Tractatus de Deo Trino secundum personas

«Although from what has been said the absolute attributes and the operations ad extra are, without distinction, one thing common to the three persons; nevertheless both in Sacred Scripture and in the other documents of the faith certain attributes and certain operations are appropriated to one person in preference to the others. The reason for this predication is that, with the community of the absolutes preserved, the properties of the individual persons may be manifested; wherefore the foundation of appropriation is the analogy and, as it were, affinity of the absolute attribute with the hypostatic character of the person to whom it is appropriated.»

I. For there to be appropriation it does not suffice that an absolute be explicitly predicated of some one person; but appropriation in the strict sense exists only then, when an absolute is predicated of one person in preference to another. Therefore it is not quite fittingly, or not in the strict sense, called appropriation in the passages where the Father is called «the only Potentate, King of kings... who alone has immortality» 1. Tim. VI. 15, or where the Son says: «I am the way, the truth and the life» Io. XIV. 5. ¹ or where it is promised to the Apostles: «you shall receive the power of the Holy Spirit coming upon you» Act. I. 8; all of which Didacus Ruiz disp. 82. sect. 2. numbers among the appropriations, cf. S. Th. I. q. 39. a. 8. For these are not predicated by a special and proper reason of one person in preference to the others, but it is simply the affirmation of an absolute of one person ² also considered in itself, as it is God, which surely seems not more to be called appropriation than when the individual persons separately, e. g., are predicated God.

Nor again is it appropriation in the strict sense when a name, which in itself signifies an absolute attribute having affinity with a personal property, is used in a relative sense to designate the person herself, as when the Word is called begotten Wisdom, or subsisting Wisdom; the Holy Spirit, proceeding or subsisting love or will. These are not appropriated but proper; for by these names a common attribute is not ascribed more specially to one person, but the relative personal property itself is expressed.

In the strict sense, therefore, appropriation is when attributes or operations ad extra common to the three persons are predicated specially of one person, so that from such an attribute or operation we may be led to some understanding of a personal property. For this is the scope of appropriation. «For this reason certain things are uttered whether under the appellation of the Father, or of the Son, or of the Holy Spirit; so that the confession of believers in the Trinity may not err. Since it is inseparable, the Trinity would never be understood, if it were always spoken of inseparably» s. Leo M. serm. 2. de Pentec. c. 3. St. Thomas declares the same scope: «As we use the likeness of the trace or of the image found in creatures for the manifestation of the divine persons, so also the essential attributes. And this manifestation of the persons through essential attributes is called appropriation» I. q. 39. a. 7.

Hence the law or foundation of appropriation is manifest. The foundation, namely, is the analogy or likeness of certain absolute attributes with the hypostatic property of one person in preference to the others ³ For unless there were some peculiar affinity between the property and these certain attributes, as they are conceived by us, the special predication of such attributes of one person would not help but rather hinder the understanding of the proper personal character. «If we speak of the appropriated things as to the order or origin which they connote, thus they are appropriated on the side of the thing on account of their fittingness with the proper attributes of the persons. Whence, because the Father is from no one, and the Son from the Father, and the Holy Spirit from both, and an order of this kind is attended to in power, wisdom and goodness; therefore the reason of appropriating is manifest. Whence those things which do not in some way connote order or origin are not appropriable» s. Bonavent. in I. dist. 34. q. 3.

But since the personal characters can be considered under several different respects, according to which different attributes correspond to them: hence it comes about that several attributes can be appropriated to one person, and in turn one attribute can be appropriated not only to one, but under a different consideration also to the other persons. Thus e. g. power is appropriated to the Father according to the personal character, inasmuch as He is the principle of all processions ad intra; to the Son, however, inasmuch as He is the Word through whom all things were made, and thence through appropriation the arm of God the Father; likewise to the Holy Spirit as proceeding through love is appropriated every effecting of sanctifying charisms, and therefore power.

Hence it is that that passage Luc. I. 35: «the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee» is interpreted by some Fathers of the Holy Spirit, by others of the Son, by others of the Father — a diversity which would have no place, if appropriation were always fixed and settled according to one single mode. Nevertheless the likeness or affinity of the absolute attributes and operations with the personal properties must be considered according to the mode in which it is exhibited in the Scriptures and according to the norm of Catholic understanding. For in Scripture, in the creeds, among the holy Fathers appropriation is frequent enough, so that from these the foundation and the mode of application may easily be understood. The things said thus far must be confirmed and further declared by some examples.

II. In the Scriptures, where two or all three persons are enumerated together, they are frequently distinguished by absolute predicates — not indeed as proper, since these are elsewhere shown to be common to the three persons, but to designate the personal character proper to each. Thus: «there are diversities of graces (χαρισμάτων), but the same Spirit: and there are diversities of ministrations (διακονιῶν), but the same Lord; and there are diversities of operations (ἐνεργημάτων), but the same God, who works (ὁ ἐνεργῶν) all in all» 1. Cor. XII. 4. sq. Here you see a twofold appropriation; the former is that well-known one, by which in the connumeration the Father is called God, the Son Lord (see above p. 155). By the other appropriation, to the Father, the principle without principle, are attributed the operations of powers, i. e. of miracles, just as elsewhere in the creeds and by the Fathers omnipotence is appropriated to Him; to the Son as incarnate and as head and Lord of the Church are attributed the ministries disposed in the Church; to the Holy Spirit proceeding through love are attributed the sanctifying charisms — which sanctification indeed has such a relation and affinity to the proper personal character of the Holy Spirit, and is so constantly derived in Scripture and by the Fathers peculiarly from the Holy Spirit, that to some theologians sanctification seemed to be enunciated not merely by appropriation, but as proper to the third person; certainly by the Fathers sometimes the sanctifying power (δύναμις ἁγιαστική) is called the proper character of the Holy Spirit (Petav. l. VII. c. 13. n. 21. sq.), and that the character of gift, or of the givable, under a certain peculiar respect is proper to the third person is the common doctrine. But there will be a place to speak of these elsewhere. Meanwhile this must be held as most certain, that the efficiency of created charisms is not proper to the Holy Spirit in preference to the other persons, but appropriated, on account of the special affinity of these effects with His personal character.

