Trinity

[-V-]

...


I'm assuming your question is rhetorical, and your answer to my question,

What is the one essence in the three persons?
​

is this:

A living soul is the one essence in the three persons.
​

But let me know if I'm mistaken and your question was actual, rather than rhetorical.

We're first assuming that "a soul is the essence in a human being." (You simply asserted that is true, you didn't actually prove it.) *IF* we're following that premise, then I'm not sure what God's "essence" should be, if not a soul.

 

[SolomonVII]

Hi, SolomonVII. Is Trinity Sunday an annual thing? I'm having difficulty understanding the words,

Indeed, God does not have relationships at all...
​

Can you explain what they mean?

Trinity Sunday is part of the Liturgical calendar in the Latin rite anyway. I can't imagine it not being a thing for most other Churches which try to follow ancient rites.
I think what the words mean is that the essence of God is relationship.
A poor analogy might be that a person has a career. He might be a engineer, then a teacher, and round things out by being an artisan working in stained glass. He is a teacher, an engineer, and an artisan, but at no point are any of those careers essential to who he is. They are aspects of what he does rather than defining who he is.

God on the other hand is defined by being in a relationship. He does not have a relationship. He is a relationship. This is actually how the Catholic Church speaks of marriage too. "Husband" and "wife" are not just optional roles, but are part of the essence of the married couple. "What God has joined together" is meant to be taken literally.

 

[spockrates]

We're first assuming that "a soul is the essence in a human being." (You simply asserted that is true, you didn't actually prove it.) *IF* we're following that premise, then I'm not sure what God's "essence" should be, if not a soul.

I'm good with leaving a discussion of the essence of a human being for another discussion thread, unless you think hashing that out is necessary for this current topic.

So let's say for the sake of discussion the one essence of God is a living soul. That would mean this:

There is one soul is in the three persons.
​

The next question I think we would have to wrestle with is this: Does this mean the three persons who share this one soul have no soul of their own? Or does this mean the three persons who share this one soul also have souls of their own?

But perhaps the prerequisite question is this: What is a soul? I'd answer: The soul is that non-material thing which thinks, feels emotions, decides to take action and takes action. If you have a different definition of a living soul, let me know. Otherwise, let's consider whether the three persons of the Trinity share one soul, or have two souls (their own and the one they share).

 

[spockrates]

Trinity Sunday is part of the Liturgical calendar in the Latin rite anyway. I can't imagine it not being a thing for most other Churches which try to follow ancient rites.
I think what the words mean is that the essence of God is relationship.
A poor analogy might be that a person has a career. He might be a engineer, then a teacher, and round things out by being an artisan working in stained glass. He is a teacher, an engineer, and an artisan, but at no point are any of those careers essential to who he is. They are aspects of what he does rather than defining who he is.

God on the other hand is defined by being in a relationship. He does not have a relationship. He is a relationship. This is actually how the Catholic Church speaks of marriage too. "Husband" and "wife" are not just optional roles, but are part of the essence of the married couple. "What God has joined together" is meant to be taken literally.

Thanks. Yes, I understand how God is a relationship. What I wonder is how God has no relationships. My thought is that the author is mistaken, or I've misunderstood.

 

[spockrates]

We're first assuming that "a soul is the essence in a human being." (You simply asserted that is true, you didn't actually prove it.) *IF* we're following that premise, then I'm not sure what God's "essence" should be, if not a soul.

So here's my thought. (I'm nowhere near certain of it's truth, and won't be offended if you point out it's weaknesses.)

The essence of a thing or person doesn't necessarily have to be all a thing or person is. It can be the minimum that is essential for a thing or person to be what he, she or it is.

Take the example of the person of a human being. One might say a person has a human body, but a human body isn't essential for a person to be. If it were, a person would cease to be at the moment of death. Yet the Bible teaches the human soul continues after death, so the soul is the essence of a person. It's not all a person can be, but it is the bare minimum requirement. A more perfect person is one who has (as the Bible seems to teach we one day will have) a soul United with an immortal body, like the one Jesus Christ had after his resurrection.

