Ryan J. Brady, Ph.D, Cand.Ave Maria University

The Divine Logos of John 1:1 and the Background ofAugustine’s Analogy of the Word as found in Philo and other

Fathers of the Church

The Gospel of John begins “Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ

λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν, καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος. οὗτος ἦν ἐν

ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν. πάντα διʼ αὐτοῦ ἐγένετο, καὶ χωρὶς αὐτοῦ

ἐγένετο οὐδὲ ἕν. οὗτος ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν.1 This

striking statement that the Logos (Word)2 was in the

beginning in relationship to God (literally, “towards” Him3)

1 Kurt Aland et al., Novum Testamentum Graece, 28th Edition. (Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2012), Jn 1:1–2. My translation: In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with (lit., ‘towards’) God and the Word was God. He was towards God inthe beginning (cf., footnote #3.2 Although the primary way Logos will be translated in this essayis as ‘word’, it should be noted that in Sophocles’ Greek Lexicon of the Roman and Byzantine Periods (from B.C. 146 to A.D. 1100), there are variousother definitions given. Though the first meaning is ‘word’, it is also said to mean ‘speech’, ‘sentence’, ‘syllogism’, ‘account’, and reason – whether internal (λόγος ἐνδιάθετος) or uttered (λόγος προφορικός). Cf., E. A. Sophocles, Greek Lexicon of the Roman and Byzantine Periods (From B. C. 146 to A. D. 1100) (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1900), 720.3 Πρός with the accusative suggests a movement towards – though amovement that “breaks off on the frontier of the object sought whereas with εἰς it is continued right on into the object.” In other words, there is a distinction of that which is ‘towards’ the other. Perhaps a similar phrase to the Λογος which was towards God, is “λέγειν πρός τι,” meaning, to speak with “reference to” someone or something and recalls the category of

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and yet also identified with God and the one through whom

all things came to be is shrouded in mystery. Although some

previous thinkers said similar things4 there is something

radically new about it. Here, the Logos is not merely some

part of creation but is also equated with God and in

relationship to Him as the transcendent God Himself.5 In

order to better understand how this can be, St. Augustine

would turn to “that image which the creature is, that is, to

the rational soul for a more careful questioning and

consideration” of the procession of the Son from the Father.

“πρός τι” in Aristotle (meaning ‘relation’; cf., chapter 7 of theCategories). The Word, then, apparently exists in reference to the Father or in relationship with Him even though He is also God. For the meaning of πρός, cf., Gerhard Kittel, Geoffrey W. Bromiley, and Gerhard Friedrich, eds., Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1964–), 721.4 As Jaeger pointed out, “the Stoics had taught that the divine principle and cause of the world was the Logos, which penetrated all that exists”),Werner Jaeger, Early Christianity and Greek Paideia (Cambridge, MA: the Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1961), 28.5 As Augustine says, on this passage: “In Him are all things: andyet in that He is God, under Him are all things.” Sermon 67.3 (Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers); sermon 117 in the modern numbering). “Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament,” in Saint Augustin: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. R. G. MacMullen, vol. 6, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1888), 459.

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He would do so by seeing a link between the way the mind

“beget[s] its knowledge when it knows itself” and the way

the Father begets the Son;6 in other words, the way a word

is spoken by man and the way the Divine Word is ‘spoken’ by

the Father. In this essay, we will investigate both the way

this ‘analogy of the word’ was used by thinkers prior to

Augustine and also the thought of the Latin Father himself.

Philo (25 BC – 50 AD)

One stage in this development may be found in the

Jewish thinker, Philo, who spoke of two kinds of words

(λόγοι) in man, that which is uttered and that which is kept

concealed.7 By this distinction between what may also be

called the spoken (προφορικὸς / Prophoric) and unspoken

(ἐνδιάθετος / Endiathic)8 words, Philo would provide a

6 Augustine of Hippo, The Trinity, ed. Hermigild Dressler, trans. Stephen McKenna, vol. 45, The Fathers of the Church (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1963), 287; Bk. 9.12.17.7 Charles Duke Yonge with Philo of Alexandria, The Works of Philo: Complete and Unabridged (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1995), 502.8 Cf., The Special Laws, IV 69 in Peder Borgen, Kare Fuglseth, and Roald Skarsten, “The Works of Philo: Greek Text with Morphology” (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2005).

