3 in 1 had a son? / Doctrine of the Trinity a logical contradiction? [merged threads]

[BrainGlutton]

@Musicat

Just waxing anecdotal here, but I can recall conversations with Protestant ministers where their only explanation for some incomprehensible things was “You can’t explain it, Son, it’s a mystery. A wonderful mystery.” And there it ended.

A mystery, to some, is something to be celebrated, a beautiful example of the wonderfulness and divine incomprehensibility of the unknowable deity.

:dubious: Indeed.

From A History of Western Philosophy (1945), by Bertrand Russell, Chapter XIX, “Rousseau”:

In theology he [Rousseau] made an innovation which has now been accepted by the great majority of Protestant theologians. Before him, every philosopher from Plato onward, if he believed in God, offered intellectual arguments in favor of his belief. The arguments may not, to us, seem very convincing, and we may feel that they would not have seemed cogent to anyone who did not already feel sure of the truth of the conclusion. But the philosopher who advanced the arguments certainly believed them to be logically valid, and such as should cause certainty of God’s existence in any unprejudiced person of sufficient philosophical capacity. Modern Protestants who urge us to believe in God, for the most part, despise the old “proofs,” and base their faith upon some aspect of human nature – emotions of awe or mystery, the sense of right and wrong, the feeling of aspiration, and so on. This way of defending religious belief was invented by Rousseau. It has become so familiar to us that its originality may easily not be appreciated by a modern reader, unless he will take the trouble to compare Rousseau with (say) Descartes or Leibniz.

“Ah, Madame!” Rousseau writes to an aristocratic lady, “sometimes in the privacy of my study, with my hands pressed tight over my eyes or in the darkness of the night, I am of the opinion that there is no God. But look yonder: the rising of the sun, as it scatters the mists that cover the earth, and lays bare the wondrous glittering scene of nature, disperses at the same moment all cloud from my soul. I find my faith again, and my God, and my belief in Him. I admire and adore Him, and prostrate myself in His presence.”

On another occasion he says, “I believe in God as strongly as I believe any other truth, because believing and not believing are the last things in the world that depend on me.” This form of argument has the drawback of being private; the fact that Rousseau cannot help believing something affords no ground for another person to believe the same thing.

<snip>

The rejection of reason in favor of the heart was not, to my mind, an advance. In fact, no one thought of this device so long as reason appeared to be on the side of religious belief. In Rousseau’s environment, reason, as represented by Voltaire, was opposed to religion, therefore away with reason! Moreover, reason was abstruse and difficult; the savage, even when he has dined, cannot understand the ontological argument, and yet the savage is the repository of all necessary wisdom. Rousseau’s savage – who was not the savage known to anthropologists – was a good husband and a kind father; he was destitute of greed, and had a religion of natural kindliness. He was a convenient person, but if he could follow the good Vicar’s reasons for believing in God he must have had more philosophy than his innocent naivete would lead one to expect.

Apart from the fictitious character of Rousseau’s “natural man,” there are two objections to the practice of basing beliefs as to objective fact upon the emotions of the heart. One is that there is no reason whatever to suppose that such beliefs will be true; the other is, that the resulting beliefs will be private, since the heart says different things to different people. Some savages are persuaded by the “natural light” that it is their duty to eat people, and even Voltaire’s savages, who are led by the voice of reason to hold that one should only eat Jesuits, are not wholly satisfactory. To Buddhists, the light of nature does not reveal the existence of God, but does proclaim that it is wrong to eat the flesh of animals. But even if the heart said the same thing to all men, that could afford no evidence for the existence of anything outside our own emotions. However ardently I, or all mankind, may desire something, however necessary it may be to human happiness, there is no ground for supposing this something to exist. There is no law of nature guaranteeing that mankind should be happy. Everybody can see that this is true of our life here on earth, but by a curious twist our sufferings in this life are made into an argument for a better life hereafter. We should not employ such an argument in any other connection. If you had bought ten dozen eggs from a man, and the first dozen were all rotten, you would not infer that the remaining nine dozen must be of surpassing excellence; yet that is the kind of reasoning that “the heart” encourages as a consolation for our sufferings here below.

For my part, I prefer the ontological argument, the cosmological argument, and the rest of the old stock-in-trade, to the sentimental illogicality that has sprung from Rousseau. The old arguments at least were honest: if valid, they proved their point; if invalid, it was open to any critic to prove them so. But the new theology of the heart dispenses with argument; it cannot be refuted, because it does not profess to prove its points. At bottom, the only reason offered for its acceptance is that it allows us to indulge in pleasant dreams. This is an unworthy reason, and if I had to choose between Thomas Aquinas and Rousseau, I should unhestitatingly choose the saint.

