Preliminary Clarifications

Before setting Thesis A in context, it w ill be well to offer some basic clarifica­ tions about its intention. The first clarification relates to the type o f discourse in­ volved. In Thesis A we find a theological interpretation o f the biblical theme o f the anointing o f Jesus.59 Note that by “anointing” here, Coffey is referring not only to biblical texts about the baptism o f Jesus, or Acts 10:38, Romans 1:4, but also and crucially to Luke 1:35, which places the anointing at the very m om ent o f coming into being o f Jesus as a human being. Jesus receives the Holy Spirit from God in an “anointing.”60 This reception is somehow foundational o f his very existence as Son.61 Because o f this anointing, Jesus is m arked out as the “Christ.” C offey’s theo­ logical interpretation o f the biblical theme o f anointing involves understanding it as a “bestow al” o f “love,” a love which is the Holy Spirit.62 It is as a result o f this anointing that Jesus is “brought into being as the divine Son in hum anity.”

N ote that Coffey’s theological interpretation o f the anointing involves trinit­ arian talk o f Father, Son and Holy Spirit. He does not intend w ith this use o f the vocabulary o f Father, Son and Holy Spirit, to suggest that the biblical authors them ­ selves intended to speak o f three distinct trinitarian persons such as would only have been possible in the light o f a fully-developed trinitarian theology. He knows

59 It is o f course recognised that the biblical texts can themselves be understood as theological in­ terpretation. For the sake o f simplicity, however, the distinction may be accepted, with “biblical” standing for the literal meaning o f biblical texts, and “theological” standing for post-biblical inter­ pretations o f these texts going beyond the ‘literal’ meaning.

60 This final text is important, since without it the danger o f ‘adoptionism’ is real. Coffey dis­

cusses the biblical background to the theme o f anointing and its patristic reception in Coffey, Grace:

The Gift o f the Holy Spirit, 120-144.

61 He writes that in his theology, there is “no element o f adoptionism, since the humanity o f Jesus

is declared not to have existed prior to the anointing.” See Ibid., 120.

62 Chapter Three below explores how the term “love” here is to be understood.

the importance o f distinguishing between the literal meaning o f biblical texts and biblical themes on the one hand,63 and later theological interpretations o f those texts, on the other.64

In relation to the specific matter o f the interpretation o f biblical anointing texts, the question o f the distinct personal being o f the Son and the Holy Spirit arises. Does the fact that doctrinal clarity on the distinct personal identity o f the three divine persons came only in the fourth century mean that we should be scep­ tical about any trinitarian interpretation o f the biblical theme o f the anointing?

Coffey is aware not only that there is no developed doctrine o f the Trinity in the New Testament, but also that there is not even clarity in the New Testam ent on w hether or how the Holy Spirit should be thought o f as distinct from God or, in­ deed, from Christ. Coffey agrees with those scholars that hold that the term “Holy Spirit” in the N ew Testament, when read historically, should probably be presumed to be equivalent to “Spirit o f God,” that is, the “pow er o f God,” or “Yahweh him ­ self apprehended in his action.”65 Where N ew Testam ent references to the Holy Sprit are personal, he accepts that it is probable that such references were intended by their authors as pointing to the personal dynamic action o f God as such, rather than the Holy Spirit as distinct.66

63 On the “literal meaning” of biblical texts see above at p. 11.

64 The reader need not infer that such interpretation is arbitrary. One might see here the work o f the Holy Spirit, who guides the church into all truth (John 16:13).

65, Coffey, Deus Trinitas: The Doctrine of the Triune God, 11. For a general overview of the bib­ lical understanding of the “Spirit o f God” see Ibid., 10-11. Elsewhere Coffey writes “It is not pos­ sible for any part o f the Bible to present the same doctrine o f the Holy Spirit as that of the First

Council of Constantinople.” Coffey, Grace: The Gift o f the Holy Spirit, 128; Coffey, “The Palamite

Doctrine o f God: A New Perspective,” 350; Coffey, “The Holy Spirit as the Mutual Love o f the Father and the Son,” 210.

For a general overview o f biblical meanings o f the term “Holy Spirit” see Geoffrey Lampe, “Holy Spirit,” in The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bble: Volume 2: E-J, ed. George Arthur Buttrick,

(New York: Abingdon Press, 1962); Eduard Schweizer, ‘Tlveupa, HveupaxiKoc, nveco, EKjrveto,

©sojrvsooioc;,” in Theological Dictionary o f the New Testament: Volume 6: Tie - P, ed. Gerhard Friedrich, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1968); F. W. Horn,

“Holy Spirit,” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary: Volume 3: H - J , ed. David Noel Freedman, (New

York: Doubleday, 1992).

66 Coffey distinguishes between the question o f the personhood (ontological) and the personality

(psychological) o f the Holy Spirit. Since the New Testament does not penetrate, he thinks, to an on­ tological level o f discourse, there is no question o f there being any recognition in it o f a distinct per-

I f Coffey is indeed clear that at the level o f the literal meaning o f the biblical texts, a fully developed trinitarian reading would be anachronistic, the question arises: is he confusing matters by bringing post-New Testam ent ideas about the dis­ tinction o f Father, Son and Holy Spirit to a reading o f New Testam ent texts in which such a distinction is only obscurely, if at all, present? The answer is simply stated: in using the trinitarian language o f the Father bestowing the Holy Spirit on the Jesus as Son, Coffey is self-consciously offering a theological interpretation o f the biblical theme o f the anointing o f Jesus. Recognising a certain prim acy o f the literal meaning o f biblical texts does not mean ruling out the possibility o f a theolo­ gical interpretation of those texts. I will have occasion to comment further on the how he handles the biblical data and the complex m anner in which he construes the relationship between this and the theological interpretation he advances. At this stage, it is sufficient to note that in offering a trinitarian reading o f the biblical

sonhood of the Holy Spirit. What traces of a recognition o f a personality o f the Holy Spirit there are in the New Testament are linked with the “personality” of God or with the “personality” of Christ:

no distinct personality is awarded him. The content o f the experience o f the Holy Spirit re­ mains either the Father or Christ; inasmuch as the Father is transcendent and hence inef­ fable, in practical terms this content must simply be said to be Christ. After the Resurrec­ tion, then, the Holy Spirit has a personality, but it is the personality o f Christ.

See Coffey, Deus Trinitas: The Doctrine of the Triune God, 11. See also Coffey, “The Holy Spirit as the Mutual Love o f the Father and the Son,” 212.

There are, however, the beginnings of an awareness o f a real distinctness o f the Holy Spirit in the occasional use o f personal pronouns of the Spirit, even in the New Testament. The direction o f de­ velopment o f doctrine regarding the Holy Spirit is towards the recognition o f distinction, eventually frilly recognised by the Council o f Constantinople (381). The direction o f thought in relation to Jesus

is, conversely, towards unity with God, which flourishes in the homoousios o f the Council o f Nicaea

(325).

For expressions o f caution about the attribution o f even “personality” to the Holy Spirit, see

Schweizer, ‘TIveupa, nveupariKoc, nvsco, Ekjtvsco, ©sojrveuaxog” 433-434.

We might note in passing an important early step in the development towards an awareness o f the distinctness o f the Holy Spirit, already evident in some New Testament writings, namely the beginn­ ings o f an association o f the Holy Spirit (the dynamic action o f God in the world) with the risen Je­ sus. After the Resurrection, Jesus is understood by the church’s earliest communities to have been transferred to the realm of the Spirit, so that the continuation o f the gifts that God makes through Je­ sus Christ is understood to be mediated by a Spirit that now has taken on the personality o f Jesus. See Coffey, “The Theandric Nature o f Christ”. Coffey refers for this point to J.D.G. Dunn. See

James D.G. Dunn, Jesus and the Spirit: A Study of the Religious and Charismatic Experience o f

Jesus as Reflected in the New Testament, (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1975), 3 18- 326, 350- 357. Thus we explain the New Testament references to the “Spirit o f Christ.” Just as the Spirit is identi­ fied with the action o f God, so too is the Spirit now identified with Jesus Christ.

theme o f the anointing o f Jesus, Coffey is not engaged in ahistorical eisegesis. With this first clarification, I have introduced the theme o f the relation o f the biblical texts to the theological interpretation o f those texts, a theme to which we will return.

A second clarification addresses the relation between Coffey’s theological in­ terpretation in Thesis A and the theological interpretations o f the classical trinitari­ an tradition. Although the language employed in Thesis A is that o f classical trinit­ arian theology (Father, Son and Holy Spirit, understood as distinct divine persons), this language is used in a way that differs in some key respects from that o f the classical theological tradition. The more obvious o f these w ill be here mentioned.

First, note the shape o f Thesis A itself. Classical christological statements typ­ ically begin with the idea o f the pre-existing divine Son and go on to speak o f the Incarnation o f this Son as Jesus.67 The subject here is the pre-existing divine Son. This reflects a logic that contemporary theology describes as “descending.” C offey’s statement, in contrast, begins with Jesus (rather than the Eternal Son) and describes w hat happens to Jesus as a result o f the bestowal o f the Spirit. The subject here is Jesus. Contemporary theology describes such a structure, beginning with Je­ sus and ending (so to speak) with the Son as “ascending.”

Second, note that the Holy Spirit is portrayed as centrally involved in this ac­ count o f how Jesus is brought into being as “divine Son in hum anity.” In this too C offey’s statem ent diverges from the classical approach in Christology, which does not generally invoke the Holy Spirit in accounts o f the Incarnation.

Third, C offey’s reading o f the biblical theme o f the anointing o f Jesus em­ ploys some unusual expressions: Jesus is said to be “brought into being” as divine

67 The “Second Letter of Cyril o f Alexandria to Nestorius,” which was accepted as official church

teaching at the Council of Ephesus (431), exemplifies the typical shape o f the statements o f classical

Christology: “we affirm that the Word, having united to him self according to the hypostasis {hath'

hupostasin) the flesh animated by a rational soul, became man in an ineffable and incomprehensible

manner and was called the Son o f man.” Translation in The Christian Faith: Doctrinal Documents

o f the Catholic Church, ed. Josef Neuner and Jacques Dupuis, 6th Revised and Expanded Edition ed., (New York: Alba House, 1996), 64. Note that the subject is the Word and that no reference to the Spirit is made.

Son “in hum anity.” As we will see, in speaking o f the divine Son “in humanity,” Coffey is referring not ju st to the idea o f hypostatic union, but rather to the effect o f this union on the humanity o f Jesus:68 the sanctification o f that hum anity by the Holy Spirit, such that that nature becomes “theandric.”69

The task now for the remainder o f this chapter is to set C offey’s Thesis A in two contexts. First, I will comment on a broader issue: the relation o f “Spirit Chris- tology” to “Logos Christology.” This is important for a num ber o f reasons, not least o f which is the fact that Coffey’s distinctive stand on this m atter - a matter directly pertinent to our topic - helps us find points o f comparison and contrast with some other theologians writing today. Second, I look at som ething more specific: the question o f the grace o f Christ.