Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
I would agree with that definition. I just don't believe what the Creeds have to say about the Father, Son and Holy Ghost all being part of a indivisible substance.
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Christians:Is Belief in the Trinity Required to Call Someone a Christian?
- Thread starter ChristineES
- Start date
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
Which "historic church"? Catholicism? If you really believed that Catholicism was "the historic church," you'd be a Catholic, wouldn't you?
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
The doctrine of the Trinity was set forth in the Nicene Creed.
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
If you recognize that "God" is a collective noun, you can believe in "one God" without believing in a vaguely-defined "single substance." The Father can be "God," the Son can be "God," and the Holy Ghost can be "God," because the title "God" is shared by all three, and they all three are absolutely and perfectly united in all of their divine attributes. "Substance" is the word many Trinitarians object to.
Jordan St. Francis
Well-Known Member
No. If there are multiple divine substances, then there are multiple gods and though they might act according to a unified purpose, and though they might share attributes, they would have distinct essences- meaning they would be separate beings. No matter how one cuts it, it becomes polytheism, which is not compatible with Biblical faith on one its most essential convictions.
I don't understand what you mean by God as a "collective noun". Do you mean like when I see several deer I still use the same word that can mean a single deer?
Ditcher161
New Member
Wait are you saying the trinity is impossible?
Jordan St. Francis
Well-Known Member
No, Ditcher, I am a Trinitarian.
The Trinitarian doctrine teaches that there is only a single divine 'substance' and that all three persons of the Blessed Trinity participate in this single divine essence. I am saying that to teach that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit each adhere in a distinct divine substance (as does the LDS) is to say that there are three co-equal gods, and that we can no longer speak of God in the singular [were this LDS doctrine to be true]
The Trinitarian doctrine teaches that there is only a single divine 'substance' and that all three persons of the Blessed Trinity participate in this single divine essence. I am saying that to teach that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit each adhere in a distinct divine substance (as does the LDS) is to say that there are three co-equal gods, and that we can no longer speak of God in the singular [were this LDS doctrine to be true]
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Ditcher161
New Member
]thanks i just wanted to make sure thats what you meant thanks for clearing that up
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
I mean a church that can trace its succession to the apostles. That includes the Catholic church, but also includes many others.
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Exactly right. The talk of "substance" in the creed is intended to point out that there is one and only one "thing" that is divine. In the words of the creed, there is only one divine substance. If there are three "substances" (we would say "things") that share a "title" of "God", it means there are three gods. This is a direct contradiction of everything the church has always preached. It cuts to the heart of who God is. Getting this aspect of God wrong is a very serious problem.
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
To be perfectly honest, it's the words "essence" and "substance" that are problematic for me and many like me. I've yet to find anyone who can actually tell me what either of those two words really means. If you can do that, we might be able to make some headway. All I know that if the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, there are three individuals who are all "God."
I mean something more like the word "team." If I am watching a basketball game and am cheering for my team, it doesn't matter which team member scores. If the crowd begins to yell the name of the player who scored, we aren't cheering against his teammates. We're really cheering for all of them. Don't misunderstand the analogy. I'm not trying to equate the Godhead to a basketball team except in the most general terms. The unity or oneness of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost so far exceeds our comprehension that they can be thought of as "one God." Still, the Father is the Father. He is not also the Son. The Son is the Son. He is not also the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is the Holy Ghost. He is not the Father.
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
Well if several Churches all trace their succession to the Apostles, somewhere along the line, one of them lost that succession.
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
Actually, the Book of Mormon teaches that there is "one God" in several different verses:
2 Nephi 31:21 And now, behold, my beloved brethren, this is the way; and there is none other way nor name given under heaven whereby man can be saved in the kingdom of God. And now, behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and the only and true doctrine of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which is one God, without end.
Mormon 7:7 And he hath brought to pass the redemption of the world, whereby he that is found guiltless before him at the judgment day hath it given unto him to dwell in the presence of God in his kingdom, to sing ceaseless praises with the choirs above, unto the Father, and unto the Son, and unto the Holy Ghost, which are one God, in a state of happiness which hath no end.
By the way, we don't teach that there are three equal Gods. We hold God the Father to be supreme, as does the Bible.
lunamoth
Will to love
Why do you say that?
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Okay, I'm copying this from Anthony Flew, A Dictionary of Philosophy, 1979. The copied portions are indented. I offer some commentary in non-indented paragraphs.
A term with several inter-related sense. 1. One definition of substance makes use of the logical notions of subject and predicate; regarded in this way, S is a substance if S is a subject of predicates, but cannot be predicated in turn of any other subject. This concept of substance can be traced back to Aristotle (Categories 2a12), and plays an important part in the philosophy of Leibnitz.
So, what's a predicate? It's the term that appears in the predicate position of a subject-predicate sentence; for example, 'man' in 'Socrates is a man.' It is that which is affirmed or denied of the subject. The same term can be a predicate of one sentence but a subject in another. For example, 'man' is the subject of 'Man is an animal.'
2. A substance of the kind just described is also said (for example, by Aristotle, Categories 2a13) to be that which does not exist in a subject, where something is understood to 'exist in' a subject if it cannot exist separately from it (Aristotle, Categories 1a24-5). In this sense, then, a substance may be said to be that which has an independent existence. Philosophers disagree about what has independent existence; for example, Aristotle said that a particular man is a substance, whereas Spinoza would say that only God has a truly independent existence....
