theismum. Essentia quidem generando cominunicatur; sed gener- atio, ut a Persona fit originaliter, ita ad Personam ierminatur." This is the common mode of I'epresentation.
2. Tliis generation is said to be eternal. " It is an eternal movement in the divine essence."
3. It is by necessity of nature, and not by the will of the Father.
4. It does not involve any separation or division, as it is not a part, but the whole and complete essence of the Father that is communicated from the Father to the Son.
6. It is without change.
The principal grounds urged in support of this representation, are the nature of sonship among men, and the passage in John v. 26, where it is said, " As the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself."
It is admitted that the relation between the First and Second persons in the Trinity is expressed by the words Father and Son, and therefore while everything in this relation as it exists among men, implying imperfection or change, must be eliminated, yet the essential idea of paternity must be retained. That essential idea is assumed to be the communication of the essence of the par- ent to his child ; and, thei'efore, it is maintained that there must be a communication of the essence of the Godhead from tlie Father to the Son in the Holy Trinity. But, in the first place, it is a gratuitous assumption that, so far as the soul is concerned, there is even among men any communication of the essence of the parent to the child. Traducianism has never been the general doctrine of the Christian Church. As, therefore, it is, to say the least, doubtful, whether there is any communication of the essence of the soul in human paternity, it is unreasonable to assume that such communication is essential to ,the relation of Father and Son in the Trinity.
In the second place, while it is admitted that the terms Father and Son are used to give us some idea of the mutual relation of the First and Second persons of the Trinity, yet they do not defi- nitely determine what that relation is. It may be equality and likeness. Among men Father and Son belong to the same order of beings. The one is not inferior in nature, although he may be ir. rank, to the other. And the son is like his father. In the same manner in the Holy Trinity the Second Person is said to be the eiKcoK, the oLTravyaaixa, the x°^P"-'^'^VPj the Aoyo5, the Word or Revealer of the Father, so that he who hears the Son hears the Father, he who hath seen the one has seen the other. Or the relation may
470 PART I. — THEOLOGY. [Ch. VI. — The Trinitt.
be that of affection. The reciprocal love of father and son is peculiar. It is, so to speak, necessary ; it is unchangeable, it is unftithoniable ; it leads, or has led, to every kind and degree of self-sacrifice. It is not necessary to assume in reference to the Trinity that these relations are all that the relative terms Father and Son are intended to reveal. These may be included, but much more may be implied which we are not now able to compre- hend. All that is contended for is, that we are not shut up to the admission that derivation of essence is essential to sonship.
As to the passage in Jolm v. 26, where it is said the Father hath given to the Son to have life in Himself, everything depends on the sense in which the word Son is to be taken. That word is sometimes used as a designation of the Ao-yos, the Second Person of the Trinity, to indicate his eternal relation to the First Person as the Father. It is, howev^er, very often used as a designation of the incarnate Xoyo9,,the Word made flesh. Many things are in Scripture pred- icated of the Godman, which cannot be predicated of the Sec- ond Person of the Trinity as such. If in this passage the Son means the Logos, then it does teach that the First Person of the Trinity communicated life, and therefore the essence in which that life inheres, to the Second Person. But if Son here designates the Theanthropos, then the passage teaches no such doctrine. That it is the historical person, Jesus of Nazareth here spoken of, may be argued not only from the fact that He is elsewhere so fre- quently called the Son of God, as in the comprehensive confession required of every Christian in the apostolic age, " I believe that Jesus is the Son of God ; " but also from the context. Our Lord had healed an impotent man on the Sabbath. For tliis the Jews accused Him of breaking the Sabbath. He vindicated Himself by saying that He had the same right to work on the Sabbath that God had, because He was the Son of God, and therefore equal with God. That He had power not only to heal but to give life, for as the Father had life in Himself, so had He given to the Son to have life in Himself He had also given Him authority to execute judgment. He was to be the judge of the quick and dead, because He is the Son of man, i. e., because He had become man for us and for our salvation. His accusers need not be sui*- prised at what He said, because the hour was coming when all who are in the grave shall. hear his voice, and shall come forth, they who have done good, unto the resurrection of life, and they who had done evil, unto the resurrection of damnatioji. The subject of discourse, therefore, in the context, is the historical