Judechild is correct. The consubstantiality of the Trinity is understood once the Council of Nicea occurs. Without this understanding of Sacred Tradition, one may also fall into the heresies of modalism, for instance, where you know from Scripture the triune nature of God, but mistakenly think He switches between modes.
Again, I concur. But for Church history, I would have no way of knowing whether what I believed was authentic orthodoxy or iligitimate heterodoxy.
Simonline.
__________________ THE MESSIAH IS ONEPERSON SIMULTANEOUSLY EXISTING IN TWO (DISTINCT BUT NOT SEPARATE) WAYS AS TWO (MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE) NATURES - DIVINE [YHWH] AND HUMAN [JESUS OF NAZARETH]. THE MESSIAH EXISTS FIRST AND FOREMOST AS THE DIVINE CREATOR AND ONLY IN A SECONDARY SENSE AS THE HUMAN CREATURE.
Last edited by Simonline; 1st November 2009 at 02:09 PM.
Only one who believed that the theology of those heretical groups (i.e. Arianism, Nestorianism and Gnosticism) were equally valid with authentic orthodox theology would claim that 'They had plenty of theology and scripture to back up their claims...'(?!) since, in Truth, the canon of Scripture does not substantiate or endorse heresy (which is why orthodoxy opposed and continues to oppose such heresy virulently).
Very well sir, then for the sake of semantics: "They used plenty of theology and scripture to back up their claims". Now how does one know that their use of Scripture and Theology is inferior?
I concur. I also reject the Roman charge against Protestantism that when it comes to Biblical interpretation, Protestantism effectively makes every man his own pope. The Scriptures are clear that only collectively, as a corporate Body, do we have 'the mind of Christ' (2Cor.2:6-16).
Couple a' questions: How is it that the correct view of Scripture is clear here too? This passage speaks of forgiving an offender against the Church. What is this "corporate Body"? (I do agree with you, btw, but we don't see it in the same way). Which people are in this "corporate Body"? What does it mean to "have 'the mind of Christ'"? How do you , personally, answer this "Roman charge"?
For the same reason that there was uncertainty about whether or not it was OK for Adam and Eve to eat fruit from the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil, especially after God had given Adam explicit and unequivocal instructions that it wasn't?!
Simonline.
Explain again please, I don't understand your train-of-thought.
There is abundant scripture describing actions and character of the Holy Spirit leading us to believe he is a person or being. There are a few scriptures equating the Holy Spirit to God. Jesus is equated to God.
There is not a single verse that explicitly states the Holy Spirit is a person, nor that God is a person.
Um, Trinitarian doctrine specifically dealing with persons, I'm not hugely committal on. Scripture doesn't define a "person". But what Scripture does say, is formulated in the Trinitarian teaching that essentially defines "person" Scripturally as to personal attributes that change depending on the Member of the Trinity being discussed.
I don't particularly have a problem with someone wondering whether the Holy Spirit is a Person. I have much more of a problem with someone denying the Father -- the Father, Who loves, graces, and exhibits the Fatherhood of His people -- is a Person. He's a Person. Jesus represents Him as a Person in the Prayer: "Our Father in heaven ..."
However, God is presented to us as Spirit as well, One Who relates to our spirits through spiritual means and acts toward us with certain attributes in a away that He could be called a "person". The wording is less important to me than the fact that the Spirit of God Scripturally does this.
Scripture does demand that all three be God, and that God be One. Christianity is a monotheistic view of God.
Originally Posted by curious-one
There is not a verse that explicitly states that God the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are three persons in one entity. Why doesn't scripture command us to worship the Spirit if he is God?
Well, it does.
"God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." John 4:24
Originally Posted by curious-one
Personally, I believe the Trinity doctrine is the closest we can come to understanding the identity of God. I believe the doctrine, but I cannot wrap my mind around the idea of three persons sharing one entity. It seems contradictory. It's a concept humans can't fully understand, and I accept that.
Here's my problem: even though I believe in the Trinity, I don't know if it should be considered a heresy to reject it. If it is such an important issue, why didn't God make it crystal clear for us to understand?
I don't think Trinitarian doctrine really demands we understand the incomprehensible. So I'm not terribly concerned that God didn't make the incomprehensible clear.
