What defines a Trinitarian?

[Anto9us]

Modalism is blown by the passage of Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist.
Jesus is in the Jordan being baptized by John -- the Father is speaking from heaven -- the Holy Spirit is descending on Jesus in the form of a dove. All three are distinct entities doing something simultaneously. The Holy Spirit is not "winking out of existence" as the Father speaks, Jesus is not "ceasing to exist" as the Holy Spirit descends -- all 3 persons of the Trinity are present at the same time doing distinct things.

The Greek word PERSONA is from their drama -- it is a MASK which identifies the character in a play -- and also had a built-in megaphone for voice amplification in a day before microphones. There can be 3 different characters in a play - the other two do not "wink out of existence" while one is giving his lines, the other two still retain their roles in the play. (I say 'his' because even female characters were played by male actors in Greek drama - the large PERSONA on his head had the features of the character being depicted, male or female.)

 

[Albion]

My understanding is that people who call themselves Trinitarians believe there are three people up there who are united in purpose.

Nope. That is one thing that does NOT describe Trinitarians. They flatly reject that view.

 

[Tigger45]

This short YouTube video might help some better understand the different terminologies and doctrines of the nature of the Godhead. Plus heck its entertaining.

 

[dreadnought]

Nope. That is one thing that does NOT describe Trinitarians. They flatly reject that view.

So do I, and they say I am a heretic.

 

[hedrick]

I believe the "three people" view is largely a result of the language used to describe it, particularly when translated into English. I'm not convinced that neo-platonic ontology is a wonderful way to describe what's going on in Scripture in the first place. Once you say that when you've seen Jesus you've seen God, it changes your idea of God. Something like the Trinity is probably inevitable. But I don't think language like the Athanasian Creed is inevitable.

The old Catholic Encyclopedia (from newadvent) says "the same mind will have a three-fold consciousness." While I'm not sure that's ideal, I think it's a better place to start than three persons.

In general I find it interesting to look at people like Aquinas. I'm more interested in the Incarnation than the Trinity. With the Incarnation I see his explanation as actually being closer to what we'd use in modern theology than to the traditional one. But he's stuck with traditional wording, so he produces a compromise.

 

[hedrick]

To answer the original question, I'm trying to think of the Trinity in a broader context than just three persons with one nature. Partly that's because modern theology doesn't always use that formulation. For me the Trinity is the understanding that God isn't just the unmoved mover, but is also the suffering servant. That is, if Christ shows us God, then his role as Son embodies something of God himself.

In the West, at least, the Trinity is define relationally. So the Holy Spirit, which for us is basically God's personal presence, reflects what I'm going to call (for lack of a perfect word) the relationality in God's own life.

I think it makes sense to start with Father, Son and Holy Spirit as we experience them. This is the "economic" Trinity. Modalism says that this is entirely a matter of how God deals with us. But Christian thought has generally said that the economic Trinity reflects distinctions within God himself. Because I'm not an admirer of ancient ontology I'd rather not go much further than that, and try to define the specifics of God's being. I'd rather simply say that there are within God aspects of being and inner life that are reflected by the three ways he deals with us.

 

[Knee V]

So, my question is: what defines a Trinitarian?

A Trinitarian is one who believes that God is a Tri-Unity of Persons.

The way we use the word "person" in contemporary English isn't exactly what the Greeks meant by their word "hypostasis". "Hypostasis" is closer to something like "a specific instance of consciousness under a particular type". For example, a particular dog would be a hypostasis/person of the dog type. I am a hypostasis/person of the human type. The Trinity is a triple-unity of hypostases of God.

However, it becomes problematic to think of the Trinity as a Divine Essence with Three Persons residing within it. The Three Persons are not one because they share the same Divine Essence (and for this reason I take issue with the illustration given previously). Rather, the Son and the Holy Spirit have the same Essence with each other and with the Father because they eternally come forth from the Father (in their own distinct ways; one is begotten, and one proceeds. However, quite frankly, the church has historically used those distinct words not because they do a really great job at describing what is happening in the Trinity. Rather, those distinct words are used to illustrate the fact that the way in which the Son comes forth from the Father is distinct from how the Holy Spirit comes forth from the Father, even if we cannot fathom exactly how those two actions are distinct). And because they both eternally come forth from Him (which is an eternal action, always eternally happening, not a once-in-time event; the Son is always being begotten of the Father eternally, and the Holy Spirit is always proceeding from the Father eternally), they are what He is and share His same Essence.

While my camp would normally eschew analogies to try to explain what God is, there are some helpful analogies that do a better job than others. One is an example of candles. We start with one candle, and then put the wicks of two other candles up to that flame, and leave them there so that they are not separated. That one flame will then light two more flames, yet because those two wicks are kept next to the first one, we only see one flame, even though we know that there are three. And both are true: there are three distinct flames, yet there is only one flame.

