Christian Foundations for Faithful Thinking: The Trinity
It seems to me that the fundamental starting point for all Christian thinking is the Trinity. There can be no compromise here. For if a Christian were ever to fail to affirm (or even deny) the fact of the Trinity, he could not proceed forward in any surety of the Truth. For the Christian, knowledge is not merely about the end, but is inescapably about the beginning. Or if it is about the end, this end determines the beginning. So if a Christian is to think faithfully, he cannot do so as a monotheist. This is not to say that the Christian understanding of the Trinity denies or invalidates the monotheism, for after all, Christians do claim to worship one God, and the Trinity is one God. But monotheism per se is not Trinitarian. And if anything a Christian is by definition one who believes in the Trinity. Jews and Muslims cannot affirm Christian Trinitarianism (which would entail confession of the divinity-humanity of Jesus). And since a Christian cannot deny the Trinity, he cannot affirm the monotheism of Judaism or Islam, precisely because these two faiths must deny the Trinity.*
So, if a Christian hopes to think faithfully, he must start with the Trinity.
By the Trinity, of course, I do not merely mean the doctrine of the Trinity. I certainly mean at least that. But more essentially I mean the Trinity, the Three-Personed God. If one is a Christian, one cannot but be so because of the reality of the Personal Trinity. This is the fundamental Christian conviction about reality. The God who revealed himself as Father has eternally begotten the Son, who makes the Father known to us, and eternally causes the Holy Spirit to proceed, who seals and unites us to the Father in the Son. The Trinity cannot be discovered by reason. The Trinity can only be known and loved as God has made himself known. The Trinity is not a matter of intellectual inquiry but of Personal enounter.
The ramifications of this are not insignificant. First and foremost, it means that the quest for Truth is no autonomous. It absolutely depends on the self-revelation of God, and depends on fellowship with that God. Apart from such revelation and participation, there is no means by which humans can in any way be assured of any knowledge concerning reality. "In him," Paul writes, "are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." Truth depends not only on the existence of God, but also on God's revealing of himself to us in the Son. Truth cannot be divorced from God's self-revelation. The Enlightenment project is stillborn.
It should be noted, however, that this self-revelation is not readily available to any and all through creation, and therefore, the Trinity is Truth that is unavailable to the unaided human mind. God's creation is revelatory of its Creator. But creation does not, in its fallen bondage, sufficiently reveal the Trinity. Rather, the full revelation of God is only in Jesus Christ. Thus those who deny the full Truth of Christ, cannot but begin wrong and conceivably can only end wrong and fail to know the Truth. Like the prisoners in Plato's Cave, they know only the dancing shadows, and cannot experience the light of Truth.
But more to the point, the fact of the Trinity implies one all-encompassing reality: hypostatic koinonia. Or, more loosely, personal communion or communal personhood.
*Which is why I cannot but affirm that monotheists (Jews, Christians and Muslims) do not all worship the same God. The only other alternative is to assume that one or more of these positions is false, albeit innocently so. But this necessarily implies that Jews and Muslims worship a Trinitarian God, though ignorant of his Triune nature. However, this patronizes Jews and Muslims by failing to take their emphatic affirmations of the radical monotheism of God seriously. We either assume that people do not mean what they say when they affirm a belief about God--but we really know better for them--or we affirm that they really do mean what they say, and these beliefs are radically incommensurable.
[Next: Christian Foundations for Faithful Thinking: Hypostatic Koinonia]
Posted by Clifton at December 2, 2003 05:00 AM | TrackBackBeautiful post. Why is saying that Jews and Muslims worship the Triune God though ignorant of his Triune nature patronizing? I do take their radical monotheism seriously and I do think I (as a Christian) have a "better" (true) understanding of God. This seems to be a better alternative than saying they worship - what? a false god? no god? Do we not all worship the God of Abraham? I remember just reading something about this in Hans Urs Von Balthasar, I will try and find the reference tonight.
You sound very Barthian, what with all your talk of revelation. But perhaps I am just overdosed on Barth lately.
Posted by: Jennifer at December 2, 2003 12:06 PMJennifer:
Thanks for your comments and questions. Barth, eh? Well, it wasn't intentional. But I do like some of what Barth was doing.
What I mean by taking Jews and Muslims seriously with regard to their specific doctrines of radical monotheism is that they mean what they say. For me to suppose that they mean what they say, BUT they are mistaken, would be, for them, patronizing. I would be saying to them, "Well, I know this is what you say about what you believe, but really what you mean is this." To which they would reply, "No, we mean what we said the first time. We do not mean what you say we mean."
In other words, I can best respect them by taking their claims at the face value. Now, I can sure believe I'm right, and they're mistaken. And I can, in as respectful and as sensitive a way as possible, try to show them how and why they are mistaken. But that's not the same as saying, "Oh well, they mean the same thing we do."
