TO SHOW MILTON's personal theologizing of scripture at its most characteristic and fullest, in De Filio on the Trinity, we scrutinize his original Latin words, at some length, from varying aspects. The style is the man, his mind thinking theologically.

First, however, I attempt an alternative account of scripture itself, using recent summaries of biblical scholarship for perspective and contrast. After all, since scripture is Milton's own authority and yardstick for doctrine, it should surprise us whenever he bypasses or downplays it—in his selection of evidence, arrangement of evidence, and mode of argument. Such surprises point to the dominance of prior conviction, and to the decisive influence of the “personal” dimension which is my focus.

Scriptural Evidence: The Road Not Taken

As regards the Trinity, one passage stands out, what is known as the “Great Commission” of Matthew's gospel. At Matt. 28:19 the disciples are enjoined to teach all nations, “baptizing into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.” As Simon Gathercole remarks: “[T] he name here is singular even though it has three owners. Neither Father, Son, nor Spirit exhaust the divine identity; rather each shares it.” And whenever Jesus is “sharing the name of YHWH” we reflect that “a name is so obviously concerned with identity.” In two more places of Matthew (18:20, 7:22), we find “the substitution of the name of YHWH with the name of Jesus […] not ‘exclusive substitution’ but ‘inclusive substitution’ […] the incorporation of Jesus.” Other scholars writing in the Oxford Handbook of the Trinity adduce passages from John's gospel, the epistles of John and Paul, and Hebrews which, without formulating a doctrine of threefold godhead, provide examples of that way of thinking, examples which in the following centuries supported the developing orthodoxy. In short, the idea of the Trinity came out of scripture and referred back into it, even to the Old Testament (Book 1, Chapter 2). Certainly during the formation of the canon, there is a kind of reflection on the three persons of the Trinity and their multiple relations and connections, with attempts beginning to express them in terms of “Trinity” and “persons.”