I have a question about the Trinity.

Erik Nelson said:

what is your definition of hypostasis, if you don't like the meaning of "person" as "actor"?

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I would prefer "persona".

JackRT said:

This comparison to the Trinity fails badly.
--- the intellect is not the body
--- the mind is not the body
--- the spirit is not the body
What you have actually presented is modalism.

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Modalism is three modes at different times. I believe our bodies have all
three consecutively. Just trying to make a comparison rather than just throw my hands up and say "I don't know". Works for me.
Blessings

Erik Nelson said:

ok, how about using the Greek?

what is your definition of hypostasis, if you don't like the meaning of "person" as "actor"?

hypostasis | Origin and meaning of hypostasis by Online Etymology Dictionary

i understand that modalism denies the dependence of the Word and Spirit on the Father, by begetting and procession

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Do you believe that the Holy Bible teaches that the Father, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, are distinct "Persons", though not separate? The Father is not the same as the Son or Holy Spirit. The Son is not the same as the Father or Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not the same as the Father of Son.

JackRT said:

I would prefer "persona".

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This term is also heretical, as it says that God has different "roles" or "characters", as in acting, which also is Modalism. Our English "Person" in the sense that refers to, "“A living, self-conscious being, as distinct from an animal or a thing; a moral agent”, as Websters defined in in their 1913 dictionary, is the best for the Triune God of the Holy Bible. Others fall short.

Seem to me that a "self-conscious being" would necessarily mean there are three beings.

Albion said:

Seem to me that a "self-conscious being" would necessarily mean there are three beings.

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can you expand on what you mean? God is One Spritual Being, Who eternally exists in Three "Persons".

TheBibleSays said:

can you expand on what you mean? God is One Spritual Being, Who eternally exists in Three "Persons".

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If so, each of them cannot be described as a "self-conscious being" as I read in post 84.

TheBibleSays said:

Our English "Person" in the sense that refers to, "“A living, self-conscious being, as distinct from an animal or a thing; a moral agent”, as Websters defined in in their 1913 dictionary, is the best for the Triune God of the Holy Bible. Others fall short.

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Perhaps I just read you incorrectly. But by the way, the use of persona is not modalism, even though the two seem similar. A persona is not just a part or role played, but "the particular type of character that a person seems to have"

Albion said:

If so, each of them cannot be described as a "self-conscious being" as I read in post 84.



Perhaps I just read you incorrectly. But by the way, the use of persona is not modalism, even though the two seem similar. A persona is not just a part or role played, but "the particular type of character that a person seems to have"

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and, "A role or character adopted by an author or an actor.", persona | Definition of persona in English by Oxford Dictionaries what is your objection to person, as Websters have it defined above?

The definition I gave above is taken from the Cambridge English Dictionary, also the Oxford Dictionary, the Collins Dictionary, and others.

Albion said:

The definition I gave above is taken from the Cambridge English Dictionary, also the Oxford Dictionary, the Collins Dictionary, and others.

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I know, but that is only one of its meanings. Why do you object to the clearer use of "Person"?

EastCoastRemnant said:

I have a question I posted in another thread that was never addressed... hopefully someone can answer it or at least discuss it.

If the Holy Spirit is a distinct person from the Father, then how is the Father the Father of Jesus when the Bible states it is was the Holy Spirit that came on Mary? Wouldn't that make the Holy Spirit Jesus' Father?

Each of us has a spirit, I think we'll all agree. Is that spirit a separate person from ourselves? If we are created in the image of God, wouldn't it be consistent then that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father.... and by extension because Christ has the same Divinity, the Spirit of His Son as well? After all, we are told that the Father is Spirit.

Matt 10:20
For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you.

and

Galatians 4:6
And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.

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We don't call Jesus the Son of God because of His virgin conception and birth from Mary. The Incarnation makes Him the Son of Man, the Child of Mary, not the Son of God. He is the Son of God from all eternity, for He is from God from all eternity, as the Nicene Creed puts it, "begotten of the Father before all ages".

That is why the Father is Jesus' Father. The Holy Spirit is not Jesus' father, the Holy Spirit worked the miracle of the virgin conception of Christ--the Holy Spirit did not impregnant Mary (otherwise she would not be a virgin), rather the Holy Spirit worked the miracle of conception without paternal seed.

Jesus has no biological father, but only a mother. His was a conception from divinely orchestrated parthenogenesis.

But from all eternity He, as the Logos and Divine Son is the only-begotten of the Father, having His Source and Origin in and from the Father; so that He is God of God, Light of Light, true God of true God, begotten, not made.

The Holy Spirit is distinct from both the Father and the Son by the obvious fact the Scriptures speak of the Father sending the Holy Spirit, as well as the Son sending the Holy Spirit (John 14:16 and John 16:7 respectively), Christ calls Him "Another Comforter", as distinct from the Father and the Son.

So there are Three: Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.

The Spirit is both the Spirit of the Father and the Spirit of Christ, because He is the Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father [and the Son]. He is distinct from the Father, but is in the Father and proceeds from the Father; He is distinct from the Son, but is in the Son and is sent by the Son and through Him. So that the Holy Spirit in us is the seal from God that we are in Christ as the adopted children of God. For Christ has become the eldest of many brothers (Romans 8:29), so that our adoption in Christ to be God's children means we are heirs of God, joint-heirs with Jesus, and we have the Holy Spirit as the seal from God that we are God's children, and therefore can call the Father of our Lord Jesus our Father, crying out, "Abba! Father!".

