Augustinus, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus LXXXV-CII

that teacher himself was able to learn something more, so that both may be teachable by God (John 6:45). And yet even among the spiritual themselves some are certainly more capable and better than others, so that one of them reached those things which it is not lawful for a man to speak. On this occasion certain vain people, with most foolish presumption, invented an Apocalypse of Paul, which the sound Church does not receive, full of I know not what fables, saying that this was the source of his saying that he had been caught up into the third heaven and had there heard unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a man to speak (2 Cor. 12:2, 4). Their audacity might have been tolerable in some way, if he had said that he had heard things which it is not yet lawful for a man to speak; but since he said, which it is not lawful for a man to speak, who are these who dare to speak them shamelessly and unhappily? But now I shall close this discourse with this ending, through which I desire you to be wise indeed in what is good, but untainted by evil.

Tractate 99. On that [saying], For He will not speak from Himself, but whatever He will hear, He will speak. Chapter 16, verse 13.

1. What is it that the Lord says about the Holy Spirit, when He promised that He would come and would teach His disciples all truth, or would lead them into all truth: For He will not speak from Himself, but whatever He will hear, He will speak? For this is like what He said of Himself, I cannot do anything of Myself: as I hear, I judge (John 5:30). But when we were expounding that, we said that it can be taken according to the man (Above, Tractates 19-22): so that the Son would seem to have foretold His obedience, by which He became obedient even unto the death of the cross (Phil. 2:8), as being also to come in the judgement, in which He will judge the living and the dead; because He will do this through that by which He is the son of man. For which reason He said, The Father judges no one, but has given all judgement to the Son: because in the judgement it is not in the form of God, in which He is equal to the Father and which cannot be seen by the ungodly, but in the form of man that He will appear, in which He was made lower, even a little lower than the angels; although He will come now in glory, not in His former humility, yet He will be visible both to the good and to the evil. Hence He says this also: And He has given Him power to execute judgement, because He is the son of man (John 5:22, 27). In which words of His it is made manifest that it is not that form which is to be presented at the judgement, in which, when He was in it, He did not think it robbery to be equal to God; but that which He received when He had emptied Himself. For He emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant (Phil. 2:6–7): in which He seems to have commended His obedience also with respect to executing judgement, when He said, I cannot do anything of Myself: as I hear, I judge. For Adam, through the disobedience of which one man many were made sinners, did not judge as he heard; because what he heard he transgressed, and of himself he did the evil that he did; because he did not do God's will, but his own: but He, through the obedience of which one man many are made righteous (Rom. 5:19), was not only obedient even unto the death of the cross, in which He, the living, was judged by the dead; but, promising that He would be obedient

even in the judgement itself, in which He is to judge the living and the dead, He says, I cannot do anything of Myself: as I hear, I judge. But will we dare to suppose that what was said of the Holy Spirit, For He will not speak of Himself, but whatever He will hear, He will speak, was said according to man, or according to the assumption of some creature? For in the Trinity the Son alone received the form of a servant, which form was fitted to Him into unity of person, that is, so that the Son of God and the son of man is one Jesus Christ; lest not a Trinity but a quaternity be preached by us, which be far from us. On account of this one person, consisting of two substances, divine and human, He sometimes speaks according to that which He is as God, as is that which He says, I and the Father are one (John 10:30); sometimes according to that which He is as man, as is that saying, For the Father is greater than I (ibid. 14:28); according to which we have taken this too to have been said by Him, about which I am now discoursing, I cannot do anything of Myself: as I hear, I judge. But in the person of the Holy Spirit, how we are to take what He says, For He will not speak of Himself, but whatever He will hear, He will speak, since in it there is not one substance of divinity and another of humanity, or of any other creature whatsoever, a great difficulty arises.

2. For that the Holy Spirit appeared like a dove in bodily form (Matt. 3:16) was a vision made for the hour and then passed away; just as also, when He came upon the disciples, there appeared to them divided tongues as of fire, which also sat upon each one of them (Acts 2:3). Whoever, then, says that the dove was joined to the Holy Spirit into unity of person, so that out of it and God (since the Holy Spirit is God) there should consist one person of the Holy Spirit, is compelled to say this also of that fire, so that he may understand that he ought to say neither of these things. For these things, which, as there was need, were to signify something of the substance of God in some fashion, presented themselves to the bodily senses of men and passed away; they were made for the hour by divine agency out of the serving creature, not out of the ruling nature itself, which, abiding in itself, moves what it wills, and, being unchangeable, changes what it wills. Just as also that voice from the cloud certainly reached bodily ears, and that sense of the body which is called hearing (Luke 9:35); and yet in no way is it to be believed that the Word of God, Who is the only-begotten Son, is bounded by syllables and sounds because He is called the Word: for when speech takes place, not all the sounds can sound at once, but whatever sounds there are follow one another in their order, as the being-born follow the dying, so that the whole of what we speak is completed by the last syllable. Far be it that the Father should speak thus to the Son, that is, God to His Word, God! But to grasp this, so far as it can be grasped by man, belongs to those to whom not milk pertains, but solid food. Since, then, the Holy Spirit has not been made man by any taking up of man, has not been made an angel by any taking up of an angel, has not been made a creature by any taking up of any creature, how is what the Lord says to be understood of Him, For He will not speak of Himself, but whatever He will hear, He will speak? A hard question, exceedingly hard. May the Spirit Himself be present, so that at least as we are able to think it, so we may be able to express it, and so may it reach your understanding

