Athanasian Creed Section Two – Three Distinct Persons

Encore Post: The exact date and author of the Athanasian Creed are unknown. It derives its name from the theological tradition of Saint Athanasius. It is typically dated to the late 4^th or early 5^th century AD. Augustine’s On the Trinity (415 AD) has very similar language to the creed. Athanasius’ lifelong battle against the heresies prevalent in the early Christian church of North Africa built a theological tradition, which heavily influenced the Western church.

“Just as we are compelled by the Christian truth to acknowledge each distinct person as God and Lord, so also are we prohibited by the catholic religion to say that there are three Gods or Lords.”

In the second section of the creed, we confess personhood of the Trinity, each distinct from the other. This rejects Modalism, that God changes masks, appearance, or function, but is the same in person in each case. Rather, we confess that the individual persons of the Triune God possess unique attributes to the exclusion of the others.

This distinctness of person also describes the divine economy. That is economy in the sense of interrelationship, not of money. Within the Trinity there is an economy of relationship between the persons. The Father is eternally neither made nor begotten. The Son is eternally begotten of the Father. The Holy Spirit is eternally proceeding from the Father and the Son, neither created nor begotten.

These expressions of the Christian understanding of the Trinity push against modalism by establishing a concurrence of personhood. It is impossible for the Father to put on a Son mask. He is eternally the Father, and His personhood is unique from the Son. The Son cannot put on a Holy Spirit mask because His attributes in His person are distinct from the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit cannot wear the attributes of the Father because they are unique from His own attributes. All of these attributes are eternally the attributes of the persons of God.

But, these immutable characteristics do not a hierarchy make. All persons of the Trinity are equally God. And, none is before or after another.

The Father is not the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not the Son. The Son is not the Father. The Holy Spirit is God. The Son is God. The Father is God, coeternal and coequal.

Dear Baptized, the Trinity in Unity and the Unity in Trinity is to be worshipped!

Thanks be to God!

Rev. Jason M. Kaspar
Sole Pastor
Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church & Preschool
La Grange, TX
and
Mission planting pastoral team:
Epiphany Lutheran Church
Bastrop, TX

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