The Three Person of the Holy Trinity

The Cappadocian Fathers never consider the “Father”, “Son”, and “Holy Spirit” simply as names associated with various workings of one God, but as distinct, non-interchangeable Persons within the divine essence.

As the three divine Persons share a single will and energy, they are not three gods, that is, three divine beings, but rather one God, that is, a single divine being.

The Byzantine church has expressed by the term “Homoousios” (God the Son and God the Father are of the same substance) the consubstantiality of the Three, the mysterious identity of the Monad and of the Triad, and the identity of one essence in three persons or hypostases. (*)

The basic mystery of mystical theology is revealed to everyone and for all, for it is the primary dogma of the Christian faith. This is the mystery of Trinity and all the pathos of knowledge of God is in the comprehension of this mystery. For it is knowledge of God in his own essence. This mystery is uttered and told in words, but it must be comprehended in experience as the mystery of perfect unity — here St. Maximus follows the Cappadocian’s, especially St. Gregory of Nazianzus, and also Evagrius Ponticus. In other words, it must be comprehended through the experience of deification, through life in God, through the appearance of the Trinity in the cognizing soul itself. And once again, this will be allowed only sometime in that last deification — with the perfect revelation. The mystery of the Trinity is a mystery of the inner Divine Life. It is God outside of Revelation.

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(*) (Lossky, Mystical Theology, 48-49)

However, it is recognized only through Revelation, through theophany, through the appearance and descent of the Logos into the world.

God the Trinity is cognized in the Logos and through the Logos. Through the Logos the whole world is mysteriously permeated by the rays of the Trinity. One can recognize the inseparable actions of the Three Hypostases in everything. Everything is and lives intelligently.

In Divine Existence we contemplate the Wisdom which was born without beginning and the Life which is imparted eternally. Thus the Divine Unity is revealed as the Trinity — the Tri-Hypostatic monad; the "unlimited uniting of the Three Unlimited Ones."

It is not "one in another," and not "one and another," and not "one above another" — but the Trinity is also at once a Unity. God is entirely the Trinity without blending. This removes both the limitedness of Hellenic polytheism, and the aridity of Judaic monotheism which gravitates towards a kind of atheism.

Neither the Hellene nor the Jew knows about Jesus Christ. This means that contradictions in doctrines about God are eliminated through Christ — in the revelation of the Trinity.

The mystery of Trinity is beyond knowledge, but at the same time, this mystery contains the structure of knowledge. Everything in the world is a mystery of God and a symbol — a symbol of the Logos, for it is Revelation of the Logos. The whole world is a Revelation — a kind of book of the unwritten Revelation. Or, in another simile, the whole world is the attire of the Logos. In the variety and beauty of sensual phenomena, the Logos plays with man, as it were, to fascinate and attract him so that he raises the curtain and begins to see the spiritual sense under the external and visible images.

Complete knowledge of God consists not only of knowing that God exists but also of knowing “that He is the Father and of whom He is the Father, obviously indicating here the Holy Spirit,” writes St. Cyril. This is also the highest knowledge of God, which is revealed by Christ, namely that He showed the name of Father to people, and that He led them to an understanding of the mystery of the Trinity.

The name Father is more appropriate to God than the name God. God’s Trinitarian nature is faith’s highest truth, and is revealed only in Christ and through Christ. This is Christianity’s essential newness. The Trinitarian truth is at the same time a mystery, which cannot be completely known, which is accepted in faith, and is elucidated only partially through the imperfect analogies of created nature. In his exposition of Trinitarian dogma, for example St. Cyril starts from the Scripture and relies on the tradition of the fathers, primarily the works of St. Athanasius.

