The Trinitarian Theology of Saint Thomas Aquinas - El Camino ...

The Person of the Holy Spirit 249
Holy Spirit, since impulsion and movement belong to him, because of love. This is
why John says ‘It is the Spirit that quickeneth’ (6.64), and Ezekiel: I will send Spirit into
you and you will live’ (37.5). And, in the Symbol of our Faith, we profess our faith in
the Spirit the giver of life.124
These passages show in an eloquent way that nothing is more alien to
St Thomas than a ‘static’ vision of the universe. The Holy Spirit is the divine
impulse of love: the world and its history are formed by this impulsion, in
which they participate. One could add other texts, especially from the biblical
commentaries, but these are enough to let us see the method and the content
of Thomas’ doctrine of the Holy Spirit. It is by means of the eternal property
of the Spirit as Love, in the style of a ‘love-impulse’, that one can set forth the
deep reason for the acts attributed by Scripture to the Holy Spirit. Its aptitude
for elucidating the economy conWrms the idea of the Spirit as Love.
Thus far we have only considered creation and the universal activity of the
Spirit. St Thomas gives a much more extended elaboration to the acts of
the Spirit on behalf of humanity, and particularly to his gifts within the life
of grace. But, before we open this window, we have to examine a diVerent face
of the Holy Spirit’s personality. The Holy Spirit supplies his gifts to the
entirety of creation, and he is also given in person to human beings and to
angels: he is the Gift in person.
5. THE GIFT OF THE FATHER AND THE SON
As with the idea of love, that of the Gift arises as a deepening of the Trinitarian
tradition handed on by Augustine. Augustine actually acknowledged Gift as a
proper name of the Holy Spirit: the Spirit is the only one within the Trinity
whom we call Gift, the Gift common to Father and Son, the Gift which the
resurrection of Christ obtains for men.125 This is evidently a biblical idea: the
Holy Spirit is the highest gift which the Father makes to his children by
hearing their prayers (Lk. 11.13); it is by him that spiritual gifts are conveyed
to the Church (1 Cor. 12.4–11), he is God’s gift, whom Christ extends to us,
124 SCG IV, ch. 20 (no. 3574). Thomas Wnds here a new congruity explaining the name
‘Spirit’, by analogy with the theme of life: it is eVectively through ‘spirit’ (spiritus) that life is
communicated to the members in living beings endowed with animal life (ibid.). Cf. CT I,
ch. 147.
125 See especially De Trinitate V.XV.16–XVI.17; XV.XVII.29; XV.XVIII.32; XV.XIX.33–36; etc.
Peter Lombard collected the documentation on the topic of the name ‘Gift’ (Sentences, Book I,
dist. 18). All of Thomas’ references on this question (in ST I, q. 38) are taken from Augustine.
See F. Bourassa, ‘Don de Dieu, Nom propre du Saint-Esprit’, SE 6 (1954), 73–82; id., ‘Le don de
Dieu’, Gregorianum 50 (1969), 201–235.