God In a Box: A Comprehensive look at problems and solutions concerning the Tri-une Nature of God

8/14/2019 God In a Box: A Comprehensive look at problems and solutions concerning the Tri-une Nature of God

1/59


2/59

God: In A Box?

A Comprehensive look at problems and solutions concerning the Tri-uneNature of God

1991, 1992, 2000 by Eric Bolden

INTRODUCTION

For over 1600 years, the doctrine of the Trinity has been one of the main puzzles and

sources of conflict of the Christian faith. People could just never seem to reallyunderstand or explain how "three could be one", but most accepted it "in faith", while

various men and sects throughout the centuries arose to tackle the problem, and devised

all kinds of proposed solutions and alternatives. There has even been bloodshed over the

issue! Were any of these people right? Is the Godhead "balled up", or "boxed up" into aneat "three-in-one" formula?" Does salvation even depend on accepting this formula?"

Are all the other ideas just satanic attacks against a faithful, pure "orthodoxy"? Or is it the

Trinity itself that is the satanic deception, creeping into the Church from paganism; andone of the other alternatives promoted by a particular sect the truth? Or is there just

another way to express it that no one has thought of? And most importantly, just what

does the Bible really say, or not say on the entire matter?

These are some of the questions we shall explore. First, we shall look at the various major

alternatives, and then the history of the matter.

1 THE VARIOUS CONCLUSIONS

TRINITARIANISM: The basic doctrine states that "God the Father", "God theSon"(Jesus Christ), and "God the Holy Spirit", are three "co-equal", "co-eternal"

"persons" making up one God. It is accepted by the majority of all professing Christian

churches beginning with the Roman Catholic/Eastern Orthodox church, and all of theProtestant bodies that came out of it. It is based primarily on the interpretations of a few


3/59

Old Testament scriptures that seem to indicate a plurality within the one God of Israel

(Genesis 1:26, 11:7), and a triadic scheme in several New Testament scriptures, where

the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are mentioned together in conjunction with each other:(Matthew 28:19, 2 Corinthians 13:14, Titus 3:4-6, Ephesians 4:4-6, Revelation 1:4,5;

etc.), and various scriptures where the Three are referred to as God or are credited with

divine titles, functions or characteristics. But the big problem with this is the use of theword "persons". Even though there are all these "hints" (as scholars call them), the Bible

never puts them together as such a precise formula of "three Persons", and the concept

seems to hopelessly divide the divine unity. This is what has caused much confusion anddissent over the centuries, and has led to the various reinterpretations of the scriptures,

and either the rejection or reformulation of the doctrine. These we shall now look at.

TRITHEISM: One solution was to just go on and say that the three persons are three

separate Gods acting in unity. This was taught by some early Gnostic groups, and by the

Mormons today. But it should be obvious that this just does not go along with scriptureswhich emphasize that there is only one God (Deuteronomy 6:4, Exodus 20:3, Isaiah 44-46, 1 Cor.8:6, etc.). The main problem with the Trinity to its critics is that it seemed to

imply more than one God, so to say that it is in fact such is to go in the wrong direction.

For this reason, the remaining solutions all involve the subtraction of 'persons', one wayor the other from the Godhead. We shall now follow this downward progression, to two

persons, and then to one.

BINITARIANISM: The quickest and easiest way to start, is to subtract the Holy Spirit,

which is then said to be an impersonal extension of the divine essence, the "Power of

God"(Luke 1:35). That then only leaves the Father and Son. This position isn't verycommon. Early adherents may have included the so-called "pneumatomachians" (Spirit-

fighters) or "Macedonian heresy" in the fourth century. There is speculation that

Shepherd of Hermas and other early Christian works mentioning the Father and son, butnot clearly the Spirit, may have been binitarian. The only groups that teach it today, and

whom the theology is most known by are the Sabbath-keeping Church of God groups

(Denver, Salem, offshoots). They find support in the dyadic scheme of the majority ofscriptures, where only the Father and Son are mentioned in personal roles. A big example

is the fact that the Holy Spirit is NEVERpictured as sitting on a throne like the Father and

Son are in several scriptures, (Rev. 3:21, 5:13, 7:9,10, 12:5, 22:1,3, Eph.1:20, Col.3:1,

Ps.110:1, etc.) and all three are in some representations of the Trinity. Still, there are

several examples of the Holy Spirit speaking and doing other "personal" things, asTrinitarians point out. They seem to find their position completely in harmony with all

the personal activities of the Spirit, but still, can an "extension" or "projection" of God'sessence or power really be "grieved", for example?

Variation: Armstrong's "God Family": An offshoot of the 7th day Church of God

movement, the late Herbert W. Armstrong's Worldwide Church of God taught that God

(Heb. pluralElohim), is not one being, but afamily of beings, consisting now of the


4/59

Father and Son, and one day, all of the redeemed saints when they are "born into the

Kingdom of God" (inherit immortality) at the resurrection, actually becoming God "as

Jesus is God"! (This, to them, was the "true Gospel", which was lost and supplanted withthe "limited" Trinity concept for centuries). Yahweh of the Old Testament was the

"Word", orlogos (preexistent Christ, John 1:1-3) only; the Father was an unrevealed

higher being who was not even known about by man who was cut off from Him by Hissins, until the Word became flesh to reveal Him (John 1:18). It is basically a spin on the

Mormon concept. This "Word", or Yahweh then, was a sort of demiurge that was

mediator between God and man (an idea that was first taught by the gnostic Marcion inthe 2nd century).

Of course, it is obvious that the idea of man becoming God "as Jesus is God" is

ridiculous, (even if being God only refers to 'sonship' [hence, God family], or immortalityand reigning with Him), when only Jesus preexisted "in the beginning" as the Word (the

Creator), and was sinless. (We shall be "like"God (1 John 3:2), but that is different frombeingGod.) And the nice sounding teaching on the Word/YHWH, shared by theMormons, runs into a big problem with Isaiah 44-46. Yahweh's numerous statements

throughout these scriptures that there is no one else like Him, just does not seem to allow

for the existence of another, let alone, higher 'God being' (the "Father"). Psalms 110:1,where Yahweh is clearly distinguished from anAdonai, who sits at his right hand, and

from Matt.22:44 and other scriptures, is obviously shown to be Christ, also disproves that

view, showing that the Father also, must be Yahweh. Also, Gen.3 shows that it wasYahweh man was cut off from, so such a distinction between Him and the Father cannotexist. In an amazing turnaround in the history of sects, the group's current leaders

rethought and abandoned this view, in favor of orthodoxy, but dozens of splinter groups

still hold to Armstrong's views.

We now enter the realm ofMonarchianism the concept of God as only ONE Person.This takes on various forms we shall examine now.

ARIANISM: Formulated by the priest Arius in the 4th century to try to preserve the

oneness of God in an age of polytheism and pagan influence in the Church, its adherents

today include the Sabbathkeeping Church of God groups that followed the teachings ofthe late elders C.O. Dodd and A.N. Dugger, such as the Jerusalem group, and a few US

groups. (They probably drifted into this position from the binitarianism of the parent

Denver and Salem groups). It teaches that Jesus was notGod, but only the SON of God

(an inferior distinction), but that he did preexist as the first created being ("firstborn"Colossians 1:15), and was the Creator (v.16) under God's orders (v. 17God created

"through him").

Variation: "Michael-Arianism": This is the title I have given to Arianism's most well

known variant: the teaching of the Jehovah's Witnesses which identifies the preexisting

heavenly Jesus as the archangel Michael.1 They are most noted for changing John 1:1from "...and the Word was God", to "the Word was A god". Jehovah's Witnesses claim

this change is allowed in the Greek Grammar, because for example, this is done in

Matthew 13:57 ("A prophet is without honor..."). But just from the CONTEXT it simply does


5/59

not fit. Where there was more than one prophet, there can only be ONE God. Our

scriptures never acknowledge any other "god" as divine. Yes, sometimes men with

authority were referred to as "elohim", but they were not divine. The [supernatural]"gods" were always false idols or demons worshiped by the heathens, and "though there

are those that are calledgods...there is TO US, only ONE God, the Father..."(1 Cor.8:6,

MKJV). It is not "one God...and a lesser god, by whom are all things". Maybe it ishypothetically possible for God to have given a creature power to create, and then direct

him, and thus have "created 'through' him", but still, this entire business about angels

creating under God's supervision, or along with Him (as Jews and Muslims also claim ininterpreting Gen.1:26), is just not what the Bible teaches. God alone, or "BY HIMSELF"

(margin) is the Creator (Isaiah 44:24). And Hebrews 1:5-14 clearly distinguishes angels

from Jesus the Creator, who is also called Jehovah (v.10, from quote of Ps.102). The

Jehovah's Witnesses never have an answer to these verses, and often have to go back totheir leaders, change the subject, or give up on witnessing to you altogether when you

point these scriptures out.

