The Second Helvetic Confession: 3: Week 4
Chapter III—Of God, His Unity And Trinity
God Is One.
1. We believe and teach that God is one in essence or nature, subsisting in himself, all sufficient in himself, invisible, incorporeal, immense, eternal, Creator of all things both visible and invisible, the greatest good, living, quickening and preserving all things, omnipotent and supremely wise, kind and merciful, just and true. [2.] Truly we detest many gods because it is expressly written: “The Lord your God is one Lord” (Deut. 6:4). “I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods before me” (Ex. 20:2-3). “I am the Lord, and there is no other god besides me. Am I not the Lord, and there is no other God beside me? A righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides me” ((Isa. 45:5, 21). “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” (Ex. 34:6).
God Is Three.
3a. Notwithstanding we believe and teach that the same immense, one and indivisible God is in person inseparably and without confusion distinguished as Father, Son and Holy Spirit so, as the Father has begotten the Son from eternity, the Son is begotten by an ineffable generation, and the holy Spirit truly proceeds from them both, and the same from eternity and is to be worshipped with both.
3b. Thus there are not three gods, but three persons, cosubstantial, coeternal, and coequal; distinct with respect to hypostases, and with respect to order, the one preceding the other yet without any inequality. For according to the nature or essence they are so joined together that they are one God, and the divine nature is common to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
4. For Scripture has delivered to us a manifest distinction of persons, the angel saying, among other things, to the Blessed Virgin, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God” (Luke 1:35). And also in the baptism of Christ a voice is heard from heaven concerning Christ, saying, “This is my beloved Son” (Math. 3:17). The Holy Spirit also appeared in the form of a dove (John 1:32). And when the Lord himself commanded the apostles to baptize, he commanded them to baptize “in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 28:19). Elsewhere in the Gospel he said: “The Father will send the Holy Spirit in my name” (John 14:26), and again he said: “When the Counselor comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me,” etc. (John 15:26). In short, we receive the Apostles’ Creed because it delivers to us the true faith.
Heresies.
5. Therefore we condemn the Jews and Mohammedans, and all those who blaspheme that sacred and adorable Trinity. We also condemn all heresies and heretics who teach that the Son and Holy Spirit are God in name only, and also that there is something created and subservient, or subordinate to another in the Trinity, and that their is something unequal in it, a greater or a less, something corporeal or corporeally conceived, something different with respect to character or will, something mixed or solitary, as if the Son and Holy Spirit were the affections and properties of one God the Father, as the Monarchians, Novatians, Praxeas, Patripassians, Sabellius, Paul of Samosata, A̛ëtius, Macedonius, Anthropomorphites, Arius, and such like, have thought.
Mohammedanism: An old term for Islam, which denies the Trinity.
Monarchism: A third-century family of heresies having in common the belief that God the Father was the only God. Dynamic monarchism held that Jesus was a special man (but just a man) adopted by God and empowered (hence dynamic) to do his will. Modalist monarchism (also known as modalism) held that the three persons of the Trinity are modes or manifestations of the single undivided God. NDT
Novatian: (fl. 250) Usually remembered for a schism caused by his belief that Christians who denied the faith in face of persecution could not be readmitted to the church. NDT mentions only positive things in relation to his view of the Trinity, so I am not sure why he is included in this list.
Praxeas: (fl. 200) An exponent of modalism. NDT W
Patripassians: A term used by the orthodox in reference to modalists, who believed God the Father suffered on the cross.
Sabellius: (fl. 210) His name has become synonymous with modalism; technically he preached a particular form where God as monad sequentially ‘unfolded’ as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. NDT
Paul of Somosata: (fl. 268) A chief exponent of dynamic monarchism. He held ‘Jesus entered progressively into such an ethical relationship with God that he became the more penetrated with the divine ousia until “out of man he became God”.’ (p. 441) NDT
Aëtius of Antioch: (fl. 350) A radical Arian, leader of the Anomoean (trans. dissimilar) sect.NDT W
Macedonius: (4th cent.) was binitarian, denying the divinity of the Holy Spirit. Perhaps one of the best theological words was coined by the orthodox to describe the Macedonians: pneumatomachi: fighters against the Spirit. W
Anthropomorphites: fashioned God in the image of man, treating anthropomorphic metaphors as literal. There appear to have been several sects. NACE
Arius: (c. 250–336) Held that the Son was created by the Father, and then the Son created the rest of creation. One of the Arians hymn as a line about ‘there was when he was not.’ An orthodox hymn responded ‘there was not when he was not’.NDT
