One Lord, one faith, one baptism.
εις κυριος μια πιστις εν βαπτισμα
12 Church Fathers comment on this verse
Behold the hope of our calling. What I have said is directed against those who indiscriminately attach themselves to people who separate from the Church. What do you say? "They have the same faith, and they too are Orthodox." If so, why are they not with us? "One Lord, one faith, one baptism." If things are well with them, then things are bad with us. But if things are well with us, then things are bad with them.
For it is not the case that you have a higher Lord and another a lower one, or that you are saved by faith and he by works, or that baptism makes you free and not him.
"One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, Who is over all and through all and in all." As faith is something different in comparison with baptism, God, and the Lord, so also baptism, the Lord, and God are something different in comparison with the three taken separately, which are named together. I say this with Sabellius in view. He supposes that God the Father is the same as the Son, and confuses the persons when he acknowledges one and the same deity in the One and the Other.
Here one God the Father and one Lord the Son are named with the greatest clarity. This is written still more fully in the Epistle to the Corinthians: "But for us there is one God, the Father, from Whom are all things, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through Whom are all things, and we through Him" (1 Cor 8:6). As the Son does not take away from God the Father the meaning of Lord, although He alone is called Lord, so the Father does not deprive the Son of the meaning of God when the Father alone is called God.
Elsewhere we read: "Know that the Lord Himself is God" (Ps 99:3). Again, in another place: "The Lord your God is one God" (Deut 6:4). Indeed, if, as the Arians think, only God the Father is God, then with the same consistency one may conclude that only Jesus Christ is Lord. Then neither the Father would be Lord, nor the Son God. But God forbid that we should think there is no Godhead in lordship, or no lordship in Godhead.
There is one Lord and one God, because the lordship of the Father and the Son is one Godhead. Therefore faith is also called one, because we believe in the Father, and in the Son, and in the Holy Spirit in the same way. Baptism is one, because we are baptized into the Father, and into the Son, and into the Holy Spirit in the same way. We are immersed three times, that the one mystery of the Holy Trinity may be made manifest. Yet we are not baptized into the names of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, but into one name, which is understood as God.
I wonder by what sequence of thought Arius, Macedonius, and Eunomius suspect a difference of nature in one name, in one and the same action, and in one and the same mystery. Their disagreement is united in impiety. Having one and the same foul source in the doctrine that the Son and the Holy Spirit are creatures, they produced different streams of heresy.
"One baptism." These words also have force against Valentinus, who tries to prove that there are two baptisms, and against all heretics. They must know that they have no baptism, but that the one Church of Christ alone is the life-giving source. It can also be called one baptism because, although we are immersed three times on account of the mystery of the Trinity, this is counted as one baptism. The baptism in water, in the Spirit, and in fire is also one and the same. So also is that of which the Lord says: "I have a baptism to be baptized with" (Lk 12:50), and, "You will be baptized with My baptism" (Mk 10:39).
The difference of prepositions in the words, "one God and Father of all, Who is over all and through all and in all," points to a different understanding. God the Father is over all because He is the source of all. The Son is through all because He penetrates all things, transcurrit, and passes through all. The Holy Spirit is in all, because without Him there is nothing.
Yet one must not think that the one God is the Father of absolutely everything, so that the name Father may be assigned even to irrational animals. For ten people, five sons and five slaves, we may equally call Him one Lord and one Father for all ten, horum decem. Yet He is not Father of all and not Master of all in the same way. So also in His words, "one God and Father of all," one must understand that for some He is Father, and for others God.
Zeno with his Stoics has the same teaching about creatures and God. Following him, Virgil also says in the Aeneid, Book 6: "For God passes through all lands and the spaces of the sea," and so forth. Again he says: "From the beginning, spirit nourishes and sustains heaven and earth, the watery plains of the sea, the shining orb of the moon, and the great stars. Mind, poured through the members, moves the whole mass and mingles with the great body."
Some think that what is written by the Apostle, "over all, through all, and in all," should be referred to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Thus the Father is over all, as Creator of all. The Son is through all, because all things were created through the Son. The Holy Spirit is in all, for He is given to believers, and we are the temple of the Holy Spirit, and the Father and the Son dwell in us.
