CHAPTER XII
THE ROLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
38. Are we, then, to say that the Holy Spirit is the Father of
Christ's human nature, so that as God the Father generated the Word,
so the Holy Spirit generated the human nature, and that from both
natures Christ came to be one, Son of God the Father as the Word, Son
of the Holy Spirit as man? Do we suppose that the Holy Spirit is his
Father through begetting him of the Virgin Mary? Who would dare to say
such a thing? There is no need to show by argument how many absurd
consequences such a notion has, when it is so absurd in itself that no
believer's ear can bear to hear it. Actually, then, as we confess our
Lord Jesus Christ, who is God from God yet born as man of the Holy
Spirit and the Virgin Mary, there is in each nature (in both the
divine and the human) the only Son of God the Father Almighty, from
whom proceeds the Holy Spirit.
How, then, do we say that Christ is born of the Holy Spirit, if the
Holy Spirit did not beget him? Is it because he made him? This might
be, since through our Lord Jesus Christ--in the form of God--all
things were made. Yet in so far as he is man, he himself was made,
even as the apostle says: "He was made of the seed of David according
to the flesh."79 But since that creature which the Virgin conceived
and bore, though it was related to the Person of the Son alone, was
made by the whole Trinity--for the works of the Trinity are not
separable--why is the Holy Spirit named as the One who made it? Is it,
perhaps, that when any One of the Three is named in connection with
some divine action, the whole Trinity is to be understood as involved
in that action? This is true and can be shown by examples, but we
should not dwell too long on this kind of solution.
For what still concerns us is how it can be said, "Born of the Holy
Spirit," when he is in no wise the Son of the Holy Spirit? Now, just
because God made [fecit] this world, one could not say that the world
is the son of God, or that it is "born" of God. Rather, one says it
was "made" or "created" or "founded" or "established" by him, or
however else one might like to speak of it. So, then, when we confess,
"Born of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary," the sense in which he
is not the Son of the Holy Spirit and yet is the son of the Virgin
Mary, when he was born both of him and of her, is difficult to
explain. But there is no doubt as to the fact that he was not born
from him as Father as he was born of her as mother.
39. Consequently we should not grant that whatever is born of
something should therefore be called the son of that thing. Let us
pass over the fact that a son is "born" of a man in a different sense
than a hair is, or a louse, or a maw worm--none of these is a son. Let
us pass over these things, since they are an unfitting analogy in so
great a matter. Yet it is certain that those who are born of water and
of the Holy Spirit would not properly be called sons of the water by
anyone. But it does make sense to call them sons of God the Father and
of Mother Church. Thus, therefore, the one born of the Holy Spirit is
the son of God the Father, not of the Holy Spirit.
What we said about the hair and the other things has this much
relevance, that it reminds us that not everything which is "born" of
something is said to be "son" to him from which it is "born."
Likewise, it does not follow that those who are called sons of someone
are always said to have been born of him, since there are some who are
adopted. Even those who are called "sons of Gehenna" are not born of
it, but have been destined for it, just as the sons of the Kingdom are
destined for that.
40. Wherefore, since a thing may be "born" of something else, yet not
in the fashion of a "son," and conversely, since not everyone who is
called son is born of him whose son he is called--this is the very
mode in which Christ was "born" of the Holy Spirit (yet not as a son),
and of the Virgin Mary as a son--this suggests to us the grace of God
by which a certain human person, no merit whatever preceding, at the
very outset of his existence, was joined to the Word of God in such a
unity of person that the selfsame one who is Son of Man should be Son
of God, and the one who is Son of God should be Son of Man. Thus, in
his assumption of human nature, grace came to be natural to that
nature, allowing no power to sin. This is why grace is signified by
the Holy Spirit, because he himself is so perfectly God that he is
also called God's Gift. Still, to speak adequately of this--even if
one could--would call for a very long discussion.
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79 Rom. 1:3.