What an interesting approach.
Yes, I understand the complication. I personally think Christ (God) tasted humanity to sympathize with our weaknesses. He does not need to fall in order to understand the gravity of falling. Every human knows the adrenaline spike or the jitters. Christ would have had hormones and chemicals in His body as we all have. He was just not overwhelmed by them (to the point of sin). Christ certainly felt saddened to the point of tears, and angry to the point of whipping. These are human encounters, and Christ fully experienced them for our benefit. This is partly what is meant by “God so loved the world”. This is fairly impressive that our maker would humble Himself to such an act of exposure. Christ ate food, went to the toilet, coughed, shivered, smelt corpses and rotten food… He did all of this so that we would have greater confidence in Him as our leader. He went through the same battle. He did not just sit back and watch - he immersed Himself to the point of being flogged, spat on, beaten and ridiculed. Who would do that for someone else? God!
As Satan said… “throw yourself down from this mountain…” Now, if Jesus would not have died from “throwing Himself down”, this would have given evidence of the divine in Jesus that Satan was asking Him to confirm; but that does not mean that Jesus would not know that it is a struggle for humans to experience a fall from a horse, or falling off a chair, or breaking a bone, or being hungry, tired or thirsty. Jesus became man!
I think that, following the dogma of God’s simplicity, that the Father had no lack in himself that he needed to fill by becoming human and feeling the effects of biological life. He had no lack at all and did not need to ‘become’.
Steve, I must have been unclear in what I wrote. I most certainly would not support the abandonment of the fourth and fifth century Fathers–quite the contrary. The doctrine of the Holy Trinity cannot be properly understood apart from them.
Hi Akimel,
I didn’t misunderstand you. I think I gathered from other posts that you ascribe to the councils and fathers of the 4th and 5th centuries. That is no problem. Often the Orthodox will try and lead other christians to the early fathers, which is fantastic, but I think their admiration is a sectarian fascination from that particular time (4th and 5th centuries), and their honoring of earlier fathers is merely superficial lip services through fast days and saint days, etc. I am personally disinterested in reinforcing a darker and more sinister fraternity, even though I find some writings from this period to be very interesting. I am particularly blessed by Rufinus, Eusebius, John of Jerusalem, and to a lessor extent, Gregory, Basil’s brother, Gregory Nazianzen and John Chrysostom. I was also impressed by what I read of and about Eunomius. I certainly don’t dislike these people, I just think that they were all made delirious by the same dirty well. A more pure time in the church’s history - and in their doctrines - is found prior to the 4th century. That is where the richest gold is buried.
I think the doctrine of the trinity became particularly corrupted by these fathers. I believe in the trinity, but the fundamentalist and intolerant spirit which emerged in the 4th and 5th centuries had corrupted a simple and sublime teaching which the earlier fathers were able to grasp. It became a doctrine which was aligned with widespread corruption, bribery, extortion, hate, contempt, violence, intolerance, greed, false teachings, and secular compromise. It was a doctrine, after all, that was suggested by an unbaptized emperor. The Roman church gained a particular dominance over other churches because of their compliance to the emperors hermeneutics. The church soon changed back to become completely Arian after Constantine’s death, and than had swung back and forward like a brothel door. This was the church’s darkest hour, and the doctrines of this time are not worth any more to me than the writings of any other sect. They belong to Christ, naturally, but like the church at Ephesus, they need to repent and “Consider how far you have fallen!” (Revelation 2:5)
The Trinity - as was brought out in the lecture you did not finish 
- was not necessarily thought of by the ECF (150-300AD) in the way it was subsequently developed. Most EF’s - and I gather there is no remarkable consistency of expression - did believe in the trinity small “t” - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It is not clear to me that they believed in the Trinity big “T” as in the labyrinthine analytic developments that followed - three persons, one nature, or other terminology.
Chalcedon certainly did nothing to clear it up, but that was later.