Now consider God's essence. If it is in the three persons of the Trinity, then it doesn't have to be the same as a person, any more than a human soul has to be the same as the human body it is in. As the essence of a person called the soul differs from the human body of a person, so too the essence of God (which we have yet to define) likely differs from the living souls called the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

If this sounds OK (but surely not yet proven) I'll let you know what I think this essence of God might be, and you can tell me if you think I'm mistaken.

 

[spockrates]

@-V- : I guess we've swam out about as far as we know and are now at the edge of the deep waters of speculation. I'm OK with leaving it there and swimming back to the safety of the beach. Thanks for your time. I enjoyed thinking things through with you. Let's do it again, sometime.

 

[Pagan]

This posting moved to another thread.

 

[ToBeLoved]

In Deuteronomy chapters 5 and 6, Moses preaches to Israel. I don't understand if the information in Deuteronomy represents one sermon, something like Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, or maybe it represents a collection of sermons.

In the sermon, Moses says that God has commanded that the Israelites , "... shall have no other gods ... ." Seems to me that means that even if the Moses practiced monotheism, some of the Israelists must have had an alternate opinion.

Later in the sermon Moses says, "The Lord our God, the Lord is one," which modern theologians take to mean that Moses believed that God is the only God.

That idea that "God is the only God," has become the first idea about the Trinity. Also, it adds another way to refer to God. Besides God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, now we have Lord.

It can be a little confusing because the revelation of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is a revelation that the Messiah/Jesus Christ brought with Him. The apostles were the first to receive the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost which was right after Christ's death and before Jesus death He told the apostles that He would be sending them a Comforter.

So you can kind of think of the Trinity as a revelation that happened in the gospels which are the first four books of the New Testament.

Sometimes it is important to know the timeline of certain things and read scripture accordingly. This is one of those times.

Does that make sense?

 

[Pagan]

It can be a little confusing because the revelation of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is a revelation that the Messiah/Jesus Christ brought with Him. The apostles were the first to receive the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost which was right after Christ's death and before Jesus death He told the apostles that He would be sending them a Comforter.

So you can kind of think of the Trinity as a revelation that happened in the gospels which are the first four books of the New Testament.

Sometimes it is important to know the timeline of certain things and read scripture accordingly. This is one of those times.

Does that make sense?

I had not thought of the possibility that Jesus brought the Holy Spirit. Since both Psalms and Isaiah use the term, Holy Spirit, the idea of Holy Spiritness appears to me to have arrived before Jesus. The Bible uses the term, Spirit of God, for example in Genesis 1, and it uses the term, Spirit of the Lord, like in 1 Kings. My Christian friends insist that these mean the same as the Holy Spirit.

The Bible uses similar terms, spirit from God and spirit from the Lord. I have not yet had the opportunity to ask my Christians about these terms.

About the Trinity making sense.

Seems to me that the Trinity summarizes the way the Bible refers to God. First the Bible insists, rather ad nauseam, God is the only God.

In multiple places, the Bible refers to the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as being the same as God. Actually the Bible has more than three names, but I think the extra names must represent synonyms like stone being the same as rock.

The Bible describes the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as three different things, sometimes called persons because the Bible uses personal pronouns, like I or you, and personal adjectives, like his or your, when referring to the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

My Atheist friends like to point out that the Trinity has an apparent non-transitive nature. Three things that are the same as a fourth thing should be the same as each other. Since the Trinity's three persons are not the same as each other, there lies the apparent contradiction.

I don't know how what theologians might argue, but seems to me that since the trinity represents three persons, they are not the same, but they can still be essentially God because God does not have a body. He has an essence, and the persons of the Trinity each have that essence.

So the Trinity has no mystery. It simply states the New Testament authors' belief about the nature of God.

 

[ToBeLoved]

I had not thought of the possibility that Jesus brought the Holy Spirit. Since both Psalms and Isaiah use the term, Holy Spirit, the idea of Holy Spiritness appears to me to have arrived before Jesus. The Bible uses the term, Spirit of God, for example in Genesis 1, and it uses the term, Spirit of the Lord, like in 1 Kings. My Christian friends insist that these mean the same as the Holy Spirit.