Given the circumstances of the anti-Arian polemic, particular attention was given to uncovering and proving the ontological character of the Trinitarian hypostases. Following the Trinitarian theology of the Cappadocia’s fathers, here we can clearly distinguish the concepts of “essence” — or “nature” — on the one hand, and “hypostasis” on the other. A single Divine nature is cognized “in the three independent hypostases.” Of course, not only “is cognized” but also “exists.” The Trinitarian names indicate real differences and the features of hypostatic existence. The Trinitarian hypostases differ in their objective reality. Each exists in its own way and is what it is. And they are consubstantial. This consubstantiality signifies not only an abstract unity or identity of nature but also a perfect interpenetration and intercommunication of the Divine Persons.

Therefore, Each Person is entirely cognized in Each Person, since for all the uniqueness of their existence they “essentially reside in one another”. The Trinitarian names are relative and indicate the interrelationship of the hypostases. And in the Holy Trinity there are no differences other than the hypostatic differences. The Blessed Trinity in Cappadocian theology divine unity means a perfect identity of natures and an indissoluble bond between the hypostases. This unity of Divine nature and Divine life is manifested in the perfect unity of God’s will and Divine acts, and the kingdom and power of the Holy Trinity is united over all, for everything is inseparable from the Father through the Son in the Holy Spirit.

The unknowable Trinitarian unity of Divine reality and life finds — and must find — its perfect reflection and likeness in the Church.

Christ leads those who believe in him to spiritual unity so that the indivisible unanimity of unity, concordant in everything, reflects the traits of the natural and essential unity, which is conceived in the Father and Son. Of course, the union of love and like-mindedness does not attain the same indivisibility, which the Father and the Son have in the identity of essence.

On the other hand, the harmony and like-mindedness of those who believe reflects the essential identity and perfect interpenetration of the persons of the Holy Trinity, for there is a certain “natural unity” with, which we are bound to each other and to God in Christ and through Christ.

Thus, since each of us in and of him is within his own limit and hypostasis and is distinguished from each other in body and soul as a special personality, we are essentially united in the unity of Christ’s Body — through the Eucharist.

We become co-corporal to one another and co-corporal to Christ, who abides in us through his flesh. Is it not clear then that we all constitute one entity, both in each other and in Christ? Again we are indivisibly joined in a unity of the Spirit having perceived the extra-terrestrial representation of the Holy Spirit, who has been joined to us. And so we are all one in the Father, the Son, and in the Holy Spirit: one through the identity of characteristics, through uniformity of religion, through communion with Christ’s holy flesh, and through communion with the one Holy Spirit. Even though the similarity is incomplete, the Church, as a union of unanimity and peace, is to some extent the best image of the Divine unity — an image indicated by Christ himself in his pontifical prayer: even as “Thou Father, art in me, and I in Thee, that they also may be in us” (John 17:21).

The Trinity of the Godhead, which was introduced to in the Old Testament was revealed by Christ in the New. The revelation that God is the Father is a revelation of the Trinity, for Fatherhood presupposes Sonship, and the Father is the Father of the Son.

The name of the Father is the name of the hypostasis and points to the relationship of the First Person to the Second and the Third Persons.

The Father is also called the “Beginning and the Source”, for “He” is the root and source of Divinity, while the name of the source here signifies only whence comes objective reality.

The concepts of time and change are in no way applicable to Divine Life. Therefore, all hypostatic traits and relationships have to be conceived as eternal and immutable. There is no space between the Divinity and Fatherhood of the First Hypostasis and the eternity of the Fatherhood signifies the eternity of the ineffable Divine birth; that is, the eternity of the Sonship.

The eternal Son is born of the eternal Father. He does not come into being, does not arise, but throughout eternity “was” and abides in the Father as in a Source. He has always existed in him as his Logos, Wisdom, Force, Imprint, Reflection, and Image. To these last attributes, the apostolic favorite attributes of St. Athanasius, St. Cyril ascribes a special significance — in particular they clearly express the perfect consubstantiality and equal sanctity of Father and Son.

As the Image, reflection and “outline” of the Father’s Hypostasis, the Son is inseparable from him whose reflection He is, although He himself is to be found in Him and has the Father in himself, through a perfect identity of nature and traits — He himself is naturally to be found in the Father. Without the perfect identity of characteristics there would be no precision in the reflection and outline.

