On the Trinity 4.1–4.10

But since we have been exiled from unchangeable joy, and yet have not been cut off and broken away from it so as not to seek eternity, truth, and blessedness even in these changeable and temporal things (for we do not wish to die, nor to be deceived, nor to be troubled), visions suited to our pilgrimage have been sent to us from God, by which we might be reminded that what we seek is not here, but that we must return from this to that place on which, unless we depended on it, we would not seek these things here. And first we had to be persuaded how much God loved us, lest from despair we should not dare to be lifted up to him. But it had to be shown what kind of people he loved, lest, priding ourselves as it were on our merits, we should recoil the more from him and fail the more in our own strength. And so he dealt with us in such a way that we might make progress rather through his strength, and so the power of love might be perfected in the weakness of humility. This is signified in the Psalm where it says: "Setting apart a voluntary rain, O God, for your inheritance; and it was weakened, but you perfected it." For by "voluntary rain" he means nothing but grace, not paid for merits but given freely, which is why it is also called grace; for he gave it not because we were worthy but because he willed. Knowing this, we shall not trust in ourselves; and this is to be weakened. But he perfects us, who also said to the apostle Paul: "My grace is sufficient for you; for power is perfected in weakness." Man, therefore, had to be persuaded how much God loved us and what kind of people he loved: how much, lest we despair; what kind, lest we be proud. The Apostle explains this most necessary point thus: "But God commends his love toward us, in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us; much more, then, having now been justified by his blood, shall we be saved from wrath through him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved by his life." And in another place: "What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare his own Son but handed him over for us all, how has he not also given us all things with him?" And what is announced to us as done was shown to the righteous of old as going to be done, so that through the same faith they too, humbled, might be weakened, and weakened, might be perfected. Because, then, the Word of God is one, through whom all things were made, which is the unchangeable truth, there all things are at once, in their principles and unchangeably; not only the things that now are in this whole creation, but also those that were and those that will be. But there they neither were nor will be, but only are; and all are life, and all are one, or rather it is one and one life. For all things were made through him in such a way that whatever was made in them is life in him, and was not made: because in the beginning the Word was not made, but "the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and all things were made through him"; nor would all things have been made through him unless he had been before all things and had not been made. And among the things that were made through him, even body, which is not life, would not have been made through him unless it had been life in him before it was made. For "what was made was already life in him," and not life of any kind whatever: for the soul too is the life of the body, but it too was made, because it is changeable; and through what was it made, if not through the unchangeable Word of God? For "all things were made through him, and without him nothing was made." "What was made," then, "was already life in him," and not life of any kind whatever, but "the life was the light of men": the light, that is, of rational minds, by which men differ from beasts and are therefore men. Not, then, bodily light, which is the light of flesh, whether it shines from heaven or is kindled by earthly fires; and not of human flesh only, but also of that of beasts, down to the tiniest worms. For all these see this light; but that life was the light of men, and is not placed far from each one of us; for in it "we live and move and have our being."

But the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. Now the darkness is the foolish minds of men, blinded by depraved desire and unbelief. To cure and heal these, the Word, through whom all things were made, became flesh and dwelt among us. For our enlightenment is participation in the Word, that is, in that life which is the light of men. But for this participation we were altogether unfit and unsuited, because of the uncleanness of sins. We had, therefore, to be cleansed. Now the one cleansing of the wicked and the proud is the blood of the righteous one and the humility of God; so that, in order to contemplate God, which by nature we are not, we might be cleansed through him who became what by nature we are and what by sin we are not. For by nature we are not God; by nature we are men; by sin we are not righteous. God, therefore, having become a righteous man, interceded with God for sinful man. For the sinner does not fit with the righteous, but man fits with man. Joining to us, then, the likeness of his humanity, he took away the unlikeness of our iniquity; and having become a partaker of our mortality, he made us partakers of his divinity. For rightly the death of the sinner, coming from the necessity of condemnation, was undone by the death of the righteous one, coming from the will of mercy, while his single fits our double. For this fitting together, or agreement, or concord, or consonance, or whatever is more aptly said, which is as one to two, is of very great importance in every compacting, or, if it is better so called, in every fitting together of the creature. For I wished to speak of this fitting together, as it now occurs to me, which the Greeks call harmonia. Nor is this the place to show how much the consonance of the single to the double is worth, which is found in us most of all, and is so implanted in us by nature (by whom, certainly, if not by him who created us?) that not even the unskilled can fail to feel it, whether singing themselves or hearing others; for by it higher and lower voices are brought into concord, so that whoever departs from it offends vehemently not knowledge, which most people lack, but the very sense of our hearing. But to demonstrate this a long discourse is needed; yet it can be shown to the ears themselves by one who knows how, on a regular monochord.

