Hello again everyone. Now that I am done with my exams, I would like to resume our exchange.
Originally posted by: SXMP
I find John Piper's explanation of the Trinity concise and accurate.
Here's the link
John Piper: "Can you explain the doctrine of the Trinity and its biblical support?"
I agree with you in that Mr. Piper?s account of the Trinity is concise and presents the Christian perspective very succinctly. I think it?s safe to assume that almost everyone who has attempted to explain the Trinity in this thread would agree with his position.
However, such a conglomeration of views need not validate the argument in any way. In fact, it provides me or anyone who doesn?t believe in the Trinity or is unfamiliar with it, with a sententious compilation that is easy to analyze and consequently, accept or reject.
This is what I think of it:
1) The most common (and the only canonical) interpretation of the Trinity, which Mr. Piper reiterates, is the one that regards the three figures as three different persons and one single being in essence. This, however, could not be more paradoxical, which ever way one looks at it:
- Three
different persons means three
different individuals. Three different individuals means three different beings in essence.
Yes, it?s that simple, to me at least. But wait, this is not how Piper defines the word ?person?. He says:
?In regards to the Trinity, we use the term "Person" differently than we generally use it in everyday life. Therefore it is often difficult to have a concrete definition of Person as we use it in regards to the Trinity. What we do not mean by Person is an "independent individual" in the sense that both I and another human are separate, independent individuals who can exist apart from one another.
What we do mean by Person is something that regards himself as "I" and others as "You." So the Father, for example, is a different Person from the Son because He regards the Son as a "You," even though He regards Himself as "I." Thus, in regards to the Trinity, we can say that "Person" means a distinct subject which regards Himself as an "I" and the other two as a "You." These distinct subjects are not a division within the being of God, but "a form of personal existence other than a difference in being."[3]
Pay attention to the bolded statement ? this is NO different than the common definition of a ?person?. His definition of a person is the same as
the definition of a person!
- Another way of looking at it, if one simply doesn?t buy into the linguistics of the earlier point, is to consider what Piper says: ?The personhood of each member of the Trinity means that each Person has a distinct
center of consciousness.?
This point of view is exactly what I think invalidates the Trinity, completely. As far as I know (and anyone who can think rationally knows), three ?different consciousnesses?
is three different beings; in person, in essence and in entirety. If consciousness doesn?t define an individual (a distinct being in person and essence), I don?t know what does!
- Now consider the following two statements by Piper:
?While the three members of the Trinity are distinct, this does not mean that any is inferior to the other. Instead, they are all identical in attributes.
They are equal in power, love, mercy, justice, holiness, knowledge, and all other qualities.?
?The Trinity does not divide God into three parts. The Bible is clear that
all three Persons are each one hundred percent God.?
Now, if that is not contradictory to a sane mind, I don?t know what contradiction is. How can the three figures of the Trinity be 100% God and still be equal to each other? Three Gods?
At this point, I am seriously trying to comprehend the Trinity, but I simply cannot fathom it, no matter how much I try. No it?s not because I have predetermined beliefs, I am trying to shut them out completely as I try to do this.
- Consider another statement by Piper: ?The Trinity does not divide God into three parts. The Bible is clear that all three Persons are each one hundred percent God. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all fully God. For example, it says of Christ that ?in Him
all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form" (Colossians 2:9).
The Trinity hinges on the principle that all the three figures are eternal and coexist at all times. If God?s deity exists in ?all fullness? in Jesus, then God doesn?t exist outside of Jesus or external to him, at least in divine form!
Edit: Therefore, if Jesus died on the cross, God must have died too, fully. Simply by virtue of the fact that I am writing all this, obviously, this is not what happened.
This brings us back to why this thread was created in the first place.
2) Piper quotes the following verse from the Old Testament:
?There is no other God besides me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides me. Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other? (Isaiah 45:21-22; see also 44:6-8; Exodus 15:11; Deuteronomy 4:35; 6:4-5; 32:39; 1 Samuel 2:2; 1 Kings 8:60).
He tries to use it to prove the ?oneness of God.? What is ironic is that in this verse, it is the
God of Moses speaking to the Israelites. The same God, which I as a Muslim worship. This is not the ?God of Christianity?, if you will, who is limited in His Godhead as there are three figures who share the power equally. This is the same God (the one and only) who never said/taught anything even remotely suggestive of the Trinity. It is unfortunate that Piper uses such a verse in trying to explain the Trinity when in fact God said this to Moses in the strongest spirit of monotheism!
In conclusion, I think that Piper?s piece, as a whole, depicts the same fallacy that is inherent in the concept of the Trinity. Any attempt to explain the Trinity is just that, an attempt. In my opinion, it simply cannot be ?explained?, as that would require it to be
comprehensible to oneself.
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Originally posted by: SXMP
Something further to consider: If you are willing to accept there is an all powerful God, who is both omniscent and omnipotent, a God who cannot be fully understood by human thought, then I don't see why its so hard to believe that God who is incomprehensible can do something incomprehensible, like exist in the Trinity as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Originally posted by: sao123
Is Jesus Christ God?
Sao?s link provides the gist of what you are trying to say:
?The reason that many cults fatally err regarding the divinity of Jesus Christ is because they place sinful, finite human reason above the clear teaching of the Word of God. The Bible consistently sets forth the doctrine of the trinity from Genesis to Revelation. As revelation progresses, the doctrine of the trinity becomes clearer and clearer, until only those who are spiritually blind could deny it. If you do deny the trinity, the Bible becomes an incomprehensible jumble of contradictions ? The doctrine of the trinity is hard to comprehend yet it is clearly taught in the Bible and therefore must be believed.?
According to the last two statements, belief in the Trinity is a requirement before reading the Bible. But I don't believe in the Trinity to begin with?
So the Bible would make more sense to me if I believe in the Trinity, first? Well, if belief is a prerequisite to understanding religion and scripture, the Qur?an makes even more sense to me if I begin with the belief that God is One, in essence and in person ? I choose the latter.
Consider the following passage from the Old Testament:
And it was so, that when Solomon had made an end of praying all this prayer and supplication unto the LORD, he arose from before the altar of the LORD, from kneeling on his knees with his hands spread up to heaven.
And he stood, and blessed all the congregation of Israel with a loud voice, saying,
Blessed be the LORD, that hath given rest unto his people Israel, according to all that he promised: there hath not failed one word of all his good promise which he promised by the hand of Moses his servant.
The LORD our God be with us, as he was with our fathers: let him not leave us, nor forsake us:
That he may incline our hearts unto him, to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments, and his statutes, and his judgments, which he commanded our fathers.
And let these my words, wherewith I have made supplication before the LORD, be nigh unto the LORD our God day and night, that he maintain the cause of his servant, and the cause of his people Israel at all times, as the matter shall require:
That all the people of the earth may know that the LORD is God, and that there is none else. (1 Kings 8:54-60)
-Not Jesus, not the Holy Spirit, not the Virgin Mary. Nobody, no one, no-thing ? none.
Hence the Islamic belief.