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In Sacred Scripture the term son of God is used in a
twofold sense: in the broad sense for adoptive sons, and
in the proper sense for the only-begotten Son both before
and after the Incarnation. References to the Son of
God are to be found 1. in the Synoptic Gospels, 2.
in the Epistles, 3. in the Gospel of St. John.
In the Synoptic Gospels Christ is described as the
incarnate Son of God, not only distinct from the Father
but also equal to Him. The principal text is: "All
things are delivered to Me by My Father. And no one
knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither doth anyone
know the Father, but the Son, and he to whom it shall
please the Son to reveal Him" (Matt. 11:27).
From various codices and from the Fathers it appears that
this text is authentic, and its authenticity is admitted
by almost all critics, not only Catholics but also the
Protestant liberals. In this text is expressed the
distinction between the Father and the Son as well as the
equality of knowability and knowledge which presuppose an
equality of nature and the identity of the divine nature.
"No one knoweth the Son, but the Father, " and
therefore the Son is above natural created knowledge and
cannot be known naturally by anyone but God. From this
it follows that He is God. To this text we may add all
the texts in the Synoptic Gospels, in Christian
apologetics, and in the tract on the Incarnation, which
demonstrate the divinity of Christ. These texts may be
grouped together as follows:
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1. Jesus, according to His own testimony, is greater
than all creatures, greater than Jonas, Solomon,
David, who called Him lord, greater than Moses and
Elias, who appeared beside Him at the Transfiguration,
greater than St. John the Baptist, greater than the
angels "who ministered to Him" (Mark 1:13), and
of whom He said, "The Son of man shall send His
angels" as His servants (Matt. 13:41).
2. Jesus speaks as the supreme lawgiver, complementing
and perfecting the divine law in the Sermon on the Mount
(Matt. 10:21-48).
3. He vindicates for Himself the prerogative of
forgiving sins, which according to the Jews was a divine
attribute (Matt. 9:2).
4. He assumed the right of judging the living and the
dead, and of raising the dead to life (Mark 14:62;
8:38; 13:26).
5. He promised to send the Holy Ghost, to whom He is
therefore not inferior (Luke 24:49), and He
accepted the adoration which the apostles had rejected
(Matt. 8:2; 28:9, 17).
6. He is called the Son of the living God by St.
Peter (Matt. 16:16).
7. In the parable of the vineyard He is called the Son
of the lord of the vineyard (Mark 12:1-12; also
in Matthew and Luke). In this parable we are told that
the lord of the vineyard first sent his servants, who were
put to death by the workers in the vineyard. "Therefore
having yet one son, most dear to him; he also sent him
unto them last of all,... and laying hold of him, they
killed him." Of the Pharisees who heard this parable,
we read: "And they sought to lay hands on Him, but
they feared the people. For they knew that He spoke this
parable to them." From all these texts of the Synoptic
Gospels it is clear that Jesus' utterances about His
eminent dignity imply more than a simple Messiahship and
express a divine filiation entirely proper to Him,
constituting Him above all creatures, equal to God and
God Himself, although distinct from His Father.
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In the epistles of the apostles and in their preaching,
the divinity of Christ is still more explicitly
expressed.
In the Acts of the Apostles (3:13, 15), St.
Peter declared: "The God of our fathers hath glorified
His Son Jesus, whom you indeed delivered up... .
But the author of life you killed." The author of life
is none other than God. Again in the Acts of the
Apostles, St. Peter said: "Neither is there
salvation in any other. For there is no other name under
heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved," that
is, Jesus is the Savior of the world, the author of
grace and salvation. Of no prophet and of no angel were
similar words spoken. Again, "Him hath God exalted
with His right hand, to be Prince and Savior, to give
repentance to Israel, and remission of sins" (Acts
5:31). But only God can be the Savior, forgiving
sins. Similarly St. Peter calls Jesus "the Lord of
all, appointed by God judge of the living and of the
dead" (Acts 10:36, 42).