[Little_Nemo]

the other is, that the resulting beliefs will be private, since the heart says different things to different people. Some savages are persuaded by the “natural light” that it is their duty to eat people, and even Voltaire’s savages, who are led by the voice of reason to hold that one should only eat Jesuits, are not wholly satisfactory. To Buddhists, the light of nature does not reveal the existence of God, but does proclaim that it is wrong to eat the flesh of animals.

This, to me, has always been the sticking point. I’ll hear a Christian use an argument to support the truth of Christianity. But then I’ll hear a Muslim use the same argument to support the truth of Islam or a Buddhist us it to support the truth of Buddhism. That means the argument isn’t proving anything to me. For me, an argument that proves a religion has to be unique to that religion.

[Blaster_Master]

I am a Christian. Personally, I don’t believe in the Trinity because I think it lacks support in scripture and doesn’t really add anything other than attempting to fix apparent contradictions that are better addressed in other ways. However, I think I think I have a decent understanding of exactly what the basic idea is. It’s not a perfect analogy, but I think it gets the idea across.

Let’s imagine you work for a family owned business, and your father is the owner. When you’re at home, he wears the hat of father and your relationship with him is that of father-son. When you’re at work, he wears the hat of business owner and your relationship with him is that of boss-employee. He is the same person in both cases, yet they may be two very different relationships based on the context. Thus, we could say that he is your father and he is your boss, but comparing the two roles as equal fails.

What makes it a bit more difficult to really grasp is that, unlike in the analogy above, we can’t really see that they’re the same person because God isn’t a physical being and we can only relate to him through these means. It would be like, in the analogy above, if we never actually laid eyes on the person and, other than knowing his name, if he were able to truly separate those roles well, we might have difficulty really believing that he’s the same person because we relate to him so differently even though those relationships are in different contexts.

So in that sense, when our relationship with God is that of him as creator, law-maker, provider, all those sorts of things, he takes on that role and seems very different from when we relate to him on a human level, he’s a teacher, and we have a more personal relationship.
As a bit of a tangent, my own thoughts are basically that it’s just an illusion. The idea being that God is essentially a higher dimensional being and like how flat-landers can only see cross-sections of a three-dimensional object, we can only see projections of God in our own understanding, limited by our ability to grasp and understand space-time and our human relationships. Not understanding this, people would see these different aspects that appear so different but know they’re the same being and would have to simply accept it on faith. It would be akin to a flat-lander trying to understand a banana, seeing one cross-section that is essentially a circle than another that is essentially a crescent shape and being told it’s the same object. A flat-lander cannot grasp the third dimension, so they just have to accept that those cross-sections are from the same object and would probably explain it in much the same way.

[Little_Nemo]

@Blaster_Master

Let’s imagine you work for a family owned business, and your father is the owner. When you’re at home, he wears the hat of father and your relationship with him is that of father-son. When you’re at work, he wears the hat of business owner and your relationship with him is that of boss-employee. He is the same person in both cases, yet they may be two very different relationships based on the context. Thus, we could say that he is your father and he is your boss, but comparing the two roles as equal fails.

But that runs into the issue we’ve already mentioned. Everyone can understand the idea of a person having different roles at different times. But the Trinity doctrine is saying God has different roles at the same time. It’s like claiming that one man is a boss at work at the same time he’s being a husband at home - and that the boss and the husband are both the same person and two different people.

Or to put it in Christian terms, it’s saying that Jesus evicted Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden and God was crucified and died on the Cross. Because God and Jesus exist simultaneously and are the same being.

[Mangetout]

@virtually_yours

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

The doctrine of the Trinity doesn’t purport to describe multiple gods.

[Blaster_Master]

@Little_Nemo

But that runs into the issue we’ve already mentioned. Everyone can understand the idea of a person having different roles at different times. But the Trinity doctrine is saying God has different roles at the same time. It’s like claiming that one man is a boss at work at the same time he’s being a husband at home - and that the boss and the husband are both the same person and two different people.

Or to put it in Christian terms, it’s saying that Jesus evicted Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden and God was crucified and died on the Cross. Because God and Jesus exist simultaneously and are the same being.

Or, in the example above, your father fired you and your boss let you stay at his house after firing you.

Don’t take my analogy to strongly because, as I mentioned, I’m more running off my idea in how it works than my belief in it, since I don’t, and it does break down somewhat when expanding it from applying to a human being to applying it to God.

That said, I don’t really see this objection because I think most Christians would argue essentially that time has no meaning to God. That is, what we see as “at the same time” isn’t a limitation on God. It would only seem off to us because we lack the ability to understand what “time has no meaning” actually means.

