The Agencies of God’s Word and Spirit: Modern Science as a “Sacred Reminder”

Abstract

In this essay, I argue that modern science can function as a source of “sacred reminders” for aspects of Christian theology, like the doctrine of the Trinity, that are not normally engaged with in the empirical world. This approach is an alternative to the usual ways of relating scientific and theological endeavors in terms of conflict, separation, or consonance. I demonstrate this by beginning with the thoughts of two representative physicists (John Archibald Wheeler and Steven Hawking), particularly focusing on a fundamental distinction they make about the underlying ideal of the physical sciences. Noting a striking similarity of this distinction with some of the biblical imagery of God’s Word and Spirit, I review biblical texts along these lines to show partial continuity with the groundbreaking ideas of our physicists, and to show how they can be generalized to include (a) levels of organization beyond those of physics; (b) intensive, localized agencies of Word and Spirit as well as the more extensive agencies suggested their ideas; and (c) the commissioning agency of God the Father. A review of the theology of Irenaeus shows that these distinctions in biblical imagery were developed in the early Church and played an important role in early Trinitarian theology.

1. Introduction

Biblical texts are rich with imagery surrounding the divine Word and Spirit,1 their relations to God, and their agencies in the created order.2 They exhibit a variety of images that defy neat systematization. Any attempt to do justice to this variety must approach the subject from a particular viewpoint or question, theological or otherwise. My purpose in this essay will be to review those verbal images in a way that resonates with the understanding of the natural order, as proposed by two well-known modern physicists. In theological terms, these hints of an immaterial presence and agency in the physical world may be seen as a fresh way of framing the classical idea of the vestigia Trinitatis—the worldly vestiges or imprints of the triune God.3 In this way, the thoughts of physicists about their own endeavors can serve as a “sacred reminder” to Christians for aspects of biblical theology that are not normally engaged with the empirical world. So, my main objective here will be to include the thinking of physicists in our conversations about theology. The result will contribute to our understanding of the distinctive ways in which members of the divine Triad function in the created order.

Over fifty years ago, Donald Walhout published a seminal article on “Other Religions as Sacred Reminders”, in which he showed that the beliefs and practices of other religions can remind us of features that are currently forgotten or neglected in accounts of our own religious tradition.4 This relationship is, therefore, a “self-reflective” one between religions rather than a theological assessment of other religions from the perspective of one’s own (p. 201). For example, learning about the idea of ahimsa, the mandate to avoid causing harm to other beings in the indigenous religions of India, can remind us, particularly in Euro-American societies, of the reverence for life found in the biblical wisdom literature and the teachings of Jesus (which Walhout refers to as a “subdominant theme” in present-day Christianity, pp. 204–5). For other cases, Walhout states, “when in another religion, we come across a more specific utterance, a more definite stance, on a subject than we are accustomed to find in our own thought, we are reminded of unfinished business and the need for more reflection” (which Walhout refers to as a “unclarified butter”, pp. 205–6).

I suggest that the same relationship may hold true for Christian theology and the beliefs and practices of other disciplines like modern physics that are usually regarded as being completely secular.5 Thinking about scientific endeavors can not only remind us of theological issues that need clarification, but it can also provide us with a fresh way of addressing them. In this case, the attribute of “sacredness” is based on the beliefs underpinning modern scientific endeavors6 that were inspired by the historic Judeo–Christian creationist tradition, rather than overtly religious content.7

The work of modern physicists is certainly not the only vantage point from which to think about theology.8 Most people find writings about physics challenging in the abstract austerity of its concepts and their distance from everyday life as we experience it. However, physics is one of the truly creative endeavors of our time, and its main ideas lie just beneath the surface of the technologies that we rely on day by day. Moreover, physics gives us an in-depth view of the natural world that our God has created. Even though no one-to-one correlation is feasible between the ideas of modern physicists and those of the Bible, approaching theology from this angle enables us to use the categories of scientific endeavor in our understanding of biblical theology, and vice versa.9

2. Guiding Insights from Two Modern Physicists

In thinking about the vestiges—or vestigial agencies10—of the triune God (the holy Trinity)11 in our world, I have been inspired by ideas that come from two of the theoretical physicists of the previous generation: John Archibald Wheeler (1911–2008) and Stephen William Hawking (1942–2018). Both made intriguing statements about the ultimate goal of their work that point to a shared understanding in the community of physicists. These ideas will serve as a recurring reference point in our discussion of biblical and early Christian theology.

One of the main desiderata that motivate physicists is the formulation of a “final theory” that would unify all fundamental physical phenomena in a small set of mathematical laws (equations) and principles, or even in one single law. Whether that goal is attainable in the long run or not, it is the ideal that motivates physicists to find ways of unifying all the forces of nature and those forces with all the fundamental particles in a way that accounts for phenomena like neutrino oscillations, black holes, dark matter, and dark energy. In the words of physicist–cosmologist Stephen Hawking, finding that final theory would mean that “we would know the mind of God”, at least as far as the physical level of creation is concerned.12

Although Hawking was an avowed “unbeliever” in conventional Christian terms, he was articulating a biblical insight better than many theologians do. In biblical terms, the “mind of God” that governs the organization and the evolution of the physical cosmos is usually called the Word (or Wisdom) of God,13 which is designated the second member14 of the divine Triad, the “Son of God”, in Christian theology.15 The creative Mind or Word of God is first manifested in the laws and principles that determine the form of the natural world and inform its evolution.16 So, if we want to find vestiges of the triune God in the world governed by physics, we can do no better than to begin with the very laws of nature that Christians sometimes fear will exclude God (i.e., a “God-of-the-gaps”) from the world around us. These laws manifest at the sensible, empirical level, but they are not in themselves empirical, spacetime entities like the phenomena they govern—they are not encoded in a software program hidden in the interior of fundamental particles or in the vastness of cosmic fields of force.

Consider the Pauli “exclusion principle”, for example. It governs all the fermions (subatomic particles having spins in odd-numbered multiples of one half), and it explains why ordinary matter does not instantaneously collapse. Yet the exclusion principle does not exert a force on the particles that it governs, and it is not inscribed anywhere in space or time. Mathematical laws like these constitute the agency that governs the form of the empirical realm and informs its emergence and evolution.17

This association of physical laws with the divine Mind, Intelligence, or Word is not a new idea. It has often been noted by biblical writers, philosophers, and theologians before.18 By itself, moreover, it is clearly incomplete from the standpoint of Christian theology. The vestigial agency here relates only to God as the Creative Mind or Creator Word. From the trinitarian perspective of traditional Christianity, it misses the complementary work of the Holy Spirit. There is more to God than a cosmic Intellect—more to be said about creation than God pronouncing a master equation.

I find another example of this idea in the words of a leading theoretical physicist of the postwar period, John Archibald Wheeler. When he was asked about finding a final theory to explain the existence and evolution of the material world, Wheeler began by saying: “There must be at the bottom of it all an utterly simple, if not an equation, an idea”.19

This much agrees with what, with Hawking’s help, we have associated theologically with the vestigial agency of the divine Word. What caught my attention was what Wheeler went on to say: “There is nothing deader than an equation…. Yet the universe flies. It has a life in it that no equation has”.20 Mathematical laws and equations are one part of what brings our world into being; whatever it is that actualizes the laws, gives them a life of their own, is another.21

By using the word “life”, Wheeler suggested a meaningful connection to “giver of life”, which is one of the main attributes of the Holy Spirit in trinitarian theology (Greek zōopoión in the third article of the Niceno–Constantinopolitan Creed). We normally associate that quality with organic life, or even with our own individual lives. But it can also apply, as Wheeler suggested for the foundational, physical level, to whatever it is that makes the mathematical formalism, or foundational “idea” of the universe, get up and “fly”.