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foundation for thinking about the procession of the Word in

eternity and the procession of the Word into the world, when

the Father would ‘speak’ the Word externally. In one

remarkable section of On Abraham, he argues “the speech which

is conceived within is naturally the father of that which is

uttered (πατὴρ γὰρ ὁ ἐνδιάθετος φύσει τοῦ γεγωνοῦ).”9 There

could hardly be a better foundation of pagan thought for

people like St. Ignatius to later teach that “Christ was the

Father’s Word issuing from silence.”10

For Philo, God made man after the image “of some other

god” because he could not conceive of a mortal being having

been formed in the likeness “of the supreme Father of the

universe.” He thought man could only be made “after the

pattern of the second deity, who is the Word of the supreme

Being.” He grants “it is fitting that the rational soul of

man should bear in it the type of the divine Word since …

9 Charles Duke Yonge with Philo of Alexandria, The Works of Philo: Complete and Unabridged (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1995), 418, On Abraham 83.10 Quote from J.N.D. Kelly’s paraphrase of his teaching. Cf., Magn. 8, 2: cf. Eph. 3, 2; Rom. 8, 2., and J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, Fifth Ed., Revised. (London; New Delhi; New York;Sydney: Bloomsbury, 1977), 96.

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virtuous and consistent men … bear in themselves a familiar

acquaintance with his Word, of which the human mind is the

similitude and form,”11 but the supreme Father, the first

deity, is so transcendent in his estimation that He could

not have made man in his own likeness. Man must consequently

be made in the image of the secondary God or Word because

“in his first Word, God is superior to the most rational

possible nature,”12 which is apparently the second Word. So

even if he “undeniably shows a tendency to hypostasize the

Logos and the powers, as if they were separate from God

himself,” Philo nevertheless held to the common Jewish

belief that there is but one God (and not more than one

Person).13 Unfortunately, others such as the Arians seemed

to follow Philo more than the Gospel on tis point, so such

speculations had potential to lead to error despite their

11 Charles Duke Yonge with Philo of Alexandria, The Works of Philo: Complete and Unabridged (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1995), 834; Questions and Answers on Genesis, 2.62.12 Charles Duke Yonge with Philo of Alexandria, The Works of Philo: Complete and Unabridged (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1995), 834.13 Cf., David T. Runia, “Philo the Theologian (15 BC–50 AD),” ed. Trevor A. Hart, The Dictionary of Historical Theology (Carlisle, Cumbria, U.K.: Paternoster Press, 2000), 425–426 and J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, Fifth, Revised. (London; New Delhi; New York; Sydney: Bloomsbury, 1977), 11.

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remarkable proximity to some of the teachings of

Christianity. As Newman observed regarding the Arians, they

“meant by the προφορικὸς λόγος a created being, made at the

beginning of all things as the visible emblem of the

ἐνδιάθετος, to be the instrument of God’s purposes towards

His creation.”14 In other words, they forgot that the Word’s

nature was identical with God’s, and their penchant for

philosophy combined with their errors would cause others to

mitigate or outright deny the role of philosophical

analogies in discussions of the Trinity.

St. Athanasius (296-373 AD) and St. Basil (330-379 AD)

In view of Arian tendencies to exaggerate the likeness

between the human mind’s word and the Divine Word and to

think of the Son as proceeding by the Father’s will (and,

according to some, for the sake of man), Athanasius came

down soundly against the role of philosophical speculation

both in general (he argues that the Word brought the

philosophical schools to naught in On the Incarnation, 50.3) and14 John Henry Newman, The Arians of the Fourth Century (London: J. G. & F.Rivington, 1833), 216.

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in this regard in particular. In responding to the Arians

who pointed out that a human word is made up of syllables

and once those syllables are spoken, the word disappears

(and thus the Word of God must not be truly God, who exists

always) he responded by simply insisting on the scriptural

teaching. “If their dispute concerns God, who created

humanity,” he said, they ought not to “entertain human

thoughts but others that are above human nature”15 because

God’s Word is not merely pronounced as a human word is.

Interestingly, though, St. Athanasius’ contemporary,

St. Basil the Great, saw that he could use the analogy to

his advantage on this point. He noticed that “our outward

word has some similarity to the divine Word” inasmuch as our

word “declares the whole conception of the mind,” which is

its “source.”16 The Mind of the Father, in other words, is

completely expressed in the generation of the Word.

