In this thread on where the Trinity came from, I have been focusing on early Christology – the understandings of who Christ was. My reason for that is simple. The issue of the Trinity arose only because Christians said more than one being was God but that there was only one God. The “other” being at the outset, of course, was Christ. After his death his followers called him God. The Trinity doctrine, as I will now start to explain in greater detail, emerged by the problems that then arose: two beings who are God, but only one God.
I will be getting to the Spirit later, but frankly there is not as much to say there.
First I need to keep going on the idea of Jesus being God and God being God. The question that naturally arose among the Christians was how that could be the case: how could *BOTH* of them be God? In what sense?
That’s an issue I dealt with in my book How Jesus Became God. Here I’ll provide some of that discussion, edited a bit for the blog.
By the end of the second century, so far as we can tell, most Christians maintained the two views just mentioned that on the surface may seem – and did seem to others – to be completely contradictory. The first was monotheism: there is only one God. There are not two gods, as per Marcion, or an entire realm of gods as per the Gnostics. There is one God and only one God. But the second view was that Christ is God. It wasn’t merely that Christ was a human who had been adopted to a status of divine power, as in the (now primitive) exaltation Christologies. By this time most Christians agreed that Christ was a pre-existent divine being who was by his very nature, in some sense, God. But if God the Father is God and Christ is God, how is it that there are not two Gods?
One very popular view emerged that explained it. Scholars have called it
This is an issue that even modern Christians usually get completely wrong. Want to see how it works? Join the blog. It’s a small membership fee, and all of it goes straight to charities helping those in need. Click here for membership options
Prof,
Would you say that around the late 2nd century CE, in terms of popularity amongst Christians in general, from most to least popular, we have:
1. modalism,
2. subordinationism (one God the Father with a derived divine Son, antecedent view to 4th century orthodoxy),
3. Jesus-is-man-only Christologies (e.g. Ebionites)?
Or do we not have enough information to make such conclusions?
(Perhaps, like today, most laypeople just don’t give much thought to this topic, and are just confused when they do think about it.)
I’d say probably 1 or 2, but we really don’t have the sources of information to let us know, both because there are hardly any sources from the period and because they are all written by the educated elite, not by hoi polloi. But yes, I think most people probably didn’t give it much thought, even thoose who worshiped Jesus. Seems weird, but as you say, it’s still the case today.
The gospel of John is absolutely clear on the topic. The Only True God was the Father (17:3). Jesus was a man who heard/received the truth (the word- logos) from God (8:40; 17:14,17). Being a recipient of the word-logos of God, a Jewish man could be called a “god” or son of God (10:34; Psalm 82:6) like Moses (Exodus 4:6).
Greek speaking Christians simply lost touch with the Hebrew Scriptures and their cultural context. They sought to reinterpret Semitic concepts through a Hellenist lense.
The results were fatal especially since the disappearance of Palestinian Jewish Christianity and the conversion of Pagan Roman emperors in Helenist Christians.
Bingo
Hi Bart
The time for your Sunday lectures are given in EST. I live in Dublin (same time zone as London) and I can’t make out if the time difference is 5 hours or 6 hours. Can you clear this up for me. Thanks.
Martin Hilliard ([email protected])
Five hours. Easy way to check: it’s the time zone for New York City.
How early do we see Christian discussions about the incompatibility of two gods – God the father and God the son – with monotheism? I would think that once people started calling Jesus a pre-existent divine being on the same level as God someone must have sounded the alarm – hey doesn’t this contradict monotheism.
Yes, modalists insisted the the orthodox view was polytheist. We don’t have authors who make the charge but we do have authors who defend *against* it, which shows it was being made.
So if the early popes held a modalist view that was in conflict with the orthodox heresiologists, were the popes themselves heretics in the minds of Hippolytus, Tertullian, and their peers?
Yup! Ain’t history grand! (They weren’t called popes yet, just the bishops of Rome. But still….)
The reference to a devine “person” gives me the impression of an external entity to be just another guy in the sky. This is a context that I am completely lost, and gives me a premise for understanding God that I do not believe in. It seems that the premise lingers in the old divine conception, even an idea from before Isaiah about various devinities, such as that Yahweh was not the god of all tribes, even of all Hebrews where Baalsebub was the god of Ekron, Milcom was the god of Ammon, Chemosh was the god of the Moabites, etc, etc.
