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Augustinian Neo-Platonism Vs. Orthodox Nicene Theology: the Trinity and the One-Many Problem in the Debate Between East and West by W

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Augustinian Neo-Platonism Vs. Orthodox Nicene Theology: the Trinity and the One-Many Problem in the Debate Between East and West by W Augustinian Neo-Platonism vs. Orthodox Nicene Theology: The Trinity and the One-Many Problem in the Debate Between East and West By W. J. Whitman “If anyone reads this work and says, ‘I understand what is being said, but it is not true,’ he is at liberty to affirm his own conviction as much as he likes and refute mine if he can. If he succeeds in doing so charitably and truthfully, and also takes the trouble to let me know (if I am still alive), then that will be the choicest plum that could fall to me from these labors of mine. If he cannot do me this service, I would be only too pleased that he should do it for anybody he can.” —St. Augustine1 Augustinian Theology The great partition between Eastern and Western Christianity really traces back to St. Augustine (354-430AD). The different conceptions of the Trinity that now characterize the difference between Eastern Orthodoxy (teaching the monarchia of the Father) and Papism/Protestantism (teaching absolute simplicity and the filioque) were not known prior to the time of St. Augustine, who was to become the chief advocate of what would now be considered the Western tradition. Augustine took the theology of Tertullian (ca. 160-220AD) and combined it with the philosophical framework of the Neo-Platonic philosopher Plotinus (ca 204-270AD). It is this Tertullian-Plotinus synthesis that the Orthodox Church rejects as heresy.2 Nevertheless, we must not look at Augustine as a heresiarch: for St. Photius, Fr. Michael Pomazansky, and Fr. Seraphim Rose all affirm the status of Augustine among the “blessed” Fathers of the Church. It would be inappropriate for us to question the authority of such great men on this topic. Augustine was merely trying to defend the Trinity from a philosophical perspective. The heretics that denied the Trinity were Neo-Platonists, so it was only natural for Augustine to work within that same Neo-Platonic framework when arguing against them. The 1 St. Augustine, De Trinitate, Book 1, Chapter 1 (I:5) 2 Tertullian’s approach was flawed because he saw the Son as proceeding from the essence of God rather than from the person of the Father—but then the Son would not relate to the Father as a Son because he would be the Son of the Essence rather than the Son of the Father—, but Tertullian did not teach “absolute simplicity” or the “filioque”: these two doctrines were borrowed by Augustine from Neo-Platonism. heresy of Western “theology” only occurs when this philosophical framework is turned into a “dogma” of the faith. In his work On Christian Doctrine, St. Augustine lays out the doctrine of the Trinity in a way that is perfectly compatible with Eastern theology, without mentioning absolute simplicity or the filioque.3 In De Trinitate, St. Augustine first speaks of the Trinity in entirely orthodox terms. His heretical ideas only come out later, when he attempts to philosophically defend and explain the Trinitarian doctrines. However, Augustine’s philosophical explanation of the Trinity is heretical and it is precisely this erroneous explanation that is the basis of all of Western Christian thought. Augustine taught that God’s singularity relies entirely upon His absolute simplicity. Therefore, it is impossible to distinguish between God’s essence and His attributes, qualities, and energies: for God must be altogether without distinctions if He is to be absolutely simple. To understand the notion of absolute simplicity you must equate absolute simplicity with pure oneness. Perhaps the following illustration will help: If you want to simplify something, you “break it down.” To totally and absolutely simplify something, you would have to break it down into the most singular and basic components. For example: if you need to simplify some object, you break it down into atoms. Then you can break those atoms down into quarks, which are the most basic parts. These quarks (theoretically) cannot be broken down any further. A quark is purely one—it is a single particle without composition. Therefore, absolute simplicity and singularity are synonymous. Thus, Cornelius van Til writes, “Singularity and simplicity are involved in one another.” 4 And this Augustinian understanding of things is shared by all subsequent Western theological philosophers. To understand St. Augustine, it is important to put him in the proper historical context. When Augustine was writing about the Trinity, the Arian heresy was still prevalent. The Arian apologist Eunomius had developed a rigorous philosophical argument in defense of the heresy. Eunomius followed Greek philosophy and built his defense of the Arian position around the teachings of the Neo-Platonic philosopher Plotinus. Plotinus, the pagan philosopher, wrote, “And this name, The One, contains really no more than the negation of plurality: under the same pressure the Pythagoreans found their indication in the symbol ‘Apollo’ (α=not; πολλων=of 3 Cf. Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, Book 1, Ch. 5 4 Cornelius van Til, An Introduction to Systematic Theology, Ch. 16 many) with its repudiation of the multiple…. the designation, a mere aid to inquiry, was never intended for more than a preliminary affirmation of absolute simplicity to be followed by the rejection of even that statement.”5 Eunomius adopted this Neo-Platonic notion of absolute simplicity and asserted that “the Unbegotten God is one and alone…a simple and uncompounded being.” 6 According to Eunomius, God is absolutely “simple, and uncompounded, nor is any internal thing different from him” because “he is without parts.” Therefore the expression “Unbegotten” does not refer to something distinct from the substance (essence) of God itself but God “must himself be the Unbegotten Substance.”7 Simplicity, to Eunomius, requires that God’s substance (essence) be synonymous with his unbegotten-ness. He argues that the Son is begotten and therefore he is not consubstantial with the Unbegotten: “How can reason admit us to equal a begotten substance to that which is Unbegotten?”8 With this doctrine of absolute simplicity, Eunomius was able to eliminate the Trinity. “If either person be Unbegotten, then he is not a Son; and if he be a Son, he is not Unbegotten. But that there is only one God of the universe Unbegotten…what we have said already upon this subject does sufficiently demonstrate.”9 “[God] alone is unbegotten. Now it is impossible that a being should be begotten which has its substance unbegotten,” thus the Son is not God “since the character of Son, and of a being begotten, will not admit that of an Unbegotten Substance.”10 Thus Eunomius argued against the deity of Christ. When addressing this Eunomian argument, Augustine makes a fatal mistake. He grants the heretics their premise—i.e. the presupposition of Neo-Platonic absolute simplicity. Augustine starts with this false premise (absolute simplicity) and then attempts to work up to the true doctrine of God. This is not valid. You cannot allow the “natural man” his false presuppositions and then built upon those presuppositions in order to establish a true and accurate worldview. You must first address the presuppositions themselves. What Augustine should have done is this: he should have pointed out that the doctrine of absolute simplicity lacks any biblical basis and is 5 Plotinus, The Enneads 5.6 6 Eunomius, The First Apology 7 Eunomius, The First Apology 8 Eunomius, The First Apology 9 Eunomius, The First Apology 10 Eunomius, The First Apology a heathen philosophical concept that comes straight out of Plotinus, thus calling the very premise of the Arian argument into question. But this, unfortunately, is not what Augustine did. Instead, St. Augustine concedes the validity of Eunomius’ Neo-Platonic framework, asserting that in God Himself “to be” and “to be wise” cannot “be understood as two different things” because that would be to affirm that God is “not supremely and perfectly simple.”11 Augustine writes: “But now it is not one thing that makes him great and another that makes him God; what makes him great is what makes him God, because for him it is not one thing to be great and another to be God; so it will follow, presumably, that the Father is not God taken singly, but only with and taken together with the godhead he has begotten; and so the Son will be the godhead of the Father just as he is the wisdom and power of the Father, and just as he is the Word and image of the Father. And furthermore, because it is not one thing for him to be and another for him to be God, it follows that the Son will also be the being of the Father, just as he is his Word and his image. This means that apart from being Father, the Father is nothing but what the Son is for him. It is clear, of course, that he is only called Father because he has a Son, since he is called Father not with reference to himself but with reference to the Son. But now we are forced to say in addition that it is only because he has begotten his own being or ‘is-ness’ that he is what he is with reference to himself. Just as he is only great with the greatness he has begotten, because for him it is not one thing to be and another to be great. Are we not then forced to say he is the Father of his own being just as he is the Father of his own greatness, just as he is the Father of his own power and wisdom? 11St. Augustine, De Trinitate, Book 7, Chapter 1 (VII:2) For without doubt his greatness is the same as his power, and his being is the same as his greatness.”12 In other words, Augustine argues that because the Bible says that “Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God,” it follows that Christ is God because God’s wisdom is synonymous with his being.
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