Richard of St. Victor is well known for his argument that perfect love must be shared between three persons, and since God’s love is perfect, there must be three persons in God. Richard presents this argument in Book 3 of his De Trinitate, and that’s what we’ll be looking at in this series of posts.
I allow, indeed I declare, that the mystery of the Godhead surpasses rational apprehension; and it may be that in the end it will have to be represented by a contradiction. But it is essential that this should happen only when all our rational resources are at an end. It is ludicrous if we represent divine mysteries by avoidable contradictions, by muddles, which more disciplined… Read More »Christopher Stead on mysteries in theology
Unlike Redirectors, Revisers don’t change the subject. Unlike Resisters, they don’t claim we should just “live with the tension”. Unlike practitioners of Restraint, they don’t think we can put off the issue. Like Resolvers through Rational Reinterpretation, they have a solution. But they don’t think tricky, new, more careful formulations are what is called for. Rather, something must go out on the rubbish heap. Revisers are usually accused of arrogance, lack of respect for tradition, biblical ignorance, idolatry of human reason, not being Christians at all, and of hating babies and cute little puppies.
Open theists are RevisersRead More »Dealing with Apparent Contradictions: Part 20 – Resolution by Revision
We now turn to Richard’s De Trinitate Book 3, Chapters 14-19
Here’s my formulation of the first part of ch.14:
Suppose there’s at least one divine person: P.
Then (1) P is so benevolent that he wants to have no good that he does not want to share.
And (2) P is so powerful that everything is possible for him.
And (3) P is so happy that nothing is difficult for him.
And (4) if (1)-(3) are true, there are at least three divine persons.
Therefore, (C) If there is at least one divine person, then there are at least three divine persons.Read More »Richard of St. Victor’s De Trinitate Ch.14
Now, to resume our drawn out and often-stalled series on Richard of St. Victor, in which we blog through the entirety of book III of his De Trinitate (On the Trinity), in which he famously / notoriously argues for the Trinity from reason alone. These chapters, like many preceding ones, are too compressed, so I’ll try to unpack them for us.
In chapter 23, Richard says that between the members of the Trinity “there seems to be more identity [sameness] than equality.” (p. 395) He then cites as an example three indistinguishable golden statues. Because they’re indistinguishable, we say they are “equal”. But there are three masses of gold involved, and so there are really three things here, three statues. But the case of the Trinity is different, he urges. How? Because “whatever is in any one person of the Trinity, the smae is also completely in any other person.” Here, he implies, we do have a deeper kind of “identity” or “sameness”.
I take it that Richard’s point is that the three Persons of the Trinity don’t differ as far as their composition, because each contains one and the same divine nature, here thought of as a particular.
He then brings up a case of “three rational spirits”, three souls. Read More »Richard of St. Victor’s De Trinitate, Ch. 23
Is it reasonable to believe in the reported miracles of early Christianity?
Poetry, anyone?
Karen Armstrong is a famous ex-nun who has written, among other things, a puffing biography of the prophet Muhammad. She frequently appears on TV confidently gassing about various religious matters. But I was really taken a back by this, which I ran across in a podcast:
Ms. Armstrong: Well, you see, I think theology is poetry. That’s what my Jewish friend, Chaim Maccabee, told me all those years ago when he quoted Hillel’s golden rule to me and said, “You know, it doesn’t matter what you believe. Theology is poetry.”Read More »How not to do theology, Or: the theological Vogon (Dale)
If faith is not simply believing that some doctrine is true, what is it?
Is faith, as Mark Twain quipped, believing what you know ain’t so?
Catholic analytic philosopher Tim Pawl (University of St. Thomas, in Minnesota) argues that this is logically consistent: Jesus has both a divine and a human nature.
His answer is challenged by another talented young Catholic philosopher, Tomas Bogardus, of Pepperdine University. With their permission, I’ve reposted their dialogue from Facebook. I thought it deserved a wider audience.
From that same thread, I learned that Dr. Pawl is working on a book on the metaphysics of the Christology that comes from the “ecumenical” councils. I’ve thought and taught a good bit about those in recent years, and plan to discuss them in upcoming podcasts, so I look forward to seeing this book, and the discussion it will generate.
Which is mightier – this beard or this one?
You decide. I’ll weigh in with a comment later.
Here, unedited but for the addition of a few explanatory links (and a gratuitous picture), is their dialogue:Read More »Tim Pawl: a God-man is possible
In what sense, according to Craig and Moreland, are the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit each “divine”? Well, consider Rover. They’d say that the following four things are canine: Rover Rover’s nose Rover’s tail Rover’s left ear So, just as the parts of a dog are just as canine as the dog, so maybe “we could think of the persons of the Trinity as divine… Read More »Trinity Monotheism part 5: “divine”
In the last post, I explained that Nestorians believe that a complete individual human nature is indiscernible from an individual human person.
Monophysites also take this idea very seriously. In fact, the Monophysite takes very seriously the more general claim that a complete individual nature of any kind is indiscernible from the corresponding individual that belongs to that kind (for instance, a complete individual cow-nature just is the individual cow in question). So if there are two natures in Christ, then there will be two individuals that correspond to each of those natures.
But the Monophysite does not want to say that there are two persons in Christ, so he will insist that there is just one nature in Christ. That way, there will just be one person. But since Christ is both human and divine, this one nature must be a special hybrid of divinity and humanity.
The strongest form of Monophysitism would claim that this hybrid Christness-nature has all divine properties, and all human properties. This, however, is incoherent, for it would amount to two persons as well. After all, having all the divine properties is sufficient for membership in God’s-kind, and having all human properties is sufficient for membership in human-kind. There would, then, still be two natures, which contradicts the initial claim that there is just one (allegedly) hybrid nature.Read More »Christology and Heresy 5 – Monophysitism Proper (JT)
St. Anselm was the Roman Catholic archbishop of Canterbury, and an important medieval Christian philosopher. He defined the concept of God as “that than which no greater can be thought.” Using this concept, he argues that there must actually be such a being; this is his famous “ontological” argument for God’s existence. And he also deduces that this being must be eternal, and omnipotent (etc.)… Read More »podcast 64 – Dr. Mark C. Murphy on Anselmianism about God
In this recent book, Dr. Winfried Corduan re-opens the case for “original monotheism,” the view that the forms of human religion which are probably the oldest, are mostly monotheistic, which is what one would expect if the earliest human religions were all or mostly monotheistic.
James Goetz and Corby Amos on the inconsistent triad about Jesus dying.
In this episode, Dr. Craig A. Evans and I discuss the surprising and bold methodological claims about doing history in chapter 4 of Dr. Ehrman’s How Jesus Became God. Along the way we bring up such topics as Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, the historicity of the New Testament gospels, the views of David Hume (pictured above) on belief in miracles, the probability of… Read More »podcast 39 – Dr. Craig Evans on Dr. Bart Ehrman’s historical methodology
Happy Easter. For the uninitiated, this holiday really has nothing to do with a bunny and colored eggs. What we’re celebrating is this: Saturday evening, when the Sabbath ended, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome went out and purchased burial spices so they could anoint Jesus’ body. Very early on Sunday morning, just at sunrise, they went to the tomb. On the… Read More »He is Risen!
I’ve been reading I Told Me So (review) by Gregg Ten Elshof, a USC PhD who who teaches and chairs the Philosophy Department at my undergraduate alma mater. He’s been thinking about this topic for a long time (part 2) and so far, I really like the book. It is clearly written, insightful, and he trains his guns on self-deceptions by Christians in particular. Some of… Read More »You’re Foolin’ Yourself and You Don’t Believe It – Part 1