The Bible uses similar terms, spirit from God and spirit from the Lord. I have not yet had the opportunity to ask my Christians about these terms.

About the Trinity making sense.

Seems to me that the Trinity summarizes the way the Bible refers to God. First the Bible insists, rather ad nauseam, God is the only God.

In multiple places, the Bible refers to the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as being the same as God. Actually the Bible has more than three names, but I think the extra names must represent synonyms like stone being the same as rock.

The Bible describes the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as three different things, sometimes called persons because the Bible uses personal pronouns, like I or you, and personal adjectives, like his or your, when referring to the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

My Atheist friends like to point out that the Trinity has an apparent non-transitive nature. Three things that are the same as a fourth thing should be the same as each other. Since the Trinity's three persons are not the same as each other, there lies the apparent contradiction.

I don't know how what theologians might argue, but seems to me that since the trinity represents three persons, they are not the same, but they can still be essentially God because God does not have a body. He has an essence, and the persons of the Trinity each have that essence.

So the Trinity has no mystery. It simply states the New Testament authors' belief about the nature of God.

That's a pretty good way of looking at it.

I would also add one thing and that is that the Trinity is in total agreement with each other and always seem to point to one another and not to themselves.

For instance, the Father sent the Son to come to earth as the Messiah and the Son glorified the Father in His living a sinful life and saving God's people from eternal death (removal from God), yet what is interesting is that at the ressurection, that Christ asks the Father to raise Him to His rightful and previous position, which the Father does and once again seats Jesus at the Father's right hand.

1 Peter 1:21
Through Him you believe in God, who raised Him from the dead and glorified Him; and so your faith and hope are in God.

John 20:19-20
The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.

21 Again Jesus said to them, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent Me, so also I am sending you.”

John 6:38
38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but to do the will of Him who sent Me.

Christ tells them that He will send a Comforter/Advocate to them, which is the Holy Spirit. Now, the Holy Spirit was around in the Old Testament, but He did not permanantly indwell anyone. Notice though that the Son asks the Father and the Father sends the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit only testifies of the Son, not of Himself. It's very interesting.

John 14:16-17
16 And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate to be with you forever — 17 the Spirit of truth.

Romans 8:10-12
10 But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet the Spirit gives you life because of righteousness. 11 And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who dwells within you. 12 Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation, but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it.

1 Peter 1:20-21
20 He was known before the foundation of the world, but was revealed in the last times for your sake. 21 Through Him you believe in God, who raised Him from the dead and glorified Him; and so your faith and hope are in God.

 

[dcalling]

I had not thought of the possibility that Jesus brought the Holy Spirit. Since both Psalms and Isaiah use the term, Holy Spirit, the idea of Holy Spiritness appears to me to have arrived before Jesus. The Bible uses the term, Spirit of God, for example in Genesis 1, and it uses the term, Spirit of the Lord, like in 1 Kings. My Christian friends insist that these mean the same as the Holy Spirit.

The Bible uses similar terms, spirit from God and spirit from the Lord. I have not yet had the opportunity to ask my Christians about these terms.

About the Trinity making sense.

Seems to me that the Trinity summarizes the way the Bible refers to God. First the Bible insists, rather ad nauseam, God is the only God.

In multiple places, the Bible refers to the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as being the same as God. Actually the Bible has more than three names, but I think the extra names must represent synonyms like stone being the same as rock.

The Bible describes the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as three different things, sometimes called persons because the Bible uses personal pronouns, like I or you, and personal adjectives, like his or your, when referring to the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

My Atheist friends like to point out that the Trinity has an apparent non-transitive nature. Three things that are the same as a fourth thing should be the same as each other. Since the Trinity's three persons are not the same as each other, there lies the apparent contradiction.

I don't know how what theologians might argue, but seems to me that since the trinity represents three persons, they are not the same, but they can still be essentially God because God does not have a body. He has an essence, and the persons of the Trinity each have that essence.

So the Trinity has no mystery. It simply states the New Testament authors' belief about the nature of God.

