Current Seminar:
• Augustine's De Trinitate
1/6/2007
Book IX, Prologue and Chapter 1
John Kohl
In Book 9 Augustine continues looking to understand God as a trinity. He cautions us that we should not expect this quest to finish until we
see God face-to-face (1 Corinthians 13:12). He summarizes that we are to "believe that Father and Son and Holy Spirit are one God, maker and ruler
of all creation; and that the Father is not the Son, and the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son, but that they are a trinity of persons
related to each other, and a unity of equal being."
In chapter 1 he uses two analogies to try to understand the trinity of God. The first is that of lover, beloved, and love that he presented in
Book 8. He takes a short digression to consider someone loving themselves. Here the lover and a beloved are the same individual. Thus,
there are two: the lover/beloved and love. Augustine seems to bring out this example to further explore the love trio and that love can be had
without the necessity of there being a trio.
Augustine transitions to his second trinity analogy: the mind, love and knowing. He considers the mind loving itself. This gives two
entities: mind and love. "Where then is the trinity?" Augustine introduces knowing. The mind cannot love itself unless the mind knows
itself. "The mind therefore and its love and knowledge are three somethings and these three are one thing, and when they are complete they are
equal."
How well do these analogies aid our understanding of the Trinity? They provide examples of trinity, which is a difficult concept. What
about providing insight into the nature of the Trinity itself? The love trinity has a nice match-up of lover with Father and beloved with
Son. How well does the Holy Spirit fit in as love? "Love" is not usually considered as a person, while the Holy Spirit is a person.
Another trinity analogy to consider is the trichotomist view of the human being as body, soul, and spirit. Aristotle posited that beyond the
animal souls, humans have rational souls. Origen developed this viewpoint into a viewpoint of man as body, soul, and spirit. In this
viewpoint the spirit part of the human being is aware of the spiritual dimension of existence. Especially of God, who is a spirit. The
match-up is our spirit with the Holy Spirit. Our body is matched with the second person of the Trinity and our soul is matched with God the
Father. Our souls are unknowable except through our bodies. Likewise the Father is only known through the Son. Our bodies do the will
of our souls. Likewise the Son does the will of His Father.
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