Originally posted by One Bad Pig
View Post
Imo, it is because there is and was too little that the churchmen could agree upon. And most particularly the incontestable scriptural evidence for the personhood of the Spirit is almost non existent. Scripture is prolific in describing the Holy Spirit in terms of an energia (power) but not as a person.
On the personhood side: Our only substantial evidence is in the Gospel of John...
1. John 14:16-18 (vs18 causes difficulty). For me: The personhood of the Spirit is confirmed by the association of 1 John 2:1 with John 14:16 "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever.
2. John 15:26 which indicates the source & cause of the Spirit. Here the Spirit is described in the terms of an emanation rather than a person (this text gives weight to the filioque). However, as the Spirit is termed a Parakletos then we have an indication of personhood;
3. Imo, John 16:13-15 is the strongest indicator of personhood, but the text can readily be understood as messianic. That is a flesh and blood person rather than an invisible thingy was to be expected (as Muslims & Bahai'a & others propose to defend their claimants. From church history we know that Simon Magnus made the claim, Marcionites advocated A.Paul, Montanus claimed he was the incarnation of the Paraklete, Mani did the same. There were plenty of others even within my lifetime).
Apart from John's Gospel there is Romans 8:16,26-27 but these texts are iffy (debatable). Matthew 28:19-20 has potential but vs20 presents a difficulty.
_________________
Apart from the lack of evidence in scripture for the personhood of the Holy Spirit there are technical difficulties in considering it/him "homoousios with the Father". For instance..
* If he/it is an emanation or phantasm (theophany) he/it cannot be homoousios with the Father (no further arguement required).
* If he/it is a creation he/it could be endowed with the Father's ousia (as Adam was endowed with humanity), but unlike the Son he/it would not be naturally homoousios with the Father. Thus the Spirit would be another God, additional to the Binity of the Father and the Son.
The Son having been begotten by the Father is natural offspring of the Father and thus proved to be "homoousios with the Father". The Spirit was not begotten but A.John tells us he/it proceeds from the Father. On first thought you might argue that begettal and procession give rise to "natural offspring". A fair point except scripture gets in the way. John 1:14 depicts the Son as the only child of the Father (μονογενοῦς παρὰ πατρός), so the Spirit cannot be natural offspring of the Father else the Son would have a brother/sister. Elsewhere A.John qualifies the monogenus, refering to the Son as the Father's only begotten son (ὁ μονογενὴς υἱός), which leaves the door open to the Father having a daughter (welllll, provided we ignore John 1:14)...
This is an incomplete synopsis of the theological issues, I am sure you could find a theological treatise that fleshes out the details...
_________________
ps: If you are interested, I'm currently reading The Holy Spirit in the Cappadocians Past and Present.
Comment