Since St. Peter uttered these words immediately after
Pentecost, the argument of the rationalists that a
process of idealization intervened, transforming the
original preaching of Christ, has no validity. These
words represent the confirmation by the Holy Ghost of
those things that Christ, during His public ministry,
said about His divine filiation. It should be remembered
that the Acts of the Apostles in its entirety is
attributed to St. Luke, who was St. Paul's
co-worker, and this not only by all Catholic and
conservative Protestant critics but also by many
rationalists, among them Renan, Reuss, and Harnack,
and that it was most probably written about A.D.
63-64.[77]
In the epistles of St. Paul we find the following
references to the divinity of the Son, as distinct from
the Father. These texts are important since St.
Paul, beginning in the year 53, speaks of the divinity
of Christ as a dogma already received in the various
churches before there was sufficient time for any process
of idealization.
1. St. Paul speaks of the Son of God in the
strictest sense: "God sending His own Son, in the
likeness of sinful flesh" (Rom 8. 3)
"He that spared not even His own Son, but delivered
Him up for us all" (Rom. 8:32); "God sent His
Son... that He might redeem them who were under the
law: that we might receive the adoption of sons" (Gal.
4:4 f.). In the last text the adopted sons are
clearly distinguished from God's own Son, and the
only-begotten Son is represented as the Savior of the
world.
2. St. Paul affirms the pre-existence of the Son of
God before the Incarnation: "Giving thanks to God the
Father... who hath delivered us from the power of
darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of the
Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His
blood, the remission of sins. Who is the image of the
invisible God, the first-born of every creature. For
in Him were all things created in heaven, and on earth,
visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominations or
principalities or powers: all things were created by Him
and in Him. And He is before all, and by Him all
things consist" (Col. 1:12-17). These
attributes belong to God alone, and at the same time the
Son of God is distinguished from the Father. A little
farther on we read: "Because in Him, it hath well
pleased the Father that all fullness should dwell; and
through Him to reconcile all things unto Himself" (w.
19 f.). Here the Son of God is clearly called the
Creator and the Savior.
Again, St. Paul says: "For in Him dwelleth all the
fullness of the Godhead corporeally; and you are filled
in Him, who is the head of all principality and power"
(Col. 2:9 f.). Writing to the Philippians,
while exhorting them to humility he casually says these
sublime words: "For let this mind be in you, which was
also in Christ Jesus: who being in the form of God,
thought it not robbery to be equal with God: but emptied
Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the
likeness of men, and in habit found as a man" (Phil.
2:5 ff.). In this text, the expression "in the
form of God" (qui in forma Dei esset) signifies the
essence and nature of God, and this interpretation is
confirmed by the following words, "No be equal with
God." We could have no clearer statement of the
pre-existing glory of the Son of God before the
Incarnation.
Writing to the Romans, St. Paul said: "For I
wished myself to be an anathema from Christ, for my
brethren,... and of whom is Christ, according to the
flesh, who is over all things, God blessed forever.
Amen" (Rom. 9:3 ff.). Some controversy exists
whether the punctuation mark before the phrase "who is
over all things" is a comma or a period, but most
critics, even those who are considered liberal, admit the
comma, and thus this phrase refers to Christ.
Lastly, we read in the Epistle to the Hebrews: "In
these days [God] hath spoken to us by His Son, whom
He hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also He
made the world. Who being the brightness of His glory,
and the figure of His substance, and upholding all things
by the word of His power, making purgation of sins,
sitteth on the right hand of the majesty on high" (1:2
f.). In this text the Son of God, distinct from the
Father, is declared to be the Creator, the Preserver,
and the Savior, "upholding all things by the word of
His power." In this Epistle also the Son of God is
said to be superior to Moses and the angels, the mediator
and the high priest for all eternity. Speaking in this
manner, St. Paul intended to affirm, not something
new, but that which had been held by the different
churches before this time. No time had intervened,
therefore, to permit any progressive idealization of the
primitive preaching.
In the Gospel according to St. John the divinity of
Christ and the distinction of the Son from the Father is
so clearly enunciated that the rationalists themselves have
had to admit it, but they argue that this Gospel,
written against those who denied the divinity of Christ,
was composed only in the second century. Renan places it
about A.D. 125, and Holtzmann between 100 and
123. The later rationalists however have had to
acknowledge that it was written toward the end of the first
century: B. Weiss placing its composition in the year
go; Harnack between 80 and 110. The theory of the
intervening process of idealization is excluded by the fact
that as early as 54 and 58 St. Paul speaks of the
eternal pre-existence of the Son of God.