We could take that a step further. The two candles have alway been next to the first one, and the first candle is always lighting the other two in an eternal action. As such, there was never a time when both candles were not actively being lit by the first, and the two flames are thus equally as eternal as the first one. And if we imagine that fire is an element, then the two flames are flames because of the fact that the first flame is a flame.

In terms of "but why three?" we could use another analogy. If I want to utter a word, that word begins with a thought in my mind. The word that a person hears reveals exactly what that thought is, even though the two are technically distinct. If one hears the word that I speak, then one knows the thought that I was thinking because, while they are distinct, they are one and the same. However, the word that you hear was brought to you by the power of the air coming out of my mouth. While we don't necessarily experience that breath the same way that we experience the word that we hear, that breath is carrying the same information as the word we hear. Its pattern of vibration is the exact same information as both the thought and the word, although we experience it in a very different way.

Can Trinitarians believe in a one-person God (which is one God made up of one Spirit and one will with three record-bearers), or are Trinitarians defined by a strict belief of a three-person God (which is the essence of one God with three distinct persons and wills, that co-exist equally eternally)?

A one-person God is, by definition, not a Trinity. One is ony a Trinitarian if one believes that there are three distinct Persons.

Also, is it wrong for a Trinitarian to believe that Jesus is equal with the Father?

It would depend on what is meant by "equal". They have the same Divinity and the same Glory, and are both equally worshipped as God.

 

[hedrick]

The way we use the word "person" in contemporary English isn't exactly what the Greeks meant by their word "hypostasis". "Hypostasis" is closer to something like "a specific instance of consciousness under a particular type". For example, a particular dog would be a hypostasis/person of the dog type. I am a hypostasis/person of the human type. The Trinity is a triple-unity of hypostases of God.

Any illustration involving multiple instances of a type leads to three gods of the same type, i.e. tri-theism. I believe any attempt to explain what the traditional terminology means can reasonably be shown to be heretical. That should lead us to wonder about the usefulness of that way of explaining the Trinity.

 

[gordonhooker]

I think the more we talk about God the more we point to the mystery.

 

[MarkRohfrietsch]

This short YouTube video might help some better understand the different terminologies and doctrines of the nature of the Godhead. Plus heck its entertaining.

I was about to post this and saw that you beat me too it!

This question has confounded theologians and lay-persons alike from the very beginning of the Church; the Bible mentions it; the early Church defined it through the Apostles Creed; the Nicene Creed came to be to resolve controversy and unite the Church; and the Athanasian Creed was faithfully compiled to further unify the Church regarding this doctrine.

For me the Athanasian Creed is still the greatest culmination of our efforts to understand this truth; and one would be well served to use it in the context of Scripture to further grow in our own understanding.

For today's society, the admonishments contained in both the opening and closing statements in the Creed seem harsh and cruel; they are not. Rather, the speak to the fact that errors that change the understanding of the nature of God result in misdirecting our worship; and doing so may well change the meaning of the Gospel by diverting honor and glory from the three persons of God; all of which have equal parts in the Gospel and it's benefits; and without which we end up with a "different gospel"; of which Scripture has warned us.

 

[Cappadocious]

God has a Word and a Spirit
God always does
They are both divine because they always come from God.

They are because God always gives himself to them to be. He doesn't just give them the sort of thing he is to be, rather he gives them himself to be.

 

[dzheremi]

Surely the answer must be the Nicene(-Constantinopolitan) Creed.

Is that too basic for this thread or something?

I dunno...I'm just a simple layperson, but from where I'm sitting it has stood for over 1600 years, it was written by one of our greatest patriarchs (HH Pope St. Athanasius the Apostolic), and has never been supplanted or tarnished by anything. (Yes, yes...the filioque controversy...fine...you'll have to excuse me if in light of my confessional allegiance I evoke a kind of 'Coptic privilege' here so as to ignore anything that has happened in the Western/Greco-Roman church since 451 AD, since it is truly irrelevant save those few overtures made to us by the Romans, the Russians, and others over the years, as none of this even slightly touches the Creed in any manner whatsoever. No other communion or church likewise feels bound to 'snoop' on the others or bind themselves to whatever these others do, right? e.g., the RCC can have all the 'ecumenical councils' it wants subsequent to 1054, and the EO will rightly not care, as it does not concern them. Well, we are the same. We just started earlier, and have a wider swath of people to ignore. So not even the filioque counts, as it is regrettably too late a development, though I certainly recognize that it may matter a great deal to those who confess it or set it up as a significant reason not to reunite with the Latins, e.g., Mark of Ephesus at the failed reunion council of Florence.)