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SPIRIT CHRISTOLOGY: LACTANTIUS AND HIS SOURCES
Author(s) -
McGUCKIN PAUL
Publication year - 1983
Publication title -
the heythrop journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.127
H-Index - 10
eISSN - 1468-2265
pISSN - 0018-1196
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-2265.1983.tb00787.x
Subject(s) - christology , citation , theology , philosophy , classics , library science , history , computer science
Lactantius conceives the preexistent Christ as the first-born spirit of God, a holy spirit from the supreme spirit of the Deity.’ Analogously the angels are spirits of God in so far as they too derive their origin from the Deity and share a spiritual nature.* In this context the description ‘spirit of God’ would not constitute per se a divine title; it would rather signify a substantive being3 that participated in the spiritual nature of God, as opposed to a physical type of creaturehood. When Lactantius wishes to distinguish the Son who is God’s spirit from the angels who are similarly God’s spirits he always specifies the formulae; so he calls the Son either incorruptibilem spiritum4 or spiriturn, qui esset virtutibus patris dei praeditus.’ Such a precise specification is always required since the concept of ‘holy spirit’ can be equally applied to the Father, the Son or the angels. The clearest differentiation of the Sonspirit from the angel-spirits occurs in Lactantius’s adaptation of Tertullian’s Logos theology where the Son is defined as the only communicative spirit of God, the Word, or vocal spirit,6 who fulfils the role of revelation.’ 1 Divinae Institutwnes (hereafter DI) 11, 8.3: Deus . . . produxit similem sui spiritum, qui esset virtutibus patris dei praeditus; DI IV, 6 , l : Deus . . . sanctum e t incorruptibilem spiritum genuit, quem filium nuncuparet. 2 Epit. 37.3: ex omnibus angelis. quos idem deus de suis spiritibus figuravit . . . DI IV, 8,6: sed tamen sanctae litterae docent, in quibus cautum est illum dei filium dei m e sermonem itemque ceteros angelos dei spiritus esse. Cf. V. Loi, Lattunzio (Zurich, 1970), pp.176-83: ‘spiritus quale sostanza celeste degli angeli’. 3 DI IV, 8,iO: nostri spiritus dissolubiles sunt, quia mortales sumus, dei autem spiritus e t uiuunt e t manent e t sentiunt, quia ipse immortalis est e t sensus ac uitae dator. nostrae uoces licet aurae misceantur atque uanescant, tamen plerumque permanent litteris conprehensae; quanto magis dei uocem credendum est e t manere in aeternum e t sensu ac uirtute comitari quam d e deo patre tamquam riuus de fonte traduxerit! 4 DI IV, 6 , l . The incorruptibilis is applied as a divine epithet one in which the angels evidently do not share, because he elsewhere teaches their sexual fall from grace