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podcast 361 – A Lutheran pastor explains Socinianism and biblical unitarianism

In this episode I interact with a video by Lutheran Pastor Joshua Sullivan at Holy Cross Lutheran Church in Kerrville, Texas. A listener asked him for his views on “Socinianism” and this so-called “biblical unitarianism,” and why they contradict the Bible.

He replies with some descriptions and definitions, and then gives some arguments as to why these sorts of views are unbiblical.

I interact with his video, agreeing, disagreeing, and adding a lot of information – historical, theological, and sociological.

Topics include:

  • “Socinians” and Socinus
  • “Arians”
  • “biblical unitarians”
  • “unitarian Christians”
  • Whether unitarian Christianity can be defined by a “rationalistic” methodological stance.
  • Whether unitarian Christians think Jesus is in any sense “divine.”
  • Traditional catholic views on generation and procession, and why most unitarian Christians don’t accept these – like some present-day trinitarians!
  • unitarian views on atonement and salvation
  • unitarian views on “the holy spirit”
  • Characterizations of unitarian Christians as “deniers” of various things.
  • How anti-Calvinistic today’s unitarians are
  • 18th-19th British and American unitarian Christianity
  • Traditional catholic appeals to “mystery” in the face of theological problems.
  • So-called “classical theism”
  • Various traditional catholic claims which are neither self-evident nor taught in Scripture, but which are widely assumed in trinitarian circles.
  • How to prove an impossibility claim, e.g. it would be impossible for a non-divine Jesus to “fully” reveal God.
  • Whether worshiping a non-divine Jesus is the sin of idolatry.
  • 2 (literal) definitions of “idolatry”
  • Whether Scripture teaches that it is wrong to worship anyone unless they are fully divine.
  • The implications of Jesus’ exaltation to God’s right hand.
  • Whether Jesus claims essential equality with the Father.

Pastor Sullivan argues that if unitarian Christian views were true then:

  • the Father wouldn’t be a real father and the Son wouldn’t be a real son
  • the Son wouldn’t be the brightness of God’s glory or a true image of God
  • God would have changed, so would not be essentially immutable
  • the Son wouldn’t be able to “fully” reveal God
  • Jesus couldn’t truly say that if you’ve seen him you’ve seen the Father
  • Jesus would basically be like other prophets, and not in a class of his own
  • Jesus would have been unable to do any miracles.
  • Jesus could not truly be called our “savior.”
  • It would be wrong for us to worship Jesus

I explain why, for various reasons, these are not powerful objections to the views of unitarian Christians.

Links for this episode:

Pastor Sullivan’s video

The Racovian Catechism

An Interview With Dr. Dale Tuggy – by J. Dan Gill

Biblicalunitarian.com

podcast 357 – Seminary student takes Trinity class, becomes unitarian – Part 2

podcast 356 – Seminary student takes Trinity class, becomes unitarian – Part 1

podcast 189 – The unfinished business of the Reformation

The Tuggy-Brown debate: Dale’s opening statement

podcast 358 – Baptist Justice: Samuel Eddy on Scripture, Church Discipline, and the Trinity

Clarifying Catholic Christologies – by Dr. Dale Tuggy

podcast 235 – The Case Against Preexistence

Debate – “Is Jesus Human and not Divine?” – Dr. Dale Tuggy vs. Chris Date

podcast 145 – ‘Tis Mystery All: the Immortal dies!

The aloneness argument against classical theism

podcast 227 – Who Should Christians Worship?

podcast 167 – Lamson’s History of The Unitarian Congregationalists

Biblical Unitarian Podcast 204: An Introduction to the Theme of Misunderstanding in the Gospel of John

Biblical Unitarian Podcast 211: Jesus’ Misunderstood Father (John 8)

What John 1 meant

podcast 70 – The one God and his Son according to John

podcast 52 – John Locke’s The Reasonableness of Christianity, Part 1

podcast 286 – Is the Trinity Essential? – Three Views

What is essential to the gospel, according to Luke?

John 17:1-3, 1 Corinthians 8:4-6; Ephesians4:4-6: John 10: John 20:17; John 5:23; Phil 2:10-11; Act 2:22; John 14:10; John 3:34; Malachi 3:6; Revelation 5; Exodus 20:4-6; Matthew 4:10; John 8:40; John 5:15-47.

This week’s thinking music is “I dunno” by grapes.

