# 3 in 1 had a son? / Doctrine of the Trinity a logical contradiction? \[merged threads\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 11, 2013, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811 "2013-01-11T01:40:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/21 "2013-01-12T01:46:39Z")
> [@virtually\_yours](#): > > Some Christians say God is three in one, does that mean whenever they say God did something, the three in one did it? No, it means God is a brand of bicycle oil. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/22 "2013-01-12T01:47:49Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > The best you can hope for is to envision the “Triple Point of Water” (where ice, liquid water, and steam all “co-exist,” and write it off as metaphor. Or do what St. Patrick did, and liken God to a shamrock. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/23 "2013-01-12T01:48:58Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > You really can’t reduce it to a rational system. It’s a paradox that surpasses human understanding that you’re supposed to take on faith. “TRINITY, n. In the multiplex theism of certain Christian churches, three entirely distinct deities consistent with only one. Subordinate deities of the polytheistic faith, such as devils and angels, are not dowered with the power of combination, and must urge individually their claims to adoration and propitiation. The Trinity is one of the most sublime mysteries of our holy religion. In rejecting it because it is incomprehensible, Unitarians betray their inadequate sense of theological fundamentals. In religion we believe only what we do not understand, except in the instance of an intelligible doctrine that contradicts an incomprehensible one. In that case we believe the former as a part of the latter.” – Ambrose Bierce ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/24 "2013-01-12T01:52:06Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > So what was there before the big bang. Same thing that’s north of the North Pole. ---
**Author:** ![Cheshire\_Human](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Cheshire\_Human](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheshire_Human)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/25 "2013-01-12T02:28:54Z")
> [@virtually\_yours](#): > > I know what it’s _supposed_ to be but it isn’t. if God is 3 in 1 and God had a son then 3 in 1 had a son. Or is he not 3 in 1 when it comes to the son? and wouldn’t that be more than one god then? the father had the son? but not the 3 in 1? > vy It’s kinda like the muslims look at it. Eventually you just _have_ to say _Inshallah_, and leave it at that. Or abandon your faith. Either-Or. ---
**Author:** ![Cheshire\_Human](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Cheshire\_Human](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheshire_Human)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/26 "2013-01-12T02:34:00Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > – Ambrose Bierce In other words, drop back 5 yards, and punt. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/27 "2013-01-12T04:51:17Z")
> [@Cheshire\_Human](#): > > In other words, drop back 5 yards, and punt. ACADEME, n. An ancient school where morality and philosophy were taught. ACADEMY, n. [from ACADEME] A modern school where football is taught. – Ambrose Bierce ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/28 "2013-01-12T07:21:08Z")
This may not be the very best place for this, but I’m not a member of any Christian apologetics forums, and I know we have some doctrinally standard faithful Christians here who have been up for discussing things like this before. I’m not an angry atheist, I am just interested in the topic in a purely philosophical way. It appears to me that one of the following statements must be false. Formal logic shows they can not all be true. Can you tell me which one it is? (Or which ones?) Jesus == God The Father == God Jesus is distinct from the Father There is a God, (call him X), and anything that is God == X That last one may be a little obscure. It’s basically a long way of saying there’s only one God. I wanted to be really precise about how to say it, so it would be clear how the statement is in formal contradiction with the other three statements. If anything that is god == X, then from the first statement Jesus == X, and from the second statement The Father == X. By transitivity of identity, then, Jesus == The Father. But by the third statement, it’s not the case that Jesus == The Father. So we have a contradiction. So one of the four statements must be false. But which is it? ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/29 "2013-01-12T15:37:25Z")
Okay, I’ll give this a shot. Bear in mind that **Frylock** is challenging the concept on the basis of logical contradiction, and that I’m addressing the “naked Trinity,” not the theological elaborations or socioreligious shibboleths that are often associated with the doctrine. First key point: Christianity evolved in a monotheistic Weltanschaaung. Not only was it a derivative of Judaism and its dogmatically monotheistic stance, but it evolved in a Hellenistic world that had moved from Olympian polytheism to a view that there was only one capital-G God, with a supporting cast of gods doing His will within their own spheres of interest6 and authority – as a parallel. consider the difference in 18th Century British Cabinet government and today;s PM-centric structure. (Not the greatest analogy, to be sure, but I’m trying to give a handle on how people’s conceptualization worked, not the direct power comparison where it falls short.) The disciples’ experience was, “When we see Jesus, we see God.” He was the answer to the question, “What if Gpd was one of us, _unum vir in omnibus_…” This was bolstered by some of His mystical utterances, “I and the Father are one:, :If youy have seen me, you have seen the Father,” etc. Jesus, then. was seen as truly God and truly man. And, as man, He humbled himself to worship God, calling Him Father. That metaphor is vitally important: for Jesus and His followers, God was not unknowably alien Power