Augustine of Hippo, On the Trinity

25. But now of the clouds, and voices, and lightnings, and the trumpet, and the smoke on Mount Sinai, when it was said, “And Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire, and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace; and all the people that was in the camp trembled; and when the voice of the trumpet sounded long and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice.”290 Ex. xix. 18, 19 And a little after, when the Law had been given in the ten commandments, it follows in the text, “And all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking.” And a little after, “And [when the people saw it,] they removed and stood afar off, and Moses drew near unto the thick darkness291 Nebulam where God was, and the Lord said unto Moses,”292 Ex. xx. 18, 21 etc. What shall I say about this, save that no one can be so insane as to believe the smoke, and the fire, and the cloud, and the darkness, and whatever there was of the kind, to be the substance of the word and wisdom of God which is Christ, or of the Holy Spirit? For not even the Arians ever dared to say that they were the substance of God the Father. All these things, then, were wrought through the creature serving the Creator, and were presented in a suitable economy (dispensatio) to human senses; unless, perhaps, because it is said, “And Moses drew near to the cloud where God was,” carnal thoughts must needs suppose that the cloud was indeed seen by the people, but that within the cloud Moses with the eyes of the flesh saw the Son of God, whom doting heretics will have to be seen in His own substance. Forsooth, Moses may have seen Him with the eyes of the flesh, if not only the wisdom of God which is Christ, but even that of any man you please and howsoever wise, can be seen with the eyes of the flesh; or if, because it is written of the elders of Israel, that “they saw the place where the God of Israel had stood,” and that “there was under His feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his clearness,”293 Ex. xxiv. 10 therefore we are to believe that the word and wisdom of God in His own substance stood within the space of an earthly place, who indeed “reacheth firmly from end to end, and sweetly ordereth all things;”294 Wisd. viii. 1 and that the Word of God, by whom all things were made,295 John i. 3 is in such wise changeable, as now to contract, now to expand Himself; (may the Lord cleanse the hearts of His faithful ones from such thoughts!) But indeed all these visible and sensible things are, as we have often said, exhibited through the creature made subject in order to signify the invisible and intelligible God, not only the Father, but also the Son and the Holy Spirit, “of whom are all things, and through whom are all things, and in whom are all things;”296 Rom. xi. 36 although “the invisible things of God, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead.”297 Rom. i. 20

26. But as far as concerns our present undertaking, neither on Mount Sinai do I see how it appears, by all those things which were fearfully displayed to the senses of mortal men, whether God the Trinity spake, or the Father, or the Son, or the Holy Spirit severally. But if it is allowable, without rash assertion, to venture upon a modest and hesitating conjecture from this passage, if it is possible to understand it of one person of the Trinity, why do we not rather understand the Holy Spirit to be spoken of, since the Law itself also, which was given there, is said to have been written upon tables of stone with the finger of God,298 Ex. xxi. 18 by which name we know the Holy Spirit to be signified in the Gospel.299 Luke xi. 20 And fifty days are numbered from the slaying of the lamb and the celebration of the Passover until the day in which these things began to be done in Mount Sinai; just as after the passion of our Lord fifty days are numbered from His resurrection, and then came the Holy Spirit which the Son of God had promised. And in that very coming of His, which we read of in the Acts of the Apostles, there appeared cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them:300 Acts. ii. 1–4 which agrees with Exodus, where it is written, “And Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire;” and a little after, “And the sight of the glory of the Lord,” he says, “was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel.”301 Ex. xxiv. 17 Or if these things were therefore wrought because neither the Father nor the Son could be there presented in that mode without the Holy Spirit, by whom the Law itself must needs be written; then we know doubtless that God appeared there, not by His own substance, which remains invisible and unchangeable, but by the appearance above mentioned of the creature; but that some special person of the Trinity appeared, distinguished by a proper mark, as far as my capacity of understanding reaches, we do not see.

CAPUT XV.

