Early Church, Filioque & Origen
Table of Contents
The list of quotes cited here is taken from David W. Bercot’s A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs, published by Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts in 1998, pp. 561-562.
The author will mention the particular volume and page number of the ten-volume set of The Ante-Nicene Fathers, ed. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, 1885–1887, reprinted by Hendrickson in 1994). For instance, this 1.144 means volume 1, p. 144. Bercot will also signify whether the Christian writer is an eastern and/or western theologian/apologist.
Here are the links where this set can be accessed online:
The Early Christian Church Fathers.38Volumes.
All emphasis will be mine.
FILIOQUE
Filioque is Latin for “and the Son.” It refers to the addition made in the sixth century in the West to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, saying that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. The eastern church has vigorously opposed this addition, as it implies two sources of the Trinity.
When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me. John 15:26.
I believe the Spirit to proceed from no other source than from the Father through the Son. Tertullian (c. 213, W), 3.599.
The Holy Spirit, through whom all things are sanctified, proceeds from the Father. Origen (c. 225, E), 4.344.
The Father generates an uncreated Son and brings forth a Holy Spirit—not as if He had no previous existence, but because the Father is the origin and source of the Son and Holy Spirit. Origen (c. 225, E), 4.270.
. . . to the Holy Spirit (through whom all things are sanctified). He proceeds from the Father, to whom be glory forever and ever. Origen (c. 225, E), 4.344.
It is one and the same thing to have a share in the Holy Spirit, which is of the Father and the Son, since the nature of the Trinity is one and incorporeal. Origen (c. 225, E), 4.379.
Many of the pre-Nicene Christians used “begotten” [Gr. gennetos] and “created” [Gr. genetos and ktizein] as interchangeable terms. For example, in the passage below, Origen used the verb ktizein to describe the generation of the Spirit. He does not mean, however, that the Spirit was created out of nothing. Rather, as Origen states below and in other places, the Holy Spirit shares in the one essence of the Father, through the Son.
We have seen that all things were made through Him [the Son]. Accordingly, we have to inquire if the Holy Spirit also was generated through Him. It appears to me that those who hold the Holy Spirit to be generated, and who also admit that “all things were made through Him” must necessarily assume that the Holy Spirit was made through the Logos, the Logos accordingly being older than He. And he who shrinks from allowing the Holy Spirit to have been made through Christ must—if he admits the truth of the statements of this Gospel [of John]—assume the Spirit to be ungenerated. . . . We consider, therefore, that there are three Persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. At the same time, we believe nothing to be unbegotten but the Father. We, therefore, as the more pious and the truer course, admit that all things were made by the Logos and that the Holy Spirit is the most excellent and the first in order of all that was made by the Father through Christ. And this, perhaps, is the reason why the Spirit is not said to be God’s own Son. The Only-Begotten is the only One who is by nature and from the beginning a Son. The Holy Spirit seems to have need of the Son to administer to Him His essence—so as to enable Him not only to exist, but to be wise, reasonable, and just. Origen (c. 228, E), 9.328.
How can the Holy Spirit be the Mother of Christ when He was Himself brought into being through the Word? Origen (c. 228, E), 9.329.
The source of the entire Holy Spirit remains in Christ, so that from Him could be drawn streams of gifts and works, while the Holy Spirit dwelled richly in Christ. Novatian (c. 235, W), 5.641.
Methodius thinks that the following are types of the holy and consubstantial Trinity. He says the innocent and unbegotten Adam is a type and resemblance of God the Father Almighty, who is uncaused and the cause of all. . . . He says Eve, who proceeded forth from Adam, signifies the person and procession of the Holy Spirit. Reference to Methodius (c. 290, E), 6.402, from a post-Nicene writer.
[I believe in the Holy Spirit], who proceeds from the Father, who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified. Creed of Constantinople (A.D. 381), 7.524.
Origen’s Trinitarianism
To prove thatOrigen did not think the Spirit was a creature made by the Son, I cite some of his statements which Bercot references:
The Father generates an uncreated Son and brings forth a Holy Spirit—not as if He had no previous existence, but because the Father is the origin and source of the Son or Holy Spirit. Origen (c. 225, E), 4.270.
