Merry Christmas! …unto us, a Son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Who was Mary’s first son? Was it God himself, the Father, the Lord God Almighty? Isaiah seems to say so… But appearances can be deceiving. Here are some helpful discussions by… Read More »Unto us a Child is Born
Episode 19 – the final segment of the Lewis-Rogers debate: Is the Trinity polytheism? In this last of our three segments, our debaters each give a second seven-minute rebuttal, and then a five-minute closing argument. This is when they wrap up any loose ends, reiterate their main points, and try to “make the sale.” Are you buying? They get into questions like: Does the Qur’an… Read More »podcast 19 – Lewis vs. Rogers 3 – second rebuttals and closing statements
Last time I sketched out the broad, old, deep case for the Christian God being a being. This time, I want to explain where and why I get off the Thomist metaphysical bus before it reaches its destination. The Thomist project looks something like this. (I know this is oversimplified; I don’t think it matters for the subjects before us though. Correct me in the… Read More »why I am not a Thomist 2 – the possibility of a non-simple Source
Fr. Aiden Kimel has a good and thoughtful post on my Mark posts. I think he concedes my main point: … if we were to isolate the Gospel of Mark from the rest of the Bible, and indeed the Christian Church altogether, and read it just as historical artifact, would we come to the conclusion that Jesus of Nazareth is God? I doubt it. Indeed,… Read More »Mark, evangelicals, and catholics
To follow up on Kruger vs. McGrath: in light of what Mark either explicitly says or clearly implies, Dr. McGrath is correct. Not only does Mark not teach that Jesus is God himself, but he plainly implies that Jesus is not God himself. For Mark, God is someone else, the one who sent, empowered, worked through, raised, and exalted Jesus. Jesus is the human Messiah, the unique Son of God,… Read More »Mark: Jesus is God’s Son, the Messiah
Our friend Dr. Ed Feser has got himself worked up into full drunken polemicist mode. I earn ridicule and ire normally reserved for Dawkins types. Evidently I touched a nerve by pointing out that most (analytic) philosophers now – reflecting a fairly wide consensus since early modern times – think of God as the greatest being there is or could be, and not as “Being… Read More »why I’m not a Thomist 1 – the Christian tradition that God is a Being
Rebuttals are the hardest parts of a debate – the hardest part to perform, and the hardest to listen to.
On September 9, 2013, Reformed Christian apologist Anthony Rogers debated Islamic apologist Shadid Lewis. The debate question was: Are trinitarians polytheists? (Entire video here.) I think this debate is worth thinking through carefully. In this podcast series, I’m breaking up the debate into three listenable chunks. I’ve also slightly shortened the audio by removing some dead air, etc., but I have not deleted a single word by the… Read More »podcast 17 – Lewis vs. Rogers 1 – opening statements
Pastor Greg Boyd, on the theme of Jesus being forsaken by the Father (and Spirit?) on the cross: If God’s eternal essence is the perfect love of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, as I believe, then any suggestion that this perfect love was severed, even for a moment, would, by definition, entail that God ceased to exist. Such a conclusion is, to my way… Read More »Boyd: a broken Trinity?
Philosopher Ed Feser thinks my comments about God (here and here) are ridiculous. So, he breaks out his rhetorical brass knuckles, and tries to knock some sense into me. Feser may suspect that I’m trolling, simply dishing out accusation of “atheism” just to get a rise out of people, or to get attention, or just for the joy of annoying others. But I’m afraid the… Read More »Passing Feser’s Laugh Test
At his blogs Ben Nasmith has been writing so very good posts weighing trinitarian vs. unitarian theologies, and in particular thinking about Richard Bauckham and Samuel Clarke. In Monotheism and the unitarian-trinitarian dilemma he concludes, I think rightly: to answer this question we need a clear understanding of the monotheism of the Bible. That links to a post at his other blog, THE “HERESY OF CLARITY” –… Read More »Ben Nasmith on ancient Jewish monotheism
Paul calls Jesus “the one Lord.” What does this mean? In episode 15, we saw why we can’t take Paul to mean that Jesus is Yahweh himself. In this episode, we see what, according to the New Testament, it means for Jesus to be “the one Lord.” Sir Anthony Buzzard has helpfully covered Psalm 110:1 many times. See this blog post and this video, in addition to… Read More »podcast 16 – How is Jesus “the one Lord”?
Theologian Roger Olson asks, How important is the doctrine of the Trinity? He seems to hold, with many others, that …the doctrine of the Trinity is crucial, essential, indispensable to a robust and healthy Christian view of God. But, The problem is, of course, that many, perhaps most, Christians have little or no understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity. And they couldn’t care less. Indeed.… Read More »Roger Olson asks: How important is the doctrine of the Trinity?
The Bible is poorly labeled as any single genre. It is a library, and it certainly contains fiction. But some of it is pure fiction, and some of it is historical fiction, and some of it needs other labels than those. Dr. James McGrath, stirring the pot as usual, raising some big questions, and providing a bunch of interesting links. Relatedly, here’s a helpful chart… Read More »McGrath asks: What’s a Bible?
In 1 Corinthians 8:6, Paul says, …yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist. Is this statement by Paul a gift to unitarians (who hold that the one God is the Father, but not Jesus), or does he here… Read More »podcast 15 – Are Paul’s “one God” and “one Lord” one and the same?
Lutheran theology grad student Matthew Frost reflects on The Doctrine of the Trinity, and Scripture. Some insights: …because this doctrine is built on a scriptural foundation, we also have a tendency, in every generation, to read the doctrine as it stands back into the texts on which we have built it. And there’s a problem with that, namely: none of the authors of scripture, or their… Read More »Frost on Trinity and Scripture
Daniel Calder surveys the Top 7 weirdest Christian theologians. Of these, how many are atheists? Consider, for example, John Scotus Eriugena (c.800 – c.877). The author gives an encyclopedia quote which rings true to me. In general, the system of thought just outlined is a combination of neo-Platonic mysticism, emanationism, and pantheism which Eriugena strove in vain to reconcile with Aristotelean empiricism, Christian creationism, and theism.… Read More »7 Weird Theologians
Dr. James McGrath has responded to my post on belief in “God” where this amounts to an ineffable Ultimate – which, I claimed, is a variety of atheism. He seems to think that thinking that God resembles humans to any degree or in any way counts as “anthropomorphism.” I think that’s a goofy use of the term, but why quibble about words? So, in James’s… Read More »more thoughts on “God,” atheism, and panentheism
The apostle Paul famously says, …for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist. (1 Corinthians 8:6) Is this passage a radical transformation of, or a redefinition of Jewish monotheism? Is it an insertion of Jesus into the Shema confession, that… Read More »podcast 14 – One God, One Lord, Two Interpretations
