66 Erasmus were right in his assumption that the phrase, "The true God and life eternal" designates the Father, not the Son, St. John would have made himself guilty of an insufferable tautology, viz.: "Verus Deus est verus Deus." Moreover, the aim of St. John's First Epistle, which was written as a prologue to his Gospel, is not to demonstrate the Godhead of the Father, which no one denied, but the Divinity of the Son, who had appeared corporeally in Christ. It is furthermore to be noted that the true God" whom St. John has in mind, is also called "eternal life" (οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ ἀληθινὸς Θεὸς καὶ ζωὴ αἰώνιος). Now St. John never means the Father but invariably the Son when he uses the phrase "eternal life." Consequently Christ is as certainly "verus Deus" as is His Father. Cfr. 1 John I, 2: "Annuntiamus vobis vitam aeternam, quae erat apud Patrem et apparuit nobis We declare unto you the life eternal, which was with the Father, and hath appeared to us." 119 I John V, "Vitam aeternam dedit nobis Deus, et haec vita in Filio eius est. Qui habet Filium, habet vitam; qui non habet Filium, vitam non habet-God hath given to us eternal life. And this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son, hath life. He that hath not the Son, hath not life." The last vestige of possible doubt is removed by the Greek text, which reads thus: "Kaì čopev ev τῷ ἀληθινῷ ἐν τῷ υἱῷ αὐτοῦ Ἰησοῦ Χριστῷ· οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ ἀληθινὸς Θεὸς καὶ ζωὴ αἰώνιος.” The demonstrative pronoun clearly points to Jesus Christ. ἐν 8) The "crux Rationalistarum" is the famous doxology, Rom. IX, 5: "Ex quibus [scil. Isra 119 Cfr. also John I, 4; XI, 25, XIV, 6. elitis] est Christus secundum carnem, qui est super omnia Deus benedictus in saecula (kaì è§ ὧν ὁ Χριστὸς τὸ κατὰ σάρκα ὁ ὢν ἐπὶ πάντων Θεὸς εὐλογητὸς eis Toùs ai@vas)." Whoever reads this sentence τοὺς without prepossession will unhesitatingly refer the predicate Deus super omnia (ἐπὶ πάντων Θεὸς) to Christ. The Greek manuscript codices present the New Testament text without punctuation marks, and it would seem to be the business of exegesis rather than of textual criticism to determine whether there should be a comma or a period after the word σáρκа. If a comma, then the whole doxology plainly refers to Christ; if a period, it would be most natural to refer it to the Father or to the Deity in general. Similarly, in the Latin text of the Vulgate, the Rationalists place a period after "carnem and reconstruct the passage thus: ". . . ex quibus est Christus secundum carnem. Qui est super omnia Deus [= Pater], benedictus [sit] in saecula." 120 But this punctuation is arbitrary. There is no intrinsic reason whatever for inserting such an abrupt hymn of praise in honor of the Father into a context which treats solely of the Son. Conversely, the Apostle had excellent reasons for connecting the doxology with the name of Christ, whose descent according to the flesh from the Jews he had accentuated immediately before. This interpretation of the passage is so natural and plausible that the early writers were unanimous in referring the doxology to the Son and not to the Father. To the fifteen witnesses whom Petavius 121 was able to mar 120 Thus Erasmus, Westen, Griesbach, and others. shal in confirmation of this statement, Cardinal Franzelin 122 added thirty others, while Hurter 123 enriched the list with fourteen more. This practically unanimous consent of the Fathers loses none of its force by the circumstance that some of them (in a very correct sense) assert that the epithet ò ènì mávτwv cós belongs solely to the Father, because the Father alone, as the First Person of the Blessed Trinity, is unoriginate (ävapxos) and at the same time the principle of the Son (ȧрxỳ τñ≤ ȧрxñs). Thus Athanasius,124 Basil,125 and Gregory of Nyssa.126 However, since these Fathers did not have in mind the Epistle to the Romans, but that to the Ephesians, in which St. Paul writes: Unus Deus et Pater omnium qui est super omnes (ò ènì πáνтwv)-One God and Father