On the procession of the Holy Spirit: regarding the Old Catholic question

Old Catholics abandoned the Filioque as a dogma, excluded it from the creed, and recognized the doctrine of the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father as a dogma of faith. But at the same time, they would like to retain something like the same formally rejected Filioque - to retain it as a theological, that is, scientific, school opinion. They motivate this desire by the fact that without allowing some participation of the second Hypostasis of the Holy Trinity of the Son of God in the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father, they cannot imagine in their theological speculation the pre-eternal acts of the birth of the Son and the procession of the Holy Spirit. Their method of presentation (which, with some minor shades, can be called common to the entire West) seems to them the only possible one, as soon as the human mind begins to touch with its speculation the mystery of the eternal existence of the Holy Trinity. It seems to them that the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father cannot be thought of otherwise, “as an act that has its basis in the divine nature, but also depends on the will, and precisely as an act, not in time, but logically following the birth of the Son,” 1 which, in their opinion, is confirmed by the order of the persons of the Holy Trinity: the Father is the first person, the Son is the second, the Holy Spirit is the third. Thus, the born Son participates in the giving of the Holy Spirit - one way or another: actively or passively, that is, either actively assists the Father in giving out the Holy Spirit, or, at least, passively participates in this act, representing, as it were, the medium through which the Holy Spirit passes when proceeding from God the Father. Apparently, the Old Catholics are more inclined to this latter form of representation, as it less sharply puts forward the secondary (Son) reason for the outpouring of the Spirit and seems to be in complete agreement with the ancient patristic one - “through the Son.” The West has become so accustomed to this way of thinking that it does not even recognize another way of thinking about the procession of the Holy Spirit as possible. At the 2nd Bonn Conference in 1875, one of the Old Catholic members of the congress, Koodt, bluntly stated: “The Easterners defend a view that is completely incomprehensible to me” 2 . One of the eastern participants in the mentioned conference (Bishop Gennady of Argazu) quite correctly pointed out the following feature of the Orthodox-Eastern concept of the procession of the Holy Spirit, which significantly distinguishes it from the Western one, although he did not develop the thought he expressed. He said: according to the Eastern idea, “the work of the Son and the Holy Spirit coincides with one another so much that one cannot be placed before the other, not only chronologically, but also logically” 3 . Let us try, at least in general terms, to develop the thought of the Orthodox bishop. The Orthodox East, in its idea of ​​birth and procession, proceeds not from the idea of ​​consistency in the existence of the divine Hypostases, but from the idea of ​​the combined action by which God the Father gives birth to the Son and brings out the Holy Spirit. This action can be called birth-harassing. The Son is born with the Spirit, the Spirit comes with the Son. With hypostatic difference, they, however, are unitedly co-originating from the Father, like the human word and breath, which, with difference, are so united with one another that the first (word) cannot occur and be conceived without the second (breath). Likewise, God the Word is not born without the Spirit, and the Spirit does not proceed without the Word. In the Holy Trinity, therefore, we think of the hypostases of the Son and the Spirit as inseparably united and in their very being from the Father. In accordance with the idea of ​​the existence of the persons of the Holy Trinity, not one outside and next to the other, but one in the other, we imagine the birth of the Son and the procession of the Holy Spirit as the birth of the Word of the lips of God in the Spirit - the breath of the same lips, and the Breath of the divine lips, as resting in the Word of these lips. When we talk about the combined action of God the Father by which He gives birth to the Son and brings forth the Holy Spirit, or about His birthing and bringing forth action, then through the affirmation of this totality, unity, we do not deny the complexity of this action and do not confuse birth and procession, just as through the inseparability of the persons of the Holy Trinity the difference of hypostases is not denied. Let's use one more comparison. The sun, through the action of emitting its rays, both shines and warms. It cannot be said that light and heat are the same thing; these are two different products of one and the same sun, and most importantly of one action of the sun - the emission of rays. Therefore, two products, two distinct results, can arise from one action of one cause. The birth of the Son-Word and the emission of the Spirit-Breath of God, or in another comparison, as if the light and warmth of the divine, can be thought of as two special products of the combined action of one cause - the Father. So, our Eastern idea of ​​​​the existence of the Son and the Spirit is as follows: we imagine that both of them come from the Father united, collectively, together - the Son is born with the outgoing Spirit, the Spirit descends with the begotten Son - inseparably, although unmerged. Neither one nor the other Hypostasis, therefore, assists one another in receiving existence from the Father and does not condition the existence of the other. This idea fundamentally undermines the Western, filioquistic one. Where, as in our Eastern world, every reason for supposing the sequence of birth and procession is eliminated, there can be no place for the thought of the assistance of the Son (in one way or another) in the emission of the Holy Spirit. The idea of ​​assistance can only rest on the idea of ​​gradualism; where the gradualness of these divine acts is thought of, only there can be thought of the dependence of procession on birth, the Spirit on the Son in being. That is why the Westerners, wanting to protect their flioquistic idea in every possible way, insist on “following" procession after birth. And they must do this, because without this their idea is impossible. True, realizing the inconvenience of the idea of consistency, gradualism in relation to God, to oneself, they make a reservation, noting that they think of the act of procession as following birth - “not in time, but logically.” But this reservation is completely untenable. If