A Treatise of Novatian Concerning the Trinity.

 A Treatise of Novatian Concerning the Trinity.

 The Rule of truth requires that we should first of all things believe on God the Father and Lord Omnipotent that is, the absolutely perfect Founder o

 And over all these things He Himself, containing all things, having nothing vacant beyond Himself, has left room for no superior God, such as some peo

 Him, then, we acknowledge and know to be God, the Creator of all things—Lord on account of His power, Parent on account of His discipline—Him, I say,

 Him alone the Lord rightly declares good, of whose goodness the whole world is witness which world He would not have ordained if He had not been good

 Moreover, if we read of His wrath, and consider certain descriptions of His indignation, and learn that hatred is asserted of Him, yet we are not to u

 And although the heavenly Scripture often turns the divine appearance into a human form,—as when it says, “The eyes of the Lord are over the righteous

 But when the Lord says that God is a Spirit, I think that Christ spoke thus of the Father, as wishing that something still more should be understood t

 This God, then, setting aside the fables and figments of heretics, the Church knows and worships, to whom the universal and entire nature of things as

 The same rule of truth teaches us to believe, after the Father, also on the Son of God, Christ Jesus, the Lord our God, but the Son of God—of that God

 But of this I remind you , that Christ was not to be expected in the Gospel in any other wise than as He was promised before by the Creator, in the Sc

 Chapter XI.—And Indeed that Christ Was Not Only Man, But God Also That Even as He Was the Son of Man, So Also He Was the Son of God.

 Why, then, should we hesitate to say what Scripture does not shrink from declaring? Why shall the truth of faith hesitate in that wherein the authorit

 And thus also John, describing the nativity of Christ, says: “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, the glory as of the o

 And yet the heretic still shrinks from urging that Christ is God, whom he perceives to be proved God by so many words as well as facts. If Christ is o

 If Christ is only man, how is it that He says, “Though I bear record of myself, yet my record is true:  because I know whence I came, and whither I go

 If Christ was only man, how is it that He Himself says, “And every one that believeth in me shall not die for evermore?” And yet he who believes in ma

 What if Moses pursues this same rule of truth, and delivers to us in the beginning of his sacred writings, this principle by which we may learn that a

 Behold, the same Moses tells us in another place that “God was seen of Abraham.” And yet the same Moses hears from God, that “no man can see God and l

 What if in another place also we read in like manner that God was described as an angel? For when, to his wives Leah and Rachel, Jacob complained of t

 But if some heretic, obstinately struggling against the truth, should persist in all these instances either in understanding that Christ was properly

 And indeed I could set forth the treatment of this subject by all heavenly Scriptures, and set in motion, so to speak, a perfect forest of texts conce

 But why, although we appear to hasten to another branch of the argument, should we pass over that passage in the apostle: “Who, although He was in the

 In this place I may be permitted also to collect arguments from the side of other heretics. It is a substantial kind of proof which is gathered even f

 But the material of that heretical error has arisen, as I judge, from this, that they think that there is no distinction between the Son of God and th

 Therefore, say they, if Christ is not man only, but God also—and Scripture tells us that He died for us, and was raised again—then Scripture teaches u

 But from this occasion of Christ being proved from the sacred authority of the divine writings not man only, but God also, other heretics, breaking fo

 But since they frequently urge upon us the passage where it is said, “I and the Father are one,” in this also we shall overcome them with equal facili

 Hereto also I will add that view wherein the heretic, while he rejoices as if at the loss of some power of seeing special truth and light, acknowledge

 Moreover, the order of reason, and the authority of the faith in the disposition of the words and in the Scriptures of the Lord, admonish us after the

 And now, indeed, concerning the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, let it be sufficient to have briefly said thus much, and to have laid down t

 Thus God the Father, the Founder and Creator of all things, who only knows no beginning, invisible, infinite, immortal, eternal, is one God to whose

Chapter XXVII.213    According to Pamelius, ch. xxii.  Argument.—He Skilfully Replies to a Passage Which the Heretics Employed in Defence of Their Own Opinion.

