Augustine and the Holy Trinity

Spurred on by the writings of Karl Barth, the theologian who most fully explored the Trinitarian mystery in the 20th century, 1 several important works were written on the doctrine of the Trinity. In the last two decades of the 20th century, Karl Rahner, Jurgen Moltmann, Leonardo Boff, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Colin Gunton, and Millard Erickson, sought to reflect and reapply the Trinitarian doctrine, producing a large number of dogmatic, biblical, and historical studies. 2 The purpose of this essay is to expose the understanding of the Trinitarian doctrine as formulated by Augustine of Hippone, who produced a foundational work on this subject on this subject. , The Trinity, with which all these writers interact.

Augustine and the Trinity

It was Augustine who gave the Western tradition its mature and definitive expression of the Trinity.
Although Augustine is best known through works such as confessions (his autobiography.
Published in 400) or The City of God (published in 426).
His masterpiece is probably the treatise known as The Trinity.
Which took sixteen years to write.
Between 400 and 416.
This work is divided into two distinct parts.
The first.
With biblical emphasis.
Goes from Book I to VII.
This is the theological section itself.
The second part.
From Book VIII to 15.
Has a psychological and philosophical speculative character.
In the analog genre.
In his words: “As I was still very young.
I began to prepare my books on the Trinity.
Which is the supreme and true God.
Now.
For years.
Have I brought them to the public?.
3 In fact.
The Trinity is the work of thy maturity.

Augustine assumed as a biblical truth that there is only one God who is the Trinity, and that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are simultaneously distinct and co-essential, numerically one in substance:

The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, that is, the Trinity itself, unique and supreme reality, is the only thing that can be enjoyed [una quaedam summa res], a common good of all. If we can call it Thing and not, preferably, the cause of all things? although that can also be called a cause. It is not easy to find a name that can be so great and used to correctly name the Trinity. Unless it is said that there is only one God, of whom, through whom and for whom all things exist (Rom 11:36). So the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are each God. And the three are one God. For him, each of them is a complete substance and, all three together, a single substance. The Father is neither the Son nor the Holy Spirit. The Son is not the Father or the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son. The Father is only Father, the Only Begotten Son and the Holy Spirit only Holy Spirit. All three have the same eternity, the same immutability, the same majesty, the same power. In the Father there is unity, in the Son there is equality and in the Holy Spirit there is harmony between unity and equality. These three attributes are all one, because of the Father, they are all equal because of the Son, and they are all related because of the Holy Spirit.

Nowhere has Augustine tried to biblically prove these claims. “It is a fact of revelation that, for him, the scriptures proclaim almost every page, and that the “Catholic faith” is transmitted to the faithful. His understanding, God is incomprehensible, but not incognishable, with two ways of knowing God: the way of elimination or denial (apathopathic), which consists in eliminating all the flaws of God, the creatures, and the eminence (catapathic), which consists in attributing to God, to elevate them to infinity, all perfections: “Whoever thinks so about God, even if he does not fully know what he is , however, then what can you do?As a pious man, will you avoid thinking about him, which he is not?. 6

Like J. N. D. Kelly, his “immense theological effort is an attempt at understanding, this being the supreme example of his principle that faith must precede understanding (praecedit fides, sequitur intellectus)”.

Faith seeks, understanding finds; that is why the prophet says: If you do not believe, you will not understand (Is 7:9). On the other hand, understanding continues to seek the one who has found faith, so God looks from heaven at the children of men. , as sung in the sacred psalm: to see if anyone has intelligence and seeks God (Ps 13:2). That is why man must be intelligent: seek God.

Therefore, in this work, Augustine, assuming the truth of biblical testimony about the teaching of the Trinitarian God and based on the conciliar decisions established in Nicea and Constantinople, built the first truly systematic treatise on the doctrine of the Trinity.

Augustine’s loving and confident prayers to God, as part of his task of investigating the mystery of the Trinity, are continuous and bear witness to dependence and fiery supplication, so characteristic of Augustinian prayer. Theological work was developed in a climate of prayer. In it lies the united sapientia (? Wisdom refers to contemplation?) And the scientia (?Science refers to action?), Effort in the pursuit of spiritual wisdom.

