On the Holy Spirit (in Jerome's Latin translation) 11–22

God, the giver of good things, will render the hope he promised in the power of the Holy Spirit to those who have him; he fills with joy and peace those who, possessing an untroubled and calm mind, have hearts that are glad and tranquil from every storm of disturbance. And those who have obtained the good things just mentioned in the power of the Holy Spirit will also attain right faith in the mystery of the Trinity. In another place of the same epistle he says: "The kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit." By asserting that righteousness, that is, all virtue, and the peace we spoke of above, are joined to the joy of God in the Holy Spirit, he proves most plainly to those who could hear him that these good things are nothing other than the substance of the Holy Spirit. Since, then, these good things come to men from the bounty of the Holy Spirit, the calling of the Gentiles, which he brought in through the teaching of the Gospel, is made acceptable and sanctified in the Holy Spirit; for in this too the Holy Spirit, making them sanctified and accepted, is the substance of God's good things. And one who is full of him does all things according to reason, teaching rightly, living blamelessly, showing signs and wonders truly and perfectly; for he has the strength of the Holy Spirit as a treasure supplying him and the cause of the fullness of all good things. Peter, the disciple of the Lord Jesus, knew that the bestowal of the Holy Spirit is the nature of God's gifts. For he says to those who reproached him for going in to Cornelius: "If, then, God gave them the same grace, giving the Holy Spirit, as he did to us at the beginning, who was I that I could hinder the Lord?" And further, to his own: "God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us, and he made no distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith." With this sense agrees also what is said in many places, that the Holy Spirit is given by the Lord: "Jacob my servant, I will uphold him; Israel my chosen, my soul will receive him; I have put my Spirit upon him"; and again: "Who gives breath to the people upon it," no doubt the earth, "and spirit to those who walk on it." We showed above that the Spirit of God is not one and the Holy Spirit another. Paul also says: "The love of God has been poured out in your hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to you"; and that saying: "How much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?" This Spirit is also said to have been poured out by God upon all flesh, so that those who receive him may prophesy and see visions, according to Joel, who speaks in the person of God: "I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters will prophesy." For the pouring out of the Spirit is the cause of prophesying and of seeing the meaning and the beauty of truth. The very word "pouring out" proves the uncreated substance of the Holy Spirit. For God does not send an angel or another creature in this way: does he say, I will pour out of my angel, or principality, or throne, or dominion? This expression fits only things that are shared by others, as we said now and a little earlier of the love of God, which has been poured out in the hearts of those who have received the Holy Spirit: "The love of God has been poured out in your hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to you." The Saviour too, since he also is one who is received, is said to be poured out like ointment: "Your name is ointment poured out." For just as ointment held in a vessel has the substance of its fragrance but is prevented from spreading far because it is shut up inside the vessel, but when the vessel is poured out it sends its sweet smell far off, so the fragrant name of Christ, before his coming, was found only among the people of Israel, shut up, as it were, in the vessel of Judaea: "God is known in Judaea," it says, "his name is great in Israel." But when the Saviour shone forth in his flesh, he extended his name to the whole earth, or rather to every creature, fulfilling what is written: "How wonderful is your name in all the earth!" To which the Apostle accordingly says: "For no other name has been given under heaven by which we must be saved"; and the Psalmist says to the Lord: "You have magnified your holy name above all things." Then was fulfilled: "Your name is ointment poured out." The word "pouring out" signifies a generous and rich abundance of the gift.

