On the Trinity 14.16–15.4

But those who, when reminded, turn to the Lord from that deformity by which they were conformed to this world through worldly desires, are re-formed by him, hearing the apostle say, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be re-formed in the newness of your mind”; so that that image may begin to be re-formed by him by whom it was formed. For it cannot re-form itself, as it could deform itself. He says also elsewhere: “Be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, who is created according to God in justice and holiness of truth.” What he says, “created according to God,” is said in another place, “in the image of God.” But by sinning it lost justice and holiness of truth; for which reason this image became deformed and discolored; it receives it back when it is re-formed and renewed. And when he says, “in the spirit of your mind,” he did not mean two things to be understood there, as though the mind were one thing and the spirit of the mind another; but because every mind is a spirit, but not every spirit is a mind. For God too is a spirit, who cannot be renewed, because neither can he grow old. A spirit is also spoken of in man which is not the mind, to which images like bodies belong; of which he speaks to the Corinthians, where he says, “But if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful.” For he says this when what is said is not understood; because it cannot even be said unless the images of bodily sounds precede the sound of the mouth in the thought of the spirit. The soul of man too is called spirit; whence in the Gospel, “And bowing his head he gave up his spirit,” by which the death of the body, the soul departing, is signified. The spirit of a beast too is spoken of, as is most plainly written in Solomon's book Ecclesiastes, where he says, “Who knows whether the spirit of the sons of men goes upward, and whether the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth?” It is written also in Genesis, where it says that all flesh died in the flood which had in it the spirit of life. Wind too is called spirit, a thing most plainly bodily; whence that in the Psalms, “Fire, hail, snow, ice, spirit of the storm.” Since, then, spirit is spoken of in so many ways, by “the spirit of the mind” he meant that spirit which is called mind. As the same apostle also says, “in the stripping off of the body of the flesh.” He certainly did not mean two things to be understood, as though the flesh were one thing and the body of the flesh another; but because body is the name of many things of which none is flesh (for there are many bodies besides flesh, heavenly bodies and earthly bodies), he said “body of the flesh,” meaning the body which is flesh. So, then, by “the spirit of the mind” he means the spirit which is the mind. Elsewhere too he named the image even more plainly, giving the same command in other words: “Stripping off,” he says, “the old man with his deeds, put on the new man, who is being renewed in the knowledge of God according to the image of him who created him.” What we read there, then, “Put on the new man, who is created according to God,” is in this place, “Put on the new man, who is being renewed according to the image of him who created him.” There he says “according to God”; here, “according to the image of him who created him.” And in place of what he put there, “in justice and holiness of truth,” he put here, “in the knowledge of God.” This renewal and re-forming of the mind, then, takes place according to God, or according to the image of God. But it is said to be “according to God” so that it may not be thought to take place according to another creature; and “according to the image of God,” so that this renewal may be understood to take place in that thing where the image of God is, that is, in the mind. Just as we say that one who departs from the body faithful and just is dead according to the body, not according to the spirit. For what do we mean by “dead according to the body” except dead in body or by the body, not in soul or by the soul? Or if we say, “He is beautiful according to the body,” or, “strong according to the body,” not according to the mind, what else is this than “He is beautiful or strong in body, not in mind”? And we speak in this way innumerable times. Let us not, then, so understand “according to the image of him who created him” as though the image according to which it is renewed were another than the very image which is renewed.

Certainly this renewal does not take place in one moment of conversion itself, as that renewal in baptism takes place in one moment by the remission of all sins; for not even one sin, however small, remains that is not forgiven. But just as it is one thing to be free of fever and another to recover from the weakness which the fever has caused; and again it is one thing to take a weapon fixed in the body out of it, another to heal the wound it has made by a second treatment: so the first treatment is to remove the cause of the sickness, which is done through the pardon of all sins; the second is to heal the sickness itself, which is done gradually by making progress in the renewal of this image. These two are shown in the Psalm, where we read, “Who is gracious to all your iniquities,” which is done in baptism; then follows, “Who heals all your sicknesses,” which is done by daily advances, when this image is being renewed. Of this the apostle spoke most plainly, saying: “Even if our outer man is perishing, yet the inner man is being renewed day by day.” And it is renewed in the knowledge of God, that is, in justice and holiness of truth, as the apostolic testimonies which I mentioned a little earlier have it. He, then, who is renewed day by day by making progress in the knowledge of God and in justice and holiness of truth, transfers his love from temporal things to eternal, from visible to intelligible, from carnal to spiritual; and he diligently presses on to rein in and lessen desire for the former, and to bind himself to the latter by love. But he does this only so far as he is helped by God. For it is God's word: “Without me you can do nothing.” Whomever the last day of this life finds holding the faith of the Mediator in this progress and advance, he will be received by the holy angels, to be led to God whom he worshiped and to be made perfect by him, and at the end of the world he will receive an incorruptible body, not for punishment but for glory. For in this image the likeness of God will be perfect then, when the sight of God is perfect. Of this the apostle Paul says: “We see now through a mirror in an enigma, but then face to face.” He says likewise, “But we, beholding the glory of the Lord with unveiled face, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord”: this is what happens day by day in those who make good progress.