1. The Holy Trinity

Here we will follow the basic points of JND Kelly’s summary of the exhibition of Trinitarian doctrine in Augustine9, which is based entirely on the scriptures, but contrary to the Eastern tradition that made the person of the Father his starting point, Augustine with a divine nature. Is this simple and immutable nature or essence what is The Trinity. 10 Is the unity of the Trinity clearly affirmed, strictly eliminating itself?The arrianism and subordination of his doctrine of the Trinity. 11 also affirmed by each of the three peoples. of divinity: “The only true God is not only the Father, but the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. “

As Kelly points out, several consequences stem from this insistence on the unity of divine nature. First, the people of the Trinity are not three separate individuals, but “each of the divine persons is identical to the others or to the divine substance itself. “and does it mean “that each person dwells in others or is he inherent in others?”As Augustine wrote:

Believe man the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit as one God, great, omnipotent, good, just, merciful, creator of all that is visible and invisible, and of all that can be said with dignity and truth, according to the capacity of human intelligence. And when you hear that the Father is one God, do not separate the Son and the Holy Spirit, for with him you are one God. When they hear that the Son is a unique God, they must understand this: but without separating him from the Father and the Holy Ghost, and thus say that there is only one essence, and not consider that the essence of one is greater or better than that of the other and different in some respects. , do not think that the Father is the Son or the Holy Spirit or anything that an apart person says in relation to others, for example, the term?Word?applies only to the Son, and the Gift is affirmed only with regard to the Holy Ghost.

Second, everything that belongs to the divine nature as such?It must, in exact language, “express itself in singular, for this nature is unique”. Therefore, although each of the three people is uncreated, infinite, omnipotent, eternal, there are not three uncreated, infinite, omnipotent, and eternal, but one.

The different names applied to each of the three people of the Trinity reflect a reciprocal relationship, such as: Father and Son, and the Gift of the Two, the Holy Spirit. In fact, it cannot be said that the Father is the Trinity, or that the Son is the Trinity, nor that the Gift cannot be the Trinity, but what is said of each of the three in relation to himself is not said in the plural, but in singular, since it refers to a single reality: the Trinity itself.

Third, “the Trinity has a unique and indivisible action and a unique will”. In other words, its operation is “inseparable” 15, that is, in relation to the contingent order, the three persons act as “a principle (unum principium) 16” and because people are inseparable, do they therefore also operate inseparably?As an example, according to Kelly, Augustine argues that the orphanias, manifestations of God recorded in the Old Testament, should not be considered exclusively manifestations of the Son. Sometimes theophanies can be attributed to the Son or the Holy Ghost, sometimes to the Father, sometimes to the three people of divinity; at other times, it is still impossible to decide which of the three people to assign them to. 18

The difficulty posed by this theory is that it seems to ignore the different roles of the three people, to which Augustine responds that, if it is true that the Son, although different from the Father, was born, suffered and resurrected, is it also true?that the Father collaborated with the Son in the realization of incarnation, passion, and resurrection; however, it was desirable for the Son, because of his relationship with the Father, to come forward and make visible to each of them, in the external functioning of the Divinity, his own role by virtue of his origin?. 20

2. The distinction between people

According to Augustine, the distinction between people is based on “their mutual relations within the Divinity”. Although considered a divine substance, people are identical, the Father distinguishes themselves as Father in the generation of the Son, and the Son is distinguished as a Son. when generated.

As for the mutual relations in the Godhead, if the one he has generated is the principle of what has been generated, the Father is the principle in reference to the Son, for he has generated it; however, it is not a minor investigation. It is important to ask whether the Father is also a principle in relation to the Holy Ghost, as written: it comes from the Father; if so, it is a principle not only of what he generates or does (the Son), but also of the person who gives (the Spirit). This would shed a possible light on the question of concern to many about the possibility of saying that the Holy Ghost is also a Son, for he leaves the Father, as read in the Gospel (Jn 15:26). He left the Father, yes, but not as born, but as a Gift, and therefore it cannot be said that he is a son, because he was not born as the One. Son and was not created like us, who were born for filial adoption by the grace of God. 21

