 |
| English: child Jesus with the virgin Mary, with the Holy Spirit (represented as a dove) and God the Father, with child john the Baptist and saint Elizabeth on the right (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
 |
| Holy Trinity by Fridolin Leiber (1853–1912) (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
 |
| Detail - Glory of the New Born Christ in presence of God Father and the Holy Spirit (Annakirche, Vienna) Adam and Eva are represented bellow Jesus-Christ Ceiling painting made by Daniel Gran (1694-1757). Post-processing: perspective and fade correction. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
 |
| Church Fathers, a miniature from Svyatoslav's Miscellany (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
 |
| Icon depicting the First Council of Nicaea. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
 |
| Stained glass at St John the Baptist's Anglican Church http://www.stjohnsashfield.org.au, Ashfield, New South Wales. Illustrates Jesus' description of himself "I am the Good Shepherd" (from the Gospel of John, chapter 10, verse 11). This version of the image shows the detail of his face. The memorial window is also captioned: "To the Glory of God and in Loving Memory of William Wright. Died 6th November, 1932. Aged 70 Yrs." (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
 |
| Depiction of the Trinity on the portal of the Basilica of St.-Denis, France (version losslessly cropped to remove inessential or distracting details for Trinity article). Shows the dove of the Holy Spirit above God the Father holding an Agnus Dei (symbol of Christ). (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
It
is debated (between trinitarians and nontrinitarians, and between trinitarians
themselves) whether or not the early
Church Fathers believed
in the
Trinity. Some of the
evidence used to support an early belief in the Trinity are triadic statements
(referring to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit) from the New Testament and the
Church Fathers. The view that the Son was 'of the essence of the Father, God of
God...very God of very God' was formally ratified at the
First Council of
Nicaea in 325 CE. The Holy Spirit was included at the
First
Council of Constantinople (381 CE), where the relationship between the
Father, Son and Holy Spirit as one substance (
ousia)
and three co-equal persons (
hypostaseis) was formally ratified.
[1]
Some Trinitarians
state that the doctrine of the Trinity was revealed in
New Testament times;
others, that it was revealed in the
Patristic period.
[2] Nontrinitarians, on
the other hand, will generally state that the traditional doctrine of the
Trinity did not exist until centuries after the end of the New Testament
period.
[3] Some Trinitarians agree with this,
seeing a development over time towards a true understanding of the Trinity.
[4] Trinitarians sometimes refer to
Christian belief about
God
before the traditional statements on the Trinity as unsophisticated, 'naive',
[5] or 'incipient Trinitarianism',
[6] and that early Christians were
'proto-Trinitarian, partially Trinitarian', etc.
[7] Unitarians would state
that this means those early Christians were not actually Trinitarians.
[citation needed]
Expressions which
link together the name of the
Father, the
Son, and the
Holy Spirit occurred very
early in the
History of
the Christian Church. These are sometimes taken as expressions about the
Trinity.
[citation needed] Other times, they are referred to more
generally as 'triadic'.
[8] It is stated by some that 'These
passages cannot immediately be taken as evidence of the belief in the
co-substantial unity of God; names may be conjoined for any number of reasons
(e.g. unity in greeting, unity of purpose, etc) so even the use of a threefold
formula cannot be conclusive'.
[9]
Two examples appear
in the
New Testament:
2 Corinthians
13:14 and
Matthew
28:19. The context of 2 Corinthians 13:14 (verse 13 in the
Vulgate), which is the close of
a letter, suggests the church's conjunction of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit
may have originated as a
doxological
formula; while the context of Matthew 28:19, the
Great Commission,
shows that the verbal conjunction of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit was used
early on as a
baptismal
formula. Unitarians hold that 'the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are mentioned
together [in the New Testament] in the same context, but not in any way that
suggests they are all distinct persons who together comprise the totality of
God';
[10] a 'literary triad does not equate
to an ontological triunity'.
[11]
This triadic pattern
is even more marked in the glimpses available of the early Church's
liturgy and day-to-day
catechetical practice.
[1] Even so, some have said that the
'indications from the apostolic and sub-apostolic writers are that [their]
triadic formulas...do not carry the same significance as post-Nicene triadic
formulas'.