But since they frequently urge upon us the passage where it is said, “I and the Father are one,”214    John x. 30; scil. “unum,” Gr. ἕν. in this also we shall overcome them with equal facility. For if, as the heretics think, Christ were the Father, He ought to have said, “I and the Father are one.”215    Original, “unas.” Scil. person. But when He says I, and afterwards introduces the Father by saying, “I and the Father,” He severs and distinguishes the peculiarity of His, that is, the Son’s person, from the paternal authority, not only in respect of the sound of the name, but moreover in respect of the order of the distribution of power, since He might have said, “I the Father,” if He had had it in mind that He Himself was the Father. And since He said “one” thing, let the heretics understand that He did not say “one” person. For one placed in the neuter, intimates the social concord, not the personal unity. He is said to be one neuter, not one masculine, because the expression is not referred to the number, but it is declared with reference to the association of another. Finally, He adds, and says, “We are,” not “I am,” so as to show, by the fact of His saying “I and the Father are,” that they are two persons. Moreover, that He says one,216    Neuter. has reference to the agreement, and to the identity of judgment, and to the loving association itself, as reasonably the Father and Son are one in agreement, in love, and in affection; and because He is of the Father, whatsoever He is, He is the Son; the distinction however remaining, that He is not the Father who is the Son, because He is not the Son who is the Father. For He would not have added “We are,” if He had had it in mind that He, the only and sole Father, had become the Son. In fine, the Apostle Paul also apprehended this agreement of unity, with the distinction of persons notwithstanding: for in writing to the Corinthians he said, “I have planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. Therefore neither is he that planteth anything, nor he that watereth, but God who gives the increase.  Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one.”217    1 Cor. iii. 6, 7, 8 ( scil. ἕν). And who does not perceive that Apollos is one person and Paul another, and that Apollos and Paul are not one and the same person? Moreover, also, the offices mentioned of each one of them are different; for one is he who plants, and another he who waters. The Apostle Paul, however, put forward these two not as being one person, but as being “one;” so that although Apollos indeed is one, and Paul another, so far as respects the distinction of persons, yet as far as respects their agreement both are “one.” For when two persons have one judgment, one truth, one faith, one and the same religion, one fear of God also, they are one even although they are two persons: they are the same, in that they have the same mind. Since those whom the consideration of person divides from one another, these same again are brought together as one by the consideration of religion. And although they are not actually the self-same people, yet in feeling the same, they are the same; and although they are two, are still one, as having an association in faith, even although they bear diversity in persons. Besides, when at these words of the Lord the Jewish ignorance had been aroused, so that hastily they ran to take up stones, and said, “For a good work we stone thee not, but for blasphemy; and because thou, being a man, makest thyself God,”218    John x. 33. the Lord established the distinction, in giving them the principle on which He had either said that He was God, or wished it to be understood, and says, “Say ye of Him, whom the Father sanctified, and sent into this world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?”219    John x. 36. Even here also He said that He had the Father. He is therefore the Son, not the Father:  for He would have confessed that He was the Father had He considered Himself to be the Father; and He declares that He was sanctified by His Father. In receiving, then, sanctification from the Father, He is inferior to the Father. Now, consequently, He who is inferior to the Father, is not the Father, but the Son; for had He been the Father, He would have given, and not received, sanctification.  Now, however, by declaring that He has received sanctification from the Father, by the very fact of proving Himself to be less than the Father, by receiving from Him sanctification, He has shown that He is the Son, and not the Father. Besides, He says that He is sent: so that by that obedience wherewith the Lord Christ came, being sent, He might be proved to be not the Father, but the Son, who assuredly would have sent had He been the Father; but being sent, He was not the Father, lest the Father should be proved, in being sent, to be subjected to another God. And still after this He added what might dissolve all ambiguity, and quench all the controversy of error: for He says, in the last portion of His discourse, “Ye say, Thou blasphemest, because I said I am the Son of God.” Therefore if He plainly testifies that He is the Son of God, and not the Father, it is an instance of great temerity and excessive madness to stir up a controversy of divinity and religion, contrary to the testimony of the Lord Christ Himself, and to say that Christ Jesus is the Father, when it is observed that He has proved Himself to be, not the Father, but the Son.

CAPUT XXVII. al. XXII. Pulchre respondet ad illud: Ego et Pater unum sumus, quod illi pro se intendebant.

