Disputatio LIII: De Felicitate Theologica: Utrum Spiritus Sit Auctor Locutionis Fideli

 On Theological Felicity: Whether the Spirit is the Author of Faithful Speech

Quaeritur

Utrum felicitas locutionis theologicae, id est, rectitudo, auctoritas, et veritas performativa sermonis fidei, non ex intentione vel peritia humana oriatur, sed ex ipso Spiritu Sancto qui loquentem informat, linguam fidei custodiens, purgans, et in Verbo ordinans.

Whether the felicity of theological speech—its rightness, authority, and performative truth—arises not from human intention or rhetorical skill but from the Holy Spirit, who forms the speaker, guards the language of faith, and orders it to the Word.

Thesis

Theological felicity is Spirit-authored rightness of speech. A theological utterance is felicitous not merely when it is grammatically correct or doctrinally sound, but when the Spirit authorizes the speech-act so that the real presence of the Logos (Disp. LI) and the constitutive truth (Disp. L) are authorized for creaturely utterance in one act of fidelis locutio.”

Thus: Felicity just in case forma recta + auctoritas Spiritus + ordinatio ad Verbum. The creature speaks truthfully because the Spirit speaks in, with, and through the creature.

Locus Classicus

1. 1 Corinthians 12:3 — οὐδεὶς δύναται εἰπεῖν· Κύριος Ἰησοῦς, εἰ μὴ ἐν Πνεύματι Ἁγίῳ

“No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except in the Holy Spirit.”

Since the simplest and most central Christian confession is impossible without the Spirit, felicity is pneumatic.

2. Romans 8:26 — τὸ Πνεῦμα συναντιλαμβάνεται τῇ ἀσθενείᾳ ἡμῶν

“The Spirit helps us in our weakness… He intercedes with groanings too deep for words.”

The Spirit perfects our speech when our words fail.

3. John 14:26 — ἐκεῖνος διδάξει ὑμᾶς πάντα

“The Spirit will teach you all things and remind you of all that I have said.”

Speech becomes felicitous when it is brought under the teaching and remembrance of the Spirit.

4. Augustine, De Trinitate XV.19

Spiritus est nexus amoris quo redimus ad Verbum.
“The Spirit is the bond of love through whom we return to the Word.”

The Spirit links the human speaker to the Word He speaks.

5. Luther, WA 10/3, 14

Spiritus Sanctus est verus doctor verbi.
“The Holy Spirit is the true teacher of the Word.”

Preaching is felicitous only as the Spirit’s work.

Explicatio

Disputatio LII established that reference in theology is donation, that the Spirit gives the res. Yet the possession of a donated res does not by itself yield a felicitous assertion. Between the ontological gift of the thing and the faithful utterance of the Word, another act is required. This act is not interpretive mediation but authorization.

1. Felicity as Pneumatic Authorization

In theological speech, felicity is not reducible to correctness of syntax, accuracy of doctrinal formulation, sincerity of intention, rhetorical force, or conceptual clarity. All of these may be present without faithful speech occurring. Felicity consists rather in the Holy Spirit’s act of authorizing a finite utterance to function as faithful speech within the order of the Word.

This authorization does not interpret the Word, translate the Word, or supply meaning to the Word. It grants the speaker the right to speak under the Word, so that the utterance stands as obedient proclamation rather than autonomous discourse.

2. The Structure of Felicity

A theological utterance is felicitous if and only if two conditions are jointly satisfied.

First, the utterance must satisfy the internal conditions of theological grammar: it must be well formed, consistent, coherent, and suitably derivable within the rule governed language of faith.

Second, the utterance must be externally authorized by the Holy Spirit, who orders it to the Word and grants it the status of faithful speech.

This is why Paul says:

“We speak not in words taught by human wisdom, but taught by the Spirit” (1 Cor 2:13).

The contrast is not between interpretation and its absence, but between speech generated by human authority and speech authorized by the Spirit.

