The Threefold Personality of God in the New Testament: Texts Treating of the Three Divine Persons Together

Section 2: —

the threefold personality of God is distinctly and formally enunciated. i. The Gospels. — Four such texts occur in the Gospels. Though their combined effect is sufficiently compelling, they are not all of equal weight. The most convincing is the passage embodying the form of Baptism. a) The first brief intimation of the functioning of Three Divine Persons is given in the Annunciation: ” Spiritus Sanctus superveniet in te, et virtus Altissimi obumbrabit tibi; ideoque et quod nascetur ex te sanctum, vocabitur Filius Dei — shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.” 2 Here all three Divine Persons are distinctly mentioned: first, the Son who is to be born, second, the Holy Ghost, and third, the ” Most High,” who stands in the relation of a Father to Him of whom it is said a few verses farther up: 3 ” Hie erit magnus et Filius Altissimi vocabitur — He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High.” Where there is a Son of God, there must also be a Divine Father. The relative opposition between the terms Father and Son forbids the welding of both persons into one. This is sufficient evidence that we have here not merely three different names for one Divine Person, but three really distinct Hypostases, of which one is not the other. Nor can it have been the intention of the sacred writer merely to personify certain absolute attributes of the Deity. The Son of God, who is to be made flesh (Christ), manifestly represents a real Person. 2 Luke I, 35. 8 Luke I» 32.

Moreover, the strict monotheism of the Bible necessitates the assumption that the three Divine Persons mentioned in the text must be consubstantial, i. e., absolutely identical in essence. b) The most glorious external manifestation of the Blessed Trinity occurred in connection with the Baptism of Christ.4 Christ, the Son of God, is standing in the Jordan; descends upon Him in the form of a dove, and the voice of the Father calls from Heaven: * This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.* Here, too, the hypostatic difference between the three Persons, and the impossibility of blending them into one, is quite apparent. The ” beloved Son ” and the Father expressing His pleasure are clearly differentiated, while the Person of is emblemed by the dove, a symbolic figure which would be unsuited to any absolute attribute of the Godhead.5 Though the identity of Nature of the three Divine Persons is not expressly enunciated in the above-quoted passages, it may, as a matter of course, be presumed. c) In His famous farewell discourse delivered after the last Supper,6 Christ announced that He was ” going to the Father” and would ask Him to send the Paraclete. The distinction here made between the three Divine Persons is as obvious as it is real. No one can be father and son under the same aspect, nor can any one send himself. When Christ says, for instance: “Ego rogabo Patrem, et alium Paraclitum dabit vobis, ut mane at vobiscum in aeternum, Spiritum veritatis — I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Paraclete, that he may abide with you forever, the Spirit of truth,” 7 4Matth. Ill, 13 .sqq.; Mark I, o 8 Cf r. T. J. Gerrard, The WayLuke III, 21 sqq.; cfr. Job I, farer’s Vision, pp. 200 sqq. 6 John XIV-XVI. Tjohn XIV, 16 sq.

