Microsoft Word - IGWEBUIKE JOURNAL VOL.1 NO. 2 IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 22 AUGUSTINE’S UNDERSTANDING OF GOD AND HUMANITY IN DE TRINITATE By + John Niyiring, O.S.A., Ph.D Catholic Bishop of Kano Diocese jnniyiring@yahoo.com Abstract Since the starting point of Augustine's Trinitarian theology/spirituality is a faith based on the historical experience of God's self-revelation and self-communication as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the first section of this piece focuses on the revelation of the divine triad in the history of salvation, and how Augustine used the evidence of biblical data to conceive the Christian Trinity. The second section not only concentrates on Augustine's theory of divine relations and how such a theory can enable us to speak and think about the Trinitarian God but also accentuates the distinctive characteristics of the three divine persons. Finally, the third section analyses Augustine's doctrine of Trinity within God himself, enunciating the generation of the Son and the double procession of the Holy Spirit. Keywords: Augustine, Understanding, God, Humanity, De Trinitate Introduction One of the theological themes that occupied Augustine in De Trinitate was God. Given that Augustine's quest for God in De Trinitate not only oscillates between faith and reason, emphasizing the significance of the canonical rule and charity, but also begins by examining the question of Trinitarian missions, and then progresses through relations and processions, the discussion is divided into three main sections: God ad extra, divine relations and God in se. Since the starting point of Augustine's Trinitarian theology/spirituality is a faith based on the historical experience of God's self-revelation and self-communication as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the first section of this piece focuses on the revelation of the divine triad in the history of salvation, and how Augustine used the evidence of biblical data to conceive the Christian Trinity. The second section not only concentrates on Augustine's theory of divine relations and how such a theory can IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 23 enable us to speak and think about the Trinitarian God but also accentuates the distinctive characteristics of the three divine persons. Finally, the third section analyses Augustine's doctrine of Trinity within God himself, enunciating the generation of the Son and the double procession of the Holy Spirit. God ad Extra: The "Economic" Trinity Christians experience God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Augustine not only reflected on God's divine attributes but also, as a committed Christian, experienced God who is Trinity. There is a need to establish the scriptural foundations of Augustine's understanding of God as Trinity. In what follows we do not wish to present a new biblical theology of Augustine's doctrine of God the Trinity in De Trinitate. Rather, we would like to bring into relief some aspects of Augustine's treatise that are of special interest for this study. The Knowability of God Humans value the knowledge of both earthly and heavenly realities41. Can one really. Know the absolute nature and being of God the Trinity? God is light that is inaccessible to the mind; we cannot fully understand God: he is incomprehensible and ineffable42. Our thoughts are quite inadequate and incapable of grasping and expressing the Trinity as he is43. “If we say we comprehend and know God, then what we comprehend and know is not God.”If you have been able to comprehend it [what you want to say about God], you have comprehended something else instead of God. If you think you have been able to comprehend, your thoughts have deceived you”44. The prideful mind cannot know God the Trinity. The intellect that does not only accept its weakness, but also relies on its own capacity and strength to attain divine knowledge is presumptuous. For the humble intellect, it is not absolutely impossible to know something about the Trinity in itself for while we humbly profess the ignorance of the knowledge of God, we certainly can have a touch or taste of him. Augustine argues in Send. 117 (c. 418) that it is possible to have a little taste or touch of God, but to have complete understanding of him is impossible. "[H]uman knowledge is possible because of two lights: the uncreated 41Trin., IV, 1: CC L, p. 159. 42 Chevalier, La thcoric augustinicnnc des relations trinitaircs (Fribourg cn Suisse: Librairic dc L'Univcrsite, 1940), p. 5. 43 Trin., V, 1: CC L, p. 206. 44 Scrm., 52, 16: PL,38, col. 360: "si comprchcndcrc potuisti, aliud pro Dco comprchcndisti. Si quasi comprchcndcrc potUisti, cogitationc tUa tc dcccpisti." Scnnons, III/3, p. 57. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 24 light of God and the created, mutable light which is man's intellect."45 In other words, the Trinity is relatively known through the lights of faith and reason. Faith purifies our minds and helps us attain knowledge of God. 11 Knowledge of God which comes from the authority of faith is a gift from him to the one who humbly believes in him. Faith helps us acknowledge the existence of the Trinity in its authoritative... expressions in Sacred Scripture and tradition. However, this faith requires the warmth of the Holy Spirit. Thus, “take a man who has been roused by the warmth of the Holy Spirit and has already woken up to God; and in loving him he has become cheap in his own estimation; and being eager yet unable to go in to him, he has taken a look at himself in God's light, and discovered himself: and realised that his own sickness cannot be compounded with God's cleanness. So he finds it a relief to weep and implore him over and over again to take pity and pull him altogether out of his pitiful condition, and he prays with all confidence once he has received the free gratuitous pledge of health through the one and only saviour and enlightener granted us by God”46. Augustine makes a number of points in this text. First, one needs the help of the Holy Spirit in one's search for the knowledge of God. Second, an examination of oneself in the light of God leads to the discovery of the gulf between oneself and God (for example, one's own sinfulness and God's purity)47. Moreover, through our saviour and enlightener, one receives the freedom necessary for setting out to explore and know God. Finally, one should confidently pray and constantly seek the face of God48. The understanding of the universal nature of things that surround us is a source of the knowledge of the Trinity. Our natural capacity to reason makes our knowledge and thinking about God possible. "Because God has created man after his own image as a rational soul and because God continually sustains and aids the soul in its quest for knowledge, human knowledge is possible. God allows and enables us to know him (the Trinity) through the essential properties of truth, goodness, love and justice, since God is truth (veritas), good itself (ipsum bonum), love (caritas), and justice (iustitia). The Categories of Aristotle, which treats of some of the attributes of God, can help us in our search for a 45 R. H. Nash, "Some Philosophic Sources of Augustinc's Illumination Thcory," in Augustinian Studics 2 (1971), p. 49. 46 Trin., IV, 1: CC L, p. 159: "Q!li ucro jam cuigilauit in dcum spiritus sancti calorc cxcitatus atquc in cius amorc coram sc uiluit ad cumquc intrarc uolcns ncc ualcns eoquc sibi lucente attcndit in sc inuenitquc se suamquc acgritudincm illius munditiac contcmperari non posse cognouit, flere dulce habet et eum deprccari ut ctiam atque ctiam miscrcatur doncc cxuat totam miseriam, ct precari cum fiducia jam gratuito pignore salutis acccpto per eius unicum saluatorcm hominis et iriluminatorcm " Trinity, p. 152. 47 Trin., V, 2: CC L, pp. 206-207. 48 Trin., XV, 2: CC LA, pp. 460-462. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 25 genuine manner of understanding God. Let Augustine express how some philosophical categories can help us to develop a pious way of thinking about God: “Thus we should understand God, if we can and as far as we can,be good without quality, great without quantity, creative without need or necessity, presiding without position, holding all things together without possession, wholly everywhere without place, everlasting without time, without any change in himself making changeable things, and undergoing nothing. Whoever thinks of God like that may not yet be able to discover altogether what he is, but is at least piously on his guard against thinking about him anything that he is not”49. In this passage one observes that, for Augustine, God makes himself known through philosophical categories so that with the help of reason those who seek him can understand him. The authority of faith proclaimed by the Church and the power of human reason are the two lights that make God the Trinity accessible to human knowledge of God. Concluding, he says, God in his divine absoluteness is the inaccessible, the ungraspable, the unknown. Trinity, yet, somehow, he has made himself relatively known by revealing himself to humanity. Revelation and the Trinity It is not an easy task to search for and to understand God50. To search for the Trinity, some historical revelation of the intimate life of God is necessary51. Although no human eye has ever seen God, yet, God the Father has not only revealed himself figuratively through what he has made but also he makes himself known through the incarnation of his Son! God has unfolded his plan of salvation through created objects. God revealed himself through the actions and speech of angels. God is manifested in the messages of the prophets. Add to this is the fact that some bodily substances are at the service of God, and it becomes quite clear that although God has not shown himself to human eyes, yet, he has indirectly revealed himself to us in history. 49Trin., V, 2: CC L, p. 207: "ut sic intcllcgamus deum si possumus, quantum possumus, sine qualitate bonum, sine quantitate magnum, sine indigcntia creatorem, sine situ praesentcm, sine habitu omnia contincntcm, ine loco ubiquc totum, sine tempore scmpitcmum, sine ulla sui mutationc mutabilia facicntcm nihilquc paticntcm. Q!lisquis deum ita cogitat ctsi nondum potcst omni modo inucnirc quid sit, pie tameD cauet quantum potest aliquid de illo sentirc quod non sit." Trinity, p. 190. 50 Trin., II, 1: CC L, p. 80. Here, Augustine makes a list of the obstacles that make the search for the Trinity quite difficult. He specifically mentions the problem of the inaccessibility of God. 51 F. Bourassa, "Theologie trinitaire chez saint Augustin," in Grcgorianum 58 (1977), pp. 686-688. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 26 Although divine revelation insists that God is inaccessible and one, it also bears witness to the possibility of plurality within the one God. The OT passages Gn 1: 26; 3: 22; 11: 7; and Is 6: 8 speak of God in the plural. The Jewish interpretation of Gn 1: 26; 3: 22; and 11: 7 is strictly monotheistic "so as to maintain the doctrine of God's unity., Although there is no evidence that Christian authors of the NT saw the Trinitarian implications of these passages, early Christian writers asserted that the texts were "proof-texts for the doctrine of The trinity"52. For example, Abraham's and Lot's encounters with the Lord in Genesis 18 and 19 respectively provoked a passionate speculation on the revelation of the Trinitarian nature of God in the ancient Church. First, in the Gn 18 narrative, Abraham sees three men and addresses them as "My lord:" "He looked up and saw three men standing near him. He said, 'My lord ...’" (Gn 18: 2-3)53. The same visitors, though in the form of two angels, appear to Lot who addresses them as "my lords!" "The two angels came to Sodom in the evening ….When Lot saw them … He said, 'Please, my lords ...’" (Gn 19: 1-2)54 the name "lord" in these stories oscillate between singular and plural. The dialectic of singularity and plurality of Abraham's and Lot's human and angelic visitors allowed Augustine to make two conclusions. First, the plurality of the men or angels represents the Trinity, but is itself not the Trinity. Second, their singularity expressed by "lord" represents their unity of divinity: Thus, there is a quasi-revelation of the unity and plurality of God in the OT. Another observation about the two narratives is that they contain nothing to suggest that Abraham's and Lot's visitors are unequal in size, age or authority. Thus, for Augustine, the narratives indirectly reveal the equality of the three persons of the Trinity. Augustine asks: “So why may we not take the episode as a visible intimation by means of visible creations of the equality of the triad, and of the single identity of substance in the three persons?"55 The divine revelation mediated through creation and the supreme manifestation, of God in the incarnation of the Son form a positive source of an authentic knowledge of God who is Trinity and provides a concrete moment of divine encounter. 52 A. W. Wainwright, The Trinity in the New Testament, p. 26. Also see J. Lebreton, Histoire du Dogme de la Trinite, vol. I (Paris: Gabriel Beauchesne, 1927), pp. 552-558. 53 Trin., II, 19-21: CC L, pp. 106-108; Trin., III, 25: CC L, p. 153-156. Also see van der Lot; L. J., "L'exegese exa t objective des theophanies de l'Ancien Testament dans Ie De Trinitate," in Augustiniana XN (1964), pp. 485-499 . 54 Trin., II, 21-22: CC L, pp. 107-109. 55 See Trin., II, 19-23: CC L, p. 105-112; for the text cited, see Trin., II, 20: CC L, 107: "cur non hic ipiamus uisibiliter insinuatam per creaturam uisibilem trinitatis aequalitatem atque in tribus personis unam demque substantiam?" Trinity, p. 112. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 27 For Augustine, if God revealed himself in the theophanies of the Sacred Scripture, it follows that scriptural incidents do more than describe God's economy in regard to humanity. Through these acts one can also gain some insightful knowledge into the nature of God. Therefore, it is in the divine manifestations that we investigate whether God revealed himself simply as God the Father or God the Son or God the Holy Spirit or Trinity or any combination of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit always acted in and through angels. “Sometimes it was the Father who was represented by them, sometimes the Son, sometimes the Holy Spirit, sometimes just God without distinction of persons. Even if he appeared in visible or audible fashion, it was by means of his creation and not in his own proper substance. To see that substance, hearts have to be purified by all these things which are seen by eyes and heard by ears”56. In Gn 3: 9, God appeared to Adam under the guise of a man. Augustine argues that the God who appeared to Adam could have been the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit or simply the Trinity. Similarly, the call of Abraham in Gn 12 has nothing to indicate that one person of the three or God the Trinity appeared to Abraham. Also, the appearance of the three men to Abraham under the oak of Mamre (Gn18), in spite of the fact that the Three have a parity of everything, does not directly reveal the Trinity. It is in the New Testament that it becomes quite possible for us to know the Trinity: the Son reveals himself. Though his incarnation, through the Word of God the Father reveals himself and the Holy Spirit makes himself known at Pentecost. The New Testament event soft the incarnation; and Pentecost revealed and communicated God as Trinity although such revelations did not reveal divine substance of the Son or of the Holy Spirit to humanity. Thus, Augustine has shown in De Trinitate that the whole Trinity is relatively and effectively known and Communicated through his works, thereby pointing out the significance of basing the Trinitarian faith and reflection on the historical experience of God as Trinity. 56 Trin., 111, 26: CC L, pp. 157-158: "et aliquando pater, aliquando filius, aliquando spiritus sanctus, aliquando sine ulla distinctione personae deus per illos figurabatur etsi uisibilibus et sensibilibus formis apparens, per crcaturam tameD suam non per substantiam suam cui uidendae corda mundantur per haec omnia quae oculis uidentur et auribus audiuntur." Trinity, p. 144. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 28 THE DIVINE ENCOUNTER Divine manifestations are moments of divine encounter, that is, qualitative occasions, when God meets humanity, not only disclosing himself but also communicating himself to men and women. The story of God encountering and relating with human beings begins in the OT and attains its zenith-point in the incarnation of the Word of God in the NT. In De Trinitate, Augustine stresses the role of creatures in mediating God's will for humans. All divine manifestations formed a part of the divine plan of salvation, namely, the sacred history of the saving work of God. The divine manifestations of the salvation history were, indeed, directed towards the encounter of God and humanity in the incarnation of the Word of God. The theophanies were not purely occasional manifestations; they referred figuratively to the incarnation of the Son of God57. The Deity of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit Like his contemporary Catholics and Arians, Augustine took the deity of the Father for granted: The Father is always God. His challenge was to demonstrate the deity of the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Son and the Holy Spirit must be shown to be God, equal in divinity to the Father. In the context of the opera ad extra, he shows how the Son and the Holy Spirit are divine by arguing that these two members of the Trinity are co-equal, co- eternal58 and one with the Father. UNITY OF GODHEAD Augustine rejects the idea of the Son and Spirit being creatures by arguing that they have substantial unity with the Father. The Son and the Holy Spirit do not simply form part of opera ad extra; they belong to a different order, the divine order. Regarding his belief that the Son is God, the Bishop asserts: “For every substance that is not God is a creature, and that is not a creature is God. And if the Son is not of the same substance as the Father he is a made substance; if he is a made substance then not all things were made through him. But all things were made through him; therefore he is of one and the same substance as the Father”59. 57 J. Lebreton, "Saint Augustin theologien de la Trinite. Son exegese des theophanies,. in Miscel/lD4 agostiniana II (Roma: Tipografia Pologlotta Vaticana, 1931), p. 834: "les thcophanies ne sont pas des manifcstati118 purement occasionelles; elles se referent toutes a une fin unique, I'Incarnation du Fils de Dieu. Eiles no., prepaTent, en meme temps qu'elles la figurent." 58 G. J. P. O'Daly, "Aeternitas," in Augustinus-Lexikon, vol. 1, cols. 159-164; van Jess, W. G.,'Eternity in the Doctrine of St. Augustine," in Augustinian Studies 6 (1975), pp. 75-96. 59 Trin, I, 9: CC L, p. 38: "Omnis enim substania quae deus non cst crcatura cst, ct quae crcatura non cst deus & Ii non est filius ejusdem substantiae cuius pater, ergo facta substantia cst; si facta substantia cst, non omnia e".-Im facta sun!; at si omnia per ipsum filcta sunt, unius igitur eiusdcmquc cum patre substantiae cst." Trinity,71. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 29 Likewise, the Spirit is divine because of his consubstantiality with the Father. Augustine argues that the Holy Spirit himself "is God and not a creature. And if he is not a creature then he is not only God-for even men have been called gods (Ps 82: 6)-but also true God; therefore absolutely equal to the Father and the Son, and consubstantial and co-eternal in the oneness of the three."60 Augustine also considers the divinity of the Son and Holy Spirit from the point of view of their missions in salvation history. The missions of the Son and the Holy Spirit revealed their source and origin, namely, the Father. If the Father is God, it follows that the Son and the Spirit are divine because the three (Father, Son, Spirit) are united in the Father's deity. Finally, the deity is the Trinity. The Trinity cannot be called Father, the Son cannot be called Trinity and the Holy Spirit cannot be called Trinity, however, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are the Trinity. b. THE INSEPARABILITY OF THE FATHER, SON AND SPIRIT IN OPERA AD EXTRA The three persons of the Trinity have a relationship with the world through the divine acts of creation, redemption and sanctification. Apropos of these opera Trinitatis ad extra, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit cannot be separated. "I will say however with absolute confidence that Father and Son and Holy Spirit, God the creator, of one and the same substance, the almighty three, act inseparably."61 The divine triad made the universe and was fully involved in God's acts of self-giving (incarnation and Pentecost) to humanity. "So too the trinity together produced both the Father's voice and the Son's flesh and the Holy Spirit's dove, though each of these single things has reference to a single person."62 The Father, the Son and the Spirit relate to creatures inseparably: God the Trinity relates to creation as one origin, not two or three sources. It is instructive to note that the relationship between the Trinity and the world does not mean that God is a part of the world, and vice versa. God is creator, redeemer and sanctifier whereas the world with its contents is a creature to be redeemed and sanctified. 60 Trin, I, 13: CC L, p. 42: "ipsc deus ct non crcatura. Q!lod si non crcatura, non tantum deus (nam ct e dictisunt diJ), sed ctiam uerus deus. Ergo patri ct filio prorsus acqualis ct in trinitatis unitatc tialis ct coactcmus." Trinity, p. 73. The emphasis has been supplied. 61 Trin, IV, 30: CC L, p. 202: "Sed plane fidcntcr dixcrim patrem ct filium ct spiritum sanctum unius Qll.rantiae deum crcatorcm, trinitatcm omnipotcntcm inscparabilitcr opcrari." Trinity, p. 175. 62 Trin., N, 30: CC L, p. 203: "ita trinitas simul operata est et uocem patris et camero filii et colum"- spiritus sancti cum ad personas singulas haec singula referantur." Trinity, p. 176. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 30 Augustine powerfully argues for the divinity of the Son and the Holy Spirit with the help of the conception of inseparability of the Father, the Son and the Spirit in the opera ad extra. The godhead is involved in all divine activities. The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit act inseparably: "the trinity works inseparably in everything that God works.”63 The theophanies of the OT imply Trinitarian inseparability. The divine activities in the NT are clearly the works of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Father and Son have one will and are indivisible in their working; the incarnation and the virgin birth of the Son were "indivisibly wrought by one and the same working of the Father and the Son, not leaving out, of course, the Holy Spirit, of whom it is said in so many words that she (Mary] was found to be with child of the Holy Spirit."64 The sending of the Holy Spirit was the work of the Trinity whose aim was to reveal the Spirit's eternity. In sum, the inseparability of the opera Trinitatis ad extra shows the divine equality, eternity and unity of the Son and the Spirit with the Father. CHARACTERISTICS OF OPERA AD EXTRA The inseparability of the members of the divine triad in the opera ad extra does not deny the individual roles of the Father, the Son and the Spirit in them. The activities of the Father, the Son and Spirit in creation, redemption and sanctification are distinguishable but not separable. Augustine diligently identifies the tasks of each one of the three divine persons in the economy, and, accordingly, he appropriates such divine functions to the Father, the Son and the Spirit65. The Bishop's reason for the appropriation of the divine functions is scriptural. To illustrate, according to Scripture, the Father's voice was heard the baptism of Jesus; it was Jesus who was born in the flesh, baptized, suffered death all rose again to life and ascended into heaven; and the Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a dove and descended upon Jesus at his baptism and on the apostles at Pentecost. To repeat: “So too, the Trinity produced the flesh of Christ, but the only one of them it belongs to is Christ. The Trinity produced the dove from the sky, but the only one of them it belongs to is the Holy Spirit. The Trinity 63 Trin., I, 8: CC L, p. 36: "inseparabiliter operari trinitatem in omni re quam deus operatur." Trinity, p. 70 64 Trin., II, 9: CC L, p. 91: "una eademque operatione patris et filii inseparabiliter esse factaro, non utiqlK' separato spiritu sancto de quo aperte dicitur: Inuenta est in utero habens de spiritu sancto." Trinity, p.103.Also see Trin., II, 8: CC e pp. 89-90. 65 E. Bailleux, "Dieu Trinite et son oeuvre," in Recherches augustiniennes VII (1971), pp. 195.199. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 31 produced the voice from heaven, but the only one of them the voice belongs to is the Father”66. The fact that the 'opera ad extra are distinguishable not only shows that the three divine persons are united together as God, but also that they are distinct. Incidentally, the conceptions of the inseparability and differentiation of opera ad extra are a perennial problem of Augustine's search for God as Trinity. In brief, Augustine uses the conceptions of the unity of God, inseparability of the divine persons in opera ad extra and appropriation of divine functions to the Father, the Son and the Spirit to demonstrate that the Son and Holy Spirit are God and that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are three distinct divine persons who are co-equal, co-eternal and one. The Divine Missions of the Persons of the Trinity In general terms, divine mission is "going forth from the Father and coming into this world" {a patre exire et venire in hunc mundum)67. The missions of the Son and the Holy Spirit have a Trinitarian character. The Son "could not be sent by the Father without the Holy Spirit. On principle, when the Father sent him, that is made him of woman, he cannot be supposed to have done it without his Spirit"68 The whole Trinity was involved in the conceiving and childbearing of Mary.61 The missions do not imply some form of inequality or disparity or dissimilarity of substance of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. THE MISSIONS REVEALED THE FATHER AS SOURCE OF DEITY The Father alone, it is said, has not been sent {Pater enim sojus nusquam jegitur missus). The Father was not and could not be "sent" because he proceeded from no one. (W)hen the Father is known by someone in time he is not said to have been sent for he has not got anyone else to be from or to proceed from. Wisdom says, I went forth from the mouth of the Most High (Sir 24: 26), and of the Holy Spirit he says, He proceeds from the Father and Jn 15: 26), but the Father is from no one”69. 66 Serm., 52, 21 (ad finem): PI.38, col. 363: "Ita Trinitas fecit camem Christi: sed non pertinet nisi ad solum Cbristum. Trinitas fecit de coelo columbam: sed non perrinet nisi ad solum Spiritum sanctum. Trinitas fecit de cocIo voc(m: sed non perrinet vox nisi ad solum Patenn." Sennons, 1II/3, p. 61. 67 Trin., II, 7: CC 1., p. 88. Trinity, p. 101. 68 Trin II, 8: CC 1., p. 89: "mitti a patre sine spiritu sancto non potuit, non solum quia intellegitur pater cum - misit, id (st fecit ex femina, non utique sine spiritu suo fecisse." Trinity, p. 102. 69 Trin., IV, 28: CC L, p. 199: "Sed pater cum ex tempore a quoquam cognoscitur, non dicitur missus; nil enim habet de quo sit aut quo procedat. Sapientia quippe dicit Ego ex ore altissimi prodiui, et de spiritu sancto:A patre procedit; pater uero a nullo." IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 32 The sendings make us realize how important it is to have the Father as the "source and origin of all deity" (propter principii comnendationem)70. Similarly, Augustine asserts that in the missions of the Son and Holy Spirit into the world reveals the Father as the source of deity. “Elsewhere too, when he said, whom the Father will send, he added, in my name John 14: 26). He did not however say, 'whom the Father will send from me' as he had said whom I will send from the Father an John 15: 26), and thereby he indicated that the source of all godhead, or if you prefer it, of all deity, is the Father. So the Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son is traced back, on both counts, to him of whom the Son is born”71. He makes very much the same assertion in a sermon delivered sometime between 405 and 411: "The unity of the Godhead has its basis from the Father" (Unitas enim divinitatis a Patre habet exordium ...)72. Augustine says in Senn., 71 (preached between 417 and 420) that it is the Father's property to be the author/origin (auctoritas) of the Son and the Holy Spirit. Again, he writes in Tractate XXIX, 5: For although we say and we believe that the Son is equal to the Father, and that there is not any diversity of nature and substance in them, that there has not intervened any interval of time between Him that begets and Him that is begotten, nevertheless we say these things, while keeping and guarding this, that the one is the Father, the other is the Son. But Father He is not if He has not a Son, and the Son He is not if He has not a Father: but yet the Son is God from the Father; and the Father is God, but not from the Son. The Father of the Son, not God from the Son: but the other is Son of the Father, and God from the Father73. Trinity, p. 174. Also see Trin., XV, 47: CC LA, p. 528: "Pater enim salus nil est de alio, ideo solus appellatur ingenitus ...;" Serm., 140,2: PI.,38, col. 773: "Itaque dicimus Patrem Deum' nullo, Filium Deum de Dca.” 70 Trin., IV, 32: CC L, p. 205. See E. Hill, Trinity, p. 177; M. Mellet et al., La Trinite, in BibJiathiqa augustinienne, vol. XV, pp. 422-423. 71 Trin., IV, 29: CC L, p. 200: "Quia etiam cum dixisset: Quem mittet pater, addidit in nomine mea, Id tamen dixit, 'Quem mittet pater a me,' quemadmodum dixit, Quem ego mittam uobis a patTe, uidelicet astallb quod totius diuinitatis uel si melius dicitur dcitatis principium pater est. Qui ergo ex pat« procedit et !ilia ad. rcfcrtur a quo natus est filius." Trinity, p. 174. 72 Serm., 33, 3: PI.,38, col. 208. Sermons, 111/2, p. 155. 73 In Ioannis cvangeJium tractatus, XXIx, 5: Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina, Vol. XXXVI. edited ilya R. Willems (Tumholti: Typograhi Brepols Editores Pontificii, 1954), p. 286: "Q!lamuis enim Filium Patri m- et crcdamus acqualcm, nec uIlam in cis esse naturae substantiacque distantiam, ncc inter generantcm atque gaxi8 aliquod interfuisse temporis interuallum, tamen hoc seruato et custodito ista dicimus, quod ille Pater cst, ilk. Pater autem non est, si non habcat Filium; et Filius non est, si non habeat Patrem; sed tamen Filius Deus de,. Pater autem Deus, sed non de Filio. Pater Filii, non Deus de Filio; ille autem Filius Patris, et Deus de PIa' Translated by]. Gibb and]. Innes, Tractates on the GospeJ of John in A Sdect Library of the Nic(D(anQ'" Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series, vol. VII (Edinburgh/Grand Rapids, Michigan: T & T IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 33 To sum up briefly: Augustine has made two points that have profound Trinitarian implications. First, within the context of the Trinitarian mutual relationships, the Father is the source of the deity of the Trinity70 and, therefore, he is the foundation of the unity of the persons of the Trinity, not a blind and impersonal substance. E. Hill argues that Augustine's use of exordium (basis) in Senn., 33, 3 indicates that he (Augustine) found the et, foundation of the Trinitarian unity in the person of the Father.71 This is how E. Hill speaks about the dogmatic "cliche" that alleges that Augustine begins his Trinitarian theology with divine substance and goes on from here to the persons of the Trinity, whereas the ' Cappadocian Fathers start with the persons of the Trinity and from there move on to divine ousia. Augustine finds the basis or foundation of the divine unity in the person of the Father. Now it is almost a cliche of the history of dogma that Augustine and all Latin theology, after him, in developing his trinitarian theology starts with the substance and goes on from there to explain the distinctness of the three divine persons, whereas the Cappadocian Fathers, and all Greek theology in their wake, start with the trinity of persons, or hypostases as they call them, and conclude to their unity substance or i.e ousia. ... [It] is this cliche, and not Augustine, or any of the Fathers, Greek or Latin, that implies or seems tacitly to assume that the divine substance is distinct from the divine persons, making as it were a fourth, a substratum out of which the three persons somehow emerged. But that of course, is totally erroneous74. Second, the texts also do not allow us to exchange the positions of the divine persons. In other words, we cannot make the Son take the position of the Father; we cannot place' the Holy Spirit before the Son and the Father. “Although in the Trinity the Father is not the Son, and the Son is not the Father, and the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son; but the first is the Father of the Son, the second the Son of the Father, the third the Holy Spirit of the Father and of the Son”75. 74 E. Hill, note 6, in Serm., 33, 3: PI" 38, col. 208. Sennons, 111/2, p. 158: The only emerging (or proceeding, to give its technical name) that goes on in God is of the Son and the Holy Spirit. To think of the Father emerging or proceeding is wholly mistaken, and explicitly repudiated, for example, the so-called Athanasian Creed. The Father simply is the divine substance, the divine unity, the warp, the basis, the substratum, from whom the other two persons proceed without in the least impairing that unity, because as we say in the Nicene Creed they are consubstantial, homo-ousios, with the Father. 75 Serm., 212, 1: PI,,38, col. 1059: "Q!lamvis in hac Trinitate Pater non sit Filius, et Filius non sit Pater, et Spiritus sanctus nec Filius sit nec Pater: sed ille Pater Filii, ille Filius Patris, ille Spiritus Patris et Filii " Sennons, 1lI/6, p. 137. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 34 The Father is, and eternally remains, the first person of the divine Trinity. The first person of the Trinity has never become a second person or a third person. The Son has never become a father or a holy spirit. The Holy Spirit has never been a father or a son. THE SON The Incarnation of the Son: The Mission of His Humanity The Son said to be sent when he appeared in the world "in created bodily form while inwardly in uncreated spiritual form remaining always hidden from mortal eyes”76. The son of God was sent by the Father. The word of God is sent by him whose Word he is sent; by him he is born. The begetter sends, what is begotten is sent”77 yet, the mission of the Son in his incarnation has a Trinitarian dimension: "he could not be sent by the Father without the Holy Spirit" (mitti a patre sine spiritu sancto non potuit)78 The supreme mission of Christ is his coming into the world as a human being at the fullness of time. The "sending" of the Son by God the Trinity was his being made of woman, namely, his incarnation in history. "About the Son, the apostle writes, When the fullness of time had come God sent his Son, made of woman, made under the law, to redeem those who were under the law (Gal 4: 4)”79 Augustine describes the incarnation: If you go on to ask me how the incarnation itself was done, I say that the very Word of God was made flesh, that is, was made man, without however being turned or changed into that which he was made; that he was of course so made that you would have there not only the Word of God and the flesh of man but also the rational soul of man as well; and that this whole can be called God because it is God and man because it is man80. 76 Trin., II, 10: CC L, p. 93: "in crcatura corporali qui intus in natura spiritali oculis mortalium semper occultus cst" Trinity, p. 104. 77 Trin., IV, 28: CC L, p. 198: "Ab illo ... mittitur dci uerbum cuius cst ucrbum; ab ilIa mittitur dc quo Datum cst Mittit qui genuir, mittitur quod gcnitum cst" Trinity, p. 173. 78 Trin., II, 8: CC L, p. 89. Trinity, p. 102. 79 Trin., II, 8: CC L, p. 89: "Et dc filio quidcm ita scribit apostolus: Cum autem ucnit plenitudo tcmpons, misit deus fiJjum suum factum eX muJjerc, factum sub lege, ut eos qui sub lee erant redimcret.. Trinity, p. 102. 80 Trin., IV, 31: CC L, pp. 203-204: "Si ergo a.mc quacritur quomodo factac sint ucl uoccs ucl scnsibiles formac atquc species ante incamationem ucrbi dei quae hoc futurum praefigurarcnt, per angelos ca dcum operatum esse rcspondco, quod ctiam scripturarum sanctarum testimoniis, quantum cxistimo, satis ostcndi. Si autem quacritur ipsa incarnatio quomodo facta sit, ipsum dci ucrbum dico carncm factum, id cst hominem factum, non tamcn in hoc quod factum cst conucrsum atquc mutatum, ita sane factum ut ibi sit non tantum ucrbum dei et hominis caro sed ctiam rationalis hominis anima, atquc hoc totum et deus dicatur propter deuln et homo propter homincm." Trinity, p. 176. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 35 This description of the incarnation emphasizes the unity of the Word of God and humanity, but it is a union that does not allow the absorption or assimilation of the divinity by the humanity, and vice versa. In other words, the Word of God in his incarnation neither lost his Fonna dei in which he is forever one with and equal to the Father and the Holy Spirit nor did the human nature that he received from the Virgin Mary cease to be human. The incarnation was an exchange between divinity and humanity. But, the incarnation of the Word of God did not reveal the divinity of the Son of God. "[W)hat appeared to the bodily senses of mortals was not the very substance of the Word of God in which he is equal to the Father and co-equal...”81 This point was Important to Augustine as a safeguard against an overly materialistic and anthropomorphic concept of God. The identity of Christ's human nature and ours has its limits; for in the case of Christ the human nature was free from both original and actual sins. Lastly, as a result of the Trinitarian unity, equality and inseparability, was it possible for the Father or the Holy Spirit to be incarnated? For Augustine, the incarnation belonged to the Son in the proper sense. The Word of God became flesh so that, through the incarnation of the Word of God and his example, we might rightly live by the truth of our word. And the reason why it was not God the Father, not the Holy Spirit, not the trinity itself; but only the Son who is the Word of God that became flesh (although it was the trinity that accomplished this), is that we might live rightly by our word following and imitating his example; that is, by our having no falsehood either in contemplation or in the operation of our word82. Augustine in the sentences preceding this text argues that our word is in the likeness of the Word of God, thereby justifying the reasonableness of the incarnation of the Word of God. The Word of God was first born of God, and then, all things were made through that Word. The Word of God could exist without its good work, namely, creation. For instance, it existed before creatures came to be. The Word of God is true, implying that it always produces good things. 81 Trin., III, 27: CC L, p. 158: "non ipsum dei uerbum per substantiam qua patTi acquale atque coaeternum cst, " Trinity, pp. 144- 145. 