So when one or two people somewhere receive the Holy Spirit, it is not said, "I will pour out of my Spirit", but only when the gift of the Holy Spirit overflows to all nations. And to Titus the Apostle recalls the salvation brought about for the Gentiles: "Not by works of righteousness that we have done, but through the washing of the second regeneration and the renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out upon us richly." Here too the word "pouring out" shows the generous bestowal of the Spirit. From all this we are taught that the substance of the Holy Spirit is one that is received, and therefore uncreated. He calls a substance "received" which is taken in by many and gives them a share in itself; but a "receiving" substance is one that is filled by communion with another substance, and, receiving something else, is not itself received by another. For to what is received, unchangeableness follows at once, and to what is unchangeable, eternity; just as, on the contrary, to what receives, changeableness follows, and to what is changeable, createdness. Nothing among creatures, then, is unchangeable, and for that reason nothing is everlasting. Not only is the rational element in men changeable and created; the same changeableness is found in all creatures. For the divine oracles show the changes and falls of angels too. For although the multitude of angels and of the other excellent powers persevere in blessedness and holiness, yet since beings that have the same nature have been changed, it is clearly shown that they remain in their first state not through the unchangeableness of their substance but through more careful service in the Lord. For beings of equal rank cannot have different natures. Since the whole human race is mortal, individual men are mortal; so conversely, if any of the higher beings are immortal, there is no doubt that all those placed in the same genus and species are immortal.

Since this is so, if even one angel has been shown to be changeable, all will be changeable, even if those persevering in blessedness have not changed; just as all human bodies are divisible, though not all are divided, since some of them, having undergone division, show the nature of the rest that are like them. With this set out, the Holy Spirit is shown to be of another substance than both the visible and the invisible creatures. If this is true, some most impiously number the Holy Spirit among all things, saying that in the statement that all things were made by God through the Word, the making of the Holy Spirit is also signified. For the Holy Spirit has been shown to be not one among all things but, by his substance, something other, beyond all things, on both counts. For if creation, as we showed above, is divided into corporeal and incorporeal, and the Holy Spirit was created, he will certainly be either a visible or an invisible creature, that is, corporeal or incorporeal. But he will not be a body at all, as we said before, since he teaches and gives knowledge and is received by the mind and the soul. Nor will he be an invisible creature, as we argued a little earlier. That is why the Apostle too, in the epistle he wrote to the Hebrews, shows that he is other than all angels, saying: "To which of the angels did he ever say, Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet? Are they not all ministering spirits, sent out to serve for the sake of those who were to receive salvation?" And after other things: "How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? Having first been spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who heard, God bearing witness with signs and wonders and various powers and distributions of the Holy Spirit according to his will." When he says, "To which of the angels?" it is taken as if he said, "To none", signifying by the name of angel the substance of all invisible creatures. For to none of the angels, nor to any other rational creature, did God say, "Sit at my right hand." So the statement declares in general that "Sit at my right hand" was said to no creature; and this is said of creation in general. And speaking of all invisible creatures, he says that they are ministering spirits; which is why he added: "Are they not all ministering spirits, sent out to serve?" For although not all invisible creatures individually have been sent, yet since others of the same kind and rank have been sent, in a way they too are sent potentially, sharing the same substance as those sent. Just as, then, the Lord is other than all creatures, the Lord through whom that great salvation first began to be spoken, which the Apostle does not want us to neglect when he says, "How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation, which, having first been spoken through the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard?", and as God, who bears witness to this salvation with signs and wonders, is other than all the ministering spirits, so also the Holy Spirit, by whose distributions according to his will God bears witness, distributing him not by cutting him into parts but by communion to those to whom he has decided to give him, is himself of a substance other than those among whom he is poured out and shared.