3. Felicity and the Operator Λ ⊨* Tₜ

Truth through the Logos (Λ ⊨* Tₜ) concerns the constitutive grounding of theological truth in the divine act. Felicity does not add content to this truth, nor does it mediate its meaning. Rather, felicity concerns whether a particular utterance may bear that truth as faithful speech.

Felicity is thus the Spirit’s authorization of a grammatically proper utterance to function as a vehicle of truth, not by interpretive enrichment, but by pneumatic commissioning.

A felicitous theological assertion occurs when a Spirit authorized utterance is permitted to stand within the Church as obedient speech under the Logos.

4. Felicity as Participation

To speak felicitously is to participate in the Logos’ constitutive act (L), the Logos’ real presence (LI), and the Spirit’s authorizing work (LIII). Human speech does not become divine speech by interpretation, but is taken up into divine speech by authorization.

Accordingly, theological language remains fully creaturely in form while becoming faithful in act. Felicity is the mode by which creaturely speech is grafted into divine discourse without ceasing to be creaturely.

Objectiones

Ob I: According to the speech act theory of Austin and Searle, felicity conditions are constituted by socially established conventions governing successful performance. If a speech act satisfies the relevant conventional conditions, it is felicitous. Therefore theological felicity requires no pneumatic authorization beyond conformity to established pragmatic rules.

Ob II: Classical Protestant orthodoxy assumes that speech is felicitous when it conforms to orthodox doctrine. If this is so, divine authorization appears unnecessary.

Ob III: Liberal Protestantism claims that truthful speech arises from the authenticity of the speaker’s self-expression. If so, felicity does not require external divine agency.

Ob IV: Contemporary linguistic philosophy maintains that felicity consists in correct rule following within a linguistic practice. If a theological utterance conforms to the grammar, norms, and inferential roles of ecclesial language, no further authorization is required. Therefore felicity is exhausted by internal linguistic propriety.

Ob V: Barthian Theology declares that since human speech cannot bear divine truth as such, God alone speaks truly. If this is the case, talk of Spirit authorized human felicity collapses either into interpretation or into an incoherent hybrid of divine and human speech. 

Responsiones

Ad I: Speech act theory correctly identifies conditions governing the successful performance of human acts within social practices, but it does not account for the authorization of speech to bear divine truth. Austinian felicity concerns whether an act counts as performed within a convention; theological felicity concerns whether an utterance is permitted to stand as faithful speech under the Word. The Spirit is not an additional pragmatic condition alongside human conventions, but the agent who grants authority to speak in the name of the Word. Speech act theory explains how acts function; it cannot explain how creaturely speech becomes obedient proclamation rather than autonomous performance.

Ad II: Orthodoxy is necessary but not sufficient. One may confess correct propositions without the Spirit’s life. Felicity requires authorization, not merely accuracy.

Ad III: Authenticity is indexical to the self; felicity is ordered to the Logos. Theological speech is not self-expression but participation in divine speech.

Ad IV: Rule following governs the form of theological language, not its authority. An utterance may be grammatically correct, inferentially coherent, and ecclesially recognizable, yet remain unauthorised speech. Felicity does not arise from conformity to linguistic rules alone, nor does it emerge from participation in a linguistic practice as such. Rather, the Holy Spirit authorizes a rule governed utterance to stand as faithful speech under the Word. Grammar determines what can be said; the Spirit determines whether it may be said.

Ad V: Barth is correct to deny that human speech can, by its own capacity, bear divine truth. Yet this denial does not exclude Spirit authorized human speech; it presupposes it. The Spirit does not convert human words into divine words by interpretation, nor does He replace human speech with divine monologue. Instead, He authorizes creaturely utterance to function as obedient proclamation. Felicity names the mode by which God’s speech becomes present in human speech without ceasing to be God’s act or the creature’s act. Human speech remains human in form and origin, yet becomes faithful by divine authorization.

Nota

Felicity is the Spirit’s bridging act between the ontological donation of the res (Disp. LII) and the faithful assertion of truth (Disp. L). It is the pneumatic fitting of human speech to divine being. Thus, we can claim the following about the Trinity: 

• The Father constitutes truth.