nor megalomaniacc despot in authority through raw power, but the ultimate in fatherly authority, fair, strict but forgiving, just but merciful, knowing and loving each of His children individually. And if His Son humbles Himself to life as an itinerant rabbi from peasant roots, and even to death on the Cross, how then should the followers behave? And, too, Father and Son sent out yet a _third_ aspect of Godhood, one that infills the individual to help lead him to a more Godly and God-centered existence (which is a humanistic one in its original form). In a world where each individual is a separate persona, one to a customer, the idea that God is one, Gpd is Father and Son and Holy Spirit, but that Father is not Son and neither Father nor Son is Holy Spirit, yet they together are but one God, becomes contrary to Earthly experience – _apparently_ self-contradictory. Jewish usage did not get analytical: it would, for example, speak of a prophet hearing God’s messenger in the beginning if a oassage, and of hearing God Himself as the same messae continues. So they turned to the Hellenistic world for analysis, and found it in Aristotelian terms and categories. “God is one” is read as “there is a single Godhead,” one _ousis_ or _substantia_, within which are three distinct _hypostases_ or _personae_: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. As time went on, how this worked went through several interpretations, those that didn’t work right becoming formal heresies. But perhaps the easiest way to say it is that you can set up metaphors from human experience, and each will fall short, but averaging them out will provide a handle on the real truth of the matter. For example, and addressing the main issue, neither Modalism nor Tritheism is true, yet the midpoint of them is approxiately right. So: John is by profession a mentor/counselor. He is his father’s son, his son’s father, and his councelees’ mentor and counselor. This is Modalism, showing how one person can be in three roles at once. Divinity Products is a closely held corporation. Pepe is majority stockholder and handles HQ operations. His son Jesus is in charge of worldwide operations, and another family member, Paracleto, handles customer service and technical support. Corporate policy is set by the three of them in consultation and carried out unfailingly by all three. This is Tritheism, showing how three people can have a single purpose and will. And how God operates in reality is exempliffied by both those analogies taken together. Because an individual with three distinct personae is alien to our experience, but can be approximated by things which are not. Noiw, a great deal of theological gibberish can be built upon this foundation, but does it make sense as a basoc cit at the question? ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/30 "2013-01-12T15:51:11Z")
As **Polycarp** says, it is not possible to _logically_ argue this point, and your first three statements are true from a theological standpoint. If you believe that there is only one God, but you also believe there exist three equally powerful Gods, with three different names, then your only hope to reconcile this tri-chotomy is the concept of “The Trinity,” and logic be damned. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/31 "2013-01-12T15:53:59Z")
I’ve always wondered what the purpose of a seperate Holy Spirit served. Is God now powerless in our world after being the prime mover and he was replaced, or do they both serve different purposes, doing different sorts of things in our world? It almost seems like Christians early on figured out a duality isn’t as cool as a trinity and just sort of fudged that one in. ---
**Author:** ![TATG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/50afbb/32.png) [@TATG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TATG)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/32 "2013-01-12T16:39:55Z")
If I were to defend it I’d look for some analogous case in the essentialism literature. There you get into the same sorts of issues, wanting to say that x and y are identical, but (in at least some way) distinct. You might do so by weakening the identity claim, or by weakening the distinctness claim. This sort of thing happens with some readings of Aristotle’s essentialism, but I’d have to go back and read up on this, and I’m not going to do so. I will give a defense (for mere academic interest; I have no philosophical stake in this). I’ll take the contingent identity route (x,y, might share all their properties in one world, but not all worlds). Not obviously possible, but also not obviously not. I’ll just appeal to the Lumpl and Goliath example to say that contingent identity is at least plausible. x,y are identical (at a world) if they share all their properties (at a world). If x,y could have been different, x and y are distinct (seems a reasonable definition of distinct, or at least “in some sense distinct”, to me). x,y could share all their properties at one world, and not so do in another world (appeal to contingent identity). So it is possible that x = y, but x is distinct from y. > [@Frylock](#): > > Jesus is distinct from the Father > … > But by the third statement, it’s not the case that Jesus == The Father. As above, it doesn’t follow that, given x is distinct from y, that it is not the case that x = y. Why did you use “distinct” rather than identity in the third statement? Also is there any reason why you used “==” rather than “=”? ---
