Notes on the Christian Trinity and Incarnation - A Metaphysical Critique
Notes on the Trinity
The doctrine of the Trinity claims that the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God, and that there is exactly One God. Three divine persons equal one God. Three persons are coequal and coeternal. A contradiction arises from these seven premises:
1. The Father is God
2. The Son is God.
3. The Holy Spirit is God.
4. The Father is not the Son
5. The Father is not the Holy Spirit
6. The Son is not the Holy Spirit
7. There is exactly One God
But how many Gods are there? There are three “is God” statements where the subjects are not identical and yet we are claiming that there is only One God. It would seem by the 6 premises that there are 3 Gods and the seventh premise creates a contradiction.
In other words:
1. Zain is a man
2. Zach is a man
3. Grant is a man
4. Zain is not Zach
5. Zain is not Grant
6. Grant is not Zach
7. There is/are exactly one/three man/men
Cappadocian Father who advanced early Christian doctrines such as Trinity, now considered a saint, Gregory of Nyssa says regarding the Trinity:
“The many that have participated in the nature come to be called disciples or apostles or martyrs but the man in all is one since as was said man is not of the singular but of the common nature for Luke is a man or Stephen is but it is not the case that if someone is a man he is also wholey Luke or Stephen but the logos of the hypotheses admits the particularization through the peculiarities seen in them and is considered according to the synthesis in number yet the nature is one having been unified itself to itself a strictly indivisible monad not increased through addition not decreased through subtraction but essentially being one and remaining one even when it manifests in a plurality indivisible and continuous and whole not divided together with those particulars participating in it and in just the way that a people or an army or a church is said in the singular in every case yet each of these is conceived to be in plurality so according to the more precise account, man would be said strictly to be one despite those displayed in the same nature being in plurality. Thus it would be much better to correct our erroneous habit so as no longer to extend the plurality the name of the nature than by our bondage to habit to transfer to our statements concerning God the error which exists in the above case.”
Other premises Trinitarians subscribe to are that:
1. The Father is uncaused
2. The Son is the only begotten
3. The Holy Spirit proceeds from either the Father alone or from the Father through the Son
Possible rebuttals:
1. Trinity is a mystery
1. God is unknowable and beyond comprehension
2. Human intellect is not adequate for understanding the Trinity.
1. Negative mysterianism:
1. Lack of knowledge rather than contradiction in the Trinity, no analogy in the created order nor adequate language available. But how can you believe in what you cannot explain?
2. Positive mysterianism:
1. Not lack of information but too much information about the Trinity. It is an apparent contradiction but not actual. But prove that is apparent, not actual. Another problem with this stance is that one could use this for any religion.
Mystery versus Logical Contradiction: There is a theological understanding that we will never truly understand God or His nature but any theological system that wants to be taken seriously needs to seek to avoid contradictory statements about the divine. If a religion claims that God exists and does not exist at the same time, that is a logical contradiction, to claim that God is beyond logic is irrational.
Social Trinitarianism:
Social models claim that the term “person” should be understood in a robust and modern psychological sense of what we understand a person to be today. This entails that the persons are three distinct centers of consciousness each possessing an intellect and will. Generally they posit that the three persons of the Trinity are actually in one essence but are numerically distinct substances. These three persons share the divine nature in a similar way that humans share a human nature (Zain, Zach, Grant). There is One God because there is one divine nature. Each of the persons fully possess the divine nature and so therefore they are fully divine. These divine persons exist necessarily, (they have to exist and cannot exist in any other way), they are mutually dependent upon one another and are in perfect harmony with each other in every way including their wills. 3 souls or 3 individual rational substances. The claim is that it is not tritheism as tritheism entails that there are three independent divine beings but in this model, the persons are not independent. The “is God” statement is a statement of predication or an attribute meaning that “is God” means divine while premise 7 is a title.