Also, the term "firstborn" in Col.1:15 represents Jesus' being the first to receive the new

birth (Matt.3:16), and like v.18 and others, His being the first to be resurrected. I've only

recently realized that when the Jehovah's Witnesses say that the Holy Spirit is a "force"or "power", they really do mean that "it" is a non-living, non-divine force that God

"uses", like the wind or gravity. Unlike the other groups, they really do separate the Spirit

from the Godhead as a created spiritual form of energy. But this is easily disproved by all

the various scriptures the Trinitarians cite showing the Holy Spirit speaking, beinggrieved, being blasphemed, and what I had realized; just the fact of the Spirit being the

Spirit OF God. They also never address these points, but only restate their arguments.

UNITARIANISM: This term often refers to a denomination that started in the middle

ages, challenging the doctrine of the Trinity, and then underwent a completeliberalization in doctrine, and finally merged with the Universalists, and is now basically

an agnostic group that does not believe in the infallibility of scripture, but rather sees the

truth in all religions. But the term (in lower case) also refers to the theology of a fewgroups that do confess the infallibility of the scriptures, but reinterprets them to teach

that God consists of the Father alone, and that Jesus did not really exist prior to his birth

at all. It had its roots in the late second century with Theodotus, a learned leathermerchant from Byzantium, and was popularized the next century by Paul of Samosata,

who was from the Syrian school of thought, which was insistent on the oneness of God

and the real humanity of Jesus. Its most popular modern adherents are the WayInternational, founded by Victor Paul Wierwille, and the Christadelphians. There is also a

first-day adventist offshoot, the Church of God, Oregon, IL (formerly called the"Abrahamic Faith"), and a pair of Messianic Jewish/sacred name groups in Texas (House

of Yahweh; the "Hawkins brothers"). And it is basically the theology of the strictmonotheism of Judaism and Islam, as well, except for their rejection of Christ's Sonship.

Basically, the "Word" or "logos" is said to simply mean the "plan" or "revelatory

thought" of God, which Jesus represented. Even Muhammad acknowledged that (Qur'an

4:171)! God was the FATHER(1 Cor.8:6) and the man Jesus was His begotten Son (Luke


6/59

1:35), but not God Himself, just like a human son is obviously not the father of his own

self.

In my spiritual infancy, I had embraced this position pretty quickly because it seemed to

better fit the monadic scheme of many scriptures, which seemed to emphasize Jesus'

humanity and the Fatherhood of God, than all the "equality" and "preexistence" theories.There were numerous scriptures where Jesus clearly claimed to be less than the Father,

and was subordinate to Him, and even was limited, having to learn obedience, not

knowing all things, etc.; Acts 2:36 goes as far as saying that he was "MADE...both Lordand Christ"! So how could the "divinitarians" (Trinitarians and binitarians, collectively)

insist that he was "equal", and then regard subordinationism, the doctrine that he is not

equal, as a "heresy"?

The matter of the exact meaning of Jesus' sonship was another issue. The trinitarians call

Jesus the "Eternal Son" (a term not found in the Bible), meaning that He was a "second

Person" called "the Son" before His birth since past eternity. But Luke 1:35 plainlyequates Jesus' sonship with His divine conception. Just thinking about it, God causing a

woman to be pregnant would obviously make God the father, and the child the SON ofGod. Only He and His agent of conception, the Holy Spirit, are spirit, instead of physical.

But then there were problems. All five Christian/Messianic groups used similar methods

of interpreting not only John 1:1, but also a series of other texts used to teach the deity of

Christ. A lot of them began to sound pretty cheap and flimsy. For instance, Wierwillecame up with this idea that parenthesis 'should be' placed in Col.1:16 ("For by/in Him

[Christ preceding verse& 1/2] all things were created... All things were created

by/through Him and for Him") to separate the pronouns that obviously refer to Christ (asin v.14&15) from the rest (as in 16), which are then said to refer to the Father. I wanted to

believe this, but it just didn't seem right. The Hawkins' claimed that the "by", or "in" of

this passage could be translated as "for". In the concordance, the words did indeed have"for [the sake of]" listed somewhere amongst their various definitions, but look: another

"for" is right there in the verse, giving you "forhim andforhim". They, as well as

Wierwille, often judge how the Greek of the New Testament should be read based on thegrammar of the "original languages" (Aramaic or Hebrew). Yisrael Hawkins of Abilene

goes as far as to say that the "Elohist" or "P document" (The sections of Genesis that use

the term "Elohim") is false, and that there was an original "Yahwist" text that read "and

Yahweh said 'let Me make man in My image...'" (DidYahshua Messiah Preexist?, p238). And both his and Wierwille's John 1:1 and up as "The plan was God's/

(Yahweh's)". Now the part about "the plan" is acceptable, but to stick this POSSESSION in

there is just as bad as the way the Jehovah's Witnesses place an indefinite article there.

Another reinterpretation of the Hawkins' is that Jesus' "I AM" statement in John 8:58(from Yahweh's statement in Exodus 3:14, from which the name YHWH is derived),

really means "I was meant to come", but the Jews would not have tried to stone him forblasphemy for simply saying he was the promised Messiah, which he did frequently.

(Also, look at the POWERbehind the I AM statement in John 18:3). And like the Jehovah's

Witnesses, none of them would give any answers for Hebrews 1:10, or even Thomas'

declaration to Jesus as "My Lord and my God", in John 20:28. (R.H. Judd of the


7/59

Abrahamic Faith says it meant that Christ was "representative" of God's power, but that

argument is questionable.)

All of this began weighing on my conscience, and the idea of Jesus being God seemed

more realistic. There are so many other scriptural proofs of the deity of Christ which the

monarchian teachers never even thought of. Jesusforgave sins, which only God could do(Mark 2:5-10). He did not refuse worship like the apostles and even angels did

(Matt.28:9,17; Luke 24:52; John 20:28; Rev.1:17;2 cf. Acts 10:25,26; 14:11-15; Rev.

19:10; 22:8,9).2 And Armstrong had correctly taught that Jesus' life had to be "...greaterthan the sum total of all human lives" (Mystery of the Ages, p.211), in order to be able to

redeem all. ("In no other way could God have redeemed such a vast humanity"). If he

were just a regular man who simply had some extra power from God (to enable him to

never sin), like these five groups teach, then the most his death could have redeemedwould have been ONE OTHER SOUL! just like the lambs in the old covenant; "life for

life". (and perhaps then, the thief on the cross would have been the only man ever saved,

and the rest of us would be left without a sufficient savior!) So even though "An Elohimbeing did not sin; man sinned, so only a man could pay for man's sins", as Jacob Hawkins

of Odessa asserts in The Only Begotten Son of Yahweh, still, only an 'Elohim' couldamount to enough to be able to redeem all of man and creation. That is why it is taughtthat Jesus is equally man AND God. This dual nature ascribed to Christ explains all

those passages that make it appear he was less than God. Since He had a human nature,

(and was the model for all of His human followers) He had to go through the process of

submitting to God, and then being exalted by Him (Phil. 2:8,9). But He also had a divinenature which was fully equal with the Father. This was be further examined later.

So while these monarchians presented one side of scripture dealing with Jesus' humanity,they completely overlooked another, which sets forth deity for Him. Another error of

most unitarian groups, beginning with Theodotus and Paul of Samosata, is a concept

called adoptionism. They go to the opposite extreme from the Trinitarians in claiming hebecame Son afterhis birth, being spiritually adoptedby God as Son either at his

anointing with the Holy Spirit (Matt.3:16); or after 'qualifying' by his victory over Satan's

temptations (ch.4); or at his resurrection. Before that, he was just a regular man. (So twoother terms for this theology are dynamic monarchianism, and psilanthropism.) But the

fact that Jesus was divinely conceived and sinless (which adoptionists don't deny) means

that he had to already be more than just a regular man, and already designated the Son of

God before those things.3 Since the Scriptures declare that believers (Christians) are theadopted sons (Rom. 8:15, Gal.4:5, Eph.1:5), this theology brings Christ totally down to

our level.

SABELLIANISM/MODALISM: This view also had its roots in the late second century;

with the theologian Noetus of Smyrna and a mysterious Praxeas, and was refined andpopularized in the third century by the presbyter Sabellius. Its modern adherents include

the New Jerusalem Church (Swedenborgianism), and many people in some Charismatic

circles, known as "Oneness Pentecostals". They are also referred to as "Jesus only",because to them, the divine Person that was Jesus, winds up really being the only Person

in the Godhead, and they therefore believe in baptizing in Jesus' name only.


8/59

Now this idea, at first seems like a pretty quick, easy way to resolve the Trinity problem.