[12] The oldest
extant work in which
the word "Trinity" itself (Greek
Trias,
triados) is used is
Theophilus of Antioch's
2nd-century
To Autolycus.
[13] There it is used to refer to God,
his word and his wisdom.
[14] The view that the Son was 'of the
essence of the Father, God of God...very God of very God' was formally ratified
at the
First
Council of Nicaea in 325 CE. The Holy Spirit was included at the
First
Council of Constantinople (381 CE), where the relationship between the
Father, Son and Holy Spirit as one substance (
ousia)
and three co-equal persons (
hypostaseis) was formally ratified.
[1]
Second century
Early second century: Ignatius of Antioch
Ignatius, second
bishop of Antioch,
who was martyred in Rome around 110 AD,
[15] wrote a series of letters to
churches in
Asia Minor on
his way to be executed in Rome. The conjunction of Father, Son and Holy Spirit
appears in his letter to the Magnesian church:
Study,
therefore, to be established in the doctrines of the Lord and the apostles,
that so all things, whatsoever ye do, may prosper both in the flesh and spirit;
in faith and love; in the Son, and in the Father, and in the Spirit; in the
beginning and in the end; with your most admirable bishop, and the
well-compacted spiritual crown of your presbytery, and the deacons who are
according to God. Be ye subject to the bishop, and to one another, as Jesus
Christ to the Father, according to the flesh, and the apostles to Christ, and
to the Father, and to the Spirit; that so there may be a union both fleshly and
spiritual. —
Epistle to the Magnesians,
Chapter 13 [SR]
[16]
Unitarians would
argue that Ignatius is not indicating that the Father, the Son and the Spirit
'are one substance anymore than he is saying flesh and spirit are one
substance'.
[12]
First half of second century or late first century: Didache
This source uses the
Gospel of Matthew
only and no other known Gospel, and thus it must have been written before the
four-Gospel canon had become widespread in the churches, i.e. before the second
half of the 2nd century when
Tatian
produced the
Diatessaron.
[17] Given its literary dependence on
the Gospel of Matthew, it is not surprising that the
Didache follows the Gospel of
Matthew in designating the a triadic formula as the baptismal formula:
[18]
After
the foregoing instructions, baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son,
and of the Holy Spirit, in living [running] water…. If you have neither, pour
water three times on the head, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Spirit. —
Didache 7:1
[19]
ca.151: Justin Martyr
Even though
Justin Martyr does not
use the word "Trinity" explicitly, some argue that his
First Apology, written around AD 150, reveals
a primitive theology of the Trinity.
[citation needed] Other, however, argue that Justin was a
Unitarian.
[20] In his
First Apology he describes God as being in first place, Christ
in second, and the Spirit in third:
We
will prove that we worship him reasonably; for we have learned that he is the
Son of the true God himself, that he holds a second place, and the Spirit of
prophecy a third. For this they accuse us of madness, saying that we attribute
to a crucified man a place second to the unchangeable and eternal God, the
Creator of all things; but they are ignorant of the mystery which lies therein.
—
First Apology 13:5–6
[21]
Justin also wrote,
"in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our
Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit."
[22]
ca. 155: Polycarp of Smyrna
Polycarp was
martyred in
Smyrna (where he
was also Bishop) in the year 155. It is said by
Irenaeus of Lyons
that he was a pupil of the
Apostle
John. In his final prayer before his martyrdom, he "praises,
glorifies, and blesses" the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit:
For
this cause, yea and for all things, I praise Thee, I bless Thee, I glorify
Thee, through the eternal and heavenly High-priest, Jesus Christ, Thy beloved
Son, through whom with Him and the Holy Spirit be glory both now [and ever] and
for the ages to come. Amen. —
Martyrdom of Polycarp 14:3
[23]
169-181: Theophilus of Antioch
Theophilus of Antioch's
Ad Autolycum is the oldest extant work
that uses the actual word "Trinity" to refer to God, his Word and his
Wisdom. The context is a discussion of the first three days of creation in
Genesis 1-3:
...the
three days before the luminaries were created are types of the Trinity, God,
his Word, and his Wisdom. —
To Autolycus 2:15[24]
It is maintained by
some that 'Theophilus does not use τρίας to mean ‘three-in-one’, but rather
simply uses it to indicate that there were three things before man, God and His
Word and His Wisdom';
[13] that he, like other second and
third century authors, was referring to 'a “trinity”, triad or threesome, but
not a triune or tripersonal God'.