Consequently, the Word must have all of the same attributes

15 Joel C. Elowsky, ed., John 1–10, Ancient Christian Commentary onScripture (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006), 11 (quoting the second discourse against the Arians, 18.35)16 Homily 16.3. Cf., PG 31:477. Cited in Joel C. Elowsky, ed., John 1–10, Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006), 10.

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of the Father – including immutability and divinity.

Perhaps this would answer to Athanasius’ concern

because the Word would then not return to nothingness after

being uttered. Be that as it may, Athanasius remained

skeptical of applying the image of man’s word to God (who,

he insisted, does not exist in the way man does). Rather, He

exists always and his Word must always exist with Him just

as the radiance of a light always exists with a light.

Curiously, then, even though Athanasius was willing to use

the word ‘radiance’ analogously, he emphatically shied away

from an ‘analogy of the word’ (due to the fact that the word

of man disappears once it is spoken and is not a word that

affects anything merely by being spoken, as God’s Word

does17). Perhaps his reaction against analogy regarding the

Word was simply based off of the false conclusions of the

Arians, therefore, and not so much against any use of

analogy in shedding light on the Trinity.

St. Theophilus, Bishop of Antioch (d. 184 AD)

17 Ibid., 2.35

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Among the early Christian thinkers who were willing to

use philosophical thought in speculation about the inner and

outer words of our minds was St. Theophilus, who wrote

nearly two hundred years before Athanasius. He also made a

distinction “between the λόγος ἐνδιάθετος, the intelligence

of the Father, and the λόγος προφορικός, the Word brought

forth externally in order to create.”18 For Theophilus, God

the Father possessed his interior Word within Himself and

begat Him from His wisdom (ἔχων οὖν ὁ θεὸς τὸν ἑαυτοῦ λόγον

ἐνδιάθετον ἐν τοῖς ἰδίοις σπλάγχνοις, ἐγέννησεν αὐτὸν μετὰ

τῆς ἑαυτοῦ σοφίας ἐξερευξάμενος πρὸ τῶν ὅλων).19 As Newman

notes, the gennesis (γέννησις) or begetting he speaks of is

necessarily a proper and true begetting of the Word, which

is of one substance (ὁμοούσιος/Homoüsios) with the Father. It

is not a metaphorical begetting; “for if metaphorical, there

was nothing in it to call for mention of the intrinsic

nature of God.”20 Unfortunately, though, “the philosophical

18 F. L. Cross and Elizabeth A. Livingstone, eds., The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 1617.19 John Henry Newman, Tracts: Theological and Ecclesiastical (London: Basil Montagu Pickering, 1874), 209.20 Ibid., 210.

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words, Endiathetic and Prophoric” which are used in an

orthodox way by Theophilus and which are, according to

Newman, “implied as ideas in Justin and Tatian, as also in

Hippolytus and others,”21 were not used in such a way by

all. Newman makes a fascinating claim on this point:

The Platonic doctrine of the Logos ἐνδιάθετος and προφορικὸς, the Word conceived in the mind and the Word spoken, a Divine attribute and a Divine energy, leads either to Sabellianism or to Arianism;—to Sabellianism, since the Divine Word, Endiathetic, is not a Person; to Arianism, since the Personal Word, Prophoric, is not strictly Divine.22

It seems that he must be correct if, in fact, a) it is not

possible to think of the Endiathic procession as a procession

of the Father in eternity wherein the Word is begotten as

being of the same nature of the Father and if b) it is not

possible to think of the Prophoric procession of the Word in

time as being a procession of the Word which is God (cf.,

Jn. 1:1) and became flesh (cf., Jn. 1:14). In other words,

if the revelation of Sacred Scripture is not taken into

account in accordance with the analogy of faith, then either21 Ibid., 210.22 Ibid., 259.

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of these philosophical concepts can lead to heresy. That is,

using “either of the two absolutely and to the exclusion of

the other would have involved some form of Sabellianism, or

Arianism, as the case might be; but each term might correct

the defective sense of the other.”23 Perhaps for this reason

the terms were ultimately “received into the Church” 24

despite the need for absolute precision in understanding

them.