Since, then, we have shown according to the sense of the Scriptures that the Holy Spirit is other, beyond all creation, some who want to show that he was created use, in vain and indeed impiously, the testimony that reports that all things were made through the Word, so that the eternal substance too would be included in "all". And since, to prove his creation, they also appropriate the prophetic saying in which God says, "I create spirit", we must show that in this too they are wholly strangers to the understanding of the truth. For the prophet's statement was not about the Holy Spirit, as is understood from the order and context of the words. The prophet Amos says in the person of God: "Prepare to call upon your God, O Israel; for I am he who makes firm the thunder and creates spirit and announces his Christ to men, who makes the dawn and the mist and goes up on the high places of the earth: the Lord God Almighty is his name." For God, who had said beforehand that he founds and makes spirit, also said that he makes the thunder firm and makes the dawn and the mists. If, then, we keep to the narrative already given, that is, to thunder and dawn and clouds, we must keep the same order of narrative in the case of spirit too, so that what God says is this: That you may call upon me, who am God, who provide for all things, who am creator of all, who make firm the thunder and found the wind, who make the dawn and the mist for certain benefits of men: prepare to call upon me, O Israel, so that when you are prepared to call upon me and have prayed to me, who appoint the things mentioned, you may enjoy favourable seasons and the bestowal of other good things, while I supply you year by year with everything according to the order of nature, so that the year may run fruitfully, the hours pass in their proper spaces, the thunder roar in its season, and a healthy breeze blow with timely winds. But if the thunder and the dawn and the mist and the creation of the spirit are understood allegorically, they will signify not the substance of the thing but a figurative interpretation.

But if, on the other side, someone objects that this is clearly said of the Holy Spirit because what follows is added to the creation of the spirit, "and announces his Christ to all men" (in the Hebrew it reads, "announces his speech to man", namely that he who is creator of all himself also inspires the prophets and through them makes his will known to men), the answer to this too is that certain heretics falsely claim another, besides the Creator, as the Lord and Father of the Saviour, most impiously preaching this; and they do not foresee that their wicked supposition is struck down by God, who says: I, who make firm the thunder and create the wind and make and govern the other parts of the world, announce my Christ to men. For this work of my providence is above all my works, that I should be the cause not only of outward things but also of those that serve the profit of the soul and the benefit of the mind. I think that the saying "I create spirit" is put as if it said "creating the wind". For God by his ordering leads these blasts, which are produced by the movement of the air, according to what we read elsewhere: "Who brings out the winds from his storehouses." And it is well that in the sentence itself he does not say, "who created", but "who creates spirit". For if the statement were about the substance of the Holy Spirit, he would certainly have said "who created"; for he does not always create the same thing. But here, consistently, it is said of the wind, "who creates", because the winds were not made once for all, but in their very existence are made every day. Nor is it without reason that the created spirit is now named without the article, which in Greek signifies singularity, since it is not holy; whereas the Holy Spirit is almost always named with the article, as in αὐτὸ τὸ Πνεῦμα, that is, "the Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit"; and elsewhere, τὸ ζῳοποιοῦν, that is, "he it is who gives life". And again: "So also no one has known the things of God except τὸ Πνεῦμα," that is, "the Spirit of God": τὸ γὰρ Πνεῦμα, that is, "for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God." And there are many other passages that could be excerpted from the sacred Scriptures. Where the Holy Spirit is rarely named without the article, it must be understood that he is named with an addition signifying his greatness. He is indeed sometimes named without the article when not he himself but participation in him is shown, as for example "the spirit of Elijah" and "walk by the Spirit", and any similar sayings.

Since, then, from what I have recalled and from many other things it has been shown that the Holy Spirit is not a creature, and he is nowhere numbered among created things but always placed with the Father and the Son, let us now see what lack of difference he has from each of them. At the end of the second epistle he writes to the Corinthians, Paul says: "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit be always with you all." The present passage shows that there is one reception of the Trinity, since one who has received the grace of Christ has it both through the ministry of the Father and through the bestowal of the Holy Spirit. For it is given by God the Father and by Jesus Christ, according to the saying, "Grace to you and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ", the Father not giving one grace and the Saviour another. For he describes it as given by the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, made complete by the communion of the Holy Spirit. For the Spirit himself is called grace, according to the saying: "And outraging the Spirit of grace, by whom he was sanctified." In Zechariah too God promises that he will pour out, that is, most abundantly bestow on Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and mercy. For when someone has received the grace of the Holy Spirit, he will have it as given by God the Father and by Jesus Christ our Lord. Since, then, there is one grace of the Father and the Son, made complete by the working of the Holy Spirit, the Trinity is shown to be of one substance. In another place too: "The love of God be with you all," which is both given and confirmed by the Trinity. For the Saviour says: "He who hears my words and keeps them, he it is who loves me; and he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him." For the Saviour's love toward those who are loved is not one thing and the Father's love another. For God loves unto salvation, since "God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." Likewise the Son, who is life, loves those whom he wants to become better, so as to give them life and salvation. That is why he says that he loves the one who is loved by the Father. And of him it is set down in the prophet: "And he himself will save them, because he loved them."

