Monday, April 9, 2018

On personhood in the Trinity

Dale Tuggy, who I have listened to since 2013 on his over 200 podcast, who is also Professor of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Fredonia, makes an interesting point on personhood in relation to the Trinity doctrine.

In his book, What is the Trinity, all he ask is to clearly define, unequivocally, The Trinity and all it's parts. "......Unable to pick, many theologians self-comfort with the falsehood that these differences about the number of divine selves are merely differences of emphasis. While there are differences of emphasis between various Trinitarian theologians, there are also substantial disagreements........Tuggy goes on to say: another device used to put these disagreements out of one's mind is to talk loudly and often about "the" doctrine of the Trinity, as something agreed on by all Christians, or nearly so. But the reality is more complex. The Trinity is either a self or not. It's a matter of logic that these can't both be true; there's exactly one divine self and there are exactly three divine selves."

"Until we decide what is meant by "Person" in the statement that "God is three Persons" we'll be unable to even search for reasons for or against, or to decide whether the claim (wich claim?) fits or misfits the Bible. One can't agree or disagree with an uninterpreted sentence. You may find such a sentence in your church's or denomination's creed, something like: The eternal triune God reveals Himself to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with distinct personal attributes, but without division of nature, essence or being." See the Southern Baptist Faith and Message, Section II

"Himself"."So, the triune God is a single self, not a "they." But also, each of these has his own "personal attributes." Are there then four divine selves here-God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit? Or do the three turn out to be ways the one divine self is? Or despite the capitalized pronoun, is the triune god really not a self, but rather a group community, or collective of selves? Are we to flee here to contradictions or to obfuscation? The statement is indeterminate; it's vague enough to generate an unruly mob of clashing interpretations."

So will the true God stand up. Is it the trinity? Father? Son? Holy Spirit? Do we have a Quaternity?
When praying do you pray to the Trinity? Who did Jesus say was the True God? And who was Jesus' God? John 17.3: And John 5.44 where Jesus refers to his father as the only God. Monou Theou.

Where does the Bible clearly articulate the doctrine of the Trinity? Where does the Bible say that Jesus has two natures but is only one "person," even though each nature has conflicting sets of attributes with the other? And where does the Bible articulate the trinitarian distinction between "person" and "being"?