THE TRINITY SERIES: PART 1
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QUESTION: Do you think that a good way to illustrate the Trinity is the Son and the Holy Spirit being the hands of the Father? Do you think that a good way to describe how the Trinity creates is with the Father commanding, the Son obeying, and the Holy Spirit nourishing what is made?
IRENAEUS OF LYONS (c.130–202) was an early church Father who played an important role both in the spread of Christian churches and in the establishment of orthodox doctrine. He is the author of Against Heresies, which is a refutation of Gnosticism. He taught that true doctrine is supported by three pillars: Scripture, apostolic tradition, and teachings that can be traced back directly to the apostles. In Against Heresies, Irenaeus presents what amounts to a proto-Trinitarian view, where the Son and the Holy Spirit are likened to the two hands of the Father. It is from this work that we take our reading.
READING: The Church, though dispersed throughout the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples this faith: She believes in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them; and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensations of God, and the advents, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the ascension into heaven in the flesh of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord […] For God did not stand in need of these [angels], in order to the accomplishing of what He had Himself determined with Himself beforehand should be done, as if He did not possess His own hands. For with Him were always present the Word and Wisdom, the Son and the Spirit, by whom and in whom, freely and spontaneously, He made all things […] I have also largely demonstrated, that the Word, namely the Son, was always with the Father; and that Wisdom also, which is the Spirit, was present with Him, anterior to all creation. […] And thus in all things God has the pre-eminence, who alone is uncreated, the first of all things, and the primary cause of the existence of all, while all other things remain under God’s subjection. But being in subjection to God is continuance in immortality, and immortality is the glory of the uncreated One. By this arrangement, therefore, and these harmonies, and a sequence of this nature, man, a created and organized being, is rendered after the image and likeness of the uncreated God—the Father planning everything well and giving His commands, the Son carrying these into execution and performing the work of creating, and the Spirit nourishing and increasing what is made. [Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 1.10.1; 1.10.3; 4.38.3]
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