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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Does Scripture support the Trinity?
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Bonaventura*
Shipmate
# 5561
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
My view on this is that the long term result of Trinitarian doctrine has been to separate God and Jesus in the minds of the average Christian.
The effect, in my opinion, has been that the average person of Christian ancestry does not believe that Jesus is really divine. I think that polls confirm this. On this ship there is quite a bit of support for the idea that Joseph was Jesus' father. In my mind this confirms what Andreas is saying.
Perhaps you ought to blame the Jesus seminar™ instead? ![[Snigger]](graemlins/snigger.gif)
[ 16. May 2005, 17:14: Message edited by: Bonaventura ]
Posts: 252 | From: Et in Arcadia requiesco | Registered: Feb 2004
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
You're probably right. ![[Disappointed]](graemlins/disappointed.gif)
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
The Word is not a metaphor. You cannot deny that BEFORE the world was created, the Word existed. But before the creation itself, no metaphors could exist. The Uncreated Word of God existed before the creation itself. This we know. But for something to exist, it has to have a substance. Therefore there are two substances in the deity.
Keep this in mind: for something to exist, it must have a substance. Therefore, if the Spirit exists, it has a substance. But if He is the Spirit of God, then His substance is different than God's substance. So, there are two substances, not one.
When the Word says that He is the Gate, this is clearly a metaphor. When He says that He will send the Spirit though, this is no metaphor; He really means it. Is He a liar for He sent no Spirit, if no Spirit exists? But if the Spirit exists, then it must subsist. It is a substance different from Him that sends Him. Let's assume that the Gate is also a substance. You are saying that if my thinking is correct, then, somehow, the Gate metaphor must be a substance as well. But the Gate is not a substance. Therefore metaphors can be used that indicate no different substance that the one person. Your argument is logically wrong. Let's think about the Gate having a substance. OK, it has a substance. But the Word does not say that the Gate is different from Him. He says "I am the Gate". Or "I am the Shepherd" or "I am the Way". Assuming that the Gate has a substance, or the Way has a substance, this substance is the same with the substance of the Word, because He said "I am this or that". But Jesus's Father never said that "I am Jesus". He said that "I am in Him and He is in me". Did Jesus say that He is His Father? De He say that the Spirit is His Father? Did the Father say "I am the holy spirit"?
So, your arguments are not logical.
Now we have talked this, can you see that you have made a mistake?
You are asking what the difference between an essence and a person is. I am a person. You are a person. We are two persons. But we are one essence. The human essence is one. Is the difference clear?
All rocks have the same essence. They are all rocks! But they subsist in different substances. So, one essence, different substances (or, for rational substances, we can use the term "persons").
You are saying that there can be forms without substances. This is something I hear for the first time in my life. Everything that exists, subsists. To exist, means to subsist in substances. It's the definition! How on earth can you think that God's love does not subsist? If it does not subsist, it does not exist!
For Christ's shake, I will make one more effort to convince you that there are three divine persons and not just one.
Please, bear with me and try to think hard on what I am saying.
You saying that God loves. I am asking you, does God really love? If he does, and I confess that He does, then His love exists. But another word for "exists" is "subsists". So, His love subsists in a substance. God's love is God's love; it is not God Himself. So, God loves, i.e. from Him comes something. That something is a substance. His love has a substance, else it could n't have existed. Is His love divine? Of course not. The scriptures do not teach that His love is divine. So, His love is not God. It is something different, but not God. Therefore there are two substances; God and His love. What about His Word? FOR THE SAME REASONS, His Word has to subsist. But the scriptures clearly show that His Word is divine. Therefore this other substance is divine. So, there are two divine substances. To make a long story short, if we think using the same arguments for the Spirit, we reach to the conclusion that there are three divine substances. because these substances are rational, we call them persons. So, there are three divine persons.
P.S. I do not comment on what you are saying about Jesus's glorification, because I want the thread to focus on the Trinity.
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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Lyda*Rose
Ship's broken porthole
# 4544
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Posted
andreas1984 said: quote:
God's love is God's love; it is not God Himself.
![[Confused]](confused.gif) So what about 1 John 4:16? quote:
God is love; he who dwells in love is dwelling in God, and God in him.
Okay, I personally think that's a metaphor, but since we were pulling up the proof texts... ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
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"Dear God, whose name I do not know - thank you for my life. I forgot how BIG... thank you. Thank you for my life." ~from Joe Vs the Volcano
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
could you please provide some evidence for the ridiculous assertion that Arianism has been driving the West
I was mainly referring to the period from 410 AD to 476 AD. When Rome fell, the "winners" were Arians. The "losers" were orthodox. Now, for the winner to let himself be spiritually influenced by the loser, the winner has to have a great ethical height. For example, when Rome conquered Greece, the Greek civilisation prevailed over the Roman civilisation of that time, and another civilisation emerged (or, like the Latins said, "the barbarian Latios conquered Greece, but in fact, it was Greece that conquered Latios"). This is not, however, the case with the Fall of Rome. The new conquerors were not like Latios. The barbaric tribes did not accept the trinitarian orthodoxy in it's fullness. For everyone that is interested in understanding what played an extremely important role for the formation of today's West, read about what happened with the Fall of Rome. Who conquered whom, which different religions they confessed, what happened after the Fall of Rome, especially as far as THE PEOPLES are concerned. After inter-marriages, what do you think the leading culture was? The defeated orthodox or the conquering who-learnt-Christ-from-Arians non-orthodox one?
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lyda*Rose:
andreas1984 said: quote:
God's love is God's love; it is not God Himself.
So what about 1 John 4:16? quote:
God is love; he who dwells in love is dwelling in God, and God in him.
Okay, I personally think that's a metaphor, but since we were pulling up the proof texts...
Lyda*Rose, God did not say "Hear ye Israel, Love is me". If He did, then Love would be a person. John was trying to explain that when we love we live in Christ. If love is literally God, then we can create God, because we can start loving, and we can destroy God, for we can stop loving. So, God would be defeated whenever we were wicked, for then we would have nothing to do with God; God would not exist for us. But God is everywhere, even in Hell. This is what the scriptures say.
So, even if God said that love is divine, it would have to be another divine person that God. And if God said that He is Love, then God's nature would be explained and named. But we have been taught that what God is cannot be named, and it cannot be explained.
John is only saying that when we love, God abides in us. When we hate, we are not doing God's will.
Besides, for God to love, there must be at least another person whom He will love. But before the world was created, whom did God love? God loved His Son and His Spirit.
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by andreas1984:
Keep this in mind: for something to exist, it must have a substance. Therefore, if the Spirit exists, it has a substance. But if He is the Spirit of God, then His substance is different than God's substance. So, there are two substances, not one.
Things do not need substance to exist. If God is both divine truth and divine love, is He two different substances? These are attributes of God, not different substances. Love itself is a substance, but truth is the form of that substance, not a separate substance.
The Word is simply the divine truth. This was in the beginning with God, but it is not a substance.
But we are not looking at Scripture here. Do you have Scripture passages that illustrate what you mean about the three persons being different substance and not just metaphor?
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
Listen to what you are saying carefully. Truth us different from love. They are not the same thing. They are two different essences. Even if one of them was God, the other would not be God, or we would introduce polytheism. The two essences have to subsist is substances in order for them to exist!
Humanity is an essence. If there were no human person, then the human nature would not exist. The human nature exists because there are human persons. An essence cannot exist without a substance. This has to do with logic. If what you are saying is illogical, then it does not matter what the scriptures say. Illogical syllogisms have nothing to do with reality. And it is reality we are talking about here.
Every love subsists. It is not without substance. If it was without substance, then it would not exist. The same applies for the truths we speak. They subsist; else they would not exist. If the Word is the divine truth, then you have named that which cannot be named. You have explained that which cannot be explained, you have given form to that which has no form, you have limited the Unlimited. (because you are actually saying that the Word *IS* God's truth or love or whatever, while we use the term "Word" as a name for the person; we do not say that His nature is that of God's speech)
Truth in general is an essence. But for truth in general to exist, there must be specific truths. So, there must be substances in truth. Else, truth would not exist.
You are speaking of metaphors and so on. But you miss the whole point. For something to exist, it must subsist. All that is existent subsists. By claiming that the Word or the Spirit does not subsist, you confess that they do not exist, which is absurd. Besides, by claiming that the Word is divine, you already accept that He subsist (even though you say that His substance is the same as His Father's substance). But, in your last posts, you are arguing that the Word is different from God because it does not have a substance.
You are terribly confusing God with God's energies. Both God and His energies exist, but His energies are different than God Himself. Our conversation here cannot continue because you have stopped using logic for your arguments. Logos makes it clear that when something exists, it subsists. What you are saying does not make sense.
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by andreas1984:
Besides, for God to love, there must be at least another person whom He will love. But before the world was created, whom did God love?
This is right. The whole nature of love is to love another. So this is the purpose of creation.
quote:
1 John 4:8 He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
1 John 4:16 And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.
I think that these do mean that love defines what God is, and vice-versa. This central Christian metaphor is accepted throughout Christianity.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by andreas1984:
For something to exist, it must subsist. All that is existent subsists. By claiming that the Word or the Spirit does not subsist, you confess that they do not exist, which is absurd. Besides, by claiming that the Word is divine, you already accept that He subsist (even though you say that His substance is the same as His Father's substance). But, in your last posts, you are arguing that the Word is different from God because it does not have a substance.
I'm not saying anything complicated. The Word is the divine truth. That's all. No one thinks that truth is a substance.
quote:
Originally posted by andreas1984:
You are terribly confusing God with God's energies. Both God and His energies exist, but His energies are different than God Himself. Our conversation here cannot continue because you have stopped using logic for your arguments. Logos makes it clear that when something exists, it subsists. What you are saying does not make sense.
I realize that love is considered by the Orthodox to be an energy and not God's essence. This is not the Western view or my view.
But you can't say it's not logical just because it is different than your own theology. All Christian theology must be based on the Christian Scriptures. I'm not seeing how your view is substantiated by either Scripture or logic.
Still, I agree with your approach to Jesus' work and the path to salvation. ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
No. This has nothing to do with what the church believed in.
Firstly, the creation is not created so tha God has something to love. If God loves, then God must love even BEFORE the creation got created. This is why the Father generated the Son and spirates the Spirit.
Secondly,love does not define God. It is one thing to say that love is god (idolatry) and another to say that God loves.
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
In that case you worship idols; not God. For you worship the truth, while the Christians worship God. God's essence cannot be named or explained or limited. By saying that His essence is His love, you make Him a thing rather than a person. Your deity is impersonal. Even the person of the Father becomes a mere substance. This has nothing to do with the religions that stem from Abraham. To us, God is personal.
P.S. What you are saying is not logical not because you are not accepting the distinction between God's essence and energies, but because you say that something may exist without subsisting, which is ABSURD. This is refuted by logic itself. This is why I am saying that what you wrote is illogical. This has nothing to do with what the Western Christianity teaches. Read any RC Father you want. They all affirm that to exist, one has to subsist in something. This is plain Aristotelian logic. No "Eastern" novelty.
[ 16. May 2005, 19:25: Message edited by: andreas1984 ]
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by andreas1984:
Firstly, the creation is not created so tha God has something to love. If God loves, then God must love even BEFORE the creation got created. This is why the Father generated the Son and spirates the Spirit.
There is no "before" creation. Time only came into existence with creation.
Love needs an object. The love between the divine persons is self-love, since there is only one God. Love is the purpose of creation, because it needs an object to love, make happy and be joined with.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
There can be no love between a person and an object. Love needs at least two persons. There are two subjects of love.
There is no "before" creation for the created; not for the Uncreated. For God there is no time or place. God exists in a different mode of existence than creation.
Did God love before creation? You say that He loved Himself. What kind of love is this? How strange and novel a concept for love! This is not what the experience of the church shows. We exist because we are in relation with others (in Zulu: Ubuntu). The same applies to God. The Uncreated Source generates the Son and becomes the Fountain for the Spirit. The three persons exist in relation to each other; they are because they are related to each other. There is no Father without a Son, nor there is an Emitter without a Spirit.
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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John Holding
Coffee and Cognac
# 158
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Posted
Andreas -- as a Host I am finding it a little difficult to relate each of your posts to the appropriate antecedent. This is making it very difficult to follow the lines of the discussion for me, and no doubt for anyone else who may be following htis.
This isn't a formal ruling, but a gentle request, to somehow reference the post to which you are referring when you are posting a series of responses. Better still, remember that there is a general feeling that double or triple posting is a problem, just because it causes this problem.
John Holding
Purgatory Host
Posts: 5929 | From: Ottawa, Canada | Registered: May 2001
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
I want to apologize to the readers. I'll do my best next time.
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
Sorry. My fault as well.
Andreas, I appreciate your ideas here.
I'm wondering if it is generally accepted that the mutual love among the persons of the Trinity "before" creation fulfilled the requirement of love needing an object. I have heard this before, but am not aware if it is an official position.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
The Lord created me as the beginning of his way
the first of his acts of long ago.
Ages ago I was set up.
at the first, before the beginning of the earth.