**Author:** ![virtually\_yours](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/a587f6/32.png) [@virtually\_yours](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/virtually_yours)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/33 "2013-01-12T17:06:42Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Indeed - and according to the Nicene Creed, he’s ‘begotten, not made’ - the implication, as far as I understand it, being that the father-son thing describes the nature of the relationship, not the origin of the son. then that begs the question how can to equal persons have a father son relationship.. one god cant be subservient to another god vy VY ---
**Author:** ![Razncain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9d8465/32.png) [@Razncain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Razncain)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/34 "2013-01-12T17:14:05Z")
Slight hijack: I would only add there doesn’t seem to be enough scripture support for a Trinitarian concept. I John 5:7, 8 is obviously a late interpolation because the oldest Greek manuscripts don’t have it. A few of the later editions do. The RSV omits it out, and uses _There are three that testify: the Spirit, and the water and the blood, and these three agree._ I think there are others that also change it here. I believe Matthew 28:19 is in many of the older manuscripts (not totally sure, haven’t looked in a while), however Eusebius quotes from this passage many times, but always omits out the phrase “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" with “in thy name” which is more consistent with other scriptures in the NT. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/35 "2013-01-12T17:37:06Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > It appears to me that one of the following statements must be false. Formal logic shows they can not all be true. Can you tell me which one it is? (Or which ones?) (A) You are assuming that “God is the Father” means they are _identical_; which is not what Christians believe. (B) You are assuming God is a creature like ourself with a single, unitary mode of being… which is also not what Christians believe. Actually, let me expand upon that last part. Christians (barring a few tiny subsects including Jehovah’s Witnesses) believe that any man is composed of _two_ parts: the soul and the body. It is important to understand that _neither_ of these is the complete human being. Not even after they die. [spoiler]Or, as I like to put it, The City Council of Paradise, Heaven, votes to begin annexation of the outlying suburb of Universia. Some others hold that _Satan, Inc_. (headquartered in 7th Circle, Hell, zip 66666) will launch of a lawsuit to stop the procedings, but be found to have no standing after his legal filing was found to contain a pile of dog feces and a single page reading, “I hate you and the Christ you rode in on!” sixty times.\* Sensing immanent defeat, CEO Lucifer D. Evil launches a surprise Charm Offensive by sending out his Legion of the Damned to destroy - I mean, persuade - the people of Earth to sell; their land to him and vote against the annexation. With waves after wave of gift-giving, including care packages of giant meteors flung towards the earth, fiery volcanic cataclysms to provide free and clean energy, and peace assaults of demoic hordes who absolutey do not terrorize everyone into submission, Satan, Inc. looks like a good bet. But then in response, JesusCorp beings the development of billions of SuperAndroid mechabodies and begins downloading the consciousnesses of everyone who accepted his job offers and moved to Paradise… _I’m Catholic, and we don’t believe in the whole anti-Christ thing or the Rapture and whatnot._\* \*\*I am so going to Hell for this.[/spoiler] ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/36 "2013-01-12T17:51:24Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > Okay, I’ll give this a shot. Bear in mind that **Frylock** is challenging the concept on the basis of logical contradiction, and that I’m addressing the “naked Trinity,” not the theological elaborations or socioreligious shibboleths that are often associated with the doctrine. > > First key point: Christianity evolved in a monotheistic Weltanschaaung. Not only was it a derivative of Judaism and its dogmatically monotheistic stance, but it evolved in a Hellenistic world that had moved from Olympian polytheism to a view that there was only one capital-G God, with a supporting cast of gods doing His will within their own spheres of interest6 and authority – as a parallel. consider the difference in 18th Century British Cabinet government and today;s PM-centric structure. (Not the greatest analogy, to be sure, but I’m trying to give a handle on how people’s conceptualization worked, not the direct power comparison where it falls short.) > > The disciples’ experience was, “When we see Jesus, we see God.” He was the answer to the question, “What if Gpd was one of us, _unum vir in omnibus_…” This was bolstered by some of His mystical utterances, “I and the Father are one:, :If youy have seen me, you have seen the Father,” etc. Jesus, then. was seen as truly God and truly man. And, as man, He humbled himself to worship God, calling Him Father. That metaphor is vitally important: for Jesus and His followers, God was not unknowably alien Power nor megalomaniacc despot in authority through raw power, but the ultimate in fatherly authority, fair, strict but forgiving, just but merciful, knowing and loving each of His children individually. And if His Son humbles Himself to life as an itinerant rabbi from peasant roots, and even to death on the Cross, how then should the followers behave? And, too, Father and Son sent out yet a _third_ aspect of Godhood, one that infills the individual to help lead him to a more Godly and God-centered existence (which is a humanistic one in its original form). > > In a world where each individual is a separate persona, one to a customer, the idea that God is one, Gpd is Father and Son and Holy Spirit, but that Father is not Son and neither Father nor Son is Holy Spirit, yet they together are but one God, becomes contrary to Earthly experience – _apparently_ self-contradictory. > > Jewish usage did not get analytical: it would, for example, speak of a prophet hearing God’s messenger in the beginning if a oassage, and of hearing God Himself as the same messae continues. So they turned to the Hellenistic world for analysis, and found it in Aristotelian terms and categories. “God is one” is read as “there is a single Godhead,” one _ousis_ or _substantia_, within which are three distinct _hypostases_ or _personae_: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. > > As time went on, how this worked went through several interpretations, those that didn’t work right