He distinguishes between His own Person, that of the Father, and that of the “other Paraclete ” and clearly identifies the latter with the ” Spirit of truth.” 8 The threefold personality of the Godhead appears still more distinctly from John XV, 26: ” Quum autem venerit Paraclitus, quern ego tnittam vobis a Patre, Spiritum veritatis, qui a Patre procedit, ille testimonium perhibebit de me — But when the Paraclete cometh, whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceedeth from the Father, he shall give testimony of me.* The absolute of Father and Son is taught in John XVI, 15: Omnia, quaecumque habet Pater, mea sunt — All things whatsoever the Father hath, are mine,” and it is no less true of the Holy Ghost. d) The baptismal form, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost/’ enunciates all the essential elements of the Holy Trinity.9 “Euntes ergo docete omnes gentes, baptizantes eos in nomine Patris et Filii et SpifitUS Sandi (/2a7rTi’fovTcs aurovs cts to ovofxa rev irarpbs Kal tov viov Kal tov ay lov nvcvfiaTOS^ The hypostatic difference between Father and Son is brought out by the relative opposition, in virtue of which they exclude each other as begetting and begotten. For no one can be his own father or his own son. To admit such an absurdity would be to deny the principle of contradiction and thereby to subvert right reason. Hence there is a real difference between the 8 Paraclitus — Spirit us Sanctus. 0 Cfr. Matth. XXVIII 19. Father and the Son. As to the Holy Ghost, the co-ordination involved in the use of et — et ( 6v6fmTi 10 occur in the original Greek text, and for our present purpose they are equally conclusive. For man to be baptized in the name of the Most Holy Trinity can have no other meaning than that through 10 Acts II, 38. baptism he obtains forgiveness of his sins in virtue and by the authority of the three Divine Persons; while to baptize »V of the Blessed Trinity signifies the devotion with which the person baptized is expected to consecrate himself to and to seek his last end and aim in the “Deity.” 11 In either case Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are certainly identical with the Deity itself, because no one can expect forgiveness of his sins from, or seek his final end in, a mere creature, without making himself guilty of idolatry. If the three Persons mentioned are identical with the Godhead, they cannot be three Gods, but must be the One God taught by both Testaments.12, The essential identity of the three Divine Persons follows further from the singular form *in nomine/’ because throughout the Bible *nomen Domini” signifies God’s power, majesty, and essence.13 As the Three have but one name, so They have but one essence, one nature, one substance. St. Augustine beautifully observes: “Iste unus Deus, quia non in nominibus Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti, sed in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti. Ubi unum nomen aadis, unus est Deus — This is one God, for it is not in the names of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, but in the name of the 11 Cfr. Rom. VI, 3 sqq.; 1 Cor. KnowdbilUy, Essence, and AttriI, 12 sqq.; Ill, 4 sqq.; Gal. Ill, 27. butes, pp. 212 sqq. 12 Cfr. Pohle-Preuss, God: His 13 Nomen est numen. 3 28 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Where thou hearest one name, there is one God.” 14

2. The Epistles. — The Apostolic Epistles contain four texts in which the three Divine Persons are mentioned together. Most prominent among them is the much-discussed Comma Ioanneum ( i a) The prologue to the first Epistle of St. Peter reads: ” Petrus … electis … secundum praescientiam Dei PatriSj in sanctificationem Spiritus, in obediential et aspersionem sanguinis Iesu Christi: gratia vobis et pax multiplicetur — Peter … to the … elect, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, unto the sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you and peace be multiplied.” Here we have a Trinitarian form of benediction in which the omniscient Father, the sanctifying Spirit, and Jesus Christ, our Redeemer by the ” sprinkling of blood,” appear on a par. Consequently the Three are one true God. Though this isolated text is not sufficient to establish a real distinction between the three Divine Persons (for the sanctifying Spirit might possibly be conceived as a mere attribute of the Father or of Jesus Christ), the teaching of the New Testament in many other places makes it quite certain that Jesus Christ is the ” Son of God ” who differs hypostatically from the Father, as differs hypostatically from both the Father and the Son. 14 August., Tract, in Ioa., VI, n. Homilies on the Gospel according to 9. Browne’s translation in the Li- St. John, p. 87, Oxford 1848. brary of the Fathers, Vol. I of the John V, 7).

