The Divine Trinity: A Dogmatic Treatise

by Joseph Pohle

Whether the infinite personality of God must be conceived as simple or multiplex, is a matter which human reason cannot determine unaided. On the strength of the inductive axiom, “Quot sunt naturae, tot sunt personae,” we should rather be tempted to attribute but one personality to the one Divine Nature. Positive Revelation tells us, however, that there are in God three really distinct persons: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. This fundamental dogma, which essentially differentiates the Christian conception of God from that of the Pagans, the Jews, and the Mohammedans, is designated in the technical Latin of the Church as “Trinitas,” a term first used, so far as we know, by Theophilus of Antioch2 and Tertullian,3 and which later became current in ecclesiastical usage and was embodied in the Creeds.4 In the private symbolum of St. Gregory Thaumaturgus mention is made of a “perfect Triad” (τριὰς τελεία). Didymus the Blind, Cyril of Alexandria, Hilary, Ambrose, and Augustine have written separate treatises “On the Trinity.”

2 Ad Autolyc., II, 15: “Τριάδος τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ λόγου καὶ τῆς σοφίας αὐτοῦ” (On the three books Ad Autolycum, see Bardenhewer-Shahan, Patrology, pp. 66 sq., Freiburg and St. Louis 1908. On the word τριάς, cfr. Newman, Athanasius, II, 473 sq., 9th ed., London 1903.)

3 De Pudicitia, c. 21: “Trinitas unius divinitatis, Pater et Filius et Spiritus Sanctus.”

4 Denzinger-Bannwart, Enchiridion Symbolorum, ed. 10, nn. 213, 232, Friburgi Brisgoviae 1908.

238 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 4, 2010

About the author

Father Joseph Pohle, SJ, PhD

After completing his studies at Trier, Germany, he attended the German College in Rome, as well as the Gregorianum. He received his PhD. in philosophy in 1874, his S.T.D. in 1879. He was ordained in 1878 as a priest in the Society of Jesus.

In 1889, at the request of Bishop John Keane, he joined the founding faculty of the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., as Professor of Apologetics.

He returned to Germany in 1894 as Professor of Dogma at Münster. He transferred to Breslau in 1897, where he continued scholarly pursuits until his death, including 24 articles for the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia.