GODHEAD - TRINITY

[Note: This article is a work in progress]

The Dogma of the Most Holy Trinity is one of the most difficult for many to understand yet is encapsulated in the New Testament Gospel of Matthew 28:19, where Jesus instructs the Apostles with the following words "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." Now, this is quite a subtle revelation of three persons sharing one name, the name of God, YHWH, or Yahweh. Jesus here is telling the Apostles, that three persons different from each other - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have only one name Yahweh and therefore has one divine nature, God. The name Yahweh belongs to only one true God.

The parallelism of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit is not unique to Matthew’s Gospel, but appears elsewhere in the New Testament (e.g., 2 Cor. 13:14, Heb. 9:14), as well as in the writings of the earliest Christians, who clearly understood them in the sense that we do today—that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are three divine persons who are one divine being (God). 

John 3:16, one of the most popular and most often quoted bible verses: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

Monogenēs. ... For example, o monogenēs means "the only one", or "the only legitimate child". The word is used in Hebrews 11:17-19 to describe Isaac, the son of Abraham. However, Isaac was not the only-begotten son of Abraham, but was the chosen, having special virtue. Thus Isaac was "the only legitimate child" of Abraham.

A child (or other mammal) is born, of the mother. Begotten refers to the father's role - a man begets his children, who are then born of their mother.''Word", "Discourse", or "Reason'') is a name or title of Jesus Christ, derived from the prologue to the Gospel of John (c 100) "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God", as well as in the Book of Revelation (c 85), "And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name ...

The term consubstantial is also used to describe the common humanity which is shared by all human persons. Thus, Jesus Christ is said to be consubstantial with the Father in his divinity and consubstantial with us in his humanity. ... Meaning that, to Sabellius, the Father and Son were "one essential Person".

Biblical background

Trinitarian formulas found in the New Testament include

Matthew 28:19"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit",

2 Corinthians 13:14, May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

1 Corinthians 12:4-5, There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. 5 There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord.

Ephesians 4:4-6, There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

1 Peter 1:2  To God’s elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood:

Grace and peace be yours in abundance.

and Revelation 1:4-5. To the seven churches in the province of Asia:

Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits[a] before his throne, 5 and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood,

(a) The Seven gifts of the Holy Spirit are an enumeration of seven spiritual gifts originating from patristic authors, later elaborated by five intellectual virtues and four other groups of ethical characteristics. They are: wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord

1 Corinthians 8:6 shows the distinct Christian teaching about the agency of Christ by first stating: "there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we unto him" and immediately continuing with "and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him."

These passages provided the material with which Christians would develop doctrines of the Trinity.

The Bible declares Jesus is HIMSELF, GOD:

John 1:18  No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is Himself God and is at the Father's side, has made him known.

2 Corinthians 4:4

The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

Colossians 1:15

The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn overall creation.

1 Timothy 6:16

He alone is immortal and dwells in unapproachable light. No one has ever seen Him, nor can anyone see Him. To Him be honor and eternal dominion! Amen.

1 John 4:9

This is how God's love was revealed among us: God sent His one and only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him.

1 John 4:12

No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God remains in us, and His love is perfected in us.

1 John 5:20 And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true--in His Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.

No man has seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he has declared him.

John 6:46 Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is of God, he hath seen the Father.

Exodus 33:20 And he said Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me and live.

Deuteronomy 4:12 And the LORD spake unto you out of the midst of the fire: ye heard the voice of the words, but saw no similitude; only ye heard a voice.

the only.

John 1:14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

John 3:16-18 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life…

1 John 4:9 In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.

in the.

John 13:23 Now there was leaning on Jesus' bosom one of his disciples, whom Jesus loved.

Proverbs 8:30 Then I was by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him;

Isaiah 40:11 He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young.

he hath.

John 12:41 These things said Esaias when he saw his glory, and spake of him.

John 14:9 Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?

