Editing Trinity (section)

=== First Council of Nicaea (325) ===
{{Main|First Council of Nicaea}}
[[File:Glória de São Nicolau - António Manuel da Fonseca (Igreja de São Nicolau, Lisboa), cropped.png|thumb|''The Glory of Saint Nicholas'', by [[António Manuel da Fonseca]]; [[Nicholas of Myra]], a participant in the First Council of Nicaea, achieves the [[beatific vision]] in the shape of the Holy Trinity.]]
In the fourth century, [[Arianism]], as traditionally understood,{{efn |name=Arius}} taught that the Father existed prior to the Son, who was not, by nature, God but rather a changeable creature who was granted the dignity of becoming "Son of God".{{sfn|Cross|Livingstone|2005|p=100}} In 325, the [[First Council of Nicaea]] adopted the Nicene Creed which described Christ as "God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father", and the "Holy Ghost" as the one by which "[[Incarnation (Christianity)|was incarnate]]&nbsp;... of the [[Virgin birth of Jesus|Virgin Mary]]".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/creeds1.iv.iii.html |title=Creeds of Christendom, with a History and Critical notes |volume=I. The History of Creeds |website=Christian Classics Ethereal Library |access-date=2 June 2014 |archive-date=6 December 2003 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031206143317/http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/creeds1.iv.iii.html |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.creeds.net/ancient/niceneg.htm |title=The Nicaeno-Constantinopolitan Creed |first=Michael |last=Anderson |website=creeds.net |access-date=2 June 2014 |archive-date=17 November 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061117041739/http://www.creeds.net/ancient/niceneg.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> ("the [[Logos#Christianity|Word]] was made flesh and dwelled among us"). About the Father and the Son, the creed used the term {{lang|grc-Latn|homoousios}} (of one substance) to define the relationship between the Father and the Son. After more than fifty years of debate, {{lang|grc-Latn|homoousios}} was recognized as the hallmark of orthodoxy and was further developed into the formula of "three persons, one being".

The Confession of the First Council of Nicaea, the Nicene Creed, said little about the Holy Spirit.<ref name="BEoWR" /> At the First Council of Nicea (325) all attention was focused on the relationship between the Father and the Son, without making any similar statement about the Holy Spirit. In the words of the creed:

{{blockquote|We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of all things visible and invisible. 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, God of God,] Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father; ... And [we believe] in the Holy Ghost. }}

The Nicene Creed of 325 is also considered binitarian (although it passingly mentions the Holy Spirit).<ref name="h502">{{cite book | last=Steenberg | first=M. C. | title=Of God and Man: Theology as Anthropology from Irenaeus to Athanasius | publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing | date=1 January 2009 | isbn=978-0-567-60047-9 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JvcRBwAAQBAJ&dq=Nicaea+binitarian&pg=PA106 | access-date=12 April 2025 | page=106 | quote=Thomas Smail’s comments on attention to the Spirit in the Constantinopolitan revision of Nicaea seem even more pertinent as to the Nicene original: Attention is so concentrated on the binitarian question of the right relationship of the Father to the Son that the properly trinitarian question that deals with the relating of the Spirit to both the Father and the Son is dealt with in a way that lacks focus and specifi city and that, on any reckoning, is quite inadequate to the rich biblical and especially New Testament material that deals with the pre- and post-Pentecostal activity of the Spirit among God’s people.}}</ref><ref name="g092">{{cite book | last=Ngong | first=David Tonghou | title=The Holy Spirit and Salvation in African Christian Theology: Imagining a More Hopeful Future for Africa | publisher=Peter Lang | date=2010 | isbn=978-1-4331-0941-6 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u-PZz-TKJakC&dq=Nicaea+binitarian&pg=PA131 | access-date=12 April 2025 | pages=131, 153 fn. 35 | quote=That is why the creed drawn at Nicaea in 325 was fundamentally a binitarian creed as it dwelled on the Father and the Son, mentioning the Spirit only in passing.{{sup|35}} 35 See, R. P. C. Hanson, ''The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God'' (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1988), 163-72; John Behr, ''Formation of Christian Theology: The Way to Nicaea'', Vol. 1 (Crestwood, New York: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 2001); Oberdorfer, "The Holy Spirit," 29.}}</ref>