Does the Holy Spirit also differ from the Father and the Son while he is?For them, being the common gift? (donum) of the two, is it a kind of communion of the Father and the Son (quaedam patris and filii communiio), or is it the love they pour out together in our hearts?22. Then the question arises:? Three??Augustine recognizes that they are traditionally called people, but he is not satisfied with the term. The term probably had the connotation of separated individuals. But he agrees to use the phrase, because of the need to affirm the distinction of the three versus modalism, and with a deep sense of the inadequacy of human language. 23 His positive, original and very important theory for the later history of the doctrine of the Trinity in the West was “all three are real or substantial relationships”. In other words, any distinction between divine peoples consists of a mutual relationship that remains between them.

The reason that led Augustine to this position was the dilemma posed by the Aryans24. In the category of chance, this cannot be, because in God there is nothing accidental; However, if they were in the category of substance, then the conclusion would be that there are three gods.

Augustine denies the two alternatives, explaining that the relationship category is a possible alternative. All three, he goes on to say, are relationships as real and eternal as the “generate, generate and proceed (or be bestowed)” that underpin relationships within the Divinity.

So is there only a simple good and, consequently, an immutable good? God. And this good has created all the goods that, not being simple, are therefore changeable. I mean precisely created, that is, realized and not generated. It is that what is generated from a simple being is as simple as it is and is the same as who generated it. We call these two beings Father and Son and both with their Holy Spirit are one God. This Spirit of the Father and of the Son is called in the Holy Scriptures the Holy Spirit by a kind of appropriation of this name. However, he is distinct from the Father and the Son, because he is neither the Father nor the Son. He said that he is different, but that is nothing else, because he is also simple, equally immutable and coeternal. And this Trinity is one God and it is simple because it is the Trinity. (?) That is why it is said that nature is simple, that it has nothing to lose; or is it simply the nature in which the one who has identifies with what he has. [For this reason] perfections are called simple, which par excellence and in truth constitute the divine nature: because in them the substance is not one thing and the quality another. 26

Are the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost so in a relationship?

3. The Procession of the Holy Spirit

Augustine also tried to explain what is the procession of the Holy Ghost, or how is it different from the Son’s generation?28 He assumed that the Holy Spirit is the mutual love of the Father and the Son, and filius caritatem, the common love that the Father and the Son love the other. 29 Thus Augustine affirms that “the Holy Spirit is not Father or Son, but only the Holy Spirit of the Father and of the Son, equal to the Father and the Son, and belonging to the unity of the Trinity?. 30 Thus, in relation to the Holy Spirit, the Father and the Son form a unique principle, which is inevitable, because the relationship of the two?With the Holy Spirit “it is the same and where there is no difference in the relationship, its functioning is inseparable. “Augustine then taught the doctrine of the double procession of the Holy Spirit of the Father and of the Son (filioque).

Thus, according to Augustine, the Father is the author of the procession of the Holy Spirit because he has begat the Son, and by begat him, he has also made him the source from which the Spirit comes, and from all that the Son has. , the Father has, the Father also has the Holy Spirit that comes from Him. From this, however, we must not conclude, he warns, that the Holy Ghost has two sources or principles. 32 On the contrary, “The action of the Father and the Son?in the procession of the Spirit “it is common, as is the action of the three peoples in creation”. Moreover, despite the double procession, the Father remains – the primary source – to the extent that it is his capacity that the Holy Spirit’s capacity comes from the Son.

Also understand that just as the Father has life in himself, so that the Holy Spirit may come from him, so he has also given the Son to come from him the same Holy Spirit; coming from both, out of time; and because it is said that the Holy Spirit comes from the Father, it must be understood that the Son receives him from the Father, and therefore the Holy Spirit also comes from the Son. The Son has it, receives it from the Father, and thus receives it from the Father so that from him comes the same Holy Spirit.