St. Gregory of Nyssa (335-394)

St. Gregory of Nyssa made use of an analogy of the word

in the human mind in discussing the Father’s eternal

generation of the Son and did so in such a way that he

avoided the errors of both Sabellianism and Arianism (which

he called a ‘Jewish’ error). He argues that by rising

anagogically (ἀναγωγικῶς) “from matters that concern

23 Joseph Pohle and Arthur Preuss, Christology: A Dogmatic Treatise on the Incarnation, Dogmatic Theology (St. Louis, MO: B. Herder, 1913), p.23 n. 64.24 John Henry Newman, The Arians of the Fourth Century (London: J. G. & F.Rivington, 1833), 214.

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ourselves to that transcendent nature, we gain a knowledge

of the Word” and adds:

As in our own case we say that the word is from the mind, and no more entirely the same as the mind, than altogether other than it… in like manner, too, the Word of God by its self-subsistence is distinct from Him fromwhom it has its subsistence; and yet by exhibiting in itself those qualities which are recognized in God it isthe same in nature with Him who is recognizable by the same distinctive marks.”25

The way he specifically avoids the Sabellian error is,

perhaps, most remarkable. The Father, he says, cannot be

conceived of without the Word and the Word cannot be

conceived of without the Father, whose Word He is. Actually,

just as Father and Son are ‘relative’ terms distinguishing

the Persons, “this, too, to a certain extent is a term of

“relation.”26 In other words, the Word is personally

distinct from the Father and not simply a mode of Him that

can come and go at any given moment.

25 Gregory of Nyssa, “The Great Catechism,” in Gregory of Nyssa: Dogmatic Treatises, Etc., ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, trans. William Moore, vol. 5, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, Second Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1893), 476–477; Chapter 1.26 Ibid., 476.

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St. Augustine

The one who is most known for employing an analogy of

words in the human mind to understand the Trinity better was

St. Augustine, who argued that man “subsists” as the image

of God (cf., 1 Cor. 11:7) inasmuch as he “approaches it by a

kind of similarity” or “likeness.”27 By the likeness of some

“word of man,” the “Word of God may in some manner be seen

as in an enigma.”28 Because a word of man can be understood

internally or externally, so too the Divine Word can be

understood inasmuch as it pertains to the Divine Nature or

as it pertains to the external going forth into creation:

That the Word proceeded from God is an eternalprocession; he does not have a time, through whom timewas made. Let no one ask in his heart: before the Wordwas, in what way did God exist? You should never say,Before the Word of God was. God never was without theWord because the Word is abiding, not transient … Heproceeded from [God] as God, as equal, as the only Son,as the Word of the Father; and he came to us because theWord was made flesh that he might dwell among us.29

27 Augustine of Hippo, The Trinity, ed. Hermigild Dressler, trans. Stephen McKenna, vol. 45, The Fathers of the Church (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1963), 240.28 Ibid., 477–478, 15.11.20.

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Here we have an example of the Word proceeding from the

Father eternally as an abiding Son who is equal to the

Father. So even when Augustine has in mind the eternal

proceeding of the Word, he avoids denying that the Son is

personally distinct from the Father. In his 196th Sermon, he

did so by asserting that in the “first begetting” (that of

the eternal generation as opposed to that which took place

with the Incarnation), the Word was the “Father’s own” Word

who is the Son. It was an eternal begetting because the

Father “has never been without the Son” and thus “He both

begot and yet did not begin to do so.” Again, the Son must

be a person because “there is no beginning for one begotten

without beginning. And yet he is the Son, and yet he is

begotten.”30 He is, therefore, clearly distinct from the

Father who begot Him as an equal.

He also spoke in a Prophoric sense (pertaining to the

Word in relation to creatures, or the Word’s procession ad

29 Augustine of Hippo, Tractates on the Gospel of John 28–54, ed. Thomas P.Halton, trans. John W. Rettig, vol. 88, The Fathers of the Church(Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1993),154–155.30 Joel C. Elowsky, ed., John 1–10, Ancient Christian Commentary onScripture (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006), 3.

