Augustine on the Catholic Faith

It turns out the faith Augustine received centres on Inseparable Operations.

Augustine’s De Trinitate is one of the most significant contributions to Trinitarian doctrine in Christian thought. This article outlines Augustine's approach to explaining the Trinity and his adherence to what he terms "the Catholic faith."

Through analysis of key passages from De Trinitate Book 1, we can see Augustine's commitment to scriptural authority and traditional teaching in surprising ways.

Augustine's Purpose in Writing

In light of his audience who desire to know God yet need help understanding how Scripture purifies our mind to know God, Augustine gets to the main subject of De Trinitate. He writes:

"Therefore, with the help of the Lord our God and as far as lies in our power, we shall endeavor to give an explanation of that very thing which they demand, namely, that the Trinity is the one, only, and true God, and that one rightly says, believes, and understands that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are of one and the same substance or essence, so that they may not feel mocked as it were by our excuses, but may learn from actual experience that the supreme good exists, which can only be discerned by minds that are wholly purified, and that they themselves are unable to see or to comprehend it for this reason, because the weak eye of the human mind cannot be fixed on a light so dazzling, unless it has been nourished and become stronger by the justice of faith" (1.1.3).

Augustine writes on the Trinity, but notice how he says we can only know the triune God once our minds have been purified. He will note in a moment that we come to know him through Scripture. Note then that the "third group" he has written about previously reads the Bible too literally, as if God actually changed his mind, became jealous, and otherwise acts like human creatures, needs to purify these created images of God to know him as he is.

To put a finger on it, Augustine says you cannot know God the Trinity unless you understand that Scripture accommodates God to our understanding in human terms. If you do not understand that point, you will create an image of God who has flaring nostrils, who rages in anger, who changes his mind every day, and who remembers and forgets. In other words, people who take accommodations as direct descriptions of God's reality fall into error. Augustine aims to help those readers overcome that pattern of reading and so purify their minds.

The Structure of Augustine's Argument

To achieve his goal, Augustine outlines two steps to his argument:

• "we must first find out by an appeal to the authority of the Sacred Scriptures whether faith is in a position to do so" (1.2.4)

• "Next, if God is willing and grants us His help, we shall perhaps render such a service to these garrulous disputants … that they may discover something which they cannot doubt." (1.2.4)

As he does so, Augustine does not believe he is teaching anything other than what the church has received from the apostles. So his work is not aimed to be a novel or a new work. He thinks he communicates traditional and scriptural truths. He speaks of his work communicating medicine that the church received so that "a carefully-regulated piety heals the weakness of the mind in order that it may perceive the unchangeable truth" (1.2.4).

The Church's Teaching on the Trinity

Now we get to a crucial place in Augustine's work where he summarizes the faith in accordance with Scripture and as the Church has received it:

"All the Catholic interpreters of the divine books, both the Old and the New Testament, whom I have been able to read, who wrote before me about the Trinity, which is God, had this purpose in view:

"to teach in accordance with the Scriptures that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit constitute a divine unity of one and the same substance in an indivisible equality. Therefore, they are not three gods but one God; although the Father has begotten the Son, and, therefore, He who is the Father is not the Son; and the Son was begotten by the Father and, therefore, He who is the Son is not the Father; and the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son, but only the Spirit of the Father and the Son, and He Himself is also co-equal with the Father and the Son and belongs to the unity of the Trinity.

"Not that this same Trinity was born of the Virgin Mary and was crucified and buried under Pontius Pilate, nor rose again on the third day, nor ascended into heaven, but only the Son. Nor that this Trinity descended upon Jesus in the form of a dove when He was baptized; nor that this same Trinity on Pentecost, after the Lord's Ascension, when a sound came from heaven as if a mighty wind were blowing, settled upon each one of them with parted tongues of fire, but only the Holy Spirit. Nor that this same Trinity said from heaven: 'Thou art my Son,' either when Jesus was baptized by John or when the three disciples were with Him on the mount, nor when the voice sounded saying: 'I have glorified and I shall glorify again,' but this was the word of the Father only, spoken to the Son; although the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, as they are inseparable, so they work inseparably.

"This is also my faith, since it is the Catholic faith." (1.4.7)

Key Features of Augustine's Trinitarian Thought

A number of notable features appear here.

First, Augustine does not start with philosophical principles of Neo-Platonism as some accuse him of doing. Instead, he begins with a traditional confession of faith.

Second, what may surprise about this traditional confession that he calls "the Catholic faith" is that it relies on a doctrine of inseparable operations: "as they are inseparable, so they work inseparably."

But this should not surprise us because the faith that Augustine received has an order of teaching to it from Scripture that works like this:

• The Father and Son inseparably share in the same works, works that only God can do.

• The Father and Son thus share in the work of God and are both included in the definition of the one God of Israel

• The Holy Spirit is the common possession of both Father and Son, and hence shares in the definition of God.

• The Holy Spirit also works inseparably with the Father and Son in all that he does.

This argument for the trinity in Scripture will, at least in part, guide Augustine throughout the fifteen books of De Trinitate.

Conclusion

By maintaining that the Trinity operates inseparably while recognizing the distinguishable properties of Father, Son, and Spirit, Augustine offers a traditional approach to Trinitarian doctrine that derives from Scripture as the church has received it.

Learn more

To learn more about Augustine, I am offering a class on Augustine’s De Trinitate this Summer. In it, I will lead students through a chapter-by-chapter study of Augustine’s magisterial On The Trinity to understand the biblical, theological, and historical rationale for the Christian doctrine of the triune God.