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Complaints

Warning to New Christians

Over at Parchment and Pen Michael Patton has posted a chapter on the Trinty, part of a forthcoming book called The Discipleship Book, intended to instruct new Christians.

Dear new Christians – beware. Patton is sincere, but misinformed. He thinks the Bible obviously teaches what he’s asserting, and reasons that any prior Bible-loving Christians must’ve thought likewise.

But having studied a vast amount of historical writings by Christians, I can assure you that this is demonstrably not so, even if we stick to “mainstream” Christians (so ignoring, e.g. “Arians”, Marcionites, etc.) I take no pleasure in pointing this out, and I wish it were as simple as Patton says. But facts are facts.

I’ve discussed his sort of take on the Trinty before. It is not, as Patton says in a comment, “what the Bible teaches and Christians for 2000 years have believed.” It is what (some? many?) theologians at Dallas Theological Seminary think about the Trinity. How widespread these views are, I’m not sure. But the many evangelical and other theologians riding the “social trinitarian” bandwagon would not agree with what Patton says.

Regarding what Patton holds forth as “the best we can do”, take care lest you fall into inconsistency.

You should know that some of the most brilliant Christian thinkers in the last 100 years have held many different views on just how “the” doctrine should be understood. Unfortunately, these theories are, for the most part, not consistent with one another.

Patton asserts thatRead More »Warning to New Christians

No “Trinity Verse” – A Good Thing?

Over at Biola’s alumni magazine, Winter 2011 issue, theologian Fred Sanders has a piece in which he argues,

The Trinity is a biblical doctrine, but let’s admit it: There’s something annoying about how hard it is to put your finger on a verse that states the whole doctrine.

The Bible presents the elements of the doctrine in numerous passages, of course: that there is only one God; that the Father is God; that the Son is God; and that the Spirit is God. We can also tell easily enough that the Father, Son and Spirit are really distinct from one another, and are not just three names for one person. If you hold all those clear teachings of Scripture in your mind at one time and think through them together, the doctrine of the Trinity is inevitable. Trinitarianism is a biblical doctrine and all the ingredients are given to us there: Just add thought and you have the classic doctrine. (emphases added)

Hmmm…. I would have thought that the elements of “the” doctrine included that the three are same substance or essence (homoousios). And that the there are co-equal, and co-eternal, uncreated, though the Father timelessly generates the Son, and the Spirit proceeds from him (or if you’re Western/Latin – from both Father and Son). Maybe something about their having one “divine nature” as well.Read More »No “Trinity Verse” – A Good Thing?

Ignored Analytic Theology

Over at Aporetic Christianity Paul has had a worthy post on a major new tome of systematic theology, which he says whiffs it on the contributions of analytic philosophers of the last 40 years or so. I agree with all the examples Paul gives of philosophers / analytic theologians whose work should not be ignored by any serious investigator – not because they’re my peeps –… Read More »Ignored Analytic Theology

Linkage: Feudin’ Christian Philosophers & Theologians

Over at Aporetic Christianity, Paul M. has a long but interesting and perceptive post on the hostility he’s encountered in some Reformed circles towards analytic theology. (See his whole post if you’re wondering what “analytic theology” is.) A sample: Not only is philosophy shunned as speculative and troublesome, many Reformed… disparage some of the tools those in this discipline specialize in utilizing. Logic and analytical… Read More »Linkage: Feudin’ Christian Philosophers & Theologians

Is God a Self? – Part 7 – Swinburne

Richard Swinburne is one of the greatest living Christian philosophers, who has made immense contributions to philosophy of religion and philosophical theology. It is only idolatry of the past that prevents people from seeing him as great a Christian intellectual as Origen, Augustine, Aquinas, or Leibniz. In my view, he’s plainly a better, clearer, more well-rounded philosopher than any of them. “A prophet is honored… Read More »Is God a Self? – Part 7 – Swinburne

What if God read your posts?

What if? (What if 1+1 were 2?) By “posts”, of course, we mean “posts or comments on posts”. Read it, live it. Patton is very insightful there. I speak as one sinner to others. There’s something about human nature… if we’re convinced that we’re right about some important subject-matter, we start to think we’re entitled to pour scorn and contempt on those without this supposed… Read More »What if God read your posts?

The Mystery of Electricity

A trinitarian facepalm for this, from  a Bob Jones University Press grade school textbook (HT: Digg.) Not having seen the book, I can’t be sure what is going on here. Here are some options: The writer is terribly uninformed. The writer is feigning ignorance in a misguided attempt to instill delight and wonder into science. The writers is feigning ignorance in an attempt to multiply “mysteries”.… Read More »The Mystery of Electricity

No Trinity, No Job – Part 2

Three World Vision employees are fired because according to World Vision they don’t believe in that Jesus is “fully God” or that he’s a member of the Trinity.

But inquiring minds want to know: what did they believe, what statement or statements of faith did they sign, and are the beliefs therein necessary and sufficient for being a real Christian? This time, we’re digging a little deeper.

Their website saith,

World Vision U.S. hires only those who agree and accept to its Statement of Faith and/or the Apostles’ Creed. (source)

Interesting! Note the “and/or” – employees must affirm either one or both. As we’ve noted before here at trinities, nothing in the so-called Apostles’ Creed requires belief in either the “full deity” of Christ (whatever that may mean) or any sort of trinitarian theory.Read More »No Trinity, No Job – Part 2

No Trinity, No Job – Part 1

The latest Christianity Today magazine features an article entitle “Faith-Based Fracas”, by free-lance reporter Bobby Ross Jr. The main interest of the piece is whether or not it will remain legal for religious organizations to hire and fire on the basis of religious beliefs.

For the record: I support that right.

But the piece is occasioned by a current lawsuit against evangelical charity World Vision brought by three recently fired employees.

It strikes me that there are human and theological angles to this story which have yet to be told.

Here are the relevant bits from Ross’s story in CT:

Both [Sylvia Spencer and Vicki Hulse] signed statements affirming their Christian faith and devoted a decade to World Vision… But in November 2006, they and colleague Ted Youngerberg were fired. Their offense, as determined by a corporate investigation: The three did not believe that Jesus Christ is fully God and a member of the Trinity. (Bobby Ross Jr., “Faith-Based Fracas”, Christianity Today, June 2010, 17-21, p. 17, emphases added)

No doubt the reporter here was hindered by the fact that a lawsuit is underway. But the story has many obvious, yawning gaps:Read More »No Trinity, No Job – Part 1

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 6 Part 1 – BURKE

In the 6th and closing round, Burke argues from reason, scripture, and history. From reason: The Trinity doctrine, argues Burke, is inconsistent with itself. The “Athanasian” creed presents us with three, each of whom is a Lord, and yet insists that there is only one Lord. As some philosophers have pointed out, it is self-evident that if every F is a G, then there can’t… Read More »SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 6 Part 1 – BURKE

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 5 – BURKE – Part 1

Burke’s fifth round opens some interesting cans of worms. First, he reiterates that the Bible doesn’t explicitly talk of any triple-personed god, but instead calls the God of the Jews the Father. His Son is Jesus, and they stand in a hierarchy as two persons – the Son “under” the Father – over the realm of angels. He says that “Scripture never includes the Holy Spirit… Read More »SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 5 – BURKE – Part 1

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 5 – BOWMAN – PART 2

I still mean to comment on Bowman’s 5th round, but my inner logic nerd was drawn in by some action from round 5 here, comment 19: [Burke:] “This week I hope Rob will show Biblical evidence for the essential relationship formulae of Trinitarianism: 1. Father = ‘God’, Son = ‘God’ and Holy Spirit = ‘God’ 2. ‘God’ = Father + Son + Holy Spirit  .… Read More »SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 5 – BOWMAN – PART 2

St. Loyola

Loyola: tradition trumps sense perception

St. Ignatius Loyola (1495-1556) founded the Jesuit order and authored a famous book of Spiritual Exercises. There, in a list of rules for correct belief, we have this: Thirteenth Rule. To be right in everything, we ought always to hold that the white which I see, is black, if the Hierarchical Church so decides it, believing that between Christ our Lord, the Bridegroom, and the… Read More »Loyola: tradition trumps sense perception

confused kid

Mysterians at work in Dallas

confused kid
Clearly, the instructor’s work has been accomplished.

What I call positive mysterianism about the Trinity is the view that the doctrine, as best we can formulate it, is apparently contradictory.  Now many Christian philosophers resort to this in the end, but only after one or more elaborate attempts to spell the doctrine out in a coherent way. On the other hand, some jump more quickly for the claim, not really expanding on or interpreting the standard creedal formulas much at all. These are primarily who I have in mind when I use the label “positive mysterian”.

I ran across a striking version of this recently, in a blog post by theologian C. Michael Patton, who blogs at Parchment and Pen: a theology blog. In his interesting post, he says that all the typical analogies for the Trinity (shamrock, egg, water-ice-vapor, etc.) are useful only for showing what the Trinity doctrine is not.

This contrasts interestingly with what I call negative mysterians. Typically, and this holds for many of the Fathers, as well as for people like Brower and Rea nowadays, they hold that all these analogies are useful, at least when you pile together enough of them, for showing what the doctrine is. Individually, they are highly misleading, and only barely appropriate, but they seem to think that multiplying analogies like these results in our  achieving a minimal grasp of what is being claimed. Maybe they think the seeming inconsistency of the analogies sort of cancels out the misleading implications of each one considered alone.

In any case, in Patten’s view, the best you can do is to Read More »Mysterians at work in Dallas

Richard of St. Victor 3 – Perfect charity must be directed at another person (JT)

“Steven, let’s look over there and pretend like we don’t see that floating head.”
“Steven, let’s look over there and pretend like we don’t see that floating head.”

STAGE 2. In this stage, Richard tries to show that perfect charity must be directed at another person. Here’s the quotation:

‘no one is properly said to have charity on the basis of his own private love of himself. And so it is necessary for love to be directed toward another for it to be charity’.

Read More »Richard of St. Victor 3 – Perfect charity must be directed at another person (JT)

Don’t think/write like a contemporary theologian – Part 5 – identity blabber

Barak Hussein Obama, as I write this, enjoys untold legions of fans. Some of them identify him with Jesus, or with Abe Lincoln, or Franklin Delano Roosevelt, or Moses. What I just said is true. But what it mean? It sure does not mean that a lot of people think B.H.O. is one and the same being as (i.e. is numerically identical to) Abe (etc.).… Read More »Don’t think/write like a contemporary theologian – Part 5 – identity blabber

Don’t think/write like a contemporary theologian – Part 4 – rubber doctrines

A prominent Christian scholar is criticizing some of his peers for their discussions of Jesus-era Jewish monotheism: [these blokes work] with only two possibilities: monotheism could either have remained intact or been broken. Commendably, [one of the blokes] pictures developments stretching or even distending Jewish monotheism, but he too seems not to consider the possibility of significant reformulations and new adaptations of a religious commitment… Read More »Don’t think/write like a contemporary theologian – Part 4 – rubber doctrines

Don’t think/write like a contemporary theologian – Part 3 – tendencies

I have tendencies. Put me near a Subway restaurant, where I can smell the fresh bread, and I’ll get hungry, my mouth watering. Force me to watch reality TV shows, and I’ll become fatally bored. I have a tendency to smile in the presence of cute little kids. Doctrines do not have tendencies. They don’t do anything. They have meanings, and they stand in logical… Read More »Don’t think/write like a contemporary theologian – Part 3 – tendencies

Don’t think/write like a contemporary theologian – Part 1 – “grounded” blabber

This is the start of a series where I give some unsolicited advice based on things that make me want to throw the book across the room when I’m reading recent theologians. I’ll avoid naming names, but will sometimes use actual quotes. I offer it in love, though I admit I’m pretty cranky about it all. If you’re a philosopher or theologian, these are a series of “don’ts” – things to avoid. If you are a reader of theology or philosophical theology, these are some things to watch out for. If you detect a high density of them in what you’re reading, you may well be wasting your time in that book.

Memo my theologian friends: please, stop saying “grounded”.

Examples:

  • The doctrine of the Trinity is thoroughly grounded in the Bible.
  • The unity of the persons is grounded in their perichoresis.
  • All of systematic theology is grounded in the doctrine of the Trinity.
  • The threeness of God is grounded in salvation history.

Why? Because you are faking it when you say things like thisRead More »Don’t think/write like a contemporary theologian – Part 1 – “grounded” blabber