John 17:6,26 I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word…

MEANING OF BEGOTTEN

past participle: begotten

1. (typically of a man, sometimes of a man and a woman) bring (a child) into existence by the process of reproduction. "they hoped that the King might beget an heir by his new queen"

Similar:

father; sire; engender; generate; spawn; create; give life to; bring into being; bring into the world; reproduce; breed

2. give rise to; bring about. "success begets further success"

Similar:

cause; give rise to; bring about; create; produce; generate

In the King James Version Bible, 1 John 5:7 reads: For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one

The Greek and Roman Institutions

During the early growth of the Christian church, ministers (whether saved or not) wrote down doctrines that they said were Christian and Biblical. Starting after the death of the apostles (about 100 AD) many people taught the lie that Jesus was not God the Son and Son of God, or that Jesus became God at His baptism, or the false doctrine that the Holy Spirit was not God or was not eternal.

The growing religion that became known as Roman Catholic, after many debates eventually agreed on the doctrine of the Trinity. So they had no reason to remove 1 John 5:7 from their Bibles, since it supported what they taught.

But the Greek Eastern Orthodox religion was combating a heresy called "Sabellianism," and would have found it easier to combat the heresy by simply removing the troubling passage from their Bibles.

A Trail of Evidence

But during this same time, we find mention of 1 John 5:7, from about 200 AD through the 1500s. Here is a useful timeline of references to this verse:

200 AD  Tertullian wrote "which three are one" based on the verse in his Against Praxeas, chapter 25.

250 AD  Cyprian of Carthage, wrote, "And again, of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost it is written: "And the three are One" in his On The Lapsed, On the Novatians, (see note for Old Latin)

350 AD  Priscillian referred to it [Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, Academia Litterarum Vindobonensis, vol. xviii, p. 6.]

350 AD  Idacius Clarus referred to it [Patrilogiae Cursus Completus, Series Latina by Migne, vol. 62, col. 359.]

350 AD  Athanasius referred to it in his De Incarnatione

398 AD  Aurelius Augustine used it to defend Trinitarianism in De Trinitate against the heresy of Sabellianism

415 AD  Council of Carthage appealed to 1 John 5:7 when debating the Arian belief (Arians didn't believe in the deity of Jesus Christ)

450-530 AD         Several orthodox African writers quoted the verse when defending the doctrine of the Trinity against the gainsaying of the Vandals. These writers are:

     A) Vigilius Tapensis in "Three Witnesses in Heaven"

     B) Victor Vitensis in his Historia persecutionis [Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, Academia Litterarum Vindobonensis, vol. vii, p. 60.]

     C) Fulgentius in "The Three Heavenly Witnesses" [Patrilogiae Cursus Completus, Series Latina by Migne, vol. 65, col. 500.]

500 AD  Cassiodorus cited it [Patrilogiae Cursus Completus, Series Latina by Migne, vol. 70, col. 1373.]

550 AD  Old Latin ms r has it

550 AD  The "Speculum" has it [The Speculum is a treatise that contains some good Old Latin scriptures.]

750 AD  Wianburgensis referred to it

800 AD  Jerome's Vulgate has it [It was not in Jerome's original Vulgate, but was brought in about 800 AD from good Old Latin manuscripts.]

1000s AD              miniscule 635 has it

1150 AD                minuscule ms 88 in the margin

1300s AD              miniscule 629 has it

157-1400 AD       Waldensian (that is, Vaudois) Bibles have the verse

1500 AD                ms 61 has the verse

Even Nestle's 26th edition Greek New Testament, based upon the corrupt Alexandrian text, admits that these and other important manuscripts have the verse: 221 v.l.; 2318 Vulgate [Claromontanus]; 629; 61; 88; 429 v.l.; 636 v.l.; 918; l; r.

And that's only part of the story about the preservation of God's words.

With regards to the Apostolic Fathers and Church Fathers here are what they have said of the Trinity:

The Didache

"After the foregoing instructions, baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living [running] water. . . . If you have neither, pour water three times on the head, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" (Didache 7:1 [A.D. 70]).

Ignatius of Antioch

"[T]o the Church at Ephesus in Asia . . . chosen through true suffering by the will of the Father in Jesus Christ our God" (Letter to the Ephesians 1 [A.D. 110]).

"For our God, Jesus Christ was conceived by Mary in accord with God’s plan: of the seed of David, it is true, but also of the Holy Spirit" (ibid., 18:2).

Justin Martyr

"We will prove that we worship him reasonably; for we have learned that he is the Son of the true God himself, that he holds a second place and the Spirit of prophecy a third. For this they accuse us of madness, saying that we attribute to a crucified man a place second to the unchangeable and eternal God, the Creator of all things; but they are ignorant of the mystery which lies therein" (First Apology 13:5–6 [A.D. 151]).