But the apostle John says: “Beloved, now we are sons of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.” From this it appears that the full likeness of God will come about in this image of God then, when it has received the full sight of him. Although this could seem to have been said by the apostle John also of the immortality of the body. For in this too we shall be like God, but only like the Son, because he alone in the Trinity took a body, in which he died and rose again, and carried it to the heights above. For this too is called the image of the Son of God, in which we shall have an immortal body like him, being conformed in this respect not to the image of the Father or of the Holy Spirit, but only of the Son, because of him alone we read, and accept with most sound faith, “The Word was made flesh.” For this reason the apostle says: “Those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.” Firstborn, certainly, from the dead, according to the same apostle, by which death his flesh was sown in dishonor and rose in glory. According to this image of the Son, to which we are conformed in the body through immortality, we also do what the same apostle says, “As we have borne the image of the earthly, let us bear also the image of him who is from heaven”: that is, that we who were mortal according to Adam may hold by true faith and sure and firm hope that we shall be immortal according to Christ. For so we can now bear the same image, not yet in sight but in faith, not yet in reality but in hope. For the apostle was speaking of the resurrection of the body when he said these things.

But that image of which it was said, “Let us make man in our image and likeness,” since it was not said “in mine” or “in yours,” we believe man was made in the image of the Trinity, and we have grasped it by as much investigation as we could. And therefore what the apostle John says, “We shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is,” is rather to be understood according to this image; because he said it also of him of whom he had said, “We are sons of God.” And the immortality of the flesh will be perfected in that moment of the resurrection of which the apostle Paul says, “In the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, and the dead will rise incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” For in that very twinkling of an eye, before the judgment, the spiritual body will rise in power, in incorruption, in glory, which is now sown in weakness, corruption, and dishonor as an animal body. But the image which is renewed in the spirit of the mind in the knowledge of God, not outwardly but inwardly, day by day, will be perfected by the very sight which will then be, after the judgment, face to face, but now makes progress through a mirror in an enigma. It is on account of its perfection that we must understand it was said, “We shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.” For this gift will be given to us then, when it is said, “Come, blessed of my Father, take possession of the kingdom prepared for you.” For then the ungodly will be taken away, so that he may not see the glory of the Lord, when those on the left will go into eternal punishment, while those on the right go into eternal life. “And this,” as the Truth says, “is eternal life, that they may know you,” he says, “the one true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” This contemplative wisdom, which I think is properly called wisdom in the holy writings, as distinguished from knowledge, the wisdom only of man, which indeed he has only from him by participation in whom the rational and intellectual mind can become truly wise, Cicero commends at the end of the dialogue Hortensius, saying: “If we consider these things day and night, and sharpen our understanding, which is the mind's eye, and take care that it never grows dull, that is, if we live in philosophy, we have great hope that, either, if this by which we perceive and think is mortal and perishable, we shall have a pleasant setting when our human duties are done, and an extinction not unpleasant, and as it were a rest from life; or, if, as the ancient philosophers, the greatest and by far the most famous, held, we have eternal and divine souls, then we must think that the more these have always kept to their course, that is, to reason and the desire of inquiry, and the less they have mixed and entangled themselves in the vices and errors of men, the easier will be their ascent and return to heaven.” Then, adding this very conclusion and ending his discourse by repeating it, he says: “Therefore, to end my speech at last, if we wish either to be extinguished peacefully when we have lived in these pursuits, or to move without delay from this home to another not a little better, we must put all our effort and care into these studies.” Here I wonder that a man of such genius promises to men living in philosophy, which makes happy by the contemplation of truth, a pleasant setting when their human duties are done, if this by which we perceive and think is mortal and perishable: as if what dies and perishes were something we did not love, or rather something we bitterly hated, so that its setting could be pleasant to us. But he had not learned this from the philosophers whom he praises highly; this opinion smacked of that New Academy, where it pleased him to doubt even the most manifest things. But from the philosophers, the greatest and by far the most famous, as he himself confesses, he had received that souls are eternal. And eternal souls are not unfittingly roused by this exhortation to be found in their course when the end of this life comes, that is, in reason and the desire of inquiry, and to mix and entangle themselves less in the vices and errors of men, so that their return to God may be easier. But this course, which is set in the love and investigation of truth, is not enough for the wretched, that is, for all mortals with this reason alone, without faith in the Mediator; which I have taken care to show, as far as I could, in the earlier books of this work, above all in the fourth and the thirteenth.