First, the word trinity does not exist in the Bible. God is one. it is a word we used to try to understand God (which is impossible).

However to make it easier to understand, it can be seen that God have many different "parts", i.e. spirit of God, word of God, almost like God has a head (father), right hand (word), left hand (spirit), and God used those to do different things. And in that his word teaches people, and his spirit touches people.

This is just my very bad analogy of my understanding, as the natural of God is unexplainable, all we know is God is love, God is most powerful, God is one and works in mysteries ways.

 

[Pagan]

The Bible has more than one derivative about the nature of God, with the Trinity being the most important. A second derivative begins with God as the wind, God as a cloud, or God as a rock. At first I thought of these as metaphors, but I wonder if ancient people must have thought of them as physical manifestations of God.

In Genesis 1, God moves like the wind. In Exodus 24, God arrives in a cloud. in Acts 2, the Holy Spirit arrives in a storm.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Hello all,

This video looks into whether the trinity is biblical. It's only 7minutes long. I highly encourage you all to watch it as it really helped me understand.

God bless

The author of the video doesn't seem to understand the doctrine, and the "Trinitarians" quoted belie an ignorance of the Trinity themselves.

The doctrine of the Trinity asserts that there has always been Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. There is not multiple beings, but one Being. The Son is truly the Son of the Father, eternally begotten of the Father. The Son never became the Son, the Son has always been the Son, the only-begotten of the Father, begotten of the Father from the Father's own Being, and is therefore truly God of God, of the same Being as the Father. Which is why we confess in the Nicene Creed that the Son is homoousios with the Father, that He is "God of God, Light of Light, true God of true God". There was never a time the Son was not.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Radagast]

Later in the sermon Moses says, "The Lord our God, the Lord is one," which modern theologians take to mean that Moses believed that God is the only God.

It reads: "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one." When written in all caps, "LORD" translates the Hebrew "YHWH," which is the name of God.

It could be translated as "YHWH is our God, YHWH alone."

 

[Radagast]

From the EC rules:"you may not answer a seeker or new believer's question with a statement that God is not a Trinity."

I have reported the anti-Trinitarian post.

 

[Radagast]

The New Testament authors understood that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were each God, and that they each somehow were not each other.

That is correct, and the concept of the Trinity captures that understanding.

 

[Uber Genius]

The nature of the persons, Father, Son, and Holy may be above my pay grade, but this is what I think I know right now.

The New Testament authors understood that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were each God, and that they each somehow were not each other. The words Trinity and Person did not exist in their vocabulary. An early Christian, third century theologian, Tertullian, coined the words, trinity and person, to describe the relationship of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to God. The modern Christian Church uses Tertullian’s vocabulary, but it has not adopted his view of the relationship of the parts to the whole.

The Father is not God, theSon is not God, and the HS is not God. All together they are God.

In Deuteronomy chapters 5 and 6, Moses preaches to Israel. I don't understand if the information in Deuteronomy represents one sermon, something like Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, or maybe it represents a collection of sermons.

In the sermon, Moses says that God has commanded that the Israelites , "... shall have no other gods ... ." Seems to me that means that even if the Moses practiced monotheism, some of the Israelists must have had an alternate opinion.

Later in the sermon Moses says, "The Lord our God, the Lord is one," which modern theologians take to mean that Moses believed that God is the only God.

That idea that "God is the only God," has become the first idea about the Trinity. Also, it adds another way to refer to God. Besides God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, now we have Lord.

One God, who is tri-personal.

Not changing modes, not authorial discetion in choosing how they describe God.

 

[redleghunter]

The Father is not God, theSon is not God, and the HS is not God. All together they are Go

A bit confused about the above.

 

[Albion]

A bit confused about the above.

Probably means that no one of the persons of God constitute the whole of what God is.

 

[Uber Genius]

A bit confused about the above.

Abion's response above is correct.

One being.

Each person has all the essential attributes of divinity.

But you can't remove persons without impacting being.

All have divine attributes but only Jesus has human nature as well. Persons have differences.

Three centers of consciousness each with their own will and own intentionality.