Divine Holiness and Justice

He introduced, intending both this main point which we now proceed to, and also the great gifts and the participation in God the Father of the Holy Spirit in the rebirth in baptism. He also noted that the name 'God' is one and perhaps belongs to the Trinity; and likewise, being invoked, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit always work equally. He discourses to the Corinthians, writing, 'But you were washed, but you were justified, but you were sanctified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God' (1 Cor 6:11).

Therefore, those who participate in Him—that is, those deemed to be sanctified by Him and justified and made wise—are called 'partakers of the Holy Spirit' (Heb 3:6), as the same apostle teaches the Hebrews. And to the Ephesians he writes, 'in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise' (Eph 1:13). For it is clear that those being sealed, that is to say, being sanctified, participate, but are not participated in. For if the Holy Spirit or the Son had been a creature, where would the need be for the creature to sanctify and make the fullness, even though it had been acting without debt to God the Father?

Indeed, the creatures, knowing this anointing to be from the Creator, do not provide the sanctification from themselves, but say, 'May God sanctify you.' And I proceed to another consistent and strong right, by which even those who have studied will not be ashamed to do this. The Lord of all, having already arranged concerning God the Father and Himself, 'baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son' (Matt 28:19), did not simply lead up 'and of the Spirit,' but added 'the Holy.' So that he did not only mention Him once, but also established Him because of that being by nature what the single name signified, to which even the Spirit was associated; and likewise, because of that, the Holy Spirit is established, who is in divinity the Pa—

Even the Son is so described; what was reminded to him is, as the saying goes, evident even to a blind man. But this possesses a greater theology; so that the thing called divinity may be easily believed to be a property of God alone, and to be holy and just in nature, and moreover to sanctify and justify the creatures belonging to Him, similar to those things being praised concerning the Father, as when the Son himself says to John: 'Holy Father, keep them in your name,' (John 17:11) and again: 'Sanctify them in your truth; your word is truth,' (John 17:17) and again: 'Father, judge.' (John 17:26) And as when they prophesy, Ezekiel indeed: 'and they shall know that I am the Lord who sanctifies them,' (Ezekiel 36:23) but David in the 10th Psalm: 'The Lord is righteous, and he loved righteousness; his eyes saw uprightness,' (Psalm 33:5) and another: 'and all those led under your hands, and under you are.' And as when Paul writes to the Thessalonians: 'But the God of peace himself will sanctify you completely,' (1 Thess 5:23) to the Romans: 'God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns?' (Romans 3:24) and to the Hebrews: 'that the virgin may be holy in body and spirit,' (Hebrews 13:4) as if it were implying either that she is not holy in a local sense, or that she is to be sanctified in virtue. And he says here, the sixth thing 'spirit', and the practical energy 'body', according to Isaiah prophesying: 'and those wandering in spirit shall know by understanding;' (Isaiah 53:11) that is, those wandering by deed or by state.

But concerning the Son, as when he is euphemistically named: 'one holy, one Lord Jesus Christ,' and as the Acts discuss: 'they killed those who foretold the coming of the righteous' [about 60] and as Peter said: 'Christ, who died for sinners, a righteous one on behalf of the unrighteous.' (1 Peter 3:18) And from such sayings, therefore, it is necessary, if they wished to do righteous things, to be led to God by praising the Spirit; this they do not do, for they say that the angels were not sanctified, and yet they are holy.