82 Trin XV, 20: CC L , p. 489: eoque non eus pater, non spmtus sanctus, non Ipsa tnmtas, se so us filius quod est uerbum dei caro factum est quamuis trinitate faciente, ut scqucnte atque imitante uerbo nostro eius cxcmplum recte uiueremus, hoc est nullum habentes in uerbi nostri uel contemplatione uel operatione mendacium." Trinity, p. 411. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 36 By way of comparison, our word is first born in our heart; this generated human word produces our external work. In effect, like the Word of God, we utter all our works in our heart before we produce them. Additionally, “there is also this other likeness to the Word of God in this likeness which is our word, that we can have a word which is not followed by a work, but we cannot have a work which is not preceded by a word, just as the Word of God could be, even without any creation coming into existence, but there could not be any creation except through that Word through which all things were made”83. A human word which produces an external work can be a true or an untrue one. This is how Augustine describes a true word: "So when that which is in the awareness is also in a word, then is it a true word, and truth such as a man looks for so that what is in awareness should also be in word and what is not in awareness should not either be in word,"84 In other words, a true human word possesses in se a truth which is necessarily made evident in that (knowledge/awareness/notitia) which it (word) reveals to the human observer, and vice versa. If our word is true, it produces a good work; if it is false, it produces a sin. A sin (peccatum) is not a right work (non opus rectum). If we are to become people who always utter a true word that produces a good work, then it is appropriate that the Word of God become flesh in order to enable us to live rightly through his example of being a true Word that always produces a good work. Hence, the incarnation is properly the property of the Son, the Word of God. ii. True God and True Man The Son of God is true God and true man. Christ is true God on account of his divine origin; he is true man because of his participation in our nature, "Son of God, he is that in himself; to be Son of man, that he received from us; Son of God by what is his own, Son of man by what is ours."85 The God-man is the Word of God and flesh of man with a rational soul of man. 89 He also has one and the same will with the Father: “In terms of the Son's divinity, the Father and the Son have one and the same will, nor can it be different in any way where the nature of the Trinity as a whole is immutable. But so that the mediator of God and man, 83 Trin., XV, 20: CC LA, p. 489: "Est et haec in ista similitudine uerbi nostri sirnilitudo uerbi dei quia potest ,csse uerbum nostrum quod non scquatur opus; opus autem esse non potest nisi praecedat uerbum sicut uerbum 84 Trin., XV, 20: CC LA, p. 488: "Q!lando ergo quod est in notitia hoc est in uerbo, tunc est uerum uerbum et ueritas qualis exspectatur ab homine ut quod est in ista, hoc sit et in illo; quod non est in ista, non sit et in illo." Trinity, p. 410. 85 Serm., 127,9: PL,38, col. 710: "Filius Dei in semetipso; filius hominis ut esset, a nobis accepit. De suo Filius Dei, de nostro filius hominis." Sermons,III/4, p. 287. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 37 the man Jesus Christ, would not do his own will, which is opposed to God, he was not only man, but God and man”86. Augustine insists on the unity of Christ's two natures, divine and human: "The blessed apostle teaches this unity of the person of Christ Jesus, our Lord, including both natures, namely, the divine and the human, so that each of them shares its attributes with the other, the divine with the human, and the human with the divine”87. In Christ Jesus, the divinity took the name of humanity and humanity took the name of divinity, thereby enabling the mutual communion of properties (communicatio idiomatum) between them. This idea is best expressed in Augustine's Senn., 265B (co 412): “Each substance or nature, you see, shares with the other the names that are proper to itself; both divine names with the human nature, and the human names with the divine nature; so that on the one hand the Son of God can be called a man, and on the other hand the Son of man can be called God, while each, all the same, is identical with Christ himself”88. There were not two persons in Christ; this would imply a quaternity (quatemitas) rather than the Trinity. Christ is a two-fold substance (gemina substantia), one person in two natures, God and man at the same time. Christ is one person (Christus una persona) in two natures. He is always the Son of God on account of his birth in eternity, and by means of the grace of God the Son of God assumed humanity in time as the Son of man. He was not first created and assumed humanity, he was created in being assumed. The Son of God assumed the Son of man, taking the form of a servant. The Son of God has the form of God and the form of a servant. In the form of God, all things were made through the Son and the Son is one with the Father. Similarly, the Son does not only have life in himself: but also all that the Father has belongs to him and he is true God and life eternal. In the form of a servant, Christ was made of a woman. For this reason, he did the will of the Father who sent him by faithfully teaching the doctrine that was the Father's and undergoing his passion and the 86 Contra sermonem Ananorum, VII: PL,42, col. 688: "Caeterum quod attinet ad divinitatem Filii, una eademque voluntas est Patris et Filii: nec potest ullo modo esse diversa, ubi est natura Trinitatis immutabilis universa. Ut autem Mediator Dei et hominum homo Christus Jesus (1 Tim. II, 5) non faceret propriam, quae Deo adversa est, voluntatem, non erat tantum homo, sed Deus et homo " Translated by R. J. Teske, Arianism and other Heresies in The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Centu1y; vol. 1/18 (Hyde Park, New York: New City Press, 1995), p. 145. 87 Contra seonem Arianorum, VIII: PL,42, col. 688: "Hanc unitatem personae Christi Jesu Domini nostri, sic ex natura utraque constantem, divina scilicet atque humana ut quaelibet earum vocabulum etiam alteri impertiat, et divina humanae, et humana divinae, beatus ostendit Apostolus " Translated by R J. Teske, Arianism and other Heresies, p. 146. 88 Serm., 265B, 3: PL, SuppJementum, II, col. 531: "Utraque enim subtantia sua sibi proprietatis nomina impertit, et divina humanae, et humana divinae; ut et Filius dei dicatur homo, et filius hominis dicatur deus, utrumque tamen idem ipse Christus." Sermons, 111/7, p. 250. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 38 death on the cross. Although in the form of a servant the weakness of his humanity suffered the passion and death, the Son of God did not suffer these in his divinity by which he is only-begotten and co-eternal with the Father. iii. Union of the Word and Humanity and Christ's Power of Judgement Augustine defended the doctrine of the two natures of Christ, divine and human, insisting that the Word is not only truly divine and truly human but that there is union of both natures in his person. But how did the Bishop of Hippo interpret the union of the Word of God and humanity in the person of Christ? Like other Church fathers, Augustine's teaching on the union of the divinity and humanity of Christ was based on the analogy of the union of body and soul in a human being. However, in De Trinitate, Augustine demonstrates how the Word of God and humanity are united in the person of Christ by inquiring into who will have the power of judgement on the last day. According to Scripture (Jn 12: 47-50), neither the Son nor the Father will judge the world, but the Father's word spoken by the Son of man will judge on the last day. The Word (the Son) is God; the Father's word (proclaimed by the Son of man) is a stable and an unchangeable doctrine, abiding with the Father. The Son of God (the Father's Word) and the doctrine/message of the Son of man (the Father's word) are one, not two things. In fact, the Son of man becomes the message/doctrine (Father's word) that he proclaims: "The Father's doctrine is the Father's Word, who is his only Son."103 Consequently, the Son of God is both the Father's Word and word. The Son of God is the Father's Word on account of his being in the form of God. As being in forma dei, the Word is equal to the Father in divinity and, therefore, will not take part in the judgment of the world; for to do so would involve the revealing of the Word's divinity which is meant to remain hidden until after the judgement of the last day when the godhead will be revealed to the blessed souls. The Son of God is the Father's word, that is, Son of man, by virtue of the form of a servant that he took. It was in forma servi that he suffered and was crucified on the cross. The judgment of the last day will be conducted by the Father's word, the Son of man: “Both good and bad, of course, are going to look upon the judge of the living and the dead, but the bad, we may be sure, will only be able to see him in the form by which he is the Son of man, though in the proud splendor, certainly, that will be his as judge, not in the mean guise he once presented as IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 39 prisoner in the dock. The form of God, however, in which he is equal to the Father, this the wicked will undoubtedly not see”89. The Son of man will judge not through his human authority but by the divine authority of the Son of God. In the same vein, "it is the Son of God who is going to judge, though he will not be manifested in the form by which he is equal to the Father, but in that by which he is the Son of man."90 iv. The Visible Mission of the Son Revealing His Eternal Generation The Son was sent into the world by both the Son and the Father, but the one who appropriately did the "sending" was the Father: In order to safeguard the substantial immutability and invisibility of the divinity during the mission, the Son of God put on the visible form of a servant. To be sure: "the form of a servant was so taken on that the form of God remained immutable, and thus it is plain that what was seen in the Son was the work of the Father and the Son who remain unseen; that is the Son was sent to be visible by the invisible Father together with the invisible Son."91 The visible "sending" of the Son made known his divine procession: “So the Son of God is not said to be sent in the very fact that he is born of the Father, but either in the fact that the Word made flesh showed himself to this world; about this he says, I went forth from the Father and come into this world (Jn 16: 28). Or else he is sent in the fact that he is perceived in time by someone's mind, as it says, Send her to be with me and labor with me (Wis 9: 10). That he is born means that he is from eternity to eternity-he is the brightness of eternal light (Wis 7: 26). But that he is sent means that he is owne by someone in time”92. The sending of the Son of God is not to be confused with his eternal generation from the Father. His being sent, in effect, implies two things. First, the 89 Trin., I, 28: CC L, 70: "Cum cnim et bani et mali uisuri sint iudiccm uiuorum ct mortuorum, procu! dubio cum uidcrc mali non potcrunt nisi secumdum formam qua filius hominis cst, sed tamcn in claritatc in qua iudicabit, non in humilitatc in qua iudicatus cst. Cctcrum illam dci formam in qua acqualis cst patri procul dubio impii non uidcbunt." Trinity, pp. 86-87. 90 Trin., I, 28: CC L, p. 71: " filius dei iudicaturus est, nec tamen in ea forma apparens in qua deus est acqualis patti, sed in ea qua filius hominis est." Trinity, p87. 91 Trin., II, 9: CC L, p. 92: "accepta est forma serui ut maneret incommutabilis forma dei, manifestUm est quod a patte et filio non apparentibus factUm sit quod appareret in filio, id est ab inuisibili patte cum inuisibili filio idem ipse filius uisibilis mitteretur." Trinity, 103. losTrin., lV, 28: CC L, p. 198: "Non ergo eo ipso quo de patte natUs est missus dicitUr filius, sed uel eo quod apparuit huic mundo uerbum caro fdctum unde dicit: A patTe exii et uem in hunc mundum, uel eo quod ex tempore cuiusquarn mente percipitur sicut dictUm est: Mitre iUam ut .mecum sit et meCUm laborer. Q!lod ergo natUm est ab aetcrnO in aetemum est: Candor est enim Iuds aetemae. Q!lod autem mittitUr ex tempore a quoquarn cognoscitUr." Trinity, p. 173. 92 Trin., IV, 28 IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 40 incarnation of the Word (visible mission) and, second, the perception of the unincarnated Word of God in time by someone's mind (invisible mission). Augustine defines the visible mission of the Son in terms of his eternal generation: "And just as being born means for the Son his being from the Father, so his being sent means his being known to be from him."I09 Hence, the procession of the Word of God means his being generated from the Father. The visible mission of the Son revealed the eternal generation or procession of the Word. v. The Invisible Mission of the Son Can one talk of the "invisible mission" of the Son? Augustine's response to this question is in the affirmative. The Word of God exists in two modes: "The Word in the flesh is one thing, the Word being flesh another; which means the Word in a man is one thing, the Word being made man another.”93 The two-fold existence of the Word of God justifies Augustine's idea of the invisible mission of the Son. He says of the "invisible sending" of the Son: “When however he [the Son] is perceived by the mind in the course of someone's spiritual progress in time, he is indeed said to be sent, but not into this world, for he does not then slow himself perceptibly, that is he is not available to the physical senses”94. By way of contrast, while the visible mission involves the manifestation in the flesh of the Word of God (incarnation) which is made available to the senses, the invisible sending is spiritually perceptible only to one's mind. Thus, the former is objective because of its historical nature while the latter is subjective. THE HOLY SPIRIT The Visible Mission of the Holy Spirit The Holy Spirit was sent into the world when he appeared in the guise of the created forms of a dove, breath of Christ, violent wind and tongues of fire: "The Holy Spirit too, therefore, is said to have been sent because of these bodily forms 93 Trin., II, II: CC L. p. 94: "Aliud cst enim uerbum in came, aliud uerbum carD', id est aliud cst uerbum in homine, aliud uerbum homo." Trinity, p. 104. 94 Trin., IV, 28: CC L. p. 199: "Cum autem ex tempore cuiusque prouectus mente percipitur, mitti quidem dicitur sed non in hunc mundum; neque enim sensibiliter apparet, id est corporeis sensibus praesto est." Trinity, pp. 173-174. Also see). -L Maier, us missions divines seIon saint Augustin (Fribourg: Edition Universitaircs "Paradosis XVI," 1960), pp. 154-160. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 41 which sprang into being in time in order to signify him and show him in a manner suited to human senses.”95 The Holy Spirit was sent because charity is poured out into our hearts through him; it is through him that we love God and our neighbour. The Lord Jesus gave him twice: first, on earth for love of neighbour and, second, from heaven for the love of God. The Holy Spirit reveals the divinity of Jesus, for only God can give God. Jesus gave the Holy Spirit as God, but receive him as man. The association of the Holy Spirit with a dove, violent wind and fire simply underlines the fact of "creation serving the creator" (creatura seruiente creaton) (Wis 16: 24). The Holy Spirit did not take a "created form" like the Son; he did not take a human form. The person of the Spirit did not form an inseparable and eternal union with the dove, the violent wind and the fire that are often associated with him. We cannot say that the Spirit is God and dove or God and fire, as we say the Son is God and man. The Spirit was not united with any of them hypostatically. Yet, it can be asserted that the Holy Spirit was sent into the world. The Mission of the Holy Spirit Revealing His Procession The visible mission of the Holy Spirit revealed him as the Spirit of both the Father and the Son. Augustine defines the mission of the Holy Spirit in the following manner. “And just as for the Holy Spirit his being the gift of God means his proceeding from the Father, so his being sent means his being known to proceed from him."96 Thus, the sending of the Holy Spirit in history made known his eternal procession from the Father and the Son. Despite that, the very substance of the Spirit of the Father and the Son in which he is co- equal and co- eternal with them both is not revealed. B. Divine Relations Augustine's understanding of God in De Trinitate has influenced the western Church's conception of divine relations. Up to the time Augustine wrote his treatise on the Trinity, both the Latin and the Greek Churches held that the three persons of the Trinity participated fully, equally and distinctly in one divine nature. Augustine states this position as follows: 95 Trin., II, 12: CC L. p. 96: "Propter has ergo corporales formas quae ad eum significandum et sicut humanis sensibus oportebat demonstrandum temporaliter exstiterunt missus dicitur etiam spiritus sanctus n Trinity, p.l06. 96 Trin., N,29: CC 1., p. 199: "Et sicut spiritui sancto donum dei esse est a patre procedere, ita mitti est cognosci quod ab ilIa proccdat." Trinity, p. 174. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 42 We have remarked elsewhere that any names that are predicated with reference to each other like Father and Son and the gift of each, the Holy Spirit, are said properly in that triad or trinity, that is, they belong distinctly to the several persons; the trinity is not the Father, the trinity is not the Son, nor is the trinity the Gift. But whatever they are each and severally called with reference to self, the trinity is also called, not three such in plural but one such; thus the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God; and the Father is good, the Son is good, the Holy Spirit is good; and the Father is almighty, the Son is almighty, the Holy Spirit is almighty; yet there are not three Gods, or three good ones, or three almighty ones, but one God, good and almighty, the trinity itself; and the same goes for anything else that they are each called not with reference to one another but to self. For they are called such things with respect to being, because in this case to be is the same as to be great, to be good, to be wise, and to be anything else that each person or the trinity itself is called with reference to self. And the reason there are said to be three persons or three substances is not to signify any diversity of being, but to have at least one word to answer with when asked three what or three who. And finally we observed that so total is the equality in this triad that not only is the Father not greater than the Son as far as divinity is concerned, but also Father and Son together are not greater than the Holy Spirit, nor any single person of the three less than the trinity itself97. This passage is a representative text of Augustine's use of terms in De Trinitate. It summarises and expresses both the unity and equality of divinity and the distinction of the members of the divine triad. However, the Arian heresy insisted that: "Whatever is said or understood about God is said substance-wise, not modification-wise. Therefore the Father is unbegotten substance-wise, and the Son is begotten substance-wise. But being unbegotten is different from being begotten; therefore the Father's substance is different from the Son's."98 The Arians' source of heresy was that whatever was said of God was predicated of 97 Trin., VIII, 1: CC 1., p. 268: "Oiximus alibi ca dici proprie in ilia trinitate distincte ad singulas personas pcrtinentia quae rclatiuc dicuntur ad inuiccm sicut pater ct filius ct utriusquc donum spiritus sanctus; non coiro pater trinitas aut filius trinitas aut trinitas donum. Quod UCla ad sc dicuntur singuli non dici pluralitcr trcs sed unum ipsam trinitatcm sicut deus pater. deus filius deus spiritus sanctue et bonus pater, bonus filius, bonus spiritus sanctus; et omnipotens pater, omnipotens filius, omnipotens spiritus sanctus; nec tamen tres dii aut tres boni aut tres omnipotentes, sed unus deus, bonus, omnipotens, ipsa trinitas, et quidquid aliud non ad inuicem rclatiuc sed ad se singuli dicuntur. 