b) The epilogue of St. Paul’s second Epistle to the Corinthians contains a similar form of blessing: ” Gratia Domini nostri Iesu Christi et charitas Dei [scil. Patris] et communicatio Sancti Spiritus sit cum omnibus vobis — The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the charity of God [the Father], and the communication of be with, you all.” 15 As grace and charity are supernatural gifts which only the Godhead can dispense, there can be no question that here again the Three Dispensers are One God. But does the text oblige us to postulate three really distinct Persons ? We think it does; for the Greek original 16 puts the ” grace of our Lord Jesus Christ ” on a par with the ” charity of God ” and the ” communication ” (xoivwvta) of the Holy Ghost.” It is improbable that the “God of charity” should be personally identical either with our Lord Jesus Christ or the Holy Ghost. c) St. Paul’s teaching on the spiritual gifts and the charismata 17 is rightly held to have a special bearing on the doctrine of the Most Holy Trinity. Exegetes deduce from the threefold nature of the effect (xap’L(TflaTa> SuiKoviai, cvtpyrjfiaTa) the existence of a threefold hypostatic principle (irvevfia, Kvpios, 0eds). But, since a little further down in St. Paul’s text 18 all these gifts are appropriated to ” the same Spirit,” that which was at first divided returns to its original unity, and consequently Spirit, Lord, and God are not three gods, but one God. The somewhat involved passage is as follows: ” Divisiones vero gratiarum (xaPlcrll°‘T<0V) sunt, idem autem 152 Cor. XIII, 13. 10 The Greek text has: % xAptJ TOV KVploV ‘IfJffOV XpUTTOV, Kdl ^ dy&mi tov Oeov ical ^ Koivwvla rov &ylov W€VfiaTost which Brandscheid (Novum Testamentum, p. 361, Friburgi 1901) correctly translates: ” Gratia … et charitas.” 17 1 Cor. XII, 4 sqq. 18 1 Cor. XII, xi. Spiritus (wv€vfm); [cf r. verse 3: h irvevfrnn ayiw]; et divisiones ministrationum sunt (8ta#coviwv = ministries, ecclesiastical offices), idem autem Dominus (6 Kvpio? = Christ); et diznsiones operationum sunt (cvc/jy^/iarwv = miracles), idem vero Deus (6 avro* 0«k), qui operatur omnia in omnibus — Now there are diversities of graces, but the same Spirit; and there are diversities of ministries, but the same Lord; and there are diversities of operations, but the same God, who worketh in all.” 19 It is plain from the context that, on the basis of three supernatural operations, St. Paul here means to distinguish three separate Divine Persons: Spiritus, Dominus, and Deus. That he does not mean to assert the existence of three Gods appears from verse 11: ” Haec autem omnia operatur unus atque idem Spiritus (to cv kcI to avrb mcvfia), dividens singulis, prout vult — But all these things one and the same spirit worketh, dividing to every one according as he will.” A similar change of subject, by which the same external operation is ascribed now to this Divine Person and now to that, occurs in many other places in Holy Scripture, e. g., in the vision of Isaias.20 The authorship of this vision is in the original Hebrew referred to the Divinity in general OJiSj), in John XII, 40, to Christ, and in Acts XXVIII, 25 sqq., to the Holy Ghost. Except on the assumption of a numerical oneness of nature and essence these expressions are absolutely unintelligible.21 d) The Comma Ioanneum. — If its textual authenticity could be established, the famous 19 i Cor. XII, 4 sqq. beiden Brief e on die Korinther, pp. 20 Is. VI, 9 sq. 244 sqq., Munstcr 1903. 21 Cfr. Al. Schafcr, Erklarung der

THE COMMA IOANNEUM Comma Ioanneum (i John V, 7), or text of the three heavenly Witnesses, would be of equal dogmatic value with the form of Baptism. As it stands, it is a pregnant and clear textus per se dogmaticuSj outweighing, e. g., St. Paul’s entire Epistle to Philemon, and enforcing the dogma of the Divine Trinity more perfectly than any other passage in the Bible. It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that, should it ever become necessary to sacrifice the Comma Ioanneum, the Biblical argument for the dogma of the Blessed Trinity would suffer essential impairment. The whole of our present chapter goes to show the contrary. Yet no one will blame the Catholic theologian for utilizing, in spite of certain critical misgivings, a text which has been received into the liturgy of the Church, and for many centuries 22 formed part and parcel of the Latin Vulgate. Aside from questions of textual criticism, it is plain that the dogmatic authenticity of 1 John V, 7, cannot be questioned without endorsing the heretical view that a proposition received into the Sacred Text under the vigilant eye of the Church may contain dogmatic errors. In this purely dogmatic sense, therefore, the Comma Ioanneum is undoubtedly authentic and may be used as an argument, even though, so long as its textual authenticity has not been securely established, the demonstration based upon it cannot claim to be a strictly Biblical proof. In perfect conformity with the well-known views of St. John the Evangelist, the Comma Ioanneum enumerates the three Witnesses *who give testimony in 22 Presumably since about the year 800. v

