A Word about the Divinity of the Son and the Spirit and Praise to Righteous Abraham

The dogmatically important sermon “The Word on the Divinity of the Son and the Spirit and Praise to the Righteous Abraham” was delivered by St. Gregory of Nyssa in May 383 at the Council of Constantinople. It condemns the widespread passion among the people under the influence of the Arians for empty talk about the Divine, refutes the individual opinions of the Arians about the Holy Trinity, and defends the divine dignity of the Son and the Holy Spirit from the attacks of the Anomeans. St. Gregory compares the Arians with the Stoics and Epicureans of the time of the Apostle Paul. Part of the treatise is devoted to a description of the life of Abraham. The saint speaks of the deep impression that the painting of Abraham sacrificing Isaac always made on him: “I have often seen a picturesque depiction of this suffering and have never passed by this spectacle without tears: art presents this story so vividly to the eye.” Saint Gregory proves that the angel who appeared to Abraham during the sacrifice of Isaac (Gen. 22) was the Only Begotten Son of God. *The title of the work in Greek is δίκαιον ᾿Αβραάμ. *The title of the work in Latin is De deitate Filii et Spiritus Sancti. In multi-colored meadows with lovers of such spectacles, it happens that their eye cannot stop at anything visible because of the equal beauty in everything, but since everything attracts their lust, if they want to leave nothing unexamined, they often remain in nothing - something similar happened to my thought when I was surveying the meadow of Scripture. For the variety of beauty of thoughts equally attracts the soul to everything and makes lust not stop due to the impossibility of easily finding what is preferable in the equivalent. This is how brilliant the flowers are in the prophecy of the great David! And what a color this divine apostle is, showing the beauty of the work of heaven, emitting the great fragrance of Christ! Can any human word describe the beauty of the gospel meadows? But it seems to me that in time it is good to remember the tributary instruction and imitate the bee, about which Scripture (Sir. 11:3) says that although it is weak in strength (for it has never been seen to pick a whole flower and carry it on its back to the hive), but, shaking off the thin and fluff-like pollen from the petals in the middle of the flower with its wings and collecting it on its feet, it performs this wise work with its six legs. indeed the same number of angles; and in the middle, the smoothness of the wings, as if with some ointments, brings gloss to these thin and membranous walls. And in order for our word to become, as Solomon says, “fit for health” both for kings and simple people (Proverbs 6:8), let us attract grace through prayer—you and I together, because this is our common benefit, or better yet, to a greater extent yours, if receiving something good is much more profitable than communicating it. The Gospel forbids putting new wine “into old wineskins” (Matthew 9:17); the mysterious meaning of this relates, perhaps, to the present time. For newly squeezed wine, by the naturally occurring effervescence of moisture, is full of spirit and, due to its natural movement, throws out dirty impurities in the form of foam. This wine is not something else, in my opinion, but the teaching about the Holy Spirit, as the Apostle says: “Burning with the Spirit” (Rom. 12:11). His wineskins, if they are old, leak, and worn out from unbelief, do not hold within themselves, but burst from the greatness of dogma. Therefore, if any lofty thought from the teaching is communicated to them, they are divided into parts due to the weight of the dogma, and they themselves become useless due to the gap, and cause the grace of the Spirit to flow in vain. For “wisdom will not enter into an evil-doing soul,” as Scripture says (Wisdom 1:4). Better to say, let me imitate the custom of the poor, for it is their custom, if they are rewarded with a rich meal, to stock up on food for the next day without shame from what is offered to them. Therefore, I, taking advantage of some small remnants of yesterday’s expensive supplies, will supply the word as best I can, saving much of what is offered this day for more advanced guests. Therefore, what from yesterday’s supper remained untasted and not used for business? The history of the apostolic acts tells us about the arrival of Paul in Athens due to the fierce devotion of the people there to idols and attachment to sacrificial incense. The Holy Spirit was irritated in blessed Paul, like some kind of deep stream, oppressed in the soul of the apostle and not finding a way out among the unworthy. Therefore, Paul enters into competition with the Stoics and Epicureans and, standing on the Areopagus, raises them from the usual to the knowledge of God, because the altar and the inscription serve him to enter the sermon. But why did I mention this reading? Moreover, even now, like these Athenians, there are people who “practice in nothing else, except to say something or hear something new” (Acts 17:21). Some yesterday and during the day, having taken time away from difficult studies, became some kind of sudden teachers of theology; some, perhaps servants, who have been scourged more than once, who have fled from slave service, speak with solemnity about the incomprehensible. You, of course, know