25. De visione in Sina. An Trinitas, an aliqua proprie persona in ea visione loquebatur. Jam vero de nubibus, et vocibus, et fulguribus, et tuba, et fumo in monte Sina, cum diceretur: Sina autem mons fumabat totus, propterea quod descendisset Deus in eum in igne, et ascendebat fumus tanquam fumus fornacis; fiebant autem voces tubae prodeuntes fortiter valde: Moyses loquebatur, et Deus respondebat ei voce (Id. XIX, 18, 19). Et paulo post data Lege in decem praeceptis, consequenter dicitur: Et omnis populus videbat voces, et lampadas, et voces tubae, et montem fumantem. Et paulo post: Et stabat, inquit, omnis populus a longe; Moyses autem intravit in nebulam ubi erat Deus, et dixit Dominus ad Moysen (Id. XX, 18, 21), etc. Quid hinc dicam; nisi quod nemo tam vecors est, qui credat fumum, ignem, nubes, et nebulam, et si qua hujusmodi, Verbi et Sapientiae Dei quod est Christus, vel Spiritus sancti esse substantiam? Nam de Patre Deo, nec Ariani hoc unquam ausi sunt dicere. Ergo creatura serviente Creatori facta sunt illa omnia, et humanis sensibus pro dispensatione congrua praesentata: nisi forte, quia dictum est, Moyses autem intravit in nebulam ubi erat Deus, hoc arbitrabitur carnalis cogitatio, a populo quidem nebulam visam, intra nebulam vero Moysen oculis carneis vidisse Filium Dei, quem delirantes haeretici in sua substantia visum volunt. Sane viderit eum Moyses oculis carneis, si oculis carneis potest videri, non modo Sapientia Dei quod est Christus, sed vel ipsa cujuslibet hominis et qualiscumque sapientis: aut quia scriptum est de senioribus Israel, quia viderunt locum ubi steterat Deus Israel, et quia sub pedibus ejus tanquam opus lapidis sapphiri, et tanquam aspectus firmamenti coeli (Id. XXIV, 10), propterea credendum est Verbum et Sapientiam Dei per suam substantiam in spatio loci terreni stetisse, quae pertendit a fine usque ad finem fortiter, et disponit omnia suaviter (Sap. VIII, 1); et ita esse mutabile Verbum Dei, per quod facta sunt omnia (Joan. I, 3), ut modo se contrahat, modo distendat (mundet Dominus a talibus cogitationibus corda 0862 fidelium suorum): sed per subjectam, ut saepe diximus, creaturam exhibentur haec omnia visibilia et sensibilia, ad significandum invisibilem atque intelligibilem Deum, non solum Patrem, sed et Filium et Spiritum sanctum, ex quo omnia, per quem omnia, in quo omnia (Rom. XI, 36); quamvis invisibilia Dei, a creatura mundi, per ea quae facta sunt intellecta conspiciantur, sempiterna quoque virtus ejus ac divinitas (Id. I, 20).

26. Sed quod attinet ad id quod nunc suscepimus, nec in monte Sina video quemadmodum appareat per illa omnia quae mortalium sensibus terribiliter ostendebantur, utrum Deus Trinitas, an Pater, an Filius, an Spiritus sanctus proprie loquebatur. Verumtamen si quid hinc sine affirmandi temeritate modeste atque cunctanter conjectare conceditur, si una ex Trinitate persona potest intelligi, cur non Spiritum sanctum potius intelligimus, quando et tabulis lapideis Lex ipsa quae ibi data est, digito Dei scripta dicitur (Exod. XXXI, 18), quo nomine Spiritum sanctum in Evangelio, significari novimus (Luc. XI, 20). Et quinquaginta dies numerantur ab occisione agni et celebratione Paschae, usque ad diem quo haec fieri coepta sunt in monte Sina; sicut post Domini passionem ab ejus resurrectione quinquaginta dies numerantur, et venit promissus a Filio Dei Spiritus sanctus. Et in ipso ejus adventu, quem in Apostolorum Actibus legimus, per divisionem linguarum ignis apparuit, qui et insedit super unumquemque eorum (Act. II, 1-4): quod Exodo congruit, ubi scriptum est, Sina autem mons fumabat totus, propterea quod descendit in eum Deus in igne; et aliquanto post, Aspectus, inquit, majestatis Domini tanquam ignis ardens super verticem montis coram filiis Israel. Aut si haec ideo facta sunt, quia nec Pater, nec Filius illic eo modo praesentari poterant sine Spiritu sancto, quo ipsam Legem scribi oportebat: Deum quidem, non per substantiam suam quae invisibilis et incommutabilis manet, sed per illam speciem creaturae illic apparuisse cognoscimus; sed aliquam ex Trinitate personam signo quodam proprio, quantum ad mei sensus capacitatem pertinet, non videmus.