It teaches that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are only three different ways of looking at

one Person, or three roles ormodes of the one Person Father in creation, Son inredemption, and Holy Spirit in sanctification. But there are problems with this as well.

For one thing, it makes Jesus' conversations with the Father seem like some sort of

illusion or something; He really only had Himself to pray to, not anybody in Heaven.And what about all the post-resurrection visions of Christ at the right hand of "the

Father"? Another big problem was the resulting "patripassianism" the corollary that

[the immortal] God the Father died on the cross.


9/59

2


10/59

So now, it seems that all the alternative solutions have their problems too. But just what

was wrong with the original Trinity doctrine in the first place? Fundamentalist apologists

have pointed out how this doctrine is the most 'picked on' in the world of sects. Groupswho will accept all the other fundamentals of the faith will always dispute this one.

Meanwhile, a large portion of the body of believers are almost embarrassed by it, figuring

that it can't be understood, and thus often are willing to ignore or even compromise it. Inmy own spiritual search, when I finally saw the errors of the other theories, I tried forcing

myself to accept the "orthodox" Trinitarian position. I tried so hard to somehow work it

into my mindset, but still, something just did not seem right. One person describes to me"God is three Persons 'somehow' mysteriously 'balled up'into one", and says that it can't

be understood, but one must accept it or be 'lost'. And I saw this very same contention

(different words) in all the apologetic "cult" books, and in preaching. But there is nothing

in the Bible about God being "balled up", "mysteriously". And this whole business aboutnot being able to understand it, while seeming logical when dealing with an almighty

God, in this case sounded like it was just being used as a clever ploy to pass theirinterpretations of scriptures off as the infallible truth with the premise that one day (when

we're resurrected and see Him face to face 1 Cor.13:12, 1 John 3:2), the exact nature ofthe Godhead will be revealed, but in the meantime, they get the last word. It's their way

or no way at all, even though the scriptures place salvation on faith in the Son, and theindwelling of the Spirit, not on how they fit together with the Father. A clever

fundamentalist tactic is "default", where when they point out flaws in opposing views,

then their view wins automatically, hands down.

It is true that many people "reject it because they can't understand it". Jews, Muslims,

unitarians, and some other skeptics are certainly like that. So I myself then examined

deeply my own thoughts. But I found that my problem was not comprehension. Based onwhat I knew about God's omnipotence, I had no problem thinking that God's very being

was above our comprehension. In fact, I saw that the same Church that proclaimed the

Trinity doctrine often pictured God too anthropomorphically, with various images anddescriptions. I had always rejected these, believing God could exist outside of even time

and space themselves, since He Himself had to create them, and is therefore above them.

All of these things alone place Him well above our comprehension, "three-in-one" or not.In fact, I could see that something like a Trinity would be rathertypicalof His nature. So

just what was the problem? It couldn't be whether or not it was comprehendible. The

problem was whether or not it was reallyscriptural. That's what really matters. I knew

what was written in the Bible about God. And I had also read all of the 'proof-texts' andarguments for the doctrine the apologists use in their 'cult' books. But still, the Trinity, as

such a precise, neat formula just did not seem to be such a "clear teaching" of scripture as

they claimed it was. Instead, it seemed more like an overgeneralized, or boxed up (or

"balled up") concept that was being read into a select set of scriptures which wereinterpreted as "hinting it". I noticed a lot of hasty conclusions in the apologists' methods

of interpreting, and then "putting together" all of the scriptures (especially OldTestament) concerning the subject; the very things they would often criticize the "cults"

for. Even though those other conclusions I listed had some obvious flaws, some of them

did make some good points that were being neglected by the traditional formula. There

were many good objections raised by Armstrong and others that were never really dealt


11/59

with. The obvious errors were refuted, the proof-texts cited, and the three-in-one formula

was "proven" automatically.

I had come to accept that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all God, and somehow still

distinct, but still, the Bible just wasn't as neat, cut and clear on the exact arrangement of

the Three as the tidy idealistic "three equal Persons in one" statement. THIS is what wasmaking it so hard to comprehend, or "mysterious". If the scriptures just came right out

and taught the formula directly, complete with the term for "trinity" [trias: "triad" in the

Greek], and "three persons", then it would be less cloudy and controversial. God could

have arranged for it to have been stated this way, by one of the writers, or apostles, or by

Jesus Himself, if it were so important to God to be presented that way;If He reallywanted to reveal Himself that way! Every other "fundamental" doctrine (salvation, grace,

birth&death of Christ, etc.) is clearly spelled out in scripture, not merely "hinted". Andthe fact that a spurious verse 1 John 5:7 had to be ADDED to the text, seems to indicate

an unholy attempt to foist the doctrine on scriptures which by themselves, apparently

weren't really sufficient to teach it. The formula did seem, as Unitarians once said, "agrotesque addition to thesimplicity of the Gospel". In fact, it was the same convictions

which led me out of monarchianism that made me unsatisfied with the traditional Trinity

formula. There was just something wrong with the way it was being presented.

In fact, an ex-Catholic Spaniard of the 16th century, Michael Servetus, pointed out the

problem the doctrine caused with the evangelization of Jews and Muslims. Even

Muhammad, according to him, "was ready to admit that Christ was the greatest ofprophets, the...power of God, the breath of God, the very soul of God, the Word born by

the inbreathing of God from the Virgin" He noticed how there was no mention in

scripture of one substance and three persons, or even the key word homoousios,describing the relationship of the Son and the Father. Basically only "somethingabout the

Father,somethingabout the Son, andsomethingabout the Holy Ghost. They are never

declared to be three-in-one, and should we require of the Moors [Muslims] and Jewsadherence to a doctrine not enunciated in the Word of God? If they accept baptism [but

not] this tenet of the three in one, shall we send them to the stake?" (Bainton, The HuntedHeretic, Beacon, 1953, p.13-16, from Servetus, Trinitatus Erroribus, 42b-43a).

Muslims say we have made Christ a "partner" with God, but that's not what the doctrine

of the deity of Christ really means. But it is ourcreedal language that does give that

impression!

3

The History of the Matter

The late apologist Walter Martin once summed up one of his rebuttals to Armstrongism:

"The Christian Church has always understood unity in Trinity, and Trinity in unity, the

full understanding of which God has reserved to Himself until...Christ delivers the


12/59

kingdom to His Father...(1 Cor.15:28)". But just what does this mean? Was it the doctrine

in itspresentform that was first taught by the apostles, and then the church fathers, as

many for centuries have assumed?

Upon a careful study of the fathers of the first three centuries, you find that their

teachings were quite different from what is taught today. And now, some trinitarianscholars even admit this, and that the doctrine developed over the centuries! And it went

through some pretty bizarre stages at that! People today complain about the Jehovah's

Witness and Mormon teachings? That's nothing compared to some of Origen's and someothers' teachings! Many acknowledge him as being a bit off, but even the other fathers of

that period, such as Tertullian, had ideas that would under our strict code of "orthodoxy",

be considered subordinationist. But many from the medieval ages up to today still see

these fathers as traditional trinitarian teachers, whom they assume preserved the MODERN

doctrine which was supposedly handed down to them directly from the apostolic age. But

now, many, more honest scholars are admitting that the Trinity was not originally taught

in the earliest periods of the Church, orby the Bible, but was simply devised over time asa neat way to try to emphasize and understand what actually was taught in the Bible

about the way God reveals Himself to man.

The doctrine of the Trinity is the end result, not the starting point of a long, longprocess of thinking which can be seen going on in the first four centuries of the

Church, as Christian theologians wrestled with God's self revelation in scripture

and tried to understand it. Theproclamation is that God redeems us in JesusChrist. (A.E. McGrath, Understanding the Trinity, p.115, Zondervan)

The trinitarian understanding of God is more a conclusion that we draw aftercareful biblical study than a direct statement of scripture itself. No passage of

scripture discusses the oneness or threeness of God. (The NIV Disciples StudyBible, p.173Matt.3:16,17, Holman Bible Publishers)

The explicit doctrine was thus formulated in the post-biblical period, although

the early stages of its development can be seen in the New Testament. Attemptsto trace the origins still earlier (to the Old Testament literature) cannot be

supported by the historical-critical scholarship, and these attempts must be

understood as retrospective interpretations of this earlier corpus of scripture

in light of later theological developments. The formal doctrine of the Trinityas it was defined by the great church councils of the fourth and fifth centuries is

not to be found in the New Testament. Nevertheless...the presence of the

[triadic] formulas in 2 Cor.13:14 and Matt.28:19 indicate that the origin of thismode of thought may be found very early in Christian history. (Harper's Bible

Dictionary)

Here is the most striking admission:


13/59

The Bible does not teach the doctrine of the Trinity. Neither the word "trinity",

nor such language as "one-in-three", "three-in-one", one "substance", or "three

persons" is biblical language. The language of the doctrine is the language of theancient church, taken not from the Bible, but from classical Greek philosophy.

