ϛ. Finally, the Spirit is with great frequency joined with other Persons, as one that is Himself a Person also, whether created, Acts 15:28; compare BECMANN, Exercitationibus Theologicis XI, page 154: or uncreated, 2 Corinthians 13:14; 1 John 5:7; John 14:16. If the Father and the Son mentioned in these passages are true Persons, it is not able to be judged otherwise concerning the Spirit, who is joined with them as of the same nature and order, and is expressly distinguished from the other two as a third and another Person.
The Personality of the Holy Spirit: see LAMPE painstakingly proving it in his Dissertationum philologico-theologicarum, volume II, Disputation III, chapter II, pages 109-123, α. from the very Name of the Holy Spirit, which in itself, when an incorporal thing is treated, consistently designates a rational, understanding, and willing suppositum; but also, as it is conjoined with the Names of the Father and the Son in one series, so it indicates a true Person no less than those, § 1-4. β-ζ. From six other arguments set forth in § 5-10, pages 113-115. An Exception is resolved, concerning explaining the expression of Scripture with respect to the Holy Spirit by Personification, § 11, 12. η. From the personal Appearances of the Holy Spirit in Emblems, under which He was seen, § 13-15. Then he shows that the Personality of the Holy Spirit was always acknowledged in the Christian Church, § 16-18: indeed, what is to be embraced concerning this, partly in the catechism of the Jews, and also in the traditions of some Gentiles, he investigates, § 19-22: see also HOORNBEECK, Socinianismo confutato, tome I, book II, chapter V, section II, pages 446, 447; VAN CATTENBURGH, Spicilegio Theologiæ Christianæ, book II, chapter XVII, section II, pages 194-196.
[But the Socinians deny this, etc.] See WALCH’S Appendicem Miscellaneorum Sacrorum, Meditation VII, pages 807-809; CLOPPENBURG’S Anti-Smalcium, part I, chapter VIII, opera, tome 2, pages 634 and following; Volkelius’ book V de vera Religione, chapters IX, XIV, in MARESIUS, Hydra Socinianismi expugnata, tome 3, pages 54, 428 and following; HOORNBEECK’S Socinianismum confutatum, tome I, book II, chapter V, section II, pages 443, 444. The Socinians sometimes by the Holy Spirit understand the Gospel, or the firm and certain hope of eternal life promised to us; see the Catechesin Racovianam, chapter VI, de Prophetico Christi munere, which is de Promisso Spiritus Sancti, question 8, pages 209-211: and compare on that place ARNOLDI’S refutationem, pages 448-451. In the same place, question 12, pages 213, 214, it is denied at length that the Holy Spirit is a person; but it is rather asserted that He is the Power of God. So also Hobbes, denying that the Holy Spirit is a true Person, distinct from the Father and the Son, twists a number of passages, in which mention is made of the Spirit of God or of the Lord, and refers them to a gift, or some faculty, in man, or to doctrine, etc.; see COCQUIUS’ Anatomen Hobbesianismi, chapter VII, pages 68, 69. LAMPE, Dissertationum philologico-theologicarum, volume II, Disputation IV, chapter III, pages 124-135, exhibits a Refutation of those that deny the Holy Spirit to be a Person: such he counts the Jews, § 1-3; Christians, ancient and more recent, that assert that the Holy Spirit, with the Father and the Son, is one and the same three-named Person, or is a certain part of the divine Essence, or a certain mode of knowing in God, or the Power of God, or His peculiar Gift, § 4. He puts on record the Ancient heretics of this sort, § 5-9. As erring on this point in more recent time, he mentions the earlier Anabaptists and Fanatics, § 10; Poiret and a number of Papists, that hold the divine Persons as only certain Modes of knowing, and say that the Spirit is divine Love, § 11, 12; the Socinians, who call the Holy Spirit either the divine Power, or Gift, § 13.
The πρῶτον ψεῦδος, fundamental error, of the Socinians, here and in the immediately following § is the impugning of the Trinity, and hence also the Deity of the Holy Spirit.
They cast in opposition, 1. Those passages in which the Spirit appears to be explained by Virture or Power; as in Luke 1:35; 24:49; 1 Corinthians 2:4: see this Objection in Catechesi Racoviana, chapter VI, questions 12-14, pages 214-216.
Responses: α. Either He is called the Personal Power, not Essential in general, even less accidental, which sort of thing is not consistent with a God independent and altogether simple. Let us admit that the Holy Spirit is called the Power of God, the same is also called God, Lord, Jehovah, in the nominative case: but these names are nowhere read of an essential property of God; but He that is thus called is not merely a property of the Essence of God, but a Person subsisting in the divine Essence. But why is the Spirit, with His own Personality intact, less able to be called the Power of God, than the Son the Wisdom of God? Those that were adhering to Simon Magus were also saying of him according to their own vain imagination, οὗτός ἐστιν ἡ δύναμις τοῦ θεοῦ ἡ μεγάλη, he is the great power of God, without any detriment to His Personality, Acts 8:10. Enjedinus himself, in Explicationibus locorum Veteris et Novi Testamenti, pages 288, 289, acknowledges that the Holy Spirit is not some accidental property, but the Substantial Power of God, because in God, whatever is, is Substance.
β. Or rather Power is attributed to the Spirit in these passages, as that by which He is efficacious, just as the efficacious Power of working is frequently is attributed to the Spirit, Romans 15:13, 19; and thus expressly, for that which is in Luke 24:49, ἕως οὗ ἐνδύσησθε δύναμιν ἐξ ὕψους, until ye be endued with power from on high, we have in Acts 1:8, λήψεσθε δύναμιν, ἐπελθόντος τοῦ Ἁγίου Πνεύματος ἐφ᾽ ὑμᾶς, ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: compare ARNOLDI’S refutationem Catecheseos Racovianæ on the place cited, questions 13, 14, § IV-VII, XIII-XVI, pages 461, 462, 464, 465.