3. One and the same substance (in senses 1 and 2) can have predicates that are contrary to each other, provided that these predicates are not simultaneous (compare Aristotle, Categories 4a10); that is, a substance which has the predicate P at one time may have the predicate not-P at another. Viewed in this way, a substance is regarded as that which remains the same through change. This concept of substance, which involves a reference to time, is defined by Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason.
4. The Greek word that is translated as 'substance' (ousia) can also be rendered as 'essence', and some philosophers view the substance of a thing as what it really is, as opposed to the way in which it appears. This sense of substance is related to sense 3, in that the essence is regarded as remaining the same, whereas the appearances change. Locke (who also uses the term 'substance' in sense 2) is among the philosophers who regard the substance of a thing as what it really is.
With this as background, what does "substance" and "essence" mean in the Christian creeds? I think the best senses for these words are 2 and 4. That is, Christians say that God is three persons, but those persons do not "divide the substance." We moderns might say there is one and only one divine "thing." When we say that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, we are not saying that there are three divine "things." Whatever "person" means, it doesn't mean "a thing separate from the divine being, God." So the persons don't "divide the substance."3. One and the same substance (in senses 1 and 2) can have predicates that are contrary to each other, provided that these predicates are not simultaneous (compare Aristotle, Categories 4a10); that is, a substance which has the predicate P at one time may have the predicate not-P at another. Viewed in this way, a substance is regarded as that which remains the same through change. This concept of substance, which involves a reference to time, is defined by Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason.
4. The Greek word that is translated as 'substance' (ousia) can also be rendered as 'essence', and some philosophers view the substance of a thing as what it really is, as opposed to the way in which it appears. This sense of substance is related to sense 3, in that the essence is regarded as remaining the same, whereas the appearances change. Locke (who also uses the term 'substance' in sense 2) is among the philosophers who regard the substance of a thing as what it really is.
Here you are using "God" as if it were some sort of title like "general" or "king." Christians don't use the word that way. They use the word "God" to denote a particular being.
As stated, your slogan is a restatement of tri-theism, the view that there are three gods. Christianity affirms that there is one and only one divine being, one and only one God. By "God", Christians have in mind a being that does not depend on anything else for its existence (sense 2 above). If your slogan were true, it would mean that there are three beings who each are self-sufficient, self-existing, relying on nothing else for their origin and continued existence. But Christians say that only one being relies on nothing else for its origin and continued existence -- the one and only God.
This gets exactly at the problem. This is exactly this meaning that the early Christians were at such pains to avoid. They wanted to fully uphold the traditional Jewish view of God as one and only one. God is in no sense a team. There are not a plurality of beings that share a title (like the San Antonio Spurs are a group of people, all equally human, who share the title "San Antonio Spur"). There is instead one and only one divine being (or, substance) which is undivided, not plural.
Well, the unity you affirm is not as profound as that which the church proclaims. For the church says that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit enjoy ontological unity. That is, there is only one divine being, which exists as three persons. So the persons share the same divine substance.
The trinitarian doctrine does not say that the Father is the Son or that the Son is the Holy Spirit or the Holy Spirit is the Father. It upholds BOTH the notion that there is only one divine substance/being/thing/item, AND that there are three "persons", each of whom are fully divine. The persons do not divide the substance (i.e., turn God into a team). Nor do the persons exist as independent beings in their own right.
I'm the first to admit that this is mysterious. Lots of ink has been spilled explicating this idea over the centuries. But it is understandable. After all, as far as I've explained it, I understand it. And I don't have extraordinary intelligence.
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
The Book of Mormon arguably uses the words "one God" but invests those words with a different meaning from the church.
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
Well, because they obviously split apart for a reason -- generally over a doctrinal dispute. If Person #1 passed his authority to Person #2, Person #2 passed it to Person #3, Person #3 to person #4 and so on, there is going to come a time somewhere down the line where Persons #11 and #12 are going to both claim that Person #10 gave them the authority. If Person #11 and #12 are in complete agreement over all of the doctrines both of their churches teach, there wouldn't have been a split in the first place. If they teach opposing doctrines, they can't both be right. Why would Person #10 have passed on his authority to someone who was wrong in what he was teaching?
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
"The" church? Like there's only one.
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
Well, I guess "the Church" is wrong. So you apparently agree that there are three persons? Is each of these persons divine or not? What better word can you come up with to describe a divine person than "God"? Show me in the Bible where the Father, Son and Holy Spirit "enjoy ontological unity." They enjoy functional unity, but not ontological unity.
Well some Christians do. FYI, Mormons also use the word "God" to denote a particular being. Are you saying that "God" is God's name? It's a title, but it's a title reserved exclusively for a particular being.
I disagree. The Father is not the Son. They are distinct beings whose unity is perfect and absolute. They are all "God." There is nowhere in the Bible where God is referred to as an "undivided substance."
"The" Church teaches... "Christians" believe... This is getting tiresome, Dunemeister. There is not just "a" Church and not all "Christians" agree on all doctrines. Your subtle insults are not appreciated.
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