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But does anyone deny that the Godhead of the eternal Trinity is to be adored, when the Scriptures also set forth the inexplicable majesty of the divine Trinity, as the apostle says elsewhere: “For the God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, in the face of Christ Jesus?” … Who is it, then, who shined that we might know God in the face of Christ Jesus? For he said: “God shined,” that the glory of God might be known in the face of Jesus Christ. Who else do we think but the Spirit who was made manifest? Or who else is it but the Holy Spirit, to whom the power of the Godhead is referred? For those who exclude the Spirit must introduce another to receive with the Father and the Son the glory of the Godhead.

"Seeing it is God that said, Light shall shine out of darkness, who shined in your hearts." Seest thou how again to those who were desirous of seeing that surpassing glory, I mean that of Moses, he shows it flashing with added lustre? 'As upon the face of Moses, so also hath it shined unto your hearts,' he saith. And first, he puts them in mind of what was made in the beginning of the Creation, sensible light and darkness sensible, showing that this creation is greater. And where commanded He light to shine out of darkness? In the beginning and in prelude to the Creation; for, saith he, "Darkness was upon the face of the deep. And God said, Let there be light, and there was light." Howbeit then indeed He said, "Let it be, and it was:" but now He said nothing, but Himself became Light for us. For he said not, 'hath also now commanded,' but "hath" Himself "shined." Therefore neither do we see sensible objects by the shining of this Light, but God Himself through Christ. Seest thou the invariableness in the Trinity? For of the Spirit, he says, "But we all with unveiled face reflecting in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory even as from the Lord the Spirit." And of the Son; "That the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ, Who is the Image of God, should not dawn upon them." And of the Father; "He that said Light shall shine out of darkness shined in your hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." For as when he had said, "Of the Gospel of the glory of Christ," he added, "Who is the Image of God," showing that they were deprived of His glory also; So after saying, "the knowledge of God," he added, "in the face of Christ,' to show that through Him we know the Father, even as through the Spirit also we are brought unto Him.

Now he did not observe how much this clause of the sentence made against him: "For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to (give) the light of the knowledge (of His glory) in the face of (Jesus) Christ." Now who was it that said; "Let there be light? " And who was it that said to Christ concerning giving light to the world: "I have set Thee as a light to the Gentiles" -to them, that is, "who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death? " (None else, surely, than He), to whom the Spirit in the Psalm answers, in His foresight of the future, saying, "The light of Thy countenance, O Lord, hath been displayed upon us.

Now, if you will examine the words which precede the passage where mention is made of the outward and the inward man, will you not discover the whole truth, both of the dignity and the hope of the flesh? For, when he speaks of the "light which God hath commanded to shine in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of the Lord in the person of Jesus Christ," and says that "we have this treasure in earthen vessels," meaning of course the flesh, which is meant-that the flesh shall be destroyed, because it is "an earthen vessel," deriving its origin from clay; or that it is to be glorified, as being the receptacle of a divine treasure? Now if that true light, which is in the person of Christ, contains in itself life, and that life with its light is committed to the flesh, is that destined to perish which has life entrusted to it? Then, of course, the treasure will perish also; for perishable things are entrusted to things which are themselves perishable, which is like putting new wine into old bottles.

Since the divine nature is invisible and always remains so, it is seen for what it is in the humanity of Jesus Christ which shines with divine light and sends out its rays.

So also the mercies of God entirely dissolve death, and assist the human race, and nourish the light of the heart.

