The eternal birth of the Word in the Godhead

Ex ore altissimi prodivi (Ecclesiasticus 24). These words, which I have quoted in Latin, we may speak in the Person of the eternal Word. He says, I proceeded forth out of the mouth of the Most High. This is the exalted source which uttered from the Father's heart the eternal Word which took on human nature in our Lady's womb. I am not going to tell of this carnal birth, for you have heard much about it already. It is the eternal birth that I propose to speak about, and I will begin by answering two questions.

The first is this. Can the eternal Word be called the perfect Word, seeing that it is still in the process of being born? Yes, for the eternal Word is begotten in the inner light and remains there, unexposed to anything outside it, and yet is fully and unfailingly spoken by the Father. So it can rightly be called the perfect Word.

The second question is this. Can our understanding grasp the perfect Word at all? For it belongs to every act of understanding that it should understand. Is this not the same as our own understanding in itself? I say no, because our word is begotten in an unsteady light. Our understanding is a changing thing, so it cannot grasp a perfect word. The word you hear from me now can err; it is merely a sign of the word within me.

Now pay attention to how the eternal birth works. The personal understanding, as confined within its unity of nature, is one with the understanding by which the Father understands himself in his own nature. If this were not so there would be two intelligible essences. But there are not two. There is only one intelligible essence in which the Father sees himself in his own nature. The object of his thought is the eternal Word. Where this understanding is confined to the Father's own natural understanding, it is nothing other than the Father-nature itself. Where this same Word turns toward itself, there is always a distinction of Person, and yet it remains one simple divine essence in nature. Here I will raise four questions to help you understand the manner of the eternal birth, though I tell you plainly that this is beyond the grasp of the ordinary mind. Still, I will tell you as much as your minds can take in.

The first question is this. Why is the Person of the Son called born, and the Person of the Father not? The answer is that it is the Father's own personal understanding by which he understands himself in his own nature, but the product of this understanding is the eternal Word. So the eternal Word is said to be begotten, and the Person of the Father is not. The second question: is the work of the eternal birth done by his personal power or by his natural power? Some theologians say it is due to the Father's personal power, since it belongs to all begotten things to receive the same nature as the one who begets them. Where have you seen a father who did not give his own nature to his son? This is the argument for saying the eternal birth comes from personal power. This is not my view. Where the personal understanding stays within its unity of nature, there this nature is Person. Now the eternal Word has its origin in the inner thought by which the Father understands himself in his own nature. It follows that the work of the eternal birth must come from his natural power, for if the eternal Word arose from the Father's personal understanding, then the eternal Word would be the cause of its own self, since this understanding is itself the Word.

The third question is this. Where does the Father-nature carry maternal names? Wherever it does maternal work. Where the personal understanding stays within its unity of nature and has dealings with it, there the Father-nature carries maternal names and does a mother's work, for it is purely a mother's work to receive the seed of the eternal Word. In this inner thought, the mother-nature carries fatherly names and does fatherly work.

The fourth question is this. Does the Father take part in this work at every moment, or only now and then? I say he acts at every moment. If he paused for a single instant he would cancel himself out. For the eternal Word is the image of the Father as he conceives himself in his character as Person, with the added dignity that the eternal Word receives in its own Person, namely all the perfection the Father has and all the power proper to his nature. The heretical teacher Arius says about this: it seems to me untrue that the eternal Word receives all the perfection the Father has and all the power proper to his nature, since it cannot do what the Father does. It cannot beget another Son. But as Saint Augustine says, he does not beget another Son though he has the power to do so, because it is not fitting for him to do it. Some teachers misread this statement, taking it to mean that the Son could beget another Son if he wished. This is wrong, for then the Person of the Son would be the Person of the Father. The reason he does not do it is this. Each Person receives the same nature, but in different ways: the Father as fatherhood, the Son as sonship, and the Holy Spirit as what the two produce together. Here the Persons are the concrete expression of the nature, each Person receiving the one nature all at once as essence. Where the Word receives its dignity, the three shine with one light, since they share this light as their common being. The dignity the eternal Word receives through birth is to be equal with the Father, since it springs from the Father's own inner understanding. As confined to this understanding it is nothing other than the divine nature itself. In its aspect as Word, it is distinct as Person, yet one undivided essence in nature.

Here the question arises. How can the eternal Word be at once distinct and one simple divine essence in nature? The best answer theologians give is that this comes from the undividedness and simplicity of that nature. The whole content of the divine nature is one undivided essence which acts through the divine nature. May we reach this oneness as far as it is possible for us to do so. So help us God. Amen.