was so, then the sufferings of Christ were only those of a _man_;
and all the mystery of the Incarnation was dissipated, and became
ineffectual for any theological purpose.
A new controversy consequently arose, respecting the right adjustments
of these saving connections between the humanity and the deity of the
Christ. “Before this time,” says Mosheim, “it had been settled by the
decrees of former Councils, that Christ was truly God and truly man; but
there had as yet been no controversy, and no decision of any council,
concerning the mode and effect of the union of the two natures in
Christ. In consequence, there was a want of agreement among the
Christian Teachers in their language concerning this mystery.” This
controversy, which, for some time had been carried on without attracting
towards it definitively the public authorities of the Church, drew at
last the eager notice of all Christendom; when Nestorius, the Prelate of
Constantinople, carried the distinction between the two natures to so
definite a point as to deny that the Virgin Mary could, with any
propriety, be denominated the “Mother of God;” and that her titles
should be limited to that of “Mother of Christ” or “Mother of Man.” This
was regarded, by the orthodox, as reducing the death of Christ to that
of a mere man, and the mystery of the Incarnation to little better than
a trick of words. It was no easy matter in those times to avoid, on the
one hand, confounding the two natures; and, on the other, separating
them so distinctly as to destroy the whole theological value of the
mystical combination: nor have modern Theologians been more successful
in adjusting this puzzle than their perplexed and perplexing
predecessors.
The chief alarmist upon this occasion of the heresy of Nestorius was
Cyril, the Patriarch of Alexandria, an arrogant and aspiring man, who
gladly seized upon a tempting opportunity to humble his rival, the
bishop of Constantinople. “Some jealousy which at that time subsisted
respecting the relative dignity of the two sees, probably heightened the
contention, and is believed by some to have caused it. Whether that be
or not, the two Patriarchs anathematized each other with mutual
violence; and such troubles were raised that the Emperor (Theodosius the
younger) deemed it necessary to convoke a General Council for the
purpose of appeasing them. It was assembled at Ephesus A.D. 431, and
stands in the annals of the Church as the THIRD GENERAL COUNCIL. Cyril
was appointed to preside, and consequently to judge the cause of his
adversary: and he carried into this office such little show of
impartiality, that he refused even to wait for the arrival of the bishop
of Antioch and others, who were held friendly to Nestorius, and
proceeded to pronounce sentence, while the meeting was yet incomplete.
To secure or prosecute his advantages, he had brought with him from
Egypt a number of robust and daring fanatics, who acted as his soldiery;
and it had been skilfully arranged that Ephesus should be chosen for the
decision of a difference respecting the dignity of the Virgin; since
popular tradition had buried her in that city, and the imperfect
Christianity of its inhabitants had readily transferred to her the
worship which their ancestors had offered to Diana.”[498]
Such are the assemblies from which our Creeds date their birth; by whose
authority the Rule of Faith was determined; and whose character is
described in the words of the Emperor Theodosius when dismissing this
very Council of Ephesus—“God is my witness, that I am not the author of
this confusion. His providence will discern and punish the guilty.
Return to your provinces; and may your private virtues repair the
mischief and scandal of your meeting.” At this council it was decreed,
by bishops who could not write their own names,[499] that the Union of
the human and divine nature in Christ was so intimate that Mary might
properly be called the Mother of God. The influence of Cyril prevailed
chiefly by intimidating the bishops and bribing the imperial household.
“Thanks to the purse of St. Cyril,” says Le Clerc, “the Romish Church
which regards Councils as infallible, is not, at the present day,
Nestorian.” “The Creeds of _Protestants_ are equally indebted to St.