To appropriation pertains that most frequent, as it were, distribution of the operation ad extra through the particles indicating the relation of origin among the persons themselves operating with one operation. The Father is said to operate through the Son in the Holy Spirit (above p. 163), or all created things are said to be from the Father through the Son in the Holy Spirit. To that which is read Rom. XI. 36, Augustine draws attention: «since there is one God but nevertheless a Trinity, it is not to be taken confusedly: from whom are all things, through whom are all things, in whom are all things» Aug. Trin. VI. c. 10. n. 12. St. Thomas adds: «from him is said on account of the Father, through him on account of the Son, in him on account of the Holy Spirit» (cf. S. Hilar. Trin. l. II. n. 1).

But the Angelic Doctor expounds this distribution in such a way that it coincides with that solemn appropriation of power to the Father, of wisdom to the Son, of goodness to the Holy Spirit, I. q. 39. a. 8. ad 4. About this appropriation of power, wisdom, goodness Richard of St. Victor treats at length in c. 2. of the little book which he wrote to St. Bernard on the three appropriated attributes, and he repeats the same again in de Trin. l. VI. c. 15.

A more distinct elaboration, however, of that order, from whom, through whom, in whom are all things, is contained in an appropriation among the Fathers no less frequent, by which whether in creation in general or chiefly in the creation of angels and men, to the Father is attributed the counsel, the will (βουλή) or the command of the work, to the Son the execution (ἐνέργεια or ὑπουργία), to the Holy Spirit the perfection (τελείωσις, which is in sanctification). «In the creation of the angels think for me of the cause which is the principle without principle (τὴν προαιτίαν τῆς αἰτίας), the Father; the creative (τὴν δημιουργόν) the Son; the perfective (τὴν τελειωτικήν) the Spirit; so that by the will indeed of the Father they are ministering spirits, by the operation (ἐνεργείᾳ) of the Son they are brought to existence, by the coming of the Spirit they are perfected; moreover the perfection of the angels is sanctification» s. Basil. de Spiritu Sancto c. 16. The same, as is evident, is the reason of appropriation in the creation of man: «first of all it must be believed that there is one God who made all things out of nothing through His Word, and quickened them through the Holy Spirit» Ambros. in symbol. c. 6. ⁴ (cf. Petav. l. VII. c. 14. n. 21-23). Recall what we said above p. 163. sqq.

One may behold this appropriation strikingly expressed in the sarcophagus of the Lateran Museum, dug out from the crypt near the tomb of St. Paul, the Apostle of the Gentiles, on the Via Ostiensis. The sculpture is thought to be of the fourth century, but, as often happens in works of this kind, probably derived from an older exemplar. This appropriation of which we treat, together with the remaining carvings wrought on the same monument, the most learned men illustrated with their erudite commentaries: first the distinguished Fr. Ios. Marchi, then the distinguished I. B. De Rossi, finally the distinguished Fr. Raphael Garrucci, to whom, a most distinguished archaeologist, I owe the cast ⁵

Other appropriated attributes are related and explained, e. g., by Augustine: «eternity in the Father, form in the image, use in the gift» Trin. l. VI. c. 10., which he himself relates as from St. Hilary (cf. Ambros. in symbol. Apost. c. 1.), although Hilary, Trin. l. II. n. 1., has them disposed a little differently: «one God the Father, from whom are all things, and one only-begotten our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and one Spirit, the gift in all.... one power from which are all things, one offspring through which are all things, one gift of perfect hope. Nor will anything be found wanting to so great a consummation, within which there is in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, infinity in the eternal, form in the image, use in the gift». Augustine, however, interprets these things, l. c., and following him St. Thomas I. q. 39. a. 8., so that eternity corresponds to the property of the Father as principle without principle; form or beauty to the property of the Son, inasmuch as He is the perfect image of the Father from the very mode of procession by generation; use or «love, delight and felicity» to the property of the Holy Spirit proceeding through the love of the Father and of the Son.

You will now easily explain when by the same Augustine are predicated «in the Father unity, in the Son equality, in the Holy Spirit the concord of unity and equality; and these three are all one on account of the Father, equal on account of the Son, all connected on account of the Holy Spirit» Doctr. christ. l. I. c. 5. See s. Bonavent. 1. dist. 31. a. 2. q. 3. Likewise others: «the Father, therefore, is for the Son, the truth, a truthful origin, and the Son is the truth born of the truthful Father, and the Holy Spirit is the goodness poured forth from the good Father and the good Son» Ser. 71. n. 18. Likewise in the creeds there is the distinction of God the Father almighty, creator; then of the Son, the Lord; of the Holy Spirit, the life-giver, who spoke through the prophets. Finally, as to the mode of praying, Christ the Lord Himself according to His humanity directed explicitly to God the Father both obedience and satisfactions for us and prayers, although all these referred to the one and triune God; and besides others He taught us the same form of praying which the Church also most frequently follows in the sacred liturgy, where the Father is asked, almighty eternal God, through Jesus Christ our Lord His Son, who with Him reigns in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God. All these things, especially in conjunction with the other forms by which prayer is directed to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, pertain to expressing the unity of God in the distinction of the persons together with the order of the processions. Cf. s. Fulgentium fragm. 29. p. 626; see Didac. Ruiz disp. 82. sect. 4. et 7.