Trinity?

[JustinHesychast]

http://beconvinced.com/en/article.php?articleid=0115&catid=&subcatname=

So I stumbled across this. In my ongoing ignorance, I am slightly convinced in some areas. The Trinity, and the quotes they make, can seem to be a stretch on beliefs.

I feel terrible even asking about if the Trinity is the truth, but I am. Forgive me. :crosseo:

[Dust and Ashes]

Reading Muslim apologetics during a spiritual crisis can be hazardous to your eternal fate.

[Shubunkin]

The only time the Trinity was explained to me in a way I could understand was in Catechism class last year. And I've been a Christian for eons. :eek:

[EricTheRed]

Your trying to understand God? I wouldnt risk it.

[Kristos]

It is a stretch - a stretch of faith. You don't have to understand it or be able to explain it as long as you believe it! Why believe it? Because that is what God revealed to us at Theophany and throughout the Incarnation.

[Dust and Ashes]

It is a stretch - a stretch of faith. You don't have to understand it or be able to explain it as long as you believe it! Why believe it? Because that is what God revealed to us at Theophany and throughout the Incarnation.

:amen: :amen: :amen:


That is one of the many things I love about Orthodoxy. It hasn't changed. It doesn't change. I can trust the Church because Christ is her head and the gates of hell will not prevail against her. I don't have to understand, I don't have to be a master of classical languages, I don't have to trust myself to be the Arbiter of Truth (tm). I just have to be obedient, faithful and mindful of my own sins. That is more than enough to keep me busy without trying to understand everything.

[Orthosdoxa]

Reading Muslim apologetics during a spiritual crisis can be hazardous to your eternal fate.

Amen, amen, and amen.

[Bushmaster78FS]

Reading Muslim apologetics during a spiritual crisis can be hazardous to your eternal fate.

Why is he reading Muslim apologetics instead of what early fathers wrote about Holy Trinity? Is he trying to cover all bases? What Muslims try to make out of Trinity is human doubt with false reasoning.... Their view of God is that He is perfect and everything possible for him, He is transcendent, beyond human mind, unreachable, but having a nature such as Trinity is stupid.

[JustinHesychast]

Forgive me, but none of what has been posted so far has been all that helpful. What I am trying to understand is why I believe the Trinity, when it's a stretch from Scripture alone. And the doctrine wasn't established until, what, 400AD?

[Dust and Ashes]

Have you read On the Incarnation? I'm sure there are some great books out there on the Trinity. All we know about God is what He has revealed to us. He has revealed His triune nature to us so we must accept it. Understanding it? Can't be done.

[Orthosdoxa]

And the doctrine wasn't established until, what, 400AD?

Wrong. I have to make supper, but I'll try to find some quotes for you here in a bit.

[Dust and Ashes]

Yeah, the doctrine was dogmatized in the 4th century to combat heresy but it was clearly taught all the way back to the 1st.

[Jacob4707]

Forgive me, but none of what has been posted so far has been all that helpful. What I am trying to understand is why I believe the Trinity, when it's a stretch from Scripture alone. And the doctrine wasn't established until, what, 400AD?

Try mid-first-century A.D. :)

It was established when the monotheistic/henotheistic Jewish authors of the New Testament referred to Jesus as Deity/God, and referred to the Holy Spirit in the same way.

[MichaelArchangelos]

I've debated Muslims before, including an Anglican friend of mine who converted to Islam. She told me that the Trinity was invented in 325 at the Council of Nicaea to please the polytheists. When I met her and her friend again, her friend asked me if God was in three parts. See how ridiculously they take it!

Last night I had a dream that I was visiting a mosque, like one of the ones that I saw in Malaysia. I picked up a Qur'an from their bookcase, and in the back (one of the real Qur'ans I saw had this) there was a section entitled something like "The Real Message of Jesus Christ". This has worried me, but I suppose, just because some Muslim says that Jesus can't be God doesn't make it true, does it? There are plenty of proofs in the Scriptures that Christ is God.

[buzuxi02]

Dear Justin,

The Star of David found on Israeli flags is a prophecy of correct Christology.

There are two interlocking triangles, each triangle represents the human and divine natures of Christ.
The divine nature being triune, God, Logos, and Spirit.
And the star facing downwards is our human trinity, mind ,body and soul.

Unlike Islam which cannot find any prophecies anywhere, Prophecies of Christ are found in every writing.

When Jesus said "you search the scriptures because in them you think you have life , but they are which speak of me" means all scripture not just limited to the OT.

[buzuxi02]

The dogma of the Trinity was not invented in 325 a.d. The Nicea council simply clarified that which was always believed.
You dont believe me? Then i suggest you get a hold of the writings of the Apostolic Father Athenagoras of Athens who wrote in 177 a.d.. He was very clear on what the belief of christians were on the triune God.

As far as the NT is concerned i'll simply quote Jude 20-21:
"But ye, beloved building up yourselves on yout most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit. Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life."

This benediction is echoed in Pauls writing in 2 Cor 13.14. These are liturgical benedictions not something though up at the moment by the authors of these two epistles.

[Monica, child of God]

I wish I could type better so that I could more easily respond. I have limited use of my left hand right now so this will take a while.

God cannot be comprehended. A God who is fully comprehendable to human minds is not God. Muslims continuously argue from the idea of, "does this make sense?" when talking about the Trinity or the Incarnation. But the fact is that God says "my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways...As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." --Isaiah 55:8-9

What we know of God is what He has revealed to us. He began by revealing His Oneness. Muslims believe that Islam is the restoration and completion of the religion given to Abraham in the OT. But even in the OT period there are allusions to the Triune nature of God. Remember the hospitality of Abraham in Genesis 18? The LORD appeared to Abraham as three 'men.'

"Then the LORD appeared to [Abraham] by the terebinth trees of Mamre, as he was sitting in the tent door in the heat of the day. So he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, three men were standing by him"

In the OT God also mysteriously equates Himself with the Messianic figure:


"And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.
And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn." --Zechariah 12:9-10


"For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace." --Isaiah 9:6



Muslims accuse Christians of shirk, assigning partners to God. But in the OT, God refers to Himself as a plurality and is reflected perfectly only in plurality

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.--Genesis 1:26-27


Don't believe Islam's claims to be the same religion given to Abraham. Examine the inconsistencies. Use critical thinking. Do not judge by externals.


M.

[Jacob4707]

Dear Justin,

The Star of David found on Israeli flags is a prophecy of correct Christology.

There are two interlocking triangles, each triangle represents the human and divine natures of Christ.
The divine nature being triune, God, Logos, and Spirit.
And the star facing downwards is our human trinity, mind ,body and soul.

Unlike Islam which cannot find any prophecies anywhere, Prophecies of Christ are found in every writing.

When Jesus said "you search the scriptures because in them you think you have life , but they are which speak of me" means all scripture not just limited to the OT.

Star of David:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/star.html
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=38&letter=M

[Dorothea]

Forgive me, but none of what has been posted so far has been all that helpful. What I am trying to understand is why I believe the Trinity, when it's a stretch from Scripture alone. And the doctrine wasn't established until, what, 400AD?
I am far from a Biblical scholar...about as far as you can get, but I do recall reading that the Trinity has always been there. It was made into doctrine at that time because there was some question about it, and the Church wanted to set the record straight. Somebody correct me if I'm way off base here. :blush:

[Rowan]

Are there any Pre-Nicean liturgies that mention the Trinity?

[buzuxi02]

The scripture is clear on the trinity.

The muslim religion claims that the gospel (NT) has been changed to demonstrate that Christ is truly God. They tend to believe this change occured in about 325 a.d.

We do know that a particular verse found in the gospel of John is indeed not an original. We know this from the first three church fathers that quote of this verse.

But does this help the muslim cause? That verse is John 1.18.

The two earliest papyrus fragments p67 & p75 along with Irenious and a few other early pre- nicene fathers have the quote as such:

No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten GOD (not'son') which is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared him.


The phrase only-begotten God in John's gospel is used by Irenious, Clement, and Origen.

Now a passage which alludes to an early liturgy is found in Jude 21-22 as i quoted in a previous post on this thread. This is the emergence of a trinitarian benediction.
If you prefer to read it from someone considered an expert scroll down to the bottom of this link where it quotes one Norman Perrins from his book 'the New Testament':

Epistle of Jude (http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/jude.html)

[davidoffinland]

From Finland.

From what I read, most non-trinitrian christians and Unitarians (not the liberal ones) try to find some similarites with Islam´s monotheism.

I think, basically, from what I have studied, you have to go to Jewish sources of the 1st Ct BC and 1st Ct AD to understand how Hellenistic Judaism thought how YHWH inter-acted with His Creation. May I suggest one good book on it. James D G Dunn´s "Christology in the Making"...An inquiry into the origins of the doctrine of the incarnation. A great source to understand how this was developed in pre-christian thinking.

In Him, david.

[Macarius]

The following is an explanation of the trinity I've posted in a different forum. I think it might be helpful...

St. John the Apostle says that God is Love. We affirm that self-love is not Godlike, so we know that God is not self(ish) love. Can one, that is a single, love itself? Does not love imply an object - an other - a community?

If we also (correctly) affirm that God is, in His essence, unchanging and transcendent, then we must affirm a triune (or at least biune) God: one in essence, unchanging and perfect love and communion. Why? Because God would have to have been community in His transcendent unchanging essence to be love in His transcendent unchanging essence. Do Muslims accuse us of polytheism? I accuse them of worshipping a selfish and loveless deity.

To affirm that St. John has this in mind when he says that God is love, within the same epistle he offers the best single defense of the trinity in scripture (1 John 5:6-8): "This is He who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not only by water, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is truth. For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness on earth: the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree as one."

There is also a sense in which we submit to the teaching of the Trinity because of the antiquity of the doctrine. Matthew, 1 John, Irenaeus of Lyons and Justin Martyr (2nd century) all present baptismal formulas (or paraphrases of them) that are Trinitarian.

The line that got the Arians in a twist was this: to worship is to dedicate one's life to the thing worshipped. To be baptized is to enter fully into the life (baptism translates "imersion") of the one in whose name one is baptized. It is to be DEDICATED (along with many other things). It is an act of worship.

Since the most ancient of times, Christians (and Jews before them) have affirmed that God IS, and IS ONE. He has life in Himself; He is uncreated.

Since the most ancient of times, Christians have baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is affirmed not only by Matthew but by many 2nd century Christian writings as well. The arians also practiced this baptismal formula, and accordingly were caught in a trap. They couldn't change their worship - that would be admitting defeat and admitting that their heresy was not apostolic. They also couldn't get around the fact that if they viewed Christ as a created being - the Son as lesser than the Father - then they were worshipping a created being and committing idolatry!

We submit to the Trinity and it's mystery because it is what Christ revealed. We proclaim it because it reveals God as love in His essence - the unique good news of the Christian faith.

As an additional: there is another trinity within us, who are the image of God. We are body, mind, and spirit. Each of those is us. We are our body. We are our mind. We are our spirit. Yet each is distinct.

In answer to the question about whether early (pre-nicene) liturgies supported the Trinity - Justin Martyr prescribes triune baptism (or describes it, rather) in one of his apologies. Irenaeus of Lyons gives a Trinitarian pseudo-creed in the 3rd book of Against the Heresies. I haven't sought out much explicit trinitarian language beyond that, but those are two 2nd century giants who were wildly popular in their own day and after - suggesting that the belief was widespread.

In Christ,
Macarius

[silouanathonite]

Here is one of the best apologetic against Islam that I have read. It was written by Saint John of Damascus:


http://www.orthodoxinfo.com/general/stjohn_islam.aspx

[JustinHesychast]

Interesting post.

[Rowan]

The scripture is clear on the trinity.

The muslim religion claims that the gospel (NT) has been changed to demonstrate that Christ is truly God. They tend to believe this change occured in about 325 a.d.

We do know that a particular verse found in the gospel of John is indeed not an original. We know this from the first three church fathers that quote of this verse.

But does this help the muslim cause? That verse is John 1.18.

The two earliest papyrus fragments p67 & p75 along with Irenious and a few other early pre- nicene fathers have the quote as such:

No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten GOD (not'son') which is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared him.


The phrase only-begotten God in John's gospel is used by Irenious, Clement, and Origen.

Now a passage which alludes to an early liturgy is found in Jude 21-22 as i quoted in a previous post on this thread. This is the emergence of a trinitarian benediction.
If you prefer to read it from someone considered an expert scroll down to the bottom of this link where it quotes one Norman Perrins from his book 'the New Testament':

Epistle of Jude (http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/jude.html)

Thanks for this :)

[Dust and Ashes]

There is a really awesome thread buried somewhere in the OO forum which recounts the dialogue between the monk George and a group of Muslim "theologians" in the 12th century. You can find the majority of it online easily but there is a longer version with quite a bit of additional text if you can find it. Sorry I'm not more help but maybe the folks in VitD can point you to that thread. The monk uses the Koran to prove the Diety of Jesus, among other things and has them pretty upset.

[Grigorii]

http://beconvinced.com/en/article.ph...d=&subcatname= (http://beconvinced.com/en/article.php?articleid=0115&catid=&subcatname=)


The first problem with the article is that the author is not a Christian, and has no intention of expressing Christian doctrine correctly. Quite the contrary he is a Muslim (and for that reason alone his understanding of Christianity must be suspect) with an apologetic intent against Christianity in order to deceive Christians into Islam.

The second problem, related to the first, is that he does not (and cannot) read the Scriptures with the right key - faith in Christ. The faith in Christ that the New Testament bears witness to (Gospels as well as Epistles and Revelation) is a faith in Christ as God - hence Thomas' confession of Christ as his Lord and God (John 20, 28). This confession names Christ as "Lord" which in itself is used throughout the OT as referring to the God revealed in the OT. Jesus bears the titles the Father bears. That this is the intention of Thomas' confession is clearly demonstrated by him calling Jesus ho Theos a term almost exclusively reserved for God the Father. There can be no doubt that this confession, which comes at the end of the Gospel, is placed there because the whole preceding story of the Gospel leads one up to this confession! It is this recognition that the man Jesus Christ is God that lead to Nicea, Chalcedon, etc.

One who does not share the faith of John (or any of the other NT writers - which are identical) cannot understand the Scriptures who give testimony to Christ. What I mean is, the Scriptures are not the foremost subject of our understanding. It is Jesus Christ who is the foremost subject of our understanding by means of the Scriptures. Reading the Scriptures in any other way means one has changed the Christ-key for another. The doctrine one will find in Scripture thus depends (to a great extent) on the key being used.

Our Muslim apologist uses an Islamic key to read the Scriptures and than claims that Scripture does not teach trinitarian doctrine but agrees with his Islamic doctrine. All that he has demonstrated is that his key does not fit the testimony of the Apostles and the successors of the Apostles whose key is still being used by all Orthodox Christians today. This key unlocks the Scriptures because they are seen as testifying to Christ who - as Thomas confessed - is our Lord and our God.

When 600 years later Mohammed comes around and founds his own religion by discarding the proper key to the Christian Scriptures and using his own which he may have received in visionary experience (not unlike the Gnostics whose ultimate authority was not a Scripture but their own thoughts, dreams and experiences) he does not have particularly strong credentials that his understanding of God, Christ, and Scripture is the right one.

A personal hero of mine wrote:

",... just as the senses in the case of their being in any way diseased, or injured, require only proper treatment and then readily fulfill their own functions; just so the mind, imprisoned in flesh, and full of the thoughts that arise thence, requires right faith and right conversation,..."

Iow stick to Christian conversation partners when trying to understand Christianity. The same also wrote:

"Do not lay to the side the holy dogmas
which your fathers have laid down.
Do not abandon the faith of your baptism,
and do not thrust off the spiritual seal.
Thus can the Lord come into your soul,
and He will cover you on the evil day."

"The teachings of the heretics: angels of death.
The one who receives them loses his soul."

Christianity is a journey. It is the journey of our re-union to the Trinity in/by/through Jesus Christ. Knowledge of God is an experiental affair granted graciously by God as we grow spiritually by faithfully practicing our Christian faith:
- participating in the Sacraments
- attempting to see one's own sins and replace them with virtues (preferably under guidance of a spiritual father/mother)
- reading the Scriptures as our fathers in the faith (the saints and teachers of the Church from the Apostles until our day) have read them
- prayer (follow the rule your spiritual father/mother set for you - no more no less)

Te mind of our Muslim apologist is "imprisoned in the flesh" and thinks along fleshly lines. As a Christian one can (and should) rise above that. After all every step we take to near Christ is rewarded by Him with His grace (our steps do not earn His grace, but He gives it despite our inadequacies). The mind of a Christian will become more and more "receptive of God" and by this means achieve knowledge of God as Trinity. Trinitarian doctrine is not hard to understand or irrational at all - it is spiritual and revelatory. If one has trouble with trinitarian doctrine the problem, I firmly believe, lies in ones approach not the revealed dogma of the Trinity.

Hope this was of some help if not erase the words from memory and find another established Orthodox Christian to help you.

Gregorios

[Bushmaster78FS]

I've debated Muslims before, including an Anglican friend of mine who converted to Islam. She told me that the Trinity was invented in 325 at the Council of Nicaea to please the polytheists. When I met her and her friend again, her friend asked me if God was in three parts. See how ridiculously they take it!

Last night I had a dream that I was visiting a mosque, like one of the ones that I saw in Malaysia. I picked up a Qur'an from their bookcase, and in the back (one of the real Qur'ans I saw had this) there was a section entitled something like "The Real Message of Jesus Christ". This has worried me, but I suppose, just because some Muslim says that Jesus can't be God doesn't make it true, does it? There are plenty of proofs in the Scriptures that Christ is God.
This has worried me, but I suppose, just because some Muslim says that Jesus can't be God doesn't make it true, does it?

Why are you doubting over a dream? Dreams are the only time you are wide open to attacks by the demonic powers...

[rusmeister]

This excerpt from Chesterton's "Orthodoxy" is really good, too:

If we take any other doctrine that has been called old-fashioned we shall find the case the same. It is the same, for instance, in the deep matter of the Trinity. Unitarians (a sect never to be mentioned without a special respect for their distinguished intellectual dignity and high intellectual honour) are often reformers by the accident that throws so many small sects into such an attitude. But there is nothing in the least liberal or akin to reform in the substitution of pure monotheism for the Trinity. The complex God of the Athanasian Creed may be an enigma for the intellect; but He is far less likely to gather the mystery and cruelty of a Sultan than the lonely god of Omar or Mahomet. The god who is a mere awful unity is not only a king but an Eastern king. The heart of humanity, especially of European humanity, is certainly much more satisfied by the strange hints and symbols that gather round the Trinitarian idea, the image of a council at which mercy pleads as well as justice, the conception of a sort of liberty and variety existing even in the inmost chamber of the world. For Western religion has always felt keenly the idea "it is not well for man to be alone." The social instinct asserted itself everywhere as when the Eastern idea of hermits was practically expelled by the Western idea of monks. So even asceticism became brotherly; and the Trappists were sociable even when they were silent. If this love of a living complexity be our test, it is certainly healthier to have the Trinitarian religion than the Unitarian. For to us Trinitarians (if I may say it with reverence) -- to us God Himself is a society. It is indeed a fathomless mystery of theology, and even if I were theologian enough to deal with it directly, it would not be relevant to do so here. Suffice it to say here that this triple enigma is as comforting as wine and open as an English fireside; that this thing that bewilders the intellect utterly quiets the heart: but out of the desert, from the dry places and, the dreadful suns, come the cruel children of the lonely God; the real Unitarians who with scimitar in hand have laid waste the world. For it is not well for God to be alone.