• The Son is present as truth.

• The Spirit donates the res and authorizes the word.

Felicity is the Spirit’s signature on human speech because without felicity doctrine becomes mere abstraction, the sacrament becomes only a symbol, preaching is only exhortation, and theology remains only grammar. However, with felicity doctrine becomes light; the sacrament becomes communion; preaching becomes divine address; and theology becomes true participation.

Determinatio

We determine that:

1. Felicity is Spirit-authored, not humanly achieved.

2. A theological utterance is felicitous when the Spirit authorizes it to stand as faithful speech under the Word.”

3. Felicity unites presence, donation, and truth, completing the semantic-ontological structure of theological meaning.

4. The Spirit’s act is the condition of faithful, truthful, and effective theological speech.

5. Thus, the Spirit makes human speech a participation in divine discourse.

Transitus ad Disputationem LIV

Having established that the Spirit authorizes speech to carry the divine res, we now turn to the final structural element of our semantic theory and ask as to why divine acts require a hyperintensional semantics. For if felicity depends on Spirit-authorization rather than mere extension or modal profile, then divine acts must be individuated at a finer semantic grain than extensional or modal semantics allow.

Thus, we proceed to Disputatio LIV: De Hyperintensionalitate Divinae Operationis: Utrum Actus Dei Non Sint Reducibiles ad Extensiones vel Possibilia, in which we ask whether divine acts differ in such a fine-grained manner that no extensional or modal semantics can capture their truth.

Disputatio XXX: De Veritate Interna et Externa Theologiae

On Internal and External Truth in Theology

Quaeritur

Utrum veritas theologiae sit tantum interna in suo sermone, an etiam externa in relatione ad ipsum Deum, ita ut sermo theologicus non solum sit fidelis in se, sed etiam verus de eo quod est.

It is asked whether the truth of theology is only internal to its own discourse, or also external in its relation to God himself, so that theological language is not only faithful in itself but also true of what is.

Thesis

Theology possesses a twofold truth: internal and external. Veritas interna is the felicity of discourse authorized by the Holy Spirit within the community of faith; it is the truth of theology intra systema fidei. Veritas externa is the adequation of this discourse to divine reality: the truth of theology de Deo ipso.

The former concerns the integrity of theological grammar; the latter, the participation of that grammar in the infinite Word. The two are not opposed but ordered: the Spirit authorizes language internally so that it may participate externally in the Logos.

Formally expressed:

$$\text{<i>Auth</i>}<i>(</i>{\mathrm{<i>L</i>}}_{\mathrm{<i>t</i>}}<i>)</i><i>\Rightarrow </i>\mathrm{<i>\exists </i>}\mathrm{<i>I</i>}<i>:</i>{\mathrm{<i>L</i>}}_{\mathrm{<i>t</i>}}<i>\hookrightarrow </i>{\mathrm{<i>L</i>}}_{\mathrm{<i>\infty </i>}}$$

This states that theological truth obtains only if the Spirit establishes an interpretive inclusion of the finite theological language $L_t$ into the infinite divine discourse $L_{\mathrm{\infty }}$. This symbol (↪) indicates participatory inclusion, not the formal subset relation. It is the Spirit’s act by which finite discourse is gathered into infinite meaning.

Locus Classicus

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” — John 14:6

In this declaration, Christ identifies truth not as correspondence or coherence, but as personal participation in the divine Logos. Augustine reads this as meaning that “veritas non est aliquid extra Deum, sed ipse Deus veritas est” (De Trinitate VIII.4). Aquinas echoes: “Veritas est adaequatio intellectus et rei; in Deo autem idem est intellectus et res” (ST I.16.5). Therefore, for theology, truth cannot be merely formal, but it must be participatory. The finite intellect is true only insofar as it shares in the divine act of knowing.

Explicatio

On the Transcendental Nature of Truth

The transcendentals—ens, unum, verum, bonum—are convertible: whatever is, is one, true, and good.

