What is the trinity doctrine according to the church?

[Desert Snake]

What is the trinity doctrine according to the church? Try and be specific in terms and explanations.

 

[jeager106]

What church? Try and be specific in terms and explainations.

 

[Unveiled Artist]

What is the trinity doctrine according to the church? Try and be specific in terms and explanations.

The Catholic Church? If so...here is what the Roman Catholic defines the trinity as: The Church explains the trinity as:

252 The Church uses (I) the term "substance" (rendered also at times by "essence" or "nature") to designate the divine being in its unity, (II) the term "person" or "hypostasis" to designate the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in the real distinction among them, and (III) the term "relation" to designate the fact that their distinction lies in the relationship of each to the others.

The dogma of the Holy Trinity

253 The Trinity is One. We do not confess three Gods, but one God in three persons, the "consubstantial Trinity".83 The divine persons do not share the one divinity among themselves but each of them is God whole and entire: "The Father is that which the Son is, the Son that which the Father is, the Father and the Son that which the Holy Spirit is, i.e. by nature one God."84 In the words of the Fourth Lateran Council (1215), "Each of the persons is that supreme reality, viz., the divine substance, essence or nature."85

Here is more Church doctrine and scripture about the trinity:

232"Christians are baptized 'in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.' Before receiving the sacrament, the respond to a three-part question when asked to confess the Father, the Son, and the Spirit' "I DO." The faith of all Christians rests on the Trinity."

234"The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life. It is the mystery of God in Himself. It is therefore the source of all the other mysteries of faith, the light that enlightens them."

Mt 28:19 "Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age."

262 The Incarnation of God's Son reveals that God is the eternal Father and that the Son is consubstantial with the Father, which means that, in the Father and with the Father the Son is one and the same God.

263 The mission of the Holy Spirit, sent by the Father in the name of the Son (Jn 14:26) and by the Son "from the Father" (Jn 15:26), reveals that, with them, the Spirit is one and the same God. "With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified" (Nicene Creed).

John 15:26 "But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall."

John 14:26 "But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to."

683 "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord' except by the Holy Spirit."1 "God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!"'2 This knowledge of faith is possible only in the Holy Spirit: to be in touch with Christ, we must first have been touched by the Holy Spirit. He comes to meet us and kindles faith in us. By virtue of our Baptism, the first sacrament of the faith, the Holy Spirit in the Church communicates to us, intimately and personally, the life that originates in the Father and is offered to us in the Son.

1 Cor. 2:11 "For who knows a person's thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God."

---

I hope this helps?

 

[Pegg]

according to our belief, it is a big fat religious lie originating in pagan religions.

 

[jeager106]

according to our belief, it is a big fat religious lie originating in pagan religions.

Indeed it IS. It's a lie promulgated by the Holy Roman Church to gain pagan converts inspired by Satan the great deceiver.
It's roots are pagan. The triune godhead is false Christian doctrine and you would be well advised to do some reseach on the trinity for yourself as I did.

 

[Glaurung]

Indeed it IS. It's a lie promulgated by the Holy Roman Church to gain pagan converts inspired by Satan the great deceiver.
It's roots are pagan. The triune godhead is false Christian doctrine and you would be well advised to do some reseach on the trinity for yourself as I did.

 

[Shiranui117]

Since this question comes up a lot, and it can be pretty dense to try and explain, I tend to repost an explanation I've given numerous people. I hope you don't mind.

And if anything I said below doesn't make sense, feel free to ask questions for clarification! I don't bite.

Before we continue, the following two disclaimers need to be made:
1: When we Christians speak of the Trinity, we do NOT define it as God having schizophrenia or multiple-personality disorder; the Trinity is not God switching between three different "modes" or "masks."
2: When we Christians speak of the Trinity, we do NOT mean to say that Father, Son and Holy Spirit are three wholly separate entities. We do not have three Gods, but One.

Now that that's out of the way, here is the actual definition of what the Trinity is, courtesy of OrthodoxWiki:
Orthodox Christians worship the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—the Holy Trinity, the one God. Following the Holy Scriptures and the Church Fathers, the Church believes that the Trinity is three divine persons (hypostases) who share one essence (ousia). It is paradoxical to believe thus, but that is how God has revealed himself. All three persons are consubstantial with each other, that is, they are of one essence (homoousios) and coeternal. There never was a time when any of the persons of the Trinity did not exist. God is beyond and before time and yet acts within time, moving and speaking within history.

