God as Triune, Creator, Incarnate, Atoner

8/8/2019 God as Triune, Creator, Incarnate, Atoner

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God as Triune, CreatorIncarnate, Atoner

(A Reply to Muhammadan Objections and anEssay in Philosophic Apology)

BYW. H. T. GAIRDNER

THE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE SOCIETYFOR INDIA

MADRAS ALLAHABAD CALCUTTA nANGOON' COLOMBO1916


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CHAPTER IGod as Triune

IT would of c:>llrse be possible to p repa re thi schapter with a presentation of the scriptural prooffor th e d0ctr ine of the Triunity, and of t he histol'icaZp r o ~ f that this. doctrine was alwfloYs' held- by theOhristian community. Bu t this ha s already been.done frequently enough; and moreover it is as irra-tional that th is do ct rin e i s attacked by Islam asunscriptural. No, the very Scriptures themselvesare rejected on the ground of the ' irrationality' ofthis doctrine and of the Incarnation and Atonementwhich a re bound up with it. What we want to donow, therefore, is to try to show that this bel iefin the irrationality of th e Ohristian position is anerror; and that these dootrilles, first, ar c philosophical in themselves; and s e c o n d l ~ ' , that they makebelief in God-One, Holy, and Loving-more andno t less easy.Le t us start by applying this twofold axiom then,to th e doctrine of the Trinity in Unity. Le t us

seek to show: first, that i t is rational, by replyingto th e main philosophic objections that are urgedagainst it ; and second, that i t facilitates, notcomplicates, a true theistic faith.

Five Philosophic Objections stated and answe'red.


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GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR, INCARNATE,ATONER 3i. That the words Fa ther' and Son ' a re .

Unworthy of GodheadIThis objection may be divided i.nto two heads:(1) That these words involve the physical idea

o(generation; (2) that they involve th e temporalidea of sequence: both of which are obviouslyrepugnant to monotheism .. But we say that more careful thought shows theemptiness of_these objections.

'. (1) You h av e to distinguish ver.y carefully b e tween theidea ofprocreation and that ofjatherhood.k parent and a father are by no means the samething. Eve ry ear th ly f athe r is a parent; but no tevery parent is a fathe r! Paren thood, or procreation, is a physical act which man_ sha re s with thelowei:- animals, nay, with the lowest, nay, wit h thevegetable kingdom also, with all that reproduces it skind. You see at once now the absurdity of sayingthat such and such a jelly-fish was the father ofsuch and such another jelly-fish, or that this plantwas the father of that! When you sow a seed in agarden,.who even thinks of the precise individualplant which produced that particular seed and, inconsequence, t he part ic ul ar plant that springsfroni it ?

This shows, with a sudden clearness, that wheriwe talk even of earthly father and son, the idea ofphysical procreation is secondary in our minds:What we a re r eal ly thinking of is a se t of purelymoral coIisic.erations-the spiri tual relat ionship

be.tween two moral an d spiritual beings. We maymention a few of these: love, first. of all and mostimportant of al l ; tenderness; int imate and mutual cpmmunion ; perfect and blissful recip1'Ocity; onenessof nature; oneness of image and character and will ; .Clneness in work together with correlation of junc-tion. .. I speak, of course, of ideal fatherhood and

.'gonship; and yet have actu ally seen not seldomsuch a relationship fulfilled on earth.

Ifdhere.anything in.such qllalities, we ask then,that.'isunwolthy of Godhead as such? Certainlyno t from th e moral view-point. As to t he metafphysical difficulty of plura li ty, that is anothermatter which may be discussed thoroughly later on.But; morally speaking, these things eminently befit aholy God, and this is precisely why He deigned touse these t'erms, and no other, to bring home to ourminds the sort of relationship between Him and]Jis Eternal Word. 'Apart from some such terms,. that relationship would have inevi tably been construed in a purely trietaphysical way (as it wasindeed by th e Jewish philosopher Philo), and itwould have ~ e e n completely destitute of spiritual'falue to th e soul of man. But as it is, this doctrineof Father and Son, united by the mutua l Spi ri t ofFather and of Son, ha s given a new impetus toholiness in family l ife, a new meaning to love a.ndcommunion wherever it has been received into th eheart and not the intel lect alone.(2) We a lr eady have gone more th an h alf wayin resolving th e second objection, that these terms


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4 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR,INCARNATE, ATONER 1)involve"sequence, which, of course, would mean thatth e Son was not eternal, and that God became Father.

But our elimination of the i dea of procreation,as totally inapplicable to a purely" Spi7'itual Being,eliminates th e notion of sequence also. Whenattention i s concentrated on the moral ideas boundup with the words Father and Son, it at once is.evident that th e two terms are entirely reciprocalan d etflrnally invoive each other. Even on earth aman does n'ot become-is not -a father until hi s"selli iidn bain"go ;whan a son is bOl:.u, a father also,so to speak, is born {nto the world; then and no ttill then! How much more, then, ar e Father and Sonnon-sequent in God, in whose eternal nature thereca n be no quest ion of becoming! In other words,so fa r from 'Father' preceding 'SOil', the twoar e necessarily contemporaneous, and in the caseof God, co-eternal. Once you grant the possibilityof "eternal relations of an y s'ort in th e Godhead,there is in fac t no further difficulty whatsoever incalling them by the purely moral terms Father,Son, and Spirit-the mutual Spirit of Fatherhoodan d Sonhood.

We pause here to remark: Granting tbat the foregoing sets the matterin a slightly clearer light thanit was before, sti ll undoubtedly this doctr ine ofFatherhood and Sopship is an enormous stumblingblock to Muslims. Their repugnance is so instinct ive, so engrained in their very constitution, thatit may he really questioned whether Christiansdo well to give such prominence to terms which ar e

so capable of being misunderstood, "and which,were perhaps only used a t th e first to shadow for thth e ineffable 8ubstance of eternal truth. I f theyonly succeed in doing the exact reverse of th i s -namely, suggest error-why not drop terms of sodubious utility and seek fresh ones to shadow forthin a more fruitful way the truth (i f so be) whichl ies beyond? I f the whole point of terminologyis to facilitate explanation, what is tlw use of terminology which itself needs so much explanation?Why not drop it ?The answer to thi s is : Because we have no rightto play fast and loose with expressions that Godhas sanctioned with such, tremendous emphasis;because their continued existence in Holy Writand use by His Church ar e like th e preservation andemployment of a standard which we cannot affordto lose. Depend upon it, if this terminology werebanished from religious usage to-day, a great dealmore would go too. Sooner or later the reality, towhich these expressions are a continual witness,would be utterly lost sight of. And, if the idea ofth e F a t h e ~ h o o d of God were l os t to us, many of uswould lose interest in al l religion.

May i t then be used "in the purely figurative sensethat God loves men and supplies their needs as afather does those of his children? In regard tothis, i t is curious to observe how th e avel'age Muslim dislikes even this figurative use-showing howreally different his conception of Allah is fromour conception of the Father in heaven. This comes


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6 GOD AS TRIUNE ' CREATOR,INCARNATE,ATONER 7\lut curiously in a tradition preserved in,th6-Musnad-''of Ahmad Ib n Hanbal (vi. 21) where the versiofr,ofth e Lord's Prayer which the prophet sancti'onec:Lisgiven.' How significant that the great opening''-'invocation, 'O ur F athe r', which has c h e ~ ~ e d 'thousands and changed their whole m i n d s t & w a r ~ d s 'God, is sternly suppressed I This supports, ourcontention that if you take away the.,doc,trine ofth e eternal Fatherhood of God, and play fast an dloose with the terms' Father' and'SoIL,_ymLwilL_lose the sense that God is in any case. fatherly,Similarly, if you reject the e te rnal SOMhip' o f'Christ, you will sooner 01' later lose the power andth e right of being, in any sense, sonlike .. .History. "- -and sound sense, no less than dogma, teij.uh)1s this.The pity is that the Prophet of Islam,sh()uld h.ave.been led to use such unmeasured language as is"found i n th e Qur'an about matters he clearly neverunderstood, for nothing can be more clear f rom th eQur'an than that he confounded th e Christian doctrine of Fatherhood and the t imeless relat ions of

1 In a tradition quoted by Abdullah and traced 'to Ibn UbaidEl-Ansari the latter says: 'The Prophet (peace be upon him)taught me a charm and allowed me to use it for whomsoever rpleased. He said, Say" Our Lord\vhich art in heaven! Holy(is) Thy name, As in heaven, so (is) Thy word, Allah I inheaven and on e ar th , G rant us mercy on earth, Allah I Lordof the good, forg ive us our sins and trespas ses . And senddow-n, of Thy mercy, mercy. and ofThy healing, healing, upon(so and so) in his complaint that he may be healed," And he(the Prophet) said, "Repeat this thrice, and likewise th e twoCharms from th e Koran",'

"Divine'Father; Son, and Spirit, with the gross ideasof: the heathen Mekkans, about Allah having femaledeities as h is daugh te rs , and so for th! Indeed it is. more than probable that the words, 'H e begettethnot, neither is He begotten,' are a rebuke addressedagainst these Mekkans and have no Christian reference in them at all. Muhammad, in his attitudeto Christianity, may be said either to have totallymisunderstood the Christian doctrine of th e TrinitY',or to have been striking at ignorant forms of misbelief' that we also j'epudiate.The state of the Jews of th e times of th e Apostlesand that of th e Muslims of that day-and everyother day-are no t completely parallel in th e matte r before us; for th e Jews, monotheists as theywere, and deists as they were becoming, had hadtheir ears prepared for th e sound of the words' Godth e Father', The Son of God " as the study of theTaurat shows; for there these expressions ar e usedto denote any peculi arl y intense and lovingrelationship between God and a nation, it mightbe, a class, or an anointed king, or (finally) TheAnointed King, the expected Christ, I t was, therefore, easy for the monotheis t disciples of JesusChrist, men like th e Twelve, or the lea rned Sau l,to apply these term s in a spiritual transcendentway to the e te rnal relat ion between God and HisIncarnate Word, a relat ion with which , from ametaphysical view-point, Philo had already fami-

1The Qur'an makes it clear that the Trinity! in his mind, wasth e Father, th e Son and the Virgin Mary I


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GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR,INCARNATE,ATONER 9liarized thinkers. ' Ye t Muslims also have had a~ o r t of metaphysical proprndeu tic in the conceptionof the eternity and uncreateness of the Qur'an, the'Word of Allah '. And this is a h in t which Chrisctian may well take for their study and preaching.

