We return again to the topic equipped with some understanding in light of the above.

Aristotle used the word person hypostasis In the general, not the philosophical, sense (Socrates, Ecclesiastical History, Book 3:7 in Minn. 67:395 and Loski, p. 49): Al-Qaim is real, “the one who stands”, from the verb “he rose” (Loski).

Aristotle used the expression “according to the hypostasis” in the sense of “actually, truly” (The World, 4:25), and the word hypostasis in the sense of “heavy precipitation” (The Space, Book 2, Chapter 2:14).

In the language, it means “the one who is truly established,” “the one who is established.”

The Stoics used it as a synonym for the word “essence,” “ousia.”

Plotinus used it in relation to his trinity: the one, the mind, and the soul. Also meaning: “the special form” (Encyclopedia V, Book I, Chapter 7)

It was mentioned in the ancient and new Greek Bible, as mentioned above.

The Church Fathers used it before and after the Council of Nicaea, as will follow.

It has many meanings. It is synonymous with the word “essence,” ousia. However, a fundamental difference distinguishes them: they both define a fundamental, objective existence. They define what exists, what exists.

But “essence,” ousia, tends rather to mean internal relationships and characteristics or metaphysical reality, while “hypostasis” refers to the external, realistic character of the essence.

The Church Fathers had to confront Arianism forcefully.

The First Ecumenical Council (325) used the two words as synonyms. Athanasius the Great continued to do so. However, at the Council of Alexandria (362), he dispelled the disagreement and clarified the agreement at the core of the doctrine: one essence of the Trinity in three personal hypostases that have one and the same essence, homoousios.

The First Ecumenical Council used the two words as synonyms.

Origen was the first to use the word "Hystases" to refer to the Trinity. He used the word person. Hippolytus of Rome, who died in 235, applied the word prosopon to the Father and the Son. Tertullian, who died after 220, used the Latin word persona frequently (The Secret of Management, pp. 202-203).

It has been mentioned that Aristotle distinguished between the first essences and the second essences. The first means individual entities, established individuals. He gave an example: “This man, this horse” for the first one. The second is “essences” not as an abstract idea, but as a fundamental reality present in the individual, for example: “humans and animals.”

But this does not lead us to Christian concepts, nor to belief in hypostases as persons. The concept of the person entered thought through Christianity, while the philosophy of “essences” and “generalities” dominated Greek thought. Even if Aristotle mentioned the individual, this remains very far from: 1- The concept of the person 2- The concept of the oneness of essence in the three hypostases. His concept of the individual can be applied to humans, animals, and things. Where is the person then?

Since only a truly existing being exists, the concept of the unity of essence between hypostases without division or multiplicity of essence is also absent from Aristotle.

The Cappadocian Fathers took over (44) Expression of our faith: One God is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Three are not faces or names of the One and Only One. Sunday is not an abstract numerical unit, i.e. 1, 2, 3.

The Father is a self-existent God. The Son is a self-existing God. The Holy Spirit is a self-existent God. But they are not 3 gods, but rather one indivisible God (The Secret of Management, pp. 203-204).

The word “hypostasis” means “the personal entity” of each of the persons of the Trinity.

The Trinity contains the essence. There is no essence outside the hypostases.

The essence exists in the hypostases.

The hypostasis is what exists in truth and reality.

The essence is the being l`etre of God Himself, as Basil says (Against Ephenomius, p. 206 of No. 96, of the Springs). The hypostasis contains the essence. He is the container and the essence is the content, the content.

The essence exists in the hypostasis. Divinity exists in the hypostasis.

The Church Fathers place great emphasis on the idea of the hypostasis as an asset and on the essence as an object.

The hypostasis is indivisible. It is not accepted to be composed with another hypostasis. The two essences (soul and body) exist in the human person. The composition between them is a reality. But it is impossible to compose a person from two people, because each person is a whole. The hypostasis is not transferred to others, as it is the one who completely contains the essence. It unites everything that is in it.