1.  Ens signifies being under the aspect of actuality.
2. Verum signifies being under the aspect of intelligibility, that is being as capable of being known
3. Thus, truth is not something added to being; it is the luminosity of being itself.
4. Wherever there is being, there is an implicit veritas, because to be is to be capable of being understood
5. Hence, truth is a transcendental property of being.

In God, who is ipsum esse subsistens, being and intelligibility are identical; He is the verum primum, the archetype and measure of all other truths.

In creatures, truth is participatory: finite beings are true insofar as they share in divine intelligibility and correspond to the divine idea in which they are conceived.

On Internal and External Truth

a. Veritas interna refers to the integrity and coherence of a discourse or system—its syntactic and performative correctness, its internal felicity.

b. Veritas externa refers to the correspondence between what is said and what is—between sign and reality, intellect and being.

Theological language, like all human speech, can achieve felicity without necessarily achieving truth; yet without internal felicity, it could not even aim at truth.

Felicity, then, is the condition of possibility for truth, but not its ground. The ground of truth is the being of God, in whom every finite coherence finds its measure.

Theology, as language about God, must therefore transcend its own grammar: its truth lies not merely in saying well (bene dicere), but in saying what is (dicere esse). It is true when its internal felicity participates in divine external truth.

On the Participation of Theology in Divine Truth

Theology does not produce truth; it participates in it. When the theologian speaks truly of God, this occurs because divine being grants intelligibility to that speech—because the light of being shines through language. The Holy Spirit is the mediating act through which this participation occurs: the one who makes human words capable of bearing divine meaning.

Thus, every theological assertion is twofold:

• Internally: it is grammatically felicitous, coherent, and consistent.
• Externally: it is illuminated by the light of the One who is Truth itself.

In this participation, truth and being are united without confusion. Theology is not the measure of God; God is the measure of theology.

Obiectiones

Ob I. Empiricism claims that all truth must be verifiable by observation. Theological claims are unverifiable and thus have no external truth. There is only the internal coherence of theological discourse for believers using it. 

Ob II. From the cultural-linguistic standpoint, theology’s meaning arises only within the communal grammar of faith. Thus, to speak of “external truth” misunderstands language as representational rather than formative. Theology is true insofar as it performs its grammar.

Ob III. Post-modernity assumes that every discourse is self-referential such that “outside” a language game there is nothing. Hence “external truth” is a non-starter. All truth is internal to interpretation.

Ob IV. Barthians held that God’s revelation is self-grounded and free, and that appeal to participation or adequation cannot verify it. Truth exists only in the event of revelation, it is not tied to ontology.

Ob V. Contemporary analytic thinking holds that model-theoretic analogies fail for theology. There is no definable model of God; hence talk of inclusion Lt​↪L∞​ is metaphorical and lacks formal content.

Responsiones

Ad I. Verificationism mistakes the order of reality for the order of appearance. Theology is not an empirical but a participatory science: it knows by union, not by observation. External truth in theology is not sensory correspondence but ontological inclusion in the act of God.

Ad II. The Church’s grammar is indeed formative, yet its form is the Spirit’s work, not a human construct. The Spirit’s authorship makes the grammar porous to transcendence; hence, its truth cannot be merely communal but is grounded in the divine speech that precedes the Church.

Ad III. Postmodern closure presupposes the very transcendence it denies. The internal system’s finitude points beyond itself to the infinite that constitutes it, just as, by the Löwenheim–Skolem principle, any consistent system admits higher interpretations. The finite theological discourse testifies by its very limitation to the necessity of the divine meta-language.

Ad IV. Revelation is not opposed to participation but presupposes it. God’s free act of self-disclosure is the mode in which creatures participate in divine truth. To say revelation alone grounds truth is already to affirm that truth has external reality in Deo ipso.

Ad V. While theology cannot construct a formal model of God, the analogy holds analogically: God is the modelus sui sermonis, the reality to which divine discourse is perfectly adequate. Finite theology participates in that adequation by the Spirit. Thus, the inclusion ${\mathrm{<br>}}_{}$ is not formal but real: it signifies the Spirit’s act of joining human speech to the eternal Word.