we think of birth and procession outside of any relationship to created being existing in time, outside of any manifestation in the outside - think of it as an act taking place in the depths of a timeless divine being, then any continuity of moments of time, any sequence of one after another, of course, must be rejected. There is no consistency in this case and there really cannot be one. If it does not exist, then one should not think about it. Why think about something that doesn't really exist? Thus, the clause “not in time, but logically" contains an internal contradiction. If the sequence of birth and procession can be conceivable, then in this case something must correspond to it in reality, that is, it ceases to be only logical, but becomes “chronological.” If there is nothing corresponding to it in reality, then it should not be conceivable, i.e., it cannot be “logical.” Despite the reservation, there is no doubt that through the Western idea the thought of some moments of time - in the existence of the Divine hypostases - invades and even indirectly encourages, which, of course, cannot be attributed to the merits of the Western idea and which our Orthodox-Eastern one completely avoids. It is a different matter if we imagine the begotten Son and the outgoing Spirit in relation to creation. In this regard, God was pleased to subject Himself to self-restraint, to voluntarily subordinate His manifestations to the conditions of the changing existence He created - an existence that exists in constant continuity of the moments of his life. That is why He did not create the world in an instant, although as the omnipotent He could have done this. In this regard, a sequence can be conceivable, for it really was, according to the will of the Trinitarian God, who was pleased, in the words of the Church Fathers, to “pre-arrange” everything with the Word and “complete” everything with the Spirit. Such an order in the manifestation or revelation to the world of the ever-begotten Son and the ever-outgoing Spirit was in creation and providence and redemption and continues to this day. In this sense, the Spirit proceeds - for the world - “through the Son,” the birth of the Son can be thought and imagined before the procession of the Spirit; the Spirit is known “through the Son,” “after the Son,” as the church fathers put it (for example, Basil the Great, see below). The Eastern way of presentation is incomprehensible to the Western ones because they have departed from biblical soil. The Orthodox East firmly adheres to the biblical image of representation; the west followed a new path laid by bl. Augustine. The first, biblical, is based on images of words and breath; the second, Augustinian, is based on the analogy of mind or self-awareness and love. Meanwhile, the first image is not favorable to the idea of ​​the origin of the Son-Word preceding the descent of the Spirit, since the word cannot be conceived without breath; the second image is Western; naturally leads precisely to this idea, for love always follows thought: one cannot love before a thought appears about the object of love. Western theological thought has become so closely associated with this image that Western minds can no longer accommodate another idea. In order to clarify the essence of the Eastern Orthodox image of the birth of the Son and the procession of the Holy Spirit, we will make a general (without going into details) outline of the biblical concept of this subject and the ancient patristic concept closely related to it. Although the Old Testament word of God very covertly proclaimed the truth of the trinity of persons in God, nevertheless, the beginning of the Eastern analogy - words and breath - or the image under which the birth and procession of the Son and Spirit is presented to the Orthodox East goes back to Old Testament times. The idea of ​​the Son of God - the hypostatic Word and the Holy Spirit - the Breath of the mouth of God, very covertly expressed in the first verses of the book. Genesis in the narrative of Moses about the creation of the world through the word (“God spoke”) and in the significant words “The Spirit of God was moving on the top of the waters,” then somewhat more directly - in the words of the psalmist, which undoubtedly constitute a kind of paraphrase of the first verses of the book of Genesis - By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established and by the Spirit of His mouth all their strength (Psalm XXXII, 6) - this is a representation the word and breath of the mouth of God were revealed in more detail and expressed somewhat more directly, although not without significant secrecy, by the writers of the sacred books - the Proverbs of Solomon, Ecclesiastes and the Wisdom of Solomon under the form of the doctrine of the Wisdom of God. In this regard, two circumstances attract attention: 1) the most important thing - the word of the mouth of God - the Son and the breath of the same lips - the Holy Spirit are thought at once, united, inseparably in the image of one and the same Wisdom; 2) Wisdom is depicted in some places of these sacred texts. books, in pre-world existence, although predominantly, so to speak, in the moment closest to the creation of the world (if it is permissible to use this expression when talking about the unchangeable, eternal God); 3) is depicted as an internal word, as His divine thought, existing in Him and with Him from eternity, at the moment when it emerges from the bowels of the Father to creation, and in this sense is born; becoming the omnipotent word of the mouth of God, “the artist of everything and at the same time - like the breath coming from the depths of the being of God (“the breath of the power of God”), giving life to everything, animating everything on which it is poured out. Thus, Wisdom is conceived both in its eternal pre-worldly existence with God and with God and in its closest relationship to creation. In the book. Proverbs Sol. about Wisdom it is said that “the Lord had her (“creating me, acquiring me”) at the beginning of his path, before his creatures from time immemorial,” that she “was poured out from eternity (“the foundation of me,” from Hebrew anointed), from the beginning, before the existence of the earth,” that she was “born” before the existence of the abyss, mountains, fields, earth, and even primeval matter ("the first specks of dust of the universe") that she was already there when God laid the foundation of the heavens and drew a circular line across the face of the abyss, established the clouds, was an artist with Him, was His joy every day, rejoicing in His face, rejoicing all the time (VIII, 22-30). Here Wisdom is conceived as the inner Word, the eternal hypostatic thought of God and as the Word-Son, born of the Father and participating