To Ablabius: That There Are Not Three Gods

To Ablabius, That There Are Not Three Gods

It is right for you, who are in the prime of strength in the inner man, to contend with all your might against the opponents of the truth and not to shrink from the labours, so that we, the fathers, may rejoice in the noble sweat of our children; for this is what the law of nature suggests. But since you have reversed the order and send against us the assaults of the arrows which the opponents of the truth shoot, and bid us old men to [quench with the shield of faith] their desert coals and the darts sharpened by the knowledge falsely so called, we accept the command, becoming for you a pattern of obedience, so that you too may give us an equal return when we give you similar commands, if ever we rouse you to such contests, O Ablabius, noble soldier of Christ.

The question you have put to us is not a small one, nor such as to bring little harm if it does not receive proper examination. For by the force of the problem, on the obvious understanding, one of two unacceptable things must follow: either to say three Gods, which is unlawful, or not to testify to the Godhead of the Son and the Holy Spirit, which is impious and absurd. What you say is this. Peter, James, and John, being in one humanity, are called three men; and there is nothing absurd in numbering in the plural, by the name of their nature, those who are united by nature, if they are more than one. If, then, usage allows this in that case, and no one forbids calling two "two" and those more than two "three," how is it that in the mystical doctrines, while we confess the three hypostases and conceive no difference of nature among them, we in a way fight against our confession, saying that the Godhead of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit is one, while forbidding anyone to say three Gods?

The question, then, as I said before, is very hard to deal with. As for us, if we should find something by which the doubtful point of our mind might be supported, so that it no longer wavers toward the alternative of absurdity, [well]; but if our reasoning should be refuted by the problem, we shall keep the tradition which we received from the fathers for ever firm and unmoved, and seek from the Lord the reasoning that pleads for the faith. If it should be found by any of those who have the grace, we shall give thanks to the one who gave the grace; if not, we shall none the less hold our faith unchangeable in what we have known.

Why is it, then, that in our usage we name in the plural those shown to be of the same nature, counting them one by one, saying "so many men" and not "one" for all of them, while in the case of the divine nature the word of doctrine casts out the plurality of gods, both numbering the hypostases and not admitting the plural meaning? On the surface, one might seem to say something by telling the simpler folk that the word of doctrine, avoiding resemblance to Greek polytheism, declined to number gods in the plural, so that no common ground of doctrines might be thought to exist, if the Divine were numbered by us too, not as a unity but in the plural, like their usage. This, said to the more guileless, might perhaps seem to say something; but for the others, who seek to have one or the other side of the proposition established, either not to confess the Godhead in the three, or to name in every case as three those who share the same Godhead, what has been said is not yet such as to produce any solution of the [difficulty]. So we must make the answer at greater length, tracking down the truth as far as possible.

For the question is not about ordinary matters. We say, then, first, that it is a misuse of usage to name in the plural, by the very name of their nature, those who are not divided in nature, and to say "many men"; which is like saying "many human natures." That this is so is plain [from the following]. When we call someone, we do not name him by his nature, lest the common name cause some confusion, each of the hearers thinking himself the one called, since the call is made not by the individual name but by the common name of the nature; rather, by saying the word proper to him (I mean the one that signifies the individual subject), we so distinguish him from the many. So those who share in the nature are many, for example disciples, or apostles, or martyrs; but the man in all of them is one, since, as has been said, "man" belongs not to the individual but to what is common to the nature. For Luke is a man, or Stephen; but it does not follow that if anyone is a man, he is Luke or Stephen. The account of the hypostases admits division because of the properties seen in each, and is seen in number by combination; but the nature is one, united to itself, a unity exactly indivisible, not increased by addition nor diminished by subtraction, but being what it is, one, even if it appears in a multitude: unsplit, continuous, entire, and not divided along with the individuals who share in it. And as we say "a people," "a populace," "an army," "an assembly," all in the singular, while each of these is understood as a multitude, so by the more exact account "man" would properly be called one, even if those shown to be in the same nature are a multitude. So it would be much better to correct our mistaken usage, and no longer extend the name of the nature to the plural, or else, being slaves to it, not to transfer the error here to the divine doctrine as well.