It is completely independent from every other hypostasis (45).

He holds under His authority everything that is in Him.

The hypostasis acquires, dominates. As for nature, it does.

The hypostasis is that every real concret contains all that is in it.

This theology is existential and personal. For God who exists eternally, the issue of existence and essence does not arise because He exists eternally, because He contains His essence eternally. Essence did not precede existence, nor did existence precede essence, because they are eternal, that is, without beginning or end.

It goes without saying that realistic differentiation between the hypostases is impossible except in the field of pure thought.

The Holy Fathers said that the entire divinity is present in each of the hypostases (The Secret of Dispensation, pp. 185-187).

If we say that the Son and the Holy Spirit are not two gods, the Trinity will be eliminated.

Tertullian, who died after 220, said that the new thing that Christianity brought that distinguished it from Judaism was the belief that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are the only God (Against Praxeaas 31). The most important difference between them is the divinity of the Son and the Holy Spirit, which a person is not a Christian if he does not believe in them.

Basil the Great on this. Whoever denies the divinity of the Son is considered a non-Christian: he has denied the faith (against Ephenomius 22:2, p. 91, issue 305 of Christian Springs). According to this opinion, Athanasius and all the fathers of the Church, as De Reunion said.

As for saying that the three hypostases are 3 divided gods, it is a fall into paganism, into which John Philip of Apamea fell in the sixth century (The Secret of Management, pp. 30 and 204).

The First Ecumenical Council (325) used the word “homousios” to express that the Father and the Son are one and the same essence.

The Constitution of Reconciliation (433) and the Fourth Ecumenical Council (451) used it to say that the essence of the Son is equal to the essence of his Father theologically, and equal to us humanly. We will look into that later. We notice from now on:

The Son’s equality with the Father is not his equality with us. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit possess a single essence in and of themselves. They have one and the same essence completely, an essence that is indivisible among themselves, without there being any separation or emptiness between them, because each of them exists, is present, and exists in the others without mixing. Everything in the Trinity is an essence (Basil) and there is no accident at all in it.

As for us humans, we are individuals separate from each other.

Human nature is in us. But each of us has it individually.

None of us resides in the other completely or partially (The Secret of Management 204 and 205).

Polytheism refers to the multiplicity of essences. Divinity is one because the essence is one.

Divinity is essence, as the three Cappadocians said (The Secret of Management 30).

The role of the Cappadocians was great in distinguishing between the one and only essence shared between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit (and between) the persons of the Trinity.

The Cappadocians taught what Christians still believe today:

Divinity is one, existing completely in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, without being divided among them, or compounded or multiple.

It is entirely the Father's, entirely the Son's, and entirely the Holy Spirit's.

They called the one essence ousia and physis nature. They called the personal form “hypostasis.”

The essence ousia is the essential being of God, unapproachable and incomprehensible. As for nature, it is for attributes. The hypostasis of personal qualities: the quality of existence.

“Our saying this does not mean at all that we say a first God, a second God, and a third God. Always in the Trinity, one = three. The number here is not the same as in arithmetic. God cannot increase, so we can say: 1+1+1 =3. Basil says: “We recognize the individuality of hypostases without dividing nature into plurals.” The number 3 is not a quantity, but rather expresses the indescribable order in divinity.

Indeed, Gregory the Theologian said: “The three are one in divinity. One Sunday is three with personalities.”

Maximus the Confessor, who died in 662, said that God is “equally unity and Trinity.”

The distinction between the hypostases is limited to the non-birth of the Father, the birth of the Son, and the emanation of the Holy Spirit.

Other than that, everything is in common: their being is one, their essence is one, their divinity is one, their divinity is one, their will is one, their actions are one, their authority is one, their glory is one...

Divinity does not exist abstractly from the hypostases, but rather it actually exists in the hypostases. It does not exist outside of them.