with Him in the affairs of creation, like an artist, but here Wisdom is not yet directly called the Word. This name is given to it in the book of Jesus son of Sirach. According to this book, Wisdom abides with God forever (I, 1), the Source of wisdom (revealed in the world) is the Word of the Most High God (I, 5); He produced it and saw and measured and poured it out on all his works (I, 8-9); Wisdom “came from the mouth of the Most High and covered the earth like a cloud” (XXIY, 3). Here it is made clear that Wisdom is not only the word, but at the same time the breath of the mouth of God; the latter is evident from the image of a kind of vapor coming out of the mouth of God when breathing, and forming clouds with which the earth is covered. Isn’t this a paraphrase of the words of Moses: “The Spirit of God was carried on the surface of the waters?” In the book. Wisdom of Solomon The Wisdom of Solomon is directly called the Spirit and, what is remarkable, on the one hand, reasonable and only-begotten, on the other, so subtle and easily mobile that it penetrates everything. The writer of this book, wanting to more accurately define what Wisdom is, how it came about, wanting to penetrate into the very secret of her “birth” (VI, 22-23), says that she is the artist of everything (VII, 21), that she is a rational spirit, holy, only-begotten, many-parted, subtle, easily mobile, light, pure, clear, harmless, benevolent, quick, uncontrollable, beneficent, philanthropic, firm, unshakable, calm, carefree, all-seeing and penetrating all intelligent, pure, subtle spirits, for wisdom is more mobile than any movement and by its purity passes and penetrates everything. She is the breath of the power of God (“the pair is the power of God”) and the pure outpouring of the glory of the Almighty... She is a reflection of eternal light and a pure mirror of the action of God and the image of His goodness. She is alone, but she can do everything (VII, 22 – 27). She has cohabitation with God... She is the mystery of the mind of God and the chooser or inventor of His works (VIII, 3-4). – Wisdom here is depicted by two kinds of traits: on the one hand, characteristic of the eternal hypostatic mind of God - the Word (“reasonable”, “only begotten”, “artist”, “mystery”, “inventor of affairs”), on the other hand, befitting the Spirit of God, the breath of the mouth of God (“spirit”, “subtle”, “moveable”, “all-pervading”, “breath of the power of God”). In this wonderful depiction of the Wisdom of God, we undoubtedly have in philosophical language an expressed revelation of the divinely revealed teaching, announced by Moses and the prophet David, about the Word of the Lord and the Spirit of the mouth of God, by which everything was created and ordered. Undoubtedly, it is also the case that both Hypostases of God, depicted in secret here and in other places in the Old Testament, are not only united in one common name - Wisdom, but are also collectively thought of as the word of the mouth of God and the breath of the same mouth, that the Holy Spirit appears to proceed from the mouth of God not without the Word (the “reasonable” Spirit, the “only begotten”), as well as the Word - “not without breath” (as St. I. Damascene puts it), for “Wisdom is Spirit” (according to Prince Pres. Solom.). The prayer of the writer Prince is very remarkable. Prem. Sol.: "God of the fathers and Lord of mercy, who created all things by Thy Word and formed man by Thy Wisdom... grant me the Wisdom that sits before Thy throne (IX, 1. 2. 4). With Thee is the Wisdom that knows Thy works and was present when Thou created the world" (IX, 9). Here, on the one hand, the name Wisdom is appropriated to the Holy Spirit (“who created all things by Thy Word and Thy Wisdom”), on the other hand, the same name is applied to the Word the Son (“knows Thy works and was present when He created the world”). This significant biblical unification of the Word and the Spirit in one name of Wisdom, - applied first to one, then to the other, then to both of them together, indicating their unification in representation, the conceivability of them collectively originating from the same lips of God the Father, in the form of the all-wise and omnipotent Word of the mouth of God and the life-giving Breath of the same lips, served as a deep basis for the ancient fathers and teachers of the church in their attempts to reveal the doctrine first of the second person of the Holy Trinity under the form of the doctrine of the Word, and then of the third - the Holy Spirit. All St. the fathers and teachers of the Eastern and ancient Western churches held firmly to biblical soil, thought in images of Holy Scripture and spoke in its language. Their theological thought was nourished by the word of God, and not by the philosophy of that time. Their speculation was not baselessly philosophical. In particular, in the theology about the Holy Trinity, they came from the data of Holy Scripture, mainly from the doctrine of Wisdom and the related doctrine of the Word in the Hebrews. John and about the Son of God by the apostle. Paul (God's power and God's Wisdom, the firstborn of all creation, the image of God, the radiance of glory). The Old Testament teaching about Wisdom, with its numerous, lofty, mysterious images, which, moreover, had some similarity with the philosophical ideas of that time, gave wide scope to the flight of their theological thought and a very convenient means of revealing to the then pagan educated world the entire height and depth of the Christian faith in the trinity of Persons in God. Delving deeper into this teaching, which, without any doubt, they recognized not as a work of philosophical thought (as many are inclined to look at it in our time), but as a gift of divine revelation, they theologized, so that in it (in this teaching, mainly in the teaching of Wisdom) is the key to explaining very much in their creations. Western theologians do not want to use this key. Some - because it seems to them that the ancient church fathers, like themselves, preferred to draw their wisdom from the reservoirs of pagan wisdom, and not from the source of divine revelation, as if they (the fathers) looked to St. books, especially those of later origin, as works of the philosophizing human mind, having one common source with pagan philosophy, and therefore preferred to draw primarily from the primary source, that is, from philosophy, if they turned to the Holy. Scripture, then to the extent that their own philosophically formed views coincided with seemingly similar ideas expressed in the Bible. Others - because they themselves, not standing (in relation, at least, to the doctrine of the birth of the Son and the procession of the Holy Spirit) on biblical soil, having been moved from this soil by the