The problem with this is the equivocation fallacy. It also leads to a further problem: The Trinity is a fourth instance of divine nature or it is not. If it is then there are four Gods. This is because if what makes them divine is the divine nature they share then you have the Trinity a fourth instance of the divine nature then that would mean that there are four Gods and that is unorthodox on the basis of monotheism. If the Trinity is not an instance of the divine nature then the Trinity is not divine then that abandons Trinitarian monotheism. If the Trinity is divine but not a fourth instance of the divine nature then that gives two options, either there are two ways to be divine or there is only one way to be divine. If there is one way to be divine then there again are two options, only the persons that make up the trinity are properly divine or only the Trinity as a whole is divine not the persons. But is it fair to say that only the Trinity not the persons are divine, that conflicts with the 7 premises which state that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are divine. If the persons are divine and the Trinity is not then that abandons Triniarian monotheism again. That only leaves with one option, that there are two ways to be divine differently between the Trinity and the persons but that is unorthodox as well as this leads to the persons being less divine than the trinity is as that would make the persons as three parts of God making a whole part relationship which contradicts divine simplicity which states that God is indivisible and also leads to Subordinationism as the persons of the Trinity are subordinate to the Trinity as a whole.
Functional monotheism is the view that there is only One God because the persons in the Trinity all function as one being meaning that they are three persons that have their individual wills but will the same thing. The reason why this does not suffice as it leads to the conclusion that there could be a million persons that all choose to will the exact same thing and yet there is only One God which is too thin of a monotheism.
Are the Father and the Son the same God? Are the Father and the Son the same person? If you answered yes and no respectively to the two questions then you fall into Relative Identity Trinitarianism. Relative Identity Trinitarianism: The “is God'' statement is a statement of relative identity. When you say that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, they are all the same God in terms of identity rather than predication in Social Trinitarianism. What does it mean that the identity is relative? What this means is that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God as the same God as each other but when it comes to premises 4 to 6 they are not the same persons as each other. Meaning that they are all the same God meaning One God but not the same persons as each other meaning that there are three persons and not one person. The Law of Identity means numerical sameness. If two things are compared, there are not two things but only one thing because they are numerically the same. Quantitative sameness is key for this discussion of Relative Identity Trinitarianism in order to identify whether one thing or two things are being discussed. Identity is transitive, if A and B are identical and B is identical to C then A is also identical to C. Identity is symmetrical, if A is identical to B then B is identical to A. Identity is reflexive meaning that the relation can only be applied to the thing and itself. Identity is indiscernible meaning if two things are identical then finding a distinction between them is an impossibility. Those things cannot be identical if they ever differ from each other both timeless or at a time. X and Y are identical if and only if any predicate or property P possessed by X is also possessed by Y and vice versa. Relative Identity Trinitarianism is saying that there are two things which are the Father and the Son who are both God but there is only One God. This statement casts doubt on the theories of identity above. This is because if the Father is God as a statement of identity and the Son is God as a statement of identity then it would seem from the law of identity to logically follow that the Father is the Son meaning they are the same thing but Christian Orthodoxy claims that they are not the same persons as they differ from one another as to call them the same falls into Modalism which states that God is one person who exists in three different modes. Relative Identity Trinitarianism is saying that X is the same A but X is a different B. The Father and Son are the same type of thing, God, but a different person. Classical Nicene Doctrine states that the Father begets the Son timelessly in eternity in the past but the Son does not beget the Father. This is a property that distinguishes between the two of them. Another example of this is that the Father sends the Son but the Son does not send the Father. The same examples can be used between all three Godheads. Relative Identity cannot be seen in the real world and is only applicable to the Trinity. If they are different persons they cannot be the same God and if they are not the same God and they are both Gods that leads them to being different Gods which concludes with them being three Gods.