Stephen Hawking was also aware that something like this was assumed in scientific cosmology, and he raised questions that provide us with two further verbal images that suggest the vestigial agency of the Spirit. Like Wheeler, he argued that even if the mathematical equations may be complete, a rational explanation in natural philosophy requires a way of making the equations operative so that they actually do something:

“Even if there is only one possible unified theory, it is just a set of rules and equations. What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe? … Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing?”22

Our two physicists have highlighted the need for an actualizing agency, a “life”, “breath”, or “fire”, without which the mathematical laws would be sterile.23 We might add that such actualizing “fire” would be aimless without some kind of laws to channel it. The former is required to make things happen, but the latter is needed to provide creative direction to the “fire”.24

The task of the physicist is to formulate and test equations, not to pursue the more metaphysical questions of actuality and existence. But the short, pithy statements of Wheeler and Hawking provide some clues of theological value. The terms they offer were intended to be metaphorical (as is much of theological language). They do not refer to physical forces or physical energy, but to the immaterial laws governing the physics of force and energy and an immaterial agency that actualizes them.25 My point is that they can serve as “sacred reminders” of biblical imagery regarding the roles of God’s Word and Spirit and make that imagery more relevant to the empirical world in which we live.

For those already familiar with biblical imagery, the words “life”, “breath”, and “fire” suggest the agency of the Spirit of God,26 an agency that complements the formative, governing agency of the divine Word.27 At the very beginning of the biblical narrative, when God began to create heaven and earth,28 the wind or spirit of God (Hebrew, ruach elohim) was already sweeping over the primordial items of creation (Gen. 1:2c), and it was accompanied by ten creational decrees,29 with which God formed and informed the primordial elements30 (unformed earth, darkness, waters) to produce the ordered, fruitful cosmos.31 In a Christian reading of Genesis One, the Spirit and the Word of God worked together to accomplish the will of God.32 For readers of the New Testament, something very similar occurred at the baptism of Jesus, when the hovering/anointing of the Spirit was accompanied by the declaration of God, “This is my Son”, thus initiating a renewal of creation (Mark 1:10–12; cf. Luke 4:14, 18–19; Acts 10:38). Jesus’ commissioning words to his disciples were similarly accompanied by his Spirit-granting breath (John 20:21–22; cf. Luke 24:46–49). In passages such as these, we have a recurring combination of an enabling, actualizing spirit33 and defining word.34

As we shall see in the following sections of this essay, this dialectic of the governing word and actualizing breath/spirit can be traced through the various stages of the scriptural narrative: creation, (universal) providence, revelation, and personal transformation (renewal and sanctification), thereby organizing the imagery of biblical texts in accordance with the ideas suggested by our two physicists. This approach will coordinate the many ways in which God’s Word and Spirit play active roles in our world at a range of levels, both physical and spiritual.

3. Generalizing the Agencies of God’s Word and Spirit

Based on this analysis of the cosmos at the physical level, we may first discern the vestigial agencies of the divine Word and Spirit using the dialectic of lawfulness and actuality suggested by our physicists. In other words, there is in the natural world a synergy and coordination between the agencies of the second and third members of the divine Triad, which is termed the “economic Trinity”.35 These vestigial agencies of Word and Spirit are extensive (distributive) and everlasting—they permeate every aspect of our world, including humanity, and persist, wherever applicable, throughout time.36

This natural-science-based interpretation of vestigia Trinitatis can be generalized, however, to include biblical descriptions of the Word and Spirit in relation to select human beings. In contrast to the extensive, cosmic agencies of Word and Spirit, these agencies are intensive, locative, personalized, and episodic.37 They manifest themselves as divine encounters with receptive humans at specific times and places. Such divine–human encounters occur both in revelations (“special revelation”) and in transformations (renewal and sanctification); two areas of theology that are even more frequently the focus of attention in Scripture than the extensive laws of nature are.38

In extending our investigation to the intensive agencies of Word and Spirit, I am expanding the analysis along a second dimension. In addition to the distinction between Word and Spirit (an intra-trinitarian dyad), we have the differentiation between their agencies in creation and universal providence, on the one hand, and their roles in revelation and the transformation of humanity (an extensive–intensive dyad), on the other.

The first of these intensive roles is that of divine revelation. Here, the Word manifests itself in finite, generally anthropic (humanlike), forms39 and in discrete events like spoken words and/or a theophany.40 According to the Gospel of John, for example, the divine Word had manifested itself to the patriarchs and prophets in both spoken words and visualizable, anthropic forms long before assuming the concrete form of human flesh (John 5:37–40; 12:41; cf. Isa. 6:1–13 on Isaiah’s vision of the Lord41). The agency of the Spirit is described as elevating the minds and imaginations42 of receptive human beings to behold these forms (John 14:26; 15:26).43 In some biblical texts, the Spirit is also credited with actualizing the theophanic forms of the Word.44 Throughout the New Testament, the Spirit was operative in enabling the visions and auditions of apostles and prophets.45 Here, again, there is a synergy between the vestigial agencies of the second and third members of the divine Triad—only here they are more direct and personal than in the extensive manifestations discussed earlier.46 The coordination of an anthropic form with prophetic visualization, like that of cosmic formation with actualization, reflects the synergy of the Word and Spirit within the created order.

A second intensive role of the Word and Spirit to consider is that of human transformation. According to the Gospel of John, those who believe the words of the incarnate Son/Word of God have eternal life (John 5:24; 6:63b, 68b; 15:3; 17:6–8). According to the Apostle Paul, the Son of God is the divine template in accordance with which believers are transformed in accordance with the original divine image (Rom. 8:29; 1 Cor. 15:49; 2 Cor. 3:18; Col. 3:10).47 But there is an important twist here. This process of image formation (or renewal) in humanity was only made possible by the Cross and Resurrection. In order for humanity to be restored in the image of God, the incarnate form of God had first to be broken and disfigured (John 19:30–37; Phil. 2:6–8; 1 Cor. 11:24 א^c C³ D^b,c) and then restored by God’s Spirit (Rom. 1:4; 8:11).

This transformation into the image of the risen Christ is actualized by the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:4, 7–11; 2 Tim. 1:6–7; cf. Rom. 12:6–8; 1 Tim. 4:14). Like the synergy of anthropic form and prophetic inspiration, this coordination of a formative image and actualizing gift reflects the synergy of the Word and Spirit.

These are the vestigial agencies of the second and third members of the divine Triad, both extensive and intensive. An analogy to the different parts of a musical composition may be helpful here. The extensive agencies of Word and Spirit (creation/providence) are continuous through time like the cantus firmus (“fixed song”) in medieval polyphony or like the base guitar in rock music. The intensive agencies (revelation and transformation) improvise on that foundation in contrapuntal voices and more melodic figures.

4. The Agency of God the Father in the New Testament

Thus far, our procedure of beginning with the outlook of modern physics has provided us only with vestigial agencies for the Word and Spirit, not of the triune God. The reason is that our representative physicists provided us with two guidelines in thinking about the material cosmos explored by natural scientists, and, by extension, about the spiritual realm accessed by the prophets. This leads us to wonder whether the very first member of the divine Triad, God the Father, has a distinctive agency in the created order, and, if so, in what way. Here, biblical theology may further supplement the insights suggested by our two physicists.

In fact, the agency of God the Father within the created order is not clearly defined in the New Testament in either an extensive or intensive sense. With respect to extensive phenomena, we have the teachings of Jesus, according to which the Father makes the sun to rise, the rain to fall, the earth to bring forth bread, and the birds to be fed (Matt. 5:45; 6:11, 26, 30; cf. Ps. 104:2b–30), all without specifying any means or manner of operation. Paul adds that God arranged the diverse organs of the human body (1 Cor. 12:18, 24b). Texts like these provide us with stated facts or results without any information about their implementation. The first member of the divine Triad appears to be present and active somewhere in the background, decreeing and commissioning such events (cf. Col. 4:2–6), as in the imagery of Word and Spirit in Old Testament texts like Isaiah 55:11 (“my word that goes out from my mouth”) and Psalm 104:30 (“you send forth your spirit”).

