A Confession of Faith on the Trinity

From Him, therefore, is all fatherhood in heaven and on earth. We also confess that the Son, born from the substance of the Father before the ages without beginning, was nevertheless not made. For neither did the Father ever exist without the Son, nor did the Son ever exist without the Father; and yet the Father is not from the Son in the way the Son is from the Father, because it is not the Father who received generation from the Son, but the Son who received generation from the Father. The Son, therefore, is God from the Father. The Father, however, is God, but not from the Son. The Father is indeed Father of the Son, not God from the Son.

But the Son is Son of the Father and God from the Father, yet equal in all things as Son to God the Father, because He neither began to exist at some point nor ceased [lacuna] The Son is believed to be of one substance with the Father, so that He is called homoousios with the Father, that is, of the same substance as the Father: for OMO in Greek means one, and USIA means substance, and both joined together sound as one substance. For the Son is to be believed as begotten not from nothing, nor from another substance, but from the womb of the Father, that is, from the substance of the same nature.

The Father therefore is eternal, and the Son likewise eternal; for if the Father always was, He always had a Son to whom He would be Father, and on this account we confess the Son to have been born from the Father without beginning. Nor do we call the same Son of God a small portion of a divided nature on account of His being begotten from the Father. But we assert that the perfect Father begot the perfect Son without diminution, without division, because it belongs to the Divinity alone not to have an unequal Son. This Son of God is also Son by nature, not by adoption, and God the Father is to be believed to have begotten Him neither by will nor by necessity, because no necessity has place in God, nor does will precede wisdom.

We also believe the Holy Spirit, whom we believe to be the third person in the Trinity, to be one God equal to God the Father and the Son, of one substance, one nature, yet not begotten nor created, but proceeding from both, the Spirit of both. This Holy Spirit is believed to be neither unbegotten nor begotten. Lest, if we were to say unbegotten, we should speak of two fathers, or if begotten, we should be shown to proclaim two sons. Yet He is said to be not the Spirit of the Father alone, nor of the Son alone, but at once of the Father and of the Son. For He does not proceed from the Father into the Son, nor does He proceed from the Son to sanctify creation, but He is shown to have proceeded from both simultaneously, since He is acknowledged to be the love or holiness of both.

This Holy Spirit, therefore, is believed to be sent by both, just as the Son is believed to be sent by the Father, but He is not held to be less than the Father and the Son, just as we also testify that the Son, on account of the flesh He assumed, is less than the Father and the Holy Spirit.

This is the holy Trinity, which, as the account handed down holds to be believed, can rightly be called and believed not a threefold thing, but eternity itself. Nor should it rightly be said that there is a Trinity in one God, but one God; the Trinity in the relative names of the persons—Father in relation to Son, Son in relation to Father, Holy Spirit in relation to both—though they are called three persons relatively, is nevertheless believed to be one nature, that is, one substance. Nor do we proclaim three substances as we do three persons, but one substance and three persons.

For what the Father is, He is not of Himself, but is referred to the Father. Likewise the Holy Spirit also is not of Himself, but is referred relatively to the Father and the Son in that He is proclaimed the Spirit of the Father and of the Son. Again, when we say God, it is not said in relation to something else, as Father is to Son, or Son to Father, or Holy Spirit to Father and Son, but God is said specially in relation to Himself. For even if we were asked about each person individually, we must confess each to be God. God the Father, therefore, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, each is said individually, yet there are not three Gods, but one God.

Likewise, the Father almighty, and the Son almighty, and the Holy Spirit almighty are each said individually, yet there are not three almighties, but one almighty. Just as one light and one principle is proclaimed. Each is therefore individually said to be, and so rightly called, the highest good, the fount and origin of all things, who made the world and all things that are in it; He, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands, nor is He worshipped by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all life and breath and all things. Each person is confessed and believed to be fully God, and all three persons one God, with one undivided and equal majesty, deity, and power belonging to them, neither diminished in the individual nor increased in the three.

For nothing is lacking when each individual person is called God singly, nor is there anything more when all three persons together are declared one God. This holy Trinity, therefore, which is one true God, neither departs from number nor is contained by number. For number is discerned in the relation of the persons. But in the substance of the Divinity, what is without number is not comprehended. Therefore this alone suggests number—that they are from one another—and in this alone they lack number—that they are in relation to themselves. For so fitting is the one natural name to this holy Trinity that it cannot be plural in three persons. On this account it is said in the sacred scriptures: the Lord our Lord, and great is His power, and of His wisdom there is no number. Nor, because we say these three persons are one God, shall we be able to say that the Son is the same as the Father, or that what the Holy Spirit is, is the Father or the Son.

For the Father is not the same as the Son, nor is the Son the same as the Father, nor is the Holy Spirit the same as either the Father or the Son, although the Father is the same in what the Son is, the Son is the same in what the Father is, and the Holy Spirit is the same in what the Father and the Son are, that is, by nature one God. For when we say that the Father is not the same person as the Son, this is referred to the distinction of persons.

But when we say that the Father is the same as the Son, the Son the same as the Father, the Holy Spirit the same as the Father and the Son, this is shown to pertain to the nature by which He is God, or to the substance. As to substance they are one; for we distinguish the persons, we do not separate the Deity. The Trinity did not make the begetter without the Word. Therefore we acknowledge in the distinction of persons, we profess unity on account of nature or substance. These three things, therefore, are one—by nature, that is, not by person—nor are these three persons to be thought separable, since none is believed ever to have existed before another, none after another, none without another, nor ever to have worked anything without another.

For they are found inseparable both in what they are and in what they do; thus we believe that no interval of time existed between the Father who begets, the Son who is begotten, and the Holy Spirit who proceeds, such that the begetter would ever precede the begotten, or the begotten would be absent from the begetter, or the proceeding Spirit would appear posterior to the Father or the Son. For this reason, therefore, this Trinity is both proclaimed and believed by us to be inseparable and unconfused. These three persons, therefore, are spoken of, as the elders define, so that they may be known, not so that they may be separated. For if we attend to what sacred Scripture says of Wisdom: she is the brightness of eternal light, just as we see brightness inseparably inhering in light, so we confess that the Son cannot be separated from the Father. We therefore neither confuse those three persons of one and inseparable nature, nor do we in any way proclaim them separable.

Since the Trinity itself has deigned to show this to us clearly, even in those names by which it willed the persons to be known individually, it does not permit one to be understood without another; nor is the Father known apart from the Son, nor is the Son found without the Father. For the very relation of the word forbids the separation of the persons, which, even when it does not name them together, it insinuates together. For no one can hear any one of those names without being compelled to understand the other as well.

Since, therefore, these three are one and one is three, yet each person retains its own abiding property. For the Father has eternity without nativity, the Son has nativity with eternity, and the Holy Spirit has procession without nativity together with eternity. Of these three persons we believe that the person of the Son alone, for the liberation of the human race, assumed a true man without sin from the holy and immaculate Virgin Mary, from whom He was born in a new order and a new birth, because an intact virginity knew no union with a man, and, made fruitful through the Holy Spirit, furnished the material of flesh. This birth of the Virgin is neither gathered by reason nor demonstrated by example. For if it is gathered by reason, it is not wonderful; if it is demonstrated by example, it is not unique.

Nor is the Holy Spirit to be believed to be the Father of the Son on account of Mary having conceived by the overshadowing of the same Holy Spirit, lest we seem to assert two Fathers of the Son, which is impious to say. In this wondrous conception, Wisdom building herself a house, the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Yet the Word itself was not converted and changed into flesh, so as to cease to be God because it had willed to be man. But the Word was made flesh in such a way that there is not only the Word of God and the flesh of man, but also the rational soul of man, and this whole is called both God on account of God and man on account of man. In this Son of God we believe there are two natures, one of Divinity and the other of humanity.

These the one person of Christ so united in Himself that neither can the Divinity ever be separated from the humanity, nor the humanity from the Divinity. Hence the perfect God, perfect Man in the unity of person, is one Christ. Yet because we have said there are two natures in the Son of God, we shall not on that account assert two persons in Him, lest—which God forbid—a quaternity should seem to be added to the Trinity.

For God the Word did not assume the person of a man, but the nature, and into the eternal person of the Divinity He assumed the temporal substance of flesh. Likewise, since we believe the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to be of one substance, we do not however say that the Virgin Mary gave birth to the unity of this Trinity, but only to the Son, who alone assumed our nature in the unity of His person. The Incarnation of this Son of God is also to be believed to have been wrought by the whole Trinity, because the works of the Trinity are inseparable. Yet the Son alone received the form in the singularity of His person, not in the unity of the Divine nature.