But since the correction of usage is impossible (for how could anyone be persuaded not to call those shown to be in the same nature "many men"? Usage is hard to change in everything), in the case of the lower nature, if we do not oppose the prevailing usage, we would not err very much, since no harm comes from the mistaken use of the names. But in the case of the divine doctrine the varied use of names is no longer equally free of danger. For here what is small is not small. So we must confess one God, according to the testimony of Scripture, "Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one Lord," even if the name of Godhead extends through the Holy Trinity. I say this according to the account given us in the case of human nature, in which we have learned that we must not extend the name of the nature in plural form.

But we must examine more exactly the very name "Godhead," so that through the meaning lying in the word some help may come toward the clarity of the subject. Most people think that the word "Godhead" is applied particularly to the nature; and as heaven, or the sun, or any other of the elements of the world is signified by its own words, which signify the things beneath them, so too, they say, in the case of the supreme and divine nature, the word "Godhead" has been fitted aptly to what it shows, like a proper name. But we, following the suggestions of Scripture, have learned that the divine nature is unnameable and unspeakable; and we say that every name, whether it has been invented by human nature or handed down by the Scriptures, is interpretive of something understood about the divine nature, but does not contain the meaning of the nature itself. And one would not need much labour to show that this is so.

For the other names, applied to created things, one might find fitted to their subjects even without any etymology, since we are content to mark things in any way by the word applied to them, so that our knowledge of what is marked may be free of confusion. But the names that serve to guide us to the understanding of the Divine each have their own sense contained in them, and you would find no word without some thought among the names more fitting for God. From this it is shown that the divine nature itself is not marked by any of the names, but that something about it is made known through what is said. For we say that the Divine is incorruptible, for example, or powerful, or whatever else it is customary to say. But we find in each of the names a particular meaning, fitting to be understood and said of the divine nature, yet not signifying what the nature is in its essence. For the thing itself, whatever it is, is incorruptible; but the notion of the incorruptible is this, that what is is not dissolved into corruption. So when we said "incorruptible," we said what the nature does not suffer; but what that is which does not suffer corruption, [we did not say]. So too if we say "life-giving," having signified by the name what it does, we did not define in words the one who does it. And by the same reasoning we find all the other names, from the meaning lying in the words more fitting for God, either forbidding us to know what should not be known about the divine nature, or teaching what should be, but not containing an interpretation of the nature itself.

Since, then, perceiving the various activities of the power that lies above us, we fit the names to it from each of the activities known to us, and we have supposed that this too is one activity, the activity of overseeing and seeing, or, as one might say, of beholding, by which it oversees all things and watches over all things, seeing thoughts and penetrating by its power of beholding even to what cannot be seen, we have supposed that "Godhead" (θεότης) has been named from "beholding" (θέα), and that our beholder (θεατής) is called God (θεός) both by usage and by the teaching of the Scriptures. If anyone grants that beholding and seeing are the same, and that God who oversees all things both is and is called the overseer of the universe, let him consider this activity: whether it belongs to one of the persons believed in the Holy Trinity, or whether the power extends through the three. For if the interpretation of "Godhead" is true, and what is seen is called "beheld" and what beholds is called God, then no one of the persons in the Trinity could reasonably be excluded from such a name because of the meaning lying in the word. For Scripture testifies to seeing alike in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. "Behold, O God our protector," says David. From this we learn that seeing is a proper activity of God, in so far as God is understood, from the saying, "Behold, O God." But Jesus too sees the thoughts of those who condemn him because he forgives sins by his own authority. "For Jesus," it says, "seeing their thoughts." And concerning the Spirit Peter says to Ananias: "Why has Satan filled your heart, that you should lie to the Holy Spirit?", showing that the Holy Spirit was a truthful witness and knower of what Ananias had ventured in secret, through whom also the revelation of hidden things came to Peter. For Ananias became a thief of himself, escaping the notice of all, as he thought, and hiding his sin; but the Holy Spirit was at once in Peter and detected that man's mind, dragged down to love of money, and through himself gave Peter to see what was hidden. He would plainly not have done this if he could not behold hidden things.

