Apologetics is hard, because it’s hard be an expert on more than a few subjects. There’s a strong pressure to just recycle bad arguments and wrongheaded claims propounded by other apologists.
Is “the doctrine of the Trinity” essential to salvation? To Christianity?
Equally divine or not? Dr. Craig on generation, procession, and the Logos theologians.
Dr. Evans brings to bear some fascinating historical and archaeological evidence.
In the same issue of Faith and Philosophy (22:1, Jan 2005, 77-86) Bill Craig has a critical response piece. (Available online here.) First, he gives a nice and clear summary of their article, more complete than the one I gave last time. Then he proceeds to object. As with most philosophical theories, when you start objecting, things start getting complicated, and you start to understand the theory in question better.
For starters, what do they mean by “the divine essence”? What sort of thing is this which constitutes the persons? Rea answers in an email which Craig quotes:
All we mean to commit ourselves to is the idea that maybe the Persons are like a hylomorphic [form plus matter] structure: there’s something…we call it the “divine essence”… that plays the role of commonly shared matter, and, for each Person, something else that plays the role of form. (80)
Read More »Constitution Trinitarianism Part 2: Craig’s objections
Is Ned in trouble? Here’s a quick post to wrap up the series on Brower’s and Rea’s constitution theory of the Trinity. First, it’s striking how original and self-consistent their approach is. It is rare to find something this new, and this well thought through on such an old topic. They’ve carefully carved out a unique position, one which has a motivation outside of theology… Read More »Constitution Trinitarianism Part 6: summing up
Why “that’s just Philosophy” is no excuse for a failure of basic critical thinking.
What is “mere” social trinitarianism, and why is it controversial among trinitarian theologians?
More philosophical theology in a small town newspaper. This is a response to Steve’s column, but I’m really just trying to communicate with the broader public about the interest of Trinity theories. It is cross-posted at the Objectivist v. Constructivist v. Theist blog. – Dale
Thinking About the Trinity
12 26 08 (Published in The Observer 1 14 09)
Perhaps, dear reader, you’re a Christian considering New Years resolutions. Let me suggest a resolution to reflect more on theology to which you are committed. Trinity theories (they are many) are attempts to reconcile an apparently inconsistent set of four claims many readers find in the Bible: There is only one God, the one Jesus calls Father is God, Jesus is God, and Jesus is not his Father. From any three of these, it seems to logically follow that the fourth is false. (Go ahead – try out all the combinations.)
There is an official answer to this difficulty, Read More »Thinking about the Trinity
Do Christian claims clash with Philosophy?
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
An ordinary believer with ordinary reading comprehension can see that “Sharp’s Rule” recommends misinterpretations.
Continuing the discussion with the Maverick (Bill)… “Being itself,” I take it, is something like a universal property, an abstract and not a concrete object. (Or at least, it’s not supposed to be concrete; maybe he thinks that it is neither abstract nor concrete.) I’m not sure if Bill would accept those characterizations, but if not, I invite him to say a little more about… Read More »Dialogue with the Maverick Philosopher: God is a being, not Being itself – part 2
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.
How the three are tightly functionally unified, in Swinburne’s view.
(See below for the interpretation.)
Last time we looked at Swinbure’s suggested reading of the creeds. They can’t he says, be charitably read as holding that in the same sense there’s only one divinity, and that there’s three. Swinburne comes down on the side of three. Like all social trinitarians, he’s attracted to a vision of the Trinity as being a loving community, three eternal and perfect, spirits, three selves, enjoying one another’s company, living in communion with one another, and working together in all they do. In short, he wants to say there are personal relationships internal to God – and this implies that there are persons – subjects of experience, thought, and action – in God.Read More »Swinburne’s Social Trinitarian Theory, Part 3 – functional monotheism
Q & A time, forgiving sins, Cerberus, and some answers critiqued.
Some interesting Q & A from philosopher-apologist William Lane Craig.
First, a question inspired by internet crapola, Bill Maher’s Religulous, etc:
Jesus’ story cribbed from earlier Egyptian sources?
Son, let me take you out behind the shed.
Next?
Any good analogies for understanding the Trinity?Read More »Answers from the Answer Man
2015 was a good year for the trinities podcast! Many thanks to those who supported it via PayPal or Amazon. Here are some highlights, month by month: January: podcast 70 – The one God and his Son according to John February: podcast 74 – Justin Martyr’s Dialogue with Trypho – Part 1 March: podcast 81 – Dr. Oliver Crisp on the breadth of Reformed tradition April: podcast 83 – The Spiritual… Read More »2015: the trinities podcast in review
A trinitarian ought to say No. But why? Doesn’t he accept “the deity of Christ”?
“Come on, you tired little brain – don’t fail me now.” (No, I don’t really blog naked – serious thought requires having at least your underpants on.)
Joseph Jedwab does an excellent job (here, comments 3 & 4) pressing me for details, and taking a shot at defending the Brower and Rea theory. I wanted to chew a bit on some issues that Joseph and Ian raise before moving on, offering some corrections and other reflections. (And JT – I want to post your lengthy comment (the second one) as a guest post, so we can discuss the priority issue – email me if you object to this promotion. 
) Any bold type that appears in quotes here has been added by me.
To non-philosophical readers: I apologize for the over-long load of philosopher-lingo that follows. You may want to skip this one! Read More »Constitution Trinitarianism Part 4: pausing and revisiting some issues