To me the issue is recognizing that all three are God, and that God is not a tripartite nor a composite Entity. He isn't "made of" demigods or daemons. He's God. Each One of the Trinity is also God. And the readiest way we see the Three distinguished is as Three Persons. Are the Father, Son and Holy Spirit distinguished in ways other than as Persons? Maybe. But they're not distinguished as different in substance.
The way I've generally looked at it is, if there were an entity that were beyond three dimensions, wouldn't it look like it was in three dimensions, yet not subject to the "regular" rules of a three-dimensional object?
To me God is beyond personhood: not less than personal -- More. So it looks to us as if God is not subject to the "regular" rules of personhood. He seems to be many Persons. Scripture declares three.
__________________ "... not an unconcerned sitting of God in heaven, from which He merely observes the things that are done in the world; but that all-active and all-concerned seatedness on His throne above, by which He governs the world which He Himself hath made." John Calvin
To us, O LORD, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you.
It wasn't your assertion concerning sacred tradition with which I had a problem only your suggestion that '[ancient heretical groups] had plenty of theology and scripture to back up their claims...' which isn't strictly true. Only by creating their own warped theology on the basis of false warped interpretations of Scripture were such groups able to advocate their position.
Simonline.
__________________ THE MESSIAH IS ONEPERSON SIMULTANEOUSLY EXISTING IN TWO (DISTINCT BUT NOT SEPARATE) WAYS AS TWO (MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE) NATURES - DIVINE [YHWH] AND HUMAN [JESUS OF NAZARETH]. THE MESSIAH EXISTS FIRST AND FOREMOST AS THE DIVINE CREATOR AND ONLY IN A SECONDARY SENSE AS THE HUMAN CREATURE.
Very well sir, then for the sake of semantics: "They used plenty of theology and scripture to back up their claims". Now how does one know that their use of Scripture and Theology is inferior?
It wasn't inferior, it was just wrong, Orthodox theology is not 'superior' it is, unlike heterodox theology, simply consistent with the truth.
Originally Posted by judechild
Couple a' questions: How is it that the correct view of Scripture is clear here too?
How can the correct view or understanding of Scripture be 'clear here too'?! The meaning of the Scriptural text may be clear but how one understands any particular passage of Scripture is an entirely different issue to that of the Scriptural text itself?
Originally Posted by judechild
This passage speaks of forgiving an offender against the Church.
My apologies. Wrong reference. It should have been 1Cor.2:6-16 (that should make more sense now).
Originally Posted by judechild
What is this "corporate Body"? (I do agree with you, btw, but we don't see it in the same way).
The body of all true believers, those who are believers on the basis of faith in the Messiah's redemptive life, death and resurrection rather than on the spurrious basis of their own self-righteous works, the Body of Christ (is their another body)?
Originally Posted by judechild
Which people are in this "corporate Body"?
Answer as above...
Originally Posted by judechild
What does it mean to "have 'the mind of Christ'"?
To have the mind of Christ is to know the 'good, pleasing and perfect will of God' (Rom.12:2(b)) in order that we might act in accordance with it since knowledge and understanding alone is not redemptive (Jas.2:14-26).
Originally Posted by judechild
How do you, personally, answer this "Roman charge"?
By seeking to explain the correct understanding of the aims and objectives of the Protestant Reformation which was NOT to make every believer theologically autonomous and independent of every other believer (especially those in authority) i.e. 'every man his own pope' (the Protestant Reformation occured during the 16th Century not the 20th or 21st century).
Originally Posted by judechild
Explain again please, I don't understand your train-of-thought.
Remember the question: 'If the Trinity was so clear from the outset, sir, why was there so much uncertainty about it?'. The short answer is because, ever since the garden of Eden, the Evil One has always sought to muddy the waters and sow utter confusion about the correct and clear understanding of the truth in order to deceive as many as possible and direct them into everlasting Perdition.
Simonline.