'VIle may now sum up th e answer to the firstobjection. When you have eliminated th e idea ofprocreation as inapplicable to a spiritual being, nothing remains in the ideas ' Father ' and' Son " savepurely- nioral..ideas-thatare perfectly worthy ofGodhead; and, that the same consideration solvesthe difficulty of sequence in time, for' Father' and'Son' ar e now'shown to be co-relatives and therefore co-eternals.There is now th e prior difficulty of pluralitywithin the Godhead still r emaining. Thi s thereforewe treat of next.ii. That Unit'l and Pluralit'l are Incompatible IdeasIt may be said: Does no t the very idea ofdistinction contradict identity? And does not the

very idea of plurality contradict unity?We boldly reply: On the con tr ary! There is no

such thing as identity without distinction in theworld of realities; no unity without plurality.There is nothing a Pl'i01i inconceivable in a Unityin Trinity. On the contrary, all t he bes t philosophic thought of ancient and modern t i m e ~ distinctly facilitates and points to some such conceptionif we desire to bel ieve in a rea l God.In modern philosophic thought,. particularly, it

has become more aria more clem'" that "relations,relatedness, are the very soul of being. And whatare relations save distinctions; a plurality within aunity? The more highly related' a thing is, themore reality it has; I mean, th e higher is it s typeof unity. On t!1e other hand, i f we tr y to conceiveof unitywithout differencewe find ourselves reducedto mere abstractions 'of the mind-like the mathematical points without parts '01' magnitude, whichhave no real exi stence except as an abstraction.of the mind, or in other words are really equal tozero. And so Being of this abstract sort (as Regel,one of the greatest of the moderns, saw) is literallyequivalent to Not-being.Are we then going to apply to God the p'Oorest,barest, and most abstract of th e categories, unrelated Being, undifferentiated Unity, as i f it were th esale possible and the highest one? Or also therichest, fullest and most s igni ficant? Surely th elatter I Then, somehow or other the re mus t berelatedness asc ribed to God essentially-not withthe finite created universe, or anything beyond Hisown being, for that would raise that created beingto the rank of a second god. This essential relatedness must, then, be within, within the c irc le of theUnity of the living God. The Godhead must Itselfbe the centre and home of some extraordinarilyvaried diRtinctions and relations if I t is to be livingand real, and no t 'fulfil merely some abstract ;demand of thought, as for example the demand foran . unconditioned First Cause-which seems th e


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1;0 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR,INCARNATE,ATONER 11only thing that Islamic soholastic theologizingamounts to.Btlt we go much further than this and point ou t

how, in all things known to us, the higher the differ


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12 , GOD AS TRIUNE OREATOR" INCARNATE, ATONER 13uniqueness. Lovers of animals tell us that eachindividUal aiffersfrom it s fellow nearly as muchas a: human, individual from his fellow-is, in fact,nearly as unique. They will tell you th at each isunique. In other words each presents, to a highdegree, unity, (as defined by us) alld internaldifferentiation. And ,all this culminates in man,

'whose being is the most of all inconceivably,differentiated, and ye t presents th e most perfectan d significant unity.- "'We' sum' upthelefore: In the world of l ife alldconsciousness things increase directly in 'real unity as 'they increase in internal differences; A man is moreof a unity than a turnip. He is also, by this law,more highly differentiated.

, I f we here, in an y sense, discern a principle, thenI reverently claim that it throws light on our subject. For carryon the same l ine of thought to that.Being in whom Life and Consciousness are madeperfect, who, is absolutely unique, and ent irelyindivisible, who alone in fact completely satisfiesall our postulates for perfect unity and who is THEONE, that is, God. Is it not now credible, nay, dowe no t expect to have i t revealed to us that here alsointernal differentiation ha s also increased to adegree as inconceivable as His Unity is superiorto any earthly one? We say tha t that differentiation wilFbe inconceivable, it will be only just dimlyimaginable, but i t will be most tremendously real!And this is just the character of the differentiationshadowed forth to us by the revelation of the

Trinity! I t is transcendent, i t is real, it is in a line:with legitimateeal:j;hiy analo'gfes'- 'rtis uniquely'great; for what can be greater than the d i f f e r e n ~tiation b!Jtween persons', consciousness ?

We conclude, 'then, that the highest and richestUnity of all, the Divine, exists in the indivisible butreal internal differentiation of.three Consciousnesses,One God, Blessed fo r ever and ever, Amen! .(1) The Muhammadan will at once say to this,

that it is irrelevant and irreverep.t to compare theCreatoito the createdih,'anywlJ,ywhatsoevel', thevery distinguishing feature of Divinity being distinctio'n, not-similarity; total distinction from an yand every earthly analogy whatsoever. Bnt wehave already gone over that ground sufficientlyin a criticism of Muslim Deiim,' where we showedhow barren and useless is this purely negative .doc trine of Mukhalafa (difference) which verilyreduces Allah to a negation and disables us fromsaying anything about Him whatsoever. Moreover, Muslims are better than their philosophy,for they do not con tent themselves with sayingthat ' Allah is no t thi s and that', bi,lt all say, 'Allahis Living, Knowing, Willing,' etc., thereby assertingsimilarity, no t mere naked difference. And it isidle to say that between Allah's knowing andours there is no similarity, that it entirely transcends oUI'sand is incomparablewith it , for i f thereis rea'lly no similarity, how unphilosophical it is to

1 The Muslim laea of God, London and Madras: G.L.SJo


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14 GOD AS .TRIUNE CREATOR,INOARNATE,ATONER 1&give tb e two knowings one and- the same name L'-May we not as well drop this indefensible position;cease fu til e juggling with wOl'ds, and sa y thatwhile God transcends us in every imaginable way,there are aspects in which He ha s graciously' mademan in His image', so that th e same names mayproperly be applied to both Man and God, and denotea real relation and identity?

The fear of attributing to Allah what is un worthyof Him is certainly an honourable one, but Christ_ianity does not transgress the limits, In th e"tnatterbefore uS,for example, we are" simply' asserting amental need wheIi we say that we cannot value oreven imagine an abstract unity, and that th e highestUn ity must ex hib it. the highest differentiation:What is gross or material 01 ' unworthy of God inthis?

(2) I t may be objected, that Islam itself assertsthe plurality of the attributes, mercy, justice, andso forth, that are possessed by th e Div ine Unity.But Islam has always and utterly objec ted to thehypostatizing of those attributes, which is whatChristians do,

We have two remarks to make to this. (a) Thatthe assertion of th e plurality of the attr ibutes in norespect il l eets the mental demand th at h as beenspoken of, for, instead of asserting the highest and

1 The reductio ad absw'dum of th is mode of thought is to beseen in a passage in Averroes, where 'the limiting of the sovenneither more nor less is an extraordinary example of ailbitrari-.ess.

.:_nIost"transcendent form of differentiation, we havemerely the asser tion of the very feeblest possible-."form conceivable. 'For attributes are in themselvE\&nothing ; apa rt from the essence they.are unrealabstractions, And mercy, justice, etc" ar e merelyso many aspec ts of the divine action; they mightbe at will' increased or reduced. And this againshows the a rb it ra ry and unreal character of themultiplicity thus asserted. What we want is amultiplicity of differentiations that .shall be as realand immutable as the urd ty itself. (b) Christianitydoes nb t 'simply hypostatize attributes' as Islamhas misunderstood. This misunderstanding-thatthe Father pel'sonified Justice, the Son Mel'cy,and so forth-is a total mis take which dates f romvery fa r back. I t has no foundation in the Bibleor in our theology. Both Father and Son ar eequally to be characterized as ' just ' and' merciful '.

(3) I t may be objected that thi s category ofunity-in-difference is only appl icab le to materialbeings, no t to spiritual beings. Bu t on th e contrarywe found t ha t th e spiTituality of those beings in creased directly with the differentiation of eachgrade as we ascended upwards through the inanimate, animate, sensi tive , and, finally, rational.What now hinders us, logically and rationally, fromtaking one further analogous s tep and saying that,when we .como to th e highest mode of being-theDivine-where the mater ia l gives entire place tothe spiritual, we shall find that unity-in-distinctionis as applicable as it was to all th e lower categories,

2


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1.6 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR;'1NCARNATE,. ATONER 17-onIy - in-a-far .- h igher mode as regards both thedistinction and, the unity ? T h e degree to: whichthe Divine Being surpasses and transce'nds thelowel' modes may be-is indeed-unimaginable,out we claim: this t ~ a n s o e n d e n t superiority for thedistinctions that must constitute His Unit y j us t as'much as for th e Unity itself. And we saytJiat thereal, 5mmutable distinctions of th e Persons or .'Consciousnesses meets this postulate, while th e. : p u r ~ l y _ a . h s t r a c t d i f f e r e n c e s o f the Attributes do not.

(4) But it may be objected, lastly, that when we'leave the,niaterial, all this category of organism on'which we are relying ceases, and with its failurethe reasoning fails also.

