A Treatise against the Melchites (Mingana translation) (chapter 10. On the Trisagion)
A Treatise against the Melchites (Mingana translation)
continued
Chapter 10. On the Trisagion
1 You also discuss with us the trisagion in which you have written that the Greeks say: Sanctus es Deus, Sanctus es Pater omnipotens. Let it be known to you that the Chalcedonians do not refer all the trisagion to the Father, as you write, but to the Trinity, because they say: "Sanctus es Deus Pater, Sanctus es omnipotens Filius, Sanctus es immortalis Spiritus Sancte, miserere nobis." We Syrians, with the Armenians, the Egyptians, the Abyssinians, the Nubians, and the Indians, refer the trisagion to the Son. There are some who say that when Joseph brought down the body of our Lord from the Cross, people saw that angels had set up three choirs, the first of which saying: "Sanctus es Deus," and the second: "Sanctus es omnipotens," and the third: "Sanctus es Immortalis:" then Joseph and Nicodemus were moved by the Spirit and said: "Qui crucifixus es pro nobis—i.e. for mankind—miserere nobis." This was immediately received in the Churches, and Ignatius the fiery, the disciple of John, established it in the Churches. Some others, however, say that it has been established after Nestorius had been rejected from the Church, but they are wrong. The Fathers said that it was that fourth Person, with the human nature which was crucified, who, although God, omnipotent and immortal, wished to become flesh for us, and not another kind of nature.
2 The Chalcedonians say that the trisagion is derived from the Sanctus found in Isaiah. As the Seraphim glorify the three persons of the Trinity with the thrice repeated Sanctus, so we also should refer the trisagion to the Trinity. Against them we will write as follows:— The One whom Isaiah saw on a high throne and the seraphim round him is the Son. This we know from John the Evangelist who says: "These things said Isaiah about Him when he saw His glory." Cyril, John Chrysostom, and other Doctors teach us that it was the Son, the Word, that Isaiah saw on the throne and not the Father. We also believe that it is He who is the door and that it is through Him that we go to the Father. He says: "I am the door; by me if any man enter in, he shall find life." In the fact that we refer the trisagion to the Son we may go up to the Father and say: "Our Father who art in heaven." And in referring the glory to the Son we speak in the Holy Spirit: "No man can say: 'Jesus is Lord, but in the Holy Spirit.'"
3 We say further that the Seraphim said: "Holy, Holy, Holy, heaven and earth are full of His glory," and they did not say: "Thou art holy O God, Thou art holy O Omnipotent, Thou art holy O Immortal." If the Doctors have explained the thrice repeated "holy" as referring to the three persons (of the Trinity), and if the Sanctus of the liturgy also: "Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus Dominus Omnipotens, pleni sunt," etc., refers to the three persons, although addressed to one of them only, let them show us from where they learned that the trisagion of "Sanctus es Deus" refers to the Trinity. The prophet says only: "Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus," and the words "Deus, Omnipotens, Immortalis" have been added afterwards. That this trisagion refers to the Son to whom it is appropriate is known by the following: we say "Holy art Thou O God the Son," because He became flesh although remaining God; and we say: "Holy art Thou O Omnipotent," because He put on our weak body although remaining omnipotent in His divinity; and we say: "Holy art Thou O Immortal," because He died in the flesh although remaining immortal like God. What passage is it of the heretic Macedonius or of any other who attributed mortality to the Holy Spirit that the Chalcedonians want to refute when they say: "Holy Thou art O immortal Holy Spirit?" They have really no apology to offer. The words of the trisagion have been attributed by the Doctors to the Son because He became flesh, put on the weak and mortal human body, and was addressed by them as "God," "omnipotent," "immortal," and "who hast been crucified for us" in the flesh.
4 If they refuse this and say that the trisagion refers to the Trinity, let them only say: "Holy, holy, holy," and not: "Holy art Thou O God," and the remaining "Omnipotent" and "Immortal." The Nestorians and the Chalcedonians, in order to take from the middle the question of the crucifixion, and to introduce the division of nature and natures, and count in Christ two attributes, powers, and wills, and in order not to admit that we crucify the Son in the flesh, avoided the reference of the trisagion to the Son and attributed it to the Trinity, not paying sufficient attention to what Paul said: "God forbid that I should glory save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." John the evangelist also said: "glory to the cross." The theologian said in his discourse on the passover: "We had need of a God becoming flesh and dying in order that we may live with Him. We died that we may be purified, and we rose with Him. Many miracles occurred at that time: God was crucified, the sun suffered eclipse and then shone again. It was necessary that the creatures should suffer with the Creator." Now where does this Doctor put division in Christ? Where does he say that man died or that human nature was crucified? He openly declared that God became flesh, died and was crucified.