The Son is from the Father and of the Father, not outside of him, and he did not receive his own existence with time. He rather is to be found in the essence and radiates from it like rays from the sun.

The birth is an act of nature and not an act of will. This is what distinguishes the birth from creation. The Son abides in the Father’s bosom as something indwelling in it by the immutable identity of essence, as someone who exists in, and has always existed with, the Father.

Therefore, the Father is contemplated and manifested in the Son as in some mirror as in His “essential and natural image,” as in the image of his own essence.

The Son is called the outline or sketch precisely because the outline or sketch is of the same nature as, and inseparable from that essence of which it is an outline or sketch. Thus, “consubstantiality” for St. Cyril means not only a generic similarity and community of characteristics but also a perfect and indivisible unity of life.

The concepts of “birth” and “outline” or “sketch” mutually augment and explain one another. The outline or sketch points out the perfect similarity of characteristics, while the birth points out the origin from the essence and the natural co-abiding with the Father.

The unique hypostasis of the Persons is not effaced in the “hypostasis” or “natural unity:” with the unity of essence the Father and the Son Each abide “in their own Person” and in a special existence but without separation — at once and separately and jointly.

The doctrine and belief in the Holy Trinity is a cornerstone of Christianity. This belief is that there is one God, one “ousia” or essence, and three “hypostases” or Persons Who are distinct but not separate. This formula is part of what distinguishes Christians from non-Christians.

For example, Mormons speak about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, but they are not one God in their doctrine. They believe that they are three separate gods and there are many other gods besides them.

Jehovah Witnesses also speak of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, but deny the Holy Trinity saying that the Son was created and less than the Father and that the Holy Spirit is not a Person at all, but rather a force or power.

Whenever speaking about theology, one must not only be very accurate and particular as to which words to use, one must also make sure that the right definitions to those words are understood in order to make sure that everyone is speaking with the same understanding.

There is a long history as to how these terms evolved and the different meanings for which they have been used, but the terminology used today is as follows. “Ousia” is a Greek word that means “essence”. So God is one in essence. We also say that He is one nature. However, to distinguish between the Holy Trinity, we say that He is three “hypostases”. In English, we say that He is three Persons with a capital “P”.

When we open up our prayer books, or listen to any opening prayer in the Holy Orthodox Church what is directed is to the Holy Spirit, who can be described as the “Spirit of Truth,” while the creed speaks of the “Giver of Life.”

Therefore we have the question what is the Holy Spirit?

He is the third person of the Holy Trinity, one person of the same essence with the other two persons of the one Christian God. All of pious and faithful of the Orthodox Church whole purpose of their Christian life on earth is to acquire (the acquisition) the Holy Spirit. Now we know that the true aim or the spiritual “podvig” (the inner struggle) is acquisition of the Holy Spirit. The fasts, vigils, (attending the Liturgical cycle of the Church, and praying at home) charities, and other good works done in the name of Christ are the means of acquiring the Holy Spirit of God.

St. Basil the Great wrote the Prayer of the Third Hour about the gift of the Holy Spirit, since it was the grace of the Holy Spirit who guided the Apostles and Disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ:

“O Lord our God. Who has given Your peace unto mankind, and Who did send down the gift of the Holy Spirit upon Your disciples and apostles, and in your might did open their lips with the tongues of fire. Open also the lips of us sinners and teach us how and for what we must pray. Be the Helmsman of our life, O calm haven of tempest-tossed. Make known to us the way in which we should walk. Renew a right spirit within us, and with Your governing Spirit establish our unstable mind, that, being guided daily by Your good Spirit unto that which is for our benefit, we may be counted worthy to do Your commandments and always to keep in remembrance Your glorious coming which shall search out the deeds done by man. Strengthen us that we might not be deceived by the corruptible delights of this world, but that we might desire the enjoyment of the treasures to come. For You are blessed and praised in all Your Saints unto ages of ages. Amen.”