according to the capacity of my small measure.

3. First, then, you ought to know, and to understand, you who are able, and to believe, you who are not yet able to understand, that in that substance which is God there are not senses distributed in their proper places, as it were through the bulk of a body, as in the mortal flesh of any animals sight is in one place, hearing in another, taste in another, smell in another, and touch throughout the whole. Far be it from us to believe this of that incorporeal and unchangeable nature. There, therefore, to hear and to see are the very same thing. Smell too is spoken of in God: whence the Apostle says, As Christ also loved us, and handed Himself over for us as an offering and a sacrifice to God for an odour of sweetness (Eph. 5:2). Taste too can be understood, according to which God both hates those who embitter Him, and vomits out of His mouth those who are neither cold nor hot but lukewarm (Rev. 3:16); and God, Christ, says, My food is that I do the will of Him Who sent Me (John 4:34). There is also that divine touch, whence the bride says of the bridegroom: His left hand under my head, and His right hand will embrace me (Song 2:6). These things are not in God through different places of a body. For when He is said to know, all are there: both seeing, and hearing, and smelling, and tasting, and touching; without any change of His substance, without any bulk that is greater in one part and smaller in another: even in old men it is with a childish heart that one thinks, when God is thought of in this way.

4. Do not wonder that the ineffable knowledge of God, by which He knows all things, is named, through the various modes of human speech, by the names of all these bodily senses: since even our own mind, that is, the inner man, to which, knowing in a uniform way, diverse things are reported through these five as it were messengers of the body, when it understands, chooses and loves the unchangeable truth, both sees the light of which it is said, That was the true light; and hears the Word of which it is said, In the beginning was the Word (John 1:9, 1); and catches the odour of which it is said, We shall run after the odour of your ointments (Song 1:3); and drinks from the fountain of which it is said, With Thee is the fountain of life (Ps. 35:10); and enjoys the touch of which it is said, But for me to cleave to God is good (Ps. 72:28): it is not one thing and another, but a single understanding that is named by the names of so many senses. When therefore it is said of the Holy Spirit, For He will not speak of Himself, but whatever He will hear, He will speak; much more must a simple nature be understood or believed there, where it is most truly simple, which far and loftily exceeds the nature of our mind. For our mind is changeable, which acquires by learning what it did not know, and loses by unlearning what it knew; and it is deceived by likeness to the truth, so as to approve the false in place of the true, and by its own obscurity it is hindered as if by a kind of darkness, so that it does not arrive at the truth. And therefore this substance is not most truly simple, for which to be is not the same as to know: for it can be, and not know. But that divine substance cannot, because it is what it has. And hence it does not have knowledge in such a way that the knowledge by which it knows is one thing for it, and the essence by which it is another; but both are one. Nor ought that which is simply one to be called 'both'. As the Father has life in Himself, and He Himself is nothing other than the life which is in Him; and He has given to the Son to have

life in Himself (John 5:26), that is, He begot a Son Who would Himself also be life. So therefore we ought to understand what was said of the Holy Spirit, For He will not speak from Himself, but whatever He will hear, He will speak, so that we may understand that He is not from Himself. For the Father alone is not from another. For both the Son is born of the Father, and the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father; but the Father is neither born of another, nor does He proceed. Yet let not on that account any inequality in that supreme Trinity present itself to human thought: for both the Son is equal to Him of Whom He is born, and the Holy Spirit is equal to Him from Whom He proceeds. But what difference there is there between proceeding and being born, it is both a long task to discuss by inquiring, and rash to define when you have discussed it: for this is something most difficult both for the mind to comprehend in any way at all, and, if the mind should perhaps comprehend something of it, for the tongue to set forth, however great the teacher who presides, however great the hearer who is present. Therefore He will not speak from Himself: because He is not from Himself. But whatever He will hear, He will speak: He will hear from Him from Whom He proceeds. For Him to hear is to know; and to know is to be, as was argued above. Since therefore He is not from Himself, but from Him from Whom He proceeds; from Whom He has His essence, from Him He has His knowledge: from Him, therefore, His hearing, which is nothing else than knowledge.