If we remember God, the Trinity comes to our mind. If we mention the Trinity, God comes to mind.

Gregory the Theologian said: “When I speak about God, you should feel that you are immersed in one light and three lights.”

He also said: “When I name God, I call the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. “The hypostases are the reality of divinity. The hypostases are “united in distinction and distinct in unity” (Basil and the Theologian).

Everything that belongs to the Father is to the Son and the Holy Spirit, except non-birth, birth, and emanation.

This is not shared. These are personal characteristics.

The essence is also the foundation of each of the hypostases inhabiting the other two hypostases without mixing or division, in a love that transcends all reason and description. Each of them is present for the other on Monday. That is, unity of essence means the presence of each hypostasis in the other two hypostases.

Birth and emergence are not an accidental event that occurred at a specific time.

Birth and emergence are eternal: that is, the Son, for example, was not born of the Father for so many billion years.

Rather, He is always born of the Father and united with Him as an eternal ray of splendid light.

Birth is spiritual and eternal before all creation existed. As well as emanation.

The Father is spread out and expanded in the Spirit, and the Son and to Him are their return. It is the source, the source of unity and divinity in the Trinity.

He gives the Son and the Spirit his nature, which remains one, indivisible, undivided, and equal to itself in three (The Secret of Dispensation, 204-206 and 31).

The Son and the Spirit proceed from the person of the Father: the Son by birth and the Holy Spirit by emanation. The Father is the cause. The person of the Father begets and proceeds. His person is the cause (46).

What is the difference between birth and emergence? we do not know. God knows (The Theologian, Al-Dhahabi, John of Damascus, and others: Loski, p. 54, De Reunion 124-126, Al-Damashqi, p. 68, and Surr Al-Tadar, p. 26).

What is hypostasis?

Theodoretus, Bishop of Cyrus, who died in 457, said:

“In worldly philosophy, there is no difference between the ousia and the hypostasis, because the ousia means “what is,” and the hypostasis means “what exists.” But according to the opinion of the fathers (saints), there is the same difference between the ousia and the hypostasis as there is between the general and the particular.

Al-Dimashqi defined “essence” ousia as follows:

“The essence is the thing that exists and does not need anything else in order to be coagulated. Or also: The essence is a whole that exists in itself, and does not contain its being in another.

It is, therefore, what is not for another, what does not have existence in another, what does not need another for its coagulation, but what is in itself. And in it the presentation contains existence.”

Aristotle distinguished between essence and accident. Here the symptom is present in the essence. This is a response to Aristotle.

Theodoretos mentioned the hypostasis and said:

“The word “hypostasis” has two meanings: Sometimes it designates existence only, and according to this meaning, essence and hypostasis are synonymous. That is why some fathers said: “essences” or “hypostases.”

And “at times it means what exists in itself and in its self-coagulation. According to this meaning, it means: an individual who is numerically different from everyone else, such as Peter, Paul, and this horse, for example.

“The hypostasis is the particular that exists according to itself: it is an essence with its symptoms (47) It enjoys an independent, autonomous existence, separated from other hypostases forcefully and effectively.” Attention must be paid to the words “forcefully and actually”. The issue is not theoretically intellectual, but actual.

Al-Dimashqi knew the person:

“It is the self that manifests itself through its actions and properties as distinct from other two beings who have the same (same) nature.”

So: Al-Dimashqi emphasizes the subjective, separate, and independent existence of the hypostasis.

The essence is one in the hypostases

But the hypostasis has its own independent self-existence that distinguishes it from others. He has his individuality, independence and unity.

It contains the essence and hypostatic or personal properties. There is nothing outside of it.

The essence is the general and the hypostasis is the specific. It is not specific in the sense that he owns a portion of the substance but does not own the rest. It is specific in a numerical sense, since it is individual.

The difference between the hypostases lies in number, not in essence.