But why, it may be replied, should thi s cate:gory be objected to any n:ore than those of Being orLife, as applied to the Divine? . ' Being' character'izes the v ery lowest' types of things, and 'Life',characterizes low as well a s high types. Yot weascribe both to the Divine nature. Why t hen not.' organism' (unity-in-differenoe), which as we hav'e,seen increases as the types of living being ascend?'This question really leads to a third main objection,against the Christian doctrine.iii. That the Idea of a Trinit'! makes the Godhead

Compound and DivisibleDoes Organism as suoh imply divisibility, since it' implies oomposition? Does not the doctrine of Tri

nity i n v ~ l v e th e divisibility o/the divine substance?

: W e b e l i e v e ~ t h a t the f ~ l l o W h r g considerations willtotally remove this objection.', Properly speaking,adivisible: thing is thatwhichcan be divided without destroying the thing itselfas a stone. A block of stone can be spli t into twopaTts without dam'aging t he s tone as s ~ o n e . Or asa machine; the machine can be taken to pieceswithoutdest i'oying the machine, for the piecescan be put together' again af5 before. In differingways"then, stonesand.other.--shapelessmeta:ls, andmachines, are 'divisible: But when we come on tosubstances which possess organic unity (see thelast chapter) a very different s t a t ~ of things obtains.You cannot divide them, you can merely dividetheir material.. What..do,..we. jllean by this? The meaning is'plain when you take a flower and shred i t to bits.Can you replace that flower? Certainly not. Youhave not divided it ; you have des troyed it. Thosedead parts lying on the table are not the flower,nor do they even make up the flower. The flower,th e it itself has been destroyed. You could notdivide it, you could only destroy it, or keep it.A hand when severed from the body is really nota hand at alL It is only a l ~ l m p of flesh shapedlike a hand; faT it is of the essence of a hand to beone with the whole body, to communicate throughits nerves 'with the brain, to share the one life ofth e whole.' I t is only by an abstraction, whichcontains as much falsehood as tru th , that you saythat the hand is apar t of the body at all, if by


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18 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR, INCARNATE, ATONER 19that yoti mean that it-exists 'as a - h a r i i L a f t e ~ ) : J e i n g .severed from the body; I t is only by a very partiafabstraction you can do this , namely, by arbitrarilyselecting some features,which inhere in :hand: andarbitrarily overlooking other equally o r more im-portant ones, ,..We repeat, therefore, you can divide th e materialof an organism, bu t you cannot divicl.e..the organism,

the unity-in-difference. You can .but prematurelyeffect it s dissolutioll_a_n


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GOD AS. TRIUNE CREATOR; INCARNATE, ATONER 2LOf course, if . the case were so, we. should not be

'.Trinitarian Christians. But i t is no t so. There.'are two considerations,which refute this objection.(1) A genus, thus understood, has no absolute,objective, and suhstantial.oxistence at all. I t is a.generalization, an abstraction made by the mind.from many individuals who or which'are observed

to have import an t common features. Bu t God is~ - n o t a generaJization, an abstraction! : He is . the.highest reali ty , a l iving entity. Therefore, what. ever the mysterious P ~ r s o n s of t he Holy Trinity..may be, they are not individuals, ranged under an. abstraction or generalization called God, and th e.charge of Tritheism quite falls to t he ground.Philosophical controversies have doubtless ragedround the question of whatth'ese universals reallyare. Are they th e merest abstractions, expressionsto denote common features roughly observed 'inpar ti cu la rs , mere names to labels given for con-. ,venience in classification? S.uch is the doctrine of,the Nominalists. Others agreed with that doctrineas fa r a the objective existence of th e universalsis concerned, but tried to preserve to it more realitythan was conceded by the Nominalists, by sayingthat a universal was a real conception of the mind,more than a mere name and rough label. Thesethinkers were called Conceptualists. Bu t Aristotleemphasized the importance of believing in the objective. reality of the universal underlying thesethe differences of the particulars-that is to say,t ha t e ach universal though inseparable from th e

individuals it e m b r a ~ e s ; does really indicate anintrinsic similarity in the things embraced. Tofinite.thought that similarity may be ,abstract; but to ab-.-solute thought it is real. .To absolute thought, theforms, which. inhere in all members of a species, ~ r e absolutely the reallest things of all, being the subjectof the contemplation of th e thought of God. Henceth e Aristotelians were called Realists. Bu t still theyjotallydenied that their doctrine involved attri:butingto,these universal genera (man, animal, etc.)any subst 'antial, or hypostatic, . existence, that is"declaring ,that they are distinct entities. OnlyPlatofound h is way to this extreme position, an d.appeared sometimes to teach that universals, horse",man, etc., . are distinct entities; that they inhabit.all ideal, heavenly world, that they are as substantial and real as any iudividual things here on,earth-nay, fa r more so, for they are the solerealiiW;.and in comparison _with them horses, men, e ta .,,are mere shadows, owing whatever reality theypossess to their p a r ~ a k i n g in the likeness of their.heavenly, ideal counterparts , which he named ideas.,Hence his followers were called Idealists .

These are philosqphical matters which ,are rather'remote from our thinking to-day, and we may feetth e distinctions alluded to are more subtle than is'necessary, and not w o r ~ h much trouble. Nevertheless blood has been shed in the course of workingout the controversy, bu t it would take too long toshow 'why this was. For our present purpose, how-ever, it is enough to say that God, th e supreme',.


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GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR, INCARNATE, ATONER 23living reality is in no sense a m e r e ~ U n i v e r s a l -,embracing-individnals, as conceived by any oftheseschools eif thought. ' .,If, then; God'is neither a mere Name, no r a mere

'Conception of the niind, nor a mere metaphys{bal,Essence,' bu t is a t ranscendent and perfect livingTeality, ~ h i m the Godhead is in no sense a mereUniversal",and the Persons of the Sacred Trinityare not particular individuals (gods) in the unity ofthe class' (god), 'and the charge of Tritheism falls. -_ _---_._----_. - _ - -,to the g ~ o u n d . ',(2) The second c o n s i d e r a ~ i o n which reveals thefallacy 6f the, object ion is this: a genus (man for.example) whatever be the degree ofreality which itpossesses, i s not in the least affected by the destrrrct ion of one, or any number, of it s constituent members. Annihilate Amr, Zaidand Ubald': and asmany'otfl'ers as you please, and th e genus, as genus,stirI remains. I t is no t even, as genus, mutilated.

T h f ~ slio'ws that genus is not really a living organic'unity' ; which is bound up with th e unimpairede,dstence of it s memhers. But this is exactly what,'with all reverence, we seem to see in' God, who ishighest and most perfect Life. He is a unity in,and through ,the, Persons, not one of whom has orcan have any separated existence, bu t each lives for,

'Nor an Ideal Substance, after the Platonic fashion; bu t it isnot necessary to oonsider this p o s s i b i l . i ~ y . for all subsequentthought has regarded the conception as inadmissible, and to,Plato himself it was in all probability only a cast, one of many:made by that versatile angler on the waters of truth.

, in , and through each . Therefore the Father is the, , .one Substance of God, the Son is the one Substance

of God, th e Holy Spi ri t is the one Substance ofGod; no t three gods, bu t One God. To whom beglory for ever.'

v. That the Idea of the Trinit'l is. then.Meaningless and Barren

The final objection is as follows: If, as conclu-_.,:led last time, Father, Son, and Spirit; is each the onesubstance of God, this simply means that there isno reality whatever in the distinctions Father,Son,and Spi ri t, owing to the utter ilnpossibility ofassigning to anyone of the so-called Persons anything peculiar to that Person. In other words, you


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24 GOD AS TRIUNE OREATOR; INOARNATE,ATONERthe other hand; that same property, since it is constitutive of---the-distin-rtio-n -does-not inhere In 'itllotherPersoD, therefore does

~ - n o t "irihere.in that o t h e ~ Person's essence, t h e r e f ~ r e .doel/'D:0tinhere in the essonce of Allah. Therefore the sarrie thingdo'es, 'and does not , inhere in. the eSsence of Allah; whfch' is

. ~ b s u r d . . . . Thus you can prove that , Incarnation being: aproperty of the SOll, 1\.llah did, and did not, bec,ome incarnate:, a contradiction that is self-evidently-false.To:this it may be replied: Both in physios and'

metaphysics; when you ge t down to ultimate problems, you find yourself involved in logtoal oontra--dictions. -:,';TiIIie-and e te rn ity, c reat ion and self.'suf!ioingness, extension and, infinjty, all involvecontradictions and intelleotual insolubilities, forwhioh indeed philosophers have a teohnical name,Antinomies of Reason, so inevitable have they found,these contradictions. I t need not, therefore, disturbus overmuch, even if we were to find one slightantinomy still adhering to our ultimate doctrine,that of theSacred Trinity in Unity.Now it is eminen tly to th e poin t to not ice that

even OUT super-logical authol' himselfis quite unable,to escape suoh contradiotions. In a former page,for example , we find him enlarging on another" ultimate' question, namely, the ult imate constitl1' tion of matter. He has arrived at the atom, and isdisoussing whether' it is ,divisible or uot, andwhetherit ha s extension 01' not. After proving that youcannot oonoeive the dividing prooess going on adinfinitum" he ooncludes that there must be a pointlAxab philosophers never allow-this possibility of an infiniteseries.