98 Trin., V, 4: CC L, p. 208: "Quidquid de deo dicitur uel intellegitur non secundum accidens sed secundwn substantiam dicitur. Q!lapropter ingenitum esse patri secundum substantiam est, et genitum esse filio secundwn substantiam est. Diuersum est autem ingenitum esse et genitum esse; diuersa est ergo substantia patris etfilii' Trinity; p. 191. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 43 him substantially. But according to Augustine, God has no modifications (accidens) and, therefore, nothing can be said of God modification-wise. He concedes, however, that there are some things that are true about God which cannot be predicated of him substance-wise. There is need, therefore, to examine Augustine's metaphors of unity, equality and distinction. Beginning with his theory of predicables, we shall explore his use of substantia essentia and persona in the treatise. Speaking and Thinking the Trinity: The Theory of Predicables According to L Hodgson, following Augustine's suggestions in De Trinitate, the theory of the predicables is concerned with three types of predicates: substantial, accidental and relative. “A substantial predicate indicates something without which the subject would not be what it is: man, for example, is by definition a rational being, and 'rational' is therefore a substantial predicate. But men may be white or black, tall or short, sick or well: these, therefore, are accidental predicates. And men may also be in certain relations to one another and to other created things, as are fathers and sons or teachers and pupils, not to mention relations in time and space; these are indicated by relative predicates”99. Predications about God are said substance-wise or relationship-wise. A substantial predicate tells us something about the nature of a being ad se, it makes no reference to another being. For example, the statement: The "substance or being which is God is alone unchangeable, and therefore it pertains to it most truly and supremely to be, from which comes the name being. The predicate is alone unchangeable tells us something new about God ad se, namely, that his being cannot change. This new something said about God is not concerned with God's relationship with other beings which gives rise to the conception of him as Father or creator. With reference to the Trinity: the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit and, indeed, the whole Trinity is God. So what is affirmed of God substance-wise can be affirmed of the three persons of the Trinity, individually and collectively, and such an affirmation excludes restrictive clauses that are concerned with qualification and comparison. 99 L. Hodgson, The Doctrine of the Trinity (Herts: James Nisset & Co. Ltd., 1972), p. 149. Also see Aristotk. The Categories, V- VII, translated by H. P. Co0k, in The Loeb Classical Library (London/Cambridsc, Massachusetts: William Heinemann Ltd/Harvard University Press, 1962), pp. 19-63; R. J. Teske, "Augustine's UK of , Substantia' in speaking about God," in The Modem Schoolman LXII (1985), p. 149: "Predication according to the categories of substance, quantity and quality arc ad Se; they do not contain a reference to something other dun e subject of which they are predicated. Predication according to the other categories are ad aliquid and involve I reference to something other than the subject of which they are predicated-with the exception of the category of.. which involves an internal relatedness of the subject's parts. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 44 Divine properties or attributes (e.g., great, good, eternal, omnipotent, godhead) are predicated of God substantially, for, in the Trinity, attributes and substance are identical and the same: God's greatness is identical with his wisdom, and his goodness is identical with his wisdom and greatness. God does not participate in the attribute of immutability; rather, he is identical with his divine immutability itself; for he alone is immutable. Any property affirmed of God substantially "is predicated equally and univocally of the three persons: the Trinity as a whole, for example, and each of the divine persons, is equally omnipotent and omniscient”100. Likewise, the Trinity is one eternity, one power, one majesty: the Father is one eternity, one power, one majesty; and so is the Son as well as the Spirit. For Augustine, accident (accidens) can be conceived as something that inheres in a subject and that can be lost by a change of that reality to which it pertains or something that inheres in a subject and that, though not lost, is capable of increase or decrease or something that inheres in a subject and that, though inseparable from the subject, is nonetheless lost through the destruction of that subject. At the level of material existence, accidents inhere in reality. A change in the latter results in the loss of the former or its change in size and shape. God has no accidents; he alone cannot be modified in any way. Nothing is said of God accident-wise, for God neither modifies nor possesses something in him that is changeable. Hence, our understanding of Augustine's use of accidental predicates at the divine level is a sine qua non for our investigation of his manner of talking and thinking about God and the three divine persons. Moreover, there are some things that are true about God but cannot be predicated of him substance-wise. They are said to be relationship-wise. We cannot understand the relationship between unbegotten and begotten substance- wise. Divine paternity and filiation (and spiration) are not said accident-wise; they are said with reference to relation.lJ6 Augustine clearly and carefully delineates his theory of divine relations in the following passage: Some things are said with reference to something else, like Father with reference to Son and Son with reference to Father; and this is not said modification-wise, because the one is always Father and the other always Son- not "always" in the sense that he is Son from the moment he is born or that the Father does not cease to be Father from the moment the Son does not cease to be Son, but in the sense that the Son is always born and never began to be Son. ... But since the Father is only called so because he has a 100 L Hodgson, The Doctrine of the Trinity, p.149. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 45 Son, and the Son is only called so because he has a Father, these things are not said substance-wise, as neither is said with reference to itself but only with reference to the other. Nor are they said modification-wise, because what is signified by calling them Father belongs to them eternally and unchangeably. Therefore, although being Father is different from being Son, there is no difference of substance, because they are not called these things substance-wise but relationship-wise; and yet this relationship is not a modification, because it is not changeable101. The basic point Augustine expresses is that divine attributes of internal relations are not accidents. Consequently, relationship predicates can help us think and talk about the internal relations within the godhead that we are not able to express by substantial statements. The Holy Spirit is called the Holy Spirit relationship-wise because he is the Spirit of the Father and the Son102. The Father is called Father and origin (principium) with reference to the deity and creatures relationship-wise, and he is called Father with reference to the Son relationship- wise. And the Son with reference to his Father is called Word and image relationship-wise. The Son and the Holy Spirit with reference to creation are called origin relationship-wise.139 Finally, regarding the Trinitarian import of the terms unbegotten and begotten, Augustine asks: And what does unbegotten mean but not begotten? So we do not leave the predication of relationship when we say unbegotten. Just as begotten is not said with reference to self but means from a begetter, so unbegotten is not said with reference to self but simply means not being from a begetter. Each meaning belongs to the predication that is called relationship. And what is stated relationship-wise does not designate substance. So although begotten differs from unbegotten, it does not indicate a different substance, because just as son refers to father, and not son to not father, so begotten must refer to begetter, and not begotten to not begetter103. 101 Trin., V, 6: CC 1., pp. 210-211: "Oicitur enim ad aIiquid sicut pater ad filium et filius ad pattern, quod ne est accidens quia et ille semper pater et ille semper filius, et non ita semper quasi ex quo natus est filius aut ex e quod numquarn desinat esse filius pater esse non desinat pater, sed ex eo quod semper natus est filius net coepi umquarn esse filius. ... Sed quia et pater non dicitur pater nisi ex eo quod est ei filius et filius non dicitur nisi ex e quod habet pattern, non secundum substantiarn haec clicuntur quia non quisque eorum ad se ipsurn sed ad in- atque ad alterutrum ista dicuntur; neque secundum accidens quia et quod dicitur pater et quod dicitur fiIiII aetemum atque incommutabile est eis. Q!larnobrem quamuis diuersum sit pattern esse et filium esse, non et tana diuersa substantia quia hoc non secundum substantiam dicuntur sed secundum rclatiuum, quod tarnen relariuua non est accidens quia non cst mutabile." Trinity, p. 192. 102 103 Trin., V, 8: CC 1., pp. 214-215: "Ingenitus porro quid est nisi non genitus? Non ergo receditur a relatiuo icamento cum ingenitus dicitur. Sicut enim genitus non ad se ipsum dicitur sed quod ex genitore sit. ita cum ingenitus non ad se ipsum dicitur sed quod ex genitore non sit ostenditur. In eodem tamen praedicamento relatiuum uocatur utraque significatio uertitur. Quod IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 46 Una Essentia or Substantia The traditional Christian approach to the understanding of God in the patristic period is primarily the economic141 one which emphasized the fact that God revealed himself in salvation history as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This implied that early discussions on the trninty began with the divine persons. Although this approach had the advantage of the experience of God in history, its use of the Father as the point of departure for the "trinitarian reflection often led to the subordination of the Son and the Holy Spirit. To the problem of subordination, Augustine, in De Trinitate, employs the philosophical 142 143) to bring out the unity of the essence, nature and substance = emg,) Unity the three persons of the Trinity. Conceptually, divine substance, for example, has neither nor size and, being absolute means that it is simple, indivisible, immortal, eternal, the unchangeable. The notion of the divine essence expresses the absolute unity of the Italian godhead. For the African Bishop, as has been indicated, the Father is the basis of the godhead. The Father is the unoriginate source of the one single divine nature subsisting in three persons. In Augustine's Trinitarian formulation, the metaphor of divine substantia enables one to explicate the principles of unity/eternity, equality and commonness/communion of Father, Son and Spirit. The Father is the source of the divine substance. The Son is equal to God (the Father) in all things that are said of his (God's) substance. The substance of the Father and Son is one. "So the Son is equal to the Father in every respect, and is of one and the same substance."104 The Holy Spirit shares in the unity and equality of the divine substance. “So the Holy Spirit is something common to the Father and the Son. He is their very commonness or communion, consubstantial and coetemal. Call this friendship, if it helps, but a better word for it is charity. And this too is substance because God is substance, and God is charity” (I Jn 4: 8, 16)105. Augustine appropriates unity (unitas) to the Father, equality (aequalitas) to the Son and commonness/communion (harmony/concordia) to the Holy Spirit: “In the Father unity, in the Son equality, in the Holy Spirit the harmony of unity and autem relatiue pronuntiatur non indicat substantiam. Ita uis diuersum sit genitus et ingenitus, non indicat diucrsarn substantiam, quia sicut filius ad patrem et non filius n pattern refertur, ita genitus ad genitorem et non genitus ad non genitorem referatur neccsse est." Trinity, p. 194 104 Trin., VI, 6: CC L, p. 235: "In omnibus ergo acqualis est patri filius et cst unius eiusdemque substantiac." Trinity, p. 209. 105 Trin., VI, 7: CCL, p. 235. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 47 equality; and these three are all one because of the Father, and are all equal because of the Son, and are all linked together because of the Holy Spirit”106. Additionally, since the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are one substance or essence (unius eiusdemque substantiae uel esstiae) and are consubstantial whatever is said of God substance-wise can equally be said of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Whatever human speech regards as suitable to say about God "fits both the whole trinity which the one God is and each of the persons of this trinity."107 For example, if God is substantially called charity, good and wisdom, then, all and each of the triad of Father, Son and Holy Spirit is said to be charity, good and wisdom. The concept of divine substance helped Augustine maintain the equality and eternity, unity and inseparability in the actions of the divine persons. “In their own proper substance by which they are, the three are one, Father and Son and Holy Spirit, without any temporal movement, without any intervals of time or Space, one and the same over all creation, one and the same all together from eternity to eternity, like eternity itself which is never without verity and charity”108. Concluding, Augustine places emphasis on the Father's substance as the foundation of the unity of the deity in order to talk about the persons of the Trinity and their internal relations. A text from De doctrina christiana will go a long way towards serving as a link between this section (Una Essentia or Substantia) and the one that follows it (Tres Personae), for this passage aptly introduces our next topic of discussion (Tres Personae) by commenting on the inexpressible substantial unity of the three and the distinction between them. Thus Father and Son and Holy Spirit are both each one of them singly God and all together one God; and each one of them singly is the complete divine substance, and all together are one substance. The Father is neither the Son nor the Holy Spirit; the Son is neither the Father nor the Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son; but the Father is only the Father, and the Son is only the Son, and the Holy Spirit is only the Holy 106 DDC., I. 5: CC XXXII, p. 9. 107 Trin., XV, 7: CCL, p. 468. 108 Trin., N, 30: CC L, p. 202: "In Sua quippe substantia qua Sunt tria unum Sunt, pater et filius et spiritus sanctus, nullo temporali motu super omnem creatUram idipsum sine ullis interuallis temporum uel locorum et simul unum atque idem ab aeternitate in aeternitatem tamquam ipsa aeternitas quae sine ueritate et caritate non est " Trinity, p. 175. Also see E. Portalic, A Guide to the nought of St. Augustine, p. 131: "It is the God- Trinity, that is, the basic Divinity unfolding itsclfinto three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, without sucession of the time or nature, but not without an order of origin." IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 48 Spirit. The three possess the same eternity, the same unchangeableness, the same greatness, the same power109. Tres Personae Augustine expresses his concern over the Use oftenns the "persona" and "hypostasis" in the description of Trinitarian relationships. One cannot avoid the question "three what?" in Trinitarian reflection. Augustine observes that we reply by quoting "tres personae" in order to escape the embarrassment of keeping silent. The choice of persona came about among Latin authors when they were "able to find no more suitable way of expressing in words what they understood without words."110 This is what J. Burnaby says about the patristic usage of hypostasis in Greek and persona in Latin: “Both the Greek hypostasis and the Latin persona in ordinary usage are terms of substance, not relation. In the proper sense, the Person of God is his essential being, his substance. We can only use the term 'Person' in its Trinitarian application Faute de mieux, and must always bear in mind that in the theology of the Trinity it does not bear its ordinary sense: its implication is negative-the Father is not the Son, etc.-rather than positive”111. Bishop Augustine admits that human speech is inadequate in God-talk and that persona and hypostasis should be applied to the one indivisible divine essence which relates within itself in three ways. The absence of suitable alternative terms to express the unity and distinction of the divine triad makes us keep the traditional terms of una substantia, tres personae. However, There must be neither confusion nor mixing up of the persons, nor such distinction of them as may imply any disparity. If this cannot be grasped by understanding, let it be held by faith, until he shines in our minds who said through the prophet, unless you believe, you will not understand (Is 7: 9)112. 109 DDC., I, 5: CC XXXII, p. 9: "Ita pater et filius et spiritus sanctus et singulus quisque horum deus et simul omnes unus deus, et singJIlus quisque horum plena substantia et simul omnes una substantia. Pater net filius est net spiritus sanctus, filius net pater est nec spiritus sanctus, spiritus sanctus net pater nec filius, sed pater tanturn pater et filius tantum filius et spiritus sanctus tantum spiritus sanctus. Eadem tribus aeternitas,eadem incornmutabilitas, eadem majestas, eadem potestas." Translated by E. Hill, Teaching Christianity, p. 108. 110 Trin., VII, 7: CC L, p. 255. See also In Ioannis evangelium tractatus, XXXIx, 2-4: CC XXXVI, pp. 345- 346. 111 J. Burnaby, -Introduction," p. 22. 112 Trin., VII, 12: CC l., p. 267: "neque personarurn sit confusio nec talis distinctio qua sit impar aliquid. Quod si intelIectu capi non potest, fide teneatur donec inlucescat in cordibus ille qui ait per prophctam: Nisi c«dideritis non intellegetis." Trinity, p. 232. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 49 There are many dimensions to Augustine's understanding of person. We are interested in understanding Augustine's way of explaining the notion of a divine person within the context of the Trinity. For our purpose we shall cite De Trinitate, VI, 3. This is a classic text because it not only provides a basic set of Trinitarian vocabulary, but also illuminates and explicates Augustine's conception of a divine person. But now if the Father is only called in himself what he is called with reference to the Son, that is Father or begetter or origin and if whatever else he is called, he is called it with the Son, or rather in the Son, so that he is called great with the greatness he has begotten, just with the justice he has begotten, good with the goodness he has. begotten, powerful with the power he has begotten, wise with the wisdom he has begotten-and so Father is not called greatness itself but begetter of greatness; while the Son too is indeed called Son in himself: which he is not called with the Father but with reference to the Father, but is not in the same way called great in himself: but only with the Father whose greatness he is, and wise with the Father whose wisdom he is, just as he in turn is wise with the Son because he is wise with the wisdom he has begotten-then it follows that whatever they are called with reference to themselves, neither is called without the other; that is, whatever they are called to indicate their substance they are both called together113. In the first place, this text delineates two ways of understanding a divine person, namely, ad se and in se. Augustine asserts that the substance of the person of the Father is just the Father ad se substantially, the Father as a person, refers to himself alone without reference to someone else. He explains this point further in another text: “Thus as the substance of the Father is just the Father, but insofar as he just is; so too the person of the Father is nothing but the Father. He is called person with reference to himself; not with reference to the Son or Holy Spirit; just as he is called God with reference to himself, and great and good and just and anything else of that sort. And just as it is the same for him to be as to be God, to be great, to be good so it is the same for him to be person”114. 113 Trin., VI, 3: CC l., pp. 229-230 114 Trin., VII, 11: CC L, p. 262: "Quocirca ut substantia patris ipse pater est, non quo pater cst sed quo cst; ita et persona patris non aliud quam ipse pater cst. Ad sc quippc dicitur persona, non ad filium uel spiritum sanctum; sicut ad sc dicitur deus fl magnus ct bonus ct iustus ct si quid aliud huiusmodi. Et quemadmodum hoc illi est esse quod dcum esse, quod magnum, q\lod bonum esse, ita hoc illi est esse quod personam esse." Trinity, p. 228. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 50 What Augustine says of the personhood of the Father ad se holds true of the cases of the personhood of the Son and that of the Holy Spirit. "Each person is a substance, and the same substance as the other persons (Trin., VII, 2)”115. Second, if each of the divine persons subsists in the substance and relates substantially to the other persons, then there is the problem of how to distinguish them. Augustine asks: “What have we got then? Is it agreed that we can call the Father the person of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, or the Son the person of the Father and of the Holy Spirit, or the Holy Spirit the person of the Father and of the Son? But that is not how we are in the habit of using person in any context; nor in the case of the trinity do we mean anything else when we say the person of the Father but the substance of the Father”116. From the Trinitarian point of view, "Father" per se/ in se signifies only Father in himself with reference to someone (In patris enim nomine ipse per se pater pronuntiatur, in dei ' vero et ipse et filius et spiritus sanctus quia trinitas unus deus). The person of the Father is only Father in himself with reference to the Son; the person of the Son is only Son in himself with reference to the Father. The same language applies to the Holy Spirit. The three divine persons are distinct in reality and can be distinguished as Father per se/ in se, Son per se/ in se and Holy Spirit per se/ in se. By way of contrast, the three divine persons are not three separate individuals in the manner Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are in the species man of the genus animal. The three persons of the divine triad are not three species of the same genus and, therefore, cannot be conceived generically. Unlike a genus with all its separate individuals and diversity, divine nature is unique and transcendent; all its attributes should be expressed in the singular which is proper for it. “So whatever God is called with reference to self is said three times over about each of the persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and at the same time is said in the singular and not the plural about the trinity”117. For the same reason, whatever is said with reference to the Father or the Son or the Holy Spirit is said properly (proprie) and absolutely, and not metaphorically 115 E. TcScllc, Augustine the Theologian, p. 298. 116 Trin., VII, 11: CC L, p. 262: "Q!iid ergo? Num placet dicamus patrcm personam esse filii et spiritus sancti, aut filium personam esse patris ct spiritus sancti, aut spiritum sanctum personam esse patris ct filii? Sed neque persona ita dici alicubi solet, nequc in hac trinitatc cum dicimus personam patris aliud dicimus quam substantiam patris." Translated by E. Hill, Trinity, p. 228. 173Trin., Y, 9: CC L, p. 215. 117 Trin., Y, 9: CC 1., p. 216: "Quidquid ergo ad se ipsum dicitur deus et de singulis personis ter dicitur patrt et filio et spiritu sancto, et simul de ipsa trinitate non pluraliter sed singulariter dicitur." Trinity, p. 195. Also S(C Trin., VIII, 1: CC 1., p. 268. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 51 (translate) or in simile (similitudinem)118. The three persons are necessarily identical with the divine nature; and so, they are coequal and coeternal. "And this three [Father, Son and Holy Spirit] is one only God, good, great, eternal, omnipotent; his own unity, godhead, greatness, goodness eternity, omnipotence”119. Further, the essential and substantial unity of the three divine persons, their coequality and coeternity made Augustine assert that the Father is always inseparably with the Son and the Son is always inseparably with the Father.l79 And by extension, the Holy Spirit is always inseparably with the Father and with the Son, and the Father and the Son are always inseparably with the Holy Spirit. The Trinitarian inseparability excludes the implication of divine expansion: “In God, therefore, when the equal Son cleaves to the equal Father, or the equal Holy Spirit to the Father and the Son, God is not made bigger than each of them singly, because there is no possibility of his perfection growing”120. Besides, the theory of the inseparability of Father, Son and Holy Spirit has implications for the doctrine of the profoundly intimate but unconfused Trinitarian interpenetration. Augustine explicates his doctrine of the interpenetration (inseparabiliter sibi cohaerere) of the three divine persons within themselves: “Understand, then, beloved brethren, that the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit are inseparably united in themselves; that this Trinity is one God; that all the works of the one God are works of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”121. He beautifully sums it up: "in the supreme triad one is as much as three are together and two are not more that one, and in themselves they are infinite. So 118 Trin., Y, 1 I: CC 1., p. 218. Also see W. G. T. Shedd, "Introduction," p. 6: The terms Father, Son and Holy Spirit "are literal, not metaphorical; because the relations denoted by them are etcmally in the essence. Scripture clearly teaches that the Father is such from eternity. Consequently, 'paternity' (implied in the name Father) can no more be ascribed to the first person of the Godhead in the figurative sense, than eternity can be. For a person that is a father must be so in relation to the son. No son, no father. Consequently, an etcmaJ Father implies an eternal Son. And the same reasoning holds true of the relation of the Father and Son to the Spirit. The terms Father, Son, and Spirit, in the baptismal formula and thc apostolic benediction, must designate primary and eternal distinctions." 119 Trin., Y, 12: CC 1., p. 220: "Et haec trinitas unus deus, solus, bonus, magnus, aeternus, omnipotens; ipse sibi unitas, deitas, magnitudo, bonitas, aeternitas, omnipotentia." Trinity, p. 197. Also see Trin., VII, 12: CC I, p. 265. 120 Trin., VI, 9: CC 1., p. 238: "In ipso igitur deo cum adhaeret aequali patri filius aequalis aut spiritus sanctw patri et filio aequalis, non fit major deus quam singuli eorum quia non est quo crescat ilia perfectio." Trinity; p. 211. 121 in Ioannis evangelium tractatus, xx. 13: CCXXXVI, p. 211: "Intellegite ergo, fratres carissimi, Patrem et Filium et Spiritum sanctum inseparabiliter sibi cohaerere, Trinitatem hanc unum Deum; et omnia opera unius Dei, haec esse Patris, haec esse Filii, haec esse Spiritus sancti." Translated by J. Gibb and J. Innes, Tractates on the GospeloEJohn, p. 137. The translation has been slightly altered and the emphasis supplied. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 52 they are each in each and all in each and each in all and all in all, and all are in one”122. Moreover, since they are inseparably united in themselves on account of their possession of the same divine essence, substance and being, it follows, then, that the persons of the Trinity have a single will which reveals itself in the triad's indivisible action outside God, i.e., Father, Son and Holy Spirit are inseparable in operatione ad extra. And if each divine person of the Trinity possesses the divine essence in a particular way it is possible to appropriate to each of them the external operations of the godhead according to their roles in salvation history. This is logically inferred from the narratives of Jesus' birth, baptism, passion and resurrection and the descent of the Holy Spirit, where the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are inseparably present, each playing his own role. Augustine found it necessary to express in clear terms the distinctness of the three divine persons, for there were people, namely, the patripassians, who got the doctrine of inseparability wrong by saying that "it was the Father himself who was born of a woman, the Father himself who suffered, the Father himself; in fact, who is the Son- they are two names, merely. In conclusion, Augustine's understanding of the person is that divine person is in relation. “[He] knows that a relation is nothing but a logical term predicable of that which is or possesses substance. He has simply pointed out that what differentiates the divine substance as it exists in the several Persons of the Trinity is a specific form of relation which in no way affects the 'substantial' equality of the Persons”123. Augustine's Doctrine of God in Se: The "Transcendent" Trinity Mutual Relations ad Intra Augustine's unprecedented emphasis on the unity within the godhead, the equality and the operation ad extra of the three persons could imply an objection to the distinction of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and consequently, modalism. To allay this suspicion, Augustine develops the theory of mutual relations within the godhead. E. TeSelle argues that Augustine's Christian source 122 Trin., VI, 12: CC L, p. 243: "in summa trinitate tantum est una quantum tres simul, nec plus aliquid sunt duae quam una, et in se infinita sunt. Ita et singula sunt in singulis et omnia in singulis et singula in omnibus et omnia in omnibus et t1num omnia." Trinity, pp. 213-214. The emphasis has been supplied. See also Trin., Ix, 8: CC L, p. 300. 123 J. Burnaby, “Introduction”, p. 22. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 53 for this theory was the Latin translation of the Oration of Gregory of Nazianzen124. There are two models of relations ad intra, namely, the relationship between the godhead and the three persons and the relationship among the three persons. First, there is the relationship between the divine substance (godhead) and the three divine persons. The Father is the unbegotten (ingenitus); this is said with reference to himself and not to another. The unbegotten is source of the divine substance. As a result, the Father relates to the godhead as its unbegotten source. The Son is the begotten; this refers to a begetter. The Father is beginning/origin in relation to the Son because he (the Father) generated/begot him (the Son) (pater ad /ilium principium est quia genuit eum). But what makes the Son equal to the Father is not what is said of him with reference to his begetter or Father. What makes him equal to the Father is what he is called with reference to himself; namely, his substance. The Son's substance is the same as the Father's (eadem est utriusque substantia). Thus, the Son's relationship with the godhead is that of participation and sharing in the fullness of its divinity. Similarly, what makes the Holy Spirit equal to the Father and the Son is what is said of the Spirit with reference to himself; and this is said substance-wise. In effect, the Holy Spirit has a substantial relationship with the godhead. The substance of the godhead is eternally and immanently possessed by the three divine persons in mutual relationship. Thus, the substantial relationship between the godhead and the divine triad has the inevitable corollary of "the Father is God and the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God, and no one denies that this is said substance- wise; and yet we say that this supreme triad is not three Gods but one God”125. Second, we have the relationship among the members of the divine Trinity. Following the theory of mutual relations, Augustine asserts that we can maintain the unity of the divine substance or essence without the destruction of the distinction of the three Persons. Thus, the Father is called Father because he truly has a Son. "It is clear, of course, that he is only called Father because he has a Son, since he is called Father not with ' reference to himself but with reference to the Son.126" The Father is distinguished from the Son because the Father begets the Son; the Son is distinguished from the Father because he is begotten of the Father; the Holy Spirit is distinguished from the Father and the Son because he is the gift common to the Father and the Son. The Father relates to the Son as 124 E. TcSelle, Augustine the Theologian, p. 295. 125 Trin., V, 9: CC L, p. 215: "deus est pater et filius deus est et spiritus sanctus deus est, quod secundum substantiam dici Demo dubitat, non tameD tres deos sed unum deum dicimus eam ipsam praestantissimam trinitatem." 126 Trin., VII, 1: CC L, p. 245: "dicitur pater (quod manifestum est eum non ad se ipsum sed ad filium relatiue dici et ideo patrem quia est ei filius)." Trinity, p. 218. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 54 Father; the Son relates to the Father as Son; and the Holy Spirit relates to the Father and the Son as the mutual charity between them. The Generation of the Son: Videre Patrem and Gignere Interior Verbum VIDERE PATREM Augustine employed the metaphor of seeing to explicate his insightful understanding of the Son's generation from the Father. The Son is the Son by seeing the Father. In a celebrated text, he writes: [A]nd the way in which the Son sees the Father is simply by being the Son. For him, being from the Father, that is being born of the Father, is not something different from seeing the Father; nor is seeing him working something different from his working equally; and the reason he does work of himself is that he does not (so to put it) be of himself; and the reason he does what he sees the Father doing is that he is from the Father. He does not do other things likewise, like a painter copying pictures he has seen painted by someone else; nor does he do the same things differently, like the body forming letters which the mind has thought; but Whatever the Father does, he says, the same the Son also does likewise ( 5: 19). "The same," he said; and also, "likewise"; thus showing that the working of the Father and of the Son is equal and indivisible, and yet the Son's working comes from the Father. That is why the Son cannot do anything of himself except what he sees the Father doing127. Being from the Father is being born of the Father. Being from the Father and being born of the Father are nothing but seeing the Father. Also, for the Son, to see the Father work is the same as seeing the Father. The working of the Father and the Son's seeing of the Father working happen without succession of a space- time continuum. The working of the Father and the seeing of the Father working 127 Trin., II, 3: CC L, pp. 83-84: "et ita uidet filius pattern ut quo eum uidet hoc ipso sit filius. Non enim aliud illi est esse de patre, id est nasci de patTe, quam uidere patrem, aut aliud uidere operantem quam pariter operari; sed ideo non a se quia non est a se, et ideo quod uiderit patTern quia de patTe est. Neque enim alia similiter, sicut pictor alias tabulas pingit quemadmodum alias ab alio pictas uidit; nec eadem dissimiliter, sicut corpus easdem litteras exprirnit quas animus cogitauit; sed: Quaecumque, inquit, pater facit, haec eadem et filius facit similiter. Et haec eadem dixit et similiter, ac per hoc inseparabilis et par operatio est patri et filio, sed a patre est filio. Ideo non palest filius a se facere quidquam nisi uiderit patTern facientem." Trinity, p. 99. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 55 are an inseparable eternal divine act. The Son's seeing of his Father working indicates the Son's eternal generation from his Father. To buttress his argument, Augustine begins In Ioannis Evangelium Tractatus, XXI, 4 by contrasting the way the Son sees the Father with the manner humans see objects. We humans turn to whom or what we wish to see; we are when we are seeing and not seeing; we are seekers when we turn to seek and to see; when we have turned well towards objects and have seen them, we become humans- seeing instead of the humans-not-seeing we were before. Our seeing is one thing and our being humans-seeing is quite another. In other words, our act of seeing is not ourselves. Our act of seeing is contingent upon our finitude. In the case of the Son of God, his own act of seeing and the Son-seeing (the Son's very self as he sees) are not two but the same thing. For: “[i]f you could see the Word's own act of seeing, by the very fact of seeing the Word's act of seeing you will possibly be seeing the Word itself: since the Word cannot be one thing and the Word's act of seeing another, because there cannot be anything there added on, or coupled, or doubled or compounded. It's something simple, you see, with an inexpressible simplicity”128. The implication of this original doctrine of Augustine for the understanding of the generation of the Son has been summarised as follows: "the Son, by seeing the Father, is the Son, for his being begotten by the Father consists in nothing else than seeing the Father."129 E. TeSelle further suggests that the Son "seeing the Father" is the same as the Son "hearing the Father." And both "seeing" and "hearing" are acts of inward self relatedness achieved through the introspection of the mind within itself. “Augustine first calls for introspection in order to observe that the human mind can "see" within itself: without the senses, and then suggests that the same kind of inward self-relatedness, the "seeing" and "hearing" mentioned in the passage from the Fourth Gospel (Jn 5:19-20), is what constitutes the Son: the Son is this seeing and hearing, his very being is his seeing and hearing of the Father”130. Thus, Augustine explains the generation of the Son as an act of the Father's mind. For this, the Son is the Father's intelligence. The 128 Serm., 126, 15: PL,38, col. 705: "Videre enim verbi si videas. forte in eo quod vides videre Verbi, ipsum Verbum videbis; ut non aliud sit Verbum, aliud videre Verbi, ne ibi sit aliquid coaugmentatum et copulatum et duplex et compaginatum. Simplex enim aliquid est ineffabili simplicitate" Sermons, 111/4, p. 278. 129 E. TeSellc, Augustine the Theologian, p. 298. 