There are some New Testament texts that indicate agency for God the Father in the intensive work of revelation. We occasionally hear the Father’s voice (Mark 1:11; 9:7 and parallels; John 1:33; 12:28), but we only find vague indications of an anthropic form of the Father like that of the divine Word. While being tried before the high priest, for example, Jesus prophesied the coming of the Son of man “seated at the right hand of Power”, referring obliquely to his heavenly Father (Mark 14:62 and parallels; cf. Acts 7:55–56).48 The focus here was on the celestial status of the Son of man, not on God himself (partly reflecting Ps. 110:1).

The heavenly vision of “one seated on the throne” in the Revelation to John (the Book of Revelation) comes closest to a visual description of God the Father.49 He looked “like jasper and carnelian”, and he held a sealed scroll in his right hand (Rev. 4:2–3a; 5:1). Without any description of the face or form of the Father, however, our gaze is immediately diverted to the Lion–Lamb who is “worthy to open the scroll and … look into it” (Rev. 5:2–10). The contrast between the stationary position of God (“seated on the throne”)50 and the detailed activity of the Lion–Lamb (“has conquered”, “standing”, “went and took the scroll”, “worthy to take the scroll and open its seven seals”, “ransomed saints for God”, “made them to be a kingdom”, Rev. 5:5–10) emphasizes the idea that the Lion–Lamb executes the will of the one seated on the throne.51

As a rule, therefore, God’s Son, or the divine Word is the means through which God’s revelations were assumed to take place,52 and so was God’s Spirit. This observation holds up even in cases that may appear to state the contrary. In Gospel accounts of Jesus’ baptism, the Father designates Jesus as his beloved Son, but only after either Jesus or John the Baptist sees the Spirit descending upon him (Mark 1:1 and parallels; cf. Isa. 42:1). In the Gospel of John, God tells John the Baptist how he will recognize the pre-existent Lamb of God, and the Spirit is the means that God uses to direct John’s attention to Jesus, the Son of God (John. 1:30–33). In the early source used by Matthew and Luke (Q for the German Quelle), the Father is said to reveal hidden truths to his children, but the text goes on to say that they can only know the Father through the Son (Matt. 11:25–27; Luke 10:21–22). A partial exception may be Matthew’s account of Peter professing Jesus to be the Messiah, the Son of God. Jesus credited this revelation to the “Father in heaven” (Matt. 16:16–17). Yet, the sense of distance from earth that this celestial location suggests may reflect the fact that Jesus had previously attributed his disciples’ ability to confess and defend their faith to the Spirit of their Father (Matt. 10:20; cf. Mark 13:11).53

The only agency impinging on the empirical realm that is frequently attributed directly to God the Father is the Resurrection. At least twenty passages in the New Testament state that God raised Jesus from the dead.54 The raising of the beloved Son apparently elicited the immediate agency of the Father in a way that no other space–time situation called for. This striking exception to the general rule may be connected literally with the fact that seven of these passages associate the Resurrection with the postmortem agency of Jesus.55 In theological terms, Jesus could not be said to restore himself to life without calling into question the reality of his death on the Cross 56 So, the long-term mission that God had mandated for his Son could not be completed without Jesus’ being restored to life by the direct action of the Father.57

This relative ineffability of God the Father is made explicit in the Gospel of John, where we are informed that no one had ever before seen God himself (John 1:18; cf. 1 John 4:12). “You have never heard his voice or seen his form” (John 5:37b; cf. 6:46a): John’s Jesus says these words to his fellow Jews, who certainly knew of the anthropic divine appearances to their patriarchs and prophets (which John assigns to the pre-incarnate Word; John 8:56–58; 12:37–41). As elsewhere in the New Testament, God the Father operates somewhere in the background as far as the affairs on earth are concerned. John’s emphasis on the ineffability of the Father was not meant to deny the possibility of knowing God, however. The distancing of the Father here is compensated by the fact that he is now known and seen through his Son, the incarnate Word (John 1:18b; 5:38b; 6:46b; 14:7, 9b; cf. Matt. 11:27c), or at least is seen by those who are enlightened through the Spirit (John 16:13–15; cf. Rom. 8:13–16; Gal. 4:6).

In terms of Old Testament imagery, the role of the Father in New Testament texts is modeled on that of the presiding figure of the divine council. This council was a deliberative assembly in heaven that oversaw and managed affairs on earth.58 In 1 Kings 22, for example, the prophet Micaiah reported a vison of “the Lord [YHWH/Adonai] sitting on his throne, with all the host of heaven standing beside him to the right and to the left of him” (1 Kgs 22:19 = 2 Chron. 18:18). The Lord asked for a volunteer from his attendant angels (here called “spirits”) who would entice Ahab, the King of Israel. When one of the angels came forward, the Lord commissioned it, promised it success, and sent it out (1 Kgs 22:20–22 = 2 Chron. 18:19–21).59 This is clearly an intensive (locative, temporal) action of God.60

Another example is the throne–room vision of the prophet Isaiah. Here, also, the Lord (YHWH/Adonai) was seen by the prophet on a majestic throne (“high and lofty”) with angels (seraphim) in attendance (Isa. 6:1–2). The Lord called for a messenger to deliver a message to his people, and when Isaiah volunteered, he was sent out with detailed instructions (Isa. 6:9–13).

Both of these Old Testament narratives set events on earth in the context of a larger cosmic order (a celestial courtroom in 1 Kings 22 and a cosmic temple in Isaiah 661). Like the revelatory events described earlier, they are locative and temporal, but they occur in the spiritual realm (“host of heaven”, “high and lofty”) which transcends our empirical realm, and to which inspired seers like the prophets were granted access.

The heavenly court is clearly the context of the throne–room vision of Revelation 4–5 that was discussed above. This passage gives us only a minimal description of the one seated on the heavenly throne with twenty-four elders in attendance (Rev. 4:2–4). John was invited to ascend by the trumpet-like voice of the risen Lord, the “Word of God”, whom he had already seen in anthropic, theophanic form (Rev. 4:1b; cf. 1:10; 19:13). His visionary capabilities were then elevated “in the Spirit” (en pneumati)62 so that he could behold the celestial throne and see that God was seated there (Rev. 4:2). This formative/informative agency of the Word and actualizing/transformative agency of the Spirit are the intensive kind experienced by the prophets and apocalypticists rather than the extensive ones that apply to the whole of creation. Here, the role of God the Father, like that of the conciliar Lord seen by Micaiah and Isaiah, is limited to commissioning someone to execute his plan. In fact, the Enthroned One is even more passive here than in our Old Testament texts. He does not ask for volunteers or give any verbal instructions. He merely holds a sealed scroll and leaves it to an attendant angel to look for someone worthy of opening the seals and thereby controlling future history. The crucified Lion–Lamb then steps forward to receive the scroll and open it (Rev.5:1–6:1). The role of the Enthroned One is again one of deliberating and decreeing.63

In fact, the New Testament is replete with texts that refer to Christ, the Son of God, being commissioned by God the Father to administer justice and open the way to salvation64 and also to his obeying the Father’s instructions.65 There are also texts that speak of the Holy Spirit being sent by the Father to carry out his will.66 Although the Father is somewhere in the background as far as the empirical realm is concerned, he is the central figure in the celestial, spiritual realm, the one who ordains the agencies of his Word and Spirit within that realm. This triadic arrangement is compactly stated by Paul in Galatians 4 in relation to the incarnation of the Son and the outpouring of Spirit:

“But when the fullness of time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children. And because you are children, God has sent the Spirt of his Son into our hearts, crying ‘Abba! Father!’”

(Gal. 4:4–6)

In short, the vestigial agencies of the members of the divine Triad are: (1) commissioning/sending for the Father in heaven; (2) forming/informing for the Word; and (3) actualizing/elevating for the Spirit. Commissioning takes place in the celestial realm, while formation and actualization occur in concert with each other either in the empirical realm or at the interface between the two realms.67

Thus far, I have surveyed biblical descriptions of God, God’s Word, and God’s Spirit rather selectively, being guided by the two fundamental ideas, two “sacred reminders”, from modern physics: that the physical realm is governed by formative laws and principles, which are associated in Scripture with the agency of the Word, and that those laws are actualized by some kind of immaterial “life” or “fire” that is biblically associated with the agency of the Spirit. Although the functioning of laws and whatever actualizes them is a necessary assumption for scientific endeavor, neither of them is empirical in itself. Although they govern the entire realm of the finite form and discrete events, neither is located anywhere in space or placed in the temporal sequence of events. They operate at the interface of the divine and human worlds and make the existence of space and time possible.