direction that Blessed One gave to Western theological thought. Augustine, do not have any inner impulse to bring patristic ideas and expressions closer to biblical ones. Meanwhile, there is no doubt that the above biblical images of Wisdom, the most private images and expressions of the Holy Scriptures of the Old. The Testament not only explains many confusing passages for scholars in the works of the fathers before the 4th century, but also sheds strong light on the image of the concept of the Trinity life of the Divine among all the ancient saints. fathers and teachers of the church both before and after the 4th century. First of all, the biblical images of Wisdom explain: The theory of the pre-Origen fathers about Λόγος ένδιάθετος and Λόγος προφορικός - a theory not invented by themselves, but a component of nothing more than an interpretation and in many cases a simple paraphrase of the Old Testament teaching about Wisdom, which was with God or with God (as St. John puts it) from eternity and then “born,” that is, outgoing to creation when God was pleased to create the world - their ideas about the coexistence of the Word-reason, as something second in God from eternity, and then about the birth of the Son, as if not from eternity, although not in time, but so to speak before the beginning of time (Just. martyr. 2 Apol. n. 6. Tert. Adv. Rgah. p. 6, etc.), expressions that He is “power and Son” (Just. martyr. 1 Apol. n. 32), “Word and Son” (Terth. ibid.), that He is “idea and active force” (Athens. Legat. p. 10) and many more. etc. But what is especially remarkable and what is most closely related to our subject is that among the fathers until the 4th century. There is also a biblical unification of the Word and the Spirit in one name and presentation of wisdom. In many places, speaking about the Word the Son and appending to it the name of wisdom, seeing in the words of the book. Proverbs Chapter VIII (The Lord created me...) image of the second Hypostasis of the Holy Trinity, the fathers apply the same name to the third Hypostasis - St. Spirit, and this is not once or twice. Particularly noteworthy are the following two passages from the work of St. Theophilus of Antioch: 1) his famous passage about the days of creation - “those three days that were before the creation of the world are images of the Trinity-God and His Word and Wisdom. And the fourth day is an image of a person in need of light, so that there may be God, Word, Wisdom, man” 4, and 2) somewhat higher 5, St. Theophilus, also discussing creation, although he calls the Holy Spirit wisdom, at the same time he assigns the same name to the Son, and moreover, as if he identifies the Son with the Spirit. "God, having the Word in His own bosom (ένδιάθετον), gave birth to Him, manifesting Him together (μετά) with Wisdom first of all. He had this Word as the executor of His creations and through it He created everything... It, being the Spirit of God, the beginning, wisdom and power of the Most High, descended on the prophets and through them spoke about the creation of the world and about other things. For there were no prophets at the creation of the world, but the Wisdom that was in Him (έν αύτῷ ο ὗ σα) and His holy Word, which was always present with Him (συμπαρῶν αύτῷ). Both places vividly recall how in general the biblical idea of ​​the Word and the Breath of God, inseparably, but together and inextricably united in wisdom, and in particular the wonderful words of prayer in the book. Prem. Sol., in which the name wisdom is directly applied to the Holy Spirit (as in the first place in St. Theophilus), although further, in the same prayer, it is made clear that the Son-Word, the artist of everything, can also be called wisdom (as in St. Theophilus in the second place). It’s wonderful that St. Theophilus The Word, emerging together with the Wisdom-Spirit from the depths of the father for manifestation in the world, is also the Spirit of God-Wisdom; it, like the Spirit, descends on the prophets, therefore, the Word is, as it were, the prophetic Spirit. This characteristic, as it were, confusion of the Word-Son and the Spirit-Breath and their unification in the common name of wisdom for both of them testifies, of course, not to their actual mixing, but to the idea of ​​them collectively coming from the Father: the word comes with breath and breath with the word. The biblical way of expression explains the most common things in St. Irenaeus names the Son and the Holy Spirit Word and Wisdom (Verbum et Sapientia), which are presented as if in the form of two hands of the Father. With them, as if with two hands, He created everything, controls everything and completes the entire economy of human salvation. The Holy Father, despite criticizing the ideas of his predecessors about the internal and external Word, still stood on biblical soil, as can be seen from the names of the Son and the Spirit by word and wisdom and from the representation of the father as if in the form of a man with two hands. This last idea is completely unfavorable to the Western one, for from it it is in no way possible to deduce the dependence of the Spirit in being on the Son. In the closest relation to biblical images and in particular to the Old Testament teaching about the Wisdom of God are all the most remarkable passages of Origen’s works, revealing the teaching about the Son of God and the Holy Spirit. In our opinion, there is no doubt that it was the Old Testament teaching about Wisdom for the great Alexandrian teacher, who loved secrecy and allegories, that served as the starting point in his theology about the Holy Trinity, and very many deep, difficult to explain and arousing doubts regarding his Orthodoxy, at this point teachings, passages can and should be explained by comparing them with this Old Testament teaching, full of lofty mysterious images. Origen differs from his predecessors in that he moves the act of the birth of Wisdom, so to speak, from the boundaries of creation into the depths of eternity and calls its birth the existence of Wisdom with God, as something second in God, as His interlocutor (Tertulian), which his predecessors called in an internal word, as if not yet born. And he thinks of this Wisdom not only as being born from eternity, but also as creating the images and types and forms of all things of the future world, that is, producing and containing within itself the ideal world. The birth of Wisdom and creation, or, better to say, the pre-eternal relationship of the Hypostases of the Holy Trinity to the future world are thought of as pre-eternal. As for what Origen’s predecessors called the Word that occurred outside (Λόγος προφορι x ός) or was born when God was pleased to create the world, Origen thought of this procession of Wisdom to creation