becoming formal heresies. But perhaps the easiest way to say it is that you can set up metaphors from human experience, and each will fall short, but averaging them out will provide a handle on the real truth of the matter. For example, and addressing the main issue, neither Modalism nor Tritheism is true, yet the midpoint of them is approxiately right. So: > > John is by profession a mentor/counselor. He is his father’s son, his son’s father, and his councelees’ mentor and counselor. This is Modalism, showing how one person can be in three roles at once. > > Divinity Products is a closely held corporation. Pepe is majority stockholder and handles HQ operations. His son Jesus is in charge of worldwide operations, and another family member, Paracleto, handles customer service and technical support. Corporate policy is set by the three of them in consultation and carried out unfailingly by all three. This is Tritheism, showing how three people can have a single purpose and will. > > And how God operates in reality is exempliffied by both those analogies taken together. Because an individual with three distinct personae is alien to our experience, but can be approximated by things which are not. > > Noiw, a great deal of theological gibberish can be built upon this foundation, but does it make sense as a basoc cit at the question? What? All of this without mentioning _filioque_? I want my money back.🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/37 "2013-01-12T17:56:31Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > Noiw, a great deal of theological gibberish can be built upon this foundation, but does it make sense as a basoc cit at the question? It looks like a good account of the experiences that led to Trinitarian affirmations, but it doesn’t seem to address the question directly. (I mean that as a characterization, not a criticism.) It doesn’t tell me which of the statements is supposed to be false according to Christian doctrine. That’s not to say it wasn’t informative in other ways. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/38 "2013-01-12T17:57:57Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > As **Polycarp** says, it is not possible to _logically_ argue this point, and your first three statements are true from a theological standpoint. > > If you believe that there is only one God, but you also believe there exist three equally powerful Gods, with three different names, then your only hope to reconcile this tri-chotomy is the concept of “The Trinity,” and logic be damned. But logical contradictions can’t be true. The only way I can see to do something like believing a contradiction is to think that there’s an equivocation in it somewhere, but you don’t know where. But I’m not sure that amounts to actually believing anything–maybe “affirming” it at best. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/39 "2013-01-12T18:03:37Z")
> [@razncain](#): > > I believe Matthew 28:19 is in many of the older manuscripts (not totally sure, haven’t looked in a while), however Eusebius quotes from this passage many times, but always omits out the phrase “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" with “in thy name” which is more consistent with other scriptures in the NT. I’m about as uniformed and out of my league as I can get here (and thats saying something 🙂 ). But couldn’t a verse like that be the equivalent to something like the following oath/statement. I swear to do my duty as a soldier in the name of the President of the United States, Billfish678, and American Freedom. Not a soldier here, and thats obviously a made up oath but it is something I could see being said. Now, anybody with half a brain can tell the first two are people and the last thing is a concept. Couldn’t the “Holy Spirit” be something that is not like what Jesus was/is and what God is? Not gonna kid myself, because I’d bet good money a zillion pages have been written by religious scholars on just such a concept. Just thought I’d ask and bring it up. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811/40 "2013-01-12T18:03:57Z")
> [@TATG](#): > > If I were to defend it I’d look for some analogous case in the essentialism literature. There you get into the same sorts of issues, wanting to say that x and y are identical, but (in at least some way) distinct. You might do so by weakening the identity claim, or by weakening the distinctness claim. This sort of thing happens with some readings of Aristotle’s essentialism, but I’d have to go back and read up on this, and I’m not going to do so. I will give a defense (for mere academic interest; I have no philosophical stake in this). > > I’ll take the contingent identity route (x,y, might share all their properties in one world, but not all worlds). Not obviously possible, but also not obviously not. I’ll just appeal to the Lumpl and Goliath example to say that contingent identity is at least plausible. > > x,y are identical (at a world) if they share all their properties (at a world). If x,y could have been different, x and y are distinct (seems a reasonable definition of distinct, or at least “in some sense distinct”, to me). x,y could share all their properties at one world, and not so do in another world (appeal to contingent identity). So it is possible that x = y, but x is distinct from y > > As above, it doesn’t follow that, given x is distinct from y, that it is not the case that x = y. But the Son and Father have different properties in the _actual_ world. Doesn’t this suffice to establish they’re not identical even on a contingent view of identity? > [@](#): > > Why did you use “distinct” rather than identity in the third statement? Also is there any reason why you used “==” rather than “=”? As to the first question, I was just being sloppy. As to the second question, it’s a habit I picked up online somewhere–it seems like a lot of people use double equals for equals in online contexts. I figured at some point it was somehow easier to read or something and started doing it as well. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/3-in-1-had-a-son-doctrine-of-the-trinity-a-logical-contradiction-merged-threads/646811.md?page=3)