“It is impossible to compose a composite of complete hypostases. The race does not consist of hypostases, but rather exists in hypostases.”

The essence does not have an independent existence, while the hypostasis has an independent existence. The hypostases are characterized by their inability to be transferred

Nature is shared among members of the species in theory.

As for the hypostasis, it is specific to its owner. It is not transferred to others, and others do not share with it its distinctive hypostatic properties (The Secret of Management 206-208).

The Father is specialized in not giving birth. This property of his was not transferred to the Son and the Holy Spirit. The son specializes in childbirth. He is an only son, with no second, and he did not transfer the privilege of his birth to another. The Holy Spirit specializes in emanation. Father is father. And the son is a son. And the Holy Spirit emerges. These properties are specific, not general, among the hypostases.

Basil the Great explained the relationship and difference between hypostasis and essence in a letter he sent to his brother Gregory of Nyssa, and in his book Against Ephnomius. He gave the example of man and individual people, such as Peter, Paul, and Solonus.

“Human” is a general term that can be applied to countless human beings. As for Peter, Paul, or Silvanus, it is special.

There must be “a sign of distinction by which we can understand not man in general, but Peter or John in particular.”

Peter and John are special. There is no extension, then, to what is general in nature. If we want an investigation into the essence of humanity, we do not give a definition of the essence in the matter of Peter, another definition in the matter of Paul, and a third definition in the matter of Silvanus. The same words are used in all three cases because they have one essence.

But after the investigator knows “what is common and pays attention to the distinguishing characteristics by which one is distinguished from the other, the definition of each does not coincide with the definition of the other in all characteristics, even if there is agreement in some points.”

What is said “in a particular and subjective way” is referred to as a hypostasis. Suppose we say “man.” Nature is certain, but what exists and which is specifically determined and in itself is not clear.

I suppose we say “Paul.” We thereby declare the existing, existing nature to which the name refers.”

He continued, saying: “The hypostasis is not the indefinite concept of essence that does not find any fixed abode due to the generality of the thing in question. But it is what restricts and confines the common and the indeterminate, in a being, through apparent characteristics.”

In his letter, Basil continues to deduce the characteristics, intrinsic properties, characteristics, and circumstances that determine the individual character of man, separate him from the general and common idea, and do not enter into defining nature.

Then he says: “Transfer to the divine beliefs the same pattern of differentiation that you approve of in the case of essence and hypostasis in human matters, so do not move in a misguided manner.”

There is what is common in the Trinity and what is distinct. “The common goes back to the essence, and the hypostasis is the distinguishing and distinguishing mark” (Epistle 38: 2-5 and against Ephnomius 1: 10 and 2: 28 in No. 299, p. 204 and 206 of Al-Yanabi’, p. 20 of No. 305 and 4: 1... in the Greek Minn).

Properties, as observable features and forms in essence, establish a distinction in what is common by virtue of the features that make them special, but they do not destroy the equality of nature. (48). For example, divinity is common, but fatherhood and prophecy are specific (i.e., each of them belongs to its hypostasis). “Birth and non-birth are two distinct properties” (Against Ephenomius 2: 28 and 29, pp. 120 and 122 of No. 305 of Christian Springs).

He said in letter 236:

“The distinction between essence and hypostasis is the same as what is between the general and the specific, just as it is, for example, between an animal and a specific human being... If we do not have a distinct understanding of the distinguishing properties, i.e. paternity, sonship, and sanctification, but we form our concept of God (starting) from the general idea of existence, then we cannot We give a sound account of our faith. We must, then, profess faith by adding the specific to the common. Divinity is shared, (either) fatherhood is specific.

“We must, then, mix the two and say: “I believe in God the Father... I believe in God the Son...” Thus we find a satisfactory protection for unity (that) in our recognition of one Godhead, while in distinguishing the individual properties observed in each one (of the hypostases) there is recognition of the special properties of the hypostases. “.

