consubstantial
/kɒnsəbˈstanʃ(ə)l
/adjective
Of the same substance or essence (used especially of the three persons of the Trinity in Christian theology): Christ is consubstantial with the Father...
- Thus, the rhetor ‘is both joined and separate, at once a distinct substance and consubstantial with another’.
- ‘Will you then,’ he addresses his opponents, ‘give up your contention against the Spirit, that He must be altogether begotten, or else cannot be consubstantial, or God?’
- The Word was with God, that is, in the unique equality of the divine; for this Word that is with God is equal to him in divinity, since the Word that is in God is inseparable from God and consubstantial with him.
Derivatives
consubstantiality
/ noun ...- This teaching prompted further speculation on the relation of Spirit within the Trinity, with an eye to establishing the consubstantiality of the Father, Son and Spirit.
- Like Basil, Augustine is interested in establishing the consubstantiality of the three personae, and he begins with the hard-won results of the Arian struggle: the absolute substantial identity of Father and Son.
- One must understand the formal aspects of the system, in order to evaluate the way consubstantiality reflects aspects of the motives, for it is only in contrast to norms that practice has signification.
Origin
Late Middle English: from ecclesiastical Latin consubstantialis (translating Greek homoousios 'of one substance'), from con- 'with' + substantialis (see substantial).