But what presses at present is to explain, as far as God grants, how the single of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ fits with our double and in a certain way harmonizes with it for our salvation. We certainly, as no Christian doubts, are dead both in soul and in body: in soul because of sin, in body because of the punishment of sin, and therefore in body too because of sin. And to both these parts of ours, that is, to soul and body, a medicine and resurrection were needed, so that what had been changed for the worse might be renewed for the better. Now the death of the soul is ungodliness, and the death of the body is corruptibility, through which also the departure of the soul from the body comes about. For as the soul dies when God forsakes it, so the body dies when the soul forsakes it; whence the former becomes foolish, the latter lifeless. For the soul is raised up through repentance, and in the body that is still mortal the renewal of life is begun by faith, by which one believes in him who justifies the ungodly; and it is increased and strengthened by good conduct from day to day, as the inner man is renewed more and more. But the body, as the outer man, the longer this life lasts, the more and more it is corrupted, whether by age, or disease, or various afflictions, until it comes to the last, which all call death. And its resurrection is deferred to the end, when our justification itself too will be perfected ineffably. For then we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. But now, as long as the body that is corrupted weighs down the soul, and human life on earth is all temptation, no living man will be justified in his sight, in comparison with the righteousness by which we shall be made equal to the angels, and the glory that will be revealed in us. As for distinguishing the death of the soul from the death of the body, why should I recall more proofs, when the Lord in one saying of the Gospel has set out both deaths, easy for anyone to distinguish, where he says, "Let the dead bury their dead"? For a dead body was to be buried; but he wished its buriers to be understood as dead in soul through the ungodliness of unbelief, such as are raised when it is said, "Arise, you who sleep, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light." And the Apostle condemns a certain death, saying of a widow, "But she who lives in pleasures is dead while she lives." The soul, then, which is now godly, having been ungodly, is said, because of the righteousness of faith, to have come back to life from death and to live. But the body is said in a certain place in the Scriptures even to be dead, not only as going to die because of the departure of the soul that is to come, but because of the great weakness of flesh and blood, as the Apostle says: "The body indeed is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness." This life is brought about by faith, since "the righteous lives by faith." But what follows? "But if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit dwelling in you." To this double death of ours, then, our Savior applied his single one; and to bring about both our resurrections, he set before us and set forth in sacrament and example his one resurrection. For he was not a sinner or ungodly, so that he should need, as one dead in spirit, to be renewed in the inner man, and as it were be called back by repentance to the life of righteousness; but clothed in mortal flesh, and dying in it alone, rising in it alone, in it alone he harmonized with us for both, since in it there came about a sacrament of the inner man and an example of the outer. For as a sacrament of our inner man that cry was uttered, pertaining to the signifying of the death of our soul, not only in the Psalm but also on the cross: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" With this cry the Apostle agrees, saying: "Knowing that our old man was crucified together with him, so that the body of sin might be done away, that we should no longer serve sin." For by the crucifixion of the inner man are understood the sorrows of repentance and a certain wholesome torment of self-control, by which death the death of ungodliness is destroyed, in which God left us. And therefore by such a cross the body of sin is done away, so that we no longer present our members to sin as weapons of iniquity. For if the inner man too is renewed from day to day, surely it is old before it is renewed. For it is within that what the same Apostle says takes place: "Put off the old man and put on the new." Which he goes on to explain thus: "Wherefore, putting away lying, speak the truth." And where is lying put away if not within, so that he may dwell on the holy mountain of God who speaks the truth in his heart? But the resurrection of the Lord's body is shown to pertain to the sacrament of our inner resurrection where, after he had risen, he said to the woman: "Do not touch me; for I have not yet ascended to my Father." With this mystery the Apostle agrees, saying: "If, then, you have risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God; set your minds on the things that are above." For this is not to touch Christ unless he has ascended to the Father: not to think of Christ in a carnal way. And now the death of the Lord's flesh pertains to the example of the death of our outer man, because by such a passion above all he exhorted his servants not to fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Which is why the Apostle says: "That I may fill up what is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh." And the resurrection of the Lord's body is found to pertain to the example of the resurrection of our outer man, because he said to the disciples: "Handle me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see that I have." And one of the disciples, even touching his scars, exclaimed, saying, "My Lord and my God!" And since the whole integrity of that flesh appeared, there was shown in it what he had said in exhorting his own: "Not a hair of your head shall perish." For why first "Do not touch me, for I have not yet ascended to my Father," and why is he touched by the disciples before he ascends to the Father, unless because there a sacrament of the inner man was being intimated, here an example of the outer was being offered? Or is anyone perhaps so absurd and so turned away from the truth as to dare to say that he was touched by men before he ascended, but by women when he had ascended? On account of this example of our future resurrection in the body, which went before in the Lord, the Apostle says: "Christ the firstfruits, then those who are Christ's." For in that place he was treating of the resurrection of the body, on account of which he also says, "He will transform the body of our lowliness, conformed to the body of his glory." The one death of our Savior, then, was for the salvation of our two deaths; and his one resurrection provided two resurrections for us, since his body, in both respects, that is, both in death and in resurrection, was ministered to us by a certain medicinal fitness, both as a sacrament of our inner man and as an example of the outer.