(P. 1279; emphasis mine)
Let everyone, then, who cares for truth not be concerned about words and language. For in every nation there prevails a different usage of speech. Rather, let him direct his attention to the meaning conveyed by the words (rather than to the nature of the words that convey the meaning), especially in matters of such importance and difficulty. . . . The “substance” of the Trinity that is the beginning and cause of all things . . . is altogether incorporeal. Origen (c. 225, E), 4.376.
All things that exist were made by God and there was nothing that was not made—except for the nature of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. . . . For the Father alone knows the Son. And the Son alone knows the Father. And the Holy Spirit alone searches even the deep things of God. Origen (c. 225, E), 4.380.
(P. 1280; emphasis mine)
Bercot further writes elsewhere in respect to Origen’s understand of the Son’s begetting:
V. Origen’s understanding of the Son
It has become quite commonplace today for Origen to be singled out among the pre-Nicene writers as holding heterodox views of the Son. This is quite unjust, as Origen’s teachings on the Son are essentially the same as the rest of the early church.
This can clearly be seen from the many preceding quotations from Origen, which show that he held to a Nicene understanding of the deity of the Son. Of course, like the rest of the early Christians, Origen can be selectively quoted to make him appear either Arian, Monarchian, or anything else that is desired.
One of the quotations that has often been misunderstood and misquoted is the following passage:
We next notice John’s use of the article in these sentences [John 1:1]. He does not write without care in this respect. Nor is he unfamiliar with the subtleties of the Greek language. In some cases, he uses the article; and in some cases, he omits it. He adds the article before the word “Logos.” But to the name, “God,” he adds it only sometimes. That is, he uses the article when the word, “God,” refers to the uncreated cause of all things [i.e., the Father]. But he omits it when the Logos is called “God.” Origen (c. 228, E), 9.323.
At first glance, the passage above may sound as though Origen held to an Arian view of the Son. But Origen goes on to explain what he means:
There are many persons who are sincerely concerned about religion and who here fall into great perplexity. They are afraid that they may be proclaiming two Gods. As a result, their fear drives them into doctrines that are false and wicked. They sometimes deny that the Son has a distinct nature of His own, besides that of the Father. They thereby make Him whom they call the Son to be the God, all but in the name. Or else, they deny the divinity of the Son giving Him a separate existence of His own and making His sphere of essence fall outside that of the Father, so that they are separable from each other. To such persons, we have to say that the God on the one hand is Autotheos [God of Himself]. For that reason, the Savior says in His prayer to the Father, “That they may know you, the only true God.” But all other Persons beyond this Autotheos are made Divine [Gr. theos] by participation in His divinity. They are not to be simply called “the God” [Gr. ho theos], but rather, “God” [or “Divine” [Gr. theos]. Origen (c. 228, E), 9.323.
Furthermore, preceding the first passage quoted above, Origen had already stated:
The Word was always with the Father. And so it is said, “And the Word was with God.” . . . He was in the beginning at the same time when He was with God—neither being separated from the beginning, nor being bereft of His Father. And again, neither did He come to be in the beginning after He had not been in it. Nor did He come to be with God after not having been with him. For before all time and the remotest age, the Word was in the beginning, and the Word was with God. Origen (c. 228, E), 9.322.
So in no sense can Origen be accused of holding to an Arian understanding of the Son. The passage that follows is sometimes also misunderstood in an Arian sense:
The Son of God, “the First-Born of all creation,” although He seemed recently to have become incarnate, is not by any means recent on account of that. For the Holy Scriptures know Him to be the most ancient of all the works of creation. For it was to Him that God said regarding the creation of man, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” Origen (c. 248, E), 4.560.
Again, we must remember (as discussed above under II.E. “Begotten, not made”) that most of the pre-Nicene writers used “begotten” [Gr. gennetos] and “created” [Gr. ktizein] interchangeably as synonyms. When Origen refers to the Son as a “work of creation,” he does not mean it in the sense of the Son’s being created out of nothing. He means it in the sense of begetting. As quoted above, Origen distinctly says that “the Word was always with the Father.” The following passage shows that Origen was not including the Son among those things that were created out of nothing:
The Word of God, knowing the Father, reveals the Father whom He knows. For no created being can approach the Father without a guide. For no one knows the Father except the Son and he to whomever the Son reveals Him. Origen (c. 228, E), 9.320.
(Pp. 265-266; emphasis mine)
Further Reading
What the Early Church Believed: Filioque
St. Augustine, the Trinity & the Filioque
Origen – Dialog with Heracleides
Answering Islam – Sam Shamoun Theology Newsletter
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