I, his brother Gregory, highlight the independence of the hypostasis, its spontaneity, its self-reliance, its movement from itself, its possession of reason, will, permanent action, and omnipotence, and the distinction of each hypostasis from the other.

He says about the Son, the Word of God, that he has “an independent life, not a participation in life” (Catechism, chapters 1-2).

He confirms that the divine essence is not divided, nor is it distributed among the hypostases in such a way that there are 3 essences, just as there are 3 persons (The Secret of Management 210).

As for Gregory the Theologian, he said: “They worship the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the one divinity. God the Father, God the Son, God, and the Holy Spirit are one nature in three rational properties, complete, self-existent, distinguished by number, but not distinguished by divinity” (Sermon 33:16 in Christian Springs, Issue 118, pp. 192-194). When he commented on the Lord’s saying to Moses: “I am the One who is” (Exodus 3:14), he said: “He (God) gathers and contains in Himself all that is, since He has no beginning in the past or an end in the future... transcending every concept of time and nature.” (Sermon 45:3).

Dionysius the Impostor (the Syrian who wrote between 500-510) echoed this and said:

“When God was speaking to Moses, he did not say: I am the essence, but rather: “I am the being.” He is the essential cause of all existence, the Maker of being, substance, essence, and essences” (Divine Names 5:4)

So: The Cappadocian Fathers insisted on the personal existence of the hypostases. The hypostases are the actual realities of divinity. They are bearers of divinity.

Divinity does not exist outside the hypostases, but rather it exists in them. They are divinity, they are the divine essence. The divine person has an independent existence. It is a source of nature and not its product, radiance or internal radiance. He is the person of the living God who has a unique mode of existence.

God appeared to Moses as a personal, existing “being” and not as an entity. This was expressed most clearly by Gregory Palamas, who died in 1359, when he said:

When God was speaking to Moses, he did not say: “I am the essence,” but rather “I am the being.”

Therefore, it is not “being” that emanates from essence, but rather essence that emanates from “being,” because “being” includes within itself the entire existing being.”

“L`entité precedes not only essence, but all beings, because it is the first existence.”

“Essence is necessarily a being. But being is not necessarily essence” (from Minderoff, Christ in Byzantine Theology, p. 292 - French).

Thus, Palamas did not acknowledge the equation of all being with essence.

Therefore, God can appear in His very being while remaining incapable of being contributed to His essence. In essence: God is unapproachable. He connects to us by His grace, by His powers. Thus, his being emanates from his essence. His powers how to exist are special. He is in it. Through it we unite with Him.

God is not essentially close to Him, but He is existentially present with His omnipotence in the created universe (on Meyendorff, p. 293). In other words, it was mentioned previously: God is not approached as an essence, but His powers descend to us, so we possess His grace, which is a power emanating from Him. The Sixth Ecumenical Council (680-681) and the theologians that followed it, even Palamas and before them, decided the existence of action and powers of God as a basic condition for the existence of essence.

So all essence remains a pure abstraction if it is not revealed realistically and existentially in action: God appears because He acts (Basil, Epistle 189: 76 and... The Secret of Management, p. 211): a wonderful existential realism.

It has been mentioned that Augustine says, like Palamas, that grace is not created.

This personalist-existentialist theological position led Mindorff to denounce the metaphysics of Greek essences and praise the metaphysics of personalism and Christian existentialism (pp. 289-310, especially 310).

We have previously said that the Father is concerned with paternity, the Son with sonship, and the Spirit with emanation, and that each of them resides in the other and is present to the other. Each of them is transparent to the other. None of them obscures the other, but rather dwells in him and loves him with a love that exceeds all limits and description.

Now, what is the relationship between the hypostases?

We say: The Son is born of the Father.

This specifies: how to (49) The hypostasis of the Son, but does not exhaust the reality of His person. The person is not inobjectivable, exhausted, or replaceable by something lower and simpler.

