Novatian — On the Trinity 27
XXVII. 1. But because they frequently press on us that place where it was said: I and the Father are one, in this too we will defeat them equally easily. 2. For if Christ were the Father, as the heretics think, he ought to have said ‘I the Father am one’. But when he says I, then brings in the Father by saying I and the Father, he discerns and distinguishes his own person’s property, that is the Son’s, from paternal authority, not only by a name’s sound but also by the order of arranged power — he who could have said ‘I the Father’ if he remembered he was the Father. 3. And because he said one, let the heretics understand that he did not say ‘one’ in the masculine. For one set in the neuter sounds a fellowship’s concord, not a person’s unity. For he is said to be one (unum), not ‘one’ (unus), since it is not referred to number but brought out toward another’s fellowship. 4. Then he adds saying we are, not ‘I am’, to show by this — that he said ‘we are’ and ‘Father’ — that there are two persons. But the one he speaks of belongs to concord and the same mind and love’s own fellowship, so that Father and Son are deservedly one through concord and through love and through affection. 5. And because whatever the Son is, he is from the Father, distinction still remaining, so that he who is Son is not the Father. 6. For he would not have added we are if he had meant one person from himself and the Father. 7. Finally, that it may be clearer, he also says elsewhere: The Father is greater than I, so that, while he is joined as God of God by divinity’s association, he is yet less as Son of the Father.
8. For when of two persons it is said the Father is greater than I, the Son is not the Father. 9–12. And afterward he adds what would dissolve every ambiguity and extinguish the whole controversy of error. For he says in the last part of the speech: You say that he blasphemes, because I said: I am the Son of God? Therefore if the Lord clearly testifies that he is Son, not Father, it is a sample of great rashness and huge madness to stir controversy of divinity and religion against the Lord Christ’s own testimony and to say Christ Jesus is the Father, when one notices that he has proved himself not Father but Son.
Latin
XXVII. 1. Sed quia frequenter intendunt illum nobis locum quo dictum sit: Ego et Pater unum sumus, et in hoc illos aeque facile uincemus. 2. Si enim erat, ut haeretici putant, Pater Christus, oportuit dicere 'Ego Pater unus sum'. At cum Ego dicit, deinde Patrem infert dicendo Ego et Pater, proprietatem personae suae, id est Filii, a paterna auctoritate discernit atque distinguit, non tantummodo de sono nominis, sed etiam de ordine dispositae potestatis, qui potuisset dicere 'Ego Pater', si Patrem se esse meminisset. 3. Et quia dixit unum, intellegant haeretici quia non dixit 'unus'. Vnum enim neutraliter positum societatis concordiam, non unitatem personae sonat. Vnum enim, non 'unus' esse dicitur. quoniam nec ad numerum refertur, sed ad societatem alterius expromitur. 4. Denique adicit dicens sumus, non 'sum', ut ostenderet per hoc, quod dixit 'sumus' et 'Pater', duas esse personas. Vnum autem quod ait, ad concordiam et eandem sententiam et ad ipsam caritatis societatem pertinet, ut merito unum sit Pater et Filius per concordiam et per amorem et per dilectionem. 5. Et quoniam ex Patre est, quicquid illud est, Filius est, manente tamen distinctione, ut non sit Pater ille qui Filius, quia nec Filius ille qui Pater est. Nec enim sumus addidisset, si unum se et solitarium Patrem Filium factum esse meminisset. 6. Denique nouit hanc concordiae unitatem et apostolus Paulus, cum personarum tamen distinctione. Nam cum ad Corinthios scriberet, Ego, inquit, plantaui, Apollo rigauit, sed Deus incrementum dedit. Itaque neque qui plantat est quicquam neque qui rigat, sed qui incrementum dat Deus. Qui autem plantat et qui rigat unum sunt. 7. Quis autem non intellegat alterum esse Apollo, alterum Paulum, non eundem atque ipsum Apollo pariter et Paulum? Denique et diuersa uniuscuiusque sunt officia prolata; alter enim qui plantat et alter qui rigat. Hos tamen duos non quod unus sit, sed quod unum sint proposuit apostolus Paulus, ut alter quidem sit Apollo, alter uero Paulus, quantum ad personarum distinctionem pertinet, <quantum uero ad concordiam pertinet,> unum ambo sint.
8. Nam quando duorum una sententia est, ueritas una est, fides una est, una atque eadem religio est, unus etiam Dei timor est, unum sunt, etiamsi duo sint, ipsum sunt, dum ipsum sapiunt. 9. Etenim quos personae ratio inuicem diuidit, eosdem rursus inuicem religionis ratio conducit. Et quamuis idem atque ipsi non sint, dum idem sentiunt, ipsum sunt, et cum duo sint, unum sunt, habentes in fide societatem, etiamsi gerant in personis diuersitatem. 10. Denique cum ad has uoces Domini imperitia fuisset Iudaica commota et temere adusque saxa succensa, ita ut discurrerent et dicerent: Non te lapidamus propter bonum opus, sed propter blasphemiam, et quia tu, cum homo sis, facis te Deum, distinctionem posuit Dominus in ratione reddenda, quomodo se Deum aut dixisset aut intellegi uellet. Quem Pater sanctificauit, inquit, et misit in hunc mundum, uos dicitis quia blasphemat, quia dixi: Filius Dei sum? 11. Etiam hic Patrem habere se dixit. Filius est ergo, non Pater. Patrem enim confessus se fuisset, si Patrem se esse meminisset. 12. Et sanctificatum se a suo Patre esse proponit. Dum ergo accipit sanctificationem a Patre, minor Patre est; minor autem Patre consequenter <non Pater> est, sed Filius. Pater enim si fuisset, sanctificationem dedisset, non accepisset. Et nunc autem profitendo se accepisse sanctificationem a Patre, hoc ipso quo Patre se minorem accipiendo ab ipso sanctificationem probat, Filium se esse, non Patrem, monstrauit. 13. Missum praeterea se esse dicit, ut per hanc oboedientiam, qua uenit Dominus Christus missus, non Pater, sed Filius probetur, qui misisset utique, si Pater fuisset. Missus autem non fuit Pater, ne Pater subditus alteri Deo, dum mittitur, probaretur. 14. Et tamen post haec adicit quod omnem omnino ambiguitatem dissolueret et totam controuersiam erroris extingueret. Ait enim in ultima parte sermonis: Vos dicitis quia blasphemat, quia dixi: Filius Dei sum? Ergo si euidenter Filium Dominus se, non Patrem esse testatur, magnae temeritatis et ingentis est furoris exemplum contra ipsius Christi Domini testimonium controuersiam diuinitatis et religionis agitare et Christum Iesum Patrem esse dicere, cum animaduertat illum non Patrem se, sed Filium comprobasse.