filioque

OBJ: Eastern Orthodox objection: “the Catholics unlawfully added the Filioque to the Creed.”

ANS:

1. Local Councils in the West
   
• Council of Friuli (797):  Fathers at Friuli condemn as heretical those “who whisper that the Holy Spirit is of the Father alone,” yet explicitly vindicate those “who added ‘Who proceeds from the Father and the Son’” as supplementing—rather than subtracting from—the Nicene formula  .
2. Objection from Canon 7 of Ephesus (431)
   
• Eastern Objection:  Canon 7 anathematizes anyone who “dare[s] to compose a different faith” or “take away or add” to the Creed.
• Catholic Reply:
  
• Council of Florence (Session 8, 1439):  Eastern (Greek) bishops at Florence expressly agreed “that the phrase ‘and the Son’ was licitly and reasonably added to the Creed of Constantinople”  .
• Joseph M. Dalmau, S.J. argues that Ephesus’s prohibition was aimed at heretical innovations, not at every non-contradictory restatement or development; indeed, later councils (e.g., Chalcedon) themselves amended the Creed without malevolence  .
• St. Robert Bellarmine insists that once a new error arose (Macedonianism denying any procession from the Son), “a remedy . . . should have been provided” in the form of the Filioque, and that the Roman Pontiff had full authority to do so—even unilaterally if needed  .
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3. 
   
4. St. Isidore of Seville (Letter 6 to General Claudius, c. 633)
   
• St. Isidore diagnoses the real intent of the anti-tampering canons: they forbid contrary faiths, not the expression of the same faith in fuller terms.  He therefore concludes that adding the Filioque—since it “declares the truth” and does not contradict the Nicene-Constantinopolitan formula—is entirely lawful  .
5. 
   
6. Cardinal Bessarion (Letter to Alexios Lascaris, 1439)
   
• Bessarion compiles four logical proofs that no Council ever intended to anathematize “the same Creed in different words.”  He shows that every variation in the Fathers’ creeds (e.g. at Ephesus vs. Chalcedon) was accepted provided the meaning remained orthodox—and so the Filioque, correctly understood, was never proscribed  
• The eastern orthodox themselves right now do not repeat the original Nicaea Creed 325 AD. But they repeat the Nicean-Constantinople Creed with additions of baptism, the resurrection, the Church, and full Holy Spirit exposition. It also removed the anathematization on Arians. 

Obj: Eternal manifestation

ANS: 

2. 
   
• St. Gregory of Nazianzen (Oration 31, Para. 9)
  “But the difference of manifestation, if I may so express myself, or rather of their mutual relations one to another, has caused the difference of their Names.”
  Commentary: For Gregory, “manifestation” (ἐκλάμπον) is simply another way of speaking of the internal, hypostatic relations (“mutual relations”) by which each Person of the Trinity is named and distinguished.  
• St. Athanasius (First Letter to Serapion, Para. 20)
  “[The Holy Spirit] which is said to proceed (ἐκπορεύεσθαι) from the Father, because it is from the Word (παρὰ τοῦ Λόγου), who is confessed to be from the Father, … shines forth (ἐκλάμπει) and is sent and is given.”
  Commentary: Athanasius explicitly equates “proceeding… from the Word” with “shines forth”; thus, what the Greeks call an “eternal shining forth” is nothing other than true hypostatic procession from the Son alongside the Father.  
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2. none of the great anti-Filioque champions up to the late 9th century—Photius (in his Mystagogy) or Anastasius Bibliothecarius—knew or even hinted at an “eternal manifestation” separate from true procession.  Only in 1285 did Gregory II of Cyprus first articulate it at Blachernae.  This sudden appearance, coupled with the fact that contemporary Byzantines mistook his “manifestation” teaching for the very Filioque he sought to oppose, shows it to be a later Byzantine innovation, not part of Apostolic Tradition

3. 
   

   1. 
      
   • if God’s uncreated energies were really distinct from His essence, one would either (a) deny that the energies are truly God (making them creatures), or (b) posit multiple instances of Pure Act (leading to polytheism), or (c) admit composition in God—each outcome flatly contradicting divine simplicity.  Hence energetic procession, and with it this version of eternal manifestation, collapses into heresy  

   2. • OBJ: Distinction between hypostatic origin and manner of existence (i.e. that the Spirit “exists” through the Son yet only “has existence” from the Father) likewise fails
      • ANS: if these are really distinct, the Spirit would be either composed of two acts of existence or mutable—again violating divine simplicity and immutability
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 “Thus the way of the knowledge of God lies from One Spirit through the One Son to the One Father, and conversely the natural Goodness and the inherent Holiness and the royal Dignity extend from the Father **through the Only-begotten to the Spirit**” (4th century East and West St. Basil of Caesarea, De Spiritu Sancto, 18, Para. 47).

“Have mercy on us, have mercy, holy Trinity, going into One from One…**one God from the Begetter through (δι) the Son into the great Spirit**” (4th century East and West St. Gregory Nazianzen, Moral Poems [PG 37, 632A]).

As for the **Holy Spirit, it is said to be from the Father and is testified to be from the Son** (4th century East and West St. Gregory of Nyssa, Sermon 3 on the Lord’s Prayer [PG 46, 1109BC])

“...**only the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Father and received of the Son. All other things are created beings**, and neither proceeded from the Father nor received of the Son” (4th century East and West St. Epiphanius, Panarion, Against the Arians, 34.4) 

“The Son comes from the Father; the Holy Spirit comes from the Father. The former is born; the latter proceeds. Hence, the former is the Son of the Father from whom he is born, but the latter is **the Spirit of both because he proceeds from both**” (4th-5th century East and West St. Augustine, Answer to Maximinus the Arian, Book II, Ch. 14, 1 [PL 42, 770])