That this love is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, as are joy and peace, which are supplied by the Father and the Son, the Apostle testifies, saying: "The fruit of the Spirit is joy, peace, love." This love has been poured out in the hearts of believers through the Holy Spirit: "For the love of God," he says, "has been poured out in your hearts in the Holy Spirit." For everyone who has communion with the Holy Spirit has communion by participation in him, according to the saying: "And the communion of the Holy Spirit be always with you all." And in another place: "If there is any communion of the Spirit." When he has the wisdom and word of God and truth in all things, he will also have fellowship in holiness in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit: "God is faithful, through whom you were called into the communion of his Son." John too writes of the Father: "If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have communion with him." And again: "Our communion is with the Father and his Son Jesus Christ." Whoever, then, has communion with the Holy Spirit at once has communion with the Father and the Son. And one who has the love of the Father has it from the Son, bestowed through the Holy Spirit. And one who shares in the grace of Jesus Christ has the same grace, given by the Father through the Holy Spirit. In all things it is proved that the working of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit is the same. And those whose working is one have also one substance; for things that are consubstantial (ὁμοούσια) with the same substance have the same workings, and things that are of another substance, unlike in substance (ἀνομοούσια), have discordant and different workings.

The unity of the Trinity is taught not only from what we have set out but from countless other passages, a few of which we shall again set down in their order. Peter, rebuking Ananias because, in selling a field whose whole price he said he had offered, he had kept back part of it by fraud, proved the unity of the Holy Spirit with God, not in number but in substance, saying: "Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart, so that you lied to the Holy Spirit and kept back part of the price of the field? While it remained, did it not remain yours, and when sold, was it not in your power? Why have you put this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God." If one who lies to the Lord lies to the Holy Spirit, and one who lies to the Holy Spirit lies to God, no one can doubt that the Holy Spirit shares with God. And just as holiness subsists in God, in the same way deity is understood in the Holy Spirit. This Holy Spirit, whom we have said to be of the same nature as the Father, also does not differ from the divinity of the Son, for the Saviour says to the disciples: "When they bring you into the synagogue before rulers and authorities, do not be anxious how or what you will answer; for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that hour what you ought to say. Settle it in your hearts not to prepare your answer beforehand; for I will give you a mouth and wisdom which they will not be able to resist or contradict." In these words, saying that they should not be anxious about what to answer their opponents, because in that same hour they would be taught by the Holy Spirit what to answer, he at once added what the ground of their confidence is: "Settle it," he says, "in your hearts not to prepare your answer beforehand; for I will give you a mouth and wisdom which they will not be able to resist or contradict." For having said that at the time of answering they would be taught by the Holy Spirit what to answer, he says in what follows: "For I will give you a mouth and wisdom," and so on.

From this it is shown that the wisdom given to the disciples by the Son is the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, and the teaching of the Holy Spirit is the Lord's teaching, and that the Holy Spirit shares one nature and will with the Son. And since it was shown above that the Spirit is by nature a partner of the only-begotten of God and of God the Father, and the Son and the Father are one, according to the saying "I and the Father are one", the Trinity has been shown to be undivided and inseparable by nature. In another Gospel too it is said: "For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you." If, then, the Spirit of the Father speaks in the apostles, teaching them what they ought to answer, and what is taught by the Spirit is wisdom, which we can understand as nothing other than the Son, it plainly appears that the Spirit is of the same nature as the Son and as the Father, whose Spirit he is. And the Father and the Son are one. Therefore the Trinity is joined in unity of substance.