atwhich it c e a s e s ~ a n d the_atoIILbecomes indivisible;:and he proceeds:This ultimate atom either has' extension or -it has. not. If it

has,. then the mind call alwaysfc.onceive its divisibility, and soon ad infinitum, V{hich, as we have shown, is impossible. Theonly possible conclusion,. therefore, is t ha t i t ha s not ex.tension,.and we conclnde that every body is composed of absolntelyextensionless atoms, Le., without length, breadth, or height,..but having def ini te pos it ion; resembl ing the mathematicalpoints, except that the former exist , whi le the latter arei m a g i n a r ~ . _Such is the author's amazing conclusion; and we-

must remember itjs the'basis on which he ereots hisentire argument, 'for it comes at the very beginningof a book which is supposed to be a close logicalargument for the refutation of materialism and thedemonstration .o.LMuhammadimism, with as great :certainty as that 6f the mathematical.scienoesISurely the antinomy (if any) adhering in the,dootrine,of the Trini ty i s nothing compared with

the hopeless contradiotions in terms here involved !:Matter whose one distinguishing property is,, .extension,' is said to be composed of extenslOnless,things, whioh.together, make up an extended thing.But an extensionless thing is equivalent to zero.However often you add zero to zero you only get,zero; bu t according to our author. who is sosevere

1 I t is worth while noting that Mnslim philosophic thought is,against this ~ u s l i m neolog ist on this very point. 'In El -Fudali's Matn, the 'extension of matter is selected as the best .example oftha self-evidentI To whioh his commentatorexpresslynotes, \ U Matter "-whether the atom or a o o m p ~ u n d . '


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'26 GOD AS TRIUNE OREATOR,INOARNATE,ATONER 27on Ohristian logic,you only have to add a sufficientnumber.of zeros together (query; ~ o many?) togat,an integer. How many breadthless' atoms we

., ,. - .wonder, when s et i n a row would make up:ar.Jine.an.inch broad! I t would be easy to elicit many otherTidiculous conclusions from the same' axiOlu:' .bUt- . , - .- --we forbear, for the point is not to substitute a truedoctrine.,.of the. ultimate atom for our author' s.absurd' one, but , rather. to poin t ou t "how tile finitemind, when it -gets down to u l t i ~ a t e s even' in_. - _. --._---------_.._._ ..-.. . ,- - .- ... _- .-..-.:physics, does always come to:antinomies. .But t he case is not so desperate with: the doctrine

of th e Trinity; I fwe hold firmly an d reverently toth e conclusion we have reached with such a hardeffort of thought, that a new arid unique category,'yet one not unintelligible to us, IS applicable to th eGodhead, namely, thaf ofspirituaT o ~ g a n i s m , weshall find that it solves also t h e i ~ 8 e r i o u s - I o o k i n gfinal difficulty. In any org'anism, th e whole of th eone essence act s in every action of every member,and yet tlJe member has its appropriate work. I f myeye sees, I see, bu t my ear does no t see, yet we dono t for this reason rush to the assertion that I do,an d do not, see at the same moment. Rather wesay that I see through my eye, not my ear. Thewhole, including the ear, profits from the perform-ance of the eye. .

I f one member does anything, the one essencedoes it, and al l the members co-operate; ye t thisdoes not forbid. that member to have its own inalienable function in th e economy of the organism.

-If. one member suffer, th e .whole organism s u f f e r s ~and the members co-operate in that suffering;.ye t this does no t prevent a proJ.lel' suffe,ring toeach member. , I f you will have it'so, i n t h ~ category of organism you have .come into a sphere;where the paradox of our'oritic is literally true"that the same thing does, and does not , performth e same aotion at the same time!

Without saying that the category of s p ~ r i t u a ruorganism is adequate to th e Godhead, it may be held.and maintained' that it is the h ighest we can applyif we want to have a living personal God a t a lLThe rea li ty is no doubt higher than our highest ..conception, bu t this might only make our thesismore, not Jess, true, namely, that the Divine Personsshould have each His proper function, the One Godbeing in every case the sale and invariable worker.To take our critic's instance, God certainly can beincarnate in His Word the Son, without that in carnation being predicated of the Father or theSpirit, properly. In the Atonement for mankindthat Incarnate One can take His peculiar part.

The oneness, reciprocity, and mutuality of theGodhead must indeed be ineffable if even a physical organ ism is so true a unity, whose'memberslive' only in and through each other and the oneundivided essence. How much more so, th e im-mortal, eternal, infinite God!

The Doctrine of th e Trinfty cannot then be cdticized from this View-point. The last objection ofth e critics falls to the ground.


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CHAPTER II

God as Creator'WEe pass from our purely defensivegl'ound to show.-that,',sofar from the Trinity making a belief in a

J i " ~ l 1 . i { G o r l m o r e difficult, it goes to make easier for'us some'--difficulties beset ting a ll monothe is ti c;systems, 'and no t least Islam; and especially the'difficulty; Why should a self-sufficient God havecreated the world? And, after creating it, was no tHis s e l f ~ s u f f i c i e n c y thereby imperilled? How. real, this difficul ty is a ll students of Islam know. ThePhilosophers with their theJr ies of emanatibn'(sud'llr) and the e te rn ity of thew-orld .(qidam alalam) ; the Sufis with their Tradition I are ilnough

.,to prove that this difficulty is a real one; and, asa matter of fac t, most agnosticism is owed to the'seriousness of this very difficulty to many minds.'We. say that th e doctrine ofa Trinity makes th eposition easier, no t more difficult.

Le t us recaptulate the difficulties experienced byIslamic Deism in ascribing to God creation.1 Kunta lcanze.n makhfiyan lam u'raf, fa ahbabtu an u'ru!,

.f a khalagtu khalgan wa to 'armftu ilaihim, fa bi 'arafuni.1 I was a hidden treasure, being unknown. Thon I desired tobe known. 80 I created creatures and made Myself known to,them; a nd by Me they knew Me:

,CREATOR, INCARNATE, ATONER 29. .'1 . How.couldsuch a,God.pass over into actual'creation and become a, Creator?; Have we not he re'an involving of th e Absolute God in cbntingency?-. 2. Before creation:His activit ies were entirelyinact ive, only finding'activity in creation. Theywere latent, not pOGent ; potential, not actuaL Nowpotentiality is no substitute for action. I t is, relative ly t o action" deficiency. And if we say thatcreationwas required to release the CreatorfromHislatency aIlcl s..etf1:E3.e,tlle qUfj,lityof):'9WElr,with otherqualities denoting action, then we have ascribed toHim deficiency and dependence of th e first order.

3. Creation in this case would mean for Godthe beginning' of relations, for : in creating Hecomes into relat ions with His world. But thebeginning of relations would mean the, beginningof a new kind'ofiife' for the Divine Being. This i sagainst pure transcendence (tanzih).

4. Relation involves something in th e way ofreaction for both parties. What is this reactionbut passivity? He who hear" for example, ha san acUon done upon him. This is against tanzih.How could an absolute Being like such a God limithis absoluteness, and condescend from it?,Now the idea of a Triune God, as revealedthrough Christ, greatly l e s s e n ~ , if it does no tentirely annul, these great difficulties. Let us notethe following important oonsiderations :

(a) The doctrine of the Triune God reveals to usa Godwith eternar activities, no t latent, but potentin e te rnal act ion. . Love is the essence' of His be-


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30 GOD AS 'TRIUNE OREATOR,INC.ARNATE,'ATQNER. ing, and love was _always-active in_ Him.. _Andthere is no type of activity more active than love..In creating, therefore, God was .not becomingactively act ive after being only potentially active.He was simply acting in accordwith His own everactive nature. Creation itselfwas an outcome oflove; it was love willing th e existence and thehappiness of other beings. I t was an overflow oflove more tha n an outcome of power; for love isconcerned with the end, power with the means.Here is ave'ry greaiCiifferencebetween-th.e Isiiiiifc--

and tbe Christian conceptions 6f God: IslammakesWill and Power the two sole qualities of God towhich all His relations with man and the worldcan be reduced; Ohristianity says God is Love; itmakes Will simply the articulate ex])ression ofLove, and power simplyUtlien.iLndmaid of Love.Even the glory of God is simply the triumph ofHi s nature of. Love. To all of these ideas Islamis completely strange. I t cannot advance beyondthe conception of an irresponsible Ruler. Such aconception is for ever lost i n the royal Fatherhoodof God through Christ. .

(b) The do'ctrine of the Triune God shows thatcreation did not mean for God th e beginning of. relations; for God Himself is eternally related inthe highest possibie way-in a way that infinitelytransccnds th e most h ighly organized and introrelated being on ear th. The c reati on of a world ofrelat ions is simp-Jy the r eflex of the essential lyrelational nature of God.

(e) The conception o f the -T riune God removesth e difficulty of ascribing reaction, limitation, pas, s ivity, and eniotion to God, which is so fatal to.pure transcendence, and which, nevertheless, is in

. evit ab le as soon as you have as'cribed to Him crea-t ion. The difficulty ha s -for us los t its terror, for as.we have seen that relatedness is th e very soul ofGod, we see al so that limitation is simply anotherway of expressing relatedness. All relat ions ar el imitations; they alL involve action and reaction,activity and passivity. God who is Father, Son,and Spirit, is the home of all these things. Whyshould ~ be ; 'f ra id of them then? True love andtrue freedom are not absence of all limitations. Butfreedom and love are expressed in self-limitation,and blessedness is seen in the free play of actionand reaction. All these things were found eternally in the bosom of th e one Godhead, who is love,being Father, Son, and Spirit.In the same way passivity is now shown not to

be a thing that degraded God; in God is both activity and passivity. Blessedness needs both; loveneeds both.

So also emotion. The conscience, heart, andmoral needs of men cry ou t fol' a God who standsno t coldly aloof, but for one with feeling; ye t th eintellect of man has feared to yield on this point,and attempts to figure God as total ly unaffected byanything that man can do or suffer . But th e doctrine of the Triune ,God who is Love shows thatsuch fears are groundless; for love is the highest.3


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:32 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR; INCARNATE"ATONER 33,fprm_oflife ; and s() it s emotion is part of the eternal, .ethical life of God.

