<gossip>Once some years ago, I was hanging out with a group of Christian philosophers, and the subject of the Trinity came up. One person, a well known philosopher, firmly remarked that “It’s just gotta be modalism.”
I recently shared this story with a Christian philosopher friend. In response, he told me that more recently, he was hanging with a group of Christian philosophers, and one (who is at least as respected as the aforementioned – which is to say, very) opined firmly that Christians should just admit to being tritheists and defend tritheism. </gossip>
My friend and I got a big laugh out of this.
Neither philosopher, by the way, has published yet on this topic. But maybe we’re in for a bumpy ride!
The more I think about this, though, the less funny I think it is. There’s nothing new under the sun, says my darker self. And I recall the words of the dearly departed Christian philosopher William Alston,
It is a well known fact, amply borne out by the history of the discussion of the topic, that as soon as one goes beyond the automatic recital of traditional creedal phrases one inevitably leans either in the direction of modalism – the “persons” are simply the different aspects of the divine being and/or activity – or tritheism – there are really three Gods, albeit very intimately connected in some way. (“Swinburne and Christian Theology,” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 41 (1997) , p. 54).
Well, if that’s so, maybe there’s a problem with those traditional creedal phrases! (For his part, Alston rested with a very unsatisfying appeal to mystery.)
I tremendously respect all three of these people – Alston and the two nameless ones – but I dare say that none of the three has fully enough explored all the options.
Btw, can one person have two centers of consciousness? How does one explain a person who can have distinctly different conversations with an infinite number of beings at the same time? Is more than one consciousness required to do that? For instance, God gives orders to an angel at the same time he is listening to someone praying in Argentina and at the exact same time he speaks in an audible voice to a believer in Russia.
As a Oneness Pentecostal, I’m very interested in this discussion even though I would disagree with the modalism Sabellius has been accused of. You all might be interested in this article. http://theosophical.wordpress.com/2010/11/16/reifying-%e2%80%9cnatures%e2%80%9d-two-persons/
Harriet, have you written something I can read online on this subject?
Great – let’s run through the Sabellianism piece, and then bring in the later one as relevant.
I like–thanks! I’ve got a newer article though, Photius, Filioque and Semantic Ascent in which I suggest a metaphysically minimalist solution to a Trinity puzzle according to which reference of “Father” shifts when one goes from theological to economic contexts. It also blocks the Filioque Claus–or at least, as the editor persuaded me, makes it lots less attractive.
Hi Harriet. Thanks for stopping by.
When I saw you last year in NYC I mentioned that I’d started (but never posted) a series on your piece “Sabellianism Reconsidered” – I never quite finished it though. Maybe since you’re returning to the subject this would be a good to put it out there for some virtual discussion. Let me see if I can get some of those posts out this week – have about 7-8 (I like to write short, digestible posts when possible).
How does that sound?
PMFJI, I’ve just stumbled on this blog now, as I am starting to work on a project on Trinity and Christology. I may change my mind as I work further on this, but I came out (in print) as a Sabellian some time ago–a hard Sabellian, inclining to the view that the only Trinity is the economic Trinity.
The most plausible theological arguments, versions of the Ontological and Cosmological Arguments, show the existence of one God–at most. One God is bad enough: social trinitarianism seems to multiply gods unnecessarily. Why take on more metaphysics than you have to? I suppose the fundamental question though is: what do we need the Trinity doctrine to do?
The simplest answer is that we want to explain how God has acted within history, first through the ministry of Jesus, then through the Church. And for that you don’t need 3 centers of consciousness or whatever. Why commit to more than you have to? It’s gotta be modalism.
One may be able to go in the direction of modalism or tritheism without actually endorsing either modalism or tritheism. It seems to me that that’s what most classical, paradigmatically orthodox theorists (e.g. Athanasius, the Cappadocians, Hillary, Augustine) do. I agree with you, though, that if it turns out that we can’t even explain or paraphrase what’s going on in the Creeds without ending up contradicting them, then they must be self-contradictory (or meaningless) and will have to be rejected. In fact, I’ve just been reading Hillary (De Synodis) on all the ways in which it can be destructive to accept the homoousion without giving any explanation of it.
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