The church used the language and concepts available to it to interpret what the

Bible says about God and His dealings with the world (We shall...ask laterwhether this language is adequate, or whether we ought to try to find new ways

to say it.) While we cannot find the doctrine itself spelled out in scripture, we

can find there the roots of the doctrine, some affirmations about God whichforced the church to ask questions which led it to formulate the doctrine.

(Shirley C. Guthrie, Christian Doctrine: Teachings of the ChristianChurch,

p.92 ff, 96. Marshall C. Dendy 1968. Used by permission of

Westminster/John Knox Press, Knoxville)

Not only was the doctrine of the Trinity developed, but even the idea of Christ being Godwas not right away completely grasped! Continuing from Guthrie:

The very earliest Christians did not say directly that Jesus is God, or that God isJesus. First of all, they said only that Jesus does what only God can do. They didnot think in the abstract, intellectual language of "being". They thought more

concretely...in terms ofaction. Here is a man who acts like God, who does

God's work. (p.94)

There are numerous other such confessions.

Another proof of this is in the first verse of the second epistle of Clement to the

Corinthians (late 1st century): "Brethren, we ought to think of Jesus Christ as of God; as

of the judge of the living and the dead". Archbishop Wake, who translated it, says this

passage proves the writer's "fulness of belief" on the Trinity, but in actuality, it proves thevery opposite. Christians still didn't quite consider Jesus as being "God". If they did, then

the admonition given them to think of Him as they do of God would be quite redundant!This verse proves just what Guthrie said; that the early church understood the connection

between Jesus and God only in terms of "action" Jesus doing what God does. It was,

however, statements like this, plus the widespread publication of the New Testament,

(which more clearly set forth Christ's deity), and the more scholarly, deeperinvestigations of it during that same period of time, which led the church to declare

directly (beginning with Ignatius) that Jesus is in fact God, and also, later on as people

started to ponder more on the Holy Spirit, it ultimately led to the formulation of thedoctrine of the Trinity. The doctrine wasn't finally refined into its present form until the

fourth century, by Athanasius, an Alexandrian bishop, and ratified by the Nicene council,and given its finishing touches in the fifth century council of Chalcedon. Its formulationwas simply to give the Church a solid doctrinal formula to espouse against the more

developed Arianism and all the other heresies that were creeping into the Church. Guthrie

says: "The church slowly worked out the doctrine of the Trinity in opposition tofalse

interpretations of what it meant to say 'God was in Christ'." (p.97) (The falseinterpretations refer to subordination, in both its Arian and adoptionistic forms, and

modalism, which the author then goes on to describe).


14/59

Armstrong'sJust what is the Holy Spiritpoints this out when he first goes into the wholepoliticalfactor of the matter, involving Constantine, and then concludes "And perhaps

the real reason the Trinity ever prevailed was simply that the majority were not ready todeclare that Christ was originally a created being, as maintained by Arius, or merely an

ordinary man before being anointed by the Holy Spirit...as maintained by others"[i.e. the

adoptionists](p.4) This was an example of the default principle. The Trinity wasdefinitely superior to those other positions, holding Christ in his proper position as

distinct from, but of the same essence as the Father, so it was accepted as the perfect

formula by the majority, and made official by Constantine, who was trying to end thecontroversy that was dividing his empire.Hunted Heretic, p.22 adds:

Initially, it was adopted as a formula to express all that the doctrine of the

Incarnation implied with regard to the being of God Himself. If God actuallyand uniquely became flesh in Christ, what does this mean for the nature of God?

If there were a distinction between God and Christ, and yet Christ was God,

would there not be two Gods? Or if Christ were not really distinct, but only a

mode...then God would indeed be one, but Christ could hardly be regarded as

genuinely human; and when the Spirit was personalized, the problem of the twobecame the problem of the three. The solution was to posit both a oneness and a

threeness in God. The word chosen in Latin to express the oneness wassubstance, and the word for the threeness wasperson. This was the doctrine

formulated at Nicaea in AD 325, and more precisely at Chalcedon in 450.

Thereafter was the doctrine assumed.

P.60:

In order to safeguard biblical meanings, the Council of Nicaea had been drivento employ extra-biblical terms. The Protestant Reformers [who persecuted

Servetus along with the Catholics] had been driven to the same expedient.

Calvin Burrel, president of the Church Of God 7th Day (Denver) wrote a study of the

doctrine in which he made the same observations of its purpose and problems: "Honest

attempts of earnest Christians to maintain deity and personality of Christ and the Spirit";"Never fully developed in scripture, which seems to ascribe to the Father a final

superiority"; "Spirit not consistently pictured as a 'third person' in a sense parallel with

the Father and Son", and continues: "The creeds appear to emphasize symmetry and

philosophy, while glossing over some of the complex and irregular landscape of

scripture on this topic". This was excellently pointed out in Karen Armstrong'sA

History of God, p.116-8, where she shows the PURPOSE of the nice symmetrical (i.e.3

coeternal coequals) formula was basically to make it more of a mystery just for the sake

of mystery! To the Greek church, it was something by which one experiences Godthrough contemplation. (This is where the symmetry of it was useful). It "only made

sense as a mystical or spiritual experience: It had to be lived, not thought, because Godwent far beyond human concepts. It was not a logical or intellectual formulation but an

imaginative paradigm that confounded reason". After all, the Trinity is dogma. We

usually think of dogma as those statements, that must be believed INTELLECTUALLY, no

matter how ridiculous it seems. But that's actually kerygma!Dogma is truth "that is onlygrasped intuitively and as a result of religious experience. Logically, it made no sense at


15/59

all. It reminds us that we must not hope to understand Him". It wasn't meant to be taken

literally or to make sense or be explained. But that is precisely what the Western church

tried to do (even attempting to represent it through pictures) only to have the largersociety jettison the whole idea in the Age of Reason. Where the East, following the

Cappadocian Fathers, started from the threeness, thinking of each hypostasis as the whole

(Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration, 40:41), the West, following Augustine, started from thedivine unity (the mysterious "substance") and then was left trying to figure out how the

Three hypostases fit in. THISis precisely the root of the problem in the West. Looking

through history, we see that the West is where all of the later problems with it arose, withdissenters like Servetus, the Socinians, the Unitarians, and now the "kingdom of the

cults". The East never experienced all of this dissent over the doctrine. And the Eastern

fathers, while regarding Augustine as a great father, were still mistrustful of his

Trinitarian theology. It too, like Arianism, was seen as making God seem too rational andanthropomorphic.

Most people, assuming that the formula approved at Nicaea was the original formula,regard all the others as DELIBERATE "heresies" made up by their formulators to counter the

"orthodox" view. But it was a lot more complex than that. All of these formulas sprang

out of the same biblical revelation, developed together, and diverged as different points,such as the oneness or threeness of God or the humanity or deity of the Son were

emphasized by different people or schools of thought. The challenge was to put all these

truths together in some way, and it was hard to do that without overemphasizing certain

points and thus neglecting others.

The popular view of history now, is that Athanasius represented the "historic orthodox

position" in the Arian controversy, but he actually had drawn heavily on Origen, alsofrom Alexandria, who had taught that not only Christ, but also allhuman souls preexisted

birth, being with God in the beginning, and that Christ was simply the only soul who had

not fallen, and had united Himself with the Word.

Even right before the Nicene Council, the Bishop of Rome himself, Dionysius, "was

clearly shocked at the Origen-inspired doctrine of the three hypostases", as suggested byDionysius of Alexandria, "which seemed to him to undermine the divine monarchy", and

he implied they were "virtual tritheists, splitting the indivisible oneness of the Deity into

'three powers, three absolutely separate hypostases, three divinities'" (Early Christian

Doctrines, p. 134). A History of Godp.110 points out that "When the bishops gathered atNicaea on May 20, 325, to resolve the crisis, few would have shared Athanasius' view of

Christ. Most held a position midway between Arius and Athanasius". [i.e., Him beingdivine, but neverthelessgeneratedat a point in time, and among some, that He was only

like substance (homoeousios or homoiousios) with the Father, rather than thesamesubstance (homoousios)]. Even AFTERthe resolution of the issue, the controversy

continued, with Athanasius even being exiled a few times. It was actually hard for histheology to stick, especially with the controversial unscriptural, materialistic sounding

term homoousion.