who the word means, because everything in the city is filled with such people: streets, markets, squares, intersections. These are clothing sellers, money changers, and food sellers. You ask about oxen, and he talks to you about the Born and the Unborn. You want to know about the price of bread, but he answers you that the Father is greater, and the Son is at hand; if you say that a bath is suitable, he decisively says that the Son is from nothing. I don’t know what to call this evil - delirium or madness and such a general disease that produces insanity in the mind. Therefore, I say that the legend about the Apostle applies to them. For what Scripture tells about the Athenians can now be seen in these people. It would be better to say that if it is necessary to speak the truth, then those of today act more unapologetically than the Athenians. Those spiritual eyes were, as it were, covered with some kind of dirt, idolatrous charm, and they could not personally see the pious truth about Existence; however, as if sensing with several thoughts, they understood one thing: that the Divinity is completely incomprehensible, and the Supreme Being by nature is not what his reason honors. Therefore, confessing that the true God is unknown, they honor the unknown with a church and an inscription. For that their thoughts were turned to the truly existing God, the apostle himself testifies to this, proclaiming to them that God, before whom, as they thought, they expressed their piety by honoring them in the church. Therefore, are the extravagant ones now worse than these mentioned, who do not concede that the Divinity is beyond their comprehension, but boast that they know God as well as each one knows himself? Who will mourn, as much as it should, the blindness of these pitiful ones, who, when in our time the light of truth illuminates the whole Universe with pious faith, are the only ones who do not notice this radiance? Or do you not know what kind of light I mean that abounds in our time? Recite for me these royal luminaries, which, equal in number to the Gospels and having declared almost the whole world, enlighten with peace and piety, when the Creator of everything - God, imitates the first miracle of the world, not only placing the great luminary at the beginning of the visible, but adding to it a smaller luminary, shining with paternal rays. Then, when so many good things are offered to us, they, like those maddened by the blows of demons, shamelessly rebel against the truth of dogmas, like those Stoics and Epicureans with whom Paul competes with the Athenians. And so that you don’t think that the word resorts to slander, let’s look at the dogmas themselves that we mentioned. The Stoics hold to the idea that the Divinity is material, but these prove that the Only Begotten Son is created - without a doubt, you know what the affinity of the created is with the material. Again, it seems to the Epicureans that there is nothing higher than the composition and order of beings, but everything rushes by by chance, without any thought about what is happening; and, to briefly express their error, let’s say that their dogmas tend toward godlessness. Let's see if they are imitators of the Epicureans and abolish the Son? No one will object to this that Epicurus did not know the Father and does not confess His Divinity, therefore how can they not be honored equally with him by those who do not deny the Divinity in the Father? If you look around a little, you will find that Anomeus is the new Epicurus. Let us see it this way: the apostle called the Son “the radiance of glory, the image of the hypostasis” (Heb. 1:3), the power and wisdom of God (1 Cor. 1:24) and all similar names, each of which seemed to consist in some necessary connection with the other, one is inconceivable in itself, but is comprehended in the mutual union of both. For radiance is necessarily the radiance of something and the image is certainly someone else’s. Therefore, just as light will not be radiance if there is no luminous cause, so the radiant nature cannot be represented in itself without the radiance represented with it. And similarly, the image shows the hypostasis, and the hypostasis is known by the image. Likewise, the power of God cannot exist without God, and it is unnatural to imagine God without power. Therefore, whoever claims that there is no signified element in this combination also forcibly denies the rest. But the defenders of wickedness say that the Son never existed. Therefore, if there was no Son, then, without a doubt, there was no Father. If there was no radiance, then there was no Shining One. If there was no image, then, of course, there was no hypostasis. If there was no power, then there was no wisdom, if there was no everything without which God cannot exist, then how was there a God who exists above all? This leads to the idea that there is no God, because it is impossible to imagine a glory that does not emit brilliance, a hypostasis that does not have an image, as well as a wise one without wisdom, a strong one without strength, a childless father. So, what has been said proves that he who rejects the Son does not believe in the existence of the Father, and where they do not believe in the existence of the Father, they completely reject the Divinity; To deny the Divinity is characteristic of no other person than Epicurus. So, the current teachers of deceptive teaching