Now this ratio of the single to the double arises indeed from the number three, for one and two are three; but the whole of what I have said comes to six, for one and two and three make six. This number is called perfect because it is completed by its parts: for it has these three, a sixth, a third, and a half; and no other part that can be named as a fraction is found in it. Its sixth, then, is one; its third, two; its half, three. And one and two and three complete that same six. Holy Scripture commends its perfection to us, above all in that God finished his works in six days, and on the sixth day man was made in the image of God. And in the sixth age of the human race the Son of God came and became the son of man, to re-form us to the image of God. For that is the age now in progress, whether a thousand years are assigned to each age, or we trace in the divine writings memorable and notable junctures, as it were, of time: so that the first age is found from Adam to Noah, then the second to Abraham; and next, as the evangelist Matthew distinguished them, from Abraham to David, from David to the deportation to Babylon, and from there to the Virgin's childbearing. These three ages joined to those two make five. Accordingly the birth of the Lord began the sixth, which is now in progress until the hidden end of time. That this number six bears a certain figure of time we also recognize in that threefold division by which we reckon one time before the Law, another under the Law, a third under grace. In this time we have received the sacrament of renewal, so that at the end of time, renewed in every part by the resurrection of the flesh as well, we may be healed of all weakness, not only of the soul but also of the body. Hence that woman is understood as a type of the Church, healed and straightened by the Lord, whom infirmity had bent over, Satan binding her. For it is of such hidden enemies that the voice of the Psalm laments: "They have bowed down my soul." And this woman had been in her infirmity eighteen years, which is three times six. And the months of eighteen years are found in the number of the solid cube of six, which is six times six, and that six times. For nearby in the same passage of the Gospel is also that fig tree whose miserable barrenness the third year was exposing. But intercession was made for it so that it was spared that year, so that if it bore fruit, well; but if not, it would be cut down. For the three years also belong to that same threefold division, and the months of three years make the square of six, which is six times six. One year too, if twelve full months are considered, which thirty days complete (for the ancients observed such a month, which the circuit of the moon shows), is strong in the number six. For what six is worth in the first order of numbers, which consists of ones up to ten, sixty is worth in the second order, which consists of tens up to a hundred. The number sixty, then, in days, is a sixth part of the year. Accordingly six of the first row is multiplied, as it were, by the six of the second row, and six times sixty make three hundred and sixty days, which are twelve full months. But since, just as the circuit of the moon shows men the month, so the year is marked by the circuit of the sun, and five days and a quarter of a day remain for the sun to complete its course and close the year (for four quarters make one day, which must be intercalated when a four-year period has run out, which they call the bissextile, lest the order of times be disturbed), the number six is also very strong in those five days and a quarter, if we consider them. First, because, as it usually happens that the whole is reckoned from a part, they are no longer five days but rather six, if that quarter is taken as a day. Next, because in those five days there is a sixth part of a month; and the quarter itself has six hours. For a whole day, that is, with its night, is twenty-four hours, of which the fourth part, which is a quarter of a day, is found to be six hours. So in the course of the year the number six is very strong.