of all, who is above all," 127 we can reasonably assume that they do not mean to contradict the other Fathers. This assumption is rendered still more probable by the fact that these same apparently dissentient Fathers elsewhere expressly interpret the doxology as referring to Christ.128 For the rest, such unsuspected witnesses as Rosenmüller and the editor of the new edition of H. A. W. Meyer's voluminous commentary on the various books of Sacred Scripture, B. Weiss, admit that the Rationalist interpretation involves a violation of the rules of Greek grammar. In fact it would be just as unnatural and ungrammatical to write ὁ ὢν ἐπὶ πάντων Θεός, instead of ὁ Θεὸς ὁ ὢν ἐπὶ πάντων, as it would be natural and gram 122 De Verbo Incarnato, thes. 9. 125 Ep., 38, n. 4. p. 127 Eph. IV, 6. Cfr. Newman, Athanasius, II, 348 sq., 9th ed., London 1903. 128 Athanas., Ep. ad Epict., n. 10; Basil, Contr. Eunom., IV, n. 2; Greg. Nyss., Contr. Eunom., 1. X. matical to resume by the immediately preceding subject, namely, ô Xpươτós. Be it noted in conclusion that Christ's standing epithet in the pages of the New Testament is not "God" (Deus, cós), but rather "Lord" (Dominus, Kúpios), as can easily be gathered from a perusal of the Apostolic Epistles. But inasmuch as "Dominus" corresponds exactly to the Hebrew and, the texts in which Jesus is called "Lord" prove His Divinity quite as cogently as those in which He is called "God." C. The Logos Whereas the Synoptics portray Christ mainly on His human side, St. Paul emphasizes the Godman, and St. John, who was the Saviour's favorite disciple, raising his eagle eye to the very Heavens, shows us Christ subsisting before all time in His Divine Nature as the "Word of God" (Verbum, i Aóyos). This term 129 is of the utmost importance for the proper understanding of the mystery of the Blessed Trinity.. The use of the term "Logos" is peculiar to St. John.130 The attempt to trace the Johannine Logos to the teaching of the Jewish philosopher Philo has proved abortive. Aside 129" Logos, verbum, being a term already used in the schools of heathen philosophy, was open to various misunderstandings on its appearance in the theology of revealed teaching. In the Church it was both synonymous with and corrective of the term 'Son'; but heretics had almost as many senses of the term as they had sects."- - Newman, Athanasius, II, 337, 445 sq., 9th ed., London 1903. Cfr. J. Lebreton, Les Origines du Doyme de la Trinité, Book 1, Paris 1910; E. Krebs, Der Logos als Heiland im ersten Jahrhundert, Freiburg 1910. 130 Cfr. John I, 1 sqq.; 1 John I, 1; V, 7; Apoc. XIX, 13. from the name there is absolutely no similarity between the two conceptions; rather an irreconcilable opposition. It is far more reasonable to regard the teaching of St. John on the Logos as an inspired development of the doctrine of "Uncreated Wisdom" which is set forth in the Sapiential Books of the Old Testament. May we not also assume that St. John was directly enlightened by Him on whose bosom he was privileged to lean? 131 The most important portion of the Johannean Gospel, as bearing on the dogma of the Blessed Trinity, is the prologue, which distinctly asserts the personality, the hypostatic difference, and the Divinity of the Logos, who is Christ, the Son of God made flesh. I. THE LOGOS A REAL PERSON.-The Fourth Gospel begins thus: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God (ev ȧpxñ ñv ὁ Λόγος καὶ ὁ Λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν Θεόν).” Inasmuch as St. John distinguishes very clearly between the "Word" and "God," the "Word with God" (apud Deum) cannot be an absolute divine attribute, e. g., personified wisdom or omnipotence; for wisdom and omnipotence are not "with God" but "in God." This is clearly apparent from the whole context of the prologue, especially I, 14: "And the Word was made flesh." It would be impossible for the Divine Nature, or for any one of its attributes, to "become flesh," because the Divine Nature, as such, is incapable of entering into union with a finite substance, and 131 John XIII, 23. |