heaven,* as “the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost/’ and expressly declares that ” these three are one.”23 Since the three Witnesses of whom the Apostle speaks are ” in heaven,” they seem to be the three Divine Persons, and they must be really distinct from one another, because they are expressly referred to as ol rpeU. Inasmuch as they are “one* (lv, unum), there must exist between them a communication of nature, that is to say, their unity is not merely * unitas in testificando,” but clearly also ” identitas in essendo* It is true St. John in the following verse also says of the three other witnesses who * give testimony on earth,” viz.: ” the spirit, and the water, and the blood,” that ” et hi tres unum sunt/’ But he does not say: lv ciau>, but cts to lv ctViv = in unum sunt, that is, they are one only in so far as they testify, not identical in substance.24

3. The Authenticity of the Comma Ioanneum. — On January 13, 1897, the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office, with the approbation of His Holiness Pope Leo XIII, published the subjoined doctrinal decision:25 “Ad propositionem, utrutn tuto negari an in dubiutn vocari possit, esse authenticum textum 1 Ioa. V } 7… . Eminentissimi Cardinales respondendum mandarunt: Negative — The doubt was proposed: ‘Can it be safely denied, or at least doubted, that the text of 1 John V, 7 … is authentic?’ … 23 1 John V, 7: ” “On rpeis Word, and the Holy Ghost. And elaiv ol fiaprvpovvres h r(a obpavta, these three are one.” 6 var^p, 6 \6yos ical r6 &yiov 24 Cfr. Franzelin, De Deo Trino, irvevfia • icoi o^toi ol rpeis

‘THE COMMA IOANNEUM and the Most Eminent Cardinals answered, No” a) As soon as this decree became known, the opinion was expressed, even by Catholic scholars, that it meant a definitive decision in favor of the authenticity of the Comma Ioanneum, which could not henceforth be doubted or denied without calling in question the Church’s defined right and duty to watch over and authoritatively determine all questions connected with Sacred Scripture. Those who took this view forgot that a decree of the Holy Office, even when approved by the Pope in forma communi does not partake of the nature of an infallible decision. That this is so, is manifest from the action of the same Congregation against Galilei, A. D. 1633.26 The religious assent with which Catholics are bound to receive the decisions of the Holy Office,27 is a duty growing out of Catholic respect for authority, and imposed by obedience. But it would be wrong to interpret it as forbidding deeper research into the soundness or unsoundness of a decision which does not per se claim to be infallible. The respect and obedience we owe to the Church will prompt us not to refuse our assent until it is positively certain, or at least highly probable, that the Sacred Congregation has made a mistake. The Pope in his capacity of supreme teacher can26 On the decision against Galilei, see Adolf Miiller, S. J., Der Galilei-Prosess (1632-163$) nach Ursprung, Verlauf und Folgen, Freiburg 1909, pp. 191 sqq. This excellent work, together with the same author’s Galileo Galilei und das kopernikanische Weltsystem, Freiburg 1909, is far and away the best account of this much-mooted historical incident. We hope both will soon find an English translator. 27 See the letter addressed by Pius IX to the Archbishop of Munich, under date of Dec. 21, 1863 (Denzinger-Bannwart, Enchiridion, n. 1684). Cfr. P. A. Baart, The Roman Court, pp. jii sq., New York 1895, not delegate his infallibility to any man or body of men; hence his approval of a congregational decree does not invest that decree with infallibility, unless indeed the Sovereign Pontiff sees fit, by an approbation in forma solemni, to raise it to the rank of an ex cathedra decision solemnly binding all the faithful. This was not done in the present instance. For the rest, it is well to remember that the decrees and decisions of the different Roman Congregations are as a rule disciplinary rather than doctrinal. They are for the most part designed to warn Catholic scholars against adopting doubtful theories until the reasons for and against have been thoroughly sifted. Thus it was in the early days of the Church in respect of the moot question regarding the existence of antipodes. Like value should be attached to the ecclesiastical decisions against the system of Copernicus, which has emerged victoriously from the violent conflict waged about it. Perhaps the decision of the Holy Office on the Comma Ioanneum belongs to the same category. In these parlous days, when Protestant and Rationalist critics are sapping the very foundations of sound Biblical science, and in their eagerness to frame new hypotheses are trotting out a horde of critical monsters which forthwith proceed to devour one another, there is danger that Catholic savants may venture too far along slippery paths, losing sight completely of the firm ground of ecclesiastical Tradition.28 An immediate authoritative intervention in the controversy raging round the Comma Ioanneum seemed all the more advisable because a definitive solution of the problem on purely scientific grounds could hardly be expected for a long time to come. Though it seems at present a highly im28 Take, for example, the case of the unfortunate Abbe Loisy.