Theophilus of Antioch

"It is the attribute of God, of the most high and almighty and of the living God, not only to be everywhere, but also to see and hear all; for he can in no way be contained in a place. . . . The three days before the luminaries were created are types of the Trinity: God, his Word, and his Wisdom" (To Autolycus 2:15 [A.D. 181]).

Irenaeus

"For the Church, although dispersed throughout the whole world even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and from their disciples the faith in one God, the Father Almighty . . . and in one Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who became flesh for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit" (Against Heresies 1:10:1 [A.D. 189]).

Tertullian

"We do indeed believe that there is only one God, but we believe that under this dispensation, or, as we say, oikonomia, there is also a Son of this one only God, his Word, who proceeded from him and through whom all things were made and without whom nothing was made. . . . We believe he was sent down by the Father, in accord with his own promise, the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, the sanctifier of the faith of those who believe in the Father and the Son, and in the Holy Spirit. . . . This rule of faith has been present since the beginning of the gospel, before even the earlier heretics" (Against Praxeas 2 [A.D. 216]).

"And at the same time, the mystery of the oikonomia is safeguarded, for the unity is distributed in a Trinity. Placed in order, the three are the Father, Son, and Spirit. They are three, however, not in condition, but in degree; not in being, but in form; not in power, but in kind; of one being, however, and one condition and one power, because he is one God of whom degrees and forms and kinds are taken into account in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" (ibid.).

"Keep always in mind the rule of faith which I profess and by which I bear witness that the Father and the Son and the Spirit are inseparable from each other, and then you will understand what is meant by it. Observe now that I say the Father is other [distinct], the Son is other, and the Spirit is other. This statement is wrongly understood by every uneducated or perversely disposed individual, as if it meant diversity and implied by that diversity a separation of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit" (ibid., 9).

"Thus the connection of the Father in the Son, and of the Son in the Paraclete produces three coherent Persons, who are yet distinct one from another. These three are, one essence, not one person, as it is said, ‘I and my Father are one’ [John 10:30], in respect of unity of being not singularity of the number" (ibid., 25).

Origen

"For we do not hold that which the heretics imagine: that some part of the being of God was converted into the Son, or that the Son was procreated by the Father from non-existent substances, that is, from a being outside himself, so that there was a time when he [the Son] did not exist" (The Fundamental Doctrines 4:4:1 [A.D. 225]).

"No, rejecting every suggestion of corporeality, we hold that the Word and the Wisdom was begotten out of the invisible and incorporeal God, without anything corporal being acted upon . . . the expression which we employ, however that there was never a time when he did not exist is to be taken with a certain allowance. For these very words ‘when’ and ‘never’ are terms of temporal significance, while whatever is said of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, is to be understood as transcending all time, all ages" (ibid.).

"For it is the Trinity alone which exceeds every sense in which not only temporal but even eternal may be understood. It is all other things, indeed, which are outside the Trinity, which are to be measured by time and ages" (ibid.).

Hippolytus

"The Word alone of this God is from God himself, wherefore also the Word is God, being the being of God. Now the world was made from nothing, wherefore it is not God" (Refutation of All Heresies 10:29 [A.D. 228]).

Novatian

"For Scripture as much announces Christ as also God, as it announces God Himself as a man. It has as much described Jesus Christ to be man, as moreover, it has also described Christ the Lord to be God. Because it does not set forth him to be the Son of God only, but also the son of man; nor does it only say, the son of man, but it has also been accustomed to speak of him as the Son of God. So that being of both, he is both, lest if he should be one only, he could not be the other. For as nature itself has prescribed that he must be believed to be a man who is of man, so the same nature prescribes also that he must be believed to be God who is of God. . . . Let them, therefore, who read that Jesus Christ the son of man is man, read also that this same Jesus is called also God and the Son of God" (Treatise on the Trinity 11 [A.D. 235]).

Pope Dionysius

"Next, then, I may properly turn to those who divide and cut apart and destroy the most sacred proclamation of the Church of God, making of it [the Trinity], as it were, three powers, distinct substances, and three godheads. . . . [Some heretics] proclaim that there are in some way three gods, when they divide the sacred unity into three substances foreign to each other and completely separate" (Letter to Dionysius of Alexandria 1 [A.D. 262]).

"Therefore, the divine Trinity must be gathered up and brought together in one, a summit, as it were, I mean the omnipotent God of the universe. . . . It is blasphemy, then, and not a common one but the worst, to say that the Son is in any way a handiwork [creature]. . . . But if the Son came into being [was created], there was a time when these attributes did not exist; and, consequently, there was a time when God was without them, which is utterly absurd" (ibid., 1–2).

"Neither, then, may we divide into three godheads the wonderful and divine unity. . . . Rather, we must believe in God, the Father Almighty; and in Christ Jesus, his Son; and in the Holy Spirit; and that the Word is united to the God of the universe. ‘For,’ he says, ‘The Father and I are one,’ and ‘I am in the Father, and the Father in me’" (ibid., 3).

Gregory the Wonderworker

"There is one God. . . . There is a perfect Trinity, in glory and eternity and sovereignty, neither divided nor estranged. Wherefore there is nothing either created or in servitude in the Trinity, nor anything superinduced as if at some former period it was non-existent, and at some later period, it was introduced. And thus neither was the Son ever wanting to the Father, nor the Spirit to the Son; but without variation and without change, the same Trinity abides ever" (Declaration of Faith [A.D. 265]).

Sechnall of Ireland

"Hymns, with Revelation and the Psalms of God [Patrick] sings, and does expound the same for the edifying of God’s people. This law he holds in the Trinity of the sacred Name and teaches one being in three persons" (Hymn in Praise of St. Patrick 22 [A.D. 444]).

Patrick of Ireland

"I bind to myself today the strong power of an invocation of the Trinity—the faith of the Trinity in Unity, the Creator of the universe" (The Breastplate of St. Patrick 1 [A.D. 447]).

"[T]here is no other God, nor has there been heretofore, nor will there be hereafter, except God the Father unbegotten, without beginning, from whom is all beginning, upholding all things, as we say, and his Son Jesus Christ, whom we likewise to confess to having always been with the Father—before the world’s beginning. . . . Jesus Christ is the Lord and God in whom we believe . . . and who has poured out on us abundantly the Holy Spirit . . . whom we confess and adore as one God in the Trinity of the sacred Name" (Confession of St. Patrick 4 [A.D. 452]).

Augustine

"All the Catholic interpreters of the divine books of the Old and New Testaments whom I have been able to read, who wrote before me about the Trinity, which is God, intended to teach in accord with the Scriptures that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are of one and the same substance constituting a divine unity with inseparable equality, and therefore there are not three gods but one God, although the Father begot the Son, and therefore he who is the Son is not the Father, and the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son but only the Spirit of the Father and of the Son, himself, too, coequal to the Father and to the Son and belonging to the unity of the Trinity" (The Trinity1:4:7 [A.D. 408]).

Fulgence of Ruspe

"See, in short, you have it that the Father is one, the Son another, and the Holy Spirit another; in Person, each is other, but in nature, they are not other. In this regard, he says: ‘The Father and I, we are one (John 10:30). He teaches us that one refers to their nature, and we are to their Persons. In like manner it is said: ‘There are three who bear witness in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Spirit; and these three are one (1 John 5:7). Let Sabellius hear we are, let him hear three, and let him believe that there are three Persons. Let him not b.aspheme in his sacrilegious heart by saying that the Father is the same in himself as the Son is the same in himself and as the Holy Spirit is the same in himself as if in some way he could beget himself, or in some way proceed from himself. Even in created natures, it is never able to be found that something is able to beget itself. Let also Arius hear one; and let him not say that the Son is of a different nature, if one cannot be said of that, the nature of which is different" (The Trinity 4:1–2 [c. A.D. 515]).

"But in the one true God and Trinity, it is naturally true not only that God is one but also that he is a Trinity, for the reason that the true God himself is a Trinity of Persons and one in nature. Through this natural unity the whole Father is in the Son and in the Holy Spirit, and the whole Holy Spirit, too, is in the Father and in the Son. None of these is outside any of the others; because no one of them precedes any other of them in eternity or exceeds any other in greatness, or is superior to any other in power" (The Rule of Faith 4 [c. A.D. 523).