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extra) while avoiding the Arian tendency to deny the Divinity

of the Word. The Arians had thought of the Word as

proceeding from the Father’s bosom such that he was

necessarily not divine and reasoned that if the Word were to

essentially belong to God as equal to Him, He could not be

external to Him in any way. Newman says they argued that if

Catholics “held their Logos to be Prophoric, that was enough

to prove that He was not God.”31 Augustine, nevertheless,

spoke of the need for the Divine Word to come forth from the

Father and speak with His voice. If He had remained with the

Father “as not to receive the form of a servant [cf.,

Philippians 2:7] and speak as man with men how could they

have believed in Him, since their weak hearts could not have

heard the Word intelligently without some voice that would

appeal to their senses?”32

31 John Henry Newman, Tracts: Theological and Ecclesiastical (London: Basil Montagu Pickering, 1874), 164.32 Augustine of Hippo, “Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John,” in St. Augustin: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. John Gibb and James Innes, vol. 7, A Select Library of the Niceneand Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1888), 221.

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Augustine explained this procession from the Father

into the world by noting that in the process of bringing his

own word to his congregation by means of his voice, the word

did not depart from his heart. In a similar way, the “Word

came forth to our senses, yet departed not from His Father.

My word was with me, and it came forth into a voice: the

Word of God was with the Father, and came forth into

Flesh.”33

An objection that could be raised that, if this coming

among us is similar to the way we speak a word, then the

Word must change because our own word, “when it is spoken

through a sound or through some bodily sign … is not spoken

just as it is”34 but changes in some way. For Augustine,

this is really where the particular aptness of the analogy

comes in. Surely the spoken word is distinct from the word

33 Augustine of Hippo, “Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament,” in Saint Augustin: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. R. G. MacMullen, vol. 6, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers ofthe Christian Church, First Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1888), 467; Sermon 69.7 (NPNF); 119.7 . (Ben.).34 The Trinity, 15.11.20, ed. Hermigild Dressler, trans. Stephen McKenna, vol. 45, The Fathers of the Church (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1963), 478.

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in our mind, but when “that which is in the knowledge is in

the word, then it is a true word, and the truth which is

expected from man, so that what is in the knowledge is also

in the word, and what is not in the knowledge is not in the

word.”35 So even if there is a distinction, there is also an

identity just as the Father and Son are distinct as Persons

and yet united in nature. This particular analogy is

particularly suitable for making sense of the fact that the

Word is both distinct from God and God Himself. Augustine

says it is “in this way the likeness of the image that was

made [by God; namely, man] approaches, insofar as it can, to

the likeness of the image that was born [of God; namely, the

Word], whereby God the Son is proclaimed as substantially

like the Father in all things.36 Even when speaking of the

Son’s entry into the world, therefore, he defended His true

nature as God.

35 Cf., De Trinitate, Bk. 15.11.2036 Augustine of Hippo, The Trinity, ed. Hermigild Dressler, trans. Stephen McKenna, vol. 45, The Fathers of the Church (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1963), 478; Book 15.11.20.

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It seems that among the early Christians, Augustine

utilized the patrimony of his Pagan and Jewish philosophical

predecessors most wisely. Although he ultimately placed the

highest degree of confidence in the truths explicitly

revealed in Scripture, he was willing to unfold those truths

by making use of what was best in philosophical and

analogous reasoning. Unlike Athanasius, he did not think the

use of analogy (at least in regard to the procession of the

Word) a presumptuous enterprise, but he did recognize its

limits and constantly pointed out the ways the analogy fell

short. For this reason, he pointed out in his 117th Sermon

that the first couple of verses of the Gospel of John cannot

not be comprehended and as such professed ignorance of its

meaning is better than “presumptuous knowledge” because “the

Creator transcends indescribably whatever we could gather

from the creature, whether by the bodily senses, or the

thought of the mind.”37 At the same time, he clearly

37 Sermon 67.3 (NPNF; sermon 117 in the modern numbering). Saint Augustin: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. R. G. MacMullen, vol. 6, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1888), 459 and 464.

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believed the analogy of the word was a good way of attaining

some sense of the mysteries of God that can only be known by

faith and was willing to utilize the best of philosophical

conclusions in using it.