Cyril for their purity.”[500]
The triumphant opponents of Nestorius, as is invariably found in the
history of Church Controversies, pushed their triumph to such an excess,
as to fall into the opposite error, and revived the formerly condemned
heresy of Apollinaris, of the incarnation of but one nature. Eutyches
the friend of St. Cyril and the bitter enemy of Nestorius, openly
preached “that in Christ there was but one nature, that of the incarnate
Word.” The Church was again in a blaze, and again the Emperor summoned a
Council at Ephesus, A.D. 449, over which presided Dioscorus, the
successor of St. Cyril as Patriarch of Alexandria. Here the sentence of
the last Council was reversed, and Orthodoxy was pronounced to be the
doctrine of one divine nature in Christ, and only one. This Council,
however, owing principally to the opposition made to it by the Bishop of
Rome, was never authoritatively recognized by the Church, and such was
its character for tumult and brutality that it is marked in
Ecclesiastical History by the expressive name of the Assembly of
Banditti.
Speedily then was this heresy, inconveniently sanctioned by a Council of
the Church, of only one nature in Christ, which in effect represented
God as subject to suffering and death, replaced by the orthodoxy of two
natures in one person, which was attended, however, with the opposite
difficulty of so separating the God from the Man as to nullify the
mystical efficacy of his sufferings.[501] But who will devise a form of
words in which irreconcilable ideas shall be reconciled, and no weak
point be exposed in the skilful statement of a fiction? THE FOURTH
GENERAL COUNCIL of the Church was held at Chalcedon, A.D. 451. There are
two things most remarkable respecting this Council; first—that it
declared Jesus to be of the same essence with God as to his divine
nature, only in the sense in which he was of the same essence with other
men as to his human nature, thus denying his _numerical_ oneness with
God, and merely referring him to the same class of Beings, making him
generically one, as two men are;[502] and secondly—that though the
majority of the Bishops favoured the doctrine of one nature, they were
obliged by the obstinacy of the Emperor Marcian, in conjunction with the
Bishop of Rome, to reverse at one of their sittings their decision at a
former, and finally to decree that orthodoxy consisted in believing
“Jesus Christ to be one person in two distinct natures, without any
confusion or mixture.” “It was in vain,” says Gibbon, “that a multitude
of episcopal voices (the advocates for only one nature) repeated in
chorus ‘The definition of the Fathers is orthodox and immutable! The
heretics are now discovered! Anathema to the Nestorians! Let them depart
from the synod! Let them repair to Rome!’ The Legates threatened, the
Emperor was absolute, and a committee of eighteen bishops prepared a new
decree, which was imposed on the reluctant assembly. In the name of the
fourth general Council, the Christ in one person, but _in_ two natures,
was announced to the Catholic world: an invisible line was drawn between
the heresy of Apollinaris and the faith of St. Cyril; and the road to
paradise, a bridge as sharp as a razor, was suspended over the abyss by
the master hand of the theological artist. During ten centuries of
blindness and servitude, Europe received her religious opinions from the
Oracle of the Vatican; and the same doctrine, already varnished with the
rust of antiquity, was admitted without dispute into the creed of the
Reformers, who disclaimed the supremacy of the Roman pontiff. The synod
of Chalcedon still triumphs in the Protestant churches; but the ferment
of controversy has subsided, and the most pious Christians of the
present day are ignorant, or careless, of their own belief concerning
the mystery of the incarnation.”[503]
Still the great difficulty pressed upon this decision, that the God was
so separable from the man as to destroy the mystical value of the
incarnation with respect to the sufferings of Jesus. A resource was
found, (for when are Theologians without resources?) in what has been
called the doctrine of the Communication of Properties, which meant that
though God was incapable of sufferings or death, yet that through the
mystical union of the human and divine, there might be a transmission of
qualities from the one to the other, so as to attach an infinite
efficacy to the sufferings and death of the human part of the compound
Christ. “The doctrine of the Communication of Properties,” says Le
Clerc, “is as intelligible as if one were to say, that there is a circle
which is so united with a triangle, that the circle has the properties
of the triangle, and the triangle those of the circle.” “What sense
those who have asserted the sufferings of God have fancied that the
words might have, is a question which, after all that has been written
upon the subject, is left very much to conjecture. I imagine that it is
at the present day, the gross conception of some who think themselves
orthodox on this point, that the divine and human natures being united
in Christ as the Mediator, a compound nature different from either,
capable of suffering, was thus formed.”[504]
I have now detailed the progress of the doctrine of the Trinity, as it
gained accessions from the various controversies that arose out of the
Nicene Creed. We come now to the THIRD CREED of the English Church, that
of Athanasius. Orthodoxy in this creed approaches to its perfection of
precise, if not intelligible, statements; though, strange to say, we
shall find that even here something of completeness is wanting, and that
the later schemes of the Trinity have corrected the Athanasian formula,
as dwelling too much upon the derived nature of the Son, and not
asserting with sufficient force his independent identity.
