Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 15.djvu/80

 TRINITY

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TRINITY

(4) Greater difficulty is perhaps presented by a series of passages which appear to assert that prior to the Creation of the world the Word was not a distinct hypostasis from the Father. These are found in Justin (C. Tryphon., Lxi), Tatian (Con. GrEECOs, v), Athenagoras (Legat., x), Theophilus (Ad Autol., II, X, 22); Hippolytus (Con. Noet., x); TertuUian ("Adv.Prax.",v-vLi;"Adv.Hermogenem", x-v-iii). Thus Theophilus writes (op. cit., n. 22): "What else is this voice [heard in Paradise] but the Word of God Who is also His Son? . . . For before anything came into being, He had Him as a coun- sellor, being His own mind and thought [i. e. as the X670S ifSidderos, c. x]). But when God wished to make all that He had determined on, then did He beget Him as the uttered Word [X670S 7rpo0pt/t6s], the firstborn of all creation, not, however, Himself being left without Reason (X47os), but having be- gotten Reason, and ever holding converse with Reason." Expressions such as these are undoubtedly due to the influence of the Stoic philosophy: the \6yos iv&iaBero^ and X670S Trpo<popiK6s were current conceptions of that school. It is evident that these apologists were seeking to explain the Christian Faith to their pagan readers in terms with which the latter were familiar. Some Catholic writers have indeed thought that the influence of their previous training did lead some of them into Subordination- ism, although the Church herself was never involved in the error (see Logos). Yet it does not seem necessary to adopt this conclusion. If the point of view of the writers be borne in mind, the expressions, strange as they are, wiU be seen not to be incom- patible with orthodox belief. The early Fathers, as we have said, regarded Prov., viii, 22, and Col., i, 15, as distinctly teaching that there is a sense in which the Word, begotten before all worlds, may rightly be said to have been begotten also in time. This temporal generation they conceived to be none other than the act of creation. They viewed this as the complement of the eternal generation, inas- much as it is the external manifestation of those creative ideas which from all eternity the Father has communicated to the Eternal Word. Since, in the very same works which contain these per- plexing expressions, other passages are found teaching explicitly the eternity of the Son, it appears most natural to interpret "them in this sense. It should further be remembered that throughout this period theologians, when treating of the relation of the Divine Persons to each other, invariably regard them in connexion with the cosmogony. Only later, in the Nicene epoch, did they learn to prescind from the question of creation and deal with the threefold Personality exclusively from the point of view of the Divine life of the Godhead. When that stage was reached expressions such as these became impossible (cf. d'Ales, "Tertullien", 82-96).

IV. The Trinity as a Mystery. — The Vatican Council has explained the meaning to be attributed to the term myslcrij in theology. It lays down that a mystery is a truth which we are not merely inca- pable of discovering apart from_ Divine Revelation, but which, even when revealed, remains "hidden by the veil of faith and enveloped, so to speak, by a kind of darkness" (Const., "De fide, cath.", iv). In other words, our understanding of it remains only partial, even after we have accepted it as part of the Divine message. Through analogies and types we can form a representative concept expressive of what is revealed, but we cannot attain that fuller knowledge which supposes that the various elernents of the concept are clearly grasped and their recipro- cal compatibility manifest. As regards the vindi- cation of a mystery, the office of the natural reason is solely to show that it contains no intrinsic im- possibility, that any objection urged against it on

the score that it violates the laws of thought is invalid More than this it cannot do.

The Vatican Council further defined that the Christian Faith contains mysteries strictly so called (can. 4). kW. theologians admit that the doctrine of the Trinity is of the number of these. Indeed, of all revealed truths this is the most impenetralsle to reason. Hence, to declare this to be no mystery would be a virtual denial of the canon in question. Moreover, our Lord's words. Matt., xi, 27, "No one knoweth the Son, but the Father", .seem to declare expressly that the plurahty of Persons in the Godhead is a truth entirely beyond the scope of any created inteUect. The Fathers supply many passages in which the incomprehensibility of the Divine Nature is affirmed. St. Jerome says, in a well-known phrase: "The true profession of the mystery of the Trinity is to own that we do not comprehend it" (De mysterio Trinitatus recta confessio est ignoratio scientiae. — "Proem ad 1, .xviii in Isai.", P. L., XXIV, 627). The controversy with the Eunomians, who declared that the Divine Essence was fulh- exjiressed in the absolutely simple notion of "the Innascible" (07^*- ■")Tos), and that this was full}- comprehensible by the human mind, led many of the Greek Fathers to insist on the incomprehensibility of the Divine Nature, more especially in regard to the internal processions (cf., e. g., St. BasU, "In Eunom.", I, n. 14, P. G., XXIX, 544; St. CjtII of Jerusalem, "Cat.", VI, P. G., XXXIII, 545; St. John Damascene, "Fid. orth.", I, ii, P. G., XCIV, 794, etc., etc.).

At a later date, however, some famous names are to be found defending a contrary opinion. Anselm (" Monol.", 64, P. L., CLVIII. 210), Abelard (" In Ep. ad Rom.", P. L., CLXXXIII, 802, 803), Hugo of St. Victor ("De sacram.", Ill, xi, P. L., CLXXVI, 220, A), and Richard of St. Victor ("De Trin.", Ill, v, P. L., CXCVI, 918) all declare that it is possible to assign peremptory reasons why God should be both One and Three. In explanation of this it should be noted that at that period the relation of philosophy to reveale<l doctrine was but obscurely understood. Only after the Aristotelean system had obtained recognition from theologians was this question thor- oughly treated. In the intellectual ferment of the time Abelard initiated a Rationalistic tendency: not merely did he claim a knowlerlge of the Trinitj' for the pagan philosophers, but his own Trinitarian doctrine was practically Sabellian. Ansebn's error was due not to Rationalism, but to too wide an appUcation of the August inian principle "Crede ut intelligas". Hugh and Richard of St. Victor were, however, certainly influenced by Abelard's teaching. Raymond LuUy's (1235-1315) errors in this regard were even more extreme. They were expressly condemned by Gregory XI in 1376. In the nine- teenth century the influence of the prevailing Ration- alism manifested itself in several Catholic writers. Frohschammer and Gunther both asserted that the dogma of the Trinity was capable of proof. Pius IX reprobated their opinions on more than one occasion (Denzinger, 1655 sq., 1666 sq., 1709 sq.), and it was to guard against this tendency that the Vatican Council issued the decrees to which reference has been made. A somewhat similar, though less aggravated, error on the part of Rosmini was con- demned, 14 Dec, 1887 (Denz., 1915).

V. The Doctrine as Interpreted in Greek THEOLOfiY'. — k. Nalure and Pcrsoitalily. — The Greek Fathers approached the problem of Trinitarian doc- trine in a way which diiTers in an important particu- lar from that which, since the days of St. .\ugustine, has become traditional in Latin theology. In Latin theology thought fixed first on the Nature and only subsequently on the Persons. Personality is viewed as being, so to speak, the final complement of the Nature: the Nature is regarded as logically prior to