With regard to the texts of the Fourth Gospel, we
present first the words of our Lord Himself and then the
words of St. John the Evangelist in the prologue of his
Gospel, thus observing the order of revelation.
The words of our Lord referring to His divinity and His
distinction from the Father are the following.
"The Jews sought the more to kill Him, because
He... said God was His Father, making Himself
equal to God. Then Jesus said to them... the Son
cannot do anything of Himself, but what He seeth the
Father doing: for what things soever He doth, these the
Son also doth in like manner... . For as the Father
raiseth up the dead, and giveth life; so the Son also
giveth life to whom He will. For neither doth the
Father judge any man, but hath given all judgment to the
Son. That all men may honor the Son, as they honor the
Father... . For as the Father has life in Himself,
so He hath given to the Son also to have life in
Himself" (5:18-26). This thought will be more
clearly presented below In this text the same works
"ad extra" of the Father are attributed to the
Son, particularly miracles and the sanctification of
souls, of which God alone is the author.
"Not that any man hath seen the Father; but He who is
of God, He hath seen the Father" (6:46); "You
are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this
world, I am not of this world" (8:23); "For
from God I proceeded, and came" (8:42), that
is, I proceeded from eternity and came in time;
"Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham was made,
I am" (8:58), is a clear declaration of the
pre-existence of the Son of God; "I and the Father
are one" (10:30), whereupon the Jews took up
"stones to stone Him."
"As the Father knoweth Me, and I know the Father"
(10:15), is an affirmation of the equality of
knowledge and nature, already expressed in St.
Matthew, "No one knoweth the Son, but the Father"
(11:27); "I am the way and the truth and the
life" (14:6), that is, I not only possess life
and truth, but I am life and truth, and since truth and
life are identical, He alone is truth itself who is being
itself by His essence, that is, subsisting being. Such
is the profound meaning of the verb "is" as distinguished
from "have" in the sentence, "I am truth and life,"
that only He who can say, "I am who am," could utter
these words.
"All things whatsoever the Father hath, are Mine.
Therefore I said, that He shall receive of Mine, and
show it to you" (16:15). These words clearly
state that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and
the Son.
"And now glorify Thou Me, O Father, with Thyself,
with the glory which I had, before the world was, with
Thee,... because Thou hast loved Me before the
creation of the world" (17:5, 24).
Lastly, the revelation of this doctrine is enunciated by
way of synthesis in the prologue of St. John's
Gospel, especially in the first four verses: "In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with
God. All things were made by Him: and without Him was
made nothing that was made. In Him was life, and the
life was the light of men" (John 1:1-4). These
words contain the statement of two fundamental truths:
1. the distinction of the Word from the Father, 2.
the consubstantiality of the Word with the Father. From
these truths others follow in the prologue.[78]
1. The distinction of the Word from the Father is
enunciated in the words, "The Word was with God, "
for, as is commonly remarked, no one is said to be with
himself. One difficulty, however, arises from the fact
that it is not clearly stated that the Word is a person;
it might be understood as similar to the word of our mind
which is in our intellect and "with" the intellect.
This difficulty, however, is removed by what is said
later of the Word, especially by the words," and the
word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His
glory, the glory as it were of the only-begotten of the
Father, full of grace and truth" (1:14); and
"No man hath seen God at any time: the only-begotten
Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared
Him" (1:18).
From these verses it is clear that the Word mentioned in
the first verse is the only-begotten Son who became
incarnate and before this was in the bosom of the Father,
or "with Him," in the words of the first verse. From
this we may infer a real distinction between the Father
and the only-begotten Son, for apart from any
consideration of the mind the Father is not the Son, and
he who begets does not beget himself. Father and Son,
as has been said, are personal nouns and not impersonal
nouns like truth, goodness, and intelligence, which
designate the attributes of the divine nature.
Therefore, apart from any consideration of the mind, it
is true to say that the Father is not the Son.
