Is Jesus Christ autotheos (αὐτόθεος)? Unfortunately, there is no simple answer to this question. Like many other theological terms, autotheos can be—and has been—used in more than one sense. Personally speaking, I first became aware of the term via B. B. Warfield’s reflections on John Calvin’s controversial elucidations on the doctrine of the Trinity.
Back in the fall of 2015 I published a three-part series—part 1; part 2, part 3—that delved into John Calvin's novel concepts concerning the doctrine of the Trinity, which included the denial of the communication/generation of the Son of God’s essence/substance from God the Father. To defend this view, Calvin placed a heavy emphasis on the aseity of the Son—i.e. that the Son is autotheos. An excellent introduction concerning this aspect of Calvin’s Trinitarian thought has been provided by Brannon Ellis, who wrote:
…the heart of Calvin’s approach [concerning the doctrine of the Trinity] was exactly what his traditionalist opponents also embraced. Calvin and his classical critics were in agreement against all forms of antitrinitarianism, regarding the principal role of the affirmation of both ways of speaking of God through careful distinction. They did not agree, however, on the extent to which this shared conviction should be pressed when it came to one of the central claims of Calvin’s position—one that drew explicit attention to the nexus between Unity and Trinity, between the divine processions and the consubstantiality of the Father, Son, and Spirit. A constant element in all Calvin’s controversies was his assertion of the aseity (or self-existence) of God the Son, and denial of the legitimacy of this language by all his opponents—both orthodox and heterdodox.
Against antitrinitarians who more or less conflated personal and essential language, making the Son other than the one true God the Father or else indistinguishable from the Father in God, Calvin argued along with classical tradition, that, though the Son is not who the Father is, he is all that which the Father is. But, against some Trinitarians uncomfortable with his strong claim that the Son exists in and of himself, Calvin asserted in a similar manner that we must be able to say everything of the only-begotten Son that we say of the Father with respect to essence. The Son is therefore rightly confessed to be essentially self-existent, possessing deity ‘of himself’ (a se) as the one true God together with the Father and the Spirit.
Calvin’s affirmations along these lines, explicitly employing what I call autothean language, arose in 1588 in response to Valentine Gentile’s exclusive attribution of underived deity to the Father. The adjective autothean was first applied to Calvin’s views by a Roman Catholic polemicist shortly after Calvin’s death. It derives from his appropriation of Gentile’s language in order to claim against Gentile that the Son together with the Father possesses αὐτοθεὸτης (divine aseity), and therefore is αὐτοθεὸς (‘God of himself’, self-existent God). Again, however, Calvin had employed synonymous language—drawing similar criticism—from the beginning of his career. (Calvin, Classical Trinitarianism, and the Aseity of the Son, p. 2)
Calvin was not the first individual to apply autothean language to the Son. However, he was the first to use autothean language in a sense that eliminated the communication/generation of the Son’s essence from the Father; a sense that evoked the "denial of the legitimacy of this language by all his opponents—both orthodox and heterdodox." It is a sense that stands in contrast with the original Nicene Creed, which states:
We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of all things seen and unseen. And in one Lord, Jesus Christ the Son of God, begotten of the Father, the only-begotten, that is, of the essence of the Father…
One of the most proficient defenders of the Nicene Creed was the Anglican priest/theologian George Bull. In volume 2 of his Defensio Fidei Nicænæ - A Defence of the Nicene Creed, he specifically addressed the application of αὐτόθεος to the Son. His introduction to chapter 1 of Book IV is reproduced below:
THE FIRST PROPOSITION TOUCHING THE SUBORDINATION OF THE SON TO THE FATHER AS TO HIS ORIGIN AND PRINCIPLE, STATED. THIS IS ALSO CONFIRMED BY THE UNANIMOUS CONSENT OF THE ANCIENTS. IT IS SHEWN, THAT THAT EXPRESSION OF CERTAIN MODERN WRITERS, BY WHICH THEY DESIGNATE THE SON, αὐτόθεος, THAT IS, OF HIMSELF GOD, IS QUITE REPUGNANT TO THE JUDGMENT OF THE NICENE COUNCIL ITSELF, AND ALSO TO THAT OF ALL THE CATHOLIC DOCTORS, BOTH THOSE WHO WROTE BEFORE, AND THOSE WHO WROTE AFTER, THAT COUNCIL (1852 Oxford ed., p. 556 – link to PDF)
He then writes:
...the Son has indeed the same divine nature in common with the Father, but communicated by the Father; in such sense, that is, that the Father alone hath the divine nature from Himself, in other words, from no other, but the Son from the Father; consequently that the Father is the fountain, origin, and principle, of the Divinity which is in the Son. (Ibid. p. 557)
Bull immediately follows the above with numerous quotations from the Church Fathers that clearly support his ‘FIRST PROPOSITION’. In paragraph #7 on page 565 he begins his examination “of certain moderns, who obstinately contend that the Son may properly be called αὐτόθεος, i.e God of Himself.” He then writes:
This view is inconsistent both with the hypotheses of those who maintain it, and with catholic consent. They say, I mean, that the Son is from God the Father, as He is Son, and not as He is God; that He received His Person, not His essence, or Divine Nature, from the Father. But this is self contradictory; for, as Petavius rightly says, "The Son of God cannot be begotten by the Father, unless He receive from Him His nature and Godhead." For what else is it ' to be begotten,' than to be sprung from another, so as to have a like nature ? he who is begotten must necessarily have [his] nature in such wise communicated by him [who begets,] as in it to be like him who begets [him.] Unless indeed Christ, in that He is the Son of God, is not God; or receives a relation only from the Father without [receiving] Godhead. I add, that in this case Person cannot be conceived of without essence, unless you lay down Person in the Godhead to be nothing else than a mere mode of existence, which is simple Sabellianism. (Ibid. p. 565)
On the next page, he cogently sums up his argument against those who maintain that the Son is ‘God of Himself’:
...if essence is communicated to the Son by generation, He plainly has His essence from the Father, not from Himself; otherwise either He would not be begotten, or He would not be begotten by another. Hence Damascene, on the Orthodox Faith, i. 10, rightly observes, "All things which the Son and the Spirit severally have, They have of the Father, even being itself." And in what way this opinion of theirs is repugnant to catholic consent, I have shewn a little before. The council of Nice itself certainly decreed that the Son is God of God; He, however, who is God of God, cannot, without manifest contradiction, be said to be God of Himself. (Ibid. p. 566- bold emphasis mine.)
In the last paragraph of chapter 1 (#10), Bull acknowledges a sense in which αὐτόθεος can legitimately be applied to the Son; note the following:
...no Catholic would deny that the Son both may and ought to be called αὐτόθεος, that is to say, true and veriest God. Hence, even Eusebius, who (if any one) acknowledged the subordination of the Son to the Father, as to His origin and principle, yet still did not hesitate to declare, that the Saviour is "worshipped, and rightly worshipped, as the genuine Son of the supreme God, and αὐτόθεος (very God)." Where by the word αὐτόθεος, is clearly meant, not one who is God of Himself, but one who is truly God; as may be gathered both from the fact that it is the Son of God, who is here called αὐτόθεος, as well as from the fact that in the same breath the Father is designated the supreme God; (Ibid. p. 569)
It is now time to answer the opening question of this post: Is Jesus Christ autotheos (αὐτόθεος)? If one defines αὐτόθεος as ‘God of Himself’, then NO; but, if one defines αὐτόθεος as ‘very God’ (i.e. God of God/God from God), then YES.
Grace and peace,
David
P.S. This post was prompted by this comment posted on March 13, 2021.