We can now say that the Holy Trinity that is the Most Holy Spirit is what led the Holy Prophets, the Saints, as this well includes the Holy Fathers of our Church, as well as Holy Apostles and Disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ, which all helped us in leading us all on the path towards our salvation.

We can now say also that the grace of the Holy Spirit that is the fullness of the Holy Trinity was a part of Creation. This is also the situation with the guidance of the Holy Spirit in salvation, as well as that guides our Holy Orthodox Church with sanctification, especially through the Holy Mysteries, also known as the Holy Sacraments.

This is also true that the grace of the Holy Spirit also guides us in any action we take as we call upon the Holy Trinity as our comfort and guide. As Orthodox Christians our lives should be filled with prayer, and the prayer life of the faithful starts with the invocation of the Holy Spirit. Every morning the Orthodox places them under the protection of the Holy Spirit when they recite the beautiful prayer:

Heavenly King, Comforter, the Spirit of truth, Who are everywhere present and Who fill all things, Treasury of good things and Giver of life: come and dwell in us and cleanse us all impurity; And save our souls, O good One.

The Holy Spirit guides us all also in our Christian life, and helps us on the path towards eternal life, theosis, or deification, of human nature, a notion very dear to the Orthodox. Theosis means life in God, the transformation of a human being into a little god within God. (St. John 10:34; Psalm 82:6). Thus our Lord Jesus Christ calls man a little god. This teaching has been taken over by the Holy Fathers and tradition of the Church. St. Athanasios, as is well known, has expressed it in the classic words: “God became man that man might become god.” (Cf. Psalm 82:6: & St. John 10:34). All of this constitutes an important element of the eschatological teachings of the Holy Orthodox Church.

The grace of the Holy Spirit is also a part of our daily prayer life, and in our Liturgical worship. During these Sacred and Holy Services we call upon the Grace of the Holy Spirit and that is God the Father, and feels the presence of our Lord God is with us, and hears our constant prayers, and supplications. This is also true in guiding our Church the Holy Orthodox Faith we all love, since Christ our Lord promised that the Holy Spirit would teach the Church in all things necessary for man’s salvation. To the end of time the grace of the Holy Spirit will be leading the faithful and the Church into deeper and deeper understanding of the truth of God.

The Holy Spirit even guides our local communities, within diocese of the local bishop, in understanding the meaning of Jesus’ teachings, and his church. Through the bishop we are guided on the path towards our salvation, who instructs the local parish priest and its faithful that are spiritually inspired and to learn that the Ecclesia will never be left in desolation. “I will not leave you desolate,” Jesus promised His disciples (St. John 14:18). It is the Spirit, the grace of the Holy Spirit, then, who gives purpose in life and who remains with the Church forever as “the Lord, the Giver of Life.”

The grace of the Holy Spirit not only guides the bishop, the priest, and the deacon, but also its spiritual father the Patriarch, the Archbishop, and diocesan the Metropolitans, as well as its Auxiliary bishops (all bishops). This also goes for when the Patriarch meets with its Synod of Bishops, the Holy Spirit is called upon to direct them with their good works and words. Within the Church, standing on Her foundation on earth and headed by the Son of God seated at the right hand of the Father, is mysteriously guided by the Holy Spirit. She internally links all of Her children and unites them with God. We learn also that through the Church our God bestows gifts of grace and poured out on those who strive to follow the way of Christ our Lord, sanctify and fortify all good in them, cleanse them from sin and all impurity, making them able to become receptacles of the radiance of the glory and power of God.

It is from the Church itself that man becomes a partaker of the divine nature, as he enters into the closes relationship with the Holy Trinity. Where God is present there is peace, love, joy, hope, and salvation, as well as faith renewed, and where the Son is present, our God is present, as well as where the Holy Spirit is present God is with us. Most Holy Trinity Glory To Thee!