5. Nor let it disturb anyone that a verb of the future tense has been used. For it was not said, whatever He heard, or, whatever He hears; but, whatever He will hear, He will speak. For that hearing is everlasting, because the knowledge is everlasting. But in that which is everlasting, without beginning and without end, a verb of whatever tense be used, whether of the past, or of the present, or of the future, it is not used falsely. For although that unchangeable and ineffable nature does not admit Was and Will be, but only Is: for it truly is, because it cannot be changed; and therefore it befitted Him alone to say, I am Who am; and, You shall say to the sons of Israel, He Who is has sent Me to you (Exod. 3:14): yet because of the changeableness of the times in which our mortality and our changeableness are engaged, we say not falsely both was, and will be, and is. He was, in past ages, He is in the present, He will be in the future. He was, because He never was lacking; He will be, because He will never be lacking; He is, because He always is. For neither does He perish with things past, as one who no longer is; nor does He slip away with things present, as one who does not abide; nor will He arise with things to come, as one who had not been. Accordingly, since human speech varies according to the revolutions of the times, true words of whatever tense are said of Him Who through no times could, or can, or will be able to be lacking. The Holy Spirit therefore always hears, because He always knows: therefore He both knew, and knows, and will know; and by this both heard, and hears, and will hear: because, as we have already said, for Him to hear is this, to know, and for Him to know is this, to be. From Him therefore He heard, hears, and will hear, from Whom He is: He is from Him from Whom He proceeds.

6. Here someone may perhaps ask whether the Holy Spirit proceeds also from the Son. For the Son is the Son of the Father alone, and the Father is the Father of the Son alone: but the Holy Spirit is not the Spirit of one of them, but of both. You have the Lord Himself saying, For it is not you

who speak, but the Spirit of your Father Who speaks in you (Matt. 10:20): you have also the Apostle: God has sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts (Gal. 4:6). Are there then two, one of the Father, another of the Son? Far from it. For there is one body, he says, when he meant the Church; and immediately he added, and one Spirit. And see how there he completes the Trinity. As you have been called, he says, in one hope of your calling. One Lord; here certainly he wished Christ to be understood: it remains that he should also name the Father: there follows therefore: One faith, one baptism: one God and Father of all, Who is above all, and through all, and in us all (Eph. 4:4–6). Since therefore, just as there is one Father and one Lord, that is, the Son, so there is also one Spirit, assuredly He is the Spirit of both: since Christ Jesus Himself says, the Spirit of your Father Who speaks in you; and the Apostle says, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts. You have in another place the same apostle saying, But if the Spirit of Him Who raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you; here certainly he wished the Spirit of the Father to be understood: of Whom nevertheless he says in another place, But whoever does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His (Rom. 8:11, 9). And there are many other testimonies by which this is plainly shown, that the Spirit Who in the Trinity is called the Holy Spirit is the Spirit both of the Father and of the Son.

7. Nor do I think He is properly called Spirit for any other reason than this: that even if we are asked about each one singly, we cannot but call both the Father and the Son spirit; since God is spirit (John 4:24), that is, God is not body, but spirit. What therefore they are called both in common and each singly, this it was fitting that He should be properly called Who is not one of them, but in Whom the communion of both appears. Why then should we not believe that the Holy Spirit proceeds also from the Son, since He is also the Spirit of the Son? For if He did not proceed from Him, He would not, when showing Himself again to His disciples after the resurrection, have breathed upon them, saying: Receive the Holy Spirit (John 20:22). For what else did that breathing upon them signify, but that the Holy Spirit proceeds from Him too? To this belongs also that which He said concerning the woman who suffered from a flow of blood: Someone touched Me; for I perceived that power went out from Me (Luke 8:46). For that the Holy Spirit too is called by the name of power is clear also in that place where the angel, to Mary when she said, How shall this be, since I do not know a man? answered, The Holy Spirit shall come upon you, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow you (Luke 1:34–35): and the Lord Himself, promising Him to the disciples, says, But you, stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high (Luke 24:49); and again, You shall receive, He says, the power of the Holy Spirit coming upon you, and you shall be My witnesses (Acts 1:8). Of this power the evangelist must be believed to speak, Power went out from Him, and healed all (Luke 6:19).

8. If therefore the Holy Spirit proceeds both from the Father and from the Son, why did the Son say, He proceeds from the Father (John