probable event, yet some ancient Greek or Latin palimpsest may yet be unearthed, containing the Comma in an undoubtedly genuine and original form. The absence of the passage from so many New Testament codices could then be satisfactorily explained by an oversight of the copyists. G. Schepss has lately found the mooted text cited in a work of Priscillian’s newly discovered in 1889. At the present stage of the controversy, however, there is no blinking the fact that the critical arguments against the authenticity of the Comma Ioanneum considerably outweigh those adduced in its favor. b) The most weighty objection raised against the authenticity of 1 John V, 7 is based on the circumstance that the text is missing in all the older Greek codices without exception. Not until the fifteenth century does it begin to make its appearance in the manuscript copies of St. John’s First Epistle. Moreover, not one of the Greek Fathers who combated Arianism ever cited this strong passage, which would have dealt a death blow to the heresy of Subordinationism. In fact, when we observe how eagerly the Greek Fathers of the Nicene and Post-Nicene period conned their Bible for texts with which to refute the Arians, without ever lighting upon 1 John V, 7, the only rational explanation is that the Comma Ioanneum was not there. Nor were the Latin Fathers (if we disregard a few faint and doubtful traces) acquainted with the text of the three heavenly Witnesses. St. Augustine, e. g., fails to cite it in his great work De Trinitate, in which with his customary ingenuity he turns to account practically all the Trinitarian texts found in the whole Bible.29 He repeatedly quotes 1 John V, 8, but never once 1 John V, 7. What 29 The Speculum Augustini “Audi Israhel” is spurious. Cfr. Bardenhewer-Shahan, Patrology, p. 505.

is still more remarkable is that Leo the Great, in his dogmatic Epistula ad Flavianum (A. D. 451), quotes as Scriptural the verses that immediately precede, and several that follow the passage called Comma Ioanneum, but never alludes to the Comma itself. Nor was the Comma known to St. Jerome, who restored the Vulgate text by order of Pope Damasus. If the editors of the official edition, prepared under Pope Sixtus V and his predecessors, had recognized the spuriousness of the pseudo-Hieronymian prologue to the Catholic Epistles, now so apparent to all, the Comma would probably never have been incorporated in the Vulgate. The most ancient manuscript codices of the Vulgate — among them the Codex Fuldensis, the Codex Amiatinus, and the Codex Harleianus — and the oldest extant copies of the Greek Testament, do not contain the much discussed passage, which made its way very gradually since the eighth century. In England it was unknown to Saint Bede, who died in the year 735. But how did the text of the three heavenly Witnesses find its way into the Vulgate? All explanations that have been advanced so far are pure guesswork. The circumstance that in certain manuscript codices the Comma occurs sometimes before and sometimes after verse 8, has suggested the hypothesis that it was originally a marginal note, which somehow crept into the text. Some think that a misunderstood remark by St. Cyprian first led to its reception. This would explain the early occurrence of the Comma in the African Church. St. Cyprian (+258) writes in his treatise De Unitate Ecclesiae, c. 6: ” Dicit Dominus: ego et Pater unum sumus, et iterum de Patre et Filio et Spiritu Sancto scriptum est: et tres unum sunt — The Lord sayeth: I and the Father are one; and again it is written of the