For further understanding of these vestigial agencies of God’s Word and Spirit and the way in which they were nuanced in the early Church, I turn to Irenaeus, the bishop of Lyons. In the following discussion, it will be useful for comparison to keep in mind the main points already noted in biblical texts:

• Within the world of finite forms and discrete events, both empirical and spiritual, the members of the divine Triad are described in terms of their vestigial agencies.
• The vestigial agency of God’s Word is expressed:

  ○

  Extensively (universally, continuously) in the laws and principles that govern the form of the created order and inform its evolution. We were reminded of this point by one of the ideas of our two physicists, John Archibald Wheeler and Stephen Hawking, but we have generalized it to include the agency of the Word at each of the empirical and spiritual levels of the created order.

  ○

  Intensively (episodically) in informative revelations, theophanic forms, assumption of a human form in Jesus, the disfiguration of the incarnate form on the Cross, and the image or template according to which humans are transformed. This point was one aspect of our second generalization of the ideas of physicists Wheeler and Hawking.

• The vestigial agency of God’s Spirit is expressed:

  ○

  Extensively in the actualization of the possibilities implicit in the laws that govern the created order, not only at the level of physics, but at each of its various levels, thereby effecting the evolutionary transformation of creatures from one level of organization and functioning to another.

  ○

  Intensively (episodically) in actualizing informative revelations, opening the spiritual realm to prophets and apostles, the conception/animation and anointing of Jesus, revivifying the incarnate form of the Word, and actualizing the transformation of believers into the image of the risen Christ. This was the complementary aspect of our second generalization of the ideas of physicists Wheeler and Hawking.

• There is synergy and coordination between the vestigial agencies of Word and Spirit, both extensive and intensive.
• The extensive, continual agencies of Word and Spirit in the created order provide the infrastructure for their more intensive, episodic agencies in revelation and transformation. An analogy to the coordinated parts of a musical composition was helpful here.
• On the empirical plane, manifestations of the vestigial agencies of the triune God are generally accorded to God’s Word and Spirit. The agency of God the Father occurs in the celestial background and is most often seen by prophets in the commissioning and sending of his Word and Spirit (also in the resurrection of Jesus). This point was our third generalization of the scientific ideas of Wheeler and Hawking.

5. Irenaeus in His Second-Century Context

Irenaeus’s writings date from the last two decades of the second century, roughly a century after the composition of the New Testament documents. He is of particular interest for this essay, in that he was the first comprehensive (though not systematic) theologian of the Church. He drew on biblical traditions, both written and oral, and he provided us with new language concerning the vestigial agencies of the Word and Spirit and the synergy between them. The biblical material summarized above is nicely illustrated in one of his best-known metaphors: the Word and Spirit as “two hands” through which God functions in the created order. In what follows, I shall detail the way Irenaeus differentiated and coordinated the work of these two hands of God along lines similar to our physicists’ differentiation of the laws of physics and the immaterial agency that actualizes them. His various comments give greater clarity to the scattered references in Scripture and further illustrates the notion of scientists’ ideas as sacred reminders.

In discussing Irenaeus of Lyons, there are several things to keep in mind. He was one of the last theologians (Hippolytus being another) who ministered in the Latin West, yet he still wrote, and he no doubt knew the apostolic writings, in Greek.

Irenaeus was conversant with the writings of some earlier theologians (e.g., Justin Martyr68). He was also keenly aware of oral traditions and interpretations that he had received as the very words of the Apostles, especially the Apostle John, via Polycarp and the Elders of the Church.69

Ante-Nicene theologians like Irenaeus thought largely in terms of verbal associations and correlations. They often developed those associations in ways so diverse that modern readers might see disparities or even verbal contradictions, some of which will be noted below.70 As various heresies were identified and combatted over the centuries, conciliar theologians would regularize some of the language they used, particularly with regard to the triune God, and give us the standards of faith that have guided the Church ever since. However, there is still value in revisiting earlier (ante-Nicene) theologians like Irenaeus in order to discern the rationale underlying the language of those creeds.

Irenaeus was keenly aware of adaptations that needed to be made in communicating the gospel to gentile audiences, particularly to those in southern France, who were relatively recent converts from pagan polytheism.

Irenaeus was commissioned to investigate various dissident groups that he disparagingly labeled “pretended gnostics”—what we would call “know-it-alls”.71 As he explained at length in his treatise, Against Heresies (Adversus Haereses, dating from the 170s-180s CE),72 there were three main problems that occurred in one gnostic theology or another:73

• A hierarchy of as many as thirty divine and semi-divine entities (the plērōma or pantheon), each having a different grade of stability and knowledge, thereby mediating between the ultimate, immutable reality and the ephemeral, material world;
• Denigration of the material world, in general, and the human body, in particular;
• A Christology in which the deity of Jesus required that he not experience the messier aspects of human life like natural birth and death.

Finally, Irenaeus sometimes appealed to selected traditions he claimed to have received as a way of combatting these ideas. His writing was expository and polemical, not organized systemically according to the topics of later theology.

In countering the gnostic idea of a plērōma of hypostases, Irenaeus stressed the biblical belief that there is a single divine being, “one God”, especially in his use of credal statements (AH I.10.1; III.4.1; IV.20.2; 33.7). The divine being is integral and therefore not subject to an emanation or gradation of hypostases, as some gnostics had portrayed it (AH II.13.3; 17.7; 28.4, 5).74 On the positive side, Irenaeus portrayed the triune God—God the Father, God’s Word (also titled Son and Lord75), and God’s Spirit (also titled Wisdom76)—as a single entity of which the second and third members were the agents through which God operated in the world of finite form. To make this idea more accessible, he used a simple metaphor: the Word and Spirit function like two hands with which God operates in the world of finite form.77 What did this striking image mean?

Irenaeus’s view of God the Father was not anthropomorphite. He did not view God the Father as having a bodily form with literal hands and feet. To do so would have subjected the Christian God to the ridicule of gnostics who portrayed the Old Testament deity as a demiurgic remnant of the divine plērōma (e.g., AH I.11.1). In keeping with the apostle Paul and the Evangelist John, therefore, Irenaeus referred the finite manifestations of the Deity in Scripture to the agency of God’s Son/Word: “for the Father is the invisible of the Son [invisibile Filii], but the Son is the visible [form] of the Father [visibile Patris]” (AH IV.6.6; cf. Col. 1:15–17; John 1:14).78 Here, Irenaeus used the image of hands as a metaphor to describe the agencies of God’s Word and Spirit in visualizable terms,79 terms that his gentile audience would more readily understand.80

6. Irenaeus on the Extensive Agencies of God’s Word and Spirit

To illustrate this approach and see how it exemplifies the formation–actualization dyad suggested by our physicists, let us begin with the agencies of God’s Word and Spirit in the extensive work of creation. Later, we shall look at the more intensive agencies of the Word and Spirit in original sanctification, revelation, the Incarnation, and human transformation. Our findings will then be summed up in a table at the conclusion of the following section.

First, we consider the agency of God’s Word and Spirit in creation—that of the cosmos and that of the human species, which Irenaeus usually treated together because humanity was the climactic step in the two accounts of creation in Genesis One and Two. This set of ideas is well described in Against Heresies, Book IV:

“…we do always learn that there is so great a God, and that it is he who by himself has established and made and adorned and contains all things [per semetipsum constituit et fecit et adornavit et continet omnia] and among all things both ourselves and this our world…. And this is he of whom the Scripture says, And God formed man [plasmavit Deus hominem], taking clay of the earth, and breathed into his face the breath of life [flatum vitae; cf. Gen. 2:781] …. For God did not stand in need of these [angels] in order to accomplish what he himself had determined within himself [apud se] …as if he did not possess his own hands [suas manus]. For with him were always present the Word and Wisdom, the Son and Spirit, by whom and in whom …he made all things, and to whom also he speaks, saying, Let us make man after our image and likeness [Gen. 1:26a] …”.