Therefore, the Holy Spirit is common to the Father and the Son. “The Father is only the Father of the Son, and the Son is only the Son of the Father; But is the Spirit of the Father and the Son, who unies them by a bond of love?Therefore, the Holy Spirit is the “bond that unies, on the one hand, the Father and the Son, and, on the other hand, God and Christians. The Spirit is a gift, given by God, that uniessofies Christians with God and with other Christians. The Holy Spirit forms the bonds of unity between Christians, on which the unity of the Church depends fundamentally. The Church is the “temple of the Holy Spirit”, and in it dwells the Holy Spirit: Does the same Spirit who uniesinity the Father and the Son, making them one, also unsern Christians in a church?

4. The formulation of “psychological analogies”

According to JND Kelly, “the use of analogies derived from the structure of the human soul”, although timidly expressed, is probably “Augustine’s most original contribution to Trinitarian theology”. 36 The function of these analogies is not to demonstrate that God is the Trinity, already expressed in the scriptures, but to deepen our understanding of the mystery of absolute unity and also of the current distinction of the three According to Augustine, there are traces of the Trinity everywhere, because creatures, as they exist, exist to participate in God’s ideas, so everything must reflect, albeit subduedly, the Trinity that created them.

However, to seek the true image of the Trinity, man must first look at himself, because the scriptures represent God by saying, “Let us [i. e. , all three] make man in our image and likeness. “Therefore, even the outside man, that is, the man considered in his sensitive nature, provides?(quandam trinitatis efigym) . 38 According to Kelly, the process of perception, for example, reveals three distinct and at the same time closely related elements, the first of which, in a sense, generates the latter, while the third For example, the external object (res quam viveus, what we see), the sensitive representation of the mind (visio) and the intention or act of focus of the mind (intentio; voluntas ; intentiovolunts; , the intention of the will); when the external object is removed, we have a second trinity, which is superior to it, since it is entirely in the mind. 40 In this sense, Augustine speaks of the impression of memory. (memory), the internal image of memory (internal vision), and the intention or will of the (voluntary) will.

However, for the real image of the Trinity, we must look at the inner man, or the soul. Commenting on the question of the psalm: “Why are you sad, O soul of mine?”And why are you bothering me?” He writes: “Therefore, we understand that we have something where the image of God, that is, the spirit, the reason. The spirit invoked the light of God and the truth of God. With him, we understand what is right and what is unfair. So our intellect speaks to our souls?41

As Kelly says, it has often been said that the main Trinitarian analogy of A Trinitate is that of the lover (amans), the beloved object (id quod amatur) and the love that unites them (love) 42 However, Augustine’s discussion of this trinity is quite brief, and it is only a “transition” for what he considers his most important analogy , that of “the activity of the mind directed towards itself or, better yet, towards God”.

Who can understand the omnipotent Trinity? And who doesn’t talk about it, even if they don’t understand it? He is a rare person who, speaking of the Holy Trinity, knows what he is saying. It is discussed, it is debated, but no one can contemplate this vision without inner peace. I would like men to meditate on three things that are in themselves, all three very different from the Trinity. I point to you, to practice, and thus experience and feel how far you are from this mystery. I mean existence, knowledge and will. In fact, I exist, I know and want. I exist, knowing and willing; I know that I exist and that I want; I want to exist and know. Notice, who can, how inseparable is life in these three faculties: one life, one intelligence, one essence. How inseparable are the objects of this distinction. Distinction, however, that exists! Everyone is in front of them. Study yourself, look and answer me. However, even if you reflect and answer me, do not believe that you have understood the essence of this immutable Being that is above all creatures, the Being that exists firmly, firmly knows and firmly wants. Could it be through these three faculties that the Trinity exists in God, or does this triple faculty exist in each of the three persons, so that there are three in each? Or are the two things achieved in an admirable way, with a manifold simplicity, the Trinity being its own infinite end, for which it exists, is known and is firmly sufficient, in the great abundance of its Unity? Who could easily express this concept? Who would have the words to express it? Who, somehow, would dare to speak recklessly about it?

This last analogy fascinated Augustine throughout his life, being the resulting trinitys: a) the mind (mens), his knowledge of himself (notitia) and his love for himself (love); 44 (b) memory (memory), or, more accurately, “the latent knowledge that the mind has of itself”; understanding (intelligentia), that is, “his apprehension of himself in the light of eternal reasons”; And the (voluntary) will, or self-esteem, by which this process of self-care is launched ?; 45 (c) the spirit, remembering, knowing, and loving God Himself. 46? However, is this the last of the three analogies that Augustine considers most satisfactory?Augustine considers that it is only when the mind has concentrated on itself with all its faculties of memory, understanding and love in his God so that his image, corrupted by sin, can be completely restored.