Not without reason, too, in the building of the Lord's body, in figure of which he said he would raise up in three days the temple destroyed by the Jews, the number six itself is understood as standing for a year. For they said: "Forty-six years this temple was in building." And forty-six times six makes two hundred and seventy-six. This number of days completes nine months and six days, which are counted as if ten months for women giving birth: not because all reach the sixth day after the ninth month, but because the very perfection of the Lord's body is found to have been brought to birth in so many days, as the authority of the Church, receiving it from the tradition of the elders, preserves. For he is believed to have been conceived on the eighth day before the Kalends of April, on which day he also suffered; so that to the new tomb in which he was buried, where none of the dead had been laid, either before or afterward, corresponds the Virgin's womb in which he was conceived, where none of mortals was sown. And he is reported to have been born on the eighth day before the Kalends of January. Counted from that day to this one, then, two hundred and seventy-six days are found, which contain the number six forty-six times. In this number of years the temple was built, because in this number of sixes the Lord's body was perfected, which, destroyed by the passion of death, he raised up in three days. For he spoke this of the temple of his body, as is declared by the most evident and strongest testimony of the Gospel, in which he says: "As Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights."

But that the three days themselves were not whole and full, Scripture is witness: the first day was counted as whole from its last part, and the third day from its first part, and it too as whole; but the middle one between them, that is, the second day, was absolutely whole, with its twenty-four hours, twelve of night and twelve of day. For he was crucified first by the cries of the Jews at the third hour, when it was the sixth day of the week. Then he was hung on the cross itself at the sixth hour, and gave up his spirit at the ninth hour. And he was buried when it was already evening, as the words of the Gospel run; which is understood as at the end of the day. Wherever, then, you begin, even if another explanation can be given of how it is not contrary to the Gospel of John to understand that he was hung on the wood at the third hour, you do not take in the whole first day. So it will be counted as whole from its last part, as the third is from its first part. For the night up to the dawn, at which the Lord's resurrection was made known, belongs to the third day; because God, who commanded light to shine out of darkness, so that through the grace of the New Testament and participation in the resurrection of Christ we might hear, "For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord," intimates to us in a certain way that the day takes its beginning from the night. For as the first days, on account of man's future fall, are reckoned from light to night, so these, on account of man's restoration, are reckoned from darkness to light. From the hour of death, then, to the dawn of the resurrection there are forty hours, counting the ninth hour itself. With this number agrees also his life on earth after the resurrection, in forty days. And this number is very frequent in the Scriptures to intimate the mystery of perfection in the fourfold world. For ten has a certain perfection, and ten multiplied by four makes forty. And from the evening of the burial to the dawn of the resurrection there are thirty-six hours, which is the square of six. And it is related to that ratio of the single to the double, in which is the greatest consonance of fitting together. For twelve agrees with twenty-four as single to double, and they make thirty-six: a whole night with a whole day and a whole night; and not without that sacrament I mentioned above. For not absurdly do we compare the spirit to the day and the body to the night. For the Lord's body in death and resurrection bore both a figure of our spirit and an example of our body. In this way too, then, that ratio of the single to the double appears in the thirty-six hours, when twelve are compared with twenty-four. And as for the reasons why these numbers are set down in the holy Scriptures, someone else may track down other reasons, whether reasons to be preferred to those I have given, or equally probable, or even more probable than these; yet no one will be so foolish and inept as to contend that they were set down in the Scriptures for nothing, and that there are no mystical reasons why these numbers are mentioned there. But those that I have given I have gathered either from the authority of the Church, handed down from the elders, or from the testimony of the divine Scriptures, or from the reasoning of numbers and likenesses. Against reason no sober man, against the Scriptures no Christian, against the Church no peaceable man, will hold an opinion.