This is why I prefer the projection approach instead. Consider the banana example again, except instead of one of the cross-sections I used before, we take one such that we get two disjoint ellipses. If you were to tell a flat-lander that those two ellipses are actually from one continuous object, they won’t be able to understand that.

[Little_Nemo]

@Blaster_Master

Or, in the example above, your father fired you and your boss let you stay at his house after firing you.

Don’t take my analogy to strongly because, as I mentioned, I’m more running off my idea in how it works than my belief in it, since I don’t, and it does break down somewhat when expanding it from applying to a human being to applying it to God.

Here’s a hypothetical dialogue on the issue:

“So God and Jesus are the same being?”
“Yes.”
“God is Jesus and Jesus is God?”
“Yes.”
“And Jesus was crucified and died on the Cross?”
“Yes.”
“So that means God was crucified and died on the Cross?”
“No.”
“But if Jesus was crucified and Jesus is God, then wasn’t God crucified?”
“No, God and Jesus are different.”
“So is Jesus just a part of God? Or is God just a part of Jesus?”
“No, Jesus and God are exactly the same.”
“So God and Jesus are different from each other and they’re exactly the same thing?”
“Yes.”
“How is that possible?”
“It’s a mystery we can’t understand.”

@Blaster_Master

That said, I don’t really see this objection because I think most Christians would argue essentially that time has no meaning to God. That is, what we see as “at the same time” isn’t a limitation on God. It would only seem off to us because we lack the ability to understand what “time has no meaning” actually means.

Let’s not get started on the paradoxes created by the doctrine on the presence of God.

[TATG]

@Frylock

Right, if they’re all true, it can’t be the is of (necessary) identity (and I still don’t think TATG’s attempt to use contingent identity to interpret the doctrine will work, but I haven’t replied to that yet).

To reiterate, I was using contingent identity to respond to the argument as stated, not to give a plausible interpretation of the trinity. What you said may not imply that I was so intending, I just want to be clear on this point. I don’t have the background theological knowledge to know what sort of identity would be appropriate to the trinity, my comment was pointing out one formal option.

[BrainGlutton]

@Blaster_Master

I am a Christian. Personally, I don’t believe in the Trinity because I think it lacks support in scripture and doesn’t really add anything other than attempting to fix apparent contradictions that are better addressed in other ways. However, I think I think I have a decent understanding of exactly what the basic idea is. It’s not a perfect analogy, but I think it gets the idea across.

Let’s imagine you work for a family owned business, and your father is the owner. When you’re at home, he wears the hat of father and your relationship with him is that of father-son. When you’re at work, he wears the hat of business owner and your relationship with him is that of boss-employee. He is the same person in both cases, yet they may be two very different relationships based on the context. Thus, we could say that he is your father and he is your boss, but comparing the two roles as equal fails.

Then, the Holy Ghost would be, what, the business as a corporate entity?

[virtually_yours]

@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.

So why do they say God has a relationship with the son then? can the father be God all by himself without the other two?
vy VY

[virtually_yours]

@Mangetout

The doctrine of the Trinity doesn’t purport to describe multiple gods.

so who are these three then? they say each is distinct and individual, and each has no beginning or end. so that’s three distinct individual no beginning or enders, wouldnt that be three distinct individual gods?

vyVY

[virtually_yours]

@Little_Nemo

But that runs into the issue we’ve already mentioned. Everyone can understand the idea of a person having different roles at different times. But the Trinity doctrine is saying God has different roles at the same time. It’s like claiming that one man is a boss at work at the same time he’s being a husband at home - and that the boss and the husband are both the same person and two different people.

Or to put it in Christian terms, it’s saying that Jesus evicted Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden and God was crucified and died on the Cross. Because God and Jesus exist simultaneously and are the same being.

exactly vy VY

[BrainGlutton]

@virtually_yours

so who are these three then? they say each is distinct and individual, and each has no beginning or end. so that’s three distinct individual no beginning or enders, wouldnt that be three distinct individual gods?

vyVY

Well . . . Let’s say they’re like your parents: Two distinct persons, but as far as you’re concerned, they’re both the boss, and don’t you go tryin’ to play one off against the other!

[virtually_yours]

@Little_Nemo

Here’s a hypothetical dialogue on the issue:

“So God and Jesus are the same being?”
“Yes.”
“God is Jesus and Jesus is God?”
“Yes.”
“And Jesus was crucified and died on the Cross?”
“Yes.”
“So that means God was crucified and died on the Cross?”
“No.”
“But if Jesus was crucified and Jesus is God, then wasn’t God crucified?”
“No, God and Jesus are different.”
“So is Jesus just a part of God? Or is God just a part of Jesus?”
“No, Jesus and God are exactly the same.”
“So God and Jesus are different from each other and they’re exactly the same thing?”
“Yes.”
“How is that possible?”
“It’s a mystery we can’t understand.”