,Thus we see that the dilemma which is, fatal to, Deism, namely, that in creat ion God lays Himselfopen to react ion, l imitat ion, passivi ty , 'emotion,and so to weakness and deficiency, is solved for us.These were no new things to God :"they did no tappear to Him to detract "from His glory; theyexisted quite apartfrom creation; they were ofHi sbeing, and in them He expresses Himse lf. Conse.quentlY when He graciously created a wor ld, into'which He entered in relation, and so all()wed all, th e consequences of relation-self-limitation, reac-tions, passivities, emotions-He was doing no 'newthing'; He was simply expressing His n atu re i ntime as He expresses it eternally. .

In regard to God's creating Nature, itmight con-, ceivably be maintained that He did no t in any waylimit Himself, because He was creating somethingwholly under Hi s own hand, capable of being actedon, but not of act ing nor even of reacting, whose

,smallest motion wa s really God's doing. 'And,, being entirely mechanical, it would have no pointDf resemblance or similarity with it s Maker. Bu twhat shallwe say of man, God's conscious, knowing,willing, feeling creation? How can we escape theconclusion that here' at any rate'there is a 1Joint ofsimilarity between God's will and man's; betweenGod as mind and man as mind; between God asknower and' man as knower. I f not, how could,God communicate with man? There cannot be

1J;ltelligElJlJ;communication_unless..,the'receiver is tosome ,extent like the sender. To the' oxen thehieroglyphics were, are, and will be, mere marks .Bu t to us they are messages ,simply because thel'eis a point of mental similarity between us and those,who wrote them., So prophecy itself involves thissimilarity between God's mind and ours. But it ,isimpossible for pure tanzih to admit any such correspondenceor similarity. Ye t i t attempts to assert' the poss ibi li ty o f communicat ion. This is c o n ~-tradictory:---- '"

I f Islam replies that the world, including man,is in every respect a tool in the hand of God' spower, we say that many of the former metaphysical difficulties still remain (see abov;e); and moreover that this makes impossible the quali ty of lovein God';'ll(fone loves a machine, though he haveabsolute power over it. And of course it is evenmore impossible for a machine to love it s worker,even on the assumption that i t is a conscious machine and one that can understand the communications made to it by its Maker., Bu t even this assumption (that th e machine i ssomehow rational) must be den ied on pure tanzihprinciples. Why should tanzih deny reality to thewill of man as a free thing, that is self-exercised,ye t allow to man's intelligence tha t i t is real andself-exercised. So here there is a dilemma: eitheryou allow that man's intelligence is real , sel fexercised, that is, capable of give' and take, inwhich case you mus t sa y th at the knowledge of


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34 ,'GOD AS TRIUNE OREATOR; INOARNATE, ATONER , 35God nof only gives, bu t also takes, not. only cOlnmunicates with bu t is communicated with; not'onlyknows but is known, no t only speaks but hears-'all of which is a species o f passivity and contradictstanzih. Or you mus t say tha t man's intelligEmce isas mechanical and as illusol'Y as hi s will: he seenisto hear, bu t it is only God hearing Himself; heseems to speak bu t it is only God speaking to Himself; he seems to know, bu t really he only dreams.His individual consciousness is an illusion-hisveTY individuality and-selfhood vanishes, and hebecomes like a character in a novel, a thing thatseems to act an d th ink and speak, bu t l'eally onlyexists in the mind of it s writer. So that if tanzih isincapable of being harmonized with the creation ofnature, it i s doubly incapable of being harmonizedwith the creation ofany spirituaJ being such as man.And in fact we often see, in the history of Islamic

thought, men who have in their very insistence onabsolute ta.nzih positively asseTted this very thing,namely, that only Allah exists, and that al l otherexi st ence i s i llusory, a semblance. This is thethought that underlies theil' name fol' God-AIHaqq. 'l'hey mean that no othel' being has l 'eality01' existence. These men, whether they know i t ornot, are pure pantheists, theil' belief resemblingth e Indian philosophic pantheism, whel'eby al l thatwe see is Maya (illusion). Thus eas ily does puretanzih fall to it s extl'eme opposite. In the l a n g u a g ~of these men;ta.whid did not me re ly mean callingGod the One, but calling Him th e Only-that .is,

denying l 'eality m even existence to al l phenomenawhatsoever..

Such are the terrible difficulties, intellectual andmoral, into which the Islamic doctl'ine of God falls,especially in l'elation to the cl'eation of man.Bu t th e difficulties seem almost to vanish when

we conceive of God by th e aid of th e mind ofOhrist, and know Him as Father, Son and Spirit.We have already seen how this trinitarian conception as Love facilitates th e concep'tion of Him asOreatol' of th e world geneTally. How much more'then of man, pal'ticularly-man, who alone of allcreation has, decisively, the power of memory andforethought, of self-consciousness and of o ther consciousness, of conscience, rational thought-inone word, who alone of all created things (as faras we know) has spirit, and is capable of prayel',gl'atitude, and love; who is like unto God ' in Hisimage ' in these l'espects. We note th e followingconsiderations:1. I f God created a being capable of love, whileHe Himself is incapable of Teal love, He created abeing g reat er than Himself; for 'love is thegl'eatest thing in the world.' Bu twe have seen God'has love-is love'; therefore th e creation of a lOVingcl'eature occasions no surprise but the l'everse,

2. For creation, if it has an y significance, musthave for i ts ead th e manifestation of th e glol'y of-God-by which we do not mean His power, fmthat were by itself and in itself a barren displaybut His love and His power in His love. Therefore


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36 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR,INC.ARNATE,ATONER 37-would creation have been utterly i n c ~ m p l e t e hadit stopped with the solar system-or with theminerallY'constituted earth-'-or with the vegetablekingdom. Why? Not because these things' wereinsufficiently marvellous, for who can positivelyassign degrees of marvel to the creation. Whythen? Does not one feel the answer to be thatthese things were incapable of consciously know- .ing God, 01' lov:\ng Him, or glorifyingHim, or beingor becoming like Him? That is the answer. Andit shows us, fur ther , why' creat ion did no t stop' atthe animal world, from the amoeba up to th e ape.The same answer holds good. Man is the crownof it all, and to 'man al l points. In man creationsuddenly awakes into full consciousneRs, ;as onewakes ou t of a dead sleep or a confused dream.In man God has one to whom He can talk:andwho can talk with Him, in otherwords, like Himself.Now thi s point of l ikeness is abhorrent to theMuslim, for it conflicts with his abstract doctrineof uniqueness. But he only denies it at the heavycost of denying also the possibility of communicat ion and love between God and man. For, aswe have seen, consciouscommunication absolutelyimplies some point of spiritual similarity betweenthe two, and love implies the same, a fortiori.And thus we find in the forefront of th e Bible,'God created man in His likeness ' - a truly ~ i n -spired word; jus t as we find in the New Testamimt, 'the inner man, which i s renewed aftel' theimage of Him who created him.'

_ ~ : J t i s true _that this .word_of Genesis ha s been' adopted by Islam in th e form of a tradition ..This tradition has always fascinated Muslim theologians, ..,but. has perhaps equal ly embarrassedthem. I f anyone wants to see how they sometimes do all they can to explain it away and evacuate it of meaning, let him read AI-Ghazali'sMishkat at Anwar, (pp. 34-5), We conclude.._"however, from th e existence of this tradition thatthere is a yea rn ing in' I sl am itself to establish aCloser-link betweeniminand God. Bu t the answerto that yearning, as we ar e seeing, is to be found inChristian, no t Muslim, theology. For in the HolyTrinity we see that here a lso we .have no absolutelynew principle. God saw in His Son and Wordthe ' express image of His person' (Hebrews i. 2}from all eternity. 80 th e creation of a world, in.the highest rank of which He could see t he imageof His person, finitely, is seen to be no longerstral1ge 01' new, bu t in accordance with His own.essence. 1

1. The definition, or description, of the Christian doctrine ofthe Trinity g iven by Fr . L. Cheikho in his reply [Tafnid atTazwir Ii Muhammad Tabir et Tannir (Refutation of theFals if ication of Muhammad Tahir et Tannir)] to a virulentMuslim a tt aok on Christianity [E( 'Aqa'id al- Wathaniya fi'd-Diyanat an Nasranzya] is so interesting that we quote it herein full:.God, the One, the possessor of glor,., perfect ion and an

essential unity that admits of no divis ion, is an intelligentDeity, having knowledge of the Reality (haqiqh) of His divine'essenoe (dhat) from all eterni ty; and by this perfect knowledge- .


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38 GOD .AS TRIUNEof that RealitY,_wmQh.. .9.oeS_)lot i:n a n y _ " ' ! ! ~ x _ J a k ~ __i ! ~ ~ Y ~ r o mHi s substance (jawhar) , He causes to overflow (yufi) on toihatImage (suTah) the totali ty of His perfeotions as thoughHew!3re it and It were He; and thi& is His self-subsisting Wordwhich was never subject to the: creative :fiat. And because itemanates (sadara) "from Him and is bego tten from Him in-:thought, not by motion, and not, in space nor time, abidi.ng, inHim continually, we call I t 'Word ', and Him' Father', just aswe ca.n the concept of our ow'Ii thought j the production of ourintelligence, 'the Bon-of our thought', or its' word', which ourlips utter without severing it thereby from our intelleot. Only,our word is an accidens, whi le in God there i s no accidens, so--that we a ~ - b ~ ~ ~ d tOo assert thatuGocl's W ~ r d - [ s -G'od "lust asmuch as is I ts Source. Fur ther, s ince the Son resembles theFather, beinKHis essential Image, there must be a connexionbetween the Fathor and H is Word whereby t he Fat he r lov"sHi. Image and that Image is drawn to it s Begetter. And this-connexion also is not an accidens, ~ u i s l ikewis e a substance{jawhaT), the Holy Siprit, the mutual lov.-betwixt Father and.son, prooeeding-from T h e ~ both.'