in insult to the Only Begotten Son turned out to be Epicureans, attributing superiority to the Father and claiming that One is greater and the other is less, One sends and the other is sent; tearing something about this saying from Scripture, they turn to the foolish and say: the Lord himself confesses that he was sent by the Father. You know that you were sent, but have you not heard that He who Sent is with Him? “He who sent Me is with Me,” He says (John 8:29). And what has been said has not taught you that one is sent and is not excommunicated? Although he is sent out of love for mankind, he is not excommunicated because of the indivisibility of nature. But they also say: the Only Begotten confesses that the Father is greater than Him when he says: “My Father is painful to me” (John 14:28). So, let us examine, brethren, is He who said: “I am in the Father, and the Father in Me” (John 14:10) lying? If the Father is greater than the Son, then how is the greater contained in the less? If the Son is less than the Father, how is the greater filled with what is insufficient? The greater is, without a doubt, shy in the less, and the lesser cannot expand to that which exceeds in magnitude, why is it necessary for the Son to be insufficient in the Father and for the Father to be abundant in the Son, and He who said lies: “I am in the Father” (if He is less, it should have said: I am in part of the Father), “and the Father is in Me” (if the Father is greater, it would be more fair to say: a certain part of the Father in Me). If the whole Father is in the whole Son and the whole Son is in the whole Father, then where is more and where is insufficient? And is it necessary to say a lot when all their idle talk must be contained in one word: “He who was in the form of God was not equal with God by admiration” (Phil. 2:6). Tell me, do you really hear that you are equal, but understand that you are unequal? What a new teaching in which unequal is expressed by the word “equal”! But perhaps it would be appropriate for someone more knowledgeable to find a reason for this, why the Father is greater than the Son, and the Son is equal to the Father? Because it seems that somehow this does not agree with one another. So, having left the competition with many opponents, I will talk with you in a fatherly manner about what is before us. I know that the Gospel sayings that teach about the Lord are not all equivalent and do not borrow their meanings from the same dignity. Some loudly preach the height of the Divinity in the Son of God; others descend to the humility of human nature. For when the Lord says: “I command you” (Mark 9:25), and: “I will, be clean” (Mark 1:41), and: “The Father is in Me and I in the Father” (John 14:10), and: “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:9), and: “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30), and: “No one But he knows the Son only the Father” (Matthew 11:27); and: “All mine are thine, and thine are mine: and I am glorified in them” (John 17:10); - all such expressions show a power that exceeds all nature and all power. And when speech inclines to the weakness of our nature, then he says the following: “My soul is sorrowful” (Matthew 26:38); “If it is possible... let... the cup pass by” (Matthew 26:39); “The Son cannot do anything for Himself” (John 5:19); I accepted the commandment “what I will say and what I will say” (John 12:49); “I ascend to My Father and your Father, and My God and your God” (John 20:17). Include here the tears for Lazarus, and fatigue from the journey, and the desire for food, and the asking for water, and the coming to the fig tree, and ignorance of the sterility of the plant, and the dream about the ship. For all this and similar things do not mean the dignity in the beginning of the existing Word of God, but the condescension in the form of a slave to humble Himself to the weakness of our nature. That is why it is said: “He who sent Me is in pain” (John 14:28). So let's see who this word is from. How was He sent? Is he in the image of God, or has he taken on the form of a slave? Is He in the fullness of the Godhead or has He exhausted Himself in the form of a slave? It is absolutely clear, I think, that about God’s power and about God’s Nature is omnipresent, all-pervading and all-encompassing, and it is unfair to say that it is sent, because outside of it there is nothing new, where, without being there before, it came when sent - on the contrary, containing everything with its protective power, it has no place where it could move, being itself the fullness of everything. Therefore, by the will of the Father, the complete condescension of the Son of God to our humility and to our weakness is called an embassy, ​​because the transmigration of the most pure nature into our life is not recognized as a local movement of the Lord, but shows condescension from the heights of glory to the humility of the flesh. Therefore, the Word descended and appeared, not without a veil, but having become flesh, the image of God appeared not in itself, but in the form of a servant. So, this is Who said that “he cannot... do anything about himself,” obviously because he became flesh, for not being able is characteristic of weakness. Just as light is opposed to darkness, life is opposed to death, so strength is opposed to weakness, but Christ is God’s power and God’s Wisdom, and strength, of course, is not