Father and the Son and : And the Three are one.” Of this passage, as Al. Schafer points out, only the words ” et tres unum sunt ” can be looked upon as a quotation from Sacred Scripture, and they may have been borrowed from the genuine eighth verse of the fifth chapter of St. John’s First Epistle.30 Facundus of Hermiane (+ about 570), who had no inkling of the existence of the famous Comma, .actually formulated this surmise: ” Tres sunt qui testimonium dant, spiritus, aqua et sanguis, et hi tres unum sunt … quod Ioannis testimonium B. Cyprianus de Patre, Filio et Spiritu Sancto intelligit” 31 Tertullian (born about 160) has a passage in his Contra Praxeam which sounds somewhat like the Comma/2 but we may fairly doubt whether it is intended for a citation or merely expresses the author’s personal opinion. c) Against such arguments as these it is difficult to defend the authenticity of the Comma Ioanneum** which undeniably did not find its way into the Vulgate until the ninth century, while the Greek codices contain no trace of it prior to the fifteenth century.34 All that can be said for the other side is that since the apographs 30 Schafer, Einleitung in das N. T., p. 340, Paderborn 1898. 31 Defens. Trium Capital., I, 3. 32 Contr. Prax., 25. The passage reads: ” Ita connexus Patris in Filio et Filii in Paracleto tres efficit cohaerentes, alterum ab altero, qui tres unum sunt, non unus.” 33 But few attempts at such a defense have been made in English since Dr. Wiseman published his well-known Letters on 1 John V, 7; e. g., by Lamy, in the American Ecclesiastical Review, 1897, pp. 449 sqq. Cfr. also Ch. Forster, A New Plea for the Authenticity of the Text of the Three Heavenly Witnesses, Cambridge 1867. J. Lebreton gives a brief and impartial summary of the present status of the controversy in an appendix (pp. 524-531) of his work Les Origines du Dogme de la Trinite, Paris 1910. 34 Of the Greek uncials every one that contains the First Epistle of St. John is without the Comma loanneum. Of the cursive MSS. of the Greek New Testament about one hundred and ninety do not include the passage, while only four contain it, and these four as text-witnesses are worthless. Cfr. W. L. Sullivan in the New York Review, Vol. II, (1906), No. 2, p. 180. of the earliest period are nearly all lost, there remains a bare possibility that the Comma Ioanneum may have occurred in one or the other of the most ancient, especially African, codices. Some importance attaches to the fact that as early as 380 the Spanish heresiarch Priscillian cites as Scriptural the verse: * Et tria sunt, quae testimonium dicunt in coelo, Pater, Verbum et Spiritus, et haec tria unum sunt.* 85 The main argument for the authenticity of the Comma is based upon a passage in the ” Libellus Fidei,” which the Catholic Bishops36 who were cited by Hunneric, King of the Vandals, to meet the Arians in conference on Feb. 1, 484,87 submitted in defense of their faith. The passage is as follows: ” Et ut adhuc luce clarius unius divinitatis esse cum Patre et Filio Spiritum Sanctum doceamus, Ioannis Evangelistae testimonio comprobatur. Ait namque: Tres sunt, qui testimonium perhibent in coelo: Pater, Verbum et Spiritus Sanctus, et hi tres unum sunt/’ 88 St. Fulgentius (468-533), Bishop of Ruspe, in the African province of Byzazena, undoubtedly knew of the verse and, rightly or wrongly, ascribed a knowledge of it to St. Cyprian: u Beatus Ioannes Apostolus testatur dicens: Tres sunt, qui testimonium perhibent in coelo, Pater, Verbum, et Spiritus Sanctus, et tres unum sunt; quod etiam B. martyr Cyprianus in epistola de unitate ecclesiae confitetur” 89 The defense can also claim the 85 Lib. Apologet., IV, cd. Schepss, sq. Cincinnati 1899; Sullivan in p. 6. Schepss, as we have already the New York Review, II, 2, 185 sq. intimated, discovered this lost work 88 Quoted by Hardouin, Cone, t. of Priscillian’s in the Wiirzburg ii, p. 863. University Library in 1889. 80 Resp. ad Obiect. Arianorum, 88 They included Victor of Vita 10. The passage of St. Cyprian’s, to (cfr. his Hist. Persecut., II, 56) which Fulgentius here refers, occurs and Vigilius of Tapsus. in the sixth chapter De Unitate Ec87 Cfr. Alzog, Manual of Univer- clesiae and reads as follows: ” Dicit sat Church History, Vol. II, p. 28 Dominus, ego et Pater unum sumus;