CHAPTER III

God as IncarnateWE sha.!l not consider the Incarnation from all ofits aspects, bu t shall keep within the scope of thesestudies, namely, to show t ha t i t is no t contrary toreason; to ~ ! l . o w that i t facilitates faith in God, no'fmakes it more difficult;while to deny it makes faithin God difficult, if not impossible.Le t us examine, therefore, the following objec

tions to the Incarnation:i. Was the Incarnation proper to th e Son; if so,how can you say tha t God was incamate?ii. In asserting -the Incarnation, you assert thatGod became, or was, transformed.iii. In asserting the Incarna lion you have broughtGod within the l imits of space.iv. The same with regard t the limits of time:

v. Lastly, you have involved God in weaknessand passivity and suffering.

i. Was God, or the Son of God, incarnate?We have already explained, .in speaking of the

Trinity, how it is possiblo to assign proper fun/]tions to one person as distinct from another in th eGodhead without. d iv id ing the Godhead. Thereason is that the Persons are one yet distinct.


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40 GOD .AS TRIUNE CRE.ATOR,INC.ARN.ATE,.ATONER 41. Every aot is done by God, that is to say, al l th eOne Divine essenoe does all and the Persons unitein wil ling ' every partioular.and inspiring it andordering its aooomplishment. Bu t this does no tmake it impossible that th e aotual aooomplishmentbe worked out by one PEirson speoially. 'The Sondoeth nothing of Himself , bu t what He seeth th eFather.do.' That is to say; the Father d e s i g n ~ eaohaot and wills it and shares in the spiritual emotionoonsequent on i t - in a word, does it, while. th eaotual exeoution i s t he Word's. . There is no oontradiotion in terms here.; th e brain does an aot,whioh a member exeoutes for example..Apply this prinoiple to th e Inoarnation. We findthat the Son in the fulness of His Godhead was in oarnated: the Word beoame flesh. This. Inoarn at ion was willed and planned by th e Fath er, an d- oarried out by the inspiration of th e Spirit. Weoan, therefore, say that God was inoarnate, without saying that th e Father was; or that t he Spir itwas i n th e same sense as the Son.My whole self is i the hand withwhioh I write,yet my whole self is not bounded by.my hand. SoGod Himself was in Jesus Christ-the fulne ss ofthe Godhead; ye t the Godhead was no t limited bythe Man Jesus. The one is a myste ry , and th eother is' a mystery.

I f one denies that my whole self is in my hand;then I ask him, What. part of mysel f i s in myh and? Is my spi ri t d iv ided? No; and, therefore,you oan get no further than this, that the fulness of

the Godhead was in Christ, ye t was no t boundedby the Man Jesus.Spirit i s suoh a mysterious thing and it s relation

with matter ye tmore mysterious. Howmuoh morethen is the nature of the presenoe of th e Infinite'Spir i t -God-in relation to material things a myst ery a lso? .We, therefore, oonfess that in thismatter we havea-mystery whioh does' indeed utterly transoend

reason; though it does no t oonfliot with it. I t isonlya-speCla:! case -of.the general mystery-thatis, God's relation to this universe.ii. The Incarnation and Becoming.The Word became flesh. I t is objected to thisoardinal text that it represents the' oonversion of

;'the-Godhead into flesh, and brings God into th eoategory of beooming, that is, oontingenoy.We. need not r ep ly to the first objeotion, for th etext does no t say ' the Word was oonverted intoflesh '. From this point of view, th e Churoh hasrejeoted th e theory of oonversion: 'not by the oonversion of th e Godhead into flesh, but by taking themanhood into God.' Nevertheless, th e text doesundoubtedly say beoame. Le t us look at th e matterolosely.We assert that this matter entiTely goes baok to

the previous initial diffioulty of oreation and re lation.. We as ser t that no new diffioulty is added.bu t that this becoming is s imply an .aspeot'of tho>original diffioulty.


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Now we have shown clearly that- the-odginal,difficulty affects th e Muslim even more than the.


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44 GOD AS TRIUNE OREATOR,INOARNATE,ATONER 45and limited, even i f in reality He is not? .Fromthis point of view, to be l imited spatial ly andto appear to be limited amount to just th e samething. . . God has, as a matter of fact , l im itedHimself spatially inrp.erely revealing words and, " "d" s . 'ideas like. ' throne, heaven., sen , me senger ," see' , ' hear ', etc., and attr ibuting all to Himself.Everyone of these notions is a pmely spatial one.and cal ls up spatial images. This is true jus t asmuch for the Muslim as th e Ohristian; for he a lsouses all these words; and he talks of th e throne on.which God s it s, borne by angels, surrounded by.angels above, below, and a ~ o u n d . What is thisexcept the utmost of spatial l imitat ions? And whenhe talks of th e soul's enter ing the garden, beingwith God see ing His face, standing by His throne,does he 'not necessarily imagine and picture inh is mind a place, and forms and figures and spaces?.o f course he does. Therefore we repeat from thispoint of view that God, quite ,apart from the ~ n c a r ,nation, has struck Himself mto space , havll1g tnthe minds (wd imaginations oj all men limited Himself, and, if you please, incarnated Himself, using. incarnation in th e wider sense of entering withinmaterial bounds.(2) But, in th e second place, i f we admit th e1Jrinciple that God allows Himself to appear bounded by space, in thought, while really transcendingit in a manner no t to be imagined by us, and furtheradmit that this appearance is at least a hint of,some truth, we can carry the argument a step

further -and say that it i s equalJy possible for Godto give some sensible manifestation of Hi s presence i ~ . s p a c e - t h a t is, one affecting not only th e imagina.tlOn bu t the-senses. That is to say, He can connectHis presence more with one part of space thananother, without thereby denying His omnipresence. Who sha ll s ay this is impossible? On th econtrary , :i ti sadmitted . We say even in commonparlance, at certain solemn times, we feel that GodiswJth_us. . .I f :in old times He made a wondrouslight, or fiery cloud or smoke, and gave Hi s peopleto understand that His presence was in some particular way connected with or manifested in that fireor l ight , who can deny it ? And on the other handwho is so foolish as to think that which m a n i f e s t a ~tion exhausted or monopolized th e presence of God!When Moses saw the fire in the bush and heardthe voice; when Israel saw the f iery cloud inth e Holy of Hol ies, and they bowed down andworshipped as if in the immediate presence ofGod (and they were so from this point of view)were they so foo li sh as to think that the Heavenof Heavens was then empty of God' s presence?No, they saw a mystery with two sides to it-likeall mysteries in heaven and earth (and what thingcreated or uncreated is not a mystery?) and werethankful.

And similarly the ' Angel of the Presence', theAngel who said to Manoah that Hi s name wasWONDERFUL (pelai), which is the peculiar epithetof God; in these ca ses also we have a mysterious


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self-relation of Goo to spaceimd sense, real, ye t no texhausting reality. . . . . .Islam is conscious of these mysteries as mu'Chas Ohristianity. The, prophet in one traditiontalked of feeling the Fingers of God: Would hehave said more if he had said he had seenthem? .And thus we arrive at th e incarnation i.n Ohrist.His only the same mystery carried to a hIgher andnobler_plane. ThElGodhead inspa.ce , and ye t h ~ in it ; His presence related particularly to a certamplace, and yet no t limited by it ; a p p e a l i n ~ to sense,ye t transcending sense; revealed, ye t veIled by th every medium of revelation. I t is th e o ld s to ry ofthe two-faced mystery. We must accept both an dworship. The disciples in looking on th e body ofOhri;tdid'not see God, for in this sense none s ~ ~ sGod; bu t none th e less thEjy looked on . O n ~ mwhom was th e fulness of th e Godhead boddy. . Asto th e mode in which thi s was effected, or how th ematter looks from God's point of v iew, we kno,;"not. Who knows how anything looks from God spoint of v i ew? .. .F in al ly ; if th e human spirit is not matenaJ , weo-et a precisely similar se t of problems and paradoxes. My spirit seems to be . limited b! ~ 1 bodyand housed in it , and ye t who can sa y It. IS r e a : l ~under the category.of spaco? Oan y ~ l 1 1 e a s u r ~ It.How many dimenslOns has It? Has It a shape. I fit escaped from my body, would it go up or down?through window or' door? East or Wes t? Where

t AI-Ghazali, in the Madnun SaghiT, notes this mysterious.property of the human spirit, and ohaerves how difficult it is toavoid attributing to it, in oonsequence, properties which arestrictly divino ones. The generality of mell, he says, find it.impossible to oonceive of Allah as not being related to space(I i j iha). I t is impossible to make them understand that thehuman ruh Spirit also transcends this relationI They would.think that this would be to make man like God.4

does it go to? 1 These questions in themselves showth e absurdity of trying to fit spirit into th e categoryof space. I t seems wholly above it. And yet nonet ~ e . less my spirit is in some way undoilbtediylImIted by my spa ti al body. Who ca n solve thisparadox? And if it is t rue, even though unintelligible, why should we say that a similar connexionbetween God (who is pure, transcendent Spirit)and mat te r i n general, Or man in particular isimpossible? I t i s only admitting one more-mysterybefore which bu r boasted reason retires baffled andtranscended: .. iv. In ~ s s e r t i n g Incarnation you have broughtGod within the limits of the category of t ime; and,.as time and contingency imply each other al;>soIuteIy"we have thus involved the Divine Nature in contingencyThe reply to this is very much what we replied in

the. case of space, namely, that the difficulty, if it is.a dIfficulty, is already involved in the ideas of God'screat ion and governance of this world. Whetherto th e Muslim or to the Christian or to th e Jewt he mere th ough t o f God's creating the world as

46 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR,INCARNATEiATONER 47


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50 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR, INCARNATE, ATONER 51time hut also the Self itself, there-would.be no consciousness of events. The very power to distinguishbetweeu pas t, present ana future would vanish;th e man himself would be rol led along the flood oftime as consciousless of it as is th e plant.torn up.by the rivel ' .and V [ a s l ~ e d down in its current.Theremustbe a.stablepoint to enable us to approachuns tabi li ty , a resting-place outside time to enableus. to know time. So then, i f this is true for God,,ttis .also.true JQdl1e.spirit of man.,'. But this thought, though it is no help to theMuslim Deist (but the contrary), does greatly assist'the idea.of Incarnation. Fo r it shows that man ha san extra-temporal element at the core and base ofhis selfhood, which perhaps gave th e point whereat__,the.dbdge .and human natures come together inthe indissoluble union of th e Inca rnat ion . We ,therefore, conclude by saying that the Incarnationi-s only a particular case of the general difficulty;.a particular phase of th e general mystery; a continuation of th e initial a ct o f condescension involved in the creat ion of th e wOl'ld of God and itsgovernance by His hand.

v. The Incarnation involves attributing passivityand weakness to the Almighty Godhead

We shall not spend very much time over this'objection, part ly because it has been several time;;noti'ced already, and partly be0ause it must be .more.deeply ~ x a m i n e d in th e next section, on th eAtonement.