characteristic of being unable. For if strength is weak, what will be strong? Therefore, when the Word claims that “it cannot create,” then obviously it does not attribute powerlessness to the Divinity of the Only Begotten, but testifies to the impossibility of the weakness of our nature, and the flesh is weak, as it is written, “the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Matthew 26:41). So, Divine Scripture is true in both cases, both confessing and not denying equality. When Scripture refers to human nature, then it confesses the Invisible to be greater than the visible according to the flesh. And when the thought is directed towards the Divine, then this comparative comparison of greater and lesser is not used, but instead unity is preached: “I and the Father are one”; but what is different in inequality cannot be one. Has our word sufficiently explained the matter to you, excluding heretical inequality from the dogmas of piety? Or will you demand, as in court, that this word be confirmed by a large number of witnesses? So, let me, leaving aside the concern for the brevity of the word, freely recall one event from ancient history, and perhaps this story will be useful for our purpose. Listen to the apostolic reading, which briefly conveys the story of Abraham, which says: “God made a promise to Abraham; Since many people probably do not know the content of the story, I will retell it to you as briefly as possible. God, by His command, resettles Abraham from his relatives and from his place of birth; and the patriarch lives in a foreign land, strengthened in the hope of the promise. The husband's long-term delay in his trust turns into a test of his steadfastness before God; It was promised that Abraham would become the father of the people. Much time has passed; nature suffered what was natural to him, because his age was already leaning toward old age, but hope continued. In old age, both he and his wife, as naturally, lost the strength needed for childbearing. And history, without being ashamed, points to this, saying that Sarah has “prestasha... female” (Gen. 18:11), at which conception occurs. Although the body, having passed youth, yielded to nature and hunched over from old age; however, their hope in God somehow did not grow old, but blossomed. At this time Isaac is born to them, so that it can be seen that birth is not a matter of nature, but the action of God’s power. They were, as was natural, overjoyed by this gift of God: with the birth of their son, their gray hair seemed to bloom again, and as the old woman grew older, abundant sources of milk flowed as needed - the elderly woman gave her son a full breast. She admired such a supernatural miracle, saying: “Who will tell Abraham that Sarah feeds the boy with milk” (Gen. 21:7)? Then the baby gradually grows stronger, hurries into the age preceding adolescence; now the youth is in the prime of his life, in fresh beauty, a sweet sight for his parents, thriving in beauty, coming to greater maturity; with physical beauty, it increases spiritual virtues. What it was natural for those who gave birth to him to feel, subject to your own reasoning, examine in yourself, with what disposition the father looks when his son is amused, takes part in wrestling, in children's games, in science, in the most pleasant communities with peers! At this time, the patriarch is being prepared for a test and temptation as to what he will betray more: love for God or natural inclination. I shudder, retelling only the cruelty of the test. God talks to him again and calls him by name. Abraham zealously obeys the calling, hoping, of course, to receive new mercy in addition to previous examples. But here is the command! Which one? “Feed your son,” it says (Gen. 22:2). Perhaps this word does not yet strike the father’s heart. For, of course, the father reasons something like this, for example, he is given a command to marry his son and hasten to the marriage bed so that the blessing about the seed comes to its end. But let’s see what is added to the word, it says: “feed your beloved son, your only begotten.” Look at the sting in this word, how it pierces the father’s insides, how it kindles the natural flame, how it awakens ardent love, calling the son both beloved and only begotten. With such names, how powerful a love could have been kindled for him? “Then what should I do with my son, having received him?” “Bring it up to Me,” says God. “Do you not order to be made a priest whom you command to exalt?” “Not by the priest, but by sacrifice and by offering burnt offerings; Offer it to Me, it is said, as a burnt offering on the mountain which I will show you.” How do you feel, listening to this story, you fathers, you who are naturally taught tender love for children? You know, of course, how a father’s ear receives the order to slaughter his only begotten son. Who wouldn't be shocked by such a word? Who wouldn't turn away his ears? Isn't it better to die under such a command than to take what was said to heart? Could not Abraham enter into court with God, presenting nature itself as his defender, saying: “Why, Lord, do you command me this? Did he make me a father in order to make me a child killer? Did he give me a taste of this sweet gift to turn me into a parable to the world? Will I slaughter my son with my own hands and shed my own blood before You? And do you command this? Do you enjoy such sacrifices? Should