Appendix on the Analogy of the Word and the Role of

Philosophy in Aquinas

In St. Thomas Aquinas we find a further clarification

of this doctrine. He spoke of the Word as proceeding from

the Father’s intellect by way of a kind of self-

understanding and he confidently used the arguments of

Augustine and others in doing so. He knew, however, that

purely philosophical arguments can not be used as definitive

proof of truths that can only be known by revelation - such

as those pertaining to the Trinity (as Trinity). In fact,

the likeness of our understanding as applied to the

understanding of God and the procession of the Word does not

“sufficiently prove anything about God” because

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understanding (intellectio) does not have the same meaning in

us and in Him. He says it is for this reason that Augustine

argued that faith is the way to knowledge and not the other

way around. He thus quotes Augustine, who said faith is the

way to knowledge and not the other way around.38

Faith being presupposed, however, philosophical

arguments can go a long way in coming to a better

understanding of what has been revealed. An example of this

is the way St. Thomas based an argument about the procession

of the Word by reason on the knowledge we can have of the

procession of our own knowledge into words in the Summa

Contra Gentiles. It is similar to many arguments we have

already seen but adds further precision:38 Summa Theologiae, I q.32 a.1 ad 2. Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa

Theologica, Editio altera Romana. (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible

Software, 2009): Similitudo autem intellectus nostri non

sufficienter probat aliquid de Deo propter hoc, quod intellectus

non univoce invenitur in Deo, et in nobis. Et inde est, quod

August. super Joan. (tract. 27. circa med.) dicit, quod per fidem

venitur ad cognitionem, et non e converso.

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It belongs to the interior word or intelligible species,to proceed from the intelligent being through the latter’s act of intelligence, since it is the term of its intellectual operation; for the intellect by understanding conceives and forms the understood speciesor idea which is the interior word. Therefore God’s Wordmust needs proceed from Him by reason of His act of intelligence. Hence God’s Word stands in relation to Godunderstanding, whose Word He is, as to Him from whom He proceeds; for such a relation is implied by the very nature of a word. Since then in God the intelligent subject, the act of intelligence, and the intelligible species or word, are essentially one, and since for thisreason each one of these must needs be God, it follows that there is only a distinction of relation between them, for as much as the Word is referred to the cause of His conception, as to the source whence He proceeds. Hence John the Evangelist, lest the phrase The Word was God should seem to remove any distinction whatsoever between the Word and God the speaker and conceiver of the Word, added (verse 2): The same was in the beginning with God, as though to say: “This same Word, whom I have stated to be God, is in some way distinct from God the speaker of the Word, and thus may be described as being with God.39

Arguments of this sort can go so far in the estimation of

Thomas, in fact, that they can be considered almost

demonstrative so long as faith is presupposed (as it is in

39 Saint Thomas Aquinas, Fathers of the English Dominican Province, Summa Contra Gentiles, vol. 5 (Bellingham, WA: Logos BibleSoftware, 2010), 52–53; SCG 4.11.

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this latter section of the Summa Contra Gentiles dealing

precisely with things known by revelation as opposed to

natural reason); accordingly, he says, “it is clear (patet)

from what has been said that the Son proceeds from the

Father, as the Father’s knowledge of Himself.40

For him, therefore, faith is preeminent and yet other

arguments from natural reason can be profitably used. The

theologian “makes use also of the authority of philosophers

in those questions in which they were able to know the truth

by natural reason, as Paul quotes a saying of Aratus: As

some also of your own poets said: For we are also His offspring (Acts

17:28).” Nevertheless, in doing so, he only “makes use of

these authorities as extrinsic and probable arguments; but

properly uses the authority of the canonical Scriptures as

an incontrovertible proof, and the authority of the doctors

of the Church as one that may properly be used, yet merely

as probable.”41

The first Vatican Council would echo this teaching six

centuries later:40 SCG 4.23.41 STh., I q.1 a.8 ad 2

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Reason, indeed, enlightened by faith, when it seeks earnestly, piously and calmly, attains by a gift from God some, and that a very fruitful, understanding of mysteries; partly from the analogy of those things whichit naturally knows, partly from the relations which the mysteries bear to one another and to the last end of man: but reason never becomes capable of apprehending mysteries as it does those truths which constitute its proper object. For the divine mysteries by their own nature so far transcend the created intelligence that, even when delivered by revelation and received by faith,they remain covered with a veil of faith itself, and shrouded in a certain degree of darkness, so long as we are pilgrims in this mortal life, not yet with God: “forwe walk by faith, and not by sight.”42

42 Vincent McNabb, ed., The Decrees of the Vatican Council (New York: Benziger Brothers, 1907), 26.

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