Greeting I am new to the forum and i've come across a oneness pentecostal church near me and wanted to know more about their theological views on the trinity. I've been told they are modalists but don't really know what that means.
God bless
For a bit of explanation.
Modalism is shorthand for "Modalistic Monarchianism", that's a mouthful I know. In antiquity it was usually just called Sabellianism, after one of its chief proponents, Sabellius. If we break down that mouthful of a term it can be helpful:
Monarchianism, looking at it can be helpful because it contains the word monarch, which means "one ruler"--in the way we talk of a monarchy as the rule of a single individual--a king or queen. It refers to God being the "monarch" in question, it is called "modalistic" because it says the one God expresses Himself through different modes or roles. The way they described this was that God wore different masks or "faces", in Greek this is
prosopon (plural:
prosopa). They said God was a single actor who wore three faces, the way that ancient theater actors wore different masks to play different roles or parts.
So, they said, God in heaven is the Father, but wears the face or mask of "the Son" on earth as Jesus, etc. Thus, for them, Jesus was, effectively, just a physical manifestation of God's presence on earth.
There's a lot of reasons why that is a problem, but here are some of the most significant problems with saying this:
1) In the Gospels the Lord Jesus actually prays to the Father. Jesus speaks of the Father as distinct from Himself, "The Father sent Me", "The Father is greater than I", "Not My will but Your will be done" etc. Jesus can't simply just be a physical manifestation of God's presence, Jesus is most definitely a distinct person who actually relates
to the Father. Jesus speaks of returning to share in the glory which He had with the Father before, so the distinction between Father and Son can't simply be that Jesus is on earth and the Father is in heaven, but an actual distinction that has always existed between Father and Son. Which kind of gets us to point 2
2) The prologue of John's Gospel states the following, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God." The Logos (translated as "Word") is said to be both with God and is God. For John God and His Logos are distinct, but not separate, the fact is that the Logos is Himself
God with God. It is the Logos, as we read in verse 14 of John ch 1 that "became flesh and dwelt among us", Jesus Christ is the Logos, He who was both with God in the beginning, and is Himself God. Jesus, from all eternity, is God with God. Yet there cannot be two gods, that would violate all we know from Scripture which states with abundant clarity that there is only one God. That's why Jesus' statements in John's Gospel such as "I and My Father are one" are important, it reveals to us the unity between the Father and the Son, that even though the Son/Word of God is distinct from the Father, He is nevertheless God,
one with the Father.
Modalism denies the distinction between Father and Son, it denies the fact that Jesus, though God, is not the Father but is one with the Father, united to the Father, is God of and with the Father.
It's this that was crucial, in addition to the controversy which Arius introduced about a hundred years after Sabellius, that led to the way the Council of Nicea sought to explain the orthodox Christian position:
(This is from the originally symbol of 325)
"We believe ... in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, the only-begotten; that is, of the essence of the Father, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one being with the Father;"
In the Creed that Christians have been using for hundreds of years (the symbol of 381) it reads a bit more concisely:
"
We believe ... in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father. God of God, Light of Light, true God of true God. Begotten, not made, of one being with the Father"
The Son is not God in a human suit, but is Himself truly God from all eternity, begotten of the Father not in time but eternity, and of the Father's own essence, nature, or being. He, God the Son or Logos, united Himself to our own human nature in the Incarnation, becoming man. Jesus is therefore not God in a human suit, but actual God and actual man. He is both eternally God and actually human, just like we are human.
The heresy of Modalism/Sabellianism isn't just wrong at an academically theological level, but undermines the faith which we confess in the Son of God.
Oneness Pentecostalism, with the UPC being the largest Oneness Pentecostal denomination in the world, will insist they don't teach Modalism/Sabellianism. They are partially correct, in that it's not identical to ancient Modalism, but their differences with ancient Modalism are only further problematic and heretical. Oneness Pentecostal dogma asserts that "Jesus" is the divine name of God the Father (this is why they are sometimes called "Jesus' Name Only" or "Jesus Only"), that the Father's name is "Jesus" and that the Father manifested Himself as a man on earth, and this God-as-a-man is "the Son", whereas the Holy Spirit is simply the spiritual essence of the Father which we experience in us. They go even further than the Modalists of old, and go down heretical paths different but no less heretical and wrong.
-CryptoLutheran