Can the Trinity be found within the Bible, one verse that refutes such a concept comes from John 17:3, “Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.”. This was a prayer that Jesus made in the Christian Bible before his supposed crucifixion. This refutes the Trinity as Jesus is making a distinction and separation between him and “the only true God” who is the Father not Jesus. One of the most well known church fathers, Saint Augustine has a problem with this verse due to his Trinitarian lens of the Bible. In his commentary of the Gospel of John he states, “‘And this, He adds, is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent. The proper order of the words is, That they may know You and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent, as the only true God.’”. Saint Augustine flipped the word order of the verse in order for it to read that both the Father and the Son are the only true God as the original wording of the verse was problematic as it did not fit with his theology regarding the Trinity and the divinity of Christ. Saint Augustine then attempts to fit the Holy Spirit into the verse along with the other two persons to complete the Godhead and later claims in the same commentary that the Trinity is the only true God. If John 17:3 was not so problematic for Trinitarian Christians then why would Saint Augustine completely flip the verse’s word order?
Nicene Creed:
“I believe in one God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible. I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten Son of God, born of the Father before all ages. God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father; through him all things were made. For us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven, and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and became man. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate, he suffered death and was buried, and rose again on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and his kingdom will have no end.I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified, who has spoken through the prophets. I believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. I confess one Baptism for the forgiveness of sins and I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen.”
What does it mean by the phrase, begotten of the Father? This is referring to eternal causation. The Father caused the Son and the Holy Spirit to exist. The One is uncaused while the Others depend on the cause. This means that the attribute of aseity is solely to the Father. According to early church fathers such as Saint Basil, Saint Hilary, Saint Gregory and Saint Athanasius this is what is meant by the verse in John 14:28. When Jesus in the Gospel of John said “for the Father is greater than I.” the greater is referring to the lack of aseity of the Son but they believe he was equal in terms of nature.
“He is not the source of His own being, nor did He, being Himself non-existent, bring to pass His own birth out of nothing” (Hilary of Poitiers De Trinitate Book IX).
“Since the Son’s origin is from the Father, in this respect the Father is greater, as cause and origin. Wherefore also the Lord said thus, ‘My Father is greater than I,’ clearly inasmuch as He is Father. Yea, what else does the word Father signify unless the being cause and origin of that which is begotten of Him?” (Basil Against Eunomius)
Meaning that the person had a beginning but the divinity did not. How can the Father and Son be equal in terms of nature when the Son lacks aseity? However, in order for someone to be divine they must have all divine attributes including the divine attribute of aseity. By this logic the Son and the Holy Spirit are not divine due to them originating from the Father. The only solution is to say that aseity is only belonging to the Father and is not a divine attribute. It can be argued that this can lead to Subordinationism as only the Father is unbegotten. God is uncreated while creation is created to say that the Son and Holy Spirit are also a se leads to tritheism as aseity is a necessary attribute of a necessary being. To say that the Father and the Son are still equal in nature brings the question whether it is by nature for the Father to be unbegotten and for the Son to be begotten or is it a contingent fact. William Lane Craig on this,
“Basil, who sees the contradiction, would elude it by saying, ‘the evident solution is that the Greater refers to origination, while the Equal belongs to the Nature’ (Fourth Theological Oration 9). This reply raises all sorts of difficult questions. Does it not belong to the nature of the Father as an individual person to be unbegotten and to the nature of the Son to be begotten? Is there a possible world in which the person who is in fact the Father is instead begotten and so in that world is the Son? Classical Trinitarian theology denies this. But then how are the Father and the Son equal in nature, if greatness refers to origination and manner of origination belongs to each individual's nature? And even if the Father and the Son are equal in nature, why does the accidental property of being unbegotten, which inheres in the person of the Father alone, not make Him greater than the Son, since it is admittedly a great-making property or perfection? If the Father is greater than the Son in any respect, not just in nature, then the Son is in that respect inferior to the Father.”
Another popular Christian argument for the Trinity is based on these premises:
1. Necessarily, God is perfectly and infinitely loving.
2. This entails actually loving another.
3. God loves either within God or is part of God’s creation.
4. God was free not to create.
5. This object of love is not part of God’s creation.
6. Therefore by necessity God must have another to love.
7. Therefore God is not unipersonal.
By Abrahamic tradition the first premise of the argument is sound. However, the second premise is problematic. Being loving is an attribute, the second premise had the underlying assumption that an attribute cannot be possessed unless expressed but why is that the case? As well is the case that an attribute can be expressed internally and not externally. Dale Tuggy gives this example in his article, If the word loving was substituted with another attribute such as forgiveness this shows that premise two is false. If forgiveness entails actually forgiving another then that would entail that the Father is eternally forgiving the Son and the Holy Spirit which would mean that the other two in the Godhead have done something wrong for them to be needing forgiveness for and God is void of sin. Premises three and four are also sound. However, premise five assumes that the object of God’s love cannot be part of His creation as the Trinitarian assumes that the attribute needs to be externally expressed. Premise six is rejected due to the rejection of premise five and premise seven is also rejected as follows from premise six which was rejected.
The doctrine of the Incarnation:
The second person of the Trinity known as the Son or the word became a man in Jesus of Nazareth. Matter of addition, not subtraction: The second person of the Trinity added to himself a human nature: human mind/body/soul/will.
John 1:1-2/14
“1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
Council of Chalcedon: 4th ecumenical councils: Sets to establish Christian Orthodoxy in doctrines:
“We, then, following the holy Fathers, all with one consent, teach men to confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the same perfect in Godhead and also perfect in manhood; truly God and truly man, of a reasonable soul and body; consubstantial with the Father according to the Godhead, and consubstantial with us according to the Manhood; in all things like unto us, without sin; begotten before all ages of the Father according to the Godhead, and in these latter days, for us and for our salvation, born of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, according to the Manhood; one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, only begotten, to be acknowledged in two natures, unconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably; the distinction of natures being by no means taken away by the union, but rather the property of each nature being preserved, and concurring in one Person and one Subsistence, not parted or divided into two persons, but one and the same Son, and only begotten, God the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ; as the prophets from the beginning have declared concerning Him, and the Lord Jesus Christ Himself has taught us, and the Creed of the holy Fathers has handed down to us.”
Main points of this quote:
1. There is only One Son, not two Sons or two persons in Christ, refutation of Nestorianism which said that there were two Sons in Christ. He has a human nature that does not result in a human person meaning truly God and truly man. He had a rational human soul and body. 3rd Council of Constantinople said that he had a human will.
2. He was like humans or like us in all ways in things except that he did not sin.
3. These natures did not mix nor confuse but united in the one person of Christ.
4. The incarnation does not result in the Son losing his divinity.
5. His human nature does not become compromised by his divine nature.
Problem:
Mystery versus Logical Contradiction: There is a theological understanding that we will never truly understand about God or His nature but any theological system that wants to be taken seriously needs to seek to avoid contradictory statements about the divine.
1. How can Jesus be both God and man, infinite and finite, creator and creature? How can we unite in a single person both omniscience and ignorance, omnipotence and weakness? The attributes of deity seem to drive out the attributes of humanity so that seems logically inconsistent.
1. Anything that does not have all divine attributes cannot be understood as God
2. Human beings have attributes that are essential for humanity.
3. Attributes of divinity and humanity contradict each other
4. Christ was a person with both sets of attributes.
The incarnation entails that a single person possesses contradictory attributes and is therefore logically incoherent.
Problem 2: scriptural consideration regarding this issue. The Bible says God is omniscient John 3:20/Psalm 139:4. Man is ignorant of facts Proverbs 27:1. Christ cannot be omniscient and ignorant at the same time. Christ is ignorant of facts such as the date of his second coming Matthew 24:36/Mark 13:32.
Problem 3: One can attribute certain properties to each particular nature. This answers what has these properties not who has these properties. When applied to Christ, his ignorance cannot be attributed to the divine nature as that is a contradiction to the divine nature which makes Christ, not God nor the human nature as that would entail Nestorianism which is a heresy that states that Christ was two persons as there would be a subject/person, a who, to the human nature. This concludes that no person was the subject of ignorance but there has to be one.
Problem 4: How does refute Nestorianism without giving a mechanism? Simply saying that there’s one Son does not avoid the contradiction. If it takes a person to be a human as having a human body and a human soul and to be God by having a divine body and soul then this results in the Son being 2 persons as he possessed both sets of attributes.
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