Therefore, personal truth goes beyond ontology (i.e., the science of being), and becomes méta-ontologique. The concepts of “nature” and “being” do not limit it or surround it, because they are far from all of this and mean absolute originalité uniqueness and pure difference.

When we ask about a person, we do not say: “What is he?” Rather, we say: “Who is he?” It is not a thing or a topic. It is not a topic for us to know and define.

Therefore, it is referred to, not known, and determined to the point that it is not an object of knowledge. Personal time, where every ontology is contained and defined, constitutes a “meta-ontology.” The person's secret is outside the horizon of ontology. Loski and Berdyaev see that “the image of God is man as a person” (Loski 52, 114-123 and Olivier Clément, pp. 152-174 and Berdyaev, pp. 166, 174, 180).

This new horizon in theology and anthropology broke the chain of ancient Greek philosophy, which focused on essence, reason, logic, and the general thing (Berdyaev, p. 181 and Meunier, pp. 10-16).

Therefore, Christianity is truly the institution of personalist philosophy in the modern sense of the subject (Loski, p. 52).

We only have a section on the person of Jesus in the section on the divine incarnation (see The Secret of Management).

 

 

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(44) They are Basil (379), his brother Gregory of Nyssa (395), and their friend Gregory the Theologian (389/390).

(45) The human hypostasis is the center of the union of two completely different essences: the soul and the body. It serves as a center of activity by them. It is manifested in and through them. He is in them and they are in him. He is the master owner and they are the two owned ones. He does both. Personalism does not present the matter like Aristotle, Descartes, and Western philosophy, nor does it present the opposition: soul and body. The person is one in two essences. We had given a detailed response (which was not published) to the famous Dr. Boulos Chauchar’s talk to “Al-Safar” magazine, because he was influenced by Aristotle. Who is the person? It is “I”. Who is “I”? I don't know, God knows: a secret. Oh the glory of God in the structure of man! Everything in it glorifies God.

(46) We attribute emanating birth to the person of the Father, not to the common essence. Otherwise, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit would be unbegotten, begotten, and emanating. The Father essentially and naturally begot the Son. The Son is essentially born of the Father's hypostasis. The Father essentially and naturally emanated the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit proceeds essentially and naturally from the Father. The Father did not give birth to the Son by his own action or will, otherwise his essence would be other than that of the Father. He generated him from his essence eternally, without beginning or end. Jesus is born from eternity to eternity. The father is a father as well. The Holy Spirit also emerges. Birth is eternal. Emergence is eternal: they are always continuous. They did not occur in time, otherwise the Son and the Holy Spirit would have been creatures, not creators. They emanated from the will of the Father, not from his essence (the Cappadocians, Cyril of Alexandria, etc.).

(47) A contradiction to Aristotle.

(48) opophyés in Greek. Similar wording to onousios. Meaning: the one who has one and the same nature.

(49) Al-Dimashqi 1: 8, p. 68. That is, birth is how the Son exists, just as emanation is how the Holy Spirit exists: “mode d`existence.” The distinction is in the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, in the uncaused and the effected, and in the unbegotten, the begotten, and the proceeding. For these do not indicate the essence, but rather the relationship of one of them to the other, and the manner of their existence” (Al-Dimashqi, p. 75, the English translation included two important footnotes to Al-Dimashqi’s sources, p. 12, column 2 in the post-Nicene collection. The Arab translator used the word “ratio” instead of The relationship of sxesis, all its meanings, indicates a status, not a relation of one thing to another thing. The relationship of the Father to the Son is fatherhood, and the Holy Spirit to the Father is emanation. These are hypostatic ties between the Persons. The Father is the cause and the Son is the effect of prophecy. But it does not define the person of the Son, who is beyond all definitions and limits. Likewise, God revealed to us a glimmer of Him. But His truth is unknown. He revealed to us what is necessary for our salvation through the blood of His Son and the grace of His Holy Spirit.