as not proceeding as if into the space of the word, but as if in the form of will or desire, originating from the mind 6 , or the evaporation of the power of God 7. These images, indicating the participation of the word, as an expression of the will and command of God 8 and the Spirit of God or the breath of God, are undoubtedly biblical and could not be more consistent with the biblical teaching about the creation of the world by the Word - the command of God and the Spirit - the breath of the power of God. Thus, Origen only more deeply understood the biblical teaching and, with the flight of his thoughts, ascended as high above everything temporal and spatial as possible. But, having placed in close connection the pre-eternal origin of Wisdom (as the Son and the Spirit) from the Father with the pre-eternal relationship of the Divine Hypostases to the future creation or to the world in the thought of God, Origen created great difficulties for the separate presentation of the two kinds of pre-eternal triple relationships of the Divine Hypostases: 1) in themselves, by being and 2) by their manifestation or revelation, “shine” for the future, for God, it is always real, creation. Those and other relationships, with their undoubted and deep differences, although sometimes thought of separately, were very often and even for the most part presented simultaneously, united in the thought of Origen. In accordance with this, the Son and the Spirit were thought of by him either as equal in all hypostases, or as subordinates (Son to the Father, Spirit to the Son). The Son was often presented in all respects as inferior to the Father and was even called His “creation” - precisely “for the sake of these creatures (pro his creaturis), which, as the beginning of the species and forms of the entire (future) creation (universae creaturae vel initia, vel formas, vel spesies) were contained” and “were, as it were, predestined and pre-depicted” in Him as Wisdom (velut praescriptae ac praefiguratae) 9, The Holy Spirit was thought of through the Son as receiving not only existence (τό εἴνα ׳.), but also the properties of wisdom, rationality and holiness 10. Here, in this rapprochement and at times, as if identifying the eternal birth of the Son and the eternal procession of the Spirit by being from the Father in the depths. divine depths and their eternal relationship to the future world, their eternal emergence for creation, providence, redemption and sanctification lies the deep basis of that duality in Origen’s teaching about the Holy Trinity, which (duality) was noticed long ago, even in the ancient patristic period (Jeron., Epiphanius, Theophilus Alex., Bl. Augustine), but, thanks to the breadth and depth of the patristic view, did not bring condemnation of the ancient church on the Alexandrian teacher for his doctrine of the Trinity and served as the reason for serious attacks on him only in later times, from the 17th century, from the time of Petavius, from the era of the resumption of diligent study of ancient patristic literature by Western theologians, who, however, lacked the spirit and deep understanding characteristic of the ancient fathers. The question of Origen's image of representation has not a distant, but the closest relation to the question that concerns us. For there is no doubt that the admirers of the famous Alexandrian teacher and in many ways his disciples - the great fathers of the 4th and subsequent centuries - followed Origen's presentation of the Trinity relationships and their various types: in being and in manifestation - both in eternity and in time. Holding firmly to biblical soil, they, like Origen, very often simultaneously thought about these and other relationships. And in their speeches, for the most part, it is very difficult to distinguish between what they refer to as relations of the first kind and the second. This is all the more difficult because the thoughts of (all) the ancient fathers moved and their speech flowed differently from our thoughts and speeches. Their thought did not move along the usual and monotonous track that was laid out by medieval scholasticism and along which our thought moves steadily, following the path of first general provisions, then division and the gradual and uniform development of particular thoughts contained in the general position. They did not break down the object they represented into parts, but contemplated it as a whole, carrying a whole living image of it in their souls. From this image, depending on their need, they took certain features, not caring, like us, to break it into parts and cast the broken pieces into a stereotypical lifeless logical formula. Their thought was so free, alive and fast in its flight that the word often did not have time to follow it; the thought went on and on, throwing brilliant sparks in the form of individual expressions. As contemplatives, moreover, brought up in rhetorical schools, they loved figurative expressions and were alien to our dry prosaic language. They gave a particularly wide place to such expressions in speeches about sublime subjects, in order to throw a certain cloak of mystery over them and give the opportunity for reflection to the one to whom the speech was addressed. That is why to us, with our mentality and speech, there seems to be a lot of unsaid, unclear, mutual things in their works, and we can endlessly argue about what, in all likelihood, was quite clear and did not allow for reinterpretation for their contemporaries. When thinking about the persons of the Holy Trinity and with the names of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, a whole series of ideas arose and quickly flashed through the mind of the ancient father of the church about the life of the triune God in Himself - in eternal, pre-worldly existence, about the relationship of the persons of the Holy Trinity to the future creation - in pre-worldly existence, about their manifestation in the creation of the world, about their participation in the providence of the world before the incarnation, in the incarnation, in the church Christ's. We interpret all this separately, point by point and gradually. The ancient fathers think and talk about all this together. Having begun, for example, to talk about the eternal relations of the persons of the Holy Trinity in being, pre-eternal birth and procession, they immediately then start talking about the manifestation of the born Word and the outgoing Spirit in the creative and providential activity of God, as can be seen from the various epithets applied to the Son and the Spirit, then again they return to the pre-eternal trinity relations in being, and then again thought and speech deviate towards the revelation of the Son and the Spirit to the world, etc. d. And this is not at