“He who does not believe the Spirit does not believe the Son”

“For he who does not believe the Spirit does not believe the Son, and he who does not believe the Son, does not believe the Father. .  .  . Such a person is bereft of true worship, for he cannot worship the Son except in the Holy Spirit, and he cannot call upon the Father, except in the Spirit of adopted sonship.” — Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit (11, 27).

From St. Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit translated and introduced by Stephen Hildebrand. Popular Patristic Series 42 (Yonkers, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2011).

Basil (330-379) was crucial in the defense and development of Trinitarian orthodoxy in the fourth century. In On the Holy Spirit, he defends the full divinity of the Holy Spirit. Here in this quotation he highlights how belief in the Father and the Son necessitates belief in the Spirit. He then turns to the everyday practice of Christians—worshipping Christ and praying to the Father. These two central acts of devotion are only possible in and through the Spirit. The way Christians worship and pray depends upon the divinity of the Holy Spirit. Basil wants Christians to see that their faith and practice must be trinitarian or else it is not biblical.