__________________ THE MESSIAH IS ONEPERSON SIMULTANEOUSLY EXISTING IN TWO (DISTINCT BUT NOT SEPARATE) WAYS AS TWO (MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE) NATURES - DIVINE [YHWH] AND HUMAN [JESUS OF NAZARETH]. THE MESSIAH EXISTS FIRST AND FOREMOST AS THE DIVINE CREATOR AND ONLY IN A SECONDARY SENSE AS THE HUMAN CREATURE.
Last edited by Simonline; 1st November 2009 at 02:46 PM.
Um, Trinitarian doctrine specifically dealing with persons, I'm not hugely committal on. Scripture doesn't define a "person".
Not true. God has revealed Himself to His Creation as Personal (Tri-Personal actually) and it is this that defines for us the essence of a person (which is both how and why we know that we are personal by virtue of the fact that we have been made in the likeness of God as our Tri-Personal Divine Creator (Gen.1:26-27)). However, the One Tri-Personal Divine Creator has, for reasons best known to Himself, chosen to make his finite human creatures as mono-personal rather than tri-personal (which is why we're not comfortable with being schizophrenic).
Originally Posted by heymikey80
But what Scripture does say, is formulated in the Trinitarian teaching that essentially defines "person" Scripturally as to personal attributes that change depending on the Member of the Trinity being discussed.
Again, this is not true. All Three Persons of the One Tri-Personal Divine Creator YHWH are both Eternally and Immutably Personal (Mal.3:6; Jas.1:17). The Personal attributes of the One Tri-Personal Divine Creator YHWH NEVER change (even whilst one of them also exists as the incarnate human creature, Jesus of Nazareth).
Originally Posted by heymikey80
I don't particularly have a problem with someone wondering whether the Holy Spirit is a Person.
That says a lot about your understanding of the truth. I would be rather concerned about anyone professing to be a believer and wondering whether or not God Existed as Tri-Personal, Mono-Personal or whatever? I would want to show them on the basis of Divine Revelation that God Exists both Eternally and Immutably as Tri-Personal and nothing else.
Originally Posted by heymikey80
I have much more of a problem with someone denying the Father -- the Father, Who loves, graces, and exhibits the Fatherhood of His people -- is a Person. He's a Person.
If, according to you, the Scriptures do not define a person (see above) then on what basis do you claim to know that the Father (or the Son or even the Holy Spirit) is a Person?
Originally Posted by heymikey80
Jesus represents Him as a Person in the Prayer: "Our Father in heaven ..."
And whose to say that that isn't simply a metaphor?
Originally Posted by heymikey80
However, God is presented to us as Spirit as well, One Who relates to our spirits through spiritual means and acts toward us with certain attributes in a away that He could be called a "person".
Maybe that's because He actually IS a Person (or Three Persons to be precise)?! Don't forget that we are made in the likeness of our Creator, not vice versa (Gen.1:26-27).
Originally Posted by heymikey80
The wording is less important to me than the fact that the Spirit of God Scripturally does this.
Again, the Spirit does this precisely because He Exists both Eternally and Immutably as a Person.
Originally Posted by heymikey80
Scripture does demand that all three be God, and that God be One. Christianity is a monotheistic view of God.
Scripture demands no such thing. The Scriptures reveal God to be a single Entity (i.e. Absolute Reality (of which there can, by definition, be only One)) Who simultaneously Exists as Tri-Personal rather than Mono-Personal. It is the Church who, on the basis of the Divine Revelation that is the Judeo-Christian Scriptures, insist that God is to be understood and communicated only in ways that are consistent with the Divine Revelation.
Originally Posted by heymikey80
Well, it does.
"God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." John 4:24
John.4:24 is a reference to God entire as Existing as pure Infinite Spirit rather than (like His creatures) as a finite entity either as corporeal or non-corporeal. It is not referring specifically to the Third Person of the One Tri-Personal Divine Entity called YHWH.
The Scriptures command all Mankind to worship the One true God in Spirit and in Truth. That being the case, since He has revealed Himself as Existing as Tri-Personal rather than Mono-Personal like His finite creatures, then, in worshipping the One true God as Tri-Personal, we are worshipping Him as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Originally Posted by heymikey80
I don't think Trinitarian doctrine really demands we understand the incomprehensible. So I'm not terribly concerned that God didn't make the incomprehensible clear.