That’s correct, Dave. Although most EF’s did not waver from declaring Christ as ‘God’; but that was not in the “T” sense, as you point out. There was a relative freedom of expression in the early church which was completely lost in the 4th century. The excuse is that the 4th century fathers were saving the “T” from corruption. I do not buy this. I think it was a grab for dictatorial power, and the trinity became the football. The papacy won, and now they don’t even care to protect the “T” - for it was power they were after, not purity.
The fathers were being rewarded with money and churches for their patronage to Rome, as the emperor used the Roman church to distribute wealth among the clergy. This was a vision of a new state religion, after all, and the bishops of Rome were willing to play ball. For their patronage they were officially declared the ‘head of churches’, and they were given the same power as the emperor in many cases. This is when the church went down hill. The caution is to try not to fling back the opposite way with too much force, otherwise you only create the same thing in reverse. We need the more moderate approach of Origen to guide us, IMO.
Hmmm…very interesting.
Where do we go from here?
Beats me; I’m just trying to figure out where to even start catching up with the thread! 
Um, the original post I guess, with Dave’s categorization followup later…?
For those interested in further reflection on the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, I recommend the following:
John Behr, The Way to Nicaea
_____, The Nicene Faith
Khaled Anatolios, Retrieving Nicaea
Robert W. Jenson, The Triune Identity
Thanks for those references!
What I am taking away from this discussion thus far (and maybe there is a lot more to come, it’s up to us) is that a belief in Trinitarianism (capital T) is not, for me, necessarily Orthodox (Orthodox=whoever won the fight). I don’t see it (big T) in the scriptures; I finally see the difference between little t and big T in the divide between 3rd and 4th century thought - I’m a little t’er at this point, but definitely a trinitarian; and the ever-so-complicated speculations that resulted in the (so far) unanswered questions 1-4 at the beginning of the thread have me convinced that the problems presented there, unless they are totally wrong-headed, proclaim against the big T.
That’s where I am now. I think my position is somewhere within the pale of Orthodoxy, but then, Orthodoxy is not my main concern.
Shall we continue, or wrap it up for now?
??? Um, well, actually, the majority who eventually won the fight would strongly disagree that a belief in Trinitarianism (capital T) isn’t necessary to be counted among the majority who eventually won the fight. That’s why there are Nicean and Chalcedonian creedal statements (with a variation of the latter being the two main parts of the so-called Athanasian Creed).
However, that’s after the fighting, which started late 2nd century but didn’t get particularly systematic until the 4th century. Before then (and during the original disputes leading up to the 4th century), things are a lot looser in some ways, just as strict in others. But I think it’s important to understand that the technicalities which came later followed from trying to figure out how best to affirm and not deny the stricter portions of the looser earlier time. The quote from Origen upthread illustrates that principle. He wants to protect the affirmations of the faithful deposit, and is prepared to get more technical than people generally were previously, in order to do so; but he won’t be as technical as the people who follow after him – largely following his leads and methodologies! Both of which are directly connected to Patristic arguments for Christian universalism, by the way.
(I will briefly mention here, in regard to another thread on a similar topic, that no one thinks Athanasius was a ‘unitarian’, and he was explicitly following Origen’s lead in his disputes with Arius. While he thought he had to defend Origen sometimes, because O hadn’t gone into quite the detail they were having to go into a generation or two later, Ath studied under disciples of O and had vastly much more access to his original work than anyone living today. From that alone I would find it almost impossible for anyone, arguing from scattered surviving remnants of Origen’s work, to convince me that Origen was a unitarian. Be that as it may. 
)
What does little-t (as you put it) involve? The dispute was then, and has always been, centered on this: who should we be (and not be) religiously worshiping, and why? Little-t says there is one and only one God Most High, and we should be religiously worshiping only God Most High not any lesser lord or god, and also that we should be religiously worshiping the Father, the Holy Spirit, and the Son Who was born of a woman as Jesus of Nazareth, who are three distinct persons not (merely) roles of the same person in relation to us.
Why did little-t go that way? Because that’s what they heard their teachers saying, and that’s what they found being said and taught (and claimed by Jesus) in the oldest texts with the widest use across the world where people religiously affiliated with Jesus somehow (though those texts are a little fuzzy in some ways about whether the spirit is a distinct person compared to the blatantly obvious personal distinction between Father and/or the Son).