In that which is proper to the Son, not in that which is common to the Trinity, that form was brought into the unity of the person, so that the Son of God and the Son of man is one Christ, that is, Christ subsists in these two natures in three substances—of the Word, which is to be referred to the essence of God alone, and of body and soul, which pertains to the true man. He therefore has in Himself the twofold substance of His own Divinity and of our humanity. He also, by reason of the fact that He proceeded from God the Father without defect, is received as only begotten. For He is received as neither made nor predestined.

Yet by reason of the fact that He was born of the Virgin Mary, He is to be believed also to have been predestined. Both generations in Him are nevertheless wondrous: for He was begotten of the Father before the ages without a mother, and at the end of the ages He was generated of a mother without a father. Yet according to what He is as God, He created Mary; according to what He is as man, He was created from Mary—Himself both Father of Mary His mother and Son.

Likewise, by reason of being God, he is equal to the Father; by reason of being man, he is less than the Father. Likewise, he must be believed to be both greater and lesser. For in the form of God, the Son himself is also greater than himself on account of the humanity assumed, because the Divinity is greater. But in the form of man, the Son himself is also greater than himself with respect to the humanity, which is received as lesser than the divinity. Thus according to the divinity, which is equal to the Father, he himself and the Father are greater than the man whom the person of the Son alone assumed. Likewise, in that which may be inquired, the Son is thus believed to be both equal and lesser. Let us answer: according to the form of a servant he is lesser than both the Father and the Holy Spirit. For neither is the Holy Spirit called Father.

But the person of the Son alone took on flesh, through which he is believed to be lesser than those two persons. Likewise, this Son is believed to be inseparably distinct from God the Father and the Holy Spirit as a person from the man assumed from Mary. Likewise, since in the man there exists one person, but with the Father and the Holy Spirit the substance of his divine nature, the Son who was sent must nonetheless be believed to have been sent not only by the Father but also by the Holy Spirit. In that which he himself says through the Prophet: And now the Lord hath sent me, and his spirit. He is also understood to have been sent by himself, for the reason that without parables, not only the will but also the operation of the whole Trinity is acknowledged. For he who before the ages was called the Only-begotten spiritually, was made the Firstborn. Only-begotten on account of the substance of the Divinity.

Firstborn on account of the nature of the flesh assumed, in which the form of the man received, according to evangelical truth, is believed to have been conceived without sin, born without sin, died without sin—he who alone was made a sinner for us, that is, a sacrifice for our sins. And yet he endured that very passion, with his Divinity unharmed, for our offences, and, condemned to death and to the cross, he underwent the true death of the flesh. Also on the third day, raised by his own power, he rose from the tomb.

By this example of our Head, therefore, we confess that a true resurrection of the flesh of all the dead shall come to pass. And we believe that you shall rise not in an aerial or in any other kind of flesh, as some in their folly maintain, but in this very flesh in which we live, stand, and move. When the example of this holy resurrection had been accomplished, our same Lord and Saviour, by ascending, returned to the seat of the Father, from which he had never departed through his divinity. There, seated at the right hand of the Father, he is awaited at the end of the ages as the Judge of all the living and the dead.

Thence he will come with all the saints to execute judgment, to render to each one the reward properly owed, according as each one has done while placed in the body, whether good or evil. We believe that the holy catholic Church, purchased at the price of his blood, shall reign with him forever. Established within her bosom, we believe in one baptism; and we confess it unto the remission of all sins. Under which faith, we truly believe also in the resurrection of the dead, and we await the joys of the age to come. This alone remains for us to pray and to ask: that when, with the judgment accomplished and finished, the Son shall have delivered the kingdom to God and the Father, he may make us partakers of his kingdom, so that we who through this faith cleave to him may reign with him without end.

This is the faith of our confession set forth, through which the dogma of heretics is destroyed, through which the hearts of the faithful are cleansed, through which also glorious access to God is attained; savoring its most sacred taste, we have passed on, amid the continuous exchange of discourses under a three-day fast, belching forth what we had taken in, to those things which, being set forth on the following day, are subjoined.