Current Seminar:
• Augustine's De Trinitate
10/27/2007
Book XV, Chapters 4-5
Br. Dunstan Robidoux, OSB
Chapter 4
In attending to the first procession which occurs in the Blessed Trinity, a procession which, as first, is not to be understood in a temporal sense,
it is to be noticed that, despite what likeness exists between the procession of inner words which occurs in human consciousness (i.e., the having of
ideas in our minds) and the procession of an inner word which occurs in God (the difference between point of origin and what proceeds serving as a means
for distinguishing between Father and Son), a greater unlikeness is to be postulated than any likeness since, as created beings, we can never come to an
adequate understanding of the kind of understanding which God is and has and which is not to be distinguished from the reality of God’s being or
existence. Admittedly, in terms of self-consciousness, we can never doubt the reality of our conscious acts of thinking and conceiving. Any
attempt to exercise any skepticism here fails since every effort in doubting our own thinking (the factuality of our conscious life) ends in a
performative self-contradiction. However, four reasons can be cited to show that our inner words are more unlike than like to the inner word which
exists in God. First, despite what certainty we have about conscious existence and our desires, we can still be mistaken in what we claim to
know. Second, an inner word does not arise in God through any kind of learning nor through the bodily senses. God’s word is simply Word;
it encompasses everything. While our inner words are born of our knowledge and while in a similar way the Son as Word is born of the Father, in
divine knowing, the Word does not lead to knowledge. Everything is given in God’s Word. Third, while our being is not identical to our
knowing since we can exist and be without knowing anything, with God, being and knowing are identical. Our inner words do not proceed in terms of
being from being which is the case with God; they proceed as terms of acts of thinking and understanding. It is only with God that one has an
everlasting Word which is co-eternal. And fourth, even in terms of a face to face encounter with God that is given in the Beatific Vision, we
retain our creaturely status, a creaturely status which explains why our inner words can never be on par with the Word which exists in God. Our
understanding of things will always be limited since we are formable and God is never formable. Even as we will to lack nothing in what we hope
and desire, our creaturely status makes it impossible for us to know God as fully as God knows himself.
Chapter 5
In turning now to the Holy Spirit and the giving or procession of the Holy Spirit, although we commonly refer to the Holy Spirit as a gift of charity
or love that comes from God, and though we can sense something about what this all refers to (given our own personal experiences of movements of love
which occur within us), it has to be admitted also that, in our willing, there exists more unlikeness than likeness when we think about the procession
of love which occurs in the life and being of the Holy Spirit. Each person of the Trinity is love, understanding, and power. Each possesses
each of these things independently and, in God, the possession of each of these things includes all the others. Each attribute is to be equated
with God’s being (as Augustine frequently notes). However, for us, our willing is not the same as our remembering and our understanding. In
examining the scriptures and in relating many different passages together, it is clear however that the Holy Spirit is commonly identified with love and
the proceeding of the Holy Spirit is the activity or proceeding of this love which acts as a unifying force, joining all things within the Trinity and
binding all created things to God. The Holy Spirit is that which is common to all. The gift that is poured into our hearts is the Holy Spirit
(424).
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