God is not an impersonal essence or mere "higher power," but rather each of the divine persons relates to mankind personally. Neither is God a simple name for three gods (i.e., polytheism), but rather the Orthodox faith is monotheist and yet Trinitarian. The God of the Orthodox Christian Church is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the I AM who revealed himself to Moses in the burning bush.The source and unity of the Holy Trinity is the Father, from whom the Son is begotten and also from whom the Spirit proceeds. Thus, the Father is both the ground of unity of the Trinity and also of distinction. To try to comprehend unbegottenness (Father), begottenness (Son), or procession (Holy Spirit) leads to insanity, says the holy Gregory the Theologian, and so the Church approaches God in divine mystery, approaching God apophatically, being content to encounter God personally and yet realize the inadequacy of the human mind to comprehend Him.
Now, to define those Greek terms that showed up in that quote:
-Hypostasis: A person, or a subsistence/manifestation/arising of an essence
-Ousia: An essence; i.e. that which makes an entity that particular entity; for example, the essence of Shiranui117 is different from the essence of Joe Schmoe.
-Homoousios: Of one essence.

In this case, since Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all of the same Divine Essence, they all are one "being," each Person being fully God. It is not a case of 1/3+1/3+1/3=1, or of 1+1+1=3, but 1+1+1=1. Father, Son and Holy Spirit are not just "parts" of God, but are each fully God in their own right. Three distinct Persons, yet one God. Distinct, yet not separate. United, yet not confused or mixed.

This is from Metropolitan Kallistos Ware’s book “The Orthodox Way.” (pp. 29-31)
The central and decisive affirmation in the Creed is that Jesus Christ is “true God from true God”, “one in essence” or “consubstantial” (homoousios) with God the Father. In other words, Jesus Christ is equal to God the Father; he is God in the same sense that the Father is God, and yet they are not two Gods but one. Developing this teaching, the Greek Fathers of the later fourth century said the same about the Holy Spirit; he is likewise truly God, “one in essence with the Father and the Son. But although Father, Son and Spirit are one single God, yet each of them is from all eternity a person, a distinct centre of conscious selfhood. God the Trinity is thus to be described as “three persons in one essence”. There is eternally in God true unity, combined with genuinely personal differentiation: the term “essence”, substance” or “being” (ousia) indicates the unity, and the term “person” (hypostasis, prosopon) indicates the differentiation. Let us try to understand what is signified by this somewhat baffling language, for the dogma of the Holy Trinity is vital to our own salvation.

Father, Son and Spirit are one in essence, not merely in the sense that all three are examples of the same group or general class, but in the sense that they form a single, unique, specific reality. There is in this respect an important difference between the sense in which the three divine persons are one, and the sense in three human persons may be termed one. Three human persons, Peter, James and John, belong to the same general class “man.” Yet, however closely they co-operate together, each retains his own will and his own energy, acting by virtue of his own separate power of initiative. In short, they are three men and not one man. But in the case of the three persons of the Trinity, such is not the case. There is distinction, but never separation. Father, Son and Spirit—so the saints affirm, following the testimony of Scripture—have only one will and not three, only one energy and not three. None of the three ever acts separately, apart from the other two. They are not three Gods, but one God.

Yet, although the three persons never act apart from each other, there is in God genuine diversity as well as specific unity. In our experience of God at work within our life, while we find that the three are always acting together, yet we know that each is acting within us in a different manner. We experience God as three-in-one, and we believe that this threefold differentiation in God’s outward action reflects a threefold differentiation in his inner life. The distinction between the three persons is to be regarded as an eternal distinction existing within the nature of God himself; it does not apply merely to his exterior activity in the world. Father, Son and Spirit are not just “modes” or “moods” of the Divinity, not just masks which God assumes for a time in his dealings with creation and then lays aside. They are on the contrary three coequal and coeternal persons. A human father is older than his child, but when speaking of God as “Father” and “Son” we are not to interpret the terms in this literal sense. We affirm of the Son “There was never a time when he was not”. And the same is said of the Spirit.