But someone will say that the construction of the argument does not yet look to what is sought. For even if it were granted that the name "Godhead" is a name common to the nature, it would not thereby have been established that we must not say "gods"; on the contrary, from this we are rather compelled to say "gods." For we find in human usage that not only those who share the same nature, but also any who belong to the same occupation, are not named in the singular when many are mentioned. So we speak of many rhetoricians and geometers, farmers and shoemakers, and all the rest in the same way. And if "Godhead" were a name of nature, it would be more opportune, according to the account given before, to include the three hypostases in the singular and say "one God," because the nature is uncut and indivisible. But since it has been established by what has been said that the name "Godhead" signifies an activity and not a nature, the argument is somehow turned to the opposite by what is being established, so that on this account we ought rather to say "three gods" of those seen in the same activity: as they say one speaks of three philosophers or rhetoricians, or whatever other name comes from an occupation, when those who share in it are more than one.

I have worked these things out with some care, bringing forward the argument of the opponents in reply, so that our doctrine may be made firmer, strengthened by the more laboured objections. So the argument must be taken up again. Since it has been shown to us reasonably by our construction that the word "Godhead" is a name not of nature but of activity, perhaps someone might reasonably give this as the reason why, among men, those who share with one another in the same occupations are numbered and named in the plural, while the Divine is spoken of in the singular, as one God and one Godhead, even though the three hypostases [are not separated] from the meaning that appears in "Godhead." It is because men, even if many are of one activity, each works at the task set before him separately by himself, sharing nothing in his own activity with those who practise the same. For even if the rhetoricians are many, the occupation, being one, has the same name among the many; but those who pursue it each work by himself: this one practises rhetoric on his own, and the other on his own. So among men, since the activity of each in the same occupations is distinct, they are properly named many, each of them being cut off from the others into his own outline by the particular manner of his activity.

But in the case of the divine nature we have not learned that the Father does anything by himself in which the Son does not take part with him, or again that the Son works anything particularly without the Spirit. Rather, every activity that extends from God to creation, and is named according to our manifold notions, sets out from the Father, proceeds through the Son, and is perfected in the Holy Spirit. For this reason the name of the activity is not split into a multitude of those who act, because the concern of each about anything is not separate and particular; but whatever happens, whether of the things that reach to our providential care or to the economy and constitution of the universe, happens through the three, yet what happens is not three things. Let us understand what is said in the case of one particular thing: I mean from the chief of gifts, [life]. All things that have shared in this grace have obtained life. So when we examine from where such a good has come to us, we find, through the guidance of the Scriptures, that it is from the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

But it is not because we posit three persons and names that we reckon three lives to have been given us, one from each of them separately. Rather, the same life is worked by the Father, prepared by the Son, and depends on the will of the Spirit. Since, then, in the likeness of what has been said, the Holy Trinity does not work any activity divided according to the number of the hypostases, but there comes to be one movement and ordering of the good will, from the Father through the Son to the Spirit: as we do not call those who work the one life three life-givers, nor those seen in the same goodness three good beings, nor do we express all the other things in the plural, so neither can we name three Gods those who work this divine, that is, overseeing, power and activity, conjointly and indivisibly through one another, upon us and upon all creation.

