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May 7, 2026 |
| Proceeds From | ||
After almost 1,000 years of being the center of Christianity, the Church of Rome, by then called the Roman Catholic Church, split into two parts. The split was geographic; Rome and everything west of it was the west, Greece and everything east of it was the east. This would only be the beginning. Another 500 years later, the Protestant Reformation would split the church again, this time leaving it with no geographic area to call its own.
The theological cause of the first split came down to a single word, Filioque, a Greek word meaning "and the son." The original Nicene Creed did not contain that word, but the Roman church had added it later. Translated into English, the original Creed said:
And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father
With the Roman change, it now said:
And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son
This caused a problem with the Greek churches because they had come to see the Trinity in a different way than the Roman churches. Both sides agree that the words "proceeding from" say something about the nature of the Holy Spirit, or at least a different relationship between the Holy Spirit and the Father than the Son and the Father.
The Roman church felt that the Father and the Son were consubstantial (made of the same "stuff"), therefore the Holy Spirit couldn't have only proceeded from the Father.
By the time this fight broke out, the theology of the Roman Church had already seriously diverged from the Bible, and its theologians were blinded and also only able to build on the mistakes of those who came before them, rarely correcting them. They misunderstood the nature of the Son so much so that they were forced to retract one of their decisions.
This dispute about the Holy Spirit has continued through to our time, with various people trying to define what it meant to "proceed from" the Father.
In this study, we will look at what the Bible says.
This is the verse that uses "proceeds from" in relation to the Holy Spirit.
“But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me. (John 15:26 NKJV)
The church has spent a lot of time trying to describe what it means to "proceed from the Father," and various authors have described it in slightly different ways. The problem they run into is that they only have the phrase "proceeds from the Father" to work from. There is no other reference to the Holy Spirit proceeding. It's difficult to make much out of so little, and eisegesis (injecting your own thinking) will become part of whatever is made.
This is how some AI describes it.
The phrase that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father does not describe […] a temporal event but an eternal emanation, meaning the Spirit has continuously radiated from the Father for all eternity without a beginning or end, sharing the same divine nature. (some AI)
That certainly makes a lot from very little. One problem with it is that it is a distinction without a difference. To Trinitarians, it makes absolutely no difference. They consider the Holy Spirit to be fully God and a separate person in the Trinity, who is co-equal. To Binitarians, it makes a small difference. They understand that the Holy Spirit is either not fully God, not a separate person, or not co-equal. In believing this, they risk blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.
To understand what is meant by "proceeds from the Father", we first need to understand what the word "proceeds" means. The Greek word used here is not common in the Bible, but it is certainly not unique. Therefore we can look at the way it is used to determine its meaning.
Anything that proceeds from the mouth proceeds from the heart and it defiles the man. 19 For from the heart proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, murders, fornications, thefts, lying testimonies, blasphemies. (Matthew 15:18-19)
In this verse, the word is still translated as "proceeds from," but the thing that proceeds is words, and the thing it proceeds from is the mouth.
We see something here that causes a conflict with what the AI said, which were the comments of some man or men. It says the word "proceeds" refers to an ongoing (eternal) emission (emanation). The word "proceeds" here does not have that eternality. Whatever words proceeded from the mouth are done proceeding once they have left the mouth. Looking ahead, we'll see that all the other times "proceed" is used, it does not have an eternal nature accorded to it in the AI's description.
But this kind does not go out except by fasting and by prayer. (Matthew 17:21)
This is in reference to an evil spirit in a man that Jesus has cast out.
Here the translator has chosen to use the words "go out." The translator could as easily have chosen to say "this kind does not proceed from a man except by fasting and by prayer."
For just as lightning goes out from the East and appears unto the West, so will the coming of the son of Man be. (Matthew 24:27)
In this verse, the thing that goes out is lightning, but the thing that it goes out of is a less tangible, relative thing, east or west.
And all the crowds were seeking to touch him, for power was proceeding from him and it was healing all of them. (Luke 6:19)
In this verse, the thing that proceeds is healing power, and the place it proceeds from is Jesus. So it certainly isn't crazy to think that something could proceed from the Father.