Augustine, while stopping at these analogies, has no illusions about its immense limits. First, “the image of God in the mind of man is, in any case, a distant and imperfect image”. Second, “although the rational nature of man exhibits the aforementioned trinities, (?) They represent faculties or attributes possessed by man, while divine nature is perfectly simple. “Third, memory, understanding, and will will operate on man separately, while the three divine persons “belong to each other and their action is perfectly one and indivisible. “Finally, in God, the three members of the Godhead are people, but it is not the same in the human spirit. Paraphrased by Augustine himself, the image of the Trinity is found in one person, but the Supreme Trinity itself is three people: what is a paradox, when someone reflects that, however, all three are more inseparably one than the spiritual Trinity. 47

The basis for following this [Christian] religion is history and prophecy. There we discover the disposition of divine Providence, in time, in favor of humanity, to reform and restore it, with a view to the possession of eternal life. Believing this, the mind is purified in a lifestyle adjusted to divine precepts. This will allow you to perceive spiritual realities. These realities are neither of the past nor of the future, but they are always identical to themselves, immune to any temporary changes. It is the same and only God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Do you know this Trinity? How much is possible in today’s life? Without a doubt, the mind perceives that every intellectual, animal and corporal creature receives from this same creative Trinity: being to be what it is; its way; and direction in perfect universal order. However, do not understand that only part of creatures is the work of the Father, part of the Son, and yet part of the Holy Spirit. The truth is that each individual nature receives the creation of the Father through the Son, in the gift of the Holy Spirit. Since all things, substance, essence, nature or any other more appropriate term, occurring at the same time, have these three properties: it is something unique, it is distinguished by its form from other things, and it is in universal order. 48

Conclusion: Praise to God

Finally, we can summarize Augustine’s contributions to Trinitarian doctrine: (a) In explaining the Trinity, he conceives of divine nature, before people, separately; its Formula of the Trinity is: a nature that remains in three people; on the contrary, that of the Greeks was: three people of the same nature. In Augustine, the unique deity soon appears. The equality of the divine people also appears more brilliantly. (B) Another advancement of Augustine’s Trinitarian doctrine is the insistence on making all ad extra operations the indistinct work of the three people, that is, that external operations be attributed or appropriate to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 49 (c) Finally, Augustine laid the foundations for the psychological theory of processions, on the origin of the Son and that of the Holy Spirit.

Augustine, with the greatest theologians who were able to glimpse the dimensions of the Trinitarian mystery, used to finish his works as fervent prayers, praises and thanksgivings, always aware of his limitations: “O my faith, advance in your confession. Tell the Lord your God: holy, holy, holy is the Lord my God. Have we been baptized in your name, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost?50 The respectful silence of reason causes the heart to be full of admiration. Is God shrouded in mystery, in an inaccessible light? (1 Tim 6. 13-16):

Therefore, when we reach your presence everything we have said will cease, but there is still much to say and you will be left alone, as a whole (1Cor 15:28), and then we will sing a song forever, praising in a movement, in you are closely united. Lord, only God, God trinity, everything I have said about you in these books is yours. Recognize yours, and if anything is mine, forgive me and yours forgive me. AMEN. 51

Source: Fé Para Hoje Magazine No. 40 (Article 5)

1? See Church Dogmatics, I / 1-8-12 (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2010), p. 295-489, Sketch of a Dogmatic (Sao Paulo: Fonte Editorial, 2006), p. 53-58 and Geoffrey W. Bromiley, Introduction to theology by Karl Barth (Edinburgh: T

two? For the bibliography, see J. Scott Horrell, “The Self-Giving Trinitarian God, the Dei Imago, and the Nature of the Local Church”, Vox Scripturae v. 6? N. 2 (December 1996), p. 243-244. See also J. Scott Horrell, “A Trinitarian Worldview”, Vox Scripturae v. 4? N. 1 (March 1994), p. 55-77.