So that by the grace of God we have been invited into the intimacy, life, and love of the Holy Trinity; and the Trinitarian activity surrounds and penetrates us by our union to Christ which we have received as pure grace. We are children with Christ by adoption and grace, His Father is now our Father, and the Spirit alive in us the seal of this promise.

-CryptoLutheran

EastCoastRemnant said:

John 8:42
Jesus said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me.

John 16:27-29
For the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God.
I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father.
His disciples said unto him, Lo, now speakest thou plainly, and speakest no proverb.

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Precisely the point. Jesus came forth from the Father, as the eternal Son. There was never a time He was not the Son, for He has His eternal origin in, from, and of the Father as the Son, only-begotten, begotten before all ages, as God of God. Christ's Origin from the Father is not in His Incarnation, but in His eternal generation from the Father as the Divine and Uncreated Logos, the only-begotten Son from all eternity--as true, eternal, and Almighty God.

-CryptoLutheran

ViaCrucis said:

The Holy Spirit is distinct from both the Father and the Son by the obvious fact the Scriptures speak of the Father sending the Holy Spirit, as well as the Son sending the Holy Spirit (John 14:16 and John 16:7 respectively), Christ calls Him "Another Comforter", as distinct from the Father and the Son.

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Doesn't Jesus also say in John 14:17 and 18

Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.

First, the disciples wouldn't know of any other but Christ... even with all that Jesus is recorded as saying about the Father, they didn't understand or comprehend Him. We have no scriptural evidence that Jesus talked to the disciples about the Holy Spirit. We also see in verse 18 that Jesus clarifies to the disciples why it is that they will know the Spirit... it is Christ's own Spirit that will come to them. At least that's how I read the full passage. Jesus refers to himself in the third person quite often so calling Himself another Comforter would be logical.

ViaCrucis said:

Precisely the point. Jesus came forth from the Father, as the eternal Son. There was never a time He was not the Son, for He has His eternal origin in, from, and of the Father as the Son, only-begotten, begotten before all ages, as God of God. Christ's Origin from the Father is not in His Incarnation, but in His eternal generation from the Father as the Divine and Uncreated Logos, the only-begotten Son from all eternity--as true, eternal, and Almighty God.

-CryptoLutheran

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No where in scripture though does it speak of the Spirit in the same way... could the Holy Spirit just be the life of the Father, the life of the Son? Our spirit is our life.... just thinking out loud.

For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. 1John 5:7 I wrote of this in, The Image of God, on my blog a while back at therealmbydanielmears.com In the same chapter of 1 John, it speaks of God being love, light and spirit and Jesus being the word made flesh.

EastCoastRemnant said:

Doesn't Jesus also say in John 14:17 and 18

Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.

First, the disciples wouldn't know of any other but Christ... even with all that Jesus is recorded as saying about the Father, they didn't understand or comprehend Him. We have no scriptural evidence that Jesus talked to the disciples about the Holy Spirit. We also see in verse 18 that Jesus clarifies to the disciples why it is that they will know the Spirit... it is Christ's own Spirit that will come to them. At least that's how I read the full passage. Jesus refers to himself in the third person quite often so calling Himself another Comforter would be logical.

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You say, "We have no scriptural evidence that Jesus talked to the disciples about the Holy Spirit"? Read John chapters 14, 15 and 16, and you will see very clearly that Jesus Speaks of the Holy Spirit as a DIFFERENT Person to Himself. Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit as "Another Comforter", The Greek for "another", is adjective, "allos", which has the meaning, "Someone besides Himself". This is very clear that Jesus Christ is NOT the same "Person" as the Holy Spirit. Jesus never uses "Another Comforter", for Himself, as the Greek language itself shows. In John 16:7, Jesus says of the Coming of the Holy Spirit:

Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you

Very clear that Jesus is DISTINCT from the Holy Spirit, Whom He will send.

danielmears said:

For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. 1John 5:7 I wrote of this in, The Image of God, on my blog a while back at therealmbydanielmears.com In the same chapter of 1 John, it speaks of God being love, light and spirit and Jesus being the word made flesh.

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Out of interest, do you believe 1 John 5:7 to be a genuine part of the original Epistle of John?

TheBibleSays said:

I know, but that is only one of its meanings. Why do you object to the clearer use of "Person"?

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Because what we most often think of as the #1 meaning of the word these days, and in everyday conversation, is not the meaning when we are referring to the Trinity in the language of the church which dates from antiquity.

TheBibleSays said:

Out of interest, do you believe 1 John 5:7 to be a genuine part of the original Epistle of John?

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It seems it was written later to address beliefs which were not corresponding with the gospel, not that it matters when it was written.

TheBibleSays said:

Out of interest, do you believe 1 John 5:7 to be a genuine part of the original Epistle of John?

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Albion said:

Because what we most often think of as the #1 meaning of the word these days, and in everyday conversation, is not the meaning when we are referring to the Trinity in the language of the church which dates from antiquity.

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Which church do you have in mind? One of the very earliest theologians who wrote on the Holy Trinity, was the Church father, Tertullian in Carthage, who lived between 160-220 A.D.. Tertullian wrote mainly in Latin, though also understood Greek. The terms that he used were, "trinitas" (Trinity); "persona" (equal to our, "person") and "substantia" (substance). Therefore the Trinity is Three Persons and One Substance, which is what the Church used from its earliest time.