For as when we learn from Scripture that the God of the universe judges all the earth, we say that he is the judge of all through the Son; and again, hearing that the Father judges no one, we do not think that Scripture is at war with itself. For the one who judges all the earth does this through the Son, to whom he has given all judgment; and everything done by the Only-begotten has its reference to the Father, so that he is both judge of all and judges no one, because, as has been said, he has given all judgment to the Son, and all the judgment of the Son is not estranged from the Father's will. And no one could reasonably say either that there are two judges, or that one of them is estranged from the authority and power of judgment. So too in the account of the Godhead: Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God; and the Father works the overseeing and beholding power, which we call Godhead, through the Only-begotten, while the Son perfects every power in the Holy Spirit, judging, as Isaiah says, "by the spirit of judgment and the spirit of burning," and working, according to the word of the gospel which he spoke to the Jews: "But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God," embracing from one part every kind of benefit, through the unity of the activity. For those through whom the one thing is worked by one another, the name of the activity cannot be divided among many.

For since the account of the overseeing and beholding power is one in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, as was said before, setting out from the Father as from a fountain, worked by the Son, and perfecting the grace in the power of the Spirit, no activity is divided according to the hypostases, being accomplished by each particularly and separately, apart from being seen together with the others; but all providence and care and oversight of the universe, both of what is in the perceptible creation and of what is in the nature above the world, which preserves beings, corrects what goes wrong, and instructs what goes right, is one and not three, being achieved by

the Holy Trinity, yet not cut threefold according to the number of the persons seen in the faith, as though each of the works, seen by itself, belonged either to the Father alone, or particularly to the Only-begotten, or to the Holy Spirit separately. Rather, as the apostle says, the one and the same Spirit distributes the goods to each individually; but the movement of the good from the Spirit is not without beginning; we find that the power conceived before this movement, which is the only-begotten God, makes all things, without whom nothing comes into being; and again this very fountain of goods [proceeds] from the Father's [will].

If, then, every good thing and name, depending on the power and will that are without beginning, is brought to perfection in the power of the Spirit through the only-begotten God timelessly and without interval, no extension of time occurring or being conceived in the movement of the divine will from the Father through the Son to the Spirit; and if Godhead is one of the good names and notions, then the name could not reasonably be spread out into a multitude, since the unity of the activity forbids the plural count. And as the Saviour of all men, especially of believers, has been named one by the apostle, and no one from this word says either that the Son does not save those who believe or that salvation comes to those who share in it without the Spirit; but the God over all becomes the Saviour of all, the Son working salvation in the grace of the Spirit, and yet not for this reason are three saviours named by Scripture, even though salvation is confessed to be from the Holy Trinity: so neither are there three Gods according to the meaning given to "Godhead," even if such a name fits the Holy Trinity.

To fight against those who object that one must not understand Godhead as an activity seems to me not at all necessary for the present construction of the argument. For we, believing that the divine nature is boundless and incomprehensible, conceive no comprehension of it, but declare that the nature is to be understood as infinite in every way. And what is wholly infinite is not limited in one respect and unlimited in another; infinity escapes limit in every respect. So what is outside limit is surely not limited even by a name. So that the notion of the unlimited may remain in the case of the divine nature, we say that the Divine is above every name; and Godhead is one of the names. So the same thing cannot both be a name and be thought to be above every name.

But if the opponents prefer that the meaning is not of activity but of nature, we shall run back to the argument at the beginning: that usage mistakenly brings the name of the nature to signify a multitude, since in truth neither diminution nor increase comes to the nature when it is seen in more or fewer. For only those things are numbered by combination that are seen in their own outline; and outline is grasped in the surface of a body, in size, in place, and in difference of shape and colour.

But what is seen outside these escapes outline by such means; and what is not outlined is not numbered; [and what is not numbered cannot be seen in multitude]. So we say that gold too, even if it is minted into many coins, both is and is called one; but we name many coins and many staters, finding no increase of the nature of gold in the multitude of staters. For this reason gold is said to be "much" when it is seen in a greater mass, or in vessels, or in coins; but it is not named "many golds" because of the quantity of the material, unless someone speaks of "many golds" as one speaks of Darics, the staters, in which case not the material but the coins have taken on the meaning of multitude; for properly one should call these not "golds" but "golden pieces." As, then, the golden staters are many but the gold is one, so too those shown individually in the nature of man are many, such as Peter and James and John, but the man in them is one.