On the other hand, as theologians point out, we cannot
say that, apart from the consideration of the mind, the
essence of God is not His intellect, for His essence is
subsisting being itself and subsisting intelligence
itself; no real distinction exists in God between His
being and His essence, nor between His essence,
faculties, and operation. Therefore this proposition is
false: God is not His own being, as is also the
following: God is not His own intelligence. From
revelation, however, we infer that the following is
true: God the Father is not the Son, for he who begets
does not beget himself. If therefore, apart from any
consideration of our mind, the Father is not the Son,
He is really distinct from the Son.
2. The consubstantiality of the Word with the Father
is expressed in the same first verse, in the words, "he
Word was God." According to the generally accepted
interpretation, for instance, that of St. Thomas in
his commentary on St. John's Gospel, in this phrase
the term "Word" ("ho logos") is the subject
and "God" is the predicate. This is evident from the
context, which refers to the attributes of the Word, and
from the Greek article "ho", which precedes the
term "Word" ("ho logos").
Moreover, in this sentence the predicate "God" retains
its proper meaning, as is evident from the parallel
statements, "he Word was with God," and "the Word
was God," and from the second verse, "he same was in
the beginning with God." Thus, the word "God" is
used three times in its proper meaning, designating not
God by participation, but God Himself. The sense of
the text is, therefore, that the Word is no less God
than He with whom He was from the beginning. There is,
therefore, a perfect equality between the Word and the
Father. Moreover, since the most simple and infinite
divine nature cannot be multiplied, and since, as is
clear from the Old Testament and from philosophy, there
cannot be many gods, it follows that the Word and the
Father are consubstantial. This consubstantiality was
more explicitly stated later at the Council of Nicaea.
The words "in the beginning" at the opening of the
prologue mean first of all before the creation of the
world, as is clear from the context, and also from
eternity, since God is eternal and immutable, since
before the creation no change took place.
From these two truths others follow.
1. The Word together with the Father is the Creator.
"All things were made by Him: and without Him was made
nothing that was made" (v. 3), that is, nothing
whatsoever was made without the Word. This follows from
the fact that the Word is God.
2. The Word is the author of both the natural and the
supernatural life. "In Him was life" (v. 4); thus
He is the author of life equally with the Father, since
He is God. Jesus expressed this later on in the words,
"or as the Father has life in Himself, so He hath
given to the Son also to have life in Himself"
(5:26), and this life is essential and subsisting
life and the cause of participating life, the life He
spoke of when He said, "I am the life." Further,
the Word is the author of supernatural life, as is clear
from the words," and the life was the light of men,
"which are explained in verse 9, "that was the true
light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this
world." Later on this is expressed still more clearly,
especially in verse 18, "No man hath seen God at any
time: the only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the
Father, He hath declared Him, " and by our Lord's
words to Nicodemus," or God so loved the world as to
give His only-begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in
Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting"
(3:16).
In his commentary on the fourth verse of the prologue,
"and the life was the light of men," St. Thomas
says: "This life may be explained in two ways: first,
as an infusion of natural knowledge; secondly, as the
communication of grace. It should be especially
understood in the second way, because of what follows,
namely, 'And the light shineth in darkness, and the
darkness did not comprehend it... . (John) came for
a witness, to give testimony of the light, that all men
might believe through Him'" (w. 5, 7), believe,
that is, to attain salvation.
3. The Word is the author of our redemption. In verse
twelve we read: "But as many as received Him, He gave
them power to be made the sons of God, to them that
believe in His name," that is, by the Word we are made
adopted sons of God, as St. Paul said, "[God] who
hath predestined us unto the adoption of children through
Jesus Christ unto Himself" (Eph. 1:5), and
"that we might receive the adoption of sons" (Gal.
4:5).
The five following truths, then, are announced in the
Prologue of St. John's Gospel: the Son of God is
1. distinct from the Father, 2. equal and
consubstantial with the Father, 3. the Creator, 4.
the author of both the natural and the supernatural life,
5. the Redeemer and the author of salvation. In this
way the divinity of the Word is proclaimed.
Objection. The rationalists and liberals say that this
doctrine of the Word apparently stems from Philo, an
Alexandrian Jew, born about 20 B. C., who tried
to conciliate the monotheism of the Jews with the
Neoplatonism in vogue at the time in Alexandria.