The Tri-Personal Nature of the One Divine Creator is not entirely incomprehensible (else why reveal it at all?) and God expects those who, by His Spirit (1Cor.2:6-16), are able to understand it, to do so, as much as they are able and then to help the rest to understand it as much as they are able.
God wants us to know Him not Personally but Tri-Personally since that is how He Exists both Eternally and Immutably.
Originally Posted by heymikey80
To me the issue is recognizing that all three are God, and that God is not a tripartite nor a composite Entity. He isn't "made of" demigods or daemons. He's God. Each One of the Trinity is also God. And the readiest way we see the Three distinguished is as Three Persons. Are the Father, Son and Holy Spirit distinguished in ways other than as Persons? Maybe. But they're not distinguished as different in substance.
This is a very economic understanding of the Trinity (i.e. that God is not necessarily ontologically Trinity (i.e. Existing as Tri-Personal both Eternally and Immutably, in and of Himself, without any reference to the Creation) but that God may only Exist as 'Trinity' for the purpose of salvation in relation to the redemption of His Creation)?!
The Three Persons are distinguished from each other in ways other than their Personages (see the Athanasian Creed) but that does not alter the fact that God is by Nature Tri-Personal as well as pure Spirit (Jn.4:24).
Originally Posted by heymikey80
The way I've generally looked at it is, if there were an entity that were beyond three dimensions, wouldn't it look like it was in three dimensions, yet not subject to the "regular" rules of a three-dimensional object?
I'm not sure I like where this is leading....
To me God is beyond personhood: not less than personal -- More. So it looks to us as if God is not subject to the "regular" rules of personhood. He seems to be many Persons. Scripture declares three.[/quote]
...as I suspected.
No. Not true. God is NOT 'the Great Link' of Star Trek's Deep Space Nine.
God has revealed Himself to us as Tri-Personal, Eternal and Immutable. That prevents Him from Existing as anything other than Tri-Personal (otherwise how is YHWH both Eternal and Immutable if the number of His Personages is, like DS9's 'the Great Link' fluid?!).
Simonline.
__________________ THE MESSIAH IS ONEPERSON SIMULTANEOUSLY EXISTING IN TWO (DISTINCT BUT NOT SEPARATE) WAYS AS TWO (MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE) NATURES - DIVINE [YHWH] AND HUMAN [JESUS OF NAZARETH]. THE MESSIAH EXISTS FIRST AND FOREMOST AS THE DIVINE CREATOR AND ONLY IN A SECONDARY SENSE AS THE HUMAN CREATURE.
It wasn't inferior, it was just wrong, Orthodox theology is not 'superior' it is, unlike heterodox theology, simply consistent with the truth.
Yes, I agree with you, but how can we know what is orthodox (what is true), and how do we know that what is Orthodox is true? What was "orthodox" about the nature of the cosmos according to Aristotal turned out to be false, how do we know that what is Orthodox is not false here as well?
How can the correct view or understanding of Scripture be 'clear here too'?! The meaning of the Scriptural text may be clear but how one understands any particular passage of Scripture is an entirely different issue to that of the Scriptural text itself?
I'm sorry, but, is this a question for me, or a statement?
...
Oh dear, I realize we've split the topic quite a bit. How would you like to continue this discussion? It appears like we're discussing the role of the Church more than the Trinity.
Yes, I agree with you, but how can we know what is orthodox (what is true), and how do we know that what is Orthodox is true? What was "orthodox" about the nature of the cosmos according to Aristotle turned out to be false, how do we know that what is Orthodox is not false here as well?
That was because at that time the Church had an over simplistic view of cosmic reality as revolving around the Earth. With the advance of modern science we now know differently. However this has to do with the reality of the created order rather than Theology or Christology proper the orthodoxy of which is determined by its consistency with Divine Revelation?
Originally Posted by judechild
I'm sorry, but, is
Originally Posted by judechild
this a question for me, or a statement?
It is a question for you based upon your question:
Originally Posted by judechild
How is it that the correct view of Scripture is clear here too?
As I said in my original response to your question 'How can the correct view or understanding of Scripture be 'clear here too'?!' since it cannot be assumed that everyone understands the same text in the same way?!