5 Let it be also known to you that if, as the Greeks believe, the trisagion refers to the Trinity, and the sentence Qui crucifixus es pro nobis is taken away from it, it would not only refer to the Trinity, as they say, but also to angels and demons; which is blasphemy. The angel or the demon might indeed say: "I am a God," because they are Spirits; and Satan said about himself: "I will ascend above the stars of heaven, and I will be like God," and Paul also said: "Whose minds the god of this world hath blinded." Satan calls also himself "omnipotent," because he is constantly watchful in his war against the saints, and he even made bold and fought the Christ. He is also "immortal" because he does not die. Consider well, therefore, where the trisagion might lead, if we did not add to it Qui crucifixus es pro nobis; indeed the trisagion of the Greek may reach Satan! When, however, the words Qui crucifixus es pro nobis are added to it, no one can refer "crucifixion" to an angel or a demon, because this would be impossible; nor could then the trisagion be referred to a mere man, because "immortality"
6 which is expressed in it is not referred to a man. The trisagion is, therefore, to be truly referred to the Son, and Word—God who became man, and who is both mortal and immortal: mortal in the flesh, and immortal in His Godhead, and He was crucified on our behalf. You mentioned that the Armenians at the Nativity say one thing and at the Epiphany say another thing, and on some other occasion some other thing. This, however, does not matter, since they refer the trisagion to Christ. As we say in the Passion week: "O Christ, who by His passion delivered us from error," and as at the beginning of the Gospel we say: "At the time of the Nativity of our Lord," or "at the time of His Baptism, at the time of His Economy, at the time of His resurrection" as the case may be, so also the Armenians do with the trisagion, and use it according to circumstances.
7 We gave ourselves all this trouble for your salvation, not yours alone, but that of many others who will listen to us. The prophet said: "He who taketh forth the precious from the vile shall be as my mouth." Do not throw, therefore, truth behind you, and abandon an old habit. Who is the man who can be so forgetful of his own self as to hate a human being? We do not hate the Greeks, but the schisms which they brought into the midst and the divisions which they introduced into the Church. For a certain number of years I only disclosed the trouble caused by five of their innovations in five points of faith; had I disclosed at length all the disturbances they had caused, they would have been ashamed of themselves, because not all of them are aware of what happened to them. I warned them several times to let everyone go his own way without recrimination against his neighbour of another creed, but they showed no desire to heed our advice. I wrote chapters concerning their habits, and also on the fact that we should be permitted to enter their churches, and be allowed to pray for them and they for us; I also wrote many other chapters to rebuke them and point to the disturbance that they would be causing in the Church if they did not desire to live in peace and concord. For several reasons, however, among which is the fact that they have no responsible director and head, I kept my tongue and did not disclose what we are now aiming at.
8 Because, if God gives me life, I have the intention of exposing little by little all their teaching and comparing it with the interpretation of the holy Doctors, and of outlining afterwards our own teaching and interpretation and those of the Doctors. We have written the present pages in haste, but we have confidence that we shall not find ourselves in need to write to you again on the same subject, and that you will rather constitute yourself a preacher of truth, and thus possess your own soul and that of the many who fell like you. In case you remain stubborn in your old ideas, and in case light and darkness are on the same footing with you, it is your own business, but there is a great day which will make manifest all the hidden secrets of mankind. Let it be also known to you that it is very pleasing and agreeable to God that there should be no divisions in the Churches of Christians; it would have been also more just that the Greeks should have torn and pulled at their own flesh, but they are so steeped in iniquity as to say that there are no other Christians but themselves, and they inflict more harm on our community and on that of the Armenians than the Turks. As I said above, I warned several times the Greeks of Melitene that they and the Syrians and Armenians should love one another and not to growl at one another like wolves and lions, but their madness reached such a pitch as to say like their fathers: "You are not Christians" and other similar ugly offensive words which are in keeping with their iniquity.
9 I wished to sow peace in the camp of the hostile parties, and to convince them from the books of the Apostles and Doctors that it is not good that they should contend with one another, but that they should enter one another's Churches, and pray with love, and if necessary to come nearer to one another and remember one another in prayers, with the understanding that each one may follow his own theological convictions, but they did not condescend to reconciliation. When I examined their madness and noticed that it was that of insolent people, I retorted and said to them: since you are so incurable, and believe that truth, which you do not know, is with you, bring first the testimony and the signature of your bishop, priests and notables, and I on my part shall also bring those of our Patriarch, our bishops, priests, and notables, to the effect that (in a public discussion which we will hold on religious questions) either party shall be pleased with the truth which shall there be revealed, and that either of them shall embrace it when revealed; that in the discussion no party shall abuse the other, or rebuke him and refer to extraneous subjects. By the help of God I shall on that day disclose everything to the sun with justice and equity, in spite of the fact that the affair requires labour, time, helpers and promoters.
10 Here end the ten chapters.