Therefore, having finished the world, He commanded that animals of various kinds and of dissimilar forms should be created, both great and smaller. And they were made in pairs, that is, one of each sex; from the offspring of which both the air and the earth and the seas were filled. And God gave nourishment to all these by their kinds from the earth, that they might be of service to men: some, for instance, were for food, others for clothing; but those which are of great strength He gave, that they might assist in cultivating the earth, whence they were called beasts of burthen. And thus, when all things had been settled with a wonderful arrangement, He determined to prepare for Himself an eternal kingdom, and to create innumerable souls, on whom He might bestow immortality. Then He made for Himself a figure endowed with perception and intelligence, that is, after the likeness of His own image, than which nothing can be more perfect: He formed man out of the dust of the ground, from which he was called man, because He was made from the earth. Finally, Plato says that the human form was godlike; as does the Sibyl, who says, "Thou art my image, O man, possessed of right reason." The poets also have not given a different account respecting this formation of man, however they may have corrupted it; for they said that man was made by Prometheus from clay. They were not mistaken in the matter itself, but in the name of the artificer. For they had never come into contact with a line of the truth; but the things which were handed down by the oracles of the prophets, and contained in the sacred book of God; those things collected from fables and obscure opinion, and distorted, as the truth is wont to be corrupted by the multitude when spread abroad by various conversations, everyone adding something to that which he had heard.

We should accordingly worship and glorify him who raised our dust to such state, recounting ceaselessly the holiness of him who mingled our spirit with his Spirit and mixed into our bodies the gift of his grace, causing the fire of his Holy Spirit to burst into flame in us. For “he has shone out in our hearts” which had been submerged in darkness.

Our hearts had been submerged in darkness.

When the apostle said, “God, who commanded the light to shine out of the darkness, has shined in our hearts,” he referred to the resurrection. He showed this resurrection to be the exodus from the old state which in the likeness of Sheol incarcerates a person where the light of the gospel will not shine mystically upon him. This breath of life shines through hope in the resurrection. By it the dawning of divine wisdom shines in the heart, so that a person should become new, having nothing of the old.

Why, he says, do we not preach ourselves? Because God has shone in our hearts, as in ancient times upon the face of Moses, so now upon us. As at the first creation He spoke, and light appeared out of darkness, so now too He spoke, and light appeared. However, He Himself became light for us, for He shone for us "in the face of Christ," that is, through Christ, because the Father shines in us through Christ and gives "illumination by the knowledge," not of His essence, but of His glory. Notice, here too Paul has theology concerning the Trinity. For concerning the Spirit he says, "beholding the glory of the Lord," for the Spirit is the Lord; concerning the Son: "the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ," and now concerning the Father: "to illuminate us with the knowledge of His glory."

Then when he says, For it is the God who said, he shows the source of his Gospel's power to enlighten. Here we should note the order of the Apostle's procedure. It is this: at one time, namely, before being converted to Christ, we were darkness, just as you and the others, upon whom the brightness of Christ's glory did not shine. But now, after Christ has called us to himself by his grace, that darkness has been taken away from us, and now the power of the glory of Christ's brightness shines in us, and it shines on us in such a way that not only are we enlightened so that we can see, but we enlighten others. Therefore, from the spiritual grace and abundant splendor of the brightness of the glory of Christ in us, our Gospel has the power to enlighten. And this is what he says: I say that our Gospel enlightens, for it is the God who said, i.e., who made by a single command, let light shine out of darkness, by separating the elements, when he enlightened the dark chaos by the light he made: "He said, 'let there be light'" (Gen. 1:3): "I made an unfailing light to rise in the heavens" (Sir 24:6). He, I say, has shone in our hearts, i.e., in our minds, previously darkened by the absence of the light of grace and by the obscurity of sin: "To enlighten those that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death" (Lk. 1:79). He has shone, I say, not only to enlighten us, but to give the light, i.e., that we might enlighten others: "To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given" (Eph. 3:8); "You are the light of the world" (Matt. 5:14). To give the light, I say, of the knowledge, i.e., that we make others know of the glory of God, i.e., of the clear vision of God, in the face of Christ. A Gloss: i.e., "through Jesus Christ", who is the face of the Father, because without him the Father is not known. But it is said better thus: to illumine the holy brightness of God, which indeed shines in the face of Jesus Christ, i.e., so that by that glory and brightness Jesus Christ may be known. As if to say: in summary, God has shone upon us to enlighten us, so that Jesus Christ may be known and preached among the Gentiles.