No general Council of the Church established the Athanasian creed; nor
does any one know who wrote it, nor when it was first introduced. From
one of its clauses, the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father
and Son, which secret was not made known to the Church until the eighth
century, it becomes evident that this theological paradox proceeded from
the ingenuity of some monk of the dark ages. The whole force of this
Creed depends upon two distinctions, which I presume no one can
perceive, between “created” and “begotten,” and between “begotten” and
“proceeding.” The Son is not _created_ but _begotten_—and the Holy Ghost
is not _begotten_ but _proceeding_. And this is _saving_ truth! food for
the Soul! the heavenly light sent from God to refresh man’s inner
spirit, and to fill him with the aspirations after perfection, which in
this world of temptation are to keep him true to his immortal destinies,
to connect him with his Example and Fore-runner, once tried upon the
Earth, now peaceful amid the skies! To one asking, “What shall I do to
inherit eternal life?” the answer of Jesus addressed itself to the
spiritual life of the disciple, but the answer of the Church of England
addresses itself to a perception of certain metaphysical distinctions,
and is contained in that creed which “unless a man keep whole and
undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.”
_The Athanasian Creed._ (_A.D._ 500-800.)
Whosoever will be saved: before all things it is necessary that he hold
the Catholick Faith.
Which Faith, except every one do keep whole and undefiled: without doubt
he shall perish everlastingly.
And the Catholick Faith is this: that we worship one God in Trinity, and
Trinity in Unity;
Neither confounding the Persons: nor dividing the Substance.
For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son: and another
of the Holy Ghost.
But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all
one: the Glory equal, the Majesty co-eternal.
Such as the Father is, such is the Son: and such is the Holy Ghost.
The Father uncreate, the Son uncreate: and the Holy Ghost uncreate.
The Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible: and the Holy
Ghost incomprehensible.
The Father eternal, the Son eternal: and the Holy Ghost eternal.
And yet they are not three eternals: but one eternal.
As also there are not three incomprehensibles, nor three uncreated: but
one uncreated, and one incomprehensible.
So likewise the Father is Almighty, the Son Almighty: and the Holy Ghost
Almighty.
And yet they are not three Almighties: but one Almighty.
So the Father is God, the Son is God: and the Holy Ghost is God.
And yet they are not three Gods: but one God.
So likewise the Father is Lord, the Son Lord: and the Holy Ghost Lord.
And yet not three Lords: but one Lord.
For like as we are compelled by the Christian verity: to acknowledge
every Person by himself to be God and Lord;
So are we forbidden by the Catholick Religion: to say, There be three
Gods, or three Lords.
The Father is made of none: neither created, nor begotten.
The Son is of the Father alone: not made, nor created, but begotten.
The Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son: neither made, nor
created, nor begotten, but proceeding.
So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons: one
Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts.
And in this Trinity none is afore, or after other: none is greater, or
less than another;
But the whole three Persons are co-eternal together: and co-equal.
So that in all things, as is aforesaid: the Unity in Trinity, and the
Trinity in Unity, is to be worshipped.