When there were no depths I was brought forth,
when there were no springs abounding with water.
Before the mountains had been shaped,
before the hills, I was brought forth-
when he had not yet made earth and fields,
or the world's first bits of soil.
When he established the heavens, I was there,
when he drew a circle on the face of the deep,
when he made firm the skies above,
when he established the fountains of the deep,
when he assigned to the sea it's limit,
so that the waters might not transgress his command,
when he marked out the foundations of the earth,
then I was beside him, like a master worker (or a little child);
and I was daily his delight,
rejoicing before him always
rejoicing in his inhabiting world
and delighting in the human race.
Proverbs 8.22 - 8.31
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by andreas1984:
and I was daily his delight,
rejoicing before him always
This does sound like the Son being loved by the Father at the beginning. So I see the point.
I think, however, that this is just as likely to be speaking metaphorically as literally about a divine person.
In fact if you look at the whole proverb it gives a different impression:
quote:
Proverbs 8.1 Does not wisdom cry out,
And understanding lift up her voice?
2 She takes her stand on the top of the high hill,
Beside the way, where the paths meet.
3 She cries out by the gates, at the entry of the city,
At the entrance of the doors:
4 “To you, O men, I call,
And my voice is to the sons of men.
...
12 “I, wisdom, dwell with prudence,
And find out knowledge and discretion.
13 The fear of the Lord is to hate evil;
Pride and arrogance and the evil way
And the perverse mouth I hate.
14 Counsel is mine, and sound wisdom;
I am understanding, I have strength.
15 By me kings reign,
And rulers decree justice.
16 By me princes rule, and nobles,
All the judges of the earth.
17 I love those who love me,
And those who seek me diligently will find me.
18 Riches and honor are with me,
Enduring riches and righteousness.
19 My fruit is better than gold, yes, than fine gold,
And my revenue than choice silver.
20 I traverse the way of righteousness,
In the midst of the paths of justice,
21 That I may cause those who love me to inherit wealth,
That I may fill their treasuries.
22“The Lord possessed me at the beginning of His way,
Before His works of old...
And it continues from there as you quoted.
This is about "wisdom" as a quality that always has existed with God, not "the Son" as a person who existed with Him.
As I see it, this is the same as "the Word" which was in the beginning with God. It is not a substance but a divine attribute, namely the divine truth, or, as here, wisdom itself. Not a substance, but a way of talking about the way that wisdom and prudence are eternal and come from God.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
Truly, Wisdom has "cried out by the gates, at the entry of the city, At the entrance of the doors: 'To you, O men, I call, And my voice is to the sons of men.'" but the people did not listen to her (Jesus). This prophecy has been fulfilled by the Christ of God, when, at the entrance of Jerusalem, he asked for repentance. But the people did not repent.
Actually, the text you quote shows clearly that Wisdom is not an attribute; it is divine itself. She says that He is Lord (I, Wisdom... The fear of the Lord is... I hate...). So, Wisdom is Lord. It is not the same as the attribute of wisdom rational substances can show. In fact, Wisdom has wisdom. If She is an attribute like you are saying, then how can She say that "Counsel is mine, and sound wisdom;"? She says that wisdom is hers; that wisdom is Wisdom's. So, as an attribute, wisdom belongs to all three divine persons. But as a person, She exists in relation to the Father, for "The Lord possessed me at the beginning of His way, Before His works of old".
P.S. It might be interesting to read the Wisdom thread in the forum.
[ 17. May 2005, 11:34: Message edited by: andreas1984 ]
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by andreas1984:
Actually, the text you quote shows clearly that Wisdom is not an attribute; it is divine itself. She says that He is Lord (I, Wisdom... The fear of the Lord is... I hate...). So, Wisdom is Lord.
I guess you can read it that way. She can be said to be Jesus.
I think that a more normal reading, however, would that wisdom is an eternal concept not a person. There is no problem, for example, that wisdom is usually pictured as female whereas Jesus was male. We all know that the thing itself that is being talked about is not gendered, and that the gender is just a way of picturing it (and it may also describe some deep and significant aspect of it.)
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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El Greco
Shipmate
# 9313
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Posted
Actually, the deity has no gender; therefore we can call the deity using either male or female characteristics. So, Jesus in His deity He can be called a "she", just like God is depicted as a loving mother in Isaiah.
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Ξέρω εγώ κάτι που μπορούσε, Καίσαρ, να σας σώσει.
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
Absolutely.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
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