Current Seminar:
• Augustine's De Trinitate
9/30/2006
Book V, Chapters 2-4
Ron Vardiman
Augustine begins chapter 2 by reemphasizing that ”Whatever the supreme and divine majesty is called with reference to itself is said
substance-wise: whatever it is called with reference to another is said ... relationship-wise”, and all three persons are of the same
substance, that is, one God. Thus the Father is good, the Son is good, and the Holy Spirit is good, yet Jesus says “No one is good but God
alone”. References in scripture to position, possession, times and places regarding God are always metaphor or simile. Also it is not one
thing for God to be and another for Him to be good, but His being is his goodness and all other qualities we attribute to Him. Created things
are good by partaking in goodness, but here Augustine seems to regard goodness and other abstract qualities in the Platonic manner, as having
independent existence. Thus he says regarding greatness “This greatness of course is primarily great and much more excellently so than the
things which are great by partaking of it”. But God is good or great not by partaking of these qualities, but because for Him to be is to
be good, great, etc.
Augustine digresses on a rather abstruse consideration of the Greek terms ousia and hypostasis, which usually are
translated being and substance, yet English usage now assigns the same meaning to both terms (Aristotelian and Scholastic usage distinguishes
between these terms). Thus instead of one being, three substances for God, we now say one being or substance, three persons. Augustine here
admits to the inadequacy of language to properly express these matters.
In chapter 3 Augustine implies that the Trinity might be addressed as Father at least metaphorically with regard to creation because of
the adoption of sons. In a footnote we are told that St. Thomas Aquinas follows St. Augustine on this, yet the translator regards this as an
error. Although all three persons inseparably participate in such actions as creation, he says this principle should not be taken to extreme,
lest we loose all distinction between the three persons. Further, Augustine says the Trinity can never be called Son or Holy Spirit. Though
God is both holy and spirit, the Holy Spirit is a member of the triad, being the spirit of the Father and of the Son. Augustine finds this
relationship more apparent if He is called “the gift of God”. He says we should not be concerned because the reversal of terms such as son of
the father and father of the son cannot be said in the case of the Holy Spirit as in Father of the Holy Spirit or Father of the gift, though
we can say giver of the gift.
The Father is called both Father and origin relationship-wise; Father with reference to the Son, origin with reference to all things that
are from Him. The Son is called Word and image with reference to the Father, and also can be called origin as with creation, though Augustine
uses a poorly translated passage from John 8:25 to support this (properly “what I have told you from the beginning”). In this sense the Holy
Spirit can be called origin also. Although the Father is called origin with reference to the Son, Augustine questions whether He may be called
so with reference to the Holy Spirit, since the Holy Spirit comes forth from the Father not as being born but as being given, and so is not
called Son. The Son is the Father’s but not our Son, but the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father and the son who give Him, and also our
Spirit who receive Him. Not our spirit which we receive in order to be, but ours in order to be holy. Augustine then asks does the Holy Spirit
get His being gift by being given or also simply by being, and then whether He was before He was given but was not yet gift, or was gift
because God was going to give Him. Something can be a gift before it is given, but cannot be called a donation unless it is given. The
problem here is unclear.
In chapter 4 Augustine suggests that God cannot be called Lord from everlasting, since creation is not from everlasting. This is surprising,
since Augustine was the first to recognize that time belongs only to creation, so that to use the phrase “from everlasting” cannot be right,
as it implies that eternity is simply an unending time rather than being outside of time, a permanent now. God is eternal, therefore His
relationship with all of creation is eternal, as He sees all creation and all time from His unchanging now. Augustine considers this point,
but does not grasp it fully, since he then goes on to argue that God could not be Lord of men who began in time, asking how God could be
Lord of man before man began. But this question is from man’s viewpoint, whereas from God’s viewpoint the creation of the universe, the
beginning of men and the end of the world are all simply now. Augustine avoids the problem of change in God (eg. not Lord to Lord) by pointing
out that a change in relationship can occur because of a change on only one side of the relationship. Thus God is unchanged through all
changes in creation, but as creation changes the relationship it has with God will change.
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