I t will be enough to ~ e m i n d ourselves that":(1) Passivity, as such, has already been shown tobe a necessary correlative of activity, and a Living

God mus t in Himself possess both the one and theother. And th e :!,riune God of the ' Christian hasbeen shown ac .tually to possess both. Therefore. the objections that the Incarnation involves passivity, as such, fal ls to the ground.

(2) We have a lready seen also that relation.implies passivity; that a Creator's relations to thec r e a ~ e d in gene ral , and created intelligence in.. partICular, was not , could no t be wholly one-sided.Action implies reaction, activity passivity. Therefore the bare idea of Creation involves what is here.objected to Incarnation as such.

(3) As regards weakness, we have already Shownthat the moral sphere is no t identical with th ephysical, and that what is weakness in the one maybe st rengt h in th e other and vice versa. The In carnation is an act primarily within the moralsphere, and, therefore, it is to be expected that manyaspects of it s enormous moral power will, in thephysical sphere and to the natural eye and to thenatural or carnal heart, appear to spell weakness.But ' the weakness of God is stronger than men ,',Passivity-weakness-suffering (Which meansbearing) ;. it is plain that we have now passed toanother subject, an extension of that of the Incarnation, namely, the Atonement. And this weproceed in conclusion to examine, holding on fast toall our dearly-won gains in preceding discussions.


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CHA.PTER IV

God as Atoneri. General ConsiderationsWe have frequently-pointed out, and the remark

cannot be too often made, for the point is absolutelY';cardinal, that the minute you leave the purelyphysical category and ent er the moral one, thatmoment everything becomes changed. The centreof gravity being altered, the whole system shifts,an d our thought must undergo a correspondingm'odification or be guilty of the most serious inconsistencies and errors. Now the physical categoryis concerned with the mutual relations of inanimatethings, or th e relation of t.\linking beings withinanimate things, such as the action of a player onth e ball, or t he act ion of a fall ing stone upon aperson. I t will be seen that such relations do no tgo beyond the sphere of the mechanical. Theyhave, in themselves, nothing to do with themoral,

But the minute you enter the moral sphere, that is,that which concerns the reciprocal relations ofmoral beings, animate, conscious, rational, youfind that the simple judgement conceming, for example, strength and weakness, has to be tremendously modified. In the physical sphere, for example,

CREATOR; INCARNATE; ATONER_ " t ~ e S l ~ e s ~ o n .ofrelative strength can be settled' 'by

~ . t n g , by a'dlsplay of muscular force, by a, decisive,Impact.,: Bu t how ridiculous it would be to assert,that" moral questions ca n be so settled' or thatwhenyou wish to assert your moral s u p e r i ~ r i t y overs o m e b o d y e l s e ~ or to win him morally, you can doso by a display of superior physical force! The.idea is absurd. On the contrary, the means you'employ'may seem, in the physical sphere, to bfrsheer weakness. At all events, moral means arevery-numerous and very different and delicate and.c ~ m p l i c a t e d , while- physica l means ar e alwaysSimple and th e same in character, because theyhave no other criterion than physical force whichis always calculated according to purely 'mathematicallaws.

The cardinal mistake of I sl am, as we have seen,an d the cardin al point of iiifference between it andChristianity is that the former conceives the l'ela_t ions between God and man to fal l wholly withinthe p ~ y s i c a l category (with the result, of course,that It makes men things, not persons)' whilfrC h r i s t i a ~ i t y insists that men a re persons, ~ n thatthe relatlOn between them and the ir Creator must

. be fundo/nentally moral. The forces, therefore,.~ h a t God exerts on man will not be pmely physicalm charac, ter, a contest of strength with s trength;nor ye t merely psychical , as though it were acontest between a strong intellect and a weak one;bu t moraL And from this the profoundest differences spring between what Islam r.egards as befitting


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GOD .AS TRIUNE CRE.ATOR,INC.ARN.ATE;.ATONER 55to th e Deity and whafT Chdstianity regards as such.Once masterthis fundamental difference and everything explains itself. In that which Muslim eyesregard as weakness, Christian eyes see power! Whatth e Muslim admires as power seems to the Christian under certain circumstances as ' sheer weak-"ness--the weakness of th e blundering giant -who"displays his force. in a del icate moral case wherei t is utterly ou t of place. .All these differences of .

_Yiew _culminate_in _the Cross, which (rather than-the Incarnation) is the real battle-ground betweenthe two faiths. To th


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56 OREATOR, INOARNATE,ATONER 57withouttakiIig full account, and making_.him takefull account, of his s in. Hol iness, therefore, says.what must be done, and love says what shall be done.Holiness is necessarily loving, to,be truly holy; andlove is holy, to be truly loving ;. else neither would"be worth the having. The relationS" of God 'in:'Heaven to man are determined by this, and therelations of God in Ohrist to man were dllterminedby this too, and led to Oalvary's cross.. With these gEmeral observations we may go_ todiscuss the Atonement of God in Chris t.

ii.. The Christian View of God and His Relation tothe A.tonementWe have seen in our last section that the fundamental difference between the Ohris tian .andMuslim idea. of God is that thelattel shrinks from

attributing to God distinctively moral qualities, andtends, therefore, toplace His .qualities in the physical category; and likewise makes His relat ionwith the spirits of men external, mechanical, physical, non-moial. Wherea s the former does no tshrink from conceiving God as a completely moralBeing, experiencing all the experiences proper to amoral Being, and manifesting all the manifestations proper to such. No such experience, no suchmanifestation will, a'ccording to the Ohristian view,degrade God or lessen His divine glory, bu t ratherHis divine glory will consist largely in such mani.festations.We saw further, and with deepest awe, for we

-were there -approaching ten-ible and holY,.graund,.that, when. si n affects' the relation that exists between such a being and the spiri tual beings He has ..created, then the former, just because He is whatHe is, cannot remain unaffected. Bu t in what wayis He affected? In regard to the prior question ofHi s being affected in an y way at all, we have longseen that that need no t frighten us , for our studies.have made it abundantly clear that Islam itselfcan-. no t help attributing a being-affected to the Oreator .We have not, therefore, to defend ourselves on this.score when we say that th e Oreator is affected byour sin (for t he Qur 'an itself makes Him affectedby extreme displeasure); bu t th e whole questionturns upon th e sort of way in which He is affected ..We answer unhesitatingly, in every and an y wayproper to a Being who is moral in Himself ancliwhose relat ions with those human creations arethoroughly moral, and mutually moral. In just suchways will He be affected. And when we look intothe Bible for confirmation of our theory, we find itcompletely borne out. Fo r we see i t written therethat God is affected by the sight of His rebelliouschildren with wrath, love, pity, sorrow.All th is i s repugnant to the Muslim, though we

might fairly ask him why he does no t shrink fromattributing th e emotions of wrath to God, and to alesser extent love and p ity also; bu t will no t allowsorrow to be attributed to Him. Perhaps, driveninto a corner, he tries to escape from t.his assertion.by giving his assent to the -shocking words put by


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'58 GOD AS TRIUNE OREATOR,INCARNATE,ATONER-.Al-Ghazali into the-mouth of God, 'These to bliss '' and I oar enot ; and these to th e Fire, andI oare not:'-But, in all seriousness we ask , i s this more likely_to improve our theology; or turn us into atheistsforthwith? In these fatal words Muslim theologyfinally showed its hand, an d we may truly say thati t is impossible for us to love such a God as- this,or indeed to owe Him any allegiance, for we feelthat-a righteous man on earth is more richly and_nobly: endowed thalLsuch a God in heaven.-To return then. Philosophy and revelation are atone in saying that God experienoes and manifestswhat -can only be described a s wra th , pity, love,-sorrow, in relation to sinful, rebellious man. Andall these things are all aspects of the same thing.Wrath, for example, is not th e wrath of an offendedlaw-g iver or exasperated lawadministrator, butth e wrath of ,a righteously indignant Father andthe terrible offended purity of a perfect ly holy Being. IllU8trations on earth would be th e righteouswrath of a father whose son brought disgrace onhis n ~ m e by an act of treaohery towards himself;o r the terrible indignation of a perfectly truthfulman at some instance of ignoble deoei t in hi sfriend' or the withering anger of a perfectly pure,woman at some evi l suggest ion made her by animpure mind. Is there not in such cases wrath,wrath that burns like a furnace, wrath that mak'esthe offender feel blasted, and desire to sink beneath

1. Ha'ula 'i ila n na'im wa Iii 'uball 1 wa luiulct , i la n nar waJ/i 'ubalt.

the g round and flyaway into darkness? Howm).lCh more then the 'wrath of God! Bu t noticethat in all such cases it is a purely moral emotion- the experience and manifestation of a perfectlymoral Being, not th e merely external wrath of anincensed monarch, nor the irr itat ion of a thwarted a d m i n i s t l ~ a t o r , sti'll less the merely physica l.mechanical vengeance of an almighty machine ofwhose.working man has run somehow foul; butthe still-more terrible and - burning wrath of aHoly One, Love only adds an e lement to it s- i ~ t e n s i t y . _ And is not this th e true interpretationof thewrath of God all the way through the Bibleas interpreted through Christ, that the forceexe rt ed on the impure and untruthful in th eawful Day of Judgement itself wi ll be no t essentially different from th e purely moral force exercisedhere on earth 'in the examples we have alreadysuggested? The same fire of love-holiness , whichwiII m a k ~ ' s o m e glow on that day, wiII be to othorsthe fires of hell.