[25]
Third century: Theology in response to Patripassianism
and Sabellianism
In the early 3rd
century
Tertullian and
Hippolytus of Rome
wrote
Against Praxeas and
Against Noetus, respectively, which are
sometimes considered the first extant expository treatments of Trinitarian
theology.
[26] Both authors use the word Trinity
(Latin: Trinitas; Greek:
Trias), but the
term was yet to have its Trinitarian meaning.
[25][27] They wrote these works to combat
Patripassianism, the
view that the Father suffered on the cross along with the Son. In the 3rd
century there were also Trinitarian theologies expressed in writings against
Monarchianism,
Sabellianism and
Modalism.
[citation needed]
216: Tertullian
Tertullian's treatise
against a Patripassian
heretic
named
Praxeas, who claimed
that the Father had suffered with the Son on the cross, is arguably the oldest
extant treatise with a detailed explicit Trinitarian theology.
[28] In his
Against Praxeas Tertullian wrote:
And
at the same time the mystery of the
oikonomia
is safeguarded, for the unity is distributed in a Trinity. Placed in order, the
three are the Father, Son, and Spirit. They are three, however, not in
condition, but in degree; not in being, but in form; not in power, but in kind;
of one being, however, and one condition and one power, because he is one God
of whom degrees and forms and kinds are taken into account in the name of the
Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. —
Against
Praxeas 2
[29]
Others, however,
argue that Tertullian was unitarian,
[30] claiming that Tertullian's use of
the word "trinity" differs from later Trinitarian use: 'For
Tertullian, the one God is not the Trinity; rather, the one God is a member of
the trinity...';
[31] '...Tertullian's trinity [was] not
a triune God, but rather a triad or group of three, with God as the founding
member'.
[2]
ca. 220: Hippolytus of Rome
In the early 3rd
century,
Hippolytus
of Rome wrote a treatise
Against Noetus,
in response to a Christian from Smyrna named
Noetus who had been promoting
Patripassian views, which Hippolytus deemed heretical. Noetus and other
Patripassians, such as Praxeas (see above, in relation to Tertullian), claimed
that the Father as well as the Son had suffered on the cross.
[32] Like Tertullian, Hippolytus
explicitly used the word Trinity in his treatise against Patripassian views:
The
Father's Word, therefore, knowing the economy and the will of the Father, to
wit, that the Father seeks to be worshipped in none other way than this, gave
this charge to the disciples after he rose from the dead: "Go ye and teach
all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of
the Holy Ghost." (Matt 28:19) And by this he showed that whosoever omitted
any one of these, failed in glorifying God perfectly. For it is through the
Trinity that the Father is glorified. For the Father willed, the Son did and
the Spirit manifested. —
Against Noetus[33][34]
Some, referring to
other parts of
Against Noetus along with
Hippolytus'
The Refutation of All Heresies,
view Hippolytus as nontrinitarian, saying that 'in his theology, the divine
(but less divine than God) Logos came to exist from God a finite time ago, so
that God could create the cosmos by means of him. On two counts, then, this
makes him not a trinitarian –- that the “persons” are neither co-equal nor
equally divine'.
[35]
ca. 225: Origen
Origen's
On First Principles (
De
Principiis or
Peri Archon) is the
oldest extant Christian theological treatise. Origen's theology of the godhead
is developed in this
treatise,
which reveals that by this time the use of the word Trinity to refer to Father,
Son and Holy Spirit is standard in orthodox churches. However, it is argued
that the word still did not have its later, Trinitarian meaning.
[25]
For
it is the Trinity alone which exceeds every sense in which not only temporal
but even eternal may be understood. It is all other things, indeed, which are
outside the Trinity, which are to be measured by time and ages....