There is one Lord and one God, because the lordship of the Father and the Son is one Godhead. Therefore faith is also called one, because we believe in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit in the same way. Baptism is one, because we are baptized into the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit in the same way. We are immersed three times, that the one mystery of the Trinity may be made manifest.
There are many kinds of washing, but baptism is one, cries the Apostle. Why is this so? The pagans have washings, but they are not baptism. They are ablutions and cannot be baptism.
The Apostle everywhere used the words "one" and "one single," thereby bringing the Church into concord. We have one Lord, he says. We have received one baptism. We have offered one faith. We all have one God and Father. Therefore you ought, as brethren, to be of one mind with one another. "Above all" signifies dominion, "through all" providence, and "in all" indwelling.
One must not receive baptism twice or three times. Otherwise one could say, "The first time it was useless for me, so I will correct it another time." On the contrary, if it was without benefit the first time, you will not correct it. For "one Lord, and one faith, and one baptism." Only heretics are baptized a second time, because their first baptism was not baptism.
Your unanimity, together with me, remembers what was determined at the preceding council. This rule was pronounced at the council by Aurelius, bishop of Carthage. Those baptized in childhood by the Donatists could not then know how destructive their error was. But when they reached an age capable of reflection, they came to know the truth and abhorred their madness. According to the ancient order, let them be received into the catholic Church of God, spread throughout the whole world, by the laying on of hands. The accusation attached to their former error must not hinder their reception into the clerical order. For they have approached the faith, acknowledged the true Church as their own, and believed in Christ within her.
In her they received the mysteries of the Trinity, which are plainly all true, holy, and divine. On them rests the whole hope of the soul, even though the earlier insolence of heretics recklessly tried to hand down something contrary under the name of truth. This is simple, as the holy Apostle teaches when he says: "One God, one faith, one baptism." What must be given once, namely baptism, may not be received again. Therefore, after the name of the error has been given over to anathema, let them be received by the laying on of hands into the one Church. As it is said, she is the dove, the one mother of Christians. In her all eternal and life-giving mysteries are savingly received. Yet for those who remain in heresy, these mysteries bring great condemnation and punishment. What would truly guide them more brightly toward eternal life becomes, in error, darker and more condemning for them. Some have escaped this and have learned the direct path of their mother, the catholic Church. Out of love for the truth, they believed in all those holy mysteries and received them. When testimony to their good life is added, no one will dispute that such men may rightly be confirmed in the clergy for the service of the holy mysteries. This is especially so in such difficult circumstances.
There is one Lord and Master of all, Jesus Christ, who received "all authority in heaven and on earth" (Mt 28:18). There is only one true and saving faith: the faith which Jesus Christ taught, which the God-bearing Apostles preached, which the holy martyrs confessed, and which the divine Fathers confirmed. There is one true and perfect baptism, which cleanses sins, sanctifies souls, and makes men anew as sons of God. It is baptism by water and the Spirit, with Orthodox confession, celebrated and accomplished in the Church by Orthodox priests.
"One Lord." Jesus Christ redeemed all by the price of His blood. He suffered and died for all. Therefore we all belong to Him, and we must serve Him with all our strength. "One faith," which we confess, opens to all believers the same saving truths and grace-filled mysteries. "One baptism" communicates the grace of regeneration. It makes all members of the body of Christ, brothers in Christ, and children of God. "One God and Father of all." All have one God and one Father in heaven. No one can think, "My God is higher; my heavenly Father is more caring." No. There is one God and Father of all, "who is above all," higher than everything, the beginning and end of all, the supreme Master of all. "And through all" means that His divine providence and fatherly care extend to all.