Eternality is still a problem though. As said before, lightning, once it has proceeded, is done proceeding. It isn't an ongoing thing. If a person were to say, "Light proceeds from the sun," that would be a near-eternal usage of the word, but there is no such reference in the Bible.
And by day he was teaching in the temple and by night he went out, spending the night in the mount which is called ‘Bayth Zaytha’. (Luke 21:37)
In this verse, the translator chooses to use "goes out" again, but this time it is in the past tense. Jesus is the thing that "proceeds," and the temple is the thing that he "proceeds from".
Again, once Jesus had gone out, he was out.
And when Paulus rendered a defense that he had not violated anything, not the Law (Torah) of the Jews, neither of the Temple, neither Caesar, (Acts 25:8)
When Paulus had thus rendered a defense, Festus cried out with a loud voice, “You are insane, Paul! Much study has made you insane!" (Acts 26:24)
These two verses are a little different because they use what is essentially an idiom. Literally, Paul "proceeded" a defence. This means Paul put out a defense. The thing that proceeded was a defense, and it proceeded from within Paul.
We've now covered every case where the word that was used in John 15:26 is used elsewhere in the Bible. We've seen that:
Most translations use the word "proceed" in John 15:26, but there are some that do not.
When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes forth from the Father, He will testify about Me. (John 15:26 BLB)
“When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, namely, the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, He will testify about Me (John 15:26 NASB)
These are not silly translation sources that can be dismissed. In choosing not to use "proceed," they are saying they reject the special meaning accorded to "proceed" that we saw in the AI quote. We can't know what place they understand the Holy Spirit to "go out from," but they could be thinking of "Heaven", where the Father is, or perhaps some more local place where the Father is located.
“But when The Redeemer of the accursed comes, him whom I shall send to you from the presence of my Father, the Spirit of truth, he who proceeds from the presence of my Father, he shall testify concerning me.” (John 15:26)
This translation specifies the place where the father is located, and where the Holy Spirit is also before he proceeds from that place. It is the abstract "presence of the Father." The phrase "presence of the Father" or "presence of God" is used in other places. It refers to the immediate vicinity. In human terms, it would be "in the same room," or "within the sound of his voice."
The thing that proceeds in this case is the Holy Spirit, and he proceeds from the presence of the Father, not from the Father himself. Now, like the other uses of "proceeds from", there is no reason to imagine an eternal proceeding. The usual meaning of the word applies, and it can be translated as "goes from" or "comes from" without losing any meaning.
Where did this translation get these extra words? This translation comes from the Aramaic New Testament. It was separated from the Greek manuscript very early. This makes it useful for finding adulterations that occurred in the Greek manuscripts after that separation.
In this case the Greek manuscripts dropped both instances of "presence of." By dropping both, the change appears to be intentional, not accidental. Either the people who made the change believed that "presence of the Father" was the same thing as "the Father," which is really hard to believe, or they were "correcting" the Bible.
In this section, we've seen that there are translators who reject the traditional understanding of "proceeds from." We've also seen that there is a very plausible interpretation where the usual meaning of "proceeds from" can be used in John 15:26 and makes sense.
There is another verse that says almost the same thing as our John 15:26 verse.
"But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you." (John 14:26 NASB)
This verse comes exactly one chapter before our main verse. It should be impossible for a person to miss the fact that this near-repetition, which comes from the same teaching session, has the same verse number, 26. It's like the Bible knew we would have trouble understanding the one verse, and it is saying, if you are having trouble with that verse, this one will clarify it.
The word that is translated as "will send" here is not the same word as "proceeds from," and there is no way to get an eternal emission from "will send."
Both sides in this fight agree that "proceeds from" indicates something about the nature of the Holy Spirit and his relationship to the rest of the Trinity. They were fighting over whether he proceeded from the Father only or from both the Father and the Son.
They were both wrong about the meaning of "proceeds from." It never meant anything more than "goes from" or "comes from."
Therefore the theological basis for the Great East-West Schism was complete nonsense, an understanding fabricated from 4 words from a single verse, an understanding contradicted by another verse, a distinction without a difference.
That breakup had to happen anyway. By that time the Roman Church was evil and doing evil. This breakup and the Protestant Reformation breakup that followed were necessary to dethrone the king of Christianity. By its own foolishness, it achieved God's desire and simultaneously showed that his judgment of it was just.