Sed quia frequenter intendunt illum nobis locum quo dictum sit: Ego et Pater unum sumus (Joan. X, 30); et in hoc illos aeque facile vincemus. Si enim erat, ut haeretici putant, Pater Christus, oportuit dicere : 0938BEgo et Pater unus sum (Joan. X, 30). At cum Ego dicit, deinde Patrem infert, dicendo, Ego et Pater, proprietatem personae suae, id est Filii, a paterna auctoritate discernit atque distinguit, non tantummodo de sono nominis, sed etiam de ordine dispositae potestatis; qui potuisset dicere: Ego Pater, si Patrem se esse meminisset. Et quia dixit unum, intelligant haeretici quia non dixit unus. Unum enim neutraliter positum societatis concordiam, non unitatem personae, sonat. Unum enim non unus esse dicitur, quoniam nec ad numerum refertur, sed ad societatem alterius expromitur . Denique adjicit dicens, sumus, non sum; ut ostenderet per hoc quod dixit, sumus , et Pater, duas esse personas. Unum autem quod ait, ad concordiam et eamdem sententiam et ad ipsam charitatis 0938C societatem pertinet ; ut merito unum sit Pater et Filius, per concordiam, et per amorem, et per dilectionem. Et quoniam ex Patre est; quidquid illud est , Filius est: manente tamen distinctione, ut non sit Pater ille qui Filius; quia nec Filius ille qui Pater est. Nec enim, sumus, addidisset, si unum se et solitarium Patrem, Filium factum esse meminisset. Denique novit hanc concordiae unitatem et Apostolus Paulus, cum personarum tamen distinctione. Nam cum ad Corinthios scriberet: Ego, inquit, 0939Aplantavi, Apollo rigavit; sed Deus incrementum dedit. Itaque neque qui plantat est quidquam, neque qui rigat: sed qui incrementum dat Deus. Qui autem plantat, et qui rigat unum sunt (I Cor. III, 6, 7, 8). Quis autem non intelligat alterum esse Apollo, alterum Paulum, non eumdem atque ipsum Apollo pariter et Paulum? Denique et diversa uniuscujusque sunt officia prolata: alter enim qui plantat, et alter qui rigat; hos tamen duos, non quod unus sit, sed quod unum sint proposuit Apostolus Paulus; ut alter quidem sit Apollo, alter vero Paulus, quantum ad personarum distinctionem pertinet (quantum vero ad concordiam pertinet); unum ambo sint. Nam quando duorum una sententia est, veritas una est, fides una est, una atque eadem religio est, unus etiam Dei timor est, unum sunt, etiam si duo sint; ipsum sunt, dum 0939B ipsum sapiunt. Etenim quos personae ratio invicem dividit, eosdem rursus invicem religionis ratio conducit. Et quamvis idem atque ipsi non sint; dum idem sentiunt, ipsum sunt ; et cum duo sint, unum sunt, habentes in fide societatem, etiam si gerant in personis diversitatem. Denique cum ad has voces Domini imperitia fuisset Judaica commota, et temere ad usque saxa succensa, ita ut discurrerent, et dicerent: Non te lapidamus propter bonum opus, sed propter blasphemiam, et quia tu cum homo sis, facis te Deum (Joan. X, 33); distinctionem posuit Dominus in ratione reddenda, quomodo se Deum aut dixisset aut intelligi vellet. Quem Pater sanctificavit, inquit, et misit in hunc mundum, vos dicitis quia blasphemas, quia dixi, Filius Dei sum? (Ibid. v. 36.) Etiam heic 0939C Patrem habere se dixit. Filius est ergo, non Pater; Patrem enim confessus se fuisset, si Patrem se esse meminisset: et sanctificatum se a suo Patre esse proponit. Dum ergo accipit sanctificationem a Patre, minor Patre est: minor autem Patre consequenter est , sed Filius. Pater enim si fuisset, sanctificationem dedisset, non accepisset. Et nunc autem profitendo se accepisse sanctificationem a Patre; hoc ipso , quo Patre se minorem accipiendo ab ipso sanctificationem probat, Filium se esse, non Patrem monstravit. Missum praeterea se esse dicit, ut per hanc obedientiam qua venit Dominus Christus, missus, non Pater, sed Filius probetur; qui misisset utique, si Pater fuisset: missus autem non fuit Pater, ne Pater subditus alteri Deo, dum mittitur, probaretur. 0940A Et tamen post haec adjicit, quod omnem omnino ambiguitatem dissolveret, et totam controversiam erroris extingueret. Ait enim in ultima parte sermonis: Vos dicitis quia blasphemas, quia dixi, Filius Dei sum. Ergo si evidenter Filium Dominus se, non Patrem esse testatur, magnae temeritatis et ingentis est furoris exemplum, contra ipsius Christi Domini testimonium controversiam divinitatis et religionis agitare, et Christum Jesum Patrem esse dicere, cum animadvertat illum non Patrem se, sed Filium comprobasse.