Michael Servetus had discovered a lot of these facts also, by studying the early churchfathers. The big mistake that he made was incorporating into his teachings many of the

strange concepts some of the fathers taught, such as overly literal interpretations of Christ


16/59

"living in us", and other things leading in the way of the deification of human flesh and

pantheism. But it further goes to show that the fathers did not teach the nice little

"orthodox" formula that developed later. But the Protestant and Catholic authoritiesthought otherwise. Both claimed that the fathers taught theirdoctrine, and that Servetus

was "distorting" what they said, as Melanchthon claimed. Calvin claimed that Justin "set

forth our opinions no less clearly than if he had written at our request", and derided "thisgenius of a Servetus", when it turned out that Calvin had been reading aspurious codex

known as "Pseudo-Justin", which adds "One...in the Triad, and the Triad ...in one"

(HH,p.187,8/Cal.Op.VIII 498)

So with all of this, it is clear that the precise formula of the Trinity developed over the

centuries. The ancient fathers' concepts helped develop it, but in the light of the full range

of their teachings, how so many can assume that the fourth century doctrine was "alwaystaught" is beyond me. I've heard an argument that it was originally taught, and that pagan

concepts infiltrated it, and then the "development" we see is nothing more than the

doctrine being "restored" to its "original purity", but such a theory flies right in the faceof all the biblical and historical facts, which are now acknowledged by some respected

trinitarian scholars. Apologist James White suggests that saying the doctrine developed

over time is only to "confuse men's knowledge and understandingof God's revelationwith the revelation itself", which was in the Incarnation and coming of the Holy Spirit;

actually between the Testaments. (The Forgotten Trinity, p.166) But the point being made

is, theprecise, symmetrical formula is what developed, not the idea of God as Father, Son

and Spirit, which was believed early on in the Church, as White himself shows. A perfectsymmetrical concept was notrevealed by the coming of the Son and Spirit or in the

scriptures themselves. And where the Reformers and inquisitors would accuse Servetus

of "distorting" the fathers, it seems that all they themselves did was to pull out of thefathers statements that went along with their doctrine, and ignore what didn't the

subordinationism. The neoplatonism. The strange concepts of the Logos, and of human

souls and pantheistic concepts which Servetus had only derived from those fathers.Plus,the lack of the precise formulation of the Trinity.

But both the Protestants and Catholics, (who were still fighting each other over theReformation) felt strongly enough about this doctrine that was held in common by them,

to unite themselves against Servetus, calling him all kinds of names, chasing him all

around Europe, cornering him in trials, and finally burning him at the stake in Geneva, as

he cried out to Jesus just like a traditional martyr (HH,p.212/Mosheim no.1 449-50). Hisstory is fairly reminiscent of Christ's, and the church authorities were very much like the

corrupt Jewish authorities who condemned Jesus. They were "...better informed on what

he opposed, than on what he was trying to formulate." (Encyc.Brit. 1st ed. art

"SERVETUS")

4

Economism: Triunity in Nature and the Pre-Nicene Fathers


17/59

So now that we know the formula made official at Nicaea wasn't really the original

formula, what was? What is a better alternative? Before going into this, it will be helpful

to show some models of triunity, that may help us understand how the Father, Son andHoly Spirit fit together.

To help people try to picture "trinity in unity", trinitarian writers began referring toexamples of triunity in nature. "The Heavens declare the glory of God..."(Psalms 19:1),

and for many things there is a source to which it is 'referenced', or 'identified in/as', a

visible manifestation which it is seen in, and a third manifestation, which it is

experienced in. So God Himself is identified as the FATHER, (1 Cor.8:6),seen in the SON,

(John 14:9, Heb.1:3), and experienced in the HOLY SPIRIT (Romans 5:5, 1 Cor.2:10).

The universe is identified as the physical realm, which is manifest in space, andexperienced in time. Space is referenced to a 1st dimension (l=length), seen in two

dimensions (l 2=area) and experienced in three dimensions (l 3=volume). Time has its

source in the future, is manifest in the present, and was experienced in the past. Now, themost striking analogy is a light source. The burning or glowing object is the source. it is

seen in the light it emits, and felt in the heat which is emitted by both the source itself,and also by the generated light. Now this turns out to be practically the exact model of theGodhead. In fact, this analogy is even recognized in scripture, where Jesus is called "the

light" (John 1:4-9, 8:12, 12:46, Rev.21:23), and along with the Spirit, proceeds forth from

the Father; and the Spirit is sometimes associated with fire (e.g. Luke 3:16, Acts 2:3,4),

and is also described in a similar analogy involving wind (John 3:8), and proceeds fromboth the Father and Son (John 14:16,26; 15:26; 16:7).

Moving on to living beings now, another excellent analogy is what is called the

trichotomy, or "triunity of man". Man, made in the image of a plural God (Gen.1:26), is

identified in/referenced to his SOUL, seen in his BODY, and in a sense, can be experienced

by his SPIRIT. Now the distinction between soul and spirit is pretty fuzzy, and the two arefrequently confused, but they are shown to be separate in 1 Thess.5:23 and Heb.4:12. (A

good explanation of their difference, which basically is tied up with the emotions

associated with them, is given in the appendix.) The soul is shown to be the person'sself,basically the invisible person. So your soul is you. The body is also you, representing the

person in the physical visible realm. Whereas it can be shown that animals are souls,

(Gen.1:20-21, 30; 2:19, 9:4, 10, 12, 15; Lev.11:10, 17:11) they are never shown as having

spirits, but it is man's spirit that gives him his understanding (1 Cor.2:11, Job 32:8),setting us apart from the animals, and is the part of us that communicates with God

(Rom.8:16). No doubt, God's creating us "in His image" was His adding, breathing into

us that third part of us that gave us our intelligence. Body and spirit are in a sense,

manifestations of your soul. They are your soul, or person in the sense of being differentparts or aspects of it. When something troubles your soul, they troubleyou; when your

body is hurt,you are hurt; when God 'touches' or 'moves' your spirit, He does those thingstoyou.

Another interesting thing to note is the distinctions of man's constituents. Soul, body, and

spirit can communicate with each other! Take, let's say, a temptation to sin. The body("flesh") says yes, the spirit (conscience convicted by the Holy Spirit) says no, and your

mind (soul) is in the middle and has to choose which to obey. If you please the flesh, the


18/59

spirit will trouble you; if you follow the spirit, the flesh will be displeased. The body

receives stimuli from the outside world through the senses, and this is relayed to then

back an forth between the soul and spirit through their corresponding emotions, as isdiscussed in the appendix. Also, they can communicate their own separate messages to

the outside. You cansay one thing, (whatever comes to your mind), but your body can

give a totally different message (e.g. facial expressions, gestures), and once again, it'smore fuzzy, but people can often sense what's in a person's heart (spirit), especially by the

emotions. Excellent studies of the subject are given in Man On Three Dimensions, by

Kenneth Hagin, Rhema Bible Church; and The Spiritual Man, by Watchman Nee,Christian Fellowship Publishers. See also appendix. (Note: A lot of Hagin's teachings are

seriously questionable by biblical Christianity, but his treatment of this subject seemed to

be good).

So we see how we can have three separate aspects making up one person, that can have

their own distinctions without being three separate persons. (This is, however, notto re-

suggest Sabellianism, as I shall soon explain).

All of these analogies are cited by apologists to teach three Persons in one God, butnotice that none of these analogies feature three "co-equal" parts. There is always asource and its two manifestations, which are 'equal' in its essence, but just not as

symmetrical as the way God is pictured. At this point, they will always say "Well, these

illustrations aren't exact", and that is true, but still, what they are doing is using these

analogies just enough to establish the concept of 'threeness' so they can verify thedoctrine, but not taking it any further to get a better picture of exactly how triunity

functions.

All of these examples helped me to better understand how "three could be one", but at the

same time, they all the more made the traditional Trinity formula seem more and more

out of place. The neat symmetrical form of it is itself what seemed to get in the way of abetter understanding of it. Especially when you see that these non-symmetrical models of

triunity are precisely the way the "orthodox" church saw God before the Nicene council.

