Rupert of Deutz
PL 167, col. 205C
English
For next follows the forming or adorning of that same creature, and it receives from the attention of the Spirit of God as great a bettering and as great a supplying of its poverty as, in its own small measure, an egg is bettered in that it is quickened by a bird's warmth and brings forth a chick. And what do we think this spirit is, but the goodness and love of God — a love not of feelings but substantial; love, I say, and life, and living power abiding in the Son and the Father, or proceeding from both, consubstantial with Father and Son.
Fresh draft (Claude), approved by Wilson Pruitt · cc-by
Latin
Deinceps namque creaturae ejusdem formatio vel exornatio succedit, tantamque ex intentione Spiritus Dei meliorationem et tantum inopiae suae supplementum capit, quantum pro modulo suo melioratur ovum in eo quod calore volucris animatur et pullum producit. Quid autem putamus esse hunc spiritum, nisi bonitatem amoremque Dei, amorem non affectuum, sed substantialem, amorem, inquam, et vitam, virtutemque vivam in Filio et Patre manentem, vel ab utroque procedentem, Patri Filioque consubstantialem.
PL 167, col. 205C · pd
Notes
Rupert has the egg but not the Syrian: the image arrives already naturalized. His 'love' is Confessions XIII.9 turned Trinitarian. Not found by the plan's search; surfaced by grepping the TEI for the bird vocabulary.
Bird brooding, warmingLove, gift, weight
Threads
- ← echoes · Rupert of Deutz
One design stated twice. At Gen 1:2 the Spirit's brooding is what betters the creature as a bird's warmth betters an egg; here the threefold formula of every day's work is the trace of the creating Trinity, tied to the law of three witnesses. Both are claims about how the chapter was written, not about what happened in it. - → echoes · Augustine
'ovum … calore volucris animatur et pullum producit' is Augustine's 'ova foventur ab alitibus … formandis pullis'; the Syrian is gone. - → echoes · Augustine
'bonitatem amoremque Dei … amorem et vitam' develops Conf. XIII.9's Spirit-as-gift-and-love reading of the same verse.