And if Scripture extends the name in the plural sense, saying, "Men swear by the greater," and "sons of men," and the like, we must know that, using the usage of the prevailing speech, it does not lay down a law that words must be used in this way or that, nor does it go through these matters giving technical teaching about words; but it uses language according to the prevailing usage, looking only to this, that the word may be profitable to those who receive it, being in no way precise about wording in cases where no harm to the sense arises from the words. It would be long to list from Scripture the constructions of speech that look like solecisms to prove what has been said. But where there is danger that something of the truth may be harmed, then carelessness and indifference are no longer found in the words of Scripture. For this reason it allows men to be named in the plural, because no one by such a form of the word [is led] in his suppositions to a multitude of humanities, nor thinks that many human natures are signified because the name of the nature has been expressed in the plural. But the word "God" it carefully expresses in the singular form, taking forethought for this, that different natures may not be brought into the divine essence through the plural meaning of "gods." So it says, "The Lord our God is one Lord"; yet it also proclaims the only-begotten God by the name of Godhead, and does not break up the one into a dual meaning, so as to name the Father and the Son two Gods, (even though each [is proclaimed God by the saints: God is the Father, and God is the Son]); but God is one in the same proclamation, because no difference either of nature or of activity is seen in the Godhead.

For if the nature had varied in the Holy Trinity, according to the supposition of those who are deceived, the number would consequently have been extended to a multitude of gods, divided along with the otherness of the essence of the subjects. But since the divine, simple, and unchangeable nature rejects all otherness of essence, so as to be one, it does not admit the meaning of multitude in itself. But as it is called one nature, so all the other names are expressed in the singular: God, good, holy, Saviour, just, judge, and any other of the names fitting for God that is understood, whether one says it looks to nature or to activity.

If anyone should slander the argument, as though, by not admitting a difference of nature, it were establishing a mixture and confusion of the hypostases, we shall make this defence against such a charge: that while confessing the invariability of the nature, we do not deny the difference of cause and caused, in which alone we understand the one to be distinguished from the other, by believing that one is the cause and the other is from the cause. And in what is from the cause we again understand another difference. For one is directly from the first, and the other through the one that is directly from the first; so that the being only-begotten remains undoubted in the case of the Son, and there is no doubt that the Spirit is from the Father, the mediation of the Son both keeping for him his being only-begotten and not excluding the Spirit from his natural relation to the Father.

In speaking of cause and of what is from the cause, we do not signify nature by these names; for no one would give the same account of cause and of nature. Rather, we show the difference in the manner of being. For when we said that one is caused and the other is without cause, we did not separate the nature by the account of cause, but showed only that neither is the Son unbegotten nor the Father by begetting. We must first believe that something is, and then inquire how what is believed is. So the account of what it is is one thing, and the account of how it is another. To say that something is unbegotten suggests how it is; but what it is is not shown by this word. If you asked a farmer about a tree, whether it was planted or grew of itself, and he answered either that the tree was not planted or that it came from planting, did he show its nature by his answer? Not at all. By saying how it is, he left the account of its nature unclear and uninterpreted. So here too, learning that he is unbegotten, we have been taught how we should understand him to be; but what he is we have not heard through the word.

Since, then, we speak of such a difference in the Holy Trinity, believing that one is the cause and the other is from the cause, we could no longer be accused of fusing the account of the hypostases in the community of the nature. Since, then, the account of the cause distinguishes the hypostases of the Holy Trinity, holding that one is without cause and the other from the cause, while the divine nature is grasped as invariable and indivisible by every notion, for this reason the Godhead is properly one, and God one, and all the other names fitting for God are expressed in the singular.