all surprising; for about the pre-eternal trinity relations in being in St. We have revealed very little in Scripture, namely, that there are three eternal divine hypostases - the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, that the unborn Father gives birth to the Son and brings forth the Holy Spirit, while the history of their revelation to the world is full of diverse and wondrous manifestations over the space of millennia, especially of the second and third Persons of the Holy Trinity. The thought of the ancient fathers, highly alive, and the feeling full of ardent animation did not allow them to dwell on one point for a long time; Wide horizons opened up before their mind's eye and they hastened to show or outline them, often to hint about them in at least one word, before their listeners or readers. The most important passages in their works, which form the subject of a dispute between Eastern and Western on the issue of the procession of the Holy Spirit, have precisely this character - the nature of reasoning and mixed depiction, about different aspects of the subject. In these passages, which have been examined countless times, it would be unfair to see an indication exclusively of one thing, i.e., either of one pre-eternal procession of the Holy Spirit through existence, or of the procession to creation, manifestation in creation, providence, redemption, etc. They treat both of them together, interspersed, so to speak, although, undoubtedly, much more about the second than the first. If we delve into the general structure of thoughts and individual expressions in the works of the fathers after the 4th century, comparing both with biblical ideas and expressions, and with the fathers of the first three centuries, then the way of presenting the fathers of the 4th century. and the following centuries up to and including I. Damascene, the procession of the Holy Spirit can be expressed in the following provisions 11. According to eternal existence, both the Son and the Spirit come from the Father collectively, united, together. Birth and procession are not thought of as coming one after the other, but as coinciding. “The birth of the Son from the Father and the procession of the Holy Spirit occur together,” notes St. I. Damascene 12. According to Bl. Theodoret, “The Spirit co-originates with the Word, not being generated, but coexisting and accompanying and proceeding” 13. “The Son is begotten, the Spirit comes forth,” as Didymus puts it 14. In his own words: “at the same time as the Father became the Father, without a great interval one was born, the other departed” 15. According to the meaning of the saying of St. I. Damascus: “The Word also needs Breath (the Holy Spirit), for our word is not without breath” 16 - the birth of the Son is impossible, therefore, and should not be conceivable without the procession of the Spirit. The unity of birth and procession is also thought of in the image of the mouth of God the Father, from which the Son and the Spirit come together, one in the other (inseparably, although unmerged), just as our word and breath are inseparable in their origin. This idea about the single mouth of the Father was expressed very clearly by St. Vasily Vel. and I. Damascene. According to Basil the Great, "The Father manifests birth from himself - the Word, the word is not human, but this Word truly manifests from himself. He brings forth the Spirit through his lips not in a human way, because the lips of God are not bodily, but the Spirit is from Him, and not from elsewhere... If you do not believe that the Spirit came from the mouth of God, then you cannot believe that the Word is from God" 17. By lips here we mean Father, as is clear from this and even clearer from another place from the same holy father: “it is written here - the Spirit of His mouth, and in another place it is said - the Word of His mouth, so that we understand that the Savior and His Holy Spirit are from the Father.” In the same sense, St. I. Damascene uses the expression “mouth.” Proving that the Spirit comes from the Father, and not from the Son, this holy father affirms his thought on the position that the Holy Spirit is the breath of the mouth of God the Father. “The Spirit is from the Father, but also belongs to the Son, but He is not from the Son” - why? “as the Spirit (breath) of the mouth of God (i.e. the Father), proclaiming the Word” 19. The reason for His proceeding not from the Son is that He is the Spirit of the mouth of God. One should pay special attention to the expression “the mouth of God", which is what the Old Catholics do, trying to explain it in the sense of indicating the Son. But there is not the slightest basis for understanding this expression in the cited passages due to their clarity, which does not allow for reinterpretation. If in other places, as for example in one place in the same St. I. Damascus (see below), the mouth is attributed to the Son, then in this last case, without a doubt, one must understand the procession of the Spirit from the mouth of the Son in a different sense, and not in the same sense in which He comes from the mouth of the Father, that is, not in the sense of proceeding by being from the Son. From eternity, however, there has been a special relationship between the Son and the Spirit, not in terms of being, but in terms of their manifestation in creation. In relation to the future, and for God always the present, creation, the Son, as St. I. Damascus is “the power that pre-organizes the creation of all things,” and the Spirit is “the perfect power for the creation of all things.” In relation to creation, the activity of the Son-Word, wisdom, artist, educator of types, species and forms of all things is thought of as preceding the activity of the “living-primary” (ζωαρχι x ῷ) Spirit 20. Therefore, if we think of the relationship of the Son and the Spirit to creation in the form of the production by these Hypostases from the depths of the Father of “the good (the created world) hidden in Him,” then we must think of the Father as the “source that gives birth” in the Son and “producing this good” by His Spirit, as the accomplisher of the creation of all things. This is precisely the meaning of the remarkable reasoning of St. I. Damascene in his “Accurate presentation of the right faith”, book. I, ch. 12, where at the very beginning of the speech it is made clear that the Divine Persons are thought of in their relation to creation. “God is called mind and reason and spirit and wisdom and power, as the author of this, as immaterial, as the creator of everything and omnipotent.” This is how the reasoning begins. Then, after a few lines, the words follow: "When I reflect on the mutual relationship of the Hypostases, I see that the Father is the essential sun, the