The Evangelical Universalist Forum

JRP addresses recent crits vs. trinitarianism from scripture

Theology Biblical Theology
#41

••The Father was causally prior to the Son, but not temporally prior. The early Christians taught that the Father begat His Son “as the first of His acts of old”, and that He begat Him “before all ages”. Consequently, the Son is not eternally begotten but was begotten at a particular natural time, specifically as the first event of natural time.••

Obviously trinitarians agree (with some non-trinitarian groups) that the Father is causally and not temporally prior to the Son. This might mean that the Son is the first created entity, or it might mean that the Son is eternally generated at the level of God’s own existence. Aside from metaphysical arguments either way, do the scriptures teach that Christ was begotten at only one natural time (as the start of natural time for example)?

St. Paul, in a sermon reported in Acts 13, teaches (at v33) that the raising up of Jesus by God fulfills the word of Psalm 2 where God states “You are My son; today I have begotten you!” This verse is, in fact, commonly adduced by some non-trinitarians to argue against the notion that Christ was always the only begotten son of God but became the begotten Son upon His resurrection. Yet in Hebrews 1, where the Hebraist is teaching the pre-existence of the Son (and identifying Him with the eternal YHWH of the Jewish Scriptures), the begetting of the Son “today” is taught as well; and again in Hebrews 5 along with the doctrine of being a priest of the order of Melchezidek forever, though this seems to be in regard to the Ascension of Christ in glory after the Resurrection.

The begetting of the Son, consequently, is not to be considered to occur at any one time, even the beginning of time; otherwise it could not be rightly said to apply to the Resurrection and/or to the Ascension. The scriptural data, on the contrary, indicates both that the begotten Son is Himself eternally YHWH God (in a Shema unity with the Father, not disparate Gods but one compound unity God) and also that the Res and/or the Ascension is somehow deeply connected to the begetting of the Son by the Father. How that can both be true is a metaphysical question.

#42

•• In GosJohn, Jesus’ opponents complain that he is only bearing witness of himself; Jesus replies that the Father and/or the Spirit also bear witness to him. Thus Jesus and the Father and/or the Spirit must be distinct persons. ••

Actually, trinitarians agree with that, too, over against modalists, who would have more serious problems trying to work around why the Son would be pretending that the Father and/or the Spirit can witness for Him, specifically stating that this meets the two (or three?!) witness rule of Jewish testimony.

The objection is actually very interesting in that the topic of Christ’s identity is connected (by Christ Himself) to the Jewish legal notion of multiple testimony; which in its strictest observance makes testimony against a defendant nearly impossible by requiring that the multiple witnesses be exactly identical in their verbal testimony about what the defendent said for incrimination purposes. Note that three persons are in view one way or another, all of whom must collude precisely.

What makes this especially interesting from a Christological perspective, is that in the Old Testament YHWH frequently swears important oaths upon Himself and even calls Himself to witness. This would not make much sense unless YHWH was at least two distinct persons!

It should be noted in connection that God, consequently, would be the only entity Who can legitimately speak as witness on His own behalf in religious matters (which yet implies multiple Persons in the Godhead); and that, more importantly, someone who speaks directly on religious matters without ultimately recoursing to the authority of God in Judaism is running a serious risk of claiming religious identification as (or maybe worse on par with) God.

The complaint quoted above tacitly assumes that if Jesus was God Himself then He could answer that, yes, in point of fact He can call Himself to witness because that’s what God alone is able to do (particularly on religious topics). It could be replied that doing so would goad them too far into a mob assassination attempt–such as what indeed happens at the end of this chapter of GosJohn! (8:52-59)

The more direct answer, though, is that Jesus does testify in precisely this dispute with His opponents (to which the current complaint is referring) that, “Even if I bear witness of Myself, My witness is true” (v.14) and even more strongly “I am He Who bears witness of Myself” (v.18). This latter statement is a strong divinity claim–and echoes various hard “I am” statements being given by Jesus throughout the chapter including in this same conversation (“unless you believe that I AM, you shall be dying in your sins” v 24; “When you lift up the Son of Man, the you will know that I AM” v.28; “Before Abraham was born, I AM”, v.58. For less direct “I am” statements in the same chapter which are nevertheless strongly connected to divinity claims proper to YHWH, “I am the light of the world”, v.12; “You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world”, v.23; see also Jesus’ answer to the rather nervous question “Who are you?” after one of His hard “I AM” statements, “That which I have been saying to you: from the beginning!”, v.25.)

The Evangelist has to explain, in verse 20, that the reason no one seized Him (i.e. for saying such things) was because His time had not yet come. (As an aside, the author’s location of this scene in “the treasury” means that we’re certainly looking at a behind-the-scenes discussion with leading members of the Sanhedrin, whom we know from extra-biblical sources had moved their quarters to be near both the treasury and the Court of the Gentiles which the Annas/Sadducean faction had usurped for their own profit.) I think a more direct explanation for why the stoning attempt didn’t start sooner is because along with all these statements Jesus is still talking about the Father (meaning God) as a distinct Person; which could lead to a charitable interpretation that He wasn’t really claiming identity as YHWH but was only doing something like Hillel’s scandalous declaration in the Temple two generations earlier (similar to what Jesus does in 7:37-38) albeit far more emphatically so.

The point, though, is that when hard ultimate-divinity statements and claims are being made by Jesus personally (not speaking as “the Father” at any time) throughout this chapter in several fashions connecting back to the OT, while also constantly referring to “the Father” as a distinct person; then the exegetical result is: identity with and as the One God YHWH, but distinction of Person.

That’s “orthodox” binitarianism at least, being testified to all throughout GosJohn 8.

#43

••• Where is the concept of a self-begetting God anywhere in scripture? •••

The term ‘self-begetting’ is, of course, built later of doctrines compiled from a number of concepts given in scriptural testimony. Trinitarian theism is very much a combinational doctrine set (which, from the scriptural side of things, is the main reason for its complexity.)

That God is actively self-existent, though, is pretty commonly testified to in the description of Him as “the Living God” or “the Living One”. This is a verb of action; God’s inherent life isn’t that of static existence. God is actively alive throughout His eternal totality. Not coincidentally, this description sometimes occurs in conjunction with proclamation from God, or about God, being “the First and the Last”, “He Who was and is and is to come”, “the Alpha and the Omega”. (Also not coincidentally, this is how Jesus is described, too, in RevJohn! :wink: “I am the First and the Last, the Living One!”)

That’s active self-existence; which in philosophical terms is active self-generation or positive (not privative) aseity.

The ‘begotten’ terminology per se is borrowed from scriptural descriptions of Christ, particularly in GosJohn 1:18 where Jesus Christ is distinguished from “God never seen by anyone” as “the only-begotten God Who is in (or into) the bosom of the Father”, the one “revealing” or “unfolding” the God Whom no one has ever seen. (Which in turn is a direct reference, as are many other things in the New Testament, especially in the Johannine Prologue, to the Visible Presence of YHWH acting as the Angel of YHWH; known especially in the pre-Christian Targums as the Memra/Logos of God and identified specifically as God Himself–most especially in Targumic references to Genesis 1:1 where “In the beginning the Memra of God creates the heavens and the earth”. Compare with Jn 1:1ff.)

Theologians (especially trinitarian ones) typically prefer to keep a distinction between being begotten and being created, in the sense that (as C. S. Lewis once put it) that which a person makes which is not of the same kind as himself is ‘created’. That which is made of the same kind as himself is ‘begotten’. A man creates a statue, but he begets a man. What God creates is not God; what God begets is God. So is the ‘only-begotten’ of the Father, the “only-begotten God” (as GosJohn very emphatically puts it).

#44

••• Christ is referred to as the firstborn of all creation; some translations even say the firstborn of all creatures. •••

(This has some topical relation to previous entries, of course; but I thought it was well-put enough in such a way that it deserved its own entry.)

There are several ways that Jews (among other Near Middle Eastern cultures) can use the reference term ‘firstborn’. It can have a literal meaning, of course, but it can also be used as a metaphorical reference to the chief inheritor. In the New Testament, it also occasionally involves a reference to Christ’s resurrection compared to everyone elses.

The two terms in the New Testament used for these concepts are {pro_totokon} (most-before-brought-forth) and {aparche} (from-origin-er). The former term is the one most connected to ‘firstborn’; the latter term is usually connected to the Jewish tradition of first-fruits being offered to God in gratitude for the promise of fulfillment of the harvest later.

‘Prototokon’ is used in the sense of a firstborn child at Luke 2:7, where Christ is the firstborn of Miriam (Mary). Heb 11:28 references the “exterminator” of the firstborn of Egypt, which is probably also the sense of a firstborn child. After that, things get fuzzier.

At the other end of the scale, Heb 12:23 talks about the congregation of the “firstborn”. This may be being used as a title (referring to Christ as the firstborn), but it’s far more likely that it’s being used in the sense of the church as inheritors, considering that the subsequent phrase (“registered in the heavens”) is grammatically linked to “the ecclesia of the firstborn”. Nor is the term being used in reference to a sequentially prior group (probably), because the surrounding terms are used in an absolute and/or cosmic fashion: Zion, the city of the Living God; celestial Jerusalem; the ten thousand angels; a universal convocation (which is the immediately preceding phrase); God, the judge of all; the spirits of the just perfected; Jesus, the mediator of a fresh covenant; the sprinkling of blood which is better than Abel’s. (The immediately subsequent verses are also about accepting an inheritance.)

Rev 1:5 has Jesus having the title of “firstborn from the dead” (or even “of the dead”). This is certainly a sequential event reference, and doesn’t necessarily indicate inheritorship status. (The preceding phrase is an honorific, “the Faithful Witness”; the subsequent phrase is authority scope, “Suzerein of the kings of the earth”.)

Heb 1:6 ends up being an inheritor-authority reference, though; not least because the scripture being referenced by the author (“Now, whenever He [the Father] may be leading the Firstborn into the inhabitation again, He is saying, ‘Now worship Him, all the messengers of God!’) is Psalm 97:6, where the only one in view to be worshiped (by previously rebel god/angels, by the way!) is YHWH ADNY. (Both divine names are used for God in this Psalm.) The Psalm looks forward to the day of the coming of YHWH; the Hebraist is doing the same thing, as part of his demonstration to his reader of how much greater than angels the Son is: the One coming again to the dwelling place (probably meaning the return of the Shekinah to the Temple/tabernacle) being Jesus Christ.

(The first chapter of Hebrews has a lot of important high Christology statements, and is discussed in detail many places in the 76-page digest; along with other testimony from Hebrews to the full humanity and even the creation of Christ. See the introductory comment of this thread for a link.)

Rom 8:28 talks about those “who are called in accord to the purpose that, whom God foreknew, He designates beforehand also, to be conformed to the image of His Son, into Him, to be the firstborn among many brethren.” It’s actually grammatically unclear here whether “the firstborn” means the ones called to be conformed to the image of His Son into Him, or whether the sentence means that these were called to be conformed to the image of God’s Son in order for Him to be Firstborn among many brethren. The former meaning could be a sequential event reference, comparing the first Christians to those who will come later (as St. Paul sometimes does, including elsewhere in EpistRom); but the latter meaning would pretty much void a sequential reference, since trying to apply it here would result in these Christians first being called so that eventually Christ would first exist among them all. (Wha??) Once again, the ref (if it’s to Christ) has to do with authority and inheritorship, not to sequentially coming into existence.

Col 1 has the final two places this word is used in the New Testament (whether in regard to Christ or anyone else). The first usage, at 1:15, could at first glance seem to mean Christ comes into existence sequentially first; but the language used immediately afterward for this “firstborn of every creature” is language nominally used only for YHWH ADNY–in fact, if anything, it goes emphatically beyond the normal reference use! “For in Him is the-all created, that in the heavens and that in the earth, th visible and the invisible, whether thrones, or lordships, or sovereignties, or authorities: the-all is created through Him and for (or into) Him, and He is before all, and the-all has its cohesion in Him.” These are statements only proper to the grounding fact of all reality, God; but they’re being used of Jesus Christ, “Who is the image of the invisible God” and “firstborn of every creature”.

That this term is being used for authoritative Sonship, not as a question of sequential coming-to-exist, is strengthened by the next paragraph, where variations on this same language are used in regard to “the Head of the body, the ecclesia, Who is Sovereign… for in Him the total fullness delights to dwell, and through Him to reconcile the all to Him whether things on the earth or things in the heavens.” In conjunction with the preceding paragraph, concerning maximal divinity language normally applied to YHWH ADNY ELHM, this is more of the same–except that, just as in the previous paragraph, there is more than one person in view. In this case, “the Firstborn of the dead, that in all He may be becoming first.” But this is the same person of whom the traditionally maximum phrases of creational Divinity are being used. (2:8-15 has similar topical links and emphases.)

The ‘firstfruit’ references often concern, or could concern, some kind of sequential ordering, though more typically the concept is about quality: saints have a firstfruit of the Spirit in Rom 8:23; Judaism, even the Judaism of the ones who have cast away Christ (for the conciliation of the world so who are expected to be redeemed eventually, too!) is considered a holy firstfruit and root in Rom 11:16 (not sequentially prior to paganism, but sequentially prior to the Christianity of the Gentiles–and qualitatively prior to paganism); Epanetus is called firstfruit in Rom 16:5 (although this may be more about a compliment of quality than sequential ordering); ditto the house of Stephanas and Fortunatus of Achaea in 1 Cor 16:15 (which again may be more about a compliment of quality than sequential ordering of occurrence). Ja 1:18 says that, by God’s intention, God teems us forth by the Word of truth (a reference to the Memra of God, Who is God Himself) into us (or for us), to be some (or any) firstfruit of the creatures of Himself.

Christ is called the Firstfruit of the reposing ones (i.e. among the dead) at 1 Cor 15:20; but the concept of sequential ordering, though far from absent in this portion, may be overshadowed by the concept of superior quality and importance: “For since, in fact, through a man came death, through a man also the resurrection of the dead; etc.”

The upshot is that the terms describing Christ as “firstborn” are not necessarily speaking of Christ being a first creation of God (like an Arian super-angel) and on the contrary sometimes (as in Hebrews and Colossians) also contain very strong maximal-deity language typically used for God Most High as the creator and sustainer of all things. Just as importantly, it is emphatically Jesus Who is being described this way in these places, personally distinct from the person of “the Father”–Who is usually referred to in Greek, for purposes of personally distinguishing Him from Jesus (at the very least), as “God”.

#45

••• It says in 1 Timothy that there is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the man Jesus Christ. •••

I’ve been meaning to post up a discussion of this somewhere for a while–but I kept thinking I had done it already! (I thought it was already in this thread, for example, the last time it was recently mentioned as a problem. Then I thought, ah, no, it’s in the digest… nope, not there either. Although some important and more directly positive pieces of scriptural data from the epistles to Timothy are adduced.) So, at long last, I’ve finally put it somewhere other than my private notesheet. :wink:

1 Tim 2:5-7 (which St. Paul calls, in verse 4, the recognition of the truth): “For one God and one mediator of God and mankind, (the) (hu)man Christ Jesus, he (or this one) is giving himself as a ransom for all: the testimony (or martyrdom), in its own times, into which I was appointed a herald and an apostle–I am telling the truth, I am not lying!–a teacher of the nations in knowledge and truth.”

There are many interesting issues about the passage. So get comfortable, this is going to take a while!

First (and least): the passage does not say, “For there is one God the Father and there is one mediator the man Christ Jesus.” (I have seen at least one professional unitarian apologist paraphrase it this way, which is why I am mentioning it here.) The grammar is not nearly as particular as that, and there is no reference to “the Father” in the transmission of this text (even in variants).

Second: the grammar is not entirely easy to parse out here. I’ve given an idea of the grammatic difficulty above in my translation: there is no verb at all before “he is giving himself”, for example. Even orthodox translators commonly read one or two silent “is”-es (and one or two silent “there”s) into the phrase, of course; which by the way shows that there are many ways of translating the phrase that are perfectly acceptable to orthodox theology.

Third: the first part of the opening phrase (heis gar theos) mirrors the second part of the opening phrase (heis kai mesite_s) in its construction, with the {gar} and the {kai} serving as connecting conjunctions (“for” and “and” respectively). While it need not be ironclad, this construction lends strong weight to the notion that the two subjects of the opening phrase should be translated in similarly identical construction-patterns in English. If you put a silent “there” and “is” in one place, you should probably do it in the other place, too. But then the question becomes, why use that kind of particularity in the verse?

Fourth: as noted a minute ago, even if the verse is translated “For there is one God, and there is one mediator of God and man, the man Christ Jesus”, this is not necessarily a translation that threatens orthodoxy, as we agree that the one God serves as mediator between God and man in the man Christ Jesus. Even a modalist might not have a problem with that; but we’d have even less of a problem because (considering scripture as a whole) we find two (or three, rather) Persons of the One God in operation, with the Son and the Spirit serving in somewhat related ways as access to the Person of the Father.

Fifth: it isn’t necessary to include any “there”s in the English translation. In fact, the first part of the opening phrase would thus become a version of the Shema: “For God is one” or “For one is God”. This would mean the next phrase would most likely be translated, “and one is a mediator” or “and a mediator is one”.

If the opening phrase is to be translated as a Shema declaration in the sense that there is only one ultimate God, then the next phrase would be most likely translated in the sense that there is only one ultimate mediator between man and God, the man Christ Jesus: which again is not necessarily a counter-‘orthodox’ statement. (Orthodoxy or Unitarianism could be read into the meaning either way, and the statement doesn’t conflict with either full position as, hopefully, developed from the full contexts of scriptural witness exegetically.)

If the opening phrase is to be translated as “God is only one person”, as I have seen attempted by unitarians trying to force the issue, then this is at least anachronistic as a doctrinal statement: they treat the notion of a singular unity of persons in deity as being a late innovation (from polytheism, apparently) that the original Shema declaration would not have been opposing per se. But then the matter could be clarified by checking to see how the word AeCHaD is used in Hebrew (where it is in fact commonly used in reference to a compound singularity or composite unity) and then checking to see if there are ever indications of YHWH being testified to in that fashion in other regards. (Which the orthodox have long been doing, along with some other Christian groups.) In any case “For God is only one person” would then be most likely be followed by the parallel proclamation “and the Mediator is only one person” in the sense that he isn’t multiple persons in a compound singularity–which would be even more anachronistic (and useless) for the text to be testifying to.

If the opening phrase is to be translated, not as a Shema proclamation (though perhaps as a nod to it), but simply in the sense that “For one (of these) is God, and (another) one is a/the mediator of God and man”, which would be another legitimate option (though the parenthetical portions would be tacit), then the next thing would be to check to see if Paul is thus explaining what roles and/or identities two entities possess.

The previous paragraph leading into this statement, is about entreating Paul’s congregation to pray and give thanksgiving for all mankind, including kings and superiors, so that the congregation may be living a quiet and peaceful and devoted and well-anchored life; for this is ideal and welcome in the sight of our Savior, God, who wills all mankind to be saved and to come to a recognition of the truth. Which is… that one of these entities is God and one of these entities is only a mediator between God and man…? um… wait. Paul wasn’t talking about the identity and/or roles of two entities (or even two persons) leading into this!

Consequently, treating the phrases as having this meaning would be totally un-contextual. At most, it would be evidence of something being interpolated into the text!

Sixth: if, as may also be legitimately done, the phrase is translated as I have given in my main translation above, “For one God and one Mediator…” then Paul will be saying that one God, acting as mediator between God and man, identified as the Man Christ Jesus (with ‘man’ being the words for humankind and human), is giving Himself as correspondent ransom for all. Obviously this has some advantages as an orthodox translation: it identifies the man Jesus as God but also as a mediator between God and man. How well does it fit contextually, though?

One obvious fit is that just previously Paul was talking about their savior, God, Who wills all mankind to be saved. That’s a singular subject; and this continuation would be an important (if difficult, but also poetically constructed) truth about that singular subject, which truth Paul would be teaching the nations (thus including all mankind) as an appointed apostle. It also comports well with Jesus being the Savior (which is certainly testified to elsewhere) by giving Himself for all. (I am deferring a debate about what “ransom” is supposed to mean, as it has no immediate importance for this discussion.)

The title of “savior”, aside from having its own importance within Jewish religious history, is, of course, a direct counter to a title given to various Imperial officials. Jews (and Christians) would declare: our Savior is God. Christians would also declare: our Savior is Jesus Christ. Not this or that general or emperor; this is whom we owe our ultimate allegiance to. The question has to be raised, though, how reverent Jews would be owing their religious allegiance to someone as Savior who isn’t God, especially in a larger social context where various pagan officials (some of them claiming some kind of deity themselves!) are presenting that as a loyalty-title claim, too. Certainly the conflict this would generate among Jews would go a long way toward explaining the violent revulsion given by some Jews (especially among the religious class) to Christ and to Christians in the New Testament texts. If Jesus was only making human-level claims about himself, and if his first followers were for a long time (through the composition of the canon) only making similar human-level claims about him, of a sort that unitarians (and some other critics) insist a pious Jew would have no problem with: then why were pious Jews having seriously severe problems with it? (Enough so that even Jesus’ supporters in the Sanhedrin ended up voting for his death on charges of blasphemy, minus two abstaining yea or nay.)

Seventh: to this might be appended the observation that pious Jews, already living in a larger surrounding environment where officials among their enemies (some of them claiming deity themselves) are giving themselves the title of “Lord”, are less likely thereby to give the same title to another mere sovereign, when that title is used of God in their scriptures, while treating this merely human person as having not only divine levels of authority but of being worthy to pray to as their Lord. One might at least be excusably forgiven for thinking, that when such Jews profess and proclaim Jesus as “our Lord” in the same breath that they profess God as “our Father”–the same God Whom they have previously been in the habit of calling “Lord” as an acceptable substitution for the Divine Name–then somehow those Jews are not simply talking about a human sovereign who is merely appointed lots of authority by the real Lord. What translation best coheres with this observation, then?

Eighth: it might also be noted that while the words “in Christ Jesus” are missing from Paul’s oath (sworn in verse 7) in many old texts across many textual families of this epistle, they do show up in a wide family of later texts. Either they were original but somehow dropped out (admittedly extremely doubtful), or scribes were piously replacing what they thought was a dropped term. Why would they do that?

‘Because by then they were largely trinitarian, duh!’ True, by then they were, and I do not doubt that that is a key part of the explanation. But a unitarian (or similar critic) had better be careful making that charge, because it requires admitting that Paul wouldn’t swear (in effect) the Oath of the Testimony in the name of Christ unless he thought Christ was somehow YHWH Himself.

But this is exactly what Paul is doing in Rom 9:1! Which, from the identical use of the oath ({ale_theian lego_ ou pseudomai} {ale_theian lego_ ou pseudomai}) and the mirror topic (salvation of those whom Paul’s heart is concerned about, Jews in the first text, Gentiles here), would also go a long way toward explaining why pious scribes might think the phrase had somehow accidentally dropped out: because the Romans epistle shows that when Paul is taking the Oath of the Testimony, he swears by Jesus Christ. (Who himself warned not to try avoiding the seriousness of an oath by swearing by anything less than God, even when those lesser things are religiously important in relation to God. “Let your word be yes, yes!–no, no! And anything more than this is of the Evil One.”)

Ninth: as previously mentioned, there are other statements in the Timothy Epistles regarding how Jesus Christ is to be religiously identified.

Jesus is spoken of with a kerygmatic hymn in 1 Tim 3:16 (the “common confession: great is the mystery of godliness”) as “[He who] was revealed in the flesh, was justified by (or in) the spirit, beheld by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory.” The elements “beheld by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world” are things that would normally be said about God Most High. And indeed, the nearest name who matches the “Who” (or the “this one” rather) is “the living God, the pillar and base of the truth”! Christ Jesus is mentioned a little earlier, too, (with another mention of God between, in relation to “God’s house” where the congregation of “the living God” meets); where it says that those who serve ideally are procuring for themselves an ideal rank and much boldness in the faith that is in Christ Jesus.

Speaking as a devout monotheist who believes in God and places my ultimate faith in God, I would be extremely edgy about putting my religious faith in a man who was only a human man (even if a divinely authorized one). I don’t put my religious faith in Moses, for example.

Meanwhile the very first verse of this epistle, 1 Tim 1:1, St. Paul calls God “our Savior” and then immediately calls Jesus Christ “our hope”. In the Psalms, however, these terms (our hope and our salvation) are typically combined together when speaking of YHWH (Ps 14:6; 61:2; 62:7; 71:5; 91:9; 142:5.) This is one example of a common Pauline motif, of taking OT statements referring to God and splitting up their references between “God” and “Jesus” (and/or between “the Father” and “the Son”.)

2 Tim is even more emphatic in some ways: 4:18 – “The Lord will deliver me from every evil deed and will bring me safely to His kingdom; to Him be the glory forever and ever. Amen!” Context in chapter 4 shows the only Lord in view is Jesus; but this is a recognizable doxological form of worship of God alone; Whom we are strenuously warned by St. Paul we should worship alone, and not any angel or lesser being (Col 2:18). Indeed, one of his lamentations about pagans who have done just this, is itself a similar doxology to God the Father!–Rom 1:25: “for they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, Who is blessed forver. Amen!”

At 2:19, St. Paul declares, “Nevertheless, the firm foundation of God stands, having this seal: ‘the Lord knows those who are His’ and ‘Let everyone who names the name of the Lord abstain from wickedness’.” These sayings are typical OT statements about God (and indeed the verse opens with a reference to a declaration of the YHWH ELHM concerning a cornerstone, or ‘son’ by Hebrew pun, which He will set as a stumbling stone for Israel–a stone certainly identified by Paul elsewhere as Christ.) But St. Paul personally distinguishes between Christ Jesus “our Lord” and “God the Father” in verse 1:2. This personal distinction doesn’t keep him from speaking of “the Lord” throughout his epistle in terms typically reserved for God alone (including at 2:19).

These examples (which could be multiplied further in both of the Timothean Epistles–which is the main reason why some scholars insist on dating them as pseudonymous works composed long after the death of St. Paul, due to their “high Christology”) show at the very least no hard distinction being made by Paul between God and Christ, other than a personal distinction between “the Father” and “the Son”. This adds weight to the notion that 1 Tim 2:5-7 should be interpreted in a similar fashion.

#46

You bring up an interesting point here at the end (among others), Jason. My understanding is that scholarship is nearly unanimous in rejecting both 1st and 2nd Timothy as having been written by Paul, so I’m not certain that either of us can pin an argument either way on that particular scripture.

#47

Granted. I don’t have to have either of the Tim Epistles for the evidential set. But I notice that the theological tensions (and Christological affirmations) found in the other NT canon documents are found here as well.

(Personally I have very little problem believing they are pre-70 docs, and so most likely authentic, if also possibly containing brief glosses by an early commentor–perhaps Timothy himself. But I know plenty of people, even among some conservatives, have a problem accepting them today as genuine, so… I can take or leave them either way. :slight_smile: )

#48

If I remember right, I don’t think the historical critical issues I was aware of were regarding when they were written. I’d have to go back and review the information to be certain what they were exactly. Apparently Colossians and Ephesians are very much doubted among histo-crit scholars as well.

The main thing I don’t like about the possibility that they’re not authentic is that a couple of the most powerful universalist scriptures are in 1st Timothy.

#49

Ok. I’m going to take another stab at this from the “did Jesus die in every sense of the word possible” angle.

I’m going to suggest that Jesus did actually die spiritually, as well as physically.
When the scripture talks about the penalty for sin in Genesis, it describes death as the penalty. There is some confusion due to the lack of clarity as to which type of death was meant for Adam and Eve, although I think there is enough evidence to at least conclude that spiritual death was at least part of the penalty. Elsewhere in scripture, it describes the wages of sin being death. Again the word can be used of physical or spiritual death. But here we have an additional piece of information; namely that in opposition to this, the free gift is ‘eternal’ (aionion) life. So we seem to have a contrast here between a spiritual life and a spiritual death.

We all still die physically, so if Christ only died physically, then we could not really say in any meaningful sense that he atoned or propitiated for our sin. In order to do that, he had to have died spiritually as well, hence paying our exact penalty for sin; actual separation from God. This is I think sufficiently in evidence from Christ’s last words on the cross in GosMark; My God My God, why have you forsaken me? Again, there is the distinction of himself from God, in addition to supporting the notion of an actual spiritual death. (There is no life of any kind apart from God)

Now, you also mentioned the passage where it refers to Christ’s descent into hades and preaching to the spirits imprisoned. I have heard it argued that this was after, not during the three days in the tomb, in light of some of the considerations above.

How would you solve these difficulties?

#50

This is more of a metaphysical question than a scriptural one, per se; so I’ll be addressing it over in the metaphysical crit thread. (Edited to add: here. The comment preceding that comment, contains links to prior comments in either thread which are topically relevant.)

My answer in this thread regarding the cry from the cross, can be found back here, though.

(I will note in fairness that this doesn’t necessarily preclude Jesus being in fact abandoned by God, if Jesus was not in fact quoting the opening lines of this Psalm. But considering the circumstances, that seems highly improbable.)

#51

To which I will add, that there’s nothing in the Petrine declaration which would indicate Christ’s descent into hades (sheol, the pit, the grave) only happened after Christ’s descent into, y’know, the grave. :mrgreen:

(Although I agree with theologians like Lewis and MacDonald, that it was not once at one time that Christ descends into hell to witness to spirits in bondage, but at all times. Historically, something happens naturally once corresponding to this descent.)

It may be worth considering, though, why the critics you heard this from, thought it was worth interpreting the descent to have happened only after and not during the death-and-entombment of Christ.

Is it because they think it would make no sense and/or would be invalid, for Christ to evangelize those in hades if he himself was at that time abandoned by (or at least separated from) God? (That’s my own guess, but…)

JRP addresses recent metaphysical crits of trinitarianism
#52

My guess is similar to yours, except that I think part of their point was that Jesus was actually dead in every sense of the word for three days, until raised back to life by the Father.

I wondered if perhaps this was more of a metaphysical question, or at least had elements of both.

#53

Having now addressed the problems more directly over in the metaphysical thread here, I will take a moment to reiterate back here in the scriptural thread something that I previously mentioned in another context.

Namely, GosJohn reports Jesus stating that he resurrects himself (John 2:18-22; 10:17-18); and is emphatically the Resurrection and the Life (John 11:25).

This doesn’t mean the Father doesn’t resurrect Jesus–that’s testified, too, elsewhere. (Rom 10:9, to pull one of many examples off the top of my head.) Nor does it mean that Jesus resurrects Himself by His own unique power; rather He receives power and authority from the Father to be doing so.

It does mean that Jesus has to be still existing, though, in order to resurrect himself (or Himself, either one. For someone to claim that he himself is the resurrection and the life, moreover, is extremely theologically improper within a context of Judaism–unless that person is in fact the one and only Living God Most High by Whom all live and shall live again.)

#54

Ok…Well I think these answers are sufficient to convince me of at least, er, binitarianism.

#55

I remembered something about the critical article or whatever it was, when I was reading through the earlier parts of this thread. It would seem that the critic essentially “won” his argument against trinitarianism by first setting up the straw man that most trinitarians are really modalists (though in his view they evidently don’t realize this).

#56

That’s an unusual line to take, nowadays; I think more critics of trinitarianism tend to read us as tri-theists.

And of course it’s easy for us, when we’re not being careful, to go one or the other way. (Self-critically, I think I have more of a tendency toward modalism myself, than tri-theism or some kind of arianism, for example.)

In fairness I want to add that while there’s nothing in the Petrine statement that directly indicates the descent only happened after the resurrection (and the ascension?), it’s a little unclear as to whether “being put to death truly in the flesh, yet vivified in the spirit” is supposed to be about Christ grammatically or about we who are being led to God by Christ. And the grammatic ambiguity may have been on purpose for poetic linkage, since Christ died concerning sins that He may be leading us (the unjust) to God. We submit to sharing the death of Christ so that we may also share in the life of Christ cooperatively.

(I will also mention incidentally, that the pronoun regarding the spirit “in which being gone to the spirits in jail also He heralds to those once stubborn”, may also be translated “in Whom”. But this, to be fair, cannot be used as primary scriptural testimony to the distinct person of the Holy Spirit; its translation depends on this having been settled otherwise elsewhere.)

Trinitarianism per se is rather more difficult to establish in some ways, not least because most of the scriptural testimony is about the status of Christ per se. Understandably, most of the crits brought up in this thread from local and relatively recent (at the time) arguments against trinitarianism, are about Christ, not about the Spirit. However, it happens that a few of the scriptural references discussed above do involve distinction of the Holy Spirit from both the Father and the Son. (And there’s more of this in the digest, of course. Which by the way I’m in the process of revising and expanding; but I’m also conservatively removing some of the professed testimony to a distinction of the HS as a third person, where I thought it wasn’t fairly clear enough or worse was begging the question.)