So much for wrath. I t i s only because our ownpsychological capability is so limited that we' areforced to give separate names for what a re reallyonly aspects of th e same thing in God, and talk oflove, pity, sorrow, as though they were different.and even conflicting emotions. We oan perhapsonly experience them successively, ye t even in us.they may. be all essentially related. One canimagine a mother feeling wrath, pity, love andsorrow; if not all at once, s ti ll in e s s e n ~ i a l relation


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to each other, if th e object of them was a san who'was false, treacb,erou8 and impUTe, and yetwith thepossibility of becoming a good man. In God they2.re al l simultaneous, and the full conception can-only be got by looking at them all. Love is th e1Jassionate desire to re cl aim the work of His ownhands, ' Pity th e recognition' of it s weakness andmisery. Sorrow is what is caused by treacheryagainst love, the manifestation of wounded love.Wmth we have already described.- -Ir God doesno t experience these things, somehow, in His eternal'heights, He is no god fOl' us. Bu t the study ofIsaiah, Hosea, J er emiah and Jonah (especially):shows us conclusively that this is in fact His,attitude to me and to s in fu l man. And in JesusChrist the fact is finally revealea.Apply then these thoughts, lastl:'(, to the Atone

ment. We have already seen that the Incarnationis only the particular case ofGod's genera.l condescension to relat ion and communion with, and indwelling in His world and especially man. Then'the Atonement is only the particular manifestation,in that Incarnate Word; of the general atti tude ofGod to sinful man..The Atonement is the DivineSorrow, Pity, Wrath , and Love embodied in th eIncarnate One. The Atonement is th e expressionof the eternal Patience of God-which is sinbearing-in relation to space and time, just asthe Incarnation is the expression of th e EternalEssence in relation to space and time. The Passion-of Christ is th e temporal and spatial manifestation

or-the Passi6n of God. The wrath, love, pity,sorrow, pat ience o f Christ ar e the manifestationin terms of space and time ofthe same things in theHeavenly God. The Incarnation says, God wasin Christ'; the Atonement adds, reconciling manunto Himself.'The doings of Christ, therefore, i n the flesh are,as it were, ,the doings of God when manifested on

the s tage of space and time, being brought thereinto immediate contactwith men. This conceptionshow us how far from the truth is anyone whoconstrues the Christian idea as that of a severe. ,angry Father and a mild, loving Son. The Biblel ends no such support to a division in t he Godhead, however much i t may appropriate functionsto the persons of the Trinity. In the one work ofLove and Redemption through Suffering-that isPatience-the Godhead is One Father, Son andSpirit. God so loved the world.' God wasin Ohrist.' 'God commendeth His love towardsus.'. The Atonement is thus seen to be a wmk springing from the very nature of God, no t an externalaction which had to take place before God couldforgive. We rather say: None but a God who is soloving as to bear man's s in in etel'llity, and bear it,incarnate, in t ime, could forgive and save th esinner. This is absolutely true. The Atonement,in Christ, of the Incarnate Son, is indeed the meanswhereby we attain salvation. But it is not anexternal means, an external plan, to enable God to

,60 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR, INCARNATE, ATONER 61


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62 GOD AS TRIUNE CREATOR,INCARNATE,ATONER 63do what His own nature could not do. I t is rather,so tospea.k, an internal means, .0 , transcript of th e'internal work in the heart of the Godhead, withoutwhich we could no t have been saved. A sentencelike' But for the Atonement we could no t have been. saved " really means, 'But for a God who i s a lso anAtoneI' we could not have been saved. ' God, beingas He is, could not but bear, could not hut yearn,could not hu t be incarnatejn Hi s Word, could notbu t come into conflict with sin on the ear thly stagein this Incarnate One, who as man suffered to thelast possibility the action of sin in Himself-a deathof agony in body and darkness in soul.

This last sentence brings us to' consider whetherwe can get a l it tle nearer to the heart of this greatmy-lltery.Christ came into this world arm ed only w ithmoral weapons; determined to f ight sin with thesword of righteousness and the spirit, not with theforces ofphysical or super-physical might. On the

mount of temptation He definitely renounced theselatter, and thus definitely soared away from allMuslim ideas of the kingdom of this world or theway it should be brought about. He saw that moralresults could only be brought about by moral means,and He, therefore, definitely renounced the rightofphysical resistance. Fo r another, even a prophet, .for all except the Saviour of the world, this mighthave been conceivably permissible, in certain circumstances. Fo r the Saviour of the world it wasnever in any circumstance to be. '

.To the Muslim this seems the very embodhnentof.w'lftkness. To the m a ~ w h o knows what moralpower is, it seems th ' ; ' ~ ; 7 embodiment of strength.The battle h e t w e ~ n Him and sin was,' therefore;a fair fight in the moral arena. No extraneousweapons were used. Had He s u ~ m o n e d the angeliclegions in the garden of Gethsemane had' Heinvoked His divine power on the Cross an'd descen.ded, much. more, had He invoked the' civil armsUPP!lssfully, the contest with s in would have beennon-moral; for a non-moral element w o ~ l d havebeen intl'Oduced, and the mqral salvation of nnnwould have fallen through. Sin would have reoeivcldnOc mortal wound, and no deoisive d e f e , ~ t . And soHe' resisted not.

FIe allowed the sin of man to do against Him itswor,st. He allowed it to manifes t i tsel f on Hisp ~ r f e c t l y holy, righteous Person; to manifes t onHim its true and essential natUI'e for all time-as. a;thing hating God, hating righteousness, lovingtlwdeath of all that is holy.:E!ut thi s involved going- the whole length-to

death. Had He stopped short of this, sin's nature';Voilld not have been fully exposed and its issuew,Qpld not have been fully seen. To reveal itsnature he had to bear its nature, namely, the desiret() kill all that is good. And to reveal it s inevitabled?'0m he had to bear i ts doom, namely, to pel'ishterribly. .

.Then, and not t il l then, could He turn round andtriumph. When sin had done it s worst, not till5


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64 GOD AS TRUINE OREATOR,INOARNATE,ATONER 65.then, could He show it that it had done nothing:Had He triumphed before, it might have 'been saidthat sin had no t pu t forth al l it s strength. Ikisonly when' a man has pu t forth his .last:6unce ofeffort that it cau be said he is. beaten.. .The laststrength of sin is death; it could not be beatenbefore it had accomplished that. It s final defeatcould not. be until it had exercised as great' anactivity as possible. Chris t, in order to overcomeutterly, had for one moment to yield to that supremevictory of sin and death. 1

Thus was accomplished the salvation of theworld. The sinner, when he real izes the Atonement, sees sin in it s true light-an utter enemy;he, therefore, hates it as God does; and God inforgiving him does no t do an immoral thing, butwith forgiveness gives a new life unto holiness,and death unto sin. To forgive a sinner with hissins still on him and his sinful heart still unconverted within h im is simply immorality. I t wouldend in the tottering of the pillars of eternal Holinesson which the world, yea, eternity itself, is built.And indeed you might almost say tha t the Orossha s created the sense (or the full rea liza tion) of'Did God die then? The question t hus s ta ted oonta ins afallacy and a lie. God as spirit oannot die-i.e., be extinguished.Many have asserted that even OUT spirit, as spirit. cannot die

either. But any being that has spirit and hody oan have thetwo separated and so die. It is not correct , therefore , to saythat God died. o r even that the Word of God died; bu t theInoaTnate Word oalled Christ died-i.e., the Spirit of th e Inoarnate One waS separated from His flesh.

what sin i s ~ . : c . l t . _ h a s , . therefore; createdthetrue Hattitude of abhol'rence to it. And it has, therefore,.created the true salvation from it. At th e Orossthe mind. of-man in regard to sin becomes attunedto th e mind of God. And this is the meaning ofthe word ." the Blood of Ohrist cleanseth from allsin.' It cleanseth, because it cleanses th e conscience of ma.n, telling him that because he nowfe.els towards hi s own sin as God does, he is

f o r g j . y ' e n ; ~ a y , more, h is sin is removed, he isjustified, that is, he returns to the relation with Godthat preceded sin. He is at peace with God, becausehe can now be truly at peace with himself. He isat.peace with himself because he ha.s now the rightto: be- at peace with God.Nothing but perfect Holiness eQuid have involvedsuchcost as the Passion of God in e te rn ity and inOhrist. Nothing but perfect Love could have borneit. Therefore in the Oross holiness and love, wrathand pity, justice and mercy, mee t togethe r andkiss one another . .

C. L. S. PRESS,' MADRAS-1916

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God as Triune, Creator, Incarnate, Atoner

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