What they fail to see with this mystery argument is that they give excuses to all religions with the mystery clause.. the hindu monkey god has mysterious validity now.
vy VY

[virtually_yours]

@TATG

To reiterate, I was using contingent identity to respond to the argument as stated, not to give a plausible interpretation of the trinity. What you said may not imply that I was so intending, I just want to be clear on this point. I don’t have the background theological knowledge to know what sort of identity would be appropriate to the trinity, my comment was pointing out one formal option.

The truth of the matter is that it has to be understood otherwise everyone would have an excuse on the day of judgement, even the monkey god hindus could say we didn’t understand we just believed, everyone can get into heaved then, the sun worshippers to boot
vyVY

[virtually_yours]

@BrainGlutton

Then, the Holy Ghost would be, what, the business as a corporate entity?

The executive accountant maybe, keeping an eye on things?
vyVY

[Frylock]

@Little_Nemo

Here’s a hypothetical dialogue on the issue:

“So God and Jesus are the same being?”
“Yes.”
“God is Jesus and Jesus is God?”
“Yes.”
“And Jesus was crucified and died on the Cross?”
“Yes.”
“So that means God was crucified and died on the Cross?”
“No.”
“But if Jesus was crucified and Jesus is God, then wasn’t God crucified?”
“No, God and Jesus are different.”
“So is Jesus just a part of God? Or is God just a part of Jesus?”
“No, Jesus and God are exactly the same.”
“So God and Jesus are different from each other and they’re exactly the same thing?”
“Yes.”
“How is that possible?”
“It’s a mystery we can’t understand.”

Let’s not get started on the paradoxes created by the doctrine on the presence of God.

Christians affirm that God died on the cross and was resurrected, AFAIK. I’ve just read comments to that effect in the past few days from a very devout and doctrinally oriented Catholic for example.

[The_Other_Waldo_Pepper]

@virtually_yours

otherwise everyone would have an excuse on the day of judgement, even the monkey god hindus could say we didn’t understand we just believed, everyone can get into heaved then, the sun worshippers to boot
vyVY

I’m okay with that. Beats the alternative, IMHO.

[Little_Nemo]

@Frylock

Christians affirm that God died on the cross and was resurrected, AFAIK. I’ve just read comments to that effect in the past few days from a very devout and doctrinally oriented Catholic for example.

Really? Because that would have major theological implications. There was a period, even if it was only a few days long, when God was dead? And if God died, what was the means by which he was resurrected? That implies there was some force, outside of God, which was capable of bringing God to life.

[Blaster_Master]

@Little_Nemo

Here’s a hypothetical dialogue on the issue:

“So God and Jesus are the same being?”
“Yes.”
“God is Jesus and Jesus is God?”
“Yes.”
“And Jesus was crucified and died on the Cross?”
“Yes.”
“So that means God was crucified and died on the Cross?”
“No.”
“But if Jesus was crucified and Jesus is God, then wasn’t God crucified?”
“No, God and Jesus are different.”
“So is Jesus just a part of God? Or is God just a part of Jesus?”
“No, Jesus and God are exactly the same.”
“So God and Jesus are different from each other and they’re exactly the same thing?”
“Yes.”
“How is that possible?”
“It’s a mystery we can’t understand.”

I’ve never been a fan of the “it’s a mystery we have to accept on faith” argument, specifically because one of the main things I believe is that God wants us to learn and understand and specifically putting forth something as unknowable flies in the face of that. As I’ve said, I don’t believe in the Trinity. Rather, I’ve proposed an alternative thought for why some Christians, particularly in the early Church, may have seen an apparent contradiction that they felt needed some sort of resolution.

Second, some of your hypothetical dialogue is not consistent with any doctrine I was taught or have heard those who believe it espouse. Specifically, the answer to your fourth question would typically be yes, unless you meanted God the Father, in either case, it changes the rest of your hypothetical conversation.

Let’s not get started on the paradoxes created by the doctrine on the presence of God.

This is not a fair limitation. You cannot discuss the nature of God and then explicitly deny other doctrines almost universally believed in consort by most Christians that offers explanations about it. It’d be like asking a Christian why they believed Jesus was able to turn water into wine but disallowing their belief in miracles.

@BrainGlutton

Then, the Holy Ghost would be, what, the business as a corporate entity?

It was an analogy to explain the basic thinking behind “more than one in one” not as a direct analogy to the nature of God. Again, I’ve specifically said I do NOT believe in the doctrine of the trinity, but I’m trying to help others who don’t understand it, understand it.