[This series is part of Section Four, Ethics and the Third Person. An index with links to all parts of the work as they are posted can be found [url=https://forum.evangelicaluniversalist.com/t/sword-to-the-heart-ethics-and-the-third-person/1335/1]here.]
[This series concludes Chapter 38, “Inferring the Third Person of God”.]
[Entry 1]
A Third Person of God can thus be inferred as solving a special conceptual problem, that is sometimes (and I would say quite rightly) advanced against mere monotheism, on the grounds that God can be necessarily expected to interact personally with created persons (such as ourselves) and that God has characteristics which allow for the existence of a proceeding distinct Person of God Who exists (analogically) ‘within’ the overarching Self-begetting and Self-begotten independent reality of God (without being either the Self-begetting or Self-begotten Persons).
But I hinted back in Section Three, when inferring the interpersonal unity of God (as God Self-begetting and God Self-begotten), that I could have gone on immediately at that point to inferring the existence of a Third Person of God. At the time, I needed to focus topically on the relation of God to creation more generally, and then to persons such as you and I more specifically, so I moved along with a note that I would be getting back to this topic.
While a Third Person of God would solve my conceptual problem, and may be inferred to necessarily exist (if I have properly identified some other characteristics of God and some related necessities), the strength of this conclusion would be reinforced even further if I arrive at an inference of the Third Person’s existence before arriving at the problem.