Relying on the Old Testament, Philo admitted the
existence of one personal God, the Provider, but in
accord with the Greek philosophers of Alexandria he held
that the most high God could not produce this finite world
except through some intermediate being, which he called
the "logos." As a Jew, Philo tried to
reconcile two contradictory teachings, namely, monotheism
and free creation with the pantheistic doctrine of
necessary emanation. Thus, when he considers the
"logos" under the Neoplatonic aspect he speaks
of him as an intermediate being, but when he considers the
"logos" in the light of the New Testament and
Jewish monotheism he speaks of him as a divine attribute.
Reply. The Catholic reply to this difficulty is the
following. A great difference exists between the
"logos" of Philo and the Logos of St. John.
The Logos of St. John is neither a being beneath God
nor a divine attribute, but He is properly the Son of
God the Father, at the same time God, the Creator,
and the Redeemer in the strict sense. Philo's
"logos", however, is in no way the Redeemer.
St. John's teaching, therefore, is not derived from
Philo, but from Christ's preaching, as explained by
him, and as understood by the other apostles, as we see
in the preaching of St. Peter and in the epistles of
St. Paul. St. John could have found an adumbration
of this mystery in the Old Testament, especially in the
Book of Wisdom, "or she is a vapor of the power of
God, and a certain pure emanation of the glory of the
almighty God: and therefore no defiled thing cometh into
her. For she is the brightness of eternal light, and the
unspotted mirror of God's majesty" (7:25 f.).
As to the word "Logos" itself, St. John could have
taken it from revelation, but it would not be derogatory
to admit, as many do, that he derived it directly from
Philo, for when the Evangelist was writing in Ephesus,
Apollo was preaching there, and Apollo was widely versed
in Alexandrian philosophy. Quite probably also the
earliest heretics misused the word "logos" to
designate a being midway between God and the world. St.
John may have used the term to correct the current false
interpretation, when he said, "The Word[Logos] was
God."[79]
We must add here that the Logos of St. John has no
connection with the teaching of Plotinus, who in the
third century spoke of three subordinate
"hypostases", of different rank, in his system
of pantheistic emanationism. Plotinus posited: 1. the
One-Good, corresponding to Plato's idea of the good;
2. the primal intelligence, or the "logos",
proceeding, not by a free creation, but by a necessary
emanation from the supreme good, to whom it was inferior.
Here the "logos", according to Plotinus,
resembled Aristotle's god, who is "noesis noeseos
noesis". In his primal intelligence Plotinus
tried to discern the duality of the subject and the object
known, besides a multitude of ideas for things that were
to be produced. Plotinus' third
"hypostasis" was the soul of the
universe, corresponding to the god of the Stoics, from
which, by a pantheistic emanation, the seminal ideas of
all things proceeded ("logoi spermatikoi").
The difference between Plotinus' "hypostases"
and the Trinity of Christian revelation is evident.
These three "hypostases" are distinctly
unequal, and in this pantheistic emanation a multitude of
beings proceeds from the supreme being not by free creation
but by a necessary emanation, or by a necessity of
nature. As in all kinds of pantheism, the supernatural
order of the life of grace is denied; for here our human
nature would be a participation of the divine nature and
could not be elevated to a higher order, and human reason
would be the seed of eternal life.
Lastly, the doctrine of the Word proclaimed in St.
John's Gospel has no resemblance to the Indian
trinity, called Trimourti. In this system Brahma is
god, the producer of all things; Siva is god the
destroyer, the destructive force; and Vichnu was many
times born in the flesh for the defense of the good.
The differences are obvious: 1. In the Trinity as
revealed by Christ none of the divine persons can be
called the destroyer. This idea is an expression of the
pessimism and fatalism of the Indians. 2. In the
Indian trinity, the three manifestations of God, the
producer, the destroyer, and the conserver, are adopted
with respect to the things of this world, and they seem
rather to be three aspects of the same supreme power;
indeed it is often said that there is no distinction in
God except in appearance. 3. The Indian system does
not transcend pantheism and fails to preserve the idea of a
free creation.
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