Big-T says the same things, just in more technical details. But the technical details arose because of practical questions about whether little-t really had the basic data right to begin with, which was important partly for purposes of being faithful to the original teachers (going back to Jesus) and partly for purposes of worshiping and evangelizing properly (rightly praising and rightly teaching others about God – both of which are what ortho-doxy, right-representation, can mean.)
That’s why even among the Big Three Big T groups (insert topical irony here as appropriate ), they started ostracizing and badmouthing one another eventually, actually creating the distinctions of those groups while doing so, where no such hard distinctions previously existed: the Oriental Orthodox (connected to Alexandria), the Church of the East (connected to Antioch), and the Catholic Orthodox (in the middle, touching Rome and New Rome). They weren’t just being naturally ornery (although there was some of that, too) or politically motivated in the patronage system of the ancient world (although ditto). The question of how the two-natures of Christ (which all three sides agreed about) relate to one another, and to us, touches the question of what was and wasn’t accomplished for us in Christ, and touches the question of whether we really ought to be worshiping Jesus himself personally (though all three sides agreed on that, too).
Is that really necessary for Christians to get into today? From a practical perspective, probably not, as long as they believe little-t has the basic data right and are willing to act religiously on that without being worried about further details. But then, little-t has what looks like a major conceptual contradiction in its set: religiously worship only the one and only God, and religiously worship the Father, the Son and Holy Spirit. What is religiously idolatry, and what isn’t? Maybe that wouldn’t be so much of a practical problem if the scriptures didn’t indicate God cares a lot about idolatry, but they REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY DO (OT and the new texts both).
So there are huge tensions. Leading to a huge T out of the little t.
(Then Islam comes along and provides a theologically simpler set of data by replacing the old data sets altogether.)
I’m pretty sure they proclaim against the little-t set, too; the little-t set just avoids the questions by focusing on the practical aspect of worshiping only God most high and worshiping F/S/HS. As long as people are doing that, what’s the problem, right? It’s an inscrutable mystery but if the authoritative texts point that way then why worry about it?
See, the inscrutable mystery parachute doesn’t start with Big-T. Big-T imports it as a problem solving tactic from little-t; but whereas Big-T is Big-T by also trying to meet and solve problems in other ways, that appeal to revealed mystery data is all little-t is in a position to do.
But I’ll have to illustrate that later; off to home now.
Jason, this commentary was very funny. I saw a vision of a dog chasing its tail as I was reading along with you. I don’t think you are right in your historical appraisal of Mr T’s war against Mr t, but it doesn’t matter that much. There were other considerations apart from a fight for the truth. The trinity (‘t’) was first captured by the gnostic imagination of the Valentinians in the 2nd century:
(See also, The Tripartite Tractate, gnosis.org/naghamm/tripart.htm)
This trinity was then wrestled with in the church. They decided to make a more precise definition to defend against gnostics. The problem was, they turned their inquisitors eye against other christians, including against Origen and Dionysius of Alexandria, which was instigated by the bishops of Rome. Rome had an ambition from the earliest time to become recognized as the leading church, and the bishops of Rome looked for opportunities to create a wedge between other christians so as to exert their authority over them. The trinity (‘T’) was used as a pretext to exert that authority. It allowed Roman bishops to be seen as superior to Origen, or any other church, bishop or christian. They always used prize fighters outside of Rome to do their dirty work. Athanasius, Augustine, Jerome, Hilary, Basil - these were the ‘T’ fighters, and they had Rome’s backing. This was all politics, and it led to the establishment of the papacy. Christians didn’t recognize then (or now) that they were being used as pawns in a political contest to give Rome supremacy.
I have a similar view to you, Dave. That was a good summary.
You yourself ought to know I’m not talking about the term “trinity”. And referencing the Valentinians isn’t a consideration “apart from a fight for the truth”. They were starting from the basic received data and then trying to solve the problems of the rec’d data in a way different from (what became) the Catholic/Orthodox party. (Not totally different, of course, but different enough to be a different family of ideas.) Which is why they themselves were one of the “other Christians” whom “the church” (including for example Origen!) turned “their inquisitors eye against” – also not a consideration apart from a fight for the truth.
What Dave was calling “little-t” doesn’t, in itself, bother with trying to work out the details of the received data. At most it just tries to make sure the data (the faithful deposit) has all been properly received and passed on. But even that process leads as a practical result to Big T vs. Other Ideas (so there isn’t a hard-and-fast line between little-t and Big T, no more than there’s a hard-and-fast line between “tradition” and “theology”.)
Would politicians exploit this situation for their own gain? Duh. Which is why I acknowledged a serious political dimension to what happened. But that doesn’t mean the conflicts were “all politics”.
Well, I actually did get a bit lost in what you were saying. Nevermind. I don’t know your theology well enough to make any assumptions.
The reason for mentioning the Valentinians was to show that this war began between Gnostics and Christians, but ended between Christians and Christians. The OCD set in, and now there was only ‘T’-rinity or the highway. Both ‘T’-rinity and ‘t’-rinity were acceptable in the first centuries; that is my observation at least. The 4th century geniuses tried to go back in time and announce everyone as a heretic who did not agree with their OCD version of 'T’rinity. That is not something that I think should be endorsed.
For some it was “all politics”. For others, it was OCD. For others, it was like trying to give up smoking, and the detox was still making me ANGRY!!! For a few, it was altruism. Not many though…
I’ve been re-visiting some old threads this morning - there have been some GREAT threads on this forum.
Since I am still ‘agnostic’ on the subject of the trinity, I was happy to see the following from Fr. Kimel’s Most Excellent) Blog (afkimel.wordpress.com) - it has become one of my favorites - as the selections I am quoting neatly wrap up the reason for my agnosticism. The first selection is from Channing, with whom Fr. Kimel and others (wrongly imo) disagree, followed by further elucidation - or may I say, with respect, non-elucidation (read it to see what I mean) - of the actual trinitarian position as per that blog.
This is not actually a big deal for me now - I worship God the Father through the Son Jesus Christ, with the help of the Holy Spirit - and the sophisticated metaphysics that become a measure of one’s Christianity is, for me, if not trivial, then superfluous.
All the following is from the blog:
What particularly interests me is Channing’s interpretation of “the irrational and unscriptural doctrine of the Trinity”:
( Channing) We object to the doctrine of the Trinity, that, whilst acknowledging in words, it subverts in effect, the unity of God. According to this doctrine, there are three infinite and equal persons, possessing supreme divinity, called the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Each of these persons, as described by theologians, has his own particular consciousness, will, and perceptions. They love each other, converse with each other, and delight in each other’s society. They perform different parts in man’s redemption, each having his appropriate office, and neither doing the work of the other. The Son is mediator and not the Father. The Father sends the Son, and is not himself sent; nor is he conscious, like the Son, of taking flesh. Here, then, we have three intelligent agents, possessed of different consciousness, different wills, and different perceptions, performing different acts, and sustaining different relations; and if these things do not imply and constitute three minds or beings, we are utterly at a loss to know how three minds or beings are to be formed. It is difference of properties, and acts, and consciousness, which leads us to the belief of different intelligent beings, and, if this mark fails us, our whole knowledge fall; we have no proof, that all the agents and persons in the universe are not one and the same mind. When we attempt to conceive of three Gods, we can do nothing more than represent to ourselves three agents, distinguished from each other by similar marks and peculiarities to those which separate the persons of the Trinity; and when common Christians hear these persons spoken of as conversing with each other, loving each other, and performing different acts, how can they help regarding them as different beings, different minds?
(Fr. Kimel) The Fathers did not understand the divine persons as three independent agents “possessed of different consciousness, different wills, and different perceptions, performing different acts, and sustaining different relations.” If this were the catholic doctrine, St Athanasius and the Cappadocians would have joined Channing in rejecting it. As St Gregory of Nyssa writes: “For the persons of the Divinity are not separated from one another either by time or place, not by will or by practice, not by activity or by passion, not by anything of this sort, such as is observed with regard to human beings” (Ad Graecos 25).