4 thoughts on “podcast 361 – A Lutheran pastor explains Socinianism and biblical unitarianism”

  1. Hi Dale.
    This is Isaac from El Salvador Central America. I’m glad I found your podcast and now I’m “catching up”, listening to the majority of them as time permits. I watched your debate with Dr William Lane Craig and I couldn’t believe the day for him to lose a debate had arrived (in my opinion WLC is like the Michael Jordan in the body of Messiah when it comes to debating atheists) I think it was because the trinity is indefensible even by the greatest debater in Christianity.

    I enjoyed this episode and I only wanted to ask you some things concerning the “functional polytheism” objection you have covered sometimes. I’m persuaded that the trinity is false and a deviation from the original faith of the apostles. Having said that, I find myself sometimes a little bit confused with some texts in which Jesus appears to do things only God could do:

    1) “receive the spirit of Stephen”? (Acts 7:59)
    2) “listen to prayers”? (At least according to some Unitarians, the Messiah is able to listen to millions of prayers)
    3) “uphold all things with the power of his words”? (Hebrews 1:3)

    I’m a leader in a Unitarian congregation here in El Salvador and if you could help me with a model of understanding these things and explain how the Messiah can do these things and not be God, I’d appreciate it a lot!

    Blessings brother!
    Isaac

    1. Hello Isaac,

      If you don’t mind, I would like to offer some ideas for you to consider, in response to your three points. I will leave it to you to look up the scripture references that I included. I think they will be helpful helpful in answer your questions, but to write them all out here would make my reply far too long for this context.

      1) Stephen supplicated (Philippians 4:6), ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!’ As a faith-filled child (Luke 18:17), Stephen is trustingly asking Jesus to receive him, just as Stephen has received Jesus (Matthew 10:40-41), and had served Jesus as a mature Christian (Acts 6:8), growing in grace and, on that basis, had a sure foundation for the hope of a rich welcome into Jesus’ eternal kingdom (2 Peter 1:5-11). This was the basis for Stephen’s words.

      For Jesus to be faithful with respect to these things, there is no need for Jesus to be personally, ontologically God, since Jesus only speaks the words he hears his Father speak (John 12:48-50), and therefore, Jesus’ Father fully empowers the words spoken by His Son.

      In John 12:48-50, Jesus specifically links reception of his words (that are also the words of his Father) to the promise of eternal life in the coming kingdom. I believe that Stephen was deliberately expressing his faith in this very promise that is grounded in the power of Father to fulfill, through His Son.

      Let us learn from Stephen’s example; in advance of trials, let us meditate on the promises of God, and, to the extent that we are faithful, we can rejoice in the reality of the promises, knowing that God works all things for the good of those who love Him (Romans 8:28); in this way, we can have the hope of being like Stephen: amid tribulation, we too can have the peace of God that is beyond carnal understanding (Phil 4:7), and having the strength of God that flows from our joy in Him (Nehemiah 8:10).

      2) We are told that, within certain parameters (e.g.: 1 John 5:14; Proverbs 28:9; 1 Pet 3:7; James 4:3) our prayers, entreaties, supplications etc. are heard by our Lord. The Holy Spirit of the Father, I believe through the work of heavenly beings appointed to serve the churches (Rev 2:1a, x7), is able to mediate all communication between men and God, on behalf of the Savior.

      Perhaps Jesus receives all personal communications in the sense that his heavenly court handles some on his authority and according to his will (consider Hebrews 1:14), but he himself personally reviews the most difficult cases; consider the example of Moses, in Exodus 18:13-26… and Moses is explicitly typological of the one like unto himself, the promised Messiah about whom Moses prophesied (Deuteronomy 18).

      Something else to consider: Keep in mind that in Ephesians 5:20, Paul teaches that thanksgiving is always due to the the Father for all things, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ; note that the letter (the prayer) is addressed to the Father, and not to Jesus directly; however, for the letter to be delivered, sufficient postage must be applied in the form of the name (authority, imprimatur, power) of our Lord Jesus Christ; with prayer directed to the Father, there is no ontological limit to His ability to hear, consider and answer and and every prayer. Nevertheless, at this point, I do tend to lean toward the mediatory model over the direct communication model.