Economic Trinitarianism: the Pre-Nicene Orthodoxy

According to the Encyclopedia Britannica (1st ed., art. "SABELLIANISM"), Servetus

"reformulated" Sabellianism "...to the effect that Christ and the Holy Spirit were merelyrepresentative forms of the one Godhead, the Father". Now THIS seemed to be heading

more in the way of what the Bible really implies. To repeat, God is the FATHER(1

Cor.8:6). And the Son and Spirit are MANIFESTATIONS of Him (John 14:9, Heb.1:3, Acts5:3,4), which PROCEED FORTH FROM Him (John 8:42, 16:28; 15:26). Servetus drew heavilyfrom the pre-Nicene fathers and it turned out that this was their view as well. (He started

out adoptionistic, but later modified his views). Irenaeus taught that the Son and Spirit

were the "two hands of God", representing the immediate activity of God in the world;creation, revelation and redemption. Tertullian regarded the Logos as eternal with God,

but the Son as a historical emergence when the Logos became flesh in Jesus.(HuntedHeretic, p.45)


19/59

Early Christian Doctrines, by J.N.D Kelly, (Harper & Row, 1960), gives us an even

better picture of the pre-Nicene fathers' theology, proving what Servetus said. It has been

labeled "Economic Trinitarianism": "'God the Father', connotednot the first Person of

[a] Holy Trinity, but the one Godhead considered as author of whatever exists." (p.100)

The Word and Spirit, even though always existing IN the Father, were not revealed as

separate entities from the Father until they were manifestedfor the purpose of redemptionand sanctification the 'economy' (dispensation). "Unless these points are firmly

grasped, and their significance appreciated, a completely distorted view of the Apologists'

theology is liable to result" (ibid.). The generation of Sonship was held to be at theIncarnation, and among some, the Creation.

The term 'Person'"...was still reserved for Them as manifested in the order of revelation;

only later did it come to be applied to the Word and Spirit as imminent in God's

eternal being".

So in the pre-Nicene period, the 'Triad' was represented "...by the imagery, not of three

coequal Persons (this was the analogy to be employed by the post-Nicene fathers),

but ofa single Personage, the Father, who is the Godhead itself, with His mind orrationality, and His wisdom. The motive for this approach, common to all Christian

thinkers of this period, was their intense concern for the fundamental tenet of

monotheism, but its unavoidable corollary was a certain obscuring of the position of theSon and Spirit as 'Persons'(to use the jargon of later theology)prior to their generation

or emission" (ECD, p.107,8, emphasis added). Both Hippolytus and Tertullian "...had theconception of God existing in unique solitariness from all eternity, yet having immanent

in and indivisibly one with himself, on the analogy of the mental functions in a man, His

reason or Word Logos endiathetos" (p.111). To Tertullian, the Word or Reason of God,which was like a second in addition to Himself, was like the 'rationality' by which a man

cogitates and plans, which is a 'second' in [man's] self (Adv. Prax.5).

A Nicene period form of economism was the "expansionism" of Marcellus, bishop of

Ancyra (d.374), who was actually a member of the Nicene party. He taught that the

Monad expanded/extended into a dyad (though the Logos was always immanent in theMonad), and then into a triad. The process would be reversed after the final judgment.

The Nicene party at first espoused it, proving that economism was the prior orthodoxy,

but then gradually disassociated itself from it, favoring the now more fashionable

Origenist/Athanasian position.

The fact that this 'economic trinitarianism' lies at a closer period of time to the apostolic

age than the later formulation is significant. It reflects a purer, more biblical simplicity.As has been pointed out, the Bible never makes a formula for the Godhead. But its

outlook is more 'economic' regarding the members of the Godhead. The Son and Holy

Spirit are simply laid out as the ways in which God (the Father) works and revealsHimself in the world. The idea of the three unchanging eternal equal "Persons" was

clearly a later interpretation of various scriptures put together.

Economic Trinitarian Statements


20/59

Irenaeus:

"By the very essence and nature of His being, there is but one God, while at the sametime, according to the economy of our redemption, there are both Father and Son".

(Dem.47)

Tertullian:

"We believe in only one God, yet subject to this...economy, that the one only God hasalso a Son, His Word Who has issued out of Himself...which Son then sent...the Holy

Spirit, the Paraclete, out of the Father". (Adv.Prax.2)

Hippolytus:

"When I speak of 'another', I do not mean two Gods, but as it were, light from light, water

from its source, a ray from the sun. For there is only one Power, that which issues fromthe All. The All is the Father, and the Power issuing from the All is the Word. He is the

Father's mind...thus all things are through Him" (C.Noet.7;11;14)


21/59

5 THE ENIGMA OF "PERSONHOOD"By far, the most confusing problem with the Trinity is the use of the word "Persons".Whenever you think of a "person", you think of a separate, individual BEING; usually a

human being, at that! And many representations of the Trinity have indeed been as three

men! Not only that, but many Trinitarians do sometimes call them "three beings", or even


22/59

"the divine council". And they all cite "personal" activities of each of them in various

scriptures to support this.

The basis of the Nicene formula is: 1)the scriptures mentioning Father, Son and Holy

Spirit, the most clear being the baptismal formula of Matt.28:19 and the doxology of 2

Cor.13:14. There are also other places where the Three are mentioned in the samepassage; and Isaiah 48:16 where the divine speaker mentions "the Lord God and His

Spirit" sending Him. 2) proofs of "plurality" the "Us" passages of the Old Testament:

Gen.1:26, 11:2, Is.6:8, and the plural name "Elohim". Another argument is that even the"One" (echad) of Deut.6:8 (the basic verse of the "extreme monotheists" or monarchians)

is plural! 3) Personal activities of the Spirit, and the Word's being "with" ("distinct from")

God, and speaking separately in the passage of Isaiah.

So then, it is assumed that the "distinctness" and "plurality" refers to what we call

"persons"; which are also said to be "equal" and "co-eternal", thus creating a perfect

three-way symmetry. The unity or divine nature they all share in common, is then calleda "substance" or "essence". Thus is borne the standard understanding of the Trinity,

which we are supposedly "compelled by scripture to teach". But is all of this really thebest way to describe the Godhead?

It is clear from scripture that there are two other proper nouns associated with God (the

Father). Most groups out there do believe the Holy Spirit is divine. The Mormons make

the Holy Spirit a separate god, but to them, all three are separate gods, so the Spirit is stillon an equal level with the other members. Even though the unitarians, and binitarians call

the Spirit an impersonal force, they do believe it is "the extension of the living power of

God" (Denver group doctrinal statement), or the "projected" Spirit of Christ and theFather as "the POWERthat responds and does what Jesus commands" (Armstrong). (The

Jehovah's Witnesses are the only major group who believes the Spirit is a created "force",

but they are still forced to mention 'it' in ways that distinguish 'it' from other forces.) Inthe orthodox Jewish concept, He is the person of the Father in a Power that inspires man,

and in their literature, you'll even see mention of a Person called the "holy Spirit". To

them, this is simply another name for the Person of God, especially in relation to theinspiration of scripture. These groups do see the Spirit as fully part of the one divine

essence, after all, God IS spirit; "His Spirit" is what He consists of (Gen.1:2). You could

even say, the very "substance" the trinitarians speak of. And the early Christians got their

concepts from the Jewish.

As for Christ, even though the Arians and unitarians reject His deity, He still winds up

being held by them as a unique being who is more associated with God than any other,and shares many of His powers, attributes, titles, and authority as recorded in scripture.

The Arians, including the Jehovah's Witnesses, even go as far as to acknowledge Jesus as

Creator! (What these groups should realize, is that if they are willing to confess that Jesusis all of these things, then they might as well just go on and call Him Godas the early

church, and also I, had realized).

So we see that unanimously, even among the groups that fight the Trinity concept sohard, no one can deny that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit no more and no less

are uniquely associated with Godhood. (Even the unitarian Wierwille has stated


23/59

"Biblically, there are three: 1)God...the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 2)Jesus Christ,

the Son of God and the son of man, and 3)the holy Spirit, God's gift" (JCNG p.123, also

quoted in The Spirit of Truth and the Spirit of Error)) But then does all of this lead us tothe symmetrical Athanasian-Nicene formula?

Sonship

The first thing to deal with in tackling this problem is the meaning of Jesus' Sonship.

Luke 1:35 plainly equates Jesus' Sonship with His conception by God through the Holy

Spirit. His Sonship refers to His existence after His begettalwhen He was born as aman. His dual nature is covered in both titles: "Son of man" refers to His being born of

Mary, and Son of God points to God as His Father; the one who caused Mary to be

pregnant with Him. But trinitarian scholars have turned both Sonship and begettal intoentirely different concepts. They say that "Son" is only a sort of metaphor for "the eternal

relationship shared by the first two Persons of the Trinity", and that the "begettal" or

"generation" of the Son was "from [past] eternity". But none of this redefinition is in theBible.1 People even wondered why the Son was "generated" while the Spirit only"proceeded" from the Father. It obviously points to the generation of the Son as referring

to His physical conception.