I kill my son, from whom I expected to be buried? Will I arrange such a bed for him? Will I prepare this kind of marriage joy for him? Shall I light for him not a wedding lamp, but a funeral fire? Therefore, will I be crowned with this? So will I become the father of nations, to whom it was not given to have a son?” But did Abraham say or think anything like that? No. On the contrary, as soon as he learned the purpose of the command, turning his gaze to God’s love, he immediately forgot about nature and, as if some earthly burden, throwing off the passionate dispositions of nature, completely surrendered himself to God and began to fulfill the command. And he didn’t even tell his wife about it, doing it well and with benefit for himself, that he did not recognize the woman as worthy of trust in the advice, because it was not useful to Adam, who accepted Eve’s advice. Therefore, so that Sarah herself would not tolerate anything feminine and maternal and would not weaken Abraham’s strong and pure love for God, he decided to hide the matter from his wife. For Sarah, if she had known that this was being done, then, in all likelihood, what would she not have done or how would she not have cried to Abraham?! What would she have endured, throwing herself on her son and clasping him in her arms, if she had seen that they were forcibly dragging him to the slaughter? No matter what kind of speeches she uses?! “Spare nature, husband, do not become the reason for a stormy story in the world! He is my only begotten son, my only begotten son Isaac, alone in my arms. He is my first and last. Who will we look at at dinner after this? Who will greet me with this sweet voice? Who will call me mother? Who will serve me in my old age? Who will bury you after death? Who will make the grave mound over the body? Do you see this color of youth, which if anyone saw in an enemy, of course, would take pity on its beauty. This is the fruit of long-term prayer, this is a branch of succession, this is the remnant of the family, this is the support of old age. If you raise a knife on him, then show this mercy to me, the poor one; first make use of this knife on me, and then do whatever you please with your son, let both have a common grave, let the same ashes cover the bodies, let a common tombstone proclaim our suffering, let Sarah’s eye not see either Abraham, who kills his son, or Isaac, killed by his father’s hands.” Sarah would have addressed Abraham with such and similar speeches, of course, if she had known in advance what was happening. But, so that there would be no obstacle to the enterprise, having laid the wood on the donkey and taking several servants with him, Abraham completely surrendered to God’s will. Then, leaving the servants, so that they would not advise anything cowardly and slavish and would not interfere with the sacrifice of his son, he leads him alone with him, as if he already has sufficient strength for difficult tasks by age. For, having transferred the burden from the donkey to his son, he forced him to carry a bundle of firewood. The son's voice again hurts the father's insides - here is another temptation, no easier than the previous one. Isaac calls his father by this sweet name and says: “Father.” But Abraham was not choked by tears at the thought that soon he would no longer hear such a sweet voice, would not sigh at this word, would not say anything lamentable or pitiful, but with a firm and unshakable soul and more filial would accept the womb and pronounce his answer. For he says to him: “What is there, child?” Here, imagine both the intelligence and prudence of the young man, how harmlessly he reminds his father of what he apparently overlooked, not reproaching his father for either slow-wittedness or forgetfulness, but reminding him of this oversight under the pretext that he only wants to find out. For he says: “Behold wood, fire and knife, where is the sacrifice?” But Abraham, whether encouraging his son or, like a prophet, vouching for the future, says: “God will see for Himself the sheep for a burnt offering, my child” (Gen. 22:7-8). And after this, the test of the patriarch’s soul still continues. He reaches the place indicated to him, creates an altar to God; the son offered his father the necessary substances, a fire was prepared, and so far the matter goes on without stopping, so that any faint-hearted person cannot say: even if the test had been passed before, then Abraham would not have remained the same, as soon he would have come closer to suffering. After this, the father touches his son, and nature does not oppose the matter; the son betrays himself to his father, does whatever he wants with him. Which of both of them will I admire more? Is it the one who, out of love for God, lays hands on his son, or the one who obeys his father even to death? They bicker among themselves, one rising above nature, the other reasoning that opposing one’s father is worse than death. The father then ties his son first. I have often seen a picturesque depiction of this suffering and have never passed by this spectacle without tears - so vividly does art present this story to the eye. Isaac lies in front of his father at the very altar, kneeling and with his arms bent back; the father, standing at a distance from the boy on a bent knee and with his left hand pulling his son’s hair towards him, bends down to the face looking at him pityingly, and