130 E. TeScllc, Augustine the Theologian, pp. 298-299. Dcspitc the Bishop of HipP90's orienality of the Son's procession, E. T eScllc is of the opinion that Augustinc drew upon Plotinus' doctrine of formation and actualization, see p. 299: "This is a Plotinian doctrine of a formation and actualization that takes place through knowledge, now purified of any suggestion that there is potentiality within God and therefore safely applicable to God for the first time. ... Plotinus (Enn. V, 1,7) wrote: 'Thc One is not Nous. How then does it beget Nous, except turning towards itself and seeing? This seeing is itselfNous.'" IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 56 origin of the Son from the Father is the Son seeing the Father (or the Son hearing the Father). Seeing the Father for the Son is his being begotten from the Father. It is also at once his continuing from the Father and his abiding and unchanging beginning in eternity. “So, therefore, the Father shows to the Son the thing which he does, so that the Son sees all things in the Father and the Son is all things in the Father. For by seeing he was born and by being born he sees. But not, at anytime, was he not born and later born, just as not at anytime, did he not see and later did see; but in that which for him is 'to see,' in the same way is for him 'to be,' in the same way is for him 'not to be changed,' and in the same way is for him 'to continue without beginning and without end”131. Finally, the Son's act of seeing the Father has implications for the Christian spiritual life. In the first place, the insight of the Bishop into the Son being the Son by seeing the Father had a great influence on his search for the Trinitarian image of God in the human mind 204 Second, in Senn., 126 (c. 417), Augustine urges his congregation to understand what seeing means for the Word by trying to see the Word's act of seeing:is Thus, on the basis of seeing, the Bishop wants his listeners to constantly seek the Word of God through the spiritual exercise of mental instropection. GIGNERE INTERIOR VERBUM In De Trinitate, Augustine not only uses the idea of seeing to explain the Son's generation but also explicates it by comparing it to the birth of the human word in the mind. In his search for the image of the Trinity in the human mind, Augustine describes how the mind gives birth to an inner word (interior verbum) in time when the mind itself cogitates on the things contained in its inner memory and how the generated word (also, the mind's inner understanding/knowledge) is joined to the mind by the mind's inner will, thereby making the mind to form a triad of memory, inner word and will. In the text that follows, Augustine suggests the birth of an offspring (proles), an inner word (interior verbum), a mental word (verbum mentis) in the mind. The reason why I wanted to introduce some sort of example of thought which could show how the attention is informed in recollection by the 131 In Ioannis evangelium tractatus, XXI, 4: CCXXXVI, p. 214: .Sic ergo demonstrat Pater rem quam facit Filio, ut in Patre uideat.omnia Filius, et in Patte sit omnia Filius. Videndo enim natus est, et nascendo uidet. Sed non aliquando non erat natus, et postea natus est, sicut non aliquando non uidit, et postea uidit; sed in eo quod est illi uidere, in eo est illi esse, in eo est illi non mutari, in eo est illi sine initio et sine fine persistere." Translated by J. W. Rettig, Tractates on the Gospel of John 11-27 in The Fathers of the Church, vol. 79: St. Augustine, (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1988), pp. 182-183. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 57 things contained in the memory, and how something is begotten where a man does his thinking that is like what was in him where he was only remembering before thinking, is that the distinction is easier to observe where something crops up in time and where parent precedes offspring by an interval of time. For if we refer to the inner memory of the mind with which it remembers itself and the inner understanding with which it understands itself and the inner will with which it loves itself, where these three are simultaneously together and always have been simultaneously together from the moment they began to be, whether they were being thought about or not, it will indeed seem that the image of that other trinity belongs only to the memory. But because there can be no word in it without thought-we think everything we say, including what we say with that inner word that is not part of any people's language is rather in these three that this image is to be recognized, namely memory, understanding, and will. And here I mean the understanding we understand with as we think, that is when things are brought up that were to hand in the memory but were not being thought about, and our thought is formed from them; and the will or love or esteem I mean is the one that joins this offspring to its parent and is in a certain measure common to them both132. The inner word (understanding) is begotten in the mind within an interval of time, when our attention is informed in the recollection of (recordantis) and cogitation (cogitatio) on the contents of the memory. Love (the mind's will), as the middle element, joins together this mental word and mind. It is possible for the mind to generate several offspring in time. Love (will) not only form a link between the mind and the inner word but also enables the memory to bring to the mind's consciousness a particular mental word that has been buried in the memory. However, this does not mean that the mind's will comes before the inner word in time. On the contrary, the inner word always precedes the will, for 132 Trin., XIV, 10: CC LA, pp. 434-435: "Propter hoc itaque uolui de cogitatione adhibere qualecumque documentum quo posset ostendi quomodo ex his quae memoria continentur recordantis acies informetur et tale aliquid gignatur ubi homo cogitat quale in ilia erat ubi ante cogitationem meminerat, quia facilius dinoscitur quod tempore accedit et ubi parens prolem spatia temporis antecedit. Nam si nos referamus ad interiorem mentis memoriam qua sui meminit et interiorem intellegentiam qua se intellegit et interiorem uoluntatem qua se diligit, ubi haec tria simul sunt et simul semper fuerunt ex quo esse coeperunt sine cogitarentur sine non cogitarentur, uidebitur quidem imago illius trinitatis et ad salam memoriam pertinere. Sed quia ibi uerbum esse sine cogitatione non potest (cogitamus enim omne quod dicimus etiam ilia interiore uerbo quod ad nullius gentis pertinet linguarn), in tribus pocius illis imago ista cognoscitur, memoria scilicet, intellegentia, uoluntate. "Hanc autem nunc dico intellegentiam qua intellegimus cogitantes, id est quando cis repertis quae memoriac praesto fuerunt sed non cogitabantur cogitatio nostra formatur, et earn uoluntatem sine amorem uel dilectionem quae istam prolem parentemque coniungit, et quodam modo utrisque communis est." Trinity, pp. 377-378. 207 IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 58 the memory cannot recall to the mind's awareness what was not already contained in it. The generation of an inner word may be compared with the Son's generation. Like the inner word, the Son is generated from the Father as a result of the Son's contemplation of the Father. Also, just as the will (love) joins the inner word to the memory (mind), so does the Holy Spirit join the Son to the Father and the Father to the Son. Our mental word which lights up within us becomes a sound outside if it is uttered by the mouth, God's Word became a human being by assuming flesh just as the Father perfectly expresses himself by eternally generating the Son, so does the mind express itself through the production of a word within itself. Additionally, Augustine's notion of the inner word (interior verbum) in De Trinitate XIV, 10 posits that the inner word is formless and transcendent; it is not informed in any human language. The inner word, therefore, becomes the image of the Son of God in the human mind. However, it is instructive to mention in passing the contrast between the mental word (verbum mentis) and the Word of God. One of the differences between God's Word and our inner word is that on the one hand the Father's Word, the Father's Son, is equal to the Father in all things, except with respect to origin, but on the other hand our inner word cannot be equal to our memory in all respects. Second, while the Father's knowledge is perfect, generating a Word that is perfect, divine and true, our knowledge is not perfect, producing a human word that could be true or false. Third, the human word is not born of God but made by him:l) Our word cannot be said to be being from being as the Word of God is said to be being from being133 Fourth, the Word of God is God's Son; it is not the product of God’s thinking, it is not God's thought, whereas our true word is formed through cogitation215 Finally the generation of the Son is in eternity, while the birth of the interior word happens in time. In spite of the theological weakness of the notion, Augustine's comparison of the Son's generation to the production of the inner word in the mind has a real spiritual significance and its relevance to Christian spiritual life becomes evident. In the first place, the function of the mental word is that it gives expression to our thoughts, producing our actions: “No body voluntarily does anything that he has not previously uttered as a word in his heart”134 The speaker's voice or bodily gestures only help him to express his inner word, thereby enabling him to communicate with his listeners: [18] Second, the inner word could be used for doing evil or for doing good (ad peccandum aut ad recte faciendum) The 133 Trin XV, 24: CC L , pp. 497-498. 134 Trin., Ix, 12 (ad"finem): CC L, p. 304: "Nemo enim aliquid uolens facit quod non in corde suo prius dixerit." Trinity, p. 278. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 59 Christian should desire and endeavour to conceive an inner word that is capable of doing good all the time. Finally, and far more importantly, if a mental word is conceived and born, and if it is joined to the mind that knows and loves itself with love, it indwells in love and love in it and, both the word and love reside in the lover and speaker of the word. “So when the mind knows and loves itself, its word is joined to it with love. And since it loves knowledge and knows love, the word is in the love and the love in the word and both in the lover and the utterer”135. For Augustine, when we utter a mental word that is joined to our mind with love, what is uttered indwells both our listeners and ourselves, thereby joining them and us together. The triad of the mind, its understanding/knowledge and will/love, succinctly formed by way of the nexus of love between the mind and mental word/mind's self-knowledge, leads to the trinity of the speaker, his spoken word and his listener. This insight into the triadic nature of speaker, his word and his audience is immediately relevant to the Christian teacher or preacher, who forms a trinity of himself: the word he teaches or proclaims and his congregation. The teacher indwells in his pupil and his pupil in him, thus, both teacher and pupil, in the mutuality of fellowship instruct each other. This mutual fellowship between teacher and learner produces in the master an affection (affectus) for his disciple. For Augustine, when the Christian teacher and the neophyte are linked in mind or heart, the boredom of repeating the same truths of the Christian faith to the neophyte is overcome by the teacher's affection for him. On account of sympathy, what the teacher teaches becomes new even to him every time he sets out to instruct the catechumen. Augustine writes as follows about the power of the teacher's sympathy for his student: “For so great is the power of affection, that when people are affected by us as we speak and we by them as they learn, we dwell each in the other and thus both they, as it were, speak in us what they hear, while we, after a fashion, learn in them what to teach”136. 135 Trin., Ix, 15 (ad finem): CC L, p. 307: "Cum itaque se mens nouit et arnat, iungitur ei amore uerbum eius. .. Et quoniarn arnat notitiam et nouit arnorem, et uerbum in arnore est et ardor in uerbo et utrumque in arnante atque dicente." Trinity, p. 279. 136 De Catechizandis rudibus, XII, 17: Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina, vol. XLVI, edited by I. B. Bauer (rurnholti: Typographi BrepoIs Editores Pontificii, 1969), p. 141: "Tantum enim ualet animi compatientis affectus, ut cum illi afficiuntur nobis loquentibus, et nos illis discentibus, habitemus in inuicem; atque ita et illi quae audiunt quasi loquantur in nobis, et nos in illis discamus quodam modo quae docemus." Translated by J. P. Christopher, The First Catechical Instruction in Ancient Christian Writers, vol. 2 (New York, N. Y./Ramsey, N. J.: Newman Press, 1946), p. 41. Henceforth, the Latin source of De Catechizandis rudibus will be cited as CC XLVI. The English text has been altered slightly. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 60 What Augustine says in this passage applies to the situation of Christian spiritual direction in which there exists a triad of spiritual director, his word of direction and spiritual son/daughter. The mutuality of fellowship between the spiritual director and his disciple produces in the director a sympathy for his disciple whom he leads by example along the ascending movement to the Trinity. The Procession of the Holy Spirit Eastern Fathers of the Church explained the origin of the Son within the godhead by generation from the Father that of the Holy Spirit by procession from Father through the Son. Yet, the distinction between the eternal, incorporeal and inexpressibly unchangeable generation of the Son and procession of the Holy Spirit remained far beyond the grasp and distinction of human understanding137. In his teaching, Augustine distinguishes the generation of the Son and the procession of the Spirit by asserting that the Holy Spirit is the inefable communion of Father and the Son (ineffabilis quaedam parris filiique communio) and, therefore, he is from the Father and the Son. Although the Father and the Son are described as holy and spirit, yet Scripture insists that in the Trinity only the Spirit of the Father and the Son is properly (proprie) called the Holy Spirit138. Augustine justifies why: “So the Holy Spirit is a kind of inexpressible communion or fellowship of the Father and the Son, perhaps he is given this name just because the same name can be applied to the Father and the Son. He is properly called what they are called in common, seeing that both Father and Son are holy and both Father and Son are spirit”139. The study of Y. Congar indicates that before Augustine the doctrine of the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son had been presented in various forms in the western Church by Tertullian, Hilary, Marius Victorinus, and Ambrose and that Bishop Augustine was conversant with them (228). Augustine himself wrote that prior to his writing there had been learned reflections on the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. These speculations were aimed at distinguishing the Spirit from the Father and the Son by a careful process of ensuring that, 137 Trin., XV, 48: CCLA, p. 529. 138 Trin., XV, 45: tc LA, p. 525. Also see Trin., V, 12: CC L, p. 219. zz'Trin., V, 12: CC L, p. 219-220: "Nam hoc ipse proprie dicitur quod illi communiter quia et pater spiritus a filius spiritus, et pater sanctus et filius sanctus. Vt ergo ex nomine quod utrique conuenit utriusque communio significer, uocatur donum amborum spiritus sanctus." Trinity, p. 197. 139 y, Congar, I Belicvr in the Holy Spirit, Vol. III, pp. SO, 85. Also see J. H. S. Burleigh, "The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit in the Latin Fathers," in The Scottish Joumal of Thrology 7 (1954), pp. 113-132; B. de Margene, An Introduction to the History of Exeesis, vol. III: Saint Augustine, pp. 116-118. However, we can still assert that Augustine's presentation of this doctrine was the most decisive in the life of the western Church. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 61 the Holy Spirit is not begotten of the Father like the Son, for Christ is unique. Nor was he begotten of the Son as if he were the grandson of the Father, Most High… [T]he Holy Spirit is the communion or deity, so to speak, of the Father and the Son, their OEOMS as the Greeks call it140. Also, the Holy Spirit is the gift of God (donum dei) the Father's gift of himself to the Son and likewise the Son's gift of himself to the Father. But the Holy Spirit is the gift of God to us "so that we may believe that God gives no gift inferior to himself. To summarise in brief the Holy Spirit is distinct from the Father and the Son; he is not the Son's son or the Father's grandson; his procession is unique; and he is the unity and communion of love between the Father and the Son and their mutual gift to each other and to us as God's love, God's gift, the Holy Spirit is a person. Augustinian scholars have emphasized the inseparable relationship that exists between Augustine's doctrine of the Spirit of the Father and of the Son and the theology of gift and love. The Bishop of Hippo articulated his doctrine of the procession of the Holy Spirit with the help of the metaphors of gift and love. We shall first offer in a summary form Augustine's teaching on the procession of the Spirit as God's gift. Then, we will give a detailed presentation of what he says about the Spirit's procession as love, employing the model of Holy Spirit as the communion of love between the Father and the Son. The Unity of the "Economic" and "Transcendent" Trinity in De Trinitate It has become quite clear from our investigations that for Augustine: from eternity, God is one essence, God is three-Father, Son and Holy Spirit. At the beginning of time, God is one essence; God is three-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The one God is the Creator: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are inseparable in their divine acts of creation, redemption and sanctification. The visible missions of the Son and the Holy Spirit in history were inseparably carried out by the three members of the divine triad. The substantial unity of the divine persons points to divine inseparability. The generation of the Son and the procession of the Holy Spirit indicate that there is inseparability of the three persons in the being of God. The metaphor of inseparability, as applied in De Trinitate, is an ontological and relational expression of the unity of "economic" and "transcendent" Trinity. The transcendent God revealed himself as a Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit in our history of salvation, Thus, the Father, the Son 140 De fide et symbolo, 19: Pr.40, col. 191: "Servant tamen ut non genitum Spiritum sanctum tanquam Filium de Patre praedicent; unicus enim est Christus: ncque de Filio tanquam nepotem summi Patris communionem Patris et Filii, atquc, ut ita dicam, dietatem, quam Graeci 8Elrym appellant, Spiritum sanctum. " Translated by J. H. S. Burleigh, Faith and the Creed in Augustine: Earlier Writings, p. 364. Also see E. P. Meijering, Augustine: De Fide et Symbolo (Amsterdam, J. C. Gieben, 1987), pp. 119- 123; F. Bourassa, "Communion du Pere et du Fils," in Gregorianum 48 (1967), pp. 657-705. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 62 and the Holy Spirit of the "ecomomic" Trinity are, mutatis mutandis, the eternal Father, the eternal Son and the eternal Holy Spirit of the "transcendent" Trinity. To use E. Hill's formula: "The economic Trinity is the transcendent Trinity revealed,"141 In the history of salvation, God has not only revealed his being as Trinity to us, but also is God for us. Further, since the publication of the studies of Theodore de Regnon; Augustinian Trinitarian doctrine has largely been seen by scholars as proceeding from the unity of divine nature to the distinction of the divine persons. The character of this theology, they assert, is rather different from that of the Cappadocians which not only argues the unity of the nature of God from the unity of divine activities, but also proceeds from the diversity of the divine persons. Consequently, Augustine's approach to the doctrine of the Trinity is considered a philosophical attempt to grasp the divine substance of the Trinitarian God. To cite C. M, LaCugna's understanding of Augustine's rendering of the doctrine of the Trinity: Augustine inaugurated an entirely new approach. His starting point was no longer the monarchy of the Father but the divine substance shared equally by the three persons. Instead of inquiring into the nature of theologia as it is revealed in the Incarnation of Christ and the deification by the Spirit, Augustine would inquire into the traces of the Trinity to be found in the soul of each human being142. By way of contrast, the Cappadocians' "central concern remained soteriological. They saw as their task to clarify how God's relationship to us in Christ and the Spirit in the economy of incarnation and deification reveals the essential unity and equality of Father, Son and Spirit."143 These categorizations of Augustine's and the Cappadocians' Trinitarian understanding of God have not done justice to the facts contained in the writings of the Doctors and, therefore, are a hindrance to a realistic appreciation of the saints' Trinitarian contributions. In reality, as this 141 E. Hill, "Karl Rahner's 'Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise De Trinitate and St Augustine'," p. 78. 142 C. M. LaCugna, God for Us, p. 44. Also see T. R. Martland, "A Study ofCappadocian and Augustinian Trinitarian Methodology," pp. 252-262. M. Barnes disagrees with C. M. LaCugna's estimation of the understanding of God the Trinity rather radically on the grounds that she, in her work, God for Us, uncritically embraces de Regnon's paradigm of the doctrine of the Trinity. He notes that she devdopes the paradigm successfully in order to critique the Augustinian Trinitarian component, but she seems "unaware that the paradigm is not embedded in the original texts." See M. R. Barnes, "De Regnon Reconsidered," p. 55. Also see E. Muller, "The Science ofThrology: A Review of Catherine LaCugna's God For Us," in Gregorianum 75/ 2 (1994), pp. 311-341; T. G. Weinandy, The Father's Spirit of Sons hip: Reconceiving the Trinity, pp. 123-136; D. Orsuto, "The Father's Spirit of Sons hip: A Significant Contribution-to Trinitarian Theology," p.153. 143 C. M. LaCugna, God for Us, p. 43. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 63 study has discovered, the vigilant reader of the doctrinal themes discussed in Augustine's De Trinitate will arrive at the conclusion that suggests a lack of sharp contrast between the Bishop of Hippo's theology and that of the Bishops of Cappadocia. And it should be added that Augustine's Trinitarian theology is not only a continuation of that of the great Cappadocians, but also that it is a true representative of the common faith of the ancient Church265 The text that follows is worth quoting in full, for it is one of the best remarks on the Trinitarian formulations of Augustine and the eastern theologians: Books I-IV are concerned with the interpretation of Scripture on the assumption of the equal Godhead of all three "Persons." When Scripture texts referring to Christ imply subordination of the Son to the Father, this is generally to be explained on the lines which Athanasius had laid down: the Son as incarnate has the "form of a servant" as well as the "form of God," and when Scripture speaks of him as inferior to the Father the reference is to his human nature only (Bk. I). Augustine allows, however, that in some cases the reference may be to the "form of God," inasmuch as the Son's Godhead is itself derived from the Father: here Augustine follows the lead of the Cappadocians. But Scripture tells us of "missions" of the Son and the Holy Spirit in temporal history. These signify visible manifestations of the second and third "Persons," and are not to be limited to incarnation and Pentecost, for the Word and the Spirit have been active in the world since its creation144. To conclude, Augustine's De Trinitate is a synthesis of theology and economy: "Both in his explicit theory of method and in its actual implementation, the systematics of Augustine emerge here as a perfect synthesis of faith and reason, of theology and the economy of salvation”145. The doctrine of the Trinity of the Doctor of Grace has far greater implications for the Christian spiritual life than the Trinitarian theology of Basil, Gregory of Nazianzen and Gregory of Nyssa. THE IMAGE OF THE TRINITY IN HUMANITY Augustine's De Trinitate not only discusses God as Trinity, but also offers us a doctrine of humanity. The question, for Augustine, becomes precisely this, who is this human person who is capable of God? This question is a .central one in 144 J. Burnaby, "Introduction," pp. 19-20. 145 p. Bourassa, "Theologie trinitrore de saint Augustin-II," in Grcgorianum 59 (1978), p. 410. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 64 spirituality. To develop Augustine's Trinitarian spirituality is to understanding exactly how his conception of God influenced his idea of the human person. Augustine says at the beginning of book VIII that he intends to seek God with the mind in a more inward manner (modo interiore) and, "[i]ndeed any and every bodily conception is to be so rejected" (ita enim respuitur omne corporeum)146 The mind must be intent upon, seeking God the Trinity whom Scripture has revealed as such. "And the right intent is the one that sets out from faith”147. Sacred Scripture has revealed that humanity was created in the image and likeness of God (Gn 1: 26-27). Augustine's exegesis of this passage from Genesis makes him conclude that it is humanity that was made to the image and likeness of the one true God the Trinity in contrast to the position of the Alexandrines that the only Son of God is the image (imaginem ... esse ilium) of the one God and that human beings at not the image of God but are made "according to the image" (hominem vero non imaginem sed ad imaginem)148. Also, in order to recognise the image of God, Augustine analyses various "trinities" with the help of his understanding of the Trinitarian God which be had acquired through the concept of the unity of substance, the theory of mutual relations in Trin., I-VII and the Plotinian doctrine of "the mind's conversion toward itself and its becoming formed through conceptualization in the verbum mentis."149 Today, scholars commonly assert that Trin., lX-XV is the speculative complement of the dogmatic section of Trin., I-VIV. We would not seek to argue against that. However, we wish to suggest that this unqualified theological assertion risks not only the doctrine of the unipersonality of God of anti-trinitarianism, but also the possible implication that God the Trinity be conceived according to the image of humanity. The supreme Trinity is three divine persons (summus trinitas tres personae sint) whereas, the human soul, the image of this Trinity, is one person (cum sit una persona haec imago trinitatis):1 "So the trinity as a thing in itself is quite different from the image of the trinity in another thing" (Aliud est itaque trinitas res ipsa, aIiud imago trinitatis in re alia).1Z In Trin., I, 1 Augustine has a strong admonition for his readers who try to ascribe to God the nature of the 146 Trin., VIII, 3: CC 1., p. 270. Trinity,p. 243. 147 Trin., Ix, 1: CC 1. p. 292: "Sed ca recta intentio est quae proficiscitur a fide." Trinity, p. 270. 148 Tria, VII, 12: CC 1., pp. 266-267. Also see Trin., XII, 7: CC 1.,p. 361; E. TeSeIIe, Augustine the pp. 300; H. Crouzcl, "L'image de Dieu dans la theologie d'Origene," in Studia Patristica 11/2 (1957), pp. 149 E. TeSelle, Augustine the Theologian, p. 300. Also see E. Gilson, The Christian PhilosophyofSailll Augustine, translated by 1.. E. M. Lynch (New York: Random House, 1960), p. 214. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 65 human soul!) A Trinitarian exercise that aims at investigating the inexpressible three divine persons at the level of human mind fails woefully. ____________ R. A. Markus has rightly remarked that "'The psychological trinitarianism' of the second In of his [Augustine's] treatise De Trinitate is a study not of the divine substance and mons, but of the human soul as an image of God."150 To reiterate, books VIII-XV of De linitate seek to discover in us what makes us an image of the Trinity, thereby enabling us I believe in, hope in and love the Trinity of Father, Son and the Holy Spirit. Augustine himself affirms that "What we are asking, though, is from what likeness or comparison of Thing known to us we are able to believe, so that we may love the as yet unknown God." It is clear, then, that the purpose of the latter books of De Trinitate, as for the former ones, is essentially attempt to make the Trinity relevant to the whole Christian spirituallife by way of a profoundly contemplative search for a trinity in the image of God? that is, a contemplation of the Trinity in what God himself has created; but of all his creatures "none more suitable than the one which is not called God's image for nothing" (nihil tamen est mmodatius quam id quod imago eius non trustra dicitux). To put it quite simply, VIII-XV is a spiritual pedagogical programme to lead humanity to discover and love the Trinity in the soul and community. The aim of this section, therefore, is not to provide a detailed presentation of the Augustine’s so-called psychological Trinitarian theory of the processions of the Son Instead, we will concentrate on what Augustine describes as the triune nature of the soul (that is, a soul possessing three things that are distinct but operate inseparably), Indicating in the process how the doctrine of image of God forms the theological basis for the soul’s Trinitarian spiritual life. We shall first discuss in summary form the types of trinities, in De Trinitate with a view to recognizing and locating the image of the Trinity in also indicating that both male and female are made to image of God. Finally, we will determine the originality of Augustine's understanding of humanity as image of the in De trinitate and its significance. 150 R.A. Markus, "Marius Victorinus and Augustine," p. 340. Also see J. M. Rist, Augustine, p. 145. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 66 Recognising the Image Within Traces of the Trinity God is Trinity and Augustine in De Trinitate describes the traces of God in divine attributes and in creation. On the one hand, Augustine discovers trinities in the special properties of God: eternity (aetemitas), truth (veritas) and happiness (beatitas); etenity (aeternitas), form (species) and use (usus); father (pater), image (imago) and gift (munus); and origin of things (summa origo), beauty (perfectissima pulchritudo) and delight (beatissima delectatio). On the other hand, since visible creatures are vestigia of their invisible Trinitarian origin, Augustine finds in all the things around us a trinity of unity (unitas), form (species) and order (ordo). Traces of the Trinity in Exterior Homo Augustine discovers some traces of the Trinity in the "outer-man" (exterior homo): the outer-man is endowed with sensation, and with it perceives bodies; and this sensation, as can be readily verified, is divided into five parts, seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching.25 With the help of our senses we come in contact with physical objects such as people, trees, light, etc. We are able to identify three terms in the things we see: object seen (corpus visibile), internal vision (visio), and attention of mind (animi intentio)151 In this triad, the object, the internal vision and the attention of the mind are distinct, and the object appears to generate the internal vision. The distinction of three terms and the fact that the object and internal vision have a quasi-unity suggest a trace of the Trinity. Next, as one advances into a deeper level of the mind of the outer-man, one discovers a trinity of memory, internal vision and volition or will. .. And so one gets a trinity, out of the memory and internal sight and the will which couples them together; and when these three are coagitated into unity the result is called cogitation or thought, from the very act of coagitation."152 Here too, there is a distinction of the elements of the triad; volition, the will (voluntas), links the memory (memoria) and internal vision (interna visio) to produce in them a quasi-unity. This second triad also suggests a trace of the Trinity. Although the two triads of the outer-man have quasi-unity and exhibit, through 151 Trin., XI, 2: CC L,pp. 334-335. 152 Trin., XI, 6: CC L,p. 340: "Atque ita fit iUa trinitas ex memoria et interna uisione et quae utrumquc copuk uoluntate, quae tria cum in unum coguntur ab ipso coactu cogitatio dicitur." Trinity, p. 308. Also see G. V~ "Pensee et discernment chez Augustin. Quelques reflexions sur Ie sens du terme 'cogitare,'" in RcchtrrM augustiniennes II (1962), pp. 59-80. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 67 the distinction of their terms, some mutual relationship, they cannot be the image of God for the following reasons: first, a comparison of the Trinity with the first triad shows that the Father is sufficient enough to generate the Son whereas the object seen is not sufficient to produce an internal vision; and second, likewise, we can compare the second triad with the Trinity: the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Father and the Son whereas the volition or will produces the internal vision153. Interior Homo: The Image of God Then God said, "Let us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness so God created man in his own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them (Gen 1: 26-27)154. We find traces, vestiges of the Trinity In creation, however, It is true that not everything in creation which is like God in some way or other is also to be called his image, but only that which he alone is higher than. That alone receives his direct imprint which has no other nature interposed between him and itself"155 Therefore, it is only in humanity that we discover the image of God; for our Scripture tells us that God created humanity in God's image. If the image of God is only proper to humanity, where in humanity do we locate it? In the inner-man, interior homo, where a person "is at his best, his highest and deepest. Augustine forcefully insists that the image of God in humanity is found in the highest part of humanity that is dedicated to the contemplation of truth156, namely, the human soul (anima), spirit (animus), mind (mens). Moreover, Augustine, in his characteristic step-by-step analysis of analogies, indicates to us the expression and location .the image of God in the human mind. He concentrates on three analogies: first, mind 'mens), knowledge (notitia) and love (amor); second, memory (memoria sui), understanding (intelligentia sui) and will (voluntas sui); third, memory of God (memoria Dei), understanding of God (intelligentia Dei), and love of God (amor Dei). These analogies share common characteristics: they are all distinctly found in the mind; and they have substantial or essential unity that reflects the unity of the Trinitarian God. Although the three trinities suggest that they are images of God, Augustine examines them to see if the three elements of each triad in the mind show that they are distinct and equal in their relationships. 153 E.Gilson, The Christian Philosophy of Saint Augustine, p. 216 154 Also see M. A. Tabet, "La expresi6n imago Dei (Gen 1, 26-27) en Ia reflexi6n agustiniana, " in Augustinus 38 pp. 467479. 155 Trin., XI, 8: CC 1., p. 344: "Non sane omne quod in creatum aIiquo modo simile est deo etiam eius imago CSt, sed ilia sola qua superior ipse solus est. Ea quippe de illo prorsus exprimitur inter quam et ipsum llaIecta natura est. Trinity, pp. 310-311. 156 De Gcnai ad litttram, III, 21: PI. 34, col. 293. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 68 Following Augustine in De Trinitate, IX, E. T eSelle is of the opinion that the search for the image of God leads Augustine to define the mind as nosse ("the mind's knowledge of itself through self presence"), its acts are: seeking (studere), thinking (cogitare) and conceiving (verbum gignere). In Trin., IX, 4, Augustine argues that the mind, knowledge and love are three distinct and equal terms which show a unity of three in one. Thus, the first triad (mind (mens), knowledge (notitia) and love (amor) seems to be an image of the Trinity, yet, it is not the image of the Trinity for two reasons: on the one hand, the triad is formed virtually by the mind whereas the Trinity of the divine persons is actualised perfectly.157 On the other hand, love and knowledge are the only two of the three terms of the triad that "signify relationships"158 whereas all the three persons of the Trinity have mutual relation. The second triad consists of the memory of self (memoria sui), understanding of self (intelligentia sui) and will of self (voluntas sui). De Trinitate, XIV, 10 indicates that Augustine has recognised in the inner memory with which the mind remembers itself: the inner understanding with which the mind understands itself: and the inner will with which the mind loves itself a quasi-image of the Trinity. These three always exist simultaneously together; they are not separated by the interval of time. And, as Augustine sums up in De Trinitate, XIV, 13, the image of the Trinity is certainly situated in the mind's act of conceiving a word and must be sought there: “And therefore when it [the mind) turns to itself in thought, a trinity is formed in which a word too can be perceived. It is formed of course out of the very act of though with the will joining the two together. It is here then more than anywhere that it should recognize the image we are looking for”159. The three acts of the mind, namely, remembering self (meminerit sui), understanding self (intellegit se) and loving itself (diligit se) exhibit unity of substance in the mind as well as show distinction in their relation. The three terms are within the mind and so this trinity is nearer to the image of God than the first. But again, the second trinity, in spite of its proximity to the image, cannot be the image of God in humanity. 157 E. Gilson, The Christian Philosophy of St. Augustine, p. 221. 158 E. HiU, The Mystery of the Trinity, p.126. 159 Trin., XN, 13 (ad fincm): CCLA, p. 441: "Ac per hoc quando ad se ipsam cogitatione conuertitur fit- in qua iam et uerbum possit inteUegi. Formatur quippe ex ipsa cogitatione, uoluntate utrurnque iungente magis agnoscenda est imago quam quaerimus." Trinity, p. 382. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 69 In a number of texts of De Trinitate, Augustine combines the first and the second triads (mind, knowledge, love and self-memory, self-knowledge, and self-will) and comes out with a mind that is self-possessed; for through its acts, it knows and loves itself: remembers and understands and wills itself. Yet, the image of the Trinity is not found in the seeking and thinking triad of a self-possessed mind. Augustine summarizes the results of his discussion on the image of God as follows: “In the ninth book the discussion reaches the image of God which is man as regards his mind, and a certain trinity is discovered in it, that is mind and the knowledge it knows itself with and the love it loves itself and its knowledge with; and these three are shown to be equal to each other and of one being. In the tenth book the same matter is treated more thoroughly and with more precision, and brought to the point of uncovering in the mind a clearer trinity, consisting in memory and understanding and will”160. But Augustine is not happy with this trinity of the mind as image of God; he modifies it and the result is a third triad (memory of God (memoria Dei), understanding of God (intelligentia Dei), and love of God (amor Dei), namely, the image of God: This trinity of the mind is not really the image of God because the mind remembers and understands and loves itself: but because it is also able to remember and understand and love him by whom it was made. And when it does this it becomes wise. If it does not do it, then even though it remembers and understands and loves itself it is foolish. Let it then remember its God to whose image it was made, and understand and love him. To put it in a word, let it worship the uncreated God, by whom it was created with a capacity for him and able to share in him. In this way it will be wise not with its own light but by sharing in that supreme light, and it will reign in happiness where it reigns eternal. For this is called man's wisdom in such a way that it is also God's161. 160 Trin XV, 5: CC LA, pp. 465-466: "In nono ad imaginem dei quod est homo secundum mentem peru en it I in ca quaedam trinitas inuenitur, id est mens et notitia qua se nouit et amor quo se notitiamque suam - tria aequalia inter se et unius ostenduntur esse essentiae. In decimo hoc idem diligentius subtiliusque at atque ad id perductum ut inueniretur in mente euidentior trinitas eius, in memoria scilicet et . Ituoluntate." Trinity, p. 398. 161 Trin., XN, 15: CC LA, pp. 442-443: "Haec igitur trinitatis mentis non propterea dei est imago quU" meminit mens et inteUegit ac diligit se, sed quia potest etiam meminisse et inteUegere et amare a quo facta cst cum facit sapiens ipsa fit. Si autem non facit, etiam cum sui meminit seque inteUegit ac diligit, stulta cst. M~ itaque dei sui ad cuius imagin= facta est eumque inteUegat at.que diligat Q\lod ut breuius dicam, colat dcum .. factum cuius ab eo capax facta est et cuius esse particeps potest; propter quod IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 70 Commenting on this text, E. Gilson writes: “If it [the mind] turns towards the God who made it and thereby becomes aware of its character as a divine image, then remembering itself: expressing itself in a word and loving itself will be the same as recalling God in the way He expresses Himself and loves Himself. By this a wisdom is born in man, a wisdom that is nothing less than I participation in God's Wisdom and that restores the bond between creature and Creator which was broken long ago”162. At last, then, Augustine concludes that the image of God (imago Dei) is the mind's capacity for participation in God the Trinity.50 The human mind is God's image only in its capacity to remember, understand and love God. Besides the mind's nature is incomprehensible. "He made also man after His own image and likeness, in the mind: for in that is the image of God. This is the reason why the mind cannot be comprehended even by itself: because in it is the image of God. God made us in his own image to enable us to understand him. Having empowered humanity to understand, God now teaches human beings how to contemplate the Trinity. "And since he [the human person) now has the capacity to understand, you [God] teach him to contemplate the Trinity in unity, the Unity that is Trinity."163 The image of God is fully realised in humanity through humanity's obedience to God the Trinity which translates into an uninterrupted contemplation of the Word of God. Can we conclude, then, that the Father is memory, the Son is understanding and the Holy Spirit is will? In Serm., 52 (c. 413-415) the Bishop hesitates to identify memory with the Father, understanding with the Son and will with the Holy Spirit. “I don't say memory is the Father, understanding is the Son, will is the Holy Spirit. I don't say it, however it may be understood, I don't dare to. Let's reserve these greater matters for those who can grasp them; for the weak, as one of them, I have done what I can. I haven't introduced these three things as though they were to be equated to that divine triad, as though they were to be marshaled into an analogy, that is to say”164. This issue is revisited in Epistola 169 (c. 415), where Augustine tells Bishop Evodius that “It must not, however, be scriptum est: Ecc( d6 cul/W E sapientia, et non sua luce sed summae iUius lucis participatione sapiens erit, atque ubi aetema, ibi bcata ~t." enim dicitur ista hominis sapientia ut etiam dei sit" Trinity, p. 383. Also see W. H. Principe, "The Dynamism of Augustine's Terms for Describing the Highest Trinitarian Image in the Human Person," in Studia Patristica(1982), pp. 1291- 1299. 162 E. Gilson, The Christian Philosophy of Saint Augustine, p. 223. 163 Conf, XIII, xx, 32: CCXXVII, p. 260: "ct doccs cum jam capaccm uidcrc trinitatcm unitatis ucl unitatcm trinitatis." Translatcd by M. Boulding, Th~ Confessions, p. 365. 164 Serm., 52, 23: PL.38, col. 364: "Non dico, Pater memoria cst, Filius intcllcctus cst, Spiritus voluntas cst: non dito, quomodo libct intclligatur, non audco. Scrvcmus majora capicntibus, infirmis infirmi quod possumus. Non dico isla illi Trinitati vcnut acquanda, quasi ad analogiam, id cst, ad rationcm quamdam comparationis dirigcnda: non hoc dico." Sermons, III/3, p. 62. Also scc Trin., XV, 28: CC LA, pp. 502-503. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 71 supposed, from our using this comparison between these faculties (memory, understanding and will) and the Trinity, that the things compared agree in every particular, for where, in any process of reasoning, can we find an illustration in which the correspondence between the things compared is so exact that it admits of application in every point to that which it is intended to illustrate”165. Augustine shows in the last book of De Trinitate that although there are many dissimilarities between the divine Trinity and the image of God,56 the mind's acts of memory, understanding and will have some sort of likeness to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit respectively. Thus, for example, the will of God like charity fits the person of the Holy Spirit more than the other persons of the Trinity. But if any person in the trinity is to be distinctively called the will of God, this name like charity fits the Holy Spirit more than the others. What else after all is charity but the will. However, even here there must be a caveat: Augustine's argument in Trin., XV, 28 is that the Father remembers, understands and loves, the Son remembers, understands and loves, and the Holy Spirit remembers, understands and loves; so, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit cannot just be taken as memory, understanding and loving. In any case, God is the original and humanity, like in a mirror, sees itself darkly as the image of God. "We do indeed recognise in ourselves an image of God, which is of the Supreme Trinity. It is not an adequate image, but a very distant parallel. It is not co-etemal and, in brief; it is not of the same substance as God.,, 6O Thus, if the soul's memory, understanding and will cannot be strictly compared, then, it is rather far from the point to argue that Augustine's investigation of the mental triad is an attempt to psychologically speculate on the transcendent Trinity that has been revealed in the economy of salvation. It is clear that he explores the soul in order to demonstrate that the soul in its acts of memory, understanding and will is an image of God the Trinity. To sum up, after a detailed examination of a variety of trinities with the help of the doctrine of unity of essence and the theory of distinction expressed through mutual relation, Augustine recognises the image of God in the essence and the distinct activities of the mind. Augustine's insight into the imago Dei has its basis in humanity's capacity for participation in God (capax Dei). He concludes that 165 Epistola, 169,6: PL.33, cols. 744-745: "Ncc ideo putanda sunt haec tria Trinitati sic comparata, ut omni cx ee conveniant: cui cnim similitudini in disputando convcnicntia tanta conccditur, ut ei rei cui adhibcnda cst, cx omni parte coaptctur? Vel quando cx crcatura ad Crcatorcm aliquid simile assumitur?" IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 72 the image of God the Trinity in humanity is humanity's capacity to participate in God. Being imago Dei means being able to go beyond ourselves. "Our own remembering, knowing and loving point us beyond ourselves to God.”166 However, we must not dare say that the Father is memory, the Son is understanding and the Holy Spirit is will. Humanity cannot fix its gaze into the light, God the Trinity, because the image of God in humanity is blurred by the wickedness (iniquitas) and the weakness (infirmitas) of the mind. The "... mind of man, the natural seat of his reason and understanding, is itself weakened by long-standing faults which darken it”167. The image of God becomes fully formed only through humanity's faithful obedience to God expressed in continuous contemplation of the Word. Having established in this subsection Augustine's understanding of humanity as image of God, it is worthwhile to examine in the next subsection the question of the possession of the image of the Trinity by the male and female human beings. Faced with the idea the image of God in us is the human family, namely, the union of male, female and their child, Augustine argues that the image of God in humanity subsists not in such a triad but in every individual human person, male or female. Imago Dei: Male and Female To begin with, Augustine repudiates with emphasis the theory that the trinity of the image of God is composed of the union of male, female and their offspring. According to this notion, man is the person of the Father; what proceeds from the man, the offspring, is the person of the Son; and, finally, the woman, who proceeds from the man in such a way that she is neither son nor daughter and, who, by her conceiving the offspring the man produced, is the person of the Holy Spirit. The conception of the Holy Spirit in this way seems to be supported by Jn15: 26: although the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, he is not a son. Augustine rejects this theory because, first, it makes one think of the Holy Spirit as the mother of the Son and the wife of the Father, thereby introducing impure thoughts into the doctrine of the trinity of the image of God. Also, creatures are made according to the likeness of their creator, not vice versa. Moreover, the fact that wisdom is called "bride" in Wis 8: 2 and that it is represented in many 166 J. M. Rist, Augustine, p. 90. 167 DCD., Xl, 2: CC XLVIII, p. 322: "... ipsa mens, cui ratio et intellegentia naturaliter incst, uitiis qun.- tenebrosis et ueteribus inualida est, " Translated by H. Bettenson, City of God, p. 430. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 73 languages by words of the feminine gender does not mean that its sex is female. Another reason for rejecting the idea of God the Holy Spirit as wife of God the Father and mother of God the Son is that it is against Gen 1: 26-27. Augustine argues: "Our," being plural in number, could not be right in this place if man were made to the image of one person, whether of the Father, or the Son or the Holy Spirit; but because in fact he was made in the image of the trinity, it is said to our image,. And then in case we should suppose that we have to believe in three gods in the trinity, while this same trinity is in fact one God, it goes on to say, And God made man to the image of God, which amounts to saying "to his image."168 In addition to his refusal to accept the union of the male, female and their offspring as the image of the Trinity, Augustine rejects the view that the image is realised in a human father, mother and son. Again, Augustine bases his argument on Gen 1: 27: "God made man to the image of God." Granted, the man of the text was alone before his wife and son were made; Augustine asks if that man was not made to the image of God until his wife and son were made. If Scripture says he was indeed made to the image of God before his wife and son came to be, does it mean, then, that his wife was in her husband's side and his son in his father's loins? In conclusion, the image of the supreme Trinity in humanity should be understood neither in terms of the union of male, female and their offspring nor in three human beings, namely, father, mother and son. As for the completion of the image in male and female, the assertion of Paul in 1 Cor 11: 7 presents a difficulty, for it apparently leaves the woman out of the image of the Trinity. For Augustine, male and female have a common human nature. Human nature possesses the rational substance of mind. Just as male and female are two in one flesh; both may be said to be "two in one mind" (Duo in mente una)169. For Augustine, male and female are made to the image of God. The imago Dei is identified with human nature which is realised in both man and woman. “But we must see how what the apostle says about the man and not the woman being the image of God avoids contradicting what is written in Genesis: God made man to the image of God; he made him male and female; he made them and blessed them (Gn .. 1: 27). It says that what was made to the image of God is 168 Trin., XII, 6: CC L,p. 360: "Nostmm certe quia pluralis est numerus non recte diceretur si homo ad unius personae imaginem fieret siue patris siue filii siue spiritus sancti, sed quia fiebat ad imaginem trinitatis propterca dictum est, ad imaginem nostram. Rursus autem ne in trinitate credendos arbitraremur tres deos cum sit eadem trinitas unus deus: Et fecit, inquit, deus hominem ad imaginem dei, pro eo ac si diceret, ad imaginem suam." Trinity, p. 325. 169 Trin., XII, 3: CC L, p. 358. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 74 the human nature that is realised in each sex, and it does not exclude the female from the image of God that is meant”170. Augustine does not exclude the female from being made in the image of God. The Bishop interprets Paul's "the man and not the woman being the image of God" as "a symbolism of something more mysterious in the obvious distinction of sex between male and female ... and if this does not refer to some hidden sacramental or symbolic meaning, it will remain quite pointless."171 Besides argues Augustine, The point of staging this discusion [1 Cor 11: 7] has simply been to help us understand why the apostle [Paul] attributes the image of God to the man only and not to the woman as well, and that he wanted to use the distinction of sex between two human beings to signify something that must be looked for in every single human being172. The imago Dei transcends the sex of man and woman.74 A woman may differ from a man on account of the sex of her body, but she is "being renewed to the image of God where there is no sex" (renouatur ad imaginem dei ubi sexus nullus est)173. A man's mind "does not remain the image of God except in the part which adheres to the eternal ideas to contemplate or consult them: and it is clear that females have this as well as males. So in their minds a common nature is to be acknowledged; but in their bodies the distribution of the one mind is symbolised."174 Finally, it is essential to note that since human beings exist and relate as male or female, Augustine's all-inclusive understanding of humanity (male/female) as image of God neither weakens nor destroys the fundamental sexual distinction that obtains between men and women. 170 Trin., XII, 10: CC L,p. 364: "Sed uidendum est quomodo non sit contrarium quod dicit apostolus non mulierem sed uirum cssc imaginem dci huic quod scriptum cst in genesi: Fecit dcus homincm ad imagincm dci; fccit cum masculum ct Jeminam; fecit cos ct bcncdixit coso Ad imagincm quippc dci naturam ipsam humanam lactarn dicit quae sexu utroque completur, nec ab intellegenda imaginc dei separat fcminam." Trinity, p. 327. 171 Trin., XII, 11: CC L,pp. 365-366: "... manifesto sexu masculi ct fcminac ... occultioris cuiusdam reifigurassc mysterium ... quod nisi ad aliquod secrctum sacramenti rcferatur inanc remanebit." Trinity, p. 328. 172 Trin., XII, 19: CC L,p. 373: "ad hoc tantummodo audicnda cst ut intcllcgatur apostolus imagincm dei uiro tantum tribucndo non ctiam fcminac, quamuis in diuerso scxu duorum hominum aliquid tamcn significare uoluissci quod in uno hominc quacrcretur." Trinity, pp. 332-333. 173 Trin., XII, 12: CC L, p. 367. Trinity, p. 329. 174 Trin., XII, 12-13: CC L,p. 367: "non maneat imago dei nisi ex qua parte mens hominis aetemis rationibus conspiciendis uel consulendis adhaerescit, quam non solum masculos sed ctiam feminas habere manifestum est. Ergo in eorum mentibus communis natura cognoscitur; in corum uero corporibus ipsius unius mentis distributio figuratur." Trinity, p. 329. Although M. Daly has a right to express her opinion, this text with others previous to it certainly fails to support her sweeping statement that Augustine was a misogynist "who opined that women are not made to the image of God." See M. Daly, Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women's Liberation (Wndon: The Women's Press, 1J95), p. 3. IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities. Vol. 1 No 2, September 2015. ISSN 2488-9210(Online) ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) (A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 75 Conclusion In this chapter we sought to understand Augustine's conception of humanity. We discovered that he conceived humanity as image of God or image of the Trinity. If humanity is image of trinity, then humanity should have a unique relationship with the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. De Trinitate makes the Trinitarian relevant to Christian spirituality; for Augustine insists that the trinity is reflected. in the human soul, the image of God. As image of God, we are so close to the Trinity that in the order of nature it is so arranged that there is nothing above us except God himself (sic enim ordinata est naturam ordine non locatum ut supra illam non sit nisi jile)175. Here, however, the originality of the African Father does not consist so much in his teaching that the soul is image of the Trinity (imago Trinitatis) as in his association of God's will with the person of the Holy Spirit, thus suggesting an intimacy between God's will (Holy Spirit) and the soul's will. And relying on the "analogy of the Tri-personal unity of God,"176 Augustine recognizes the image of God in the mind's acts of remembering God, understanding God and loving God. Augustine not only rejects the notion of the family of husband, wife and child as the image of God, but also strongly affirms that both male and female human beings are the image of the trinity, if and only if, they constantly remember, understand and love the Trinity. He defends the equality of the male and the female before the Trinity, thereby making the image of the trinity in us the basis for living a Christian life that is personal and radical. Although there can be and should be particular and diverse types of Christian spiritualities, yet the centre of every spirituality is the image of God in relationship with the Trinity. Finally, Augustine’s doctrine on and the soul not only positive consequence for Christian spiritual life today, but also offers us an authentic Christian way of communion with the trinity in church and society. Perhaps, we should ask the question: what is the nature of the journey which humanity can be united with God? Augustine’s insights on De Trinitate, such as the incomprehensibility and immanence of the Trinitarian God, humanity as imago Dei the roles of Christ and holy spirit in the reformation of the image of God will go a long way in helping us in our search for God the Trinity. 175 Trin., XIV, 20: CC LA, p. 448. 176 IJR. Crouse, "In Multa Defluximus: Confessions x, 29-43, and St. Augustine's Theory of Pt'rsona}ity," p. 182.