      Jesus is the Good shepherd (John 10). We are his sheep, and as, through the scriptures (1 Peter 1:3-4) we grow in the grace and knowledge of our Shepherd, we learn to recognize and hear his voice. Again, there is the distinct possibility that the ‘voice’ is the consistent response of Jesus’ faithful representative agents within his heavenly court. The scriptures are replete with examples of this or that agent speaking -often in the first person singular- on behalf of the one who sent him.

      Jesus himself regularly prayed to his Father; Jesus was heard, and he himself heard his Father, whether or not others heard as well (John 12:30). Whether the voice heard by all here was directly that of the Father or the Father represented by a heavenly messenger, remains to be determined. Because of the account of Genesis 2 and 3:8, it would seem that, during his earthly ministry, the Son, having remained faithful, could have enjoyed direct interpersonal communication with his Father, but even the Genesis account could have involved agency (the mediation of heavenly beings); consider Luke 2:13-15; Matthew 4:11 and 26:53.

      I don’t see how the scriptures would require us to think that Jesus is personally receiving and handling every prayer and supplication; through the agency of the Father’s heavenly court, these matters can all be faithfully handled on Jesus’ behalf.

      3) Consider the possibility that the writer to the Hebrew believers is alluding to the New Creation that is in the the second Adam, God’s Son (Hebrews 1:2a, and then throughout this chapter), the promised Messiah who recreates us (John 3:3-8) and all spiritual things (2 Corinthians 5:16-17) whom we who are spiritual now know after the spirit, and not after the flesh (v16). For those who are hid with Christ in God (Colossians 3:1-3) are dead to the world, and are risen with Christ (v1).

      The believer’s citizenship is in heaven (Philippians 3:20; 1 John 2:15; 2 Peter 11) where there is a better and a more enduring substance (Hebrews 10:34) laid up for believers (Colossians 1:5), and is yet to come (Matthew 6:10a; 2 Peter 3:12-13). Much more scriptural development can be done on this point. But again, nothing about the New Creation requires the second Adam (the basis for the New Creation) to be God, since, for example, God made the original Creation for the first Adam… and that first Adam was not personally, ontologically God.

      John confirms this in John 3:2, when he records the words of Nicodemus: ‘We know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.’ Note that Jesus’ power is seen to be due to God being ‘with’ Jesus, and not due to Jesus personally being some sort of deity. John puts the stamp of approval on the words of Nicodemus, in v34b-35: ‘God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him. The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand.’ (All this, prior to the cross!) This vast power is from the Father, and the Son shares it with his disciples, in the form of the keys of the kingdom (see Matthew 16 and 18); and if we have received and use the keys, are we then Gods, in the way the Father is God? Of course not. Obviously, then, we are dealing with authorized and empowered agency, and not apotheosis or ontological implications.

      God (the Father of these two Adams) is the Creator on behalf of his Sons, as it is written, ‘And all things are of God’ (2 Corinthians 5:18a). Also, please consider that in the scripture you mention, Hebrews 1:3, the Son is called the express image (G5481) of God, making him something other than God, for an essential quality of an a representation is that it is not the thing it represents.

      God faithfully empowers His Son, because His Son remains the faithful image and representation of the Father. Contrast this to the Genesis account of the first Adam, who did not faithfully remain the express image of his Father, and therefore forfeited his rule and reign over the first Creation.

      I suppose that, post immersion in the Jordan (having lived a life of faithful representation of his Father; tempted, yet without sin) Jesus could echo Paul, by saying ‘I learned (Hebrews 5:8-9) to be content in all circumstances… and now, I can do all things through my Father, who strengthens me.’

      The Father strengthens his faithful Son Jesus to this day, and forever and without limit. Now, we have a taste of the powers of the world to come (Hebrews 6:5); we have received an earnest, or downpayment (Ephesians 4:30). But for us to participate fully in the ‘all things’ New Creation of Hebrews 1:3, we will have to wait until the first resurrection, while Jesus faithfully site at the right hand of the Father, awaiting the Day (Hebrews 10:25b) when it is time for the establishment of the Kingdom (Psalm 110:1).

      Does any of this help?

  2. Of course Trinitarians think that their reasoning is spiritual and mine is fleshly, I feel that it is Trinitarians who are captive to fleshly thinking. So how about we simply make our respective arguments and let the reader/listener decide for himself/herself who is indulging in special pleading

  3. I would say that most Unitarians assume that, if the biblical text can be interpreted either reasonably or unreasonably, we should prefer the more reasonable interpretation. However, this is or should be inherent to the act of interpretation.

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