The Holy Spirit was joined with Father and Son as one God by Christian writers very early in the first millennium [St. Clement of Rome (c. 95); St. Ignatius of Antioch (d. 107)], but the Holy Spirit did not gain official recognition by the church as being divine and part of the Trinity until Constantinople I. Early Christian theologians in search of a deeper understanding of God’s nature and the works of the Holy Spirit “gradually made more explicit that which was contained only implicitly” in Scripture (Catholic Encyclopedia, 96).
As explained, the Jehovah's Witnesses reject the idea that the Holy Spirit is a Person or hypostasis, and teach that it is nothing more than God’s active force, “likened to electricity, a force that can be adapted to perform a great variety of operations” (Should You Believe, Chapter 8). This interpretation, however, is wrong.
First, it is true that in the Old Testament God’s Spirit is primarily referred to as a power used to create and influence men’s souls and minds like Moses, David or the prophets either temporarily or permanently (Catholic Encyclopedia, 574). It would teach, guide and eventually affect a moral transformation of mankind under the future New Covenant (ibid.). “The OT clearly does not envisage God’s spirit as a person, neither in the strictly philosophical sense, nor in the Semitic sense. God’s spirit is simply God’s power” (ibid.).
In the New Testament, however, the Spirit of God is both a power and a Person (ibid., 575). The Jehovah's Witnesses regard the supporting verses as mutually exclusive - the Spirit must be either a power or a person, and since it can’t be a person it must be a power. However, Scripture read together cannot accept one meaning at the expense of another, so, as indicated in Strong and Vine’s the power is the “Power of the Holy Spirit” (at 162), which is the Spirit of God (Romans 9:8-11 RSV), and Jehovah (or Lord RSV) is the Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:17 NWT). The Holy Spirit is not simply an inert unthinking electrical current flowing from Jehovah God. It is a powerful spirit Person.
“The revelation that the Spirit of God is a Person is gradual” (Catholic Encyclopedia, 575). The majority of NT texts reveal God’s spirit as something, not someone… (ibid.), but “in the Synoptic Gospels [the Trinitarian formula in Mt. 28.19] clearly speaks of the person of the Holy Spirit.” So even though in most cases “the phrase ‘spirit of God’ reflects the OT notion of “the power of God,” as a result of the teaching of Christ, the definite personality of the Third Person of the Trinity is clear” (ibid.).
In the Acts of the Apostles the Spirit’s personality is not overtly demonstrated in the texts although “[t]he statement in Acts 15.28, “the Holy Spirit and we have decided,” alone seems to imply full personality” (ibid., 575). Paul uses the [Greek word for spirit] 146 times. Sometimes it means man’s natural spirit, but more often it signifies the divine sanctifying power (2 Cor 3.17-18; Gal 4.6; Phil 1.19). However, the Trinitarian formulas employed by St. Paul (e.g., 2 Cor 13.13), indicate a real personality” (ibid., 575).
The personality of the Holy Spirit is very obvious in the theology of the apostle John and is “very rich in meaning” (ibid.).
The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth (Jn 14.17; 15.26; 16.13; cf. 1 Jn 4.6; 5.6), and “another helper,” the “paraclete” (Jn 14.16). The Spirit is “another” helper because, after Christ’s Ascension, he takes Christ’s place in assisting the disciples, in teaching them all that Jesus himself had not yet told them, in revealing the future to them, in recalling to their minds that which Jesus had taught them, in giving testimony concerning Jesus, and in glorifying Him (14.26; 16.12-16; 15.26; 1 Jn 2.27; 5.6). (Catholic Encyclopedia, 575)
The New Testament contains many additional references to attributes of the Holy Spirit that indicate personality such as “speaking, hindering, desiring [or] dwelling (Acts 8.29; 16.7; Rom 8.9)” (ibid., 575). Granted, taken in and of themselves one should not automatically identify them as personality traits because “the same expressions are used in regard to rhetorically personified things or abstract ideas (see Rom 8.6; 7.17).” However, in light of the above verses that clearly identify the Holy Spirit as a Person, other activities of a personal nature reinforce the fact that the Holy Spirit is a Person, not an impersonal “it” - and most certainly not an electrical current, or a mere “figure of speech.”
Thus, the Person of the Holy Spirit speaks (Acts 28:25), teaches (John 15:26), strives with sinners (Genesis 6:3), comforts (Acts 9:31), helps our infirmities (Rom 8:26), is grieved (Eph 4:30) and is resisted (Acts 7:51) (Strong and Vine’s, 95, Supplement).
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