It
seems right to inquire into the reason why he who is 'born again through God'
to salvation has need of both Father and Son and Holy Spirit and will not
obtain salvation apart from the entire Trinity, and why it is impossible to
become partaker of the Father or the Son without the Holy Spirit. In discussing
these points it will undoubtedly be necessary to describe the activity which is
peculiar to the Holy Spirit and that which is peculiar to the Father and Son. —
[36]
Some see Origen as
holding what many scholars refer to as a "
subordinist"
Christology: in Origen,
'the Son and Spirit are always in some sense derivative of, less than, and
subordinate to their source, the one God, that is, the Father':
[2]
The
God and Father, who holds the universe together, is superior to every being
that exists, for he imparts to each one from his own existence that which each
one is; the Son, being less than the Father, is superior to rational creatures
alone (for he is second to the Father); the Holy Spirit is still less, and
dwells within the saints alone. So that in this way the power of the Father is
greater than that of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and that of the Son is
more than that of the Holy Spirit... (Origen, First, 33-4 [I.3])
From this, it is
argued that Origen was in fact unitarian.
[2]
ca. 256: Novatian
Novatian,
presbyter of Rome, wrote the
oldest extant Christian treatise that is specifically dedicated to and entitled
On the Trinity.[37] It was written in response to a
number of views deemed heretical by Novatian, and particularly against
Sabellius, who had maintained
that the Trinity was divided into three
prosopa,
or "characters by which God is revealed to man, the Trinity being one of
revelation, not essence".
[38]
For
Scripture as much announces Christ as also God, as it announces God himself as
man. It has as much described Jesus Christ to be man, as moreover it has also
described Christ the Lord to be God. Because it does not set forth him to be
the Son of God only, but also the son of man; nor does it only say, the son of
man, but it has also been accustomed to speak of him as the Son of God. So that
being of both, he is both, lest if he should be one only, he could not be the
other. For as nature itself has prescribed that he must be believed to be a man
who is of man, so the same nature prescribes also that he must be believed to
be God who is of God…. Let them, therefore, who read that Jesus Christ the son
of man is man, read also that this same Jesus is called also God and the Son of
God. —
Treatise on the Trinity, 11
[39]
Some, referring to
chapter 31 of
On the Trinity, maintain
that when Novatian referred to Christ as 'God' he was still excluding him from
being 'the one true God'.
[2]
262: Pope Dionysius
According to
Athanasius of
Alexandria, in the mid-3rd
century
Pope Dionysius
wrote a letter to
Dionysius
of Alexandria criticizing
Sabellius's
views on the relations between the Son and the Father, as well as some who
attempted to refute Sabellius's views. He quotes parts of Dionysius' letter in
On the decrees of the Council of Nicaea .
[40] In this letter it is clear that
Dionysius used the word Trinity (Greek
Trias)
to explicate the relations between Father, Son and Holy Spirit:
Next,
I may reasonably turn to those who divide and cut to pieces and destroy that
most sacred doctrine of the Church of God, the Divine Monarchy, making it as it
were three powers and partive subsistences and godheads. I am told that some
among you who are catechists and teachers of the Divine Word, take the lead in
this tenet, who are diametrically opposed, so to speak, to Sabellius'
opininons; for he blasphemously says that the Son is the Father, and Father the
Son, but they in some sort preach three Gods, as dividing the sacred Unity into
three subsistences foreign to each other and utterly separate. For it must be
that with the God of the Universe, the Divine Word is united, and the Holy
Ghost must repose and habitate in God; thus in one as in a summit, I mean the
God of the Universe, must the Divine Trinity be gathered up and brought
together....Neither, then, may we divide into three godheads the wonderful and
divine Unity...Rather, we must believe in God, the Father Almighty; and in
Christ Jesus, his Son; and in the Holy Spirit; and that the Word is united to
the God of the universe. 'For,' he says, 'The Father and I are one,' and 'I am
in the Father, and the Father in me'. For thus both the Divine Trinity and the
holy preaching of the Monarchy will be preserved. —'De decretis Nic. syn.
26[41]
265: Gregory the Wonderworker
There
is one God.... There is a perfect Trinity, in glory and eternity and
sovereignty, neither divided nor estranged. Wherefore there is nothing either
created or in servitude in the Trinity; nor anything super-induced, as if at
some former period it was non-existent, and at some later period it was
introduced. And thus neither was the Son ever wanting to the Father, nor the
Spirit to the Son; but without variation and without change, the same Trinity
abides ever. —
Declaration of Faith.
[44]