Scholars point out that "Son of God" as it was used later on in the Gospels referred to His

actions, majesty, and authority, the term often referring in the ancient oriental world to

rulers. People believed in Jesus' miracles and authoritative teaching, not because of Hisdivine conception (which some did not even know about at first), but rather, it was the

other way around. But this only further proves that the Title could only possibly refer to

His life AFTERHis birth, AS THE MAN who did these things, not before His birth as a mystical

"second Person" beside a "first Person" called "His Father"

So I believe in the dual, or in fact triple meaning of His Sonship: His divine conception,

His spiritual adoption, and His divine life. Sonship does still refer to His conception bythe Spirit. People want to deny that the Holy Spirit has anything to do with the role of a

"seed" (or sperm) that begets. Some think that is a disgusting analogy. But remember that

GOD is the one who created the human reproductive system, and that we are in His

["OUR"] image! And it is the Spirit that begets individual people spiritually, making

them sons and daughters of God (Romans 8:14-17), AND brothers of Jesus (Matt. 12:50,

Heb.2:10,11), showing clearly that Jesus' Sonship to the Father is basically in the samesense as our sonship (but, of course, with the addition of Him receiving His physicallife

(and nature) directly from the Father as well as spiritual.) Some will charge that the Spirit

caused Mary to give birth to Jesus, not the Father, supposedly disproving Sonship asreferring to the birth. (Then people like Muslims charge "that makes the Holy SpiritJesus' father!"). But remember, as was just shown, the Father represented the whole

Godhead, and the Spirit was His means of conceiving the child Jesus. (Which disproves

the charge that this was some sort of sexual union).


24/59

Equality and Co-eternality

Trinitarians say that the Son is "equal", and this is the major cause of confusion in the

matter. "Father" is a title of authority, and "son" is a title of subordination. So picturingthe Father, Son, and Spirit as "co-equal, co-eternal Persons" seems to give the impression

that the Father, this figure of supreme authority whom the Bible says is the Source andthe one from whom the Son and Spirit proceed (and NEVERvice-versa!), is nothing more

than, as Muhammad complained, "a thirdof three" (Qu'ran 5:171). And not only that, acommon representation of the Trinity has "Father", "Son", and "Spirit" radiating out of

"God" in the center, representing the "one substance" they share. Not only does this make

the Father a third, but it has also been said that the central figure could be considered afourth entity, creating a "Quaternity". The same problem is also true for modalists who

claim that the three are only three equal masks worn by, or roles played by "God" who

could have a "true identity" which could be considered a fourth role. 2

A better way to express the Godhead is to have "God the Father" at the center, and the

Son and Spirit radiating from Him. This better fits the biblical and pre-Nicene model ofthe Godhead, like Irenaeus' "Two hands of God". This does not take into account theprocession of the Spirit from the Son also, but it is in harmony with the fact that God is

"identified as" the Father, and that the Son and Spirit are the ways that the Father is

revealed or made known, rather than the Father Himself being an equal manifestation ofsomething else. Furthermore, the Son and Spirit are the Son OF God, and Spirit OF God,

but there is no FATHEROF God.3 Likewise, "God the Son", and "God the Spirit" are not

used by Scripture, but "God, the Father" is. This shows once again, that God is referencedto the Father, and revealed in the Son and Spirit.

So the answer to subordinationism is once again to point out that Jesus' Sonship refers to

His humanity. In fact, Walter Martin admitted that the title of "Son" essentially began atbirth, and that it was a subordinate role:

The Lord Jesus Christ...is now and for all eternity the Son of God...therefore, in

this sense is He the Eternal Son. But to be Biblical in the true sense of the term,

we must be willing to admit that He was known prior to His Incarnation as the

Eternal Word. Nevertheless since the word 'son' definitely suggests

inferiority...it is absolutely essential that Christ as the Eternal Word be pointedup as an antidote to the Arian heresy of the Jehovah's Witnesses. (Kingdom ofthe Cults p.117, 118, emphasis added).

(John MacArthur also once held this view, but later renounced it, apparently, under

criticism from others.)

This is the best idea, because the title "Word" does not suggest any kind of subordinationor inferiority to the Father. The Radio Bible Class bookletDoes the Bible Contradictitself?, p.14,15 states:

As God, Christ was equal to the Father in His eternal essence and character.

However, when He left Heaven on His mission of mercy, He temporarily laid

aside His rights and honor in order to become the God-man. To become one of

us, He left His glory behind and accepted a role of total dependence on His


25/59

father. Although He has once again been restored to honor and glory, His role as

the God-man is not over. While being equal with God in essence, He has

accepted a subordinate role in order to carry out the eternal plan.

So as the Word, Jesus IS equal to and co-eternal with the Father, but the Son is a

subordinate role of the Word. This really helps to clear things up concerning the problemof subordination. But what was Jesus like as the Word before His birth? And what about

the Holy Spirit for all times? Is it necessary to refer to them as individual "Persons"? This

is the other big puzzle. Just what is a "person" anyway?


26/59

The Meaning of "Personhood"

A "person" is said to be an entity with "an intellect, emotions, and a will". Does God

then, have three different sets of will, emotions and intellect? Wouldn't the threesomehow share a common will, intellect and emotions (apart from the Word's being

manifested as a man)? Many claim they really are analogous to three separate men inunity. (It's easy for them to make this claim, since they are composed of Spirit, and

therefore easier to picture as still being of "one substance".) But still, isn't this reallycompromising even asubstantialunity? Is it like when the legion of demons possessing a

man spoke as one person with one plural name (Luke 8:27-30) as someone has

illustrated? Some more informed apologists are now renouncing these analogies, but indefending the traditional view, still speak of the "persons" in basically the same fashion.

The book that gave me the greatest help in understanding the problem concerning theterm "persons", and the most honest and down to earth treatment of the subject is Shirley

C. Guthrie's Christian Doctrine. On p.99-104, He first presents some false interpretations

of the Trinity. The most striking is:In the beginning, there were three Gods up in Heaven. At first, the Father...came

down to deal with his people. Then he sent the Son. After the Son went back up

to Heaven, the Holy Spirit came. But the doctrine of the Trinity means thatFather, Son and Holy Spirit are not a Heavenly club, with the members coming

and going like the gods of pagan mythology, or like substitutes in a football

game. Christians believe in one God, not a team of Gods. (p.91)

But a 'team' concept is what the Trinity has given the impression of, the way it's beentraditionally presented there are these three "co-equal, co-eternal Persons"; the second

One is called "the Son". It's just by coincidence that this Son is the Person who decided,or was chosen to be born as a man. But that Sonship has absolutely nothing to do with

His humanity, nor with any other kind of subordination to the "first Person", who

happens to be called "the Father", but is really nothing more than another equal memberof the Trio. (These are all just "functions" anyway, they say.)

This is part of what makes the whole thing so confusing. So then Guthrie describes whatthe church originally was trying to say:

Having rejected the false solutions of modalism and subordinationism, the

church then had to work out its own statement about the Trinity. Its alternativewas not really a solution to the problem of how God is one and yet three... All it

really did was to affirm both his oneness and his genuine presence and work in

Christ (and the Spirit). The one God makes himself known to us and works inour world and our individual lives in three different ways. But in each of these

ways of his presence and working, we really have to do with the one God

himself, not with three gods, nor with a hierarchy of divine beings, nor with

Halloween masks which hide who the one behind them really is. The ancientchurch said this in the language and concepts available to it at the time. Even

then it had no adequate way of expressing what it wanted to affirm; its

formulation was open to misunderstanding, and it was often misunderstood. The


27/59

ancient formula is even more difficult to understand in our time. Not only are

the language and concepts of the second and third centuries strange to us; they

have actually changed meaning over the years. Part of the confusion andmisunderstanding of the doctrine of the Trinity in our time is of course due to

the inexpressible mystery it points to. But part of it is due also to our reading

into the language of the doctrine handed down to us a meaning it was neverintended to have. If we turn now to look more closely at the classical doctrine,

therefore, we have two things to do: We have to try to understand its content,

and we have to translate its language. Let us look briefly at what this doctrineaffirms. If we are to understand what the doctrine affirms, then we must try to

understand what it means when it expresses the unity of God with the concepts

"one essence" or "one substance", and what it means when it expresses thedistinctions in God and his work by speaking of "three persons".

1. The Unity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are of one essence or substance. They have thesame nature. This language is misleading today, first of all, because it is

impersonal, suggesting that God is a neuter something composed out of somekind of basic stuff as we have learned to think that all things in the world are

composed of the fundamental elements. The classical trinitarian language seems

to suggest a lifeless reality of one kind or another, rather than a living, acting

person. Moreover, in our thinking this language could suggest not a way ofexpressing the oneness of God, but a way of losing it. The doctrine does not

mean that Father, Son and Spirit are three different persons who share a

common divine essence in the same way that three different men might be saidto share a common humanity [a commonly used illustration!]. That would

obviously be a crude tri-theism. One essence or substance originally meant that

Father, Son and Holy Spirit are thesame in being or identical in being. It meant,as Barth has put it, that in God there are not three divine "I's", but one "I". It is a

way of saying what we have already emphasized: When we have to do with the

Father or with the Son or with the Spirit, we have to do not with a part of God,or with a different God; we have to do with the one God himself.