4? Saint Augustine, Christian Doctrine (Sao Paulo: Paulus, 2002), 1. 5, p. 46-47.

5? J. N. D. Kelly, Patristic: Origin and Development of the Central Doctrines of the Christian Faith (Sao Paulo: Vida Nova, 2009), p. 205 Cf. Trinity 1-4, p. 23-189.

6? Trinity 5. 2, p. 193

7? Trinity 15. 2, p. 480-481.

8? Behold, piety is wisdom; and deviating from evil is science?(Job 28:28). This opposition corresponds to the two functions of reason: a higher function, by which the soul devotes himself to contemplation of eternal realities; and an inferior one, by which the soul applies to knowledge of temporal realities. Trinity 12. 21b-23, 386-390.

9? See JNDKelly, Op. cit. , P. 205-210 See also Justo L. González, A History of Christian Thought. v. 1: from the begin to the Council of Chalcedon (Sao Paulo: Cultura Crist, 2004), p. 317-323.

Ten? Like JNDKelly, Op. cit. , P. 205: Do you prefer essence? The “substance”, since it involves a subject with attributes, while, for Augustine, God is identical to his attributes “: and unusual Trinitarian haec is deus and trinitatem quae deus est, see St. Augustine, The City of God c. II [Books IX to XV] (Lisbonne: Fundacao Calouste Gulbenkian, 1993), 11. 10, p. 1011-1014. For an explanation of the key terms of Trinitarian doctrine (mainly?Substance – nature – essence: one? And? Hippostasus – subsistence – person: three really separated?), Cf. Leonardo Boff, The Trinity, Society and Liberation (Petrapolis, Voices: 1986), p. 111 -126.

11? Henry Chadwick, The Early Church (Lisbonne: Ulisseia, 1967), p. 257 See in particular Millard J. Erickson, Who? S Manipulation of the Trinity? An assessment of the debate on subordination (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel, 2009), p. 153-159. Father, who has been revived in some areas of the American Evangelical Church.

12? Trinity 6. 9, p. 227-229

13? Trinidad 7. 12, p. 256-257.

14? Trinity 8. 1, 259; See. 6. 9, p. 227-229; 5. 10-16, 203-213.

fifteen? The Trinity 2. 9, p. 78

Sixteen? Trinidad 5. 15, p. 208-210.

17? Trinity 1. 7, p. 31; 2. 3, p. 71-73.

18? Trinidad 2. 14-34, p. 85-110; 3. 4-27, p. 114-143

19? Trinity 2. 9, p. 78-80; 2. 18, p. 90-91.

20? Christian theology distinguishes between the immanent Trinity and the economic Trinity. The immanent Trinity is the Trinity considered in itself, in its eternity and its percotic communion between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Economic Trinity is the Trinity as revealed. in the history of humanity and acts for our participation in Trinitarian communion. See Karl Rarhner, “The Trinitarian God, Transcendent Foundation of the History of Salvation,” in: Johannes Feiner

21? Trinidad 5. 15, p. 208-209; 5. 6, p. 196-197; 5. 8 pp. 199-201.

22? Trinidad 5. 12, p. 204-206; 5. 15-17, p. 208-213; 8. 1, p. 259-260.

23? As Agustín Joo Calvino says, because of the poverty of human language in matters of such importance, this word hypostasis was forced out of necessity, not so that it could be expressed, but only so that the fact would not be done in silence. , Son and Spirit ?. See The Institutes of Christian Religion I. 13. 5, 18 (Sao Paulo: Cultura Crist, 2006), p. 126, 146-147. Calvin seems to distance himself from psychological analogies, although he practically repeats Augustine’s approach to the Trinity.

24? Trinity 5. 4, p. 194

25? See JND Kelly, Op. cit. P. 12-13. For Aristotle, there were ten categories: substance (ousia? In the sense of a thing), quantity or size (quantitas), quality (qualitas), relation to something (relatio ad aliquid), place (locus), time (tempus) , position or situation (situs), habit or external (habitus), action (actio), passion or action suffered (passio) . Aristotle believed that these categories represented not only the ways in which the mind thinks about the external world, but also the ways in which things exist objectively in this world.

