716 THE REFORMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND.
sition to the traditional and oecumenical faith. The style is crude and obscure, and not to be compared with Calvin's, who at the same age and in his earliest writings showed himself a master of lucid, methodical, and convincing statement in elegant and forcible Latin. Servetus was familiar with the Bible, the ante-Nicene P"'athers (TertuUian and Irenseus), and scholastic theology, and teemed with new, but ill-digested ideas which he threw out like firebrands. He afterwards embodied his first work in his last, but in revised shape. The following is a summary of the Seven Books on the Trinity : —
In the first book he proceeds from the historical Jesus of Nazareth, and proves, first, that this man is Jesus the Christ ; secondly, that he is the Son of God ; and thirdly, that he is God.^ He begins with the humanity in opposition to those who begin with the Logos and, in his opinion, lose the true Christ. In this respect he anticipates the Socinian and modern humanitarian Christology, but not in a rationalistic sense ; for he asserts a special indwelling of God in Christ (somewhat resembling Schleiermacher), and a deification of Christ after his exaltation (like the Socinians).^ He rejects the identity of the Logos with the Son of God and the doctrine of the communication of attributes. He distinguishes between the Hebrew names of God: Jeliovah means exclusively the one and eternal God ; Elohim or El or Adonai are names of God and also of angels, prophets,
^ " Primo, hie est Jesus Christus. 8ecundo,hicestJiliusDei. Tertio, hie est Deits." (p. la.)
2 " Secundutn carnem homo est, et spiritu est Deus, quia quod natum est de spiritu, spirilus est, et spiritus est deus. Et ita Esaice 9. Puer nalus est nobis, vocabitur nomen eius deus fortis. Vide clare et dei nomen et fortitudinem nnto puero attrihntam, cui data est omnis potestas in ccelo et in terra. Et Thomas lohannis 20. earn appellat, Deus meus, Dominus mens. Et Rom. nono Christus dicitur in omnibus laudandus et benedicendus. Mtdtisque aliis locis eius divinifas ostenditur, quia exallatus est, ut acciperet divinitatem, et nomen super omne nomen." 10a.
§ 141. THE BOOK AGAINST THE HOLY TRINITY. 717
and kings (John 10 : 34-36). i The prologue of John speaks of things that were, not of things that are. Everywhere else the Bible speaks of the man Christ. The Holy Spirit means, according to the Hebrew ruach and the Greek pneuma, wind or breath, and denotes in the Bible now God himself, now an angel, now the spirit of man, now a divine impulse.
He then explains away the proof texts for the doctrine of the Trinity, 1 John 5:7 (which he accepts as genuine, though Ei-asmus omitted it from his first edition) ; John 10 : 30 ; 14 : 11 ; Rom. 11 : 36. The chief passages, the baptismal formula (Matt. 28 : 19) and the apostolic benediction (2 Cor. 13 : 14) where the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are co-ordinated, he understands not of three persons, but of three dispositions of God.
In the second book he treats of the Logos, the person of Christ, and the Spirit of God, and chiefly explains the prologue to the fourth Gospel. The Logos is not a metaphysical being, but an oracle ; the voice of God and the light of the world.^ The Logos is a disposition or dispensation in God, so understood by TertuUian and Irenseus.^ Before the incarnation the Logos was God himself sj)eaking; after the incarnation the Logos is Jesus Christ, who makes God known to us.*
1 "Notes differentiam inter HIT proprium Dei nnmen, et "^X ""nX D"n'?K et alia siinilia Deo attributa. Et quod Thomas luhannis 20. non lehovah, sed elohiin et adonai de Christo dixerit, infra probiibo." 14a. " Similiter el D'bx de angelis et hominihus fortihus dicitur, Psal. 8S et lob 41." 146. He identifies Christ witli tiie Eloiiim instead of Jehovah.
2 "Ad-yos non phllosophicam ilium rem, sed oracnhtm, vocem, sermonem, eloqiiiitm Dei sonat. Usurpatiir enim a verbo \4yu, quod est dico." 47a.
3 « pg,. sacramentum Verbi intelliyit quandam in Deo disposltionem seu dispensationem, qua placitum est ei arcanum voluntatis sucb nobis revelare. Et hoc TertuUianus'olKovofjiiav, et Irenmus dispositionem sre/iissime appellant." 48a.
* " Verbum in Deo proferente, est ipsemet Deus loquens. Post prolationem est ipsa caro, sen Verbum Dei, antequam sermo ille euro Jieret, intell i<jebatur ipsum Dei oraculum intra nuhis caliginem nondum manifestatum, aula Deus erat ille sermo. Et postqnam Verbum homo factum est, per Verbum intellitjimus ipsu7n Christum, qui est Verbum Dei, et vor Dei, nam, quasi vox, est ex ore Dei prolatus." 48a and 6. He refers for proof to Rev. 19: 13: rh uvofia ahrov 'O \6yos tov @eov.