source of goodness, the abyss of essence, reason, wisdom, power, light, divinity, the source that gives birth and brings out the hidden good in Him. For He is the mind, the abyss of reason, the parent of the Word and through the Word the producer of the Spirit, which manifests Him, and - not to say much - in the Father there is no other Word, wisdom, power, will except the Son, who is the only power of the Father pre-arranging (ἠ προ x αταρ x τι x ή) the creation of all things; since He is a perfect Hypostasis, born from a perfect Hypostasis, as He Himself knows, who is and is called the Son, and the Holy Spirit is the power of the Father, manifesting the hidden in. Divinity, proceeding from the Father through the Son as the Spirit himself knows, only not through birth. Why is the Holy Spirit the finisher (τελεαιουργὸς) of the creation of all things” 21. The main purpose of this entire discussion is to show how the “good” hidden in Him came from the Father, as the source. Everything came about through the Son and was completed by the Holy Spirit. The “good” hidden in the Father receives from Him (as the “source that gives birth and emanates”) its existence through the begotten Son by the outgoing Holy Spirit. For the creation of “good,” the Father gives birth to the Son, as the power that pre-organizes the creation of all things,” and brings forth the Holy Spirit, as the force that “accomplishes the creation of all things”; in the born Son, this “good” is received preliminary (as in the creative mind) being, in the outgoing Spirit; real life, final existence. The Son, as the “preordaining power of the Father,” is the first power; the Spirit, as the “perfecting power,” manifesting what has already been preordained by the first power, is the second power, outgoing for the creation of good (in the world), through the first power—the Son, which is why He is called “the finisher of the creation of all things.” – This and similar passages in the patristic works constitute the main stumbling block for Westerners, since here, apparently, a certain sequence of birth and procession is clearly allowed, and the latter is thought of as occurring through the former, which is why the Spirit appears to proceed through the Son. But this can only be argued from a biased, Western point of view, that is, if you do not pay attention to what is being discussed in this and similar places. It is extremely clear that what is being treated here is not at all about the relationship of the Son and the Spirit in terms of being, but about completely different relationships - according to the knowledge of the good hidden in God the Father, that is, about their relationship to creation, even in pre-worldly existence. Although the Son and the Spirit participate jointly in creation and providence and also act jointly in the world and on the world, the Spirit manifests itself through the Word. In this sense, the Spirit proceeds (into the world) through the Son, as if from the mouth of the Son. The action of the Son on the world precedes the action of the Spirit. The Spirit gives life to the creation called into existence by the Word. He works through the prophetic word. He also rules the world created by the Word: he affirms everything, preserves everything. “The Son is the will, wisdom, and power of the Father” 22. “This is My Son..., through whom I created the angels, by whom the heavens were established and the earth was founded, who upholds all things by the word of His power and by the Spirit of His mouth, that is, the life-giving and sovereign Spirit” 23. “In the Word He rests and He manifests Him” 24. “The Spirit speaks the Word” 25. “The Holy Spirit is also called the Spirit of the Son, as being revealed through Him and transmitted to creation, but not having being from Him” 26. He is the “Spirit sent, creating, establishing and preserving” 27. The Spirit manifests itself through the Son both in redemption and after redemption. "He appeared and is taught to us through the Son. Duna, it is said, and the verb to them: receive the Holy Spirit. So, from the sun there is a ray and radiance, for the sun is the source of the ray and radiance, and through the ray the radiance is given to us and it illuminates us and is received by us. But we do not say about the Son that He is the son of the Spirit or from the Spirit" 28 . After this, it is clear that in relation to manifestation in the world, the Holy Spirit is thought after the Son or through the Son, as expressed by Vasily V. “Since the Holy Spirit, from which every gift of good flows upon creation, is united with the Son and is thought with Him without any interval, and being is dependent on the cause of the Father, then the distinctive sign of His specialness in hypostasis is to be cognizable after the Son and with the Son and from the Father comes the Son, giving through himself and with himself to know the Spirit who proceeds from the Father,” etc. 29 From the points of view outlined above, even some passages from the works of St. Gregory of Nyssa, apparently strongly testifying in favor of the Latin idea and as such is exactly what is presented by Westerners, including Old Catholics. The Holy Father speaks in them about the “rising of the Spirit through the Son” 30, that He “through the Son and together with Him... is immediately comprehended in a united manner... having the cause of being from God of all, from whence the only begotten Light, having risen through the true light, is not separated by any distance or difference in nature from the Father or the Only Begotten.” 31. Like I. Damascene, he thinks of the Spirit as “accompanying the Word and revealing His action” 32. All these expressions and concepts - emission, revelation, accompanying - are common to him with the other fathers and should be understood in the sense of universal fatherly views, that is, as indicating the descent of the Spirit through the Son from the depths of the Father to creation - from the depths of the Father, in which they coexist with the Father, proceeding from Him directly, and not one through the other - “being born and coming together.” There is only one place in which Gregory of Nyssa apparently appears with his own special view, similar to the Latin, but this place so clearly contradicts other parallel places in his works that it raises doubts about the identity of the point of view from which he looks at the subject in different places. If in one place he asserts that in the Holy Trinity it is necessary to imagine the origin of persons not like in the human race, where persons receive existence “not directly (οὐ x x ατὰ τό προσεχὲς) from one person,” but one from one, another from another, in the Holy Trinity, “one and the same person is the Father, from whom the Son is born.” and the Holy Spirit proceeds.” 