One final example, this time from veteran evangelical apologist Norman Geisler.
In chapter 12 of his Answering Islam: The Crescent in Light of the Cross, Geisler gives a sort of standard exegetical argument for “the” doctrine of the Trinity. But he also addresses some Islamic concerns, and when he does, his modalism jumps to the foreground.
Here, he tells us what is wrong with “modalism”.
Neither is God like the same actor playing three different parts in a play. For God is simultaneously three persons… [This analogy] does reflect another heresy known as modalism.” (273, emphasis added)
Again, the familiar idea that it is only serial modalism which is objectionable. Sigh. And here’s the modalism, presumably something like eternal, concurrent, noumenal, essential FSH modalism.
Muslim scholars make a big point of computing the mathematical impossibility of the Trinity. After all, does not 1+1=3? It certainly does if you add them, but Christians instist that this is the wrong way to understand the Trinity. The triunity of God is more like 1x1x1=1. In other words, we multiply, not add, the one God in three persons. That is, God is triune, not triplex. His one essence has multiple personalities. (269, original emphases in italics)
Further, some have pointed to the fact that Muhammad was simultaneously a prophet, a husband, and a leader. Why then should a Muslim reject the idea of a plurality of functions (persons) in God. [sic] Within the Islamic system is the very proof that plurality within unity, as it relates to God, is not unintelligible. By the same token, then, there is no reason Muslims should reject the doctrine of the Trinity as nonsensical. (276, emphasis added)
Could it be that these Muslims assumed, with some justification, that trinitarianism is not supposed to be any sort of modalism?
Where is Islam Inspired Modalism – Part 3? Thanks!
Nowhere that I can find – must have been a numbering error or my part?
The trinitarain view of Jesus incarantion denies the humanity of our Lord and relegates his humanity to a mere nature (which is not a person)this totally denies his real humanity, this is a built in contradiction of the trinity doctrine.
I cannot seem to post my web address so I will give the title on yahoogroups. To discuss the manifold contradictions of the doctrine of the trinity.
Trinity_Vs_Oneness@yahoogroups
I cannot seem to find Trinitarains willing to come out from thier comfort zones of hit and run tactics, in posting of failed apologetics to discuss these thier contradictions.
Dale,
I’m just saying the logical extension of these lines of thinking (Where Jesus is God, YHWH is God – yet YHWH and Jesus are not the same) creates two separate beings who are God – add holy spirit – and you have three: your trinity.
You must admit that they are separate beings – Jesus died, YHWH did not. Just because all three fall under the classification of God does not mean there is one God. I am a human, you are a human. There is not one human – there are 6 billion humans. We all fall under the classification of human – yet there is not one human. These are simple terms.
Hi JohnO,
Not supposed to be three beings, of course (unless we’re talking about what you might call an extreme form of Social Trinitarianism). But they gotta be three somethings, as some things are true of each, which aren’t true of the other two. Problem is, the obvious move is to make them three modes of God – roles, ways of appearing, centers of consciousness, ways of relating to himself. But as I’ve argued, that seems a theological… dead end, to put it nicely.
AnonMoos – I think Geisler counts as theologically trained, no? He’s dean of a seminary…
But then when the Father does something – isn’t the husband doing it also? (physically yes, metaphorically no) These three roles do not cause three separate beings to emerge do they? Yet Trinitarians claim that there are three beings who are equally God.
P.S. What happened to Part 3?
I’m not sure that much illumination emerges from considering apologistic discourses directed at Muslims, but the bit about analogizing the Trinity to a man who is simultaneously a son, husband, and father seems to be surprisingly popular among certain circles of non-theologically-trained Protestants (without reference to Muhammad, however)…
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