26? The City of God 11. 10, p. 1011-1012.

27? Trinity 5-7, 191-258; See also Saint Augustine, Commentary on Psalms 68 1. 5 [Enarrationes in psalmos] Psalms 51-100 (Sao Paulo: Paulus, 1997), p. 435-437. According to J. N. D. Kelly, Op. cit. , P. 207 😕 For today’s people, less well versed in technical philosophy, the notion that relationships (for example?Upstairs?Right to?,? Bigger?) They seem to have a real livelihood, albeit their objectivity, that is, that such relationships exist on their own, regardless of the observer. For Augustine, it was a more familiar idea, as Plotin and Porfirio had taught it. For him, the advantage was that by allowing him to speak of God significantly in a new level of language, he allowed him to affirm both the unity and plurality of the Divinity, without falling into a paradox?

28? Trinidad 15. 46, p. 546-550

29? Trinity 15:27-37, 521-534. In 7. 6, 244, the Holy Ghost is called “supreme charity, a bond that unies [the Father to the Son] and submits us to them. “(summa charitas, utrumque coniungens, nosque sousungens).

30? Trinity 1. 7, p. 31.

31? For Augustine’s role in the filioque controversy, see Alister E. McGrath, Systematic, Historical and Philosophical Theology (Sao Paulo: Shedd, 2005), p. 395-398.

32? Trinidad 5. 15, p. 208-210

33? What Eastern (Orthodox) theology has not always considered is that Latinos, including Augustine, have always conceived the Father as the source (Fons Trinitatis) or the special origin (origo principalis) in the Trinity. The Holy Spirit, as Augustine says, comes from the Principal Father; it comes from the Father and the Connecting Son, because of the gift the Father gives to the Son. Most Orthodox could accept such a formulation, but until an ecumenical council acted, that idea would remain simple?Theological teaching? (theopholumenous). See Trinity 15. 50, p. 553-555.

34? Trinidad 15. 47, p. 549.

35? Alister E. McGrath, op. cit. , p. 367-368

36? Henry Chadwick, Op. cit. , P. 257 Cf. Millard Erickson, Introduction to Systematic Theology (Sao Paulo: Vida Nova, 2012), p. 138: “Augustine’s greatest contribution to understanding the Trinity lies in his analogies From the field of human personality. He argued that if humanity is made in the image of God, which is trygon, it is reasonable to expect to find, in an analysis of human nature, a reflection, albeit dim, of God’s triumphality.

37? Saint Augustine, The True Religion 13 (Sao Paulo: Paulus, 2002), p. 39-40.

38? Trinidad 11. 1, p. 335-336

39? Trinity 11: 2-5, p. 337-342.

40? Trinidad 11. 6, p. 343-345.

41? St. Augustine, Commentary on Psalms 42. 6 [Enarrationes in psalmos]; Psalms 1-50 (Sao Paulo: Paulus, 1997), p. 718-719.

42? The Trinity 8. 12-9. 2, p. 260-289 and The City of God v. II, 11. 26 It is interesting to note that in the Barthian-Anselmian conception, faith is amans, the understanding of faith is id quod amatur and Theology is love. See Karl Barth, Faith in Search of Understanding (Sao Paulo: Fonte Editorial, 2006), p. 14. See also Canterbury Anselmo, Monol. 67 and passim.

43? Saint Augustine, Confessions 13. 11 (Sao Paulo: Paulus, 1997), p. 412-413.

44? Trinity 9: 2-8, p. 287-296

45? Trinity 10:17-19, p. 330-334.

46? Trinidad 14. 11-15. 28, p. 453-557.

47? For the criticism of this analysis, see Alister E. McGrath, Op. cit. , P. 386-388.

48? True Religion 13, p. 48; Trinidad 15. 43, p. 541-543

49? Additional actions are those that the Trinity performs outside the Trinitarian circle, such as the creation of the universe, revelation, salvation. Intra ad actions are intra-ctrinary actions in the Trinitarian circle, such as the generation of the Son and the breath of the Holy Spirit by the Father and the Son.

fifty? Confessions 13. 12, p. 413.

51? The Trinity, 15. 28, p. 557.