(AH IV.20.1; SC 100:624–6; ANF 1:487–8 adapted)

This typically dense statement includes the Word/Son and Wisdom/Spirit within the identity of God (“within himself”, “his own hands”). It begins by saying that God accomplished the work of creation (“established and made and adorned and contains all things”82) all by himself. He did not need angels to accomplish this task.83 Instead, he used “his own hands”, that is, his Word and Spirit in “making all things”,84 and it was to them, rather than to angels, that he addressed the words, Let us make man after our image and likeness (Gen. 1:26a).85

Irenaeus has carefully established the unity of God here, while at the same time allowing for a conversation to take place within the Godhead itself.86 The process of creation was initiated by God (identified as “God the Father”87), but it was carried out through the agency of his Word and Spirit, the two acting in conjunction with each other.88 The role of God the Father is assumed to be in the celestial background. The agency of the Godhead on the empirical plane (here the creation of humanity), is accorded to God’s Word and Spirit as if they were two hands that reach the earth.

The cited passage dealt with the extensive agencies of God’s Word and Spirit, those that pertain to all created things (including all human beings89). But it did not differentiate the agencies of the Word and Spirit in any way. For further explanation, we may begin with the section of Against Heresies that immediately follows the one quoted above (AH IV.20.2). Here, again, Irenaeus stressed the unity of God and the universal scope of God’s creation. The task of governing [principatus] and judging all things is then delegated by God the Father to the Lord (Jesus) and his Word, and the role of the Spirit is further defined. In the midst of his intricately woven discourse, Irenaeus then described God as the one “who made all things by the Word [John 1:3]90 and adorned them by Wisdom [qui omnia fecit Verbo et Sapientia adornavit]” (AH IV.20.2; SC 100:630; ANF 1:488a). In the previous section (IV.20.1), Irenaeus had assigned the role of making and adorning all things to God (“who has established and made and adorned and contains all things”), operating through both Word and Spirit. In this second text, however, he brings out the dialectic of the Word and Spirit by assigning the role of making all things to the Word and the role of adorning them to Wisdom/Spirit. This passing mention suggests that Irenaeus associated the Spirit of God with the completion or perfection of the creative work that God accomplished through his Word.91 It also provides some support for my thesis about scientific endeavor as a sacred reminder of this dialectic. It is not clear, however, whether the relation of adorning to making is proportional to that of actualization to law-giving that we discussed earlier.

Some help regarding the Spirit’s adorning work comes from Irenaeus’s discussion of horticulture, which was of particular interest for its relevance to the production of bread and wine for the Eucharist. Cuttings from a grapevine, he noted, once planted in the earth, will spontaneously grow and bear fruit (thereby adorning the vine) and kernels of wheat, once planted in the ground, will germinate to produce grain (cf. Gen. 1:11–12; Pss. 104:13–15; 147:8, 14; 1 Cor. 15:37–38). Irenaeus attributed these life-giving, transformative wonders of the natural world to the work of the Spirit who “contains all things” (continet omnia, AH V.2.3). As we saw above, Irenaeus spoke of God “containing all things” (continet omnia, IV.20.1). Elsewhere, he attributes this containing work to the Lord Jesus (AH V.18.3, continent …omnia). But for Irenaeus, the growth of fruit from detached cuttings and the growth of seemingly inert seeds perfectly illustrated the transformative, lifegiving agency of God’s Spirit throughout the vegetable kingdom. In the view of Irenaeus’s contention that God had established the laws that govern all things through the agency of his Word (Dem. 10) however, we must conclude that the Spirit’s contribution was not to displace the biological laws of growth (as for a God-of-the-gaps) but rather to actualize them at various levels of organization.92

Irenaeus further distinguished the transformative, lifegiving work of the Spirit from the formative agency of the Word in other places where he discussed the creation of humanity in Genesis One and Two. In the case of Genesis 2:7a, he accorded the formation of the human body to the Word (“God formed man from the dust of the ground”), and he assigned the divine breath that animated it to the Spirit (“and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life”). One of his clearest statements occurs in his later treatise, Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching (c. 200 CE).93

“But man he [God] fashioned with his own hands, taking of the purest and finest of earth, mingling his own power [breath]94 with the earth in a measured manner [cf. Gen. 2:7ab]. He gave man’s frame the outline of his own form [i.e., that of the anthropic Word; cf. Phil. 2:6], so that its visible appearance should be godlike [lit. ‘deiform’]—for it was as a [material] image of God that man was fashioned and set on earth [Gen. 1:27]. And in order that he might come to life, he breathed into his face the breath of life [and man became a living being, Gen. 2:7bc]. So, man became like God in inspiration [by the Spirit] as well as in frame [modeled after the form of God’s Word]”.

(Dem. 1195)

Here, again, we see the Word and Spirit described as the two “hands” with which God created all things, including all human beings. Following the account in Genesis 2, Irenaeus described the creation of humanity here in two ways:96 (1) formation of the upright human body,97 for which God’s Word served as the template (Gen. 2:7b; cf. Gen. 1:27);98 and (2) animation or ensoulment99 of that deiform body by the “breath of life” (Gen. 2:7b),100 which he has assigned to God’s Spirit.101

These associations help to clarify the intra-trinitarian dimension of the vestigial agencies of Word and Spirit that we described earlier in terms of scriptural imagery, thereby providing further support for my thesis about science as a sacred reminder. The dialectic of Word and Spirit is proportional to the dialectic of cosmos-governing laws and actualizing the breath/fire that guided our investigation from the outset.102 For Irenaeus, in this case, the archetype impressed upon the human body is the intensive agency of the Word, as the anthropic image or form of the Deity,103 rather than its extensive manifestation in laws that govern the biological world (e.g., the growth of grapes and wheat). However, Irenaeus extended the formative effect of this intensive agency to all human beings (note above). So, it is both intensive and extensive; intensive in its archetype and extensive in its effects. In that case, it provides a segue to the discussion of the intensive agencies of the Word and Spirit in the following section of this essay.

The reader will notice that Irenaeus’s description of Word and Spirit as God’s hands, with which we began, is incommensurate with his subsequent description of the distinct agencies of the Word and Spirit: formation, image, prototype, on one hand and actualization, breath, animation, on the other. These latter phrases, of course, were dictated by the twofold process, bodily form, and life-giving breath in the foundational text, Genesis 2:7. However, both ways of interrelating the members of the divine Triad served Irenaeus’s purpose of countering gnostic denigration of the human body and its Creator. Irenaeus’s two-hands metaphor adapted biblical language to ensure the unity of the Godhead together with its agency in the “hands-on” work of creation, while his use of phrases from Genesis 2:7 asserted the godlike form and divine animation of the human body—all this while using everyday language that was comprehensible to his gentile parishioners. The completion of God’s work in creating human beings requires the agencies of both formation (from earthly matter) and transformation (animation/ensoulment). Moreover, there is synergy between these two agencies just as there is every day human tasks that require the coordinated use of two hands, each in its own way, for their successful completion.

7. Irenaeus on the Intensive Agencies of God’s Word and Spirit

We have seen that the words of Genesis 2:7 were taken by Irenaeus to describe God’s deploying of the agencies of his Word and Spirit in the creation of humanity. The task was carried out by the Word in the formation of the human body from elemental material and by the Spirit in animating this finite portion of matter, thereby actualizing its operation at the biological level (“became a living being”). In addition to these operations concerning human anatomy and physiology in Genesis 2:7, Irenaeus saw two distinct agencies of the Word and Spirit in the paired phrases of Genesis 1:26 “in our image, according to our likeness”. His most detailed explanation of this text occurs in Against Heresies, of Book V, chapter 6:

“Now God shall be glorified in his handiwork [in suo plasmate, the human body104], conforming it and modeling it after his Son [conforme illud et consequens suo puero adaptans]. For by the hands of the Father, that is, by the Son and the Holy Spirit, man, and not [merely] a part of man, was [originally] made in the likeness of God [secundum similitudinem Dei, Gen. 1:26a]…. for the perfect [spiritual105] man consists in the commingling and the union of the soul [adunitio animae], receiving the Spirit of the Father [assumentis Spiritum Patris], and the admixture of that fleshly being which was molded after the Image of God [plasmata secundum imaginem Dei, Gen. 1:26a; cf. 2 Cor. 4:4; Col. 1:15] …”.

(AH V.6.1; SC 153:72; ANF 1:531b adapted)

Much of the wording here is familiar to us from Irenaeus’s treatment of Genesis 2:7—specifically the molding of Adam’s body (God’s “handiwork”), with God’s Son/Word) serving as the prototypical image (assuming a visualizable, anthropic form of the Word106); the Word and Spirit serving as the two “hands” that God used in the operation; and Adam becoming an embodied soul or ensouled body (“the commingling and the union of the soul”).107

But there are two further ideas in this passage, one regarding the creation of humanity, and the other about its redemption.108 With regard to the work of creation, the first humans were not only molded after the image of God, but they were also perfected (temporarily) by “receiving the Spirit” in their souls and so becoming God’s “likeness” (similitudo) as well as reflecting God’s image.109 In other words, Irenaeus assigned a dual role to the Spirit of God in creating humanity, animating (ensouling) the human form—an extensive agency based on Genesis 2:7b that was discussed in the previous section—and elevating that embodied soul to the divine “likeness”—an intensive agency based on Genesis 1:26.110

Ancient anthropology differentiated several levels of human existence: physical, biological, rational, and spiritual (angel-like), the latter level being the “likeness of God” as Irenaeus understood it.111 At the biological level, the Word’s modeling and the Spirit’s actualizing are extensive in the sense that they apply to all human beings to the present day. In the case of spirituality, however, the actualization turned out to be intensive. It applied to the original pair of humans, and it would subsequently apply to those who would be restored to the divine likeness, but it would not be extended to the entire human species, due to the original sin in the Garden of Eden.112

Irenaeus’s stress on the original perfection of humanity, including the human body (and all of creation), was clearly designed to counter the gnostic denigration of the created world, but it was also the basis for his main point, that the salvation of humans would include their bodies as well as “that which is purely spirit” (solum spiritus, AH V.6.1). Therefore, gnostics who denied the goodness of the human body not only blasphemed the Creator of all things, but they even “disallowed the salvation of the Creator’s workmanship [plasmatis Dei], which the flesh truly is, on behalf of which … the Son of God accomplished the whole dispensation [omnem dispositionem fecisse]” (AH IV.pref.4; SC 100:390; ANF 1:463a).

The second idea to notice in the previously cited passage (AH V.6.1) is that the agency of the Word will also operate in the future restoration of the divine likeness to humanity, “conforming it and modeling it after his Son”. This step would require the Word assuming a human form and likeness (cf. Phil. 2:6–7), his deformation on the cross, and his resurrection, all of which would involve the agency of God’s Spirit.

Before proceeding to Irenaeus’s treatment of the Incarnation, however, we should pause to note the ways in which he described the role of God the Father in creation and the roles of the Word and Spirit in prophetic revelations.

Because God the Father always operates through the agency of his two “hands”, he appears to function in the celestial background for Irenaeus as was the case in the New Testament. He is the one who plans and commands all things, including the creation of the first human as described in Genesis 1:26:

“… man, a created and organized being, is rendered ‘after the image and likeness’ of the uncreated God [Gen. 1:26a]—the Father planning everything well and giving his commands, the Son carrying these into execution and performing the work of creating, and the Spirit nourishing and increasing it”.

(AH IV.38.3; SC 294–96; ANF 1:521–22)

Here, Irenaeus correlated the paired phrases of Genesis 1:26 (“image and likeness”) with the agencies of God’s Son and Spirit, yielding a description of the roles of all three members of the divine Triad in an ordered sequence. For the Son and Spirit, it is only a summary statement, with emphasis on the forming agency of the Son (“make man in the image of God”) and the increasing, perfecting work of the Spirit (in the likeness of God). Irenaeus made it clear, however, that the initiator of these actions, the mind behind the “hands”, as it were, was God the Father.

The intensive agency of God’s Word and Spirit also occurred in revelations to the Old Testament prophets. In Against Heresies IV.36.8, Irenaeus described them rather succinctly (while discussing another topic): “He who chose the patriarchs and those [people of Israel; cf. Deut. 7:6; 14:2] is the same Word of God who visited them by [means of] the prophetic Spirit …” (SC 100:916; ANF 1:518b). Here, we find the agencies of the Word and Spirit coordinated in prophetic revelations: the one visiting the prophets and revealing himself to them (in an anthropic form and prophetic words), and the other actualizing those revelations and heightening the prophets’ faculties to see him and to hear his words.

In Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching, Section 5, Irenaeus described the reciprocity of these two agencies in more detail and applied it to prophecies of the Incarnation.

“Thus, the Spirit demonstrates [or ‘manifests’] the Word, and, because of this, the prophets announced the Son of God, while the Word articulates113 the Spirit, and therefore it is he [the Word made flesh] himself who interprets [or ‘gives their message to’] the prophets and brings humans to the Father”.

(SVSP trans., 43 adapted, with note d; cf. ACW 16:51)

Here, again, the role of the Spirit was one of inspiring the words of the Old Testament prophets, in this case words announcing the advent of the Son of God. As in the Gospel of Luke, however, some of the prophets’ words about the crucifixion and resurrection were not understood before the Word became flesh and interpreted their message to his followers [Luke 24:25–27, 44–49, which credits the Spirit, sent by the Son, for the power to bear witness]. Even if the wording here could have been clearer,114 it shows Irenaeus’s concern to coordinate the agencies of Word and Spirit along the lines we have discussed, revealing the future Incarnation to the prophets, on the one hand, and making those prophecies about the incarnate Word manifest to chosen humans, like the Apostles.

Proceeding to Irenaeus’s treatment of the agencies of Word and Spirit in the Incarnation itself, we may turn to two passages in book V of Against Heresies. I begin with section V.18.3, which is the shorter of the two passages and focuses our attention on the extensive and intensive agencies of the Word:115

“For the Creator of the world [mundi factor] is truly the Word of God. And this is our Lord, who in the last times was made man [homo factus est], existing in this world [that he created; cf. John 1:10, 14a], and who in an invisible manner [secundum invisibilitatem] contains all things created [continent quae facta omnia; cf. Col. 1:16a] and universally pervades [in universa conditione influxus], since the Word of God governs and arranges all things [gubernans et disposens omnia].116 And therefore, he came to his own [John 1:11a] in an invisible manner [invisibiliter117], and was made flesh [caro factum est, John 1:14a], and was ‘hung upon the tree’ [Acts 5:30; 10:39b; Gal. 3:13b], so that he might sum up all things in himself [universa in semetipsum recapituletur, Eph. 1:10]”.

(AH V.18.3; SC 153:244; ANF 1:546–7 adapted)

The first point of this passage is the extensive agency of the Word as maker and governor of the cosmos. Here, Irenaeus followed the traditional idea that the Godhead pervades (influxus, literally “flows into”) all things,118 while it also contains all things and therefore cannot be contained (1 Kgs. 8:27; Wis. 1:7).119

Irenaeus then built on these ideas to explain (and defend) the divine Word’s being made human flesh (John 1:14a). The Word who made all things (mundi factor) and contains all things (continent quae facta omnia), including the form of the human body, is also “our Lord” who was “made man” (homo factus est) and “made flesh” (caro factum est). By this quadruple use of the Latin verb facio, “to do or make”, Irenaeus showed that the agency of the Word/Lord has to do with forming and imaging, not only extensively in the creation of the cosmos and of human beings in general, but also intensively in the in vivo formation of the man Jesus, who is the perfect embodiment of the Word of God.120 In other words, the incarnation of the Word involved its self-formation as a flesh-and-blood human being speaking audible human words (rather than a theophanic form as in the Old Testament narratives).121

Irenaeus also describes the Cross of Jesus along these lines. The Word made flesh was “hung upon the tree that he might sum up all things in himself”. In Irenaeus’s well-known typology of recapitulation, the obedience of Christ on the “tree” of the Cross (to the point of death) atoned for the disobedience of Adam regarding the Tree of Knowledge (for which death was the prescribed penalty). However, Irenaeus seems to have a role of the Word in mind here that is more active (“sum up”) and more extensive (“all things”) than just the sin of the first humans.122 Could the Cross also be a “summing up” of the Word’s extensive agency in the entire cosmos?

The answer, I believe, comes from Irenaeus’s later treatment of the Cross in Section 34 of Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching:

“And because he is himself the Word of God Almighty, who in the invisible [preincarnate] form pervades us universally in the whole world [cf. Wis. 7:24] and encompasses both its length and breadth and height and depth [cf. Eph. 3:18]—for by God’s Word everything is disposed and administered—[so] the Son of God was also crucified in these [four dimensions] imprinted on the universe in the form of a cross. For, in becoming visible, he had necessarily to bring to light his cross-sharing with the universe, in order to show openly through his visible form [on the Cross] that [cosmic] activity of his: that it is he who illumines the height (that is, what is in heaven), and holds the deep, and stretches forth and extends the length from east to west, navigating also the northern parts and the breadth of the south, and calling in all the dispersed [people] from all sides to the knowledge of the Father”.

(Dem. 34; ACW 16:69–70 with 172n.172 and italics added; cf. SVSP, trans., 62)

Instead of using the Word’s formation of the cosmos as a way of explaining the form of the Cross, as he did in the case of the Incarnation as previously discussed, Irenaeus retroactively portrayed the four-dimensional design of the Cross as “imprinted on the universe” in its “length and breadth and height and depth”. Based on the pattern of the Cross, the Word illuminates the heavens and holds back the deep (cf. Pss. 74:16; 104:2; Pr. Man. 2–3).

In discussing Irenaeus’s theology of the Incarnation thus far, we have focused on the agency of the divine Word, largely based on the Gospel of John, chapter one. We still need to see how he coordinated the agency of the Word with that of the Holy Spirit in effecting the Incarnation. Irenaeus’s most extensive discussion of the role of the Spirit occurs in in Against Heresies, book V, and is based on the Gospel of Luke, chapter one. I divide the relevant passage into three parts: the first of which relates the Spirit to the need for holiness; the second part establishes a parallel to the formative–animating dyad of Genesis 2:7; and the third returns to the idea of the Word and Spirit as the hands of God in the image-likeness dyad of Genesis 1:26:

“… the Holy Spirit came upon Mary, and the power of the Most High overshadowed her [Luke 1:35a]. Therefore, what was generated is holy [quod generatum est sanctum est] and the Son of the Most High God, the Father of all [Luke 1:35b], who effected the incarnation of this being [the Son] and showed forth a new [kind of] generation [novam ostendit generationem]”.

(AH V.1.3; SC 153:24–26; ANF 1:527b adapted)

In this first part of this passage, Irenaeus focused on the agency of the Spirit. Evidently, noticing the AB–AB parallelism in Luke 1:35—”Holy Spirit … power of the Most High”,123 followed by “holy thing … Son of the Most High”—he explained that the incarnate Son of God was holy (sanctus est) by virtue of the Holy Spirit’s sanctifying Mary. In actualizing the conception of Jesus, the Spirit thereby effected “a new generation”, that is, one untainted by natural intercourse (cf. John 1:13; Justin, Dial. 54.2). In other words, the agency of the Spirit elevated the process of reproduction above the normal physiological level, thereby making human gestation, with all its frailties, a fit vehicle for the incarnation of the divine Word and thereby countering the common gnostic assertion that the holiness of Jesus required that he not be tainted by gross matter as in natural birth. Irenaeus also saw a parallel between the Spirit’s agency in the conception of Jesus and the agency of the Spirit in the original animation of humanity, as the sequel to the passage above explains:

“… as at the beginning of our formation [ab initio plasmationis nostrae] in Adam [Gen. 2:7a], that breath of life from God [a Deo adspiratio vitae], having been united to what had been fashioned [unita plasmati], animated [or ‘endowed with soul,’ animavit] the man and manifested him as being endowed with reason [rationabile ostendit]; so also, in the last times, the Word of the Father and the Spirit of God, being united with the ancient substance of Adam’s formation [adunitus antiquae substantiae plasmationis Adae; cf. Gen. 2:7], rendered man living and perfected [viventem et perfectum effecit hominem], receptive of the perfect Father [capientem perfectum Patrem] …”.

(AH V.1.3; SC 153:26; ANF 1:527b adapted)

This part of the passage begins by revisiting the creation story of Genesis 2:7. The first human was fashioned from earth (according to the image/form of the Word) and united with the “breath of life” (by the animating agency of the Spirit). In addition, we hear that humanity was endowed by the Spirit with reason,124 evidently, in coordination with the “Word of the Father”, and this synergy would also bring about the Incarnation “in the last times”. As the conclusion of this passage indicates, the function of human “reason” was to enable humans to respond to the teachings of the incarnate Word (the Greek term logos means both “word” and “reason”)125 and, once perfected, to receive the perfect Father (cf. Matt. 5:48).

In short, Irenaeus completely reframed the creation story here to match the Incarnation and the sanctification of humanity. As humans had been deprived of their original, spiritual perfection (the divine “likeness” of Gen. 1:26), the Word had to be directly united to human nature (the “ancient substance of Adam’s formation”), in conjunction with the Spirit’s new work (the “new generation”) in order to restore its God-given life and bestow the primordial perfection that made it “receptive of the perfect Father”.126 As in the first part of the longer passage, the Word provided the ideal form for the humanity of Jesus, but the Spirit’s agency was required to actualize it.

In the third part of this passage, Irenaeus returned to his favorite metaphor, that of Word and Spirit as the two “hands” that God used in the creation of humanity, and he extended it (along the extensive–intensive dimension) to that of the perfection of humanity in the Incarnation:

“For never at any time did Adam escape the hands of God [the Word and Spirit] to whom the Father said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness [Gen. 1:26a]. And for this reason, in the last times, his hands perfected a living man [vivum perfecerunt hominem, i.e., Jesus] ‘not by the will of the flesh, nor by the will of man, but by the good pleasure of the Father’ [John 1:13], in order that Adam [the human species] might be made [once again] after the image and likeness of God”.

(AH V.1.3; SC 153:26–28; ANF 1:527b adapted)

Like the first human created in the image and likeness of God, Jesus was perfected (in the image and likeness of God) by the two hands of God. He was conceived (by the Spirit), formed (by the Word127), and born (of the Virgin Mary) in accordance with the will of God (the Father), rather than not the will of man (cf. John 1:13),128 thereby renewing both “image and likeness of God” in humanity (Gen. 1:26a). The Word made flesh was the perfect human (as well as divine) image of God and, by virtue of his union with God the Father, he serves as a model for the restoration of humanity in the image and likeness of God as in the original creation.129

So, the Incarnation was made possible by the same synergy of the Word and Spirit that occasioned the original creation of humanity, and it re-established the likeness to God that humanity had previously lost (cf. AH V.6.1discussed above). The passage above has added, therefore, a further step along the extensive–intensive dimension: the sanctification of humanity by the restoration of the divine likeness. For clarification on this point, we may turn to a text in Against Heresies Book III, in which Irenaeus explained this step in relation to the Church and its spiritual gifts:

“For this gift of God [Dei munus, i.e., the Spirit130], has been entrusted to the Church, as breath [aspiratio] was to the first created man [Gen. 2:7], so that all members receiving it may be vivified [vivificentur]. And [the means of] communion with Christ [communicatio Christi] has been distributed in it, that is, the Holy Spirit, [which is] the earnest of incorruption [arrha incorruptelae; cf. 2 Cor. 5:5; Eph.1:14], the confirmation of our faith [confirmatio fidei],131 and the ladder of ascent to God [scala ascensionis ad Deum]. ‘For in the Church,’ it is said, ‘God has set apostles, prophets, teachers’ [1 Cor. 12:28], and all the other means through means through which the Spirit works …”.

(AH III.24.1; SC 211:472; ANF 1:458b adapted)

Once again, Irenaeus built on his earlier treatment of the creation of humanity. The work of the Spirit in creation was the bestowal of breath on the first human being (Gen. 2:7b) and its perfection in the divine likeness (Gen. 1:26a). In the new dispensation, the Church is granted the gift of the Spirit in order to vivify all its members132 and to distribute to them the means of communion with Christ—the latter presumably referring to the transformative work of the Spirit in the Eucharist. The Spirit has advanced its members toward incorruption, confirmation of their faith (in the Lord Jesus Christ), and ascent into the very presence of God.133 Among the gifts of the Spirit to the Church are apostles, prophets, teachers, and miracle workers (1 Cor. 12:28; cf. 12:4–11).134 In short, the agencies of the incarnate Word and the gifted Spirit ensure the sanctification of believers along the lines of the creation of humanity (both image and likeness; form and breath) and the Incarnation of the Lord Jesus (the perfect embodied image and likeness of God).

8. Summarizing and Assessing Irenaeus’s Theology of Word and Spirit

We have discussed Irenaeus’s views of creation, revelation, the Incarnation, and the transformation of fallen humans. The specific agencies that Irenaeus attributed to God’s Word and Spirit in these areas are summarized in

Table 1. Irenaeus on the agencies of Word and Spirit.

Level/Stage of the Created Order	Word’s Agency	Spirit’s Agency
Empirical cosmos in general	Made all things (undifferentiated) Gave laws and set bounds Contains all things, yet embedded in all in an invisible manner Governs and arranges all things Imprints the form of a cross in the dimensions of the universe Illuminates the heavens and holds back the depths	Made all things (undifferentiated) Adorned all things Contains all things
Vegetation	Same as for the empirical cosmos.	Fructifies and multiplies vegetation
Creation and animation of human beings (Gen. 1:26a; 2:7a)	Prototypical image for formation of the human body (godlike in form) Carries out the Father’s plan and commandments	Animates what was formed Produces a living soul (godlike in breath)
Humanity endowed with reason		Endows humanity with reason (in coordination with the Word)
Humanity formed in the divine Image and elevated to the divine likeness (Gen. 1:26a)	Prototypical image for the human body (godlike in form as above)	Perfected the first human (Adam) in the divine likeness (godlike in spirit)
Revelation	Coming to prophets in words and theophanic forms	Inspiring chosen humans to perceive those words and forms
Incarnation (perfect divine Image and likeness)	Was made man/flesh, visible Recapitulated the formation of Adam in Mary United the Spirit of God with humanity Hung upon the Cross that he might sum up all things in himself	Enabled Mary to produce a holy child, “Son of the Most High” Anointed the Word made flesh for service with the seven charismata of Isa. 11:2 LXX Raised the Word made flesh to glorified life
Humanity restored in the divine likeness	Re-established the divine likeness in humanity by becoming a perfect human in the image and likeness of God Raised from the dead as the prototype for restoration of humanity in union with God the Father	Vivifies us from a fallen, sinful life Renews the divine likeness in us Elevates us to union with Christ Confirms us in our faith
The life of the Church, present and future	Invites us to partake of his theanthropic life (esp. in the Eucharist) The ladder of our ascent to God the Father	Distributes the means of communion with Christ (esp. in the Eucharist) Works through apostles, prophets, and teachers The earnest/guarantee of our future resurrection and final union with Christ

. Irenaeus on the agencies of Word and Spirit. The first five entries (rows) are about extensive (distributive) agencies and the last four are about intensive agencies (personalized and episodic):

This table shows that Irenaeus balanced the complementary agencies of the Word and Spirit along the lines suggested by our physicists for each of seven topics:

The creation and development of the natural world: the Spirit’s adorning all things and fructifying vegetation, complementing the Word’s forming all things.

The bodily creation of humanity: the Spirit’s animation of virgin earth, complementing its bodily formation with the anthropic Word as its prototype.

The elevation of humanity to the spiritual likeness of God, complementing its formation in the divine image.

Divine revelations with the elevation of human minds and imaginations to perceive the forms and hear words of the divine Word.

The Incarnation: conception, anointing, crucifixion, and resurrection of Jesus.

The restoration in the divine likeness in humanity: spiritual rebirth and union with God with Christ as the prototypical Image.

The Church, its spiritual gifts, the Eucharist, and its future hope.

The general outline of Irenaeus’s treatment of the agencies of the Word and Spirit is comprehensive, spanning five major levels of the created order: physical, vegetable, physiological (animated body), mind (reason), and divine likeness (bestowed, lost and, restored). Irenaeus never systematized his ideas in this way. As seen in the passages cited above, they are entangled in such a way that you are never too far from one idea when reading about another. However, differentiating them as distinct topics can help us to describe the overall contours of his theology.

Most importantly, Irenaeus maintained the unity of the Godhead while including the Word and Spirit as integral members of the divine identity, on the one hand, and as potentialities for coordinated agency in the created world, on the other.

Recalling the ideas of our two physicists, however, one can see that Irenaeus’s treatment of the extensive agency of the Spirit in the creation of the physical cosmos is not clearly differentiated from that of the Word. Based on our physicists’ insights and our brief survey of the imagery of Scripture, I conclude that the Word’s formative, ordering, lawful agency in the physical realm needs to be complemented with the actualizing “breath” or “fire” of God’s Spirit to bring our world into existence, as stated in several biblical texts (e.g., Gen. 1:2; Ps. 33:6135). For Irenaeus, such actualization by the Spirit would not compete with the lawful evolution of the natural world.136 So, our two physicists’ ideas about scientific endeavors have not only given us an entry into the complex imagery concerning the agencies of God’s Word and Spirit found in Scripture and in Irenaeus, but they also remind us of aspects of those agencies that might otherwise escape our notice.

9. Conclusions

The purpose of this essay has been to use the idea of two representative modern physicists (John Archibald Wheeler and Stephen Hawking) concerning the goal of scientific endeavor as a template for rethinking the complex imagery for God’s Word and Spirit as described in Scripture and as further developed by Irenaeus of Lyons. The basic idea by which we were guided was a cooperative dialectic between a propensity for lawfulness and form, on the one hand, and the actualization of that propensity in all the many levels of the created order. It follows from our physicists’ idea that any description of a Deity capable of creating a lawful world of finite form must include the potential for formation/information and the potential for the actualization/elevation of such a world. In biblical terms, these potentials are manifested in the formative agency of God’s Word and the actualizing agency of God’s Spirit.

These two divine agencies operate in unison at a variety of empirical levels, and also at spiritual, supramundane ones, like the world seen in prophetic visions. Divine agencies that operate at empirical levels (physical and organic) are generally extensive in that they function in the formation and information of all members of every class of creatures. At least some human beings also function at a higher, supramundane level that may have formative laws of its own but are also subject to the intensive agencies of God’s Word and Spirit, ones like those involved in theophanies and personal transformations that apply to specific individuals at specific times.

Whether or not there is any significant harmony between the current theories of modern physics and those of Scripture, there is an overlap between their underlying dialectics of formation and actualization as far as the natural world is concerned. To offer full justice to biblical imagery for God’s Word and Spirit, however, this shared dialectic must be supplemented in several ways. It must allow for levels of the created order beyond the purely physical in order to do justice to the biblical tradition and avoid reductionism. It also must include the intensive, personal agencies of God’s Word and Spirit in the context of revelation, Incarnation, and personal transformation. In these contexts, the biblical tradition reveals the agency of God the Father as the source and commissioner of the Word and Spirit. Despite these important supplements, the basic pattern offered by our modern physicists suggests that there is a much deeper relationship between scientific endeavor and historical theology than we normally assume. As theologians, we can benefit by being reminded of aspects of our traditions that have been appropriated by modern scientists and are often neglected by the Church as being too secular.