2. The distinctions within God and his work.

If the terms essence or substance are confusing to us today as a means of

expressing the oneness of God, the term "person" is disastrous as an expression

of the distinctions within God. In our time, "person" means a self-conscious,individual, autonomous personality. To speak of God in three persons suggests

to us three different personalitiesthree different gods somehow combined into

one. The church has neverintended to say this. But in using the language of theancient world, it has led many people...to assume that Christians are supposed to

believe in three gods, no matter how carefully this is concealed with double-talk.

It is very important to get this straight.In our sense of the word, there are not

three persons or personalities in God. God is only one person . When we speak


28/59

of God as personal, or as a person, we refer to the one person who is Father, Son

and Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, the fact that we can speak of this one person only

in a threefold way does mean that there are distinctions within the richness ofGod's being and work. The classical doctrine of the Trinity tried to express these

distinctions with the Latinpersona. This concept referred in the ancient world to

a mask worn by an actor in the theater to help him play his role more effectively.Later, it came to refer to the role itself rather than to the mask. When this

concept was used in the traditional doctrine of the Trinity, it was it was intended

to mean something like "way of being" or "way of existence". "One God in threepersons", then, means one God who has at the same time three distinct "ways of

existence" as God or "ways of being God". To translate persona in this way is

not to fall back into the heresy of modalism, (a) so long as we remember that

these three ways of being are not just masks behind which the real God ishidden, but ways in which God himself lives and works; (b) so long as we

remember that God lives and works in these three ways, not in temporal

succession (as if there werefirstthe Father, then the Son, then the Spirit [an

early form of modalism]), butsimultaneously.

From CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE: Teachings of the Christian Church, by ShirleyGuthrie, p. 99-102. Marshall C. Dendy 1968. Used by permission of

Westminster/ John Knox Press.

(Kelley,Early Christian Doctrines, p.114-5 similarly goes through the early meanings ofprosopon (Greek) as well aspersona and concludes: "In neither case, it should be noted,

was the idea of self-consciousness nowadays associated with 'person' and 'personal' at allprominent.") Author Gregory Boyd of Bethel College, in Oneness Pentecostals and the

Trinity (Baker, 1992) even accepts the idea that the "persons" are like the inner

constitutions of a single human person or a person's self and self-image (the"psychological model") in response to Oneness charges of tritheism. (p.171-175). St.

Augustine and Jonathan Edwards are even quoted to the affirmative.

So this explanation really clears up the whole issue. It does still seem to leave us with a

modalisticsoundingsolution, since it does not clearly enough reaffirm the distinctness of

the Father and Son, as in the Son's prayer to the Father, or sitting at His right hand. It is

just to show that the term person as originally coined by the church did not have the samemeaning as it does to those who apply the modern meaning to the threeness of God and

read it into various scriptures, as well as those who reject the concept entirely because of

its seeming lack of sense, or appearance of tritheism. The point is, that "person" is notreally a good word for the 'threeness' of God, at all, even though one can cite scriptures

that seem to support the common understanding of it. The term itself, hypostasis, is only

used in the Bible regarding the Father with the Son as His express image (Heb.1:3). Theother Greek term,prosopon [presence], is also used for the incarnate Son (2 Cor.2:10).

"Person" really refers to human beings; it is almost synonymous, and is used as a neutral

form of "man" and "woman". Animals are individual souls with a certain amount of willand emotions, but we do not call them "persons", because they are lowerforms of being,

intellectually. We don't even really think of angels as "persons", even though they are

definitely shown to be 'personal' beings. So the term really does not fit well for either the


29/59

threeness of God, or even for the oneness (the monarchian position) either, since God is

more higher to us, than we are to the animals. But since God was manifested as an actual

human being, that entity, Jesus Christ, is definitely a "Person", separate from God in Hisnatural form. Since humans were made in the image of God (who is the Father), then He

too is identified with personhood, as Heb.1:3 acknowledges. These are the biblical uses

of the term.

Now this may leave the question of how God could be two "Persons", one human, one

divine. This is what remains the mystery. AsDoes the Bible Contradict Itself, p.15continues: "No one is able to understand how God could become a man while still

remaining God" (something modalism seems to deny). It's not a "three-in-one" mystery

the Bible emphasizes, but rather "the mystery of godliness" God manifest in the flesh

(1 Tim.3:16). Now that we have seen the personhood of the Father and Son, that leavesthe non-incarnate Word and the Holy Spirit.

The Word (Logos)

"Word" or "Logos" was a Greek concept John had used to describe the pre-incarnate Son,

which meant the plan, reason, or revelatory thought of God. Now these definitions seem

to suggest that this Word was not a separate "Person" in itself. For instance, WalterMartin concluded that "Never was there a moment when God had thought apart from

Logos or reason". (Kingdom of the Cults p.118). But when you think about it, one person

does not think through another person. His thoughts are apart of the one person. And thisis the way pre-Nicene Fathers such as Tertullian saw the pre-incarnate Word! (See his

statement quoted on p.31)

The Logos basically represented God's physical/visible activity on earth, such as Creation

(John 1:3, 2 Pet.3:5, Psalms 33:6), and the visible manifestations (theophanies) men saw.So in this sense, the Yahweh who appeared to man was the Word, but this Word was not a

demiurge or 'mediator' between man and another "higher" being man did not know about.He was simply the special visible manifestation of God to men, who could not see God in

His natural form. This can even be seen in the various "Angels of Yahweh", who were

called or spoke as "Yahweh" or "Elohim". The "one like the Son of God" in Daniel 3:25could also be such a manifestation of the pre-incarnate Word, anticipating the coming and

work of the incarnate Word as the "Son". (It could have still been a regular angel, since

angels were also called "sons of God".) 4

Now none of this means that Jesus was "created", or "began His existence" at birth, nor

was the Son "formed by the union of the Word with the human Jesus", as manyadoptionists claimed. The man Jesus, the Son of God, was simply the final form theLogos/Word has taken on. His life as a separate [human] Person began at birth, but that

was not the beginning of His existence. He had existed as/in the Person of God since "the

beginning" (past eternity). When the human person died, He simply returned to the Fatherthe way He was before. (Luke 23:46, John 16:28) This is why He could say that He

would raise His own body from the dead (John 2:19-22), when it was said that the Father

raised Him. (Acts 3:26, Galatians 1:1, Ephesians 1:17-20). And its the only answer to the


30/59

popular unitarian challenge of how God could "die". The idea of the Logos as a separate

person in itself turns out to be the more pagan version of the concept, which came

through certain of the fathers, such as Origen, who interpreted it according to theircontemporary philosophy.

The Holy Spirit

The Holy Spirit is the being of God (Father and Son) in us, speaking to us. Just think of

the Spirit "speaking" to you. Is this really a different "being" with different "emotions",

"will", and "intellect" from the Father or Son? Why is it always the Holy Spirit thatspeaks to us and never the Father or Son directly? (Wouldn't it be possible for the "team

members" to ever switch up for a change?)

Philip Yancey's "A Trinity of Voices" section inDisappointment With God, p.151-2

(Zondervan), is a great illustration of the three different ways God has "spoken" to man.

He points out that the Father no longer shouts down from Heaven, nor can the human

voice of Jesus any longer be heard on earth. God now speaks to us through the "still smallvoice" in our hearts. This, along with the verbal inspiration of scripture, is how the Spirit

has always worked. The Spirit has never shouted down from heaven (Rev.14:13: "A

VOICE" speaks from Heaven, THENthe Spirit, speaking to John adds to it "Yes..."), norbecame a man. (Yet, as I'll later explain, the Holy Spirit is made manifest in the persons

of men.)

A great example of the personal connection between the Spirit and the other Members, is

in Revelation ch.2&3 at the end of each of the messages to the seven churches: "...hear

what the Spiritsays to the churches". But who is it that has been speaking these messages

to the churches? It's Jesus! He is the Person speaking to believers through the Spirit. And

also in John 14:16-24 where Jesus speaks of the Holy Spirit's coming after His departure,and says "Iwill come to you"; "...the world will see me no more, but you will see me, you

will know that...you [are] in Me, andI in you...and I will manifest Myself to [you]...andmake my home with [you]". Once again,Jesus is the Person who lives with and in us

through the Spirit.


31/59

The Mystery of "Plurality": "Us"/"Elohim"

The biggest argument for the traditional view is the "hints of plurality" found in the Old

Testament. Like I had said before, these occurrences in scripture were quickly taken andhad the Nicene concept of "Persons" read into them. But there are other reasonable


32/59

expl

Date post:	30-May-2018
Category:	Documents
Upload:	eric-tb
View:	214 times
Download:	0 times

God In a Box: A Comprehensive look at problems and solutions concerning the Tri-une Nature of God

Documents