Originally Posted by judechild
Oh dear, I realize we've split the topic quite a bit. How would you like to continue this discussion? It appears like we're discussing the role of the Church more than the Trinity.
Actually, we were discussing the epistemological nature of orthodoxy. You start the thread and see what happens...?
Simonline.
__________________ THE MESSIAH IS ONEPERSON SIMULTANEOUSLY EXISTING IN TWO (DISTINCT BUT NOT SEPARATE) WAYS AS TWO (MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE) NATURES - DIVINE [YHWH] AND HUMAN [JESUS OF NAZARETH]. THE MESSIAH EXISTS FIRST AND FOREMOST AS THE DIVINE CREATOR AND ONLY IN A SECONDARY SENSE AS THE HUMAN CREATURE.
Not true. God has revealed Himself to His Creation as Personal (Tri-Personal actually) and it is this that defines for us the essence of a person (which is both how and why we know that we are personal by virtue of the fact that we have been made in the likeness of God as our Tri-Personal Divine Creator (Gen.1:26-27)). However, the One Tri-Personal Divine Creator has, for reasons best known to Himself, chosen to make his finite human creatures as mono-personal rather than tri-personal (which is why we're not comfortable with being schizophrenic).
Okay, so far you've asserted as true that the Bible does define a person. It's not in Gen 1:26-27.
Where's the Bible define a person?
Originally Posted by Simonline
Again, this is not true. All Three Persons of the One Tri-Personal Divine Creator YHWH are both Eternally and Immutably Personal (Mal.3:6; Jas.1:17). The Personal attributes of the One Tri-Personal Divine Creator YHWH NEVER change (even whilst one of them also exists as the incarnate human creature, Jesus of Nazareth).
The personal attributes of goodness, love, justice, and others are shared by all Persons in the Divine substance.
Again, without a definition of "person", your assertion of truth or falsehood falls. We're not talking about something with a consistent definition. Define "person", then we'll talk. But define "person" as being something that's not grounded in Scripture, and I'll take it to task.
And that's the issue. "A rose by any other name." People with differing versions of what a "person" is may differ over a doctrine of the Persons of the Godhead. What Trinitarianism communicates is the truth: that what Scripture describes as one God, are also three in our experience of them: Father, Son, Spirit. These Three are One. We have named these three "Persons". And that may be a valid human conclusion to make. But Scripture doesn't really call them Persons (though they're all referred to as personal in Scripture), nor does Scripture limit God to being these Three (though it denies any general Personal existence of God in created entities).
Originally Posted by Simonline
That says a lot about your understanding of the truth. I would be rather concerned about anyone professing to be a believer and wondering whether or not God Existed as Tri-Personal, Mono-Personal or whatever? I would want to show them on the basis of Divine Revelation that God Exists both Eternally and Immutably as Tri-Personal and nothing else.
Well, I don't try to attribute motives to people, and I would thank you to avoid it as well, as that's an ad hominem form of argument. However, if your concern were this great you would be forced to discuss Trinitarianism and nothing else for the rest of your life. Virtually everyone has some kind of wondering about Trinitarianism -- or should.
Originally Posted by Simonline
If, according to you, the Scriptures do not define a person (see above) then on what basis do you claim to know that the Father (or the Son or even the Holy Spirit) is a Person?
Because Scripture alludes to them conventionally in personal semantic cases -- just as they allude to Jesus as a human being. I wouldn't propose that Jesus is "nothing else" than human on that basis.
Lack of evidence is not evidence of lack.
Originally Posted by Simonline
And whose to say that that isn't simply a metaphor?
Because the cases in Scripture aren't metaphorical.
Originally Posted by Simonline
Maybe that's because He actually IS a Person (or Three Persons to be precise)?! Don't forget that we are made in the likeness of our Creator, not vice versa (Gen.1:26-27).
And you have some kind of problem with me stating that God is three Persons? I'm a Trinitarian, Simonline. The question is regarding the difference between doctrine and the actual Scriptural distinction.
Originally Posted by Simonline
That really concerns me. The wording is absolutely crucial because God relates to men through communicable propositional truth
Hold it. Propositional truth?