Wishing to exercise the reader, in the things that have been made, toward knowing him by whom they were made, we have now arrived at his image, which is man, in that by which he excels the other animals, that is, reason or understanding, and whatever else can be said of the rational or intellectual soul that pertains to the thing called the mind (mens) or rational spirit (animus). By this name some authors of the Latin language, in their own manner of speaking, distinguish that which excels in man and is not in the beast from the soul (anima), which is in the beast too. If, then, we seek anything above this nature, and seek truly, it is God, a nature, that is, not created but creating. Whether this is a Trinity we must now show, not only to those who believe, by the authority of divine Scripture, but also to those who understand, by some reasoning, if we can. Why I said “if we can” the matter itself will show better once it has begun to be examined by argument.

For God himself whom we seek will help, as I hope, so that our labor may not be fruitless, and that we may understand how it was said in the holy Psalm: “Let the heart of those who seek the Lord rejoice; seek the Lord and be strengthened; seek his face always.” For it seems that what is always sought is never found; and how then will the heart of those who seek rejoice, and not rather be saddened, if they cannot find what they seek? For it does not say, “Let the heart of those who find rejoice,” but “of those who seek the Lord.” And yet that the Lord God can be found while he is sought the prophet Isaiah testifies, when he says: “Seek the Lord, and as soon as you have found him, call upon him; and when he has drawn near to you, let the wicked forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his thoughts.” If, then, when sought he can be found, why was it said, “Seek his face always”? Is he perhaps to be sought even when found? For in this way things incomprehensible are to be sought, so that he who has been able to find how incomprehensible is what he was seeking may not think he has found nothing. Why then does he so seek, if he comprehends that what he seeks is incomprehensible, unless because he must not cease as long as he makes progress in the very search for incomprehensible things, and becomes better and better by seeking so great a good, which is both sought in order to be found and found in order to be sought? For it is sought that it may be found more sweetly, and found that it may be sought more eagerly. In this sense one can take what is said in the book Ecclesiasticus, that Wisdom says: “Those who eat me will hunger still, and those who drink me will thirst still.” For they eat and drink because they find; and because they hunger and thirst they still seek. Faith seeks, understanding finds; for which reason the prophet says, “Unless you believe, you will not understand.” And again, understanding still seeks him whom it finds; for “God looked down upon the sons of men,” as is sung in the holy Psalm, “to see if there is anyone who understands or seeks God.” For this, then, man ought to have understanding: that he may seek God.

We shall, then, have lingered long enough among the things God has made, that through them he who made them might be known: “For his invisible things, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood through the things that are made.” Hence those are rebuked in the book of Wisdom who “from the good things that are seen could not know him who is, nor, attending to the works, recognized the craftsman; but supposed either fire, or wind, or the swift air, or the circle of the stars, or the violence of waters, or the lights of heaven to be gods, the rulers of the world. If, delighted by their beauty, they supposed these to be gods, let them know how much better their Lord is; for the author of beauty created them. Or if they marveled at their power and working, let them understand from these how much mightier is he who established them. For from the greatness of the beauty and of the creature the Creator of these could knowably be seen.” I have set down these words from the book of Wisdom so that none of the faithful may think that I have sought vainly and idly in the creature first, through certain trinities of its own kind, step by step as it were, until I came to the mind of man, the traces of that supreme Trinity which we seek when we seek God.

But since the necessity of discussing and reasoning through fourteen books has compelled us to say many things, which we cannot view all at once so as to refer them by swift thought to what we wish to grasp, I will do, as far as I can with the Lord's help, the following: whatever I have brought to knowledge by argument in each volume I will gather briefly, with the argument removed, and set down as under one view of the mind, not the way each thing persuaded, but the very things of which we were persuaded; so that what follows may not be so far from what preceded that looking at what follows causes us to forget what preceded, or, if it does, that what has slipped away may quickly be recovered by rereading.

In the first book the unity and equality of that supreme Trinity is shown according to the holy Scriptures. In the second, third, and fourth, the same; but the question of the sending of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, carefully treated, made three books; and it was shown that the one sent is not therefore less than the sender because the one sent and the other was sent, since the Trinity, which is equal in all things, and equally unchangeable and invisible in its nature and present everywhere, works inseparably. In the fifth, for the sake of those to whom the substance of the Father and the Son seems not to be the same because they think that everything said of God is said according to substance, and who therefore contend that begetting and being begotten, or being begotten and unbegotten, since they are different, are different substances, it is shown that not everything said of God is said according to substance, as he is called good and great according to substance, and whatever else is said of him with respect to himself; but that some things are also said relatively, that is, not with respect to himself but with respect to something that he is not, as he is called Father with respect to the Son, or Lord with respect to the creature that serves him; and that where something is said relatively, that is, with respect to something he is not, and even in time, as in “Lord, you have become our refuge,” nothing happens to him by which he is changed, but he remains entirely unchangeable in his nature or essence. In the sixth, how Christ was called by the apostle's mouth “the power of God and the wisdom of God” is so discussed that the same question is deferred to be treated more carefully: whether he from whom Christ was begotten is not himself wisdom, but only the father of his own wisdom, or whether wisdom begot wisdom. But whichever of these were so, in this book too the equality of the Trinity appeared, and that God is not threefold but a Trinity; nor are the Father and the Son something double compared with a single Holy Spirit, since there not even three are anything more than one of them. It was also discussed how one may understand what Bishop Hilary said: “Eternity in the Father, form in the Image, use in the Gift.” In the seventh, the question that had been deferred is explained, so that God who begot the Son is not only the Father of his power and wisdom but himself power and wisdom, and so also the Holy Spirit; and yet they are not together three powers or three wisdoms, but one power and one wisdom, as one God and one essence. Then it was asked how they are called one essence, three persons, or by some Greeks one essence, three substances; and it was found that this is said from the necessity of speech, so that they might be expressed by some one name when it is asked what the three are whom we truly confess to be three, namely the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. In the eighth, it is made clear by reasoning also to those who understand that in the substance of truth not only is the Father not greater than the Son, but neither are both together anything greater than the Holy Spirit alone, nor any two in the same Trinity anything greater than one, nor all three together anything greater than each singly. Then, through the truth that is beheld when understood, through the supreme good from which is all good, and through the justice for which a just mind is loved even by a mind not yet just, I pointed the way to understanding, as far as possible, the nature not only incorporeal but also unchangeable which is God; and through love, which in the holy Scriptures is called God, through which the Trinity too began in some way to appear to those who understand, as the lover, what is loved, and love. In the ninth, the argument came to the image of God, which is man according to the mind; and in it a certain trinity is found, namely the mind, the knowledge by which it knows itself, and the love by which it loves itself and its knowledge; and these three are shown to be equal to one another and of one essence. In the tenth, this same subject was treated more carefully and subtly, and brought to the point that a more evident trinity of the mind was found, namely in memory, understanding, and will. But since this too was discovered, that the mind could never be such as not to remember itself, understand itself, and love itself, although it did not always think of itself, and that when it did think of itself it did not in the same thought distinguish itself from bodily things, the argument about the Trinity, of which this is the image, was deferred, so that a trinity might be found even in bodily things seen, and the reader's attention might be exercised more distinctly in it. In the eleventh, therefore, the sense of the eyes was chosen, so that what was found in it might be recognized also in the other four bodily senses, though not stated; and thus a trinity of the outer man appeared, first in the things seen from outside: from the body that is seen, the form thence impressed on the gaze of the one seeing, and the intention of the will joining both. But these three were plainly neither equal to one another nor of one substance. Then in the mind (animus) itself another trinity was found, brought in as it were from the things perceived from outside, in which the same three appeared to be of one substance: the image of the body that is in memory, the forming from it when the gaze of the one thinking is turned to it, and the intention of the will joining both. But this trinity was found to belong to the outer man, because it was brought in from bodies perceived from outside. In the twelfth it seemed necessary to distinguish wisdom from knowledge, and in that which is properly called knowledge, because it is lower, first to seek a certain trinity of its own kind, which, though it already belongs to the inner man, is not yet to be called or thought the image of God. And this is done in the thirteenth book through the commendation of the Christian faith. In the fourteenth, the true wisdom of man is discussed, that is, the wisdom given by God's gift in participation of God himself, which is distinct from knowledge; and the argument reaches the point that a trinity appears in the image of God, which is man according to the mind, which “is renewed in the knowledge of God according to the image of him who created” man in his own image, and so receives wisdom, where there is contemplation of eternal things.

Let us, then, now seek the Trinity which is God in those eternal, incorporeal, and unchangeable things themselves, in the perfect contemplation of which a happy life, which can only be eternal, is promised us. For not only does the authority of the divine Books proclaim that God exists, but the whole nature of things itself, which surrounds us and to which we also belong, proclaims that it has a most excellent Maker, who has given us a mind and natural reason, by which we see that living things are to be preferred to non-living, sentient to non-sentient, understanding to non-understanding, immortal to mortal, powerful to powerless, just to unjust, beautiful to deformed, good to evil, incorruptible to corruptible, unchangeable to changeable, invisible to visible, incorporeal to corporeal, happy to wretched. And therefore, since we set the Creator above created things without any doubt, we must confess that he lives supremely, perceives and understands all things, and cannot die, be corrupted, or be changed; and that he is not a body but a spirit, of all the most powerful, most just, most beautiful, best, and most happy.