It is within this context that the debate over the Holy Spirit’s divinity began to erupt—the Arian perspective often collaborating with the Empire and the orthodox “Fathers” at times finding themselves on the defensive, trying to protect the early Church from heresy.
Arius
Arius was a priest over the Church of Bacucalis in Alexandria (318) who systematically taught a subordinationism that thought of the Father alone as “God” and the Son and Spirit as “creatures.”13 The Arians held that the Spirit is really an angel, created by the Son, and one of the spirits ministering to God in heaven. Arianism is well known for denying the deity of the Son and particularly the idea of the Son being homoousious (“of one essence”) with the Father. According to Arius,
The essences [ousia] of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are separate in nature. They are estranged, unconnected, alien . . . and without participation in each other. . . . They are utterly dissimilar from each other with respect to both essences and glories to infinity.14
The “Arians” increased along with the Church’s imperial authority, replacing the Scriptures with numerous creeds of their own. Athanasius referred to them as “modern Jews and disciples of Caiaphas.”15 As legalists, the Arians sought to justify their doctrines with an appeal to the authority of synods. Morrison claims that, for the Arians,
Exegesis was therefore more important than the actual text. Theology and concepts of Church cohesion had shifted from repetition of scriptural passages to the right interpretation, from the text to the gloss. True believers were no longer simply those who upheld the Scriptures as true, but those who shared a particular understanding of the Scriptures’ inner meaning or implications.16
The various “Arian Councils” were actually the first ones to attempt to draft a formal theology of the Holy Spirit for the Church at large. Before that time extensive writings on the Spirit were made by Clement of Rome and Ignatius, but their teaching “seems to be solely personal and experimental, and only indirectly doctrinal,”17 serving only to confirm the presence of the Spirit in the Body of Christ. The Arian Councils (up until 360), however, expressed their theology of the work of the Spirit “in terms which were in thorough accord with the spiritual simplicity of the Holy Scripture.”18 Lest we discount the contribution of the Arians entirely, Swete acknowledges:
The Church owes a debt, it may be freely admitted, to the Arian leaders who thus persistently called attention to the teaching and sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit, at a time when there was grave risk of Christian thought being turned too entirely to theological controversy.19
Nevertheless, Arian and semi-Arian teaching on the mission and work of the Spirit made the doctrine of the Spirit’s nature conspicuous by its absence. It was “unsatisfactory and even misleading; professing to be scriptural, it represents only one side of the teaching of Scripture.”20 As a result, new controversy regarding the deity of the Spirit arose throughout Christendom. While the “trinitarian” orthodoxy of the third century was both modalist and subordinationist—shaped largely by Origen, who saw the distinctions of the three Persons mainly in terms of three levels of divine outreach to the world—Arius drafted a radical metaphysical discontinuity amongst the Persons. Arius’ denial of the Spirit’s divinity emerged from his reaction to this third-century modalism.21
The council of Nicea sought to correct such heresy through an articulation of homoousios, which was employed to define the nature of the triune God. The Council constitutes a decisive step in a general movement in the fourth-century from economic to immanent trinitarianism. Many Christians, however, were horrified at the conclusions of Nicea (conclusions which were essentially unclear regarding the specific nature of homoousios), and thought that the idea of the Father and Son as one identical ousia implied modalism. Arianism took advantage of such fears, leading many believers to the conclusion that the Holy Spirit is less than divine. In reaction, the Church Fathers gave considerable attention to the nature of the Spirit (particularly in relation to the Son and to the Father) in their writings (up to and even after the Council of Constantinople in 381).22
Athanasius
Athanasius’ Letters Concerning the Holy Spirit and Letters to Serapion present perhaps the best defense of the Spirit’s divinity in the first millennium of the Church. As the chief elaborator and defender of the Nicene Creed after 325, Athanasius suffered considerable persecution from Arian politicians. When Athanasius turned his attention to the doctrine of the Spirit he gained many converts from Arianism, such as the followers of Serapion, who had accepted the homoousios of the Son with the Father but continued to view the Spirit as a creature. In his Letters to Serapion, Athanasius uses divine attributes such as immutability and supremacy to convincingly demonstrate the Spirit’s divinity. First, the Spirit’s divinity is witnessed in His immutability.
That the Spirit is above the creation, distinct in nature from things originated, and proper to the Godhead, can be seen from the following considerations also. The Holy Spirit is incapable of change and alteration. For it says, “The Holy Spirit of discipline will flee deceit and will start away from thoughts that are without understanding.” (Wis. 1:5). And Peter said, “In the incorruptibility of the meek and quiet Spirit” (1 Pet 3:4). . . . The Holy Spirit, being in God, must be incapable of change, variation, and corruption.23
Second, the Spirit’s divinity emerges from His supremacy over all things.
Again, the Spirit of the Lord fills the universe. Thus David sings, “Whither shall I go from your Spirit?” (Psalm 139:7) Again, in Wisdom it is written, “Your incorruptible Spirit is in all things.” (Wis. 12:1) . . . But if the Spirit fills all things, and if the angels, being his inferiors, are circumscribed, and where they are sent forth, there are they present; it is not to be doubted that the Spirit does not belong to things originated, nor is he an angel at all, as you say, but by nature is above the angels.24
While Origen took a “spiritualizing” approach to the exegesis of Scriptures, Athanasius emphasized the use of a “grammatical-historical” interpretive scheme.25 Well known for his knowledge of Scripture, Athanasius actually moved beyond the letter of Scripture and theological tradition in order to confront sects that denied the deity of the Spirit. Perhaps his most famous argument lies in the contrast he drew between the nature of creatures and the nature of the Spirit. He employed Gen 1:1–23 to demonstrate that creatures are created from nothing and come into being at a particular time, and 1 Cor 2:11–12 to show that the Spirit is not created but emerges directly from God.26 Athanasius backed this contrast with persuasive logic:
They say also in their hearts “there is no God” (Ps. 14:1). For if, as no one knows the thoughts of a man save the spirit who is in him (en autw): would it not be evil speech to call the Spirit who is