Our postmodern/late modern era is heir to the universalizing tendencies of the Enlightenment, part of which saw its fruit in the project of demythologization. Somehow, beneath all these contradictory religious claims, lies the kernel of truth that is the reality of what we all believe. The trouble is, to accept that, Christians in particular have to jettison their specific claims, which is then no Christianity.
Jesus is the scandal of particularity. He cannot be generalized. Therefore, Jews and Muslims claim to worship the God of Abraham. But we Christians know, on the basis of the self-revelation of God in Christ, that the God of Abraham is a Triune God. Therefore, to deny the Triune nature of God is to deny God; at least in terms of Christian convictions.
Enlightenment/moderns want to universalize and demythologize everything. Which is why the ecumenical movement as we know it could not have gotten off the ground prior to the Enlightenment. Pomos/late-mods want to let all the radical particularity stand but then deny that these particulars really mean everything.
Christians however, have particular claims that cannot be generalized in some grand unifying kernel of truth. Thus, for a Christian, it is the Trinity or nothing.
Posted by: Clifton D. Healy at December 2, 2003 04:08 PMI certainly do not want to diminish the scandal of particularity! I looked up the Balthasar quote last night and it wasn't quite what I remembered. It was more about natural law and the pagans. I see what you mean by it being patronizing. But if I say, "well because you do not worship the Triune God then you do not worship God at all," wouldn't they be insulted? It takes our different understandings of God seriously, but it's still problematic.
It does all hang on "to deny the Triune nature of God is to deny God." Trinity or nothing. But there is no "nothing." There is only the Trinity, whose Second Person became a Jewish man, etc. etc. I can't agree that Jews and Muslims believe in or worship "nothing." I understand that the Jews and the Muslims mean what they mean. I agree that they deny the Triune God. But if you say they worship "nothing", doesn't that follow that you believe God does not accept their worship? What do you think is God's attitude towards their worship?
Even if they deny the Trinity, the Triune God does not deny them. This is a bit off topic, but I'm thinking of Romans 11. (Let's hold off on Islam). God's gifts and call are irrevocable. Romans 11 says there is a purpose for the Jews denying Christ and thus the Trinity. The denial is theologically essential. God has hardened their understanding for a certain time but does not deny them for all eternity.
Posted by: Jennifer at December 3, 2003 06:31 PMJennifer:
Tough questions!
First, of all, I don't think it's choice between Triune God and nothing. There are other spiritual beings out there (demons), whom people worship, sometimes without realizing that they are. (And lest you think I'm talking about little golden idols, we have demonic worship going on here in the U.S. under names such as consumerism, sexual gratification, etc.)
Secondly, since the Church has never endorsed dispensationalism, I'm not a dispensationalist, so if Israel (Rom 9-11) is to be saved, they will only be saved through Jesus, the Messiah. The former covenant has been fulfilled and superseded by the covenant in Jesus (see all of Hebrews).
I think it helpful to refer to Paul's Areopagus speech in Acts 17. Paul wasn't saying, "Hey, you worship the unknown God? Wow! So do I!" Rather, he was utilizing their "Just in case we overlook somebody" approach to worship by saying, "Here's what you have been overlooking." He wasn't saying that Jesus is the unknown God.
But note also: He took for granted they were searching for that Triune God who was unknown and unguessed by them. It wasn't that he blessed their mistaken worship as sincere and so, at bottom, the same as Christian worship. Rather he was utilizing their own "god vacuum" as it were, to fill it with the True God. To those who rejected his message, however, he wasn't saying, "Well, at bottom it's all the same."
So, as a whole, Jewish and Muslim theology rejects the Trinitarian God. And that theology, and those who follow it, then, do not worship the True God, but the god of their imaginations (at best) or demons (at worst).
But this is speaking in general terms.
In specific individual terms, however, the situation is much less certain, because we do not always know the heart of the individual worshipper. It may be that they truly do not seek to consciously reject the Triune God. They may indeed be truly seeking after Him whom they do not (yet) know, like the Areopagites.
So, although I can say, in general terms, that those who adhere to the theology of Judaism or Islam, do not worship the Triune God, and since these theologies explicitly reject the Triune God, that those of their adherents who similarly reject the Trinity, do not worship the Christian God. But in terms of individuals, that I cannot speak of, since I do not know their heart, nor where they are in relation to the True God. I can pray for and witness to them. But I dare not water down the exclusivist claims of the Gospel. That is not charity.
Posted by: Clifton D. Healy at December 3, 2003 07:45 PMI do so like you people.
Posted by: Tripp at December 4, 2003 10:52 AM