Find the proposition in Scripture "that God Exists both Eternally and Immutably as Tri-Personal and nothing else".
It's not there.
Originally Posted by Simonline
not New Age contentless subjective mystical experiences that cannot be propositionally communicated.
Partially agreed, and granted. Scripture is not contentless mystical experiences.
Subjective? It is relative to the subject writing, and we deduce what parts the subject is writing subjectively, from exegetical evidence. It's not objective truth unless God states it. Just reading Romans 16 should make this clear. Some things are subjective (and that does not force them to be "baseless" or "untrue" or even "personal" or "irrelevant to the objective").
I understand what Schaeffer was focusing on -- that there is objective truth and it is found by a proper handling and exegesis of what God has said in Scripture. That's true. It's not enough, but it's true.
Objective truth with no application to us, its subjects, remains useless.
Originally Posted by Simonline
Again, the Spirit does this precisely because He Exists both Eternally and Immutably as a Person.
Back it up. Where does Scripture deduce (not infer) that "the Spirit does this precisely because He Exists ... as a Person". That's a proposition. Scripture should contain such a fact, propositionally, from what I'm reading in this posting.
Again, you're talking to a Trinitarian. I hold massive skepticism for people who deny what Trinitarianism describes as God from its own definitions. What I'm denying, is that the categorization and classification of Trinitarian doctrine is sustained specifically and solely by Scripture. It is inferred from Scripture. Each element of skepticism in application of non-Trinitarian dogma can be destroyed by Scripture. But to me, with no other evidence emerging from this discussion, the Trinitarian formula is a human way of philosophizing something Scripture itself does not assert nor deduce.
Originally Posted by Simonline
Originally Posted by heymikey80
Scripture does demand that all three be God, and that God be One. Christianity is a monotheistic view of God.
Scripture demands no such thing. The Scriptures reveal God to be a single Entity (i.e. Absolute Reality (of which there can, by definition, be only One)) Who simultaneously Exists as Tri-Personal rather than Mono-Personal. It is the Church who, on the basis of the Divine Revelation that is the Judeo-Christian Scriptures, insist that God is to be understood and communicated only in ways that are consistent with the Divine Revelation.
Excuse me? Scripture demands, "The LORD our God is ONE." It does so with increasing repetition throughout Scripture. If you want a proposition, there's an explicit proposition from Scripture.
Now tell me where the proposition "The Lord is Three Persons" is found?
Christianity is a monotheistic religion.
Originally Posted by Simonline
John.4:24 is a reference to God entire as Existing as pure Infinite Spirit rather than (like His creatures) as a finite entity either as corporeal or non-corporeal. It is not referring specifically to the Third Person of the One Tri-Personal Divine Entity called YHWH.
Uh, no. That's an interpretation of what Jesus says. Jesus is saying "God is Spirit, and we're to worship Him in spirit ..." There is no "specifically to the Third Person ..." God is Spirit. This Spirit is in us. This Spirit communicates to us.
And I must point out, Scripture represents us as spirits. We agree that does not make us gods. But it usurps your current explanation of what Jesus is explaining. The distinction between creatures and infinite entities is not based on Spirit and corporeal distinctions. We are not living in a spiritual/physical dichotomy (hm: read Schaeffer?). So Jesus can't be making this distinction you're asserting. Spirits are not inherently uncreated (Jn 3:6 Rom 8:16); they're also not inherently infinite (Ps 31:5, 51:17, Pr 15:4, Rom 11:8, Matt 5:3). So that's not why Jesus is saying this.
I prefer to put it flatly the way Jesus is saying it: that God is not of the corporeal world, and that our worship thus can't be based on the corporeal, either (specifically: physical location). But our personal relation to Him of worshipping Him is spiritual, because God is a personal Spirit, and we must relate to Him on His terms, not ours.
No one worships a god Who can't accept worship. Accepting worship as well as worshipping are both, humanly speaking, personal actions. We don't expect rocks or stones to pick up and worship God as we conceive of worship. That's because of how we've defined "person"s.