That which distinguishes the divine hypostases are their originating relations: the Father is unoriginate, the Son is begotten by the Father, the Spirit is spirated by the Father. The persons of the Godhead are not “persons” in the way that individual human beings or even angels are “persons.” We need to stop thinking in such anthropomorphic terms.
When someone objects to the trinitarian doctrine on the ground that it makes no sense to them, that is precisely the point. If the doctrine made sense, it would not be speaking of the holy and ineffable three-personed Creator narrated in the Scriptures and experienced in the eucharistic liturgy. Karen Kilby elaborates:
We learn to worship the Father through the Son in the Spirit, but we do not have some very sophisticated idea with which to put all this together, with which to envisage or explain or understand that the three are one, with which to put to rest on a conceptual level worries about the coherence of a claim to monotheism. This is why attention to the doctrine of the Trinity should serve to intensify rather than diminish our sense of God’s unknownness: believing in the Trinity, we are not so much in possession of a more fully textured concept of God than a mere Enlightenment deist has, but in fact much less than any deist in possession of any sort of manageable concept of God at all. (“Is an Apophatic Trinitarianism Possible?” International Journal of Systematic Theology 12 [January 2010]: 76)
Me: in a nutshell, there’s the problem. Neither ‘side’ understands the concept ‘trinity’. And we will defend our not understanding come hell or high water!
I’m no more a fan of apophatic non-understandings of the Trinity than any unitarian is; and I’ve never once advocated someone believe something they themselves think is logically nonsensical, including the Trinity. No one ever lived and died for a cloud of unknowing. If anyone ever said they did, I respectfully submit they were self-mistaken. They died for what and for Whom they thought they knew.
Better to be agnostic, or to be unitarian or modalist or non-Christian at all, than to wallow in what one thinks is nonsense. That isn’t the way to reach or appreciate truth; all it does is train habits of being unable to detect error.
That being said, even the rank apophaticists were (and where applicable still are) trying to be faithful in religious devotion to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and to pass along correct teaching concerning them, in concert with the testimony found in the scriptures (and the various flavors of unitarians and modalists etc. to their own degrees.) Someone agnostic about how it all fits together can’t be doing wrong to do the same thing. 
I agree with you Jason. However, if I wasn’t taught the Trinity, I would never have believed it. Now, I admit that the Trinity could be true, but so could a lot of things. I think the burden of proof is on those who teach the Trinity, not on those who refuse to accept it. Because (in my opinion) there is evidence for both sides, it is almost one of those topics that you cannot build a doctrine on, because there are legitimate concerns. The Trinity, is clearly an act of faith. Nothing wrong with that, though.
Certainly, the burden of proof is on those who teach the Trinity. The burden of proof is on anyone making any case for acceptance. That’s just intellectual responsibility. And I don’t like it when trinitarians doff that responsibility off as though only opponents have a burden of proof.
However:
1.) Even where someone doesn’t yet accept the (or perhaps a) trinitarian doctrinal set, a trinitarian can and I think should go on to explain how they think further positions follow if trinitarian theism is true. That doesn’t mean the trinitarian should then expect the non-trinitarian to agree to the consequent belief, or not on that ground, but I think there’s a service to be made to opponents when proponents (of any idea) take the time and effort to work out implications of the idea (or the idea set).
2.) Among people who (at least nominally) accept the idea set, the trinitarian should be encouraged to work out corollaries and implications from the set, and to oppose ideas which can be shown to conflict with the commonly believed set. (Obviously the same would be true for any shared set of ideas.)
That’s why among trinitarians I’m keen to appeal to the ideas of the doctrinal set, in their logical coherence (which obviously CANNOT BE DONE WHEN APOPHATICISM IS THE PRIMARY METHOD OF THEOLOGY 
), for purposes of working out and otherwise testing soteriological ideas: soteriology can and should only follow logically from the prime theological claims. And even among non-trinitarians, I want to provide an account of the implications of its hypothetical truth or, perhaps, falsity.
So in those two senses, it can be legitimately built on; but only hypothetically among opponents.