. . .Each possesses, not one third of the Godhead, but the entire Godhead in its totality; yet each lives and is this one Godhead in his own distinctive and personal way.
Elsewhere in the book, the Metropolitan speaks of the relationship between various members of the Trinity. I will summarize it as follows:
-The Father is the source (Greek: arche) of the Trinity, and so is in a certain sense "greater" than the Son and Spirit. Not by virtue of being more God than the other two, but by virtue of being the source of the Trinity. It is from Him that the Son is begotten and it is from Him that the Holy Spirit proceeds.
-The Son is eternally begotten of the Father, and is also called the "Logos" or "Word" of the Father. The traditional interpretation of this is that the Son is the Word by which God spoke the world into being. The Son is not a created being, for as it says in John 1:2-3, "He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made."
-The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, or from the Father THROUGH the Son (The Latin filioque, "proceeds from the Father AND the Son", is not original and toes the line of heresy). Yet the Holy Spirit is not subordinate to the Father or the Son. As for how "being begotten" is different from "proceeding from," we cannot say.

When speaking of God's essence, we Trinitarians do not refer to "essence" as a general class or nature; for example, a human nature. Rather, we speak of God's Essence as signifying "the whole God as he is in himself," as Ware said. This shows an essence that is unique to God alone; for instance, I am different from you in how I am within myself, and you are different from me in how you are in yourself.

The Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese has a page about this, too.

The Orthodox Church in America has a primer about this online for free. Here's that link.

Indeed it IS. It's a lie promulgated by the Holy Roman Church to gain pagan converts inspired by Satan the great deceiver.
It's roots are pagan. The triune godhead is false Christian doctrine and you would be well advised to do some reseach on the trinity for yourself as I did.

Obviously you didn't research very hard or look at primary source documents from the earliest Christians. We have stuff from personal students of St. John the Apostle, one of whom became bishop of the Church that St. Peter founded in Antioch, saying explicitly that Jesus is God.

 

[BilliardsBall]

There are many churches and doctrines. One reasonable look at the trinity based on the scriptures:

God is several persons but One, just as my spouse and I are clearly distinct people but are to be uniquely one flesh (no adultery). The difference is the three persons of the trinity have exactly the same thoughts, actions, wills, etc.

 

[wgw]

The Apostolic churches (Eastern and Oriental Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Assyrian Church of the East), the Anglican Communion, and the mainline Protestants define the trinity according to the Niceno-Constantinoplean Creed of the second Ecumenical Council, commonly called the Nicene Creed. God consists of three persons, consubstantial (of one divine essence).

The Eastern churches believe that Jesus Christ was begotten by the father before the beginning of time, and that the Holy Spirit proceeds continually from the Father alone. The Latin Rite of the Catholic Church and most Western Christians add the Filioque clause to the creed, stating that the Holy Spirit also proceeds from Christ. This caused the Great Schism of 1054. However the Orthodox will say that the Holy Spirit was sent to us by Christ on Pentecost; he proceeds from the Father who is the source of the Godhead, and is sent by Christ, the incarnate Word of God by whom all things were made. The Holy Spirit spoke by the prophets.

The Trinity is more than an abstract concept however. The Eastern Orthodox regard God in his energies (what we perceive as the Holy Trinity) to be a union of perfect love. Thus, the Holy Trinity is a model for marriage, the life of the Church, the life of families, the life of monasteries, and the blueprint for human society. This is based on Christ's prayer to the Father "That they may all be one, just as you and I are one." The idea of God as a single God comprised of three persons who are coeternal and consubstantial and United by perfect love is a powerful one. It could be said the objective of the Orthodox Church is to shape itself in imitation of the Trinity. We believe in salvation through Theosis, or deification; this does not mean we become parts of the Trinity, but are saved by the sacrifice of Jesus sanctifying all parts of human experience and ransoming us from sin, allowing us through Grace to become like God, sons of God by adoption, which is why in the Lord's Prayer we dare to call upon our Heavenly God as Father. Thus striving to make our families, churches and social institutions living icons of the holy, consubstantial and life-giving trinity is an important part of Orthodox salvation.