33), meanwhile in another place he says the complete opposite of this, namely, that in the Holy Trinity “one is immediate (προσεχῶς) from the first, and the other through what is directly from Him” 34, then are we not right to think that in these two places St. does the father look at the same object, but from different angles? Doesn’t he contemplate the procession through being in the first place, and the Holy Spirit in the second? in that state of His when He, coming into the world, rests in the Son-Word, accompanying Him, manifests His action, shines for the world through the Son? Where did he get the idea of mediation, when in the first place he decisively asserted the “immediate” origin of both the Son and the Spirit from the one person of the Father? Addition to the above words about the mediation of the Son: “why the only-begottenness undoubtedly remains with the Son and the Spirit undoubtedly belongs to being from the Father, for the mediation of the Son and to Him (the Son) preserves the only-begottenness and It does not remove the Spirit from its connection with the Father by nature” – does not require any necessary explanation in the sense of defining in these words the relationship of the persons of the Holy Trinity according to pre-eternal existence. As is known, the fathers represented birth and procession not as acts that took place once, but as acts that were endlessly completed; Consequently, Gregory of Nyssa could think of procession, as if mediated by birth, in relation to creation, and in this sense speak of only-begottenness and connection by nature. If we apply a Western interpretation to this place, then how can we reconcile with it the well-known place about the Son and the Spirit, as the “double ray of the Father” (ἡ δίδυμος τοῦ Πατρὸς ἀ x τὶς), not to mention the above-mentioned place asserting “direct” origin Son and Spirit from the Father, as completely different from the mediated origin of human persons? However, even if it were proven that Gregory of Nyssa had his own special way of presenting on this subject, as he had it on some others, then even in this case his view would have to be recognized as nothing more than a peculiar idea constituting a deviation from the general patristic. In order to reveal the Orthodox-Eastern idea of ​​​​the birth of the Son and the procession of the Holy Spirit, we turned to Holy Scripture and, in its light, tried to outline and, although in general terms, trace the path along which the thought of the ancient fathers of the Orthodox East moved, in order to thus determine the direction given by them to the Orthodox-Eastern contemplation in the future to the present day. At the same time, we have seen how much it helps to understand the patristic views on birth and procession by turning to their starting point - biblical teaching and ideas. The Word of God sheds such abundant light on the most difficult passages of the patristic works that no other means in the hands of a learned researcher can compare with it. And we think that if the Old Catholics, having renounced the starting point of their theology about St. Trinity - the Augustinian concept and its analogies, having abandoned scholastic straightforwardness in handling the text of the patristic works, casting aside self-confidence in the correctness of their understanding of the patristic view, imbued with saving doubt in this case, humbly trusted in the leadership of the Word of God, then with its light they could come to complete unanimity with us Eastern not only regarding the addition of the Filioque to the creed, but also regarding the image ideas about the procession of the Holy Spirit. Dellinger at the Bonn Conference of 1875, see Collection. duct. total loves. spirits education (St. Petersburg department). St. Petersburg 1876 p. 16. Velut si voluntas procedat a mente. De princ. IV, 28. Psalm. CXXXII, 6. Comp. Art. 9: That speech was born, led and created. More Ps. CXIII, 11: Create everything as you please. Let us recommend to the attention of our readers op. N. M. Bogorodsky: “The Teaching of St. I. Damascene on the procession of the Holy Spirit" (St. Petersburg, 1879). This work, written in view of the Old Catholic movement, very carefully and, in general, correctly, in our opinion, explains almost all the passages below. We disagree with Mr. Bogorodsky in a few things, mainly in the understanding of the paternal expression ὸιά τοῦ ϒ ιοῦ, although, of course, this point in the doctrine of the procession of the Holy Spirit is far from secondary. – We quote passages from our fathers’ works according to Min’s edition. V58; Αμα δε x αὶ ή τοῦ ϓ ιοῦ έ x τοῦ Πατρός γέννὴ with ις x αὶ ή τοῦ ἀγὶου Πνεῦματος έ x πόρευσις. I. Dam. De fide orth. I, 7 t. 94 col. 804. Ệ υμπροεῖσ τῷ Λογω το Πνεΰμα οὐ ςυγγεννόμενον , ἀλλἀ ξυνον x αί παροραρτοΰν x αί ἐ x πορευόμενον . Theodorit Graec. affect. curat. 2 t. 83 col. 860. ῾ Ο ϓ ιος συναπογεννηθείς ἔμφυτον ἔχει τήν ἀγαθότητα x αί τὰ ἄλλα, ὄσα ό Πατήρ. V58; Αλλὰ x αί το ἄγιον Πνεΰμα συνε x πορευθέν x ατα φύσιν έοτιν αγαθον x αί ὅ σα ὁ Θεος Πατήρ. Didyma De Trinit. II, 3 t. 39 col. 477. V58; Αμα γάρ Πατήρ, ἀδιαστάτως ό μεν ένεννήθη, το δε έ x πορεύθη. Ibid., col. 320. Therefore, it is impossible to think that God the Father became a Father before he brought forth the Holy Spirit, or - what is the same thing - birth cannot be imagined as preceding the procession. How soon He is thought of as the Father (Αμα γάρ Πατήρ). At the same time, he is also thought of as the bearer of the Holy Spirit. Δε ῐ δὲ τὸν Λόγον x αί Πνεΰμα ἔχειν . Καί γὰρ ό ήμέτερος λόγος ο ὒх ἅ μοιρός . I. Dam. De fide orth. I, 7 t. 94 col. 804. You. Vel. Contr. Eunom. Vt. 29 col. 733–737. ἵ να νοηθή ό Σωτήρ x αὶ τὸ ἄγιον αὐτο ῠ τὸ Πνε ῠ μα ἐ x τὸ ῠ Πατρος. You. Vel. Homil. in psalm. XXXII, t. 29 col. 333. V58; Ε x Πατρος μεν, ϓ ιο ῠ δἐ, x αὶ μὴ ὲξ ϓ ιο ῠ ώς Πνε ῠ μα στόματος Θεοῠ. Λόγου ἐςαγγελτι x ον. I. Damascus. De hymn, trisag. n. 27 t. 05 col. 60. I. Damascus. Homil. in transf. n. 18, t. 96, col. 573. I. Dam. De fide orth. I, 12 t. 94 col. 848 – 849. Damascus. De fide. orth. I, 13 col. 856. τῷ πνεύματι το ῠ οτόματος αὐτου, τῷ ζωαρχι x ῷ x αὶ ἡγεμονι x ῷ ὃ ηλα ὃ ὴ Πνεύματι. I. Dam. Homil. in transfig. 13. t. 96. col. 573. ἐν τῷ Λόγω ἀναπαυομένην x αὶ αὐτοῦ ο ὔ σαν ἐ x φαντι x ὴν . I. Damascus. Do fide orth. I, 7 col. 805. Λόγου ἐξαγγελτι x ὸν. I. Dam. De hymno trisag. n. 27. t. 95 col. 60. I. Dam. Homil. in s. Sablat. 4.t. 96 col. 605. Πνεῦμα δὲ ἀποστελλόμενον x αὶ ποιοῦν x αὶ οτερεοῦν x αὶ συνέχον . I.Dam, De fide orth. I, 7 col. 808. Vasil. Vel. Epist. ad fratr. Gregorium n. 4.t. 32 col. 329 – 332. ὸι ᾿ αὐτο ῡ ἐ x λάμπον. Contra Eunom. I.t. 45. col. 416. ? Orat. athech. 2 ibid. col. 17. De comm. not. ibid. col. 180. Quod non sint tres dii. ibid. col. 133. You might be interested in: