Library › St Gregory of Tours › History of the Franks

History of the Franks

St Gregory of Tours, tr. Dalton, 1927

Book 5, 43. Of My Dispute with a Heretic

King Leuvigild sent as envoy to Chilperic, Agilan, a man of poor wits, untrained in reasoning, and distinguished only for malevolence towards the Catholic law. His way bringing him to Tours, he proceeded to provoke me as to my belief, and to assail the dogmas of the Church. ‘That’, he said, ‘was a wrong opinion of the ancient bishops which asserted the Son equal to the Father. For how can He be equal to the Father in power who Himself saith: “The Father is greater than I”?¹ It is not therefore right that He should be considered equal to Him than whom He proclaimeth Himself less, to whom He lamenteth the sadness of death, to whom as He died He commended His spirit as though Himself without all power, whence it is plain that in power, as in age, He was lesser than His Father.’ To this I replied by asking whether he believed that Jesus Christ was Son of God, and whether he admitted that He was the wisdom of God, the light, the truth, the life, the justice. ‘I believe’, he said, ‘that the Son of God is all these things.’ Then I said: ‘Tell me now, when was the Father without wisdom, without light, without life, without truth? when was He without justice? For like as the Father could not exist without these things, so neither could He be without the Son. For these things above all are essential to the holiness of the divine name. But neither also could He be called the Father if He had no Son. As for the words which thou imputest to Him, “My Father is greater than I”, know that He said this in the lowliness of the flesh which He had assumed to teach thee that by humility thou wert redeemed and not by power. And well were it that thou shouldst remember, thou who dost cite the words, “My Father is greater than I”, that in another place He saith: “I and My Father are one.”² His fear of death and the commending of His Spirit are to be referred to the weakness of the flesh; that even as He is believed to be very God, so He may be believed to be very man.’ He answered: ‘He that doeth the will of another is less than he; and the Son is ever less than the Father in that He doeth the will of the Father, nor is it proven that the Father doeth His.’ To this I replied: ‘Know that the Father is in the Son, and the Son in the Father, each subsisting eternally in one Godhead. Wouldst thou know, therefore, that the Father doeth the will of the Son? Hear then, if faith in the Gospel abide in thee, what Christ our Lord Himself said when He came to raise Lazarus: “I thank Thee, Father, that Thou hast heard Me, and I knew that Thou hearest Me always. But because of the people that stand by I said it, that they may believe that Thou hast sent Me.”³ And when He came to His Passion, He said: “O Father, glorify Me with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was made.”⁴ And the Father replied to Him from Heaven: “I have both glorified, and will glorify again.”⁵ Therefore is the Son equal in Godhead and not inferior; nor is He in anything less. For if thou dost confess Him God, it is needful that thou confess that He is perfect and lacking nothing; if thou deny that He is perfect, thou dost not believe Him God.’ To this he said: ‘It was after He was made man that He began to be called the Son of God; for there was a time when yet He was not.’ I answered: ‘Hear David, speaking in the name of the Lord: “Out of my womb I have borne thee before the morning star.”⁶ And John the Evangelist: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”⁷ And this consequence: “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, by whom all things were made.”⁸ But ye who are blinded by the poison of a vain opinion have no worthy perception of God.’ He then replied: ‘Do ye then say that the Holy Ghost is God, or declare Him equal to the Father and the Son?’ I answered: ‘In the Three there is one will, one power, one action, one God in Trinity, and three Persons in unity. There be three Persons, but there is one kingdom, one majesty, one power, one omnipotence.’ To that he rejoined: ‘The Holy Ghost whom ye proclaim equal to the Father and the Son is admitted less than either, for we read that He was promised by the Son and sent by the Father. Now man promiseth only that which standeth within his control, and sendeth only him who is inferior to himself, as He saith Himself in the Gospel: “If I go not away, the Comforter will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him unto you.”’⁹’ Whereto I made reply: ‘Well did the Son say before His Passion that if He returned not victor to His Father, having redeemed the world with His own blood, and prepared in the heart of man a habitation worthy of God, the Holy Spirit, which is God, should not descend in a heart idolatrous and spotted with the stain of original sin. “For the Holy Spirit”, saith Solomon, “will flee deceit.”¹⁰ And thou, if thou have no hope of resurrection, speak not against the Holy Spirit, for according to the word of God: “He that blasphemeth against the Holy Spirit shall not be forgiven in this world or the next.”’¹¹ ‘But’, said he, ‘God is He who sendeth; he who is sent is no God.’ At this I inquired whether he believed the doctrine of the apostles Peter and Paul? And when he replied, ‘I do believe,’ I added: ‘But when the apostle Peter convicted Ananias of fraud in the matter of his field, see what he said: “Wherefore hath it seemed good to thee to lie to the Holy Ghost? Thou hast not lied unto men but unto God.”¹² And Paul, when he was distinguishing the degrees of spiritual graces, spake thus: “All these things worketh that one and the same Spirit, dividing to every one severally as he will.”¹³ For he that doeth according to his will is brought under the power of no man. But ye, as I said but now, hold no right opinion on the Holy Trinity, and how wicked is the perversity of this sect the end of your founder Arius hath plainly shown.’ To this he answered: ‘Speak not evil of law which thou thyself observest not; as for us, though we believe not the things which ye believe, yet we do not speak evil of them, for the holding of this or that belief may not be imputed as a crime. And indeed we have a common saying that no harm is done when one passing between the altars of the Gentiles and the church of God, payeth respect to both.’ I saw the stupidity of the man, and said: ‘As I perceive, thou art a defender of the Gentiles and a champion of heretics, for thou dost defile the dogmas of the Church, and dost proclaim the worship of pagan abominations. It were better done if thou wouldst arm thee with the faith which Abraham found at the oak, Isaac in the ram, Jacob in the stone, Moses in the bush; which Aaron wore in the ephod, and David knew, dancing before the ark with the timbrel; which Solomon proclaimed by his wisdom; which all the patriarchs and prophets, and the very law itself, sang in oracles or figured forth in sacrifice; which the holy Martin, to-day ever present with us, possessed in his heart and manifested in his works, that so thou also mightst be converted to believe in the Trinity indivisible, receiving our benediction and cleansing thy heart from the poison of false belief until these iniquities were blotted out.’ Then was he moved to wrath, and gnashing his teeth almost like a madman, rejoined: ‘The soul shall leave the bonds of this body, or ever I receive the benediction from a priest of thy religion.’ Whereto I: ‘Neither may the Lord so make lukewarm our religion or our faith that we distribute His holy thing to dogs, or expose the sacredness of precious pearls before unclean swine.’ Thereat he abandoned the argument, and rising up, withdrew. But afterwards, on his return to Spain, when he was made weak by sickness, necessity constrained him, and he was converted to our faith.

Previous · Contents · Next