Through another example from the Scriptures too, the unity, nature and power of the Trinity are shown. The Son is called the hand, the right hand and the arm of the Father. As we have often taught, these terms show the lack of difference of one nature. The Holy Spirit is also called the finger of God, according to his union with the nature of the Father and the Son. For in one of the Gospels, against those who disparaged the Lord's signs, saying, "He casts out demons by Beelzebub, the prince of demons", the Saviour asks: "If I cast out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out? But if I cast out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you." Another evangelist, describing this same passage, presents the Son as saying: "But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God." From this it is shown that the finger of God is the Holy Spirit. If, then, the finger is joined to the hand, and the hand to him whose hand it is, the finger too is undoubtedly referred to the substance of him whose finger it is.

But beware lest, cast down to low things and forgetting the subject now under discussion, you paint in your mind the differences of bodily limbs and begin to imagine for yourself sizes and inequalities and the other larger or smaller members of bodies, saying that the finger differs from the hand, and the hand from him whose hand it is, by many inequalities; for Scripture is now speaking of incorporeal things, wishing to show only the unity of substance, not its measure. For as the hand through which one does and works everything is not divided from the body, and is in him whose hand it is, so the finger is not separated from the hand whose finger it is. So when you think of God, reject inequalities and measures, and understand the unity of the finger and the hand and the whole substance: the finger by which the law was written on tablets of stone. Through another Scripture too it is very easy to show the proof of our faith. God alone is called wise: not receiving wisdom from another, nor called wise through participation in some other wisdom. For many are called wise, not by their own nature but by sharing in wisdom. But God, not made wise by sharing in another's wisdom or from elsewhere, is called the only wise, begetting wisdom and making others wise. This wisdom is our Lord Jesus Christ, who is called the power of God and the wisdom of God. The Holy Spirit too is called wisdom: for in the ancient books it is reported that Joshua son of Nun was filled by the Lord with the spirit of wisdom. As, then, God alone is wise, not receiving wisdom from elsewhere but making others wise and begetting wisdom, he alone is wise, apart from all who are called wise by sharing his name ("The multitude of the wise is the salvation of the world"; and "Those who know themselves are wise"; and again "When you are with the wise, you will be wise"); so too the Holy Spirit, not receiving wisdom from elsewhere, is called the spirit of wisdom; for his very subsistence is the spirit of wisdom, and his nature is nothing other than the Spirit of truth and the Spirit of God, on which we have already argued at length in our book On the Sects. So, not to repeat the same things needlessly, let us be content with that earlier discussion.

Since, then, the Spirit of wisdom and truth is inseparably with the Son, he too subsists as wisdom and truth. For if he were a receiver of wisdom and truth, he might at some time sink so low as to cease to have what he had received from elsewhere; but, subsisting himself as wisdom and truth, he is not separated from the Father, who alone is proclaimed by the words of the Scriptures as wise and as truth. We see that the Holy Spirit, inasmuch as he is the spirit of wisdom and truth, has the same circle of unity and substance with the Son, and again that the Son does not differ from the substance of the Father. Since the Son is the image of the invisible God and the form of his substance, all who are shaped and formed according to this image or form are brought into the likeness of God, attaining such a form and image according to the strength of human progress. Likewise, since the Holy Spirit is the seal of God, those who receive the form and image of God, sealed by him, are led in him to the seal of Christ, full of wisdom and knowledge, and of faith besides. "For there are distributions of workings, but it is the same Spirit who works all in all." So while the Father works the manifold fullness of gifts, the Son multiplies it as it subsists through the Holy Spirit. "For to one is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith in the same Spirit," and the other gifts listed by the Apostle, to which is added: "All these are worked by one and the same Spirit, distributing to each as he wills."