{"id":44156,"date":"2023-01-31T20:24:18","date_gmt":"2023-02-01T02:24:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/?p=44156"},"modified":"2023-01-31T20:24:25","modified_gmt":"2023-02-01T02:24:25","slug":"hyer-on-trinitarian-confusion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/hyer-on-trinitarian-confusion\/","title":{"rendered":"Hyer on trinitarian confusion"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In this 1852 book former Episcopal priest G.W. Hyer explains How I Became a Unitarian<\/a><\/em>. It’s an interesting read, yet another example of the whistleblower<\/a> genre; naturally, I don’t agree with all of it. But I thought he hit the nail on the head which it comes to the confused status quo among trinitarians. Obviously, this is the voice of experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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. . . the Trinitarian “worships he knows not what.”<\/strong> First it is the Father, then the Son, then the Holy Spirit. Then all three in one. Then one for the sake of the other, then two. Then they are three gods because they are three personalities; but, frightened by the idea, he groups them before his mental vision in a kind of aggregation<\/strong> which is without division or divisibility. Lost again<\/strong>, he puts one forth as an influence, another as a sacrifice. Then, although they are but one god, one appeases the other, petitions, prays to him. Thus there is a continual conflict of ideas<\/strong>, and from lack of clear conception of the subject, a distraction which is equivalent to doubt. To affirm in this case may be easy, but to believe is impossible. For to attempt to worship three Persons as one God is to deny the attribute of deity to each. Or to worship each Person separately as God is to create three gods, for three divine persons equal to each other cannot be other than three gods.<\/p>\npp. 90-91, modernized, emphases added<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Is each Person of the Trinity a god?<\/strong> Some trinitarians say yes. (Most will then add that they are the same<\/em> god – despite their differences!) But others will deny that any of the Three is a god. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worship is something we do to another self; it is, as they say, an I-Thou relation or action. But trinitarians disagree about how many selves there<\/strong> are among the “three Persons” of the Trinity. You might think the obvious answer is three <\/em>selves, but sone trinitarians clearly assert there to be one<\/em>. Others, four<\/em>. Others, none<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Is it enough<\/strong> to worship “the Trinity”? Or must one also – or instead – worship the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit? And if the latter, it is important to equally distribute worship among the three, or among the four, the Trinity being a fourth? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If they are one in being\/essence, does worshiping one of them count<\/strong> as worshiping all of them? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The New Testament picture of worship (e.g. Revelation 5<\/a>) is very simple and clear by comparison, as is its theology. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former Episcopalian G.W. Hyer on the confused mind of the trinitarian layperson.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44159,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[21,16,77,7,3,90,53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bible","category-books","category-protestant","category-quotes","category-theories","category-whistleblower","category-worship"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44156"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44156\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44161,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44156\/revisions\/44161"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}