Nota 

The distinction between internal and external truth in theology mirrors the structure of revelation itself. Veritas interna designates the truth of faith—the Spirit’s authorization of discourse within the divine economy of speech, and veritas externa names the correspondence of that discourse to divine reality as such. These are not two truths, but two perspectives upon one act. The internal truth is the participation of the believer in the Word, while the external truth is the participation of the Word in the world.

Within the sphere of veritas interna, felicity and faith coincide: the statement “Jesus is Lord” is true because it is spoken in the Spirit. Within veritas externa, that same statement is true because the incarnate Word is objectively Lord of all. The Spirit assures, the Word grounds, and the Father unites these two horizons in the single act of truth.

Thus, theology’s truth is not reducible to logic nor to experience; it is a relation of participation. Language, illumined by the Spirit, shares in the ontological act of the Word and so becomes both performative and correspondent. The finite utterance is true when it is gathered into the divine discourse that both causes and completes its meaning.

Determinatio

1. Truth is a transcendental property of being: verum est ens in quantum cognoscibile.

2. Being and intelligibility are coextensive; full being entails full intelligibility.

3. In God, being and knowing are one: esse et intelligere sunt idem.

4. Every finite act of truth is participatory, grounded in the infinite act of self-identical being.

5. Theology’s internal coherence (felicity) depends upon its participation in external divine truth.

6. Therefore, theology is true because it shares in the self-identical fullness of being, in whom to be and to be known are one.

7. Veritas interna is the pneumatological authorization of theological discourse, its faithfulness, coherence, and integrity within the Spirit’s grammar.

8. Veritas externa is the Christological participation of that discourse in the divine Logos, the ontological adequation by which the Word that words also constitutes what is.

9. The two are ordered: the Spirit perfects language internally so that it may correspond externally to the Word.

10. Finite discourse, like a logical system, cannot ground its own truth; it requires inclusion in the infinite speech of God.

11. Therefore, theological truth is neither merely communal nor purely propositional but participatory, It is rather the inclusion of finite utterance in infinite meaning.

Hence we conclude: Veritas interna sine externa est infidelis; veritas externa sine interna est muta. Only when the Spirit authorizes and the Logos fulfills does theology speak the truth.

Postscriptum Modernum

Gödel’s incompleteness theorems and the Löwenheim–Skolem results together illuminate the formal necessity of theological participation.
Gödel showed that any sufficiently rich, consistent formal system contains truths that cannot be proven within it; there are statements true in the system but not demonstrable by it. The Löwenheim–Skolem theorems, conversely, reveal that no formal language uniquely determines its own model, for even first-order theories with infinite models admit both smaller and larger interpretations.

Taken together, these findings expose a deep structural fact: no finite system can secure its own truth. Consistency does not entail completeness and satisfaction within does not entail adequation without. Hence, every coherent finite language gestures beyond itself toward a meta-language or an infinite frame in which its truth is grounded.

Theology mirrors this logic. The finite L_t of human discourse may be internally consistent—Spiritually felicitous—but its truth as about God depends upon participation in the infinite L_∞ of the divine Logos. The incompleteness of reason is not its defect but its vocation: it is the mark of the finite’s openness to the Infinite.

Thus, what logic demonstrates negatively—that no system can prove itself complete—theology confesses positively: Finite speech becomes true only when the Word that words gathers it into the world that worlds. In this gathering, internal felicity becomes external truth; the Spirit’s authorization becomes the Logos’s fulfillment.

Transitus ad Disputationem XXXI

If the Spirit authorizes theology’s internal felicity and the Logos grounds its external truth, what is the nature of the concept that mediates between them? The next disputation investigates the structure of human conceptuality itself: its finitude, its schematism, and its completion in the real Word. 

We proceed to Disputatio XXXI: De Conceptuali Schematismo et Verbo Reali, and ask how human concepts, limited by finitude, become vessels of infinite meaning, and how the Real Word transforms thought itself into a mode of divine speech.