authority of Cassiodorus, who, about the middle of the sixth century, with many ancient manuscripts at his elbow, revised the entire Vulgate of St. Jerome, especially the Apostolic Epistles, and deliberately inserted I John V, 7, which St. Jerome had left out. If we consider all these facts, in connection with the passage quoted above from Tertullian, which bears the earmarks of a direct citation from Holy Scripture, we are justified in assuming that the Comma Ioanneum was perhaps found in copies of the Latin Bible current in Africa as early as the third century. d) The dogmatic authenticity of I John V, 7, is quite another matter. It can be satisfactorily established by a purely theological process of reasoning. The Comma Ioanneum played a prominent part at the Fourth Lateran Council, A. D. 121 5, where Abbot Joachim of Flora adduced it in favor of his tritheistic vagaries. In the Caput ” Damnamus,” which solemnly condemns his errors, we read: “Non enim (ait Ioachim) fideles Christi sunt unum, i. e., quaedam una res, quae communis sit omnibus, sed hoc modo sunt unum, i. e., una ecclesia, propter catholicae iidei unitatem … quemadmodum in canonica Ioannis Apostoli epistula legitur: ‘quia tres sunt, qui testimonium dant in coelo, Pater et Filius [sic!] et Spiritus Sanctus, et hi tres unum sunt! Statimque subiungitur: Et tres sunt, qui testimonium dant in terra, spiritus, aqua et sanguis, et hi tres unum sunt: sicut in quibusdam codicibus invenitur.” 40 Though we have here the express testimony of a council of the et iter urn de Patre et Filio et Spiritu text which contained the ” Comma ”; Sancto scrip turn est: et tres unum and if it did, it would by no means sunt.” It is, as Teschendorf has follow that the verse was written by rightly observed, by far the weight- St. John. Cfr. Sullivan in the New iest proof for the Comma Ioanneum. York Review, II, 2, pp. 182 sq. But it does not prove decisively that 40 Quoted by Denzinger-Bannwart, St. Cyprian used a New Testament Enchiridion, n. 431.

hurch that the Comma occurs only in certain codices, it is to be noted that this council does not reject the text of the three heavenly witnesses as apocryphal or spurious, or as having been smuggled into the Bible. The strongest dogmatical argument, according to Franzelin41 and Kleutgen,42 is that drawn from the Tridentine decree De Canonicis Scripturis: “Si quis libros integros cum omnibus suis partibus, prout in ecclesia catholica legi consueverunt et in veteri vulgata latina editione habentur, pro sacris et canonicis non susceperit, … anathema sit.” 48 Franzelin and Kleutgen argue that since the Comma Ioanneum, being an important ” dogmatic text,” must be regarded as an integral part of Sacred Scripture, and as it undoubtedly formed part of the ancient Latin Vulgate, its canonical authenticity is fully covered by the Tridentine decree. If this claim were well founded, the whole discussion would have been irrevocably closed in the sixteenth century. But Franzelin and Kleutgen overshoot the mark. The Tridentine decree settles nothing either for or against the authenticity of the Comma Ioanneum. For, as Schafer points out,44 the decree is distinctly limited by the phrases *prout in ecclesia catholica legi consueverunt/’ and * et in veteri vulgata latina editione habentur.” Of these limitations the former does not fully apply to the Comma Ioanneum, and the latter can not affect the official edition of the Vulgate issued in 1592. Of the earlier editions many were notoriously without the Comma. Consequently, the clause ” omnibus suis partibus ” is not strictly applicable to 1 John V, 7. This argument is strengthened by the testimony 41 De Deo Trino, thes. 4. 44 Einleitung in das Neue Testa42 De Ipso Deo, pp. 519 tqq. ment, pp. 341 sqq., Paderborn 1898. 43 Denzinger-Bannwart, Enchiridion, n. 784.