I don't expect Protestants or non Trinitarians to necessarily agree with this, but I ask that you at least love us and pray for our suffering members in Syria and Iraq. I would urge Protestants wanting to understand the Trinity who are uncomfortable reading Orthodox works on the subject (of which The Orthodox Way by Kallistos Ware is particularly helpful) to read John Wesley's writing on the Trinity. Wesley's theology of the Trinity, and of salvation involving entire sanctification, is very close to the Orthodox view, and should also be studied by every Methodist, Anglican, and Arminian Evangelical, as John Wesley was a lifelong Anglican who created the Methodist Church in America when the American Anglicans were abandoned by the Church of England in 1781, out of necessity. I don't think he would have approved of the later schism between British Methodists and the Established Church. Wesley was also after Arminius the first really successful proponent of Arminain theology, which is very close to Orthodox theology, and I would argue Wesley could also be said to be the first evangelical in the modern sense

 

[wgw]

Indeed it IS. It's a lie promulgated by the Holy Roman Church to gain pagan converts inspired by Satan the great deceiver.
It's roots are pagan. The triune godhead is false Christian doctrine and you would be well advised to do some reseach on the trinity for yourself as I did.

If I might ask, how do you interpret the Baptism of Jesus, where the Farher speaks to him and the Holy Spirit descends as a dove? Or John 1:1-14? Do you believe in Mark 16:9-16 (the so called "longer ending")? Do you believe Jesus is God, and if not, how do you interpret "For I and the Father are one" and the aforementioned Orayer for human unity before Christ's passion?

Also, are you aware that the canon of 27 books that comprise the New Testament was first compiled by Athanasius, the most ardent defender of the Trinity in the early and mid fourth centuries, and that the early Christian Emperors beginning with Constantius I the son of Constantine favored the Arians, and Trinitarians were persecuted until the coronation of Theodosius in the 370s? Even after Theodosius persecurion continued on a provincial level, for example, Theodora attempted to hand several of the larger churches in Milan to the Arians by force. Ambrose, the Trinitarian bishop, packed the churches with his followers who sang hymns day and night for over a week, until the governor gave up and let the Trinitarians keep the Basillica. Also, while some Trinitarians were killed by Arians, the reverse was not true, and Athanasius insisted on receiving penitent Arian clergy back into the church in their former ranks; notable among these was Bishop Cyril of Jerusalem, who composed the prototypical Holy Week services; his liturgy, described in his Catechtical Homilies, forms the basis of Orthodox, Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran and Methosist Holy Week and Pascha / Easter services even today.

One thing that troubles me is the Unitarians of Boston initially had the same zeal you do, but look at them today. Only a handful of Unitarian churches like Kimgs Chapel in Boston are still nominally Christian. I don't think non-Trinitarian Christianity is sustainable. Arianism, which was never the subject of violent persecution, but was the religion of the Vandals and Visigoths who conquered large chunks of the collapsing Roman Empire, died on its own around AD 800. There is just one Arian edifice still standing, the Arian Baptistry in Ravenna, which was built a century after the Orthodox Baptistry. The iconography is interesting; the same images are used, but whereas in the Orthodox Baptistry Christ has a beard and a mature appearance, in the Arian Baptistry he has an adolescent appearance with no beard, and his genitalia are slightly visible (the early church and John the Baptist baptized in the nude, but almost all icons of Christ being baptized conceal the genitals with a wave or other detail.

The only enduring non-Trinitarian churches seem to be the Unitarians of Hungary and Transylvania, whose doctrine is based on Socinius. These two churches are interesting in that they are each led by a Bishop and have their own creed and catechism. They were an inspiration for the British and American Unitarians, but the latter never embraced the episcopal polity.

 

[jeager106]

" I and the Father are One". It means Jesus and the Father are one mind and purpose, not the same person.
Like my son and I are one. My wife and I are one. How hard it that to understand?
We soldiers are one. It means they have the same mission.
Get it?
We democrates are one. It means the political party is united in purpose.
To destroy our nation and values and traditions and freedoms and to pay lazy people
to exist from the labor of working people.
Get it?
Wow. Really?
You seem overly concerned with genitailia. How come?
To me that is really weird.