This sacrament, this sacrifice, this priest, this God: before he came, sent, made of a woman, all the things that appeared sacredly and mystically to our fathers through angelic miracles, or that were done through the fathers themselves, were likenesses of him, so that the whole creation in a way spoke by deeds of the one who was to come, in whom would be the salvation of all who were to be restored from death. For because, recoiling and falling out of harmony through the iniquity of ungodliness, we had flowed away from the one true and highest God and had vanished into many things, torn apart through many things and clinging to many things, it was fitting, by the will and command of the merciful God, that the many things themselves should cry out together that the one was coming; and that the one, cried out by the many, should come; and that the many should bear witness that the one had come; and that, unburdened of the many, we should come to the one; and that, dead in soul through many sins, and going to die in the flesh because of sin, we should love the one who died in the flesh for us without sin; and that, believing in him raised up, and rising with him in spirit through faith, we should be justified in the one righteous one, made one; and that we should not despair of rising in the flesh itself, when we see that the one head has gone before us, the many members; in whom, now cleansed through faith and then made whole again through sight, and reconciled to God through the Mediator, we may cleave to the one, enjoy the one, and remain one.

So the Son of God himself, the Word of God, and the same mediator between God and men, the Son of Man, equal to the Father through the unity of divinity, and our partner through the taking up of humanity, interceding with the Father for us by that by which he was man, yet not keeping silent that as God he was one with the Father, speaks thus among other things: "I do not pray for these only," he says, "but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they all may be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be one in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me. And the glory which you gave me I have given them, that they may be one, as we also are one."

He did not say, "I and they are one," although, because he is the head of the Church and the Church is his body, he could have said, "I and they," not "are one thing" but "are one person," because the head and the body is one Christ. But, showing his divinity consubstantial with the Father (which is why he also says in another place, "I and the Father are one"), he wishes his own to be one in their own kind, that is, in the consubstantial equality of the same nature, but in him; because in themselves they could not be, separated from one another by different pleasures and desires and the uncleanness of sins. From these they are cleansed through the Mediator, so that they may be one in him: not only through the same nature by which all, from mortal men, are made equal to the angels, but also through the same most harmonious will, breathing together toward the same blessedness, fused in a certain way by the fire of love into one spirit. For this is the force of his saying, "that they may be one, as we also are one": that just as the Father and the Son are one not only by equality of substance but also by will, so also those between whom and God the Son is mediator may be one not only through being of the same nature but also through the same fellowship of love. Then he indicates the very fact that he is the Mediator through whom we are reconciled to God, thus: "I in them," he says, "and you in me, that they may be perfected in one."

This is true peace and a firm bond for us with our Creator, cleansed and reconciled through the Mediator of life, just as, stained and estranged, we had departed from him through the mediator of death. For as the proud devil led proud man to death, so the humble Christ led obedient man back to life; because as the one, lifted up, fell and cast down the one who consented, so the other, humbled, rose again and raised up the one who believes. For because the devil had not come to where he had led man (for he bore the death of the spirit in ungodliness, but had not undergone the death of the flesh, since he had not taken on its garment), he seemed to man a great prince among the legions of demons, through whom he exercises the kingdom of deceits. So he holds man in subjection, puffing him up the more through the vapor of pride, more eager for power than for righteousness, or through false philosophy, or ensnaring him through sacrilegious rites, in which also, by magical deceits, he casts down headlong the more curious and prouder souls, deceived and mocked; promising even a purification of the soul through what they call teletai, transforming himself into an angel of light by manifold contrivance, in lying signs and wonders.