"And in us all" means that His saving grace acts in us all. As the visible sun shines on all and pours its warmth upon all, so the gifts of the heavenly Father are poured out upon all. How many motives Christians have for preserving spiritual unity, concord, and peace among themselves through contemplation of these great truths proposed by the Apostle. Yet with so many strong motives toward one mind and peace, a tempting thought may arise. Let there be many motives toward one mind and mutual concord, it says, but there is also an occasion for division. The grace-filled gifts possessed by believers are different. From this, division, disagreement, and the exaltation of some over others may naturally arise. Against such thoughts and others like them, the Apostle says:
One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all. The Apostle points to the best encouragement toward unanimity: all Christians must constitute one family. The most important privileges of Christians, the Lord, faith, and baptism, are one and the same for all. Finally, over them all is one God, the Father of all.
Is it possible to think that God, pure and righteous, receives with equal favor the convictions of a Christian who acknowledges Jesus Christ as his Redeemer, the faith of a Jew who, on the contrary, hates Christ, and the religion of a Mohammedan, for whom Mohammed, a corrupt man, is higher than all the prophets? If it were all the same how anyone believed, provided he were an honest man according to his faith, then the Savior would not have exposed the errors of the Pharisees and the beliefs of the Sadducees. No. To give equal honor to all faiths, while they differ in meaning and dispose men toward different ways of life, means having no respect either for truth or for virtue. It means approving every error and every immoral rule, such as one may find, for example, in the Koran. Such indifference to the one true, or Orthodox, faith, which must necessarily exist among other faiths, is worse even than unbelief itself.
"Here is yet another motive for loving communion!" (Oecumenius). Earlier he said that we must abide in this communion because all are one body with one spirit, not only for time, but also for eternity. Now he presents as a motive this fact: every Christian, considered separately, is the same as another. In the way people become Christians, all are equal. One has no advantages, and another has no deprivation. As all are born into the world by one path, and neither a king nor the poorest man differs in this, so all become Christians in the same way.
The Lord accomplished salvation and laid the foundation of new life, as the Firstborn. People approach Him by faith and receive access to communion in the one life contained in Him through baptism. In whomever this has taken place, that person has become a Christian. In this, the Lord is one for all, faith is one, and baptism is one. For no one do they have greater or lesser significance. They are equal for all and impart their power equally to all.
There is one Lord, Jesus Christ, the Only-begotten Son of God, true God of true God, begotten, not made. For us men He came down from heaven, became man, suffered, was crucified, died, was buried, rose again, ascended into heaven, and sat at the right hand of the Father. In His own person He reunited all with God. Yet for all to be reunited with God in deed, they must be united by a living bond with the Lord. The Lord also prayed for this: "that they all may be one; as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us" (Jn 17:21). Or as He explained earlier: "I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you" (Jn 14:20).
Faith opens the path to this union. Here it is perfectly one among all, as if spoken with one voice. Everyone confesses: I am perishing, and there is no salvation for me except in the Lord. I cleave to Him, and to Him I surrender and dedicate myself. This confession opens the door to the Lord. No one brings anything more than this into it, and nothing else is taken into account. Neither origin, nor education, nor works, nor former faith is considered. Everything is put aside. Only this one confession must be presented for access to the Lord.
The one who presents faith is joined to Him by a living bond through baptism. In baptism everyone is immersed into the Lord's death and becomes a partaker of His resurrection. He is grafted into the Lord and becomes His member. The Apostle speaks as if saying: this is how each of you became a Christian. Look, then, whether anyone has anything more than another in any respect, so that he might separate himself from him. Is the Lord more your Redeemer, Savior, and Reconciler, and less another's? Was your faith joined with some other advantage, so as to have greater power than the faith of others? Or was it one, the same as everyone's? Was baptism not performed over you with three immersions and the invocation of the name of the Most Holy Trinity, as over everyone else? Do not the words apply equally to all the baptized: "as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death. We were buried with Him by baptism into death" (Rom 6:3-4). And again: "As many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ" (Gal 3:27)?
Chrysostom says on this: "He is one and the same Lord for all. Was He named greater for you, and lesser for another? Were you saved by faith, and he by works? Were your sins forgiven in baptism, but his not? Let such a thought be far from us!"
Passages read together with this verse.
Greek text, 6 words with lemma, transliteration and Strong’s number. Tap to expand.
THEOSIS