Originally Posted by Simonline
The Scriptures command all Mankind to worship the One true God in Spirit and in Truth. That being the case, since He has revealed Himself as Existing as Tri-Personal rather than Mono-Personal like His finite creatures, then, in worshipping the One true God as Tri-Personal, we are worshipping Him as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
God has revealed Himself as Father, Son and Spirit, and as One God. How you categorize these as persons is an issue derived through numerous dogmatic infights -- largely because the definitions aren't Scriptural, they're simply inferred. Did you know that, prior to Nicea, asserting "homoousios" would get you branded a heretic? Yet afterward it was orthodoxy. These are human, philosophical definitions for words, conceived (and often well-conceived) by councils. They shouldn't be rejected lightly. They certainly shouldn't be rejected without years-long examination and meditation on what they're asserting. Still, councils can make errors. They're not Scripture. And often they present human arrangements of their conclusions.
It doesn't mean anything for the conclusions Scripture shares with Trinitarianism. As I said, I'm Trinitarian, I think of it this way. But it doesn't make Trinitarianism into Scripture.
Originally Posted by Simonline
The Tri-Personal Nature of the One Divine Creator is not entirely incomprehensible (else why reveal it at all?) and God expects those who, by His Spirit (1Cor.2:6-16), are able to understand it, to do so, as much as they are able and then to help the rest to understand it as much as they are able.
Um, again, the issue is what God has said and not said about Himself in Scripture, not whether we have a propositional understanding of it.
Originally Posted by Simonline
God wants us to know Him not Personally but Tri-Personally since that is how He Exists both Eternally and Immutably. This is a very economic understanding of the Trinity (i.e. that God is not necessarily ontologically Trinity (i.e. Existing as Tri-Personal both Eternally and Immutably, in and of Himself, without any reference to the Creation) but that God may only Exist as 'Trinity' for the purpose of salvation in relation to the redemption of His Creation)?!
God wants us to know Him in the terms He's set apart in Scripture: Father, Son/Jesus/Word, Holy Spirit. Categorizing these as "tri-personal" and dealing with the economics and ontology meant by these words -- well, there are less deductions you can make about this from Scripture.
Originally Posted by Simonline
The Three Persons are distinguished from each other in ways other than their Personages (see the Athanasian Creed) but that does not alter the fact that God is by Nature Tri-Personal as well as pure Spirit (Jn.4:24).
That has implications that attack the Deity of the Incarnate Son.
Originally Posted by Simonline
I'm not sure I like where this is leading....
Originally Posted by heymikey80
To me God is beyond personhood: not less than personal -- More. So it looks to us as if God is not subject to the "regular" rules of personhood. He seems to be many Persons. Scripture declares three.
...as I suspected.
Originally Posted by Simonline
No. Not true. God is NOT 'the Great Link' of Star Trek's Deep Space Nine.
You misunderstand. I never said this. It's a false representation.
Retract.
Your assertion "not true" is getting tiring. I know you disagree. Don't usurp reality by asserting your argument will establish truth.
Originally Posted by Simonline
God has revealed Himself to us as Tri-Personal, Eternal and Immutable. That prevents Him from Existing as anything other than Tri-Personal (otherwise how is YHWH both Eternal and Immutable if the number of His Personages is, like DS9's 'the Great Link' fluid?!).
So. When God said "The Lord our God, the Lord is ONE" that would've prevented Him precedentially from existing as anything other than as ONE.
And because John said the Word was God from the Beginning, that would prevent God precedentially from existing as anything other than as TWO.
Let God say things about Himself when He wishes. My point stands. We've no reason to go beyond three, because Scripture asserts no more than three.
But a man will not limit God. God does as He pleases, and tells us what He wishes.
__________________ "... not an unconcerned sitting of God in heaven, from which He merely observes the things that are done in the world; but that all-active and all-concerned seatedness on His throne above, by which He governs the world which He Himself hath made." John Calvin
To us, O LORD, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you.
Last edited by heymikey80; 6th November 2009 at 10:19 AM.
These are human, philosophical definitions for words, conceived (and often well-conceived) by councils. They shouldn't be rejected lightly. They certainly shouldn't be rejected without years-long examination and meditation on what they're asserting. Still, councils can make errors. They're not Scripture. And often they present human arrangements of their conclusions.
Linear Mode