directs his right armed hand with a knife to slaughter his son, and the tip of the knife already touches the body - then a voice comes to him from above, stopping the matter. What was that voice? For we hardly bring our speech to the straight path, like some young horse, disobedient, unbridled, deviating from the straight path and galloping in many circles around. But we proposed to show the evidence of the apostolic word that the Father is not greater than the Son. For here the Scripture, having given the name of the angel to the word of God, gives the voice: “And the Angel of the Lord also cried out and said: because “thou hast done this word, and hast not spared thy beloved son, ... By myself swear” (Gen. 22:16) to fulfill everything that can be found out in the promise of the Word. Therefore, who was the one who spoke with Abraham? Is it really Father? But you cannot say that the Father is someone’s angel. Consequently, the Only Begotten Son, about whom the prophet says: “His name is called the Great Angel of Council” (Is. 9:6). Of course, Paul, initiated into the mysteries in paradise, knows that this oath promise was given by the Only Begotten. And Paul says that, “God the Word made a promise to Abraham, because he swears by no one greater, he swears by himself” (Heb. 6:13). How then do these say that the Father is greater than the Son, when Paul asserts that the Son is not greater? But let us return again to the new gospel wine, so that with the help of the teaching we will accept the effervescence of the spirit into ourselves, and we ourselves will become vessels suitable for such wine - such vessels that themselves do not spill and do not pour out the grace hidden in them. I hear psalmody, prophesying, as I think, about real disasters, for it speaks about sinners: “The sinner is alienated from lies, she has gone astray from the womb” (Ps. 57:4). I think the Church calls those born according to God false, because, bearing in its own womb those born of it, it brings them into the world by faith. But sinners, like those born prematurely, “have become alienated from falsehood and have gone astray from” their native “womb,” for I do not see apostates of the faith on the mother’s bed, and I affirm that the prophecy speaks of them, led astray by deception, that they have “lost their way from the womb,” lost in the fact that “the word is a lie.” “Their rage,” the prophet continues, “is in the likeness of the serpent” (Ps. 57:5), not just like the serpent (κατα την ομόιωσιν οφεως), so that the likeness is not to an animal, but the addition of a member to the word “serpent” (του οφεως) mysteriously points to primordial evil. But perhaps the memory of the serpent is also useful for us in rebuking those who boldly open their mouths against the Spirit. For they think that there is a strong objection to the Spirit precisely because the Holy Scripture does not call the Spirit God (as they think, because we do not agree with them), but they say: the word “Divinity” signifies nature, and since this name is nowhere to be found with the name Spirit, we conclude from this that the Spirit is not of the same nature with the Father and the Son. Let them take the serpent and the accuser of their insane blasphemy. For, as we affirm, the nature of God does not have the meaning of His name either in itself, or does not have it for us; if anything is said about Him, either according to human custom or in Holy Scripture, then it belongs to the meaning of the inessential properties of the Divine, while the very nature of God remains ineffable and ineffable, exceeding any verbal designation. It’s good time, I think, to offer you this passage of Scripture, where the serpent explains to Eve, showing her that the name “Deity” has the meaning of visual activity. For, advising them to touch what is forbidden, he announces to them the benefit of this disobedience: “Your eyes will be opened, and you will be like gods” (Gen. 3:5). Look, and the serpent testifies that the word “Divinity” means visual activity, for it is only possible to see anything except with open eyes. So, the name Divinity does not express nature, but visual power. Therefore, do they really not admit that the Holy Spirit also sees? Or will this be disputed? For if he sees, then, of course, he has a name for this action. If they demand to know this from Scripture, then, although it is unnecessary to dwell on what has already been recognized, nevertheless, with patience we will present to those who do not know the proof of this too. Who saw the sacrilege of Ananias? How did Peter know that Ananias had become his own thief, when he and his wife carried out the theft in secret? Wasn’t the Holy Spirit both in Peter and present with Ananias? Therefore Peter says: “Why would Satan fill your heart and lie to the Holy Spirit? ...Thou didst not lie to man, but to God” (Acts 5:3–4). Therefore, just as He who says that he who insulted a rational being insulted a man does not refer the insult to two, but the relation is made to one person, recognizable by different distinctive properties, so Peter, when he said that Ananias lied to both the Spirit and God, piously shows that these two names mean the same thing. But may we also become capable of insight into the truth and partakers of the Divine, through the gift of the Holy Spirit in Christ Jesus our Lord! To him be glory and power forever and ever! Amen. You might be interested in: