 |
| The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit |
St. Patrick's Bad Analogies
In
Christianity, Sabellianism in the
Eastern church or
Patripassianism in the
Western church (also known as
modalism, modalistic monarchianism, or modal monarchism) is the
nontrinitarian or anti-
trinitarian belief that the Heavenly Father, Resurrected Son, and Holy Spirit are three different modes or aspects of one monadic God, as perceived by the believer, rather than three distinct persons within the Godhead--that there are no real or substantial differences among the three, such that there is no substantial identity for the Spirit or the Son. The term Sabellianism comes from
Sabellius, who was a theologian and priest from the 3rd century.
The Arian
concept of Christ is that the Son of God did not always exist, but was created by—and is therefore distinct from—God the Father. This belief is grounded in the
Gospel of John (
14:28)
[3] passage: "You heard me say, 'I am going away and I am coming back to you.' If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I."
Arianism is defined as those teachings attributed to Arius, which are in opposition to orthodox teachings on the nature of the
Trinity and the nature of Christ. These orthodox teachings, while always held by the Church, were formally affirmed by the first two
Ecumenical Councils of the Church.
Arianism is also often used to refer to other
nontrinitarian theological systems of the 4th century, which regarded
Jesus Christ—the Son of God, the
Logos—as either a created being (as in Arianism proper and
Anomoeanism), or as neither uncreated nor created in the sense other beings are created (as in
Semi-Arianism).
What is the Trinity?
According to this central
mystery of most
Christian faiths,
[8] there is only one God in three persons: while distinct from one another in their relations of origin (as the
Fourth Lateran Councildeclared, "it is the Father who generates, the Son who is begotten, and the Holy Spirit who proceeds") and in their relations with one another, they are stated to be one in all else, co-equal, co-eternal and
consubstantial, and "each is God, whole and entire".
[9] Accordingly, the whole work of creation and grace is seen as a single operation common to all three divine persons, in which each shows forth what is proper to him in the Trinity, so that all things are "from the Father", "through the Son" and "in the Holy Spirit".
[10]
Terms such as "monotheism", "incarnation", "omnipotence", are not found in the Bible, but they denote theological concepts concerning Christian faith that are believed to be contained in the Bible. Even the term "Bible" is not found in the Bible. "Trinity" is another such term.
[11]
While the
Fathers of the Church saw even Old Testament elements such as the appearance of three men to Abraham in
Book of Genesis, chapter 18, as foreshadowings of the Trinity, it was the New Testament that they saw as a basis for developing the concept of the Trinity. The most influential of the New Testament texts seen as implying the teaching of the Trinity was
Matthew 28:19, which mandated baptizing "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit". Reflection, proclamation and dialogue led to the formulation of the doctrine that was felt to correspond to the data in the Bible. The simplest outline of the doctrine was formulated in the 4th century, largely in terms of rejection of what was considered not to be consonant with general Christian belief. Further elaboration continued in the succeeding centuries.
[12]
Scripture does not contain expressly a formulated doctrine of the Trinity. Rather, according to the Christian theology, it "bears witness to" the activity of a God who can only be understood in trinitarian terms.
[13] The doctrine did not take its definitive shape until late in the fourth century.
[14] During the intervening period, various tentative solutions, some more and some less satisfactory were proposed.
[15] Trinitarianism contrasts with
nontrinitarianpositions which include
Binitarianism (one deity in two persons, or two deities),
Unitarianism (one deity in one person, analogous to Jewish interpretation of the
Shema and Muslim belief in
Tawhid),
Oneness Pentecostalism or
Modalism (one deity manifested in three separate aspects).
Theology
In the
synoptic Gospels the
baptism of Jesus is often interpreted as a manifestation of all three persons of the Trinity: "And when Jesus was baptized, he went up immediately from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened and he saw the spirit of God descending like a dove, and alighting on him; and lo, a voice from heaven, saying, 'This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.'"
[Mt 3:16–17] Baptism is generally conferred with the
Trinitarian formula, "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit".
[Mt 28:19] Trinitarians identify this name with the Christian faith into which baptism is an initiation, as seen for example in the statement of
Basil the Great (330–379): "We are bound to be baptized in the terms we have received, and to profess faith in the terms in which we have been baptized." The
First Council of Constantinople (381) also says, "This is the Faith of our baptism that teaches us to believe in the Name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. According to this Faith there is one Godhead, Power, and Being of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."
Matthew 28:19 may be taken to indicate that baptism was associated with this formula from the earliest decades of the Church's existence.
Nontrinitarian groups, such as
Oneness Pentecostals, demur from the Trinitarian view on baptism. For them, the omission of the formula in Acts outweighs all other considerations, and is a liturgical guide for their own practice. For this reason, they often focus on the baptisms in Acts, citing many[
which?] authoritative theological works.
[43] Those who place great emphasis on the baptisms in Acts often likewise question the authenticity of
Matthew 28:19 in its present form. Most scholars of New Testament
textual criticism accept the authenticity of the passage, since there are no variant manuscripts regarding the formula, and the extant form of the passage is attested in the
Didache[44] and other
patristic works of the 1st and 2nd centuries:
Ignatius,
[45] Tertullian,
[46] Hippolytus,
[47] Cyprian,
[48] and
Gregory Thaumaturgus.
[49]
Commenting on
Matthew 28:19, Gerhard Kittel states:This threefold relation [of Father, Son and Spirit] soon found fixed expression in the triadic formulae in
2 Cor. 13:14 and in
1 Cor. 12:4–6. The form is first found in the baptismal formula in
Matthew 28:19; Did., 7. 1 and 3....[I]t is self-evident that Father, Son and Spirit are here linked in an indissoluble threefold relationship.
[50]
One God
Christianity, having emerged from
Judaism, is a monotheistic religion. Never in the New Testament does the Trinitarian concept become a "
tritheism" (three Gods) nor even two.
[51] God is one, and that God is a single being is strongly declared in the Bible:
And "Thus saith the LORD the King of Israel and his redeemer the LORD of hosts: I am the first and I am the last; and beside me there is no God."
[Isa 44:6]
In the New Testament: "The LORD our God is one."
[Mk 12:29]
In the Trinitarian view, the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost share the one essence, substance or being. The central and crucial affirmation of Christian faith is that there is one savior, God, and one salvation, manifest in Jesus Christ, to which there is access only because of the Holy Spirit. The God of the Old Testament is still the same as the God of the New. In Christianity, statements about a single God are intended to distinguish the Hebraic understanding from the
polytheistic view, which see divine power as shared by several beings, beings which can and do disagree and have conflicts with each other.
God in three persons
In Trinitarian doctrine, God exists as three persons or
hypostases, but is one being, having a single divine nature.
[52] The members of the Trinity are co-equal and co-eternal, one in essence, nature, power, action, and will. As stated in the
Athanasian Creed, the Father is uncreated, the Son is uncreated, and the Holy Spirit is uncreated, and all three are eternal without beginning.
[53] "The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit" are not names for different parts of God, but one name for God
[54] because three persons exist in God as one entity.
[55] They cannot be separate from one another. Each person is understood as having the identical essence or nature, not merely similar natures.
[56]
For Trinitarians, emphasis in Genesis 1:26 is on the plurality in the Deity, and in 1:27 on the unity of the divine Essence. A possible interpretation of Genesis 1:26 is that God's relationships in the Trinity are mirrored in man by the ideal relationship between husband and wife, two persons becoming one flesh, as described in
Eve's creation later in the next chapter.
[2:22]
Perichoresis
Perichoresis from Greek ("going around", "envelopment") is a term used by some theologians to describe the relationship among the members of the Trinity. The Latin equivalent for this term is
circumincessio. This concept refers for its basis to
John 14–17, where Jesus is instructing the disciples concerning the meaning of his departure. His going to the Father, he says, is for their sake; so that he might come to them when the "other comforter" is given to them. Then, he says, his disciples will dwell in him, as he dwells in the Father, and the Father dwells in him, and the Father will dwell in them. This is so, according to the theory of perichoresis, because the persons of the Trinity "reciprocally contain one another, so that one permanently envelopes and is permanently enveloped by, the other whom he yet envelopes". (
Hilary of Poitiers, Concerning the Trinity 3:1).
[57]
Perichoresis effectively excludes the idea that God has parts, but rather is a
simple being. It also harmonizes well with the doctrine that the Christian's union with the Son in his humanity brings him into union with one who contains in himself, in the
Apostle Paul's words, "all the fullness of deity" and not a part. (See also:
Divinization (Christian)). Perichoresis provides an intuitive figure of what this might mean. The Son, the eternal Word, is from all eternity the dwelling place of God; he is the "Father's house", just as the Son dwells in the Father and the Spirit; so that, when the Spirit is "given", then it happens as Jesus said, "I will not leave you as orphans; for I will come to you."
[John 14:18]
According to the words of Jesus, married persons are in some sense no longer two but are joined into one. Therefore, Orthodox theologians also see the marriage relationship between a man and a woman to be an example of this sacred union. "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh." Gen. 2:24. "Wherefore they are no more twain but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let no man put asunder." Matt. 19: 6.
[image or "icon" 17:22]
Eternal generation and procession
Trinitarianism affirms that the Son is "begotten" (or "generated") of the Father and that the Spirit "proceeds" from the Father, but the Father is "neither begotten nor proceeds". The argument over whether the Spirit proceeds from the Father alone, or from the Father and the Son, was one of the catalysts of the
Great Schism, in this case concerning the Western addition of the
Filioque clause to the
Nicene Creed. The Roman Catholic Church teaches that, in the sense of the
Latin verb procedere (which does not have to indicate ultimate origin and is therefore compatible with proceeding through), but not in that of the Greek verb ἐκπορεύεσθαι (which implies ultimate origin),
[58]the Spirit "proceeds" from the Father and the Son, and the Eastern Orthodox Church, which teaches that the Spirit "proceeds" from the Father alone, has made no statement on the claim of a difference in meaning between the two words, one Greek and one Latin, both of which are translated as "proceeds". The
Eastern Orthodox Churches object to the Filioque clause on ecclesiological and theological grounds, holding that "from the Father" means "from the Father alone".
This language is often considered difficult because, if used regarding humans or other created things, it would imply time and change; when used here, no beginning, change in being, or process within time is intended and is excluded. The Son is generated ("born" or "begotten"), and the Spirit proceeds, eternally.
Augustine of Hippo explains, "Thy years are one day, and Thy day is not daily, but today; because Thy today yields not to tomorrow, for neither does it follow yesterday. Thy today is eternity; therefore Thou begat the Co-eternal, to whom Thou saidst, 'This day have I begotten Thee.'"
[Ps 2:7]
Economic and Immanent Trinity
The economic Trinity refers to the acts of the triune God with respect to the creation, history, salvation, the formation of the Church, the daily lives of believers, etc. and describes how the Trinity operates within history in terms of the roles or functions performed by each Person of the Trinity—God's relationship with creation. The ontological (or essential or immanent) Trinity speaks of the interior life of the Trinity
[John 1:1–2]—the reciprocal relationships of Father, Son, and Spirit to each other without reference to God's relationship with creation.
The ancient Nicene theologians argued that everything the Trinity does is done by Father, Son, and Spirit working in unity with one will. The three persons of the Trinity always work inseparably, for their work is always the work of the one God. Because of this unity of will, the Trinity cannot involve the eternal subordination of the Son to the Father. Eternal subordination can only exist if the Son's will is at least conceivably different from the Father's. But Nicene orthodoxy says it is not. The Son's will cannot be different from the Father's because it is the Father's. They have but one will as they have but one being. Otherwise they would not be one God. If there were relations of command and obedience between the Father and the Son, there would be no Trinity at all but rather three gods.
[59] On this point St. Basil observes "When then He says, 'I have not spoken of myself', and again, 'As the Father said unto me, so I speak', and 'The word which ye hear is not mine, but [the Father's] which sent me', and in another place, 'As the Father gave me commandment, even so I do', it is not because He lacks deliberate purpose or power of initiation, nor yet because He has to wait for the preconcerted key-note, that he employs language of this kind. His object is to make it plain that His own will is connected in indissoluble union with the Father. Do not then let us understand by what is called a 'commandment' a peremptory mandate delivered by organs of speech, and giving orders to the Son, as to a subordinate, concerning what He ought to do. Let us rather, in a sense befitting the Godhead, perceive a transmission of will, like the reflexion of an object in a mirror, passing without note of time from Father to Son."
[60]
In explaining why the Bible speaks of the Son as being subordinate to the Father, the great theologian Athanasius argued that scripture gives a "double account" of the son of God—one of his temporal and voluntary subordination in the incarnation, and the other of his eternal divine status.
[61] For Athanasius, the Son is eternally one in being with the Father, temporally and voluntarily subordinate in his incarnate ministry. Such human traits, he argued, were not to be read back into the eternal Trinity.
Like Athanasius, the Cappadocian Fathers also insisted there was no economic inequality present within the Trinity. As Basil wrote: "We perceive the operation of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to be one and the same, in no respect showing differences or variation; from this identity of operation we necessarily infer the unity of nature."
[62]
Augustine also rejected an economic hierarchy within the Trinity. He claimed that the three persons of the Trinity "share the inseparable equality one substance present in divine unity".
[63] Because the three persons are one in their inner life, this means that for Augustine their works in the world are one. For this reason, it is an impossibility for Augustine to speak of the Father commanding and the Son obeying as if there could be a conflict of wills within the eternal Trinity.
John Calvin also spoke at length about the doctrine of the Trinity. Like Athanasius and Augustine before him, he concluded that
Philippians 2:4–11 prescribed how scripture was to be read correctly. For him the Son's obedience is limited to the incarnation and is indicative of his true humanity assumed for human salvation.
[64]
Much of this work is summed up in the
Athanasian Creed. This creed stresses the unity of the Trinity and the equality of the persons. It ascribes equal divinity, majesty, and authority to all three persons. All three are said to be "almighty" and "Lord" (no subordination in authority; "none is before or after another" (no hierarchical ordering); and "none is greater, or less than another" (no subordination in being or nature)). Thus, since the divine persons of the Trinity act with one will, there is no possibility of hierarchy-inequality in the Trinity.
The "economic" Trinity is the "immanent" Trinity and the
"immanent" Trinity is the "economic" Trinity.[65]