#57

If I understand what you mean by the term “tri-theism” correctly, I believe that was the other thing he mentioned. I think he claimed that most trinitarianism, as taught in our churches at least, iss really modalism and that the few who are doctrinally sorted out enough to avoid that, were really tri-theists (again, without realizing it). But from what I’ve seen of your defenses of what you refer to as ortho-trin., I’d say he’s perhaps confusing tri-theism for what you have laid out as the real trinitarian position. However, it may be that he is seeing the same tendency toward the scriptural errors that you’ve just mentioned, but from a “glass half-empty” perspective. He therefore then took the easy way out and used a more plain reading interpretation style to avoid those slippery slopes by attempting to use scripture to deny the “God” status of Jesus, without actually denying his divinity. It would appear that trinitarianism makes at least a functional subordination (if not an ontological) case for why Jesus can be God and still say that the Father is greater.

I agree with you that the most problematic aspect of trinitarianism is convincingly demonstrating the sufficiently distinct personhood of the Holy Spirit, which is why I’m only more or less cautiously convinced of binitarian theism at the moment.

#58

I want to add here, for clarity’s sake, that I know perfectly well that it’s far too simplistic (in an absolute sense) to point to some statement in GosJohn (or wherever) and infer from that statement that Jesus was and is the 2nd Person of the Trinity or that the Holy Spirit is the 3rd Person of the Trinity (personally distinct from the Son and the Father but substantially singular in unity with those persons as one entity.)

Are the texts corrupt in transmission? Is the translation appropriate? Is the context being understood (at any of several or even many levels)? Is the material forged or otherwise fictional? (And would fictionality make a negative difference?) Is the author otherwise reporting accurate memory? Does the author himself correctly understand the implications of what he is saying? (And if so, to what extent? Or if not to some extent, how much does that matter?)

And even if the material is accurate as to what Jesus was teaching and claiming about himself, this might be irrelevant (at best) unless it’s even possible (moreso actually true) for God to exist, in this fashion, and in this relation to the rest of reality. And even if God does exist in a trinitarian orthodox way, in such-n-such relationship (or relationships) to the rest of reality, and even if we could expect God to behave in a particular way toward reality, and even if the narrative matches logical expectations; Jesus might be lying, or insane. (Or merely mistaken??)

So there’s a ton of things to evaluate. :slight_smile: Which is why there are plenty of ways to be sceptical about the result.

Which I sympathize with sceptics about (whether non-religious or irreligious or religiously non-Christian or even religiously alt-Christian). :ugeek: :wink:

#59

Lots of complexity to the issues, for sure.

I guess if I were to classify myself it would be non-religious alt-Christian. :wink:

#60

Hi Jason. Could you address from the trinitarian perspective the following verses? (CLV)

Joh 17:1 These things speaks Jesus, and lifting His eyes to heaven, He said, “Father, come has the hour. Glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son should be glorifying Thee,
Joh 17:2 according as Thou givest Him authority over all flesh, that everything which Thou hast given to Him, He should be giving it to them, even life eonian.”
Joh 17:3 Now it is eonian life that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Him Whom Thou dost commission, Jesus Christ."
Joh 17:4 I glorify Thee on the earth, finishing the work which Thou hast given Me, that I should be doing it."
Joh 17:5 And now glorify Thou Me, Father, with Thyself, with the glory which I had before the world is with Thee."
Joh 17:6 I manifest Thy name to the men whom Thou givest Me out of the world. Thine they were, and to Me Thou givest them, and Thy word they have kept."
Joh 17:7 Now they know that all, whatever Thou hast given Me, is from Thee,
Joh 17:8 for the declarations which Thou hast given Me, I have given them, and they took them, and know truly that I came out from Thee, and they believe that thou dost commission Me."

I have bolded the portions which I felt were of most relevance to the discussion between ortho-trin and non-trin views.

Why, in vs. 3 in his reference to eonian life, does Jesus make a distinction between knowing the only true God (Father) and Himself, the Son, by using the qualifier “and”? It would seem that it would’ve been simpler to say that eonian life is knowing us, the only true God, if that was really what he meant.
vs. 5 is interesting in that it includes references to both Jesus’ pre-existence, and yet a distinction in glorifying himself (Jesus) with glorifying the Father. Again, in vs. 8, Jesus makes the statement that he came out from the Father, while still maintaining the distinction in identity. Now I know that trinitarians will say that Jesus would obviously make a distinction between himself and the Father since they aren’t the same person, yet these types of statements, particularly in vs. 3, would appear to further indicate that they are truly distinct in kind, even though Jesus makes clear statements about his own pre-existence with the Father, as well as his coming out from the Father.