 

[wgw]

" I and the Father are One". It means Jesus and the Father are one mind and purpose, not the same person.
Like my son and I are one. My wife and I are one. How hard it that to understand?
We soldiers are one. It means they have the same mission.
Get it?
We democrates are one. It means the political party is united in purpose.
To destroy our nation and values and traditions and freedoms and to pay lazy people
to exist from the labor of working people.
Get it?
Wow. Really?
You seem overly concerned with genitailia. How come?
To me that is really weird.

I am simply pointing out that the Arian Baptistry is distinguished by iconography of Christ that most would find obscene.

So let me ask you this: what books are in your New Testament?

 

[jeager106]

I am simply pointing out that the Arian Baptistry is distinguished by iconography of Christ that most would find obscene.

So let me ask you this: what books are in your New Testament?

Why, all of 'em of course.

 

[jeager106]

These.

• Historical Books--Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts
• Pauline Epistles--Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon
• Non-Pauline Epistles--Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, Jude, Revelation.

 

[jeager106]

Depending upon what religion.
Some Bibles have more books.
You being an astute schollar know that.

 

[wgw]

So the canon in your Bible was developed by St. Athanasius, the champion of the Trinity and the Council of Nicea. Look it up on Wikipedia - he development of the Biblical canon. Or look it up in the works of the reformers, or any commentary on the New Testament.

Athanasius specifically was the first to say that the Pastoral Spistles of Paul, Hebrews, John 2, 3, Peter 2, Jude, James and Revelation were all canonical, whereas the Apocalypse of Peter was a forgery, and 1 Clement, 1 Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas were worth reading but not canonical.

Most churches in his time either read only the four canonical Gospels, the Pauline epistles but usually not those called Timothy, and 1 John and 1 Peter; these were the uncontroversial books. Others read the Shepherd, Barnabas, Clement, the Protoevangelium of James, and the Apocalypse of Peter, and another spurious epistle, 3 Corinthians, which the Armenians still print in their bibles but regard as apocryphal. So when you say "All of them", you are saying "All of the books Athanasius said should be there, and none of the books he said should not."

Now it was asked if I think the Holy Spirit played a hand in the formation of the canon. Absolutely. And if we admit that, then we must admit the Holy Spirit guided Athanasius in compiling his canon, which he included in his Paschal Encyclical, which also specified for the Greek and Coptic Christians of Egypt what Sunday to celebrate Easter on, according to the formula adopted at Nicea.

Therefore, it stands to reason that if Athanasius was wrong about the Trinity, which was the issue that defined his life, and wrong about when to celebrate Easter, then he was surely a false prophet whose hand was not guided by God, and his canon should be rejected. One might instead use only those books mentioned by St. Irenaeus in Against Heresies, or the canon offered by Eusebius in his Ecclesiastical History. Eusebius paid lip service to Nicea, but had strong Arian sympathies. So while he was still much closer to what one might call the orthodox position than you are, he still represents the author of a Biblical canon that shares more of your worldview.

Recently Bart Ehrman, Elaine Pagels and other noted liberal Bible scholars came out with The New New Testament, which includes many Gnostic gospels and other material rejected by the Orthodox, the authors of which really did not believe in the Trinity. Nor do the editors of the New New Testament.

So my point is it's inconsistent and unnecessary to use exactly the canon of Athanasius while rejecting his doctrine, as expressed in On The Trinity (which is a great book), and his other writings. Especially when there are other canons, many of them compiled by early Christians who were opposed to the Trinity, to choose from. And especially given that in the Athanasian canon there are many Trinitarian proof texts. Even Martin Luther, who was a Trinitarian, disagreed with Athanasius and labelled Hebrews, James, Jude and Revelations as Antilegomena. And there was an ancient Marcionists church that probably became extinct in the Turkish genocide which only read Luke and the Pauline Epistles (why not Acts I have no idea). There is to this day a Russian sect that rejects the New Testament except Matthew, and at that, only really accepts the Sermon on the Mount as being worth reading. Their members mostly live in British Columbia and number a few thousand. What these non Trinitarian religions have in common is they are consistent: they do not accept the canon of a man whose doctrine they reject.