of the Fourth Lateran Council, which we have already quoted, to the effect that in the 13th century the Comma Ioanneum was found only in a few codices (“w quibusdam codkibus invenitur”). The fact that there still exist over fifty ancient manuscript codices of the Vulgate which lack the Comma Ioanneum is too remarkable to be brushed aside as irrelevant. The scientific aspect of the problem, therefore, is not touched by the Tridentine decree at all, and the Comma itself remains a doubtful text. Franzelin in another treatise admits this contention in principle.45 For the rest, it is plain that Rome does not wish to bolt the door to further critical research. Very soon after the Inquisition had promulgated its decree of Jan. 13, 1897, Cardinal Vaughan replied to a query from Mr. Wilfrid Ward: ” I have ascertained from an excellent source that the decree of the Holy Office on the passage of the ‘Three Witnesses/ which you refer to, is not intended to close the discussion on the authenticity of that text; the field of Biblical criticism is not touched by this decree.” Availing himself of the liberty thus granted, Professor Karl Kiinstle, of the University of Freiburg in Baden, has lately attempted to throw new light on the origin of the Comma, and has succeeded in making it appear extremely probable that it was formulated by Priscillian, about A. D. 380, in the heretical wording: * Et haec tria unum sunt in Christo Iesu,* in support of his Sabellian Pan-Christism, and that it was recast in an orthodox mould by some 45 De Script, et Trad., cd. 4, p. textum ita admittit vel non admittit, 489, Romae 1896: “Si de aliquo tali profit exstat vel non exstat in veteri textu posset demonstrari, non esse vulgata editione, quae longo saecuex veteri vulgata editione/’ he says, lorutn usu in ecclesia probata est, * eius conformitas cum Scriptura is nihil agit contra decretum Conprimitiva non posset did per decre- cilii* turn Concilii declarata. Qui ergo 42 THE TRINITY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT Catholic theologian46 (possibly pseudo-Vigilius of Tapsus) and inserted into the text of St. John’s First Epistle by one ” Peregrinus,” who was probably a monk named Bachiarius. It is probably of Spanish origin.47 Readings: — *Scheeben, Dogmatik, Vol. I, §107 (WilhelmScannell, Manual, I, pp. 265 sqq.). — Oswald, Dogtnatische Theologie, Vol. II: Trinitatslehre, §3, Paderborn 1888. — J. Lebreton, Les Origines du Dogtne de la TrinitS, pp. 207 sqq., 524 sqq., Paris 1910. Other bibliographical references in the text. 46 ” Whether the celebrated passage … be genuine or not/’ says Newman, ” it is felicitously descriptive of the Ante-Nicene tradition… .” Tracts The oh and Eccles., p. 1 59. 47 K. Kiinstle, Das ” Comma loaniieum ” auf seine Herkunft untersucht, Freiburg 1905; summarized by W. L. Sullivan, C. S. P., in the New York Review, Vol. II (1906), No. 2, pp. 175-188. Cfr. also Chr. Pesch, S. J., Praelect. Dogmat., 3rd ed., t. II, pp. 255 sqq., Friburgi 1906. Kiinstle’s supposition that the Comma was invented by Priscillian himself is combatted by E. C. Babut, Priscillien et le Priscillianisme, pp. 267 sqq., Paris 1909. Other references may be found in Cornely’s Introd. in Utriusque Testamenti Libros Sacros, Vol. Ill, pp. 668 sqq., Paris 1886.