The idea of the Trinity, at least one kind, is found in religions that most people on earth believed in at the time (Zoroastrianism, Hinduism and even Buddhism), but the concept was much more “esoteric” if you will than it is today. believed by modern Christians. I am quite convinced that at least one, probably several of these traditions along with the ideas of Hellenism, influenced Judaism and early Christianity ,,,, which means that the idea of the Trinity ,,, was more related to a transcendental divine emination rather than “just another guy in sky “.
In my mind, this continued in more esoteric branches of Judaism, Christianity (Gnosticism (s)) and even the first wave of rational, reason and philosophical Islamic views such as the concept of “Unity of being” found in Sufism and other early philosopical views, where you also find the concept of “Trinity” as “Love,, ,,, Lover ,,,, and beloved ” and still not for a moment outside the oneness.
Bart, I do not doubt your admirably excellent scholarship on this ,,,, not at all !!,,,,,,,,,,,, but I , in my un-scholar Norwegian mind, would at least think that the early church fathers must have missed a dimension of the term trinity if they were talking about some extraterrestrial enteties (persons) in in the sky ,,, and try to reason this concept into a devine “oneness”
I think you are being led astray by multiple imperfect translations — first from Greek to Latin, then from Latin to English. “Person” is a translation of “persona” which is a translation of “πρόσωπον”, which does not mean ‘person’. Closer though still imperfect translations would be ‘aspect’ or ‘mask’ or ‘facet’.
The Trinitarian question moves away from this debate to a degree and focuses on the ‘ούσιον’ or ‘substantia’ or ‘substance’ of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. ‘Person’ doesn’t appear in the Nicene Creed, for example, as modalism had been rejected by that point. The language changed from suggesting God hat three “πρόσωπα” to the concept that he had three ‘hypostases’ (ὑπόστασεις). But early on the distinction between ‘ousia’ and ‘hypostasis’ had not been developed.
So nothing here has anything to do with a ‘guy in the sky’ (whatever that might be).
Thank you for your good answer. It is greatly appreciated.
As for the Trinitarian question, I do not think the Christian was the first to think of this. You will find this type of concept in much older religions (divine eminence), such as in Zoroastrianism, Hinduism and Buddhism and more. The whole concept of “One” being “Two” and being “Three” (father – mother – son-like in Gnosticism) is not a new concept at all. For example , if you look at a lot of ancient religion (s) like Hinduism ((and this is just an example of many, but is limited to 200 words)). Hindi “Atman” is the core “Self” of humanity and individuality of which we are an offspring. AND ,,,,,,,,,, this Atman (which by the way, is almost like “Christ”, or the esoteric “Adam” or what they call “Anthropos”, Pigera-Adamas, who is the spiritual perfect man, the divine image of man, and still an eminence of The One / Noesis or God) is still one with the creative power of Hinduism called Brahman. (concept that you can find in the last Vedas, called “Vedanta”, which is MUCH older than Judaism and Christianity.
Perhaps,,,,,,these terms were not very different from what the early church fathers discussed, I guess.
This “Atman”, which is the primary “Self” that is one with Brahman, is similar in concept and also similar to Gnostic thoughts. No wonder Carl Gustav Jung found striking similarities in the Hindi concepts he made in Gnosticisim, and used them as the symbol of “Self”, but in that Hindi concept Arman is “Self”.
So, the divine transcendental emination existed, long before Christianity and even Judaism, and I do not think that the trinity discussion was something very new and exclusive to Christianity.
Again, thanks for your great reply!
Two questions for future posts:
1. What difference did all these different Christologies make? Was just the Christians quickly came to regard belief as central to salvation, so wrong belief would condemn your soul, and wrong teaching could condemn many people’s souls? Or are the practical or organizational implications? Part of where I’m coming from is that my period is the early modern period (I’m permanently ABD), where different theologies resulted in big differences, not to mention wars and massacres.
2. The Holy Spirit: I must confess (as an atheist or at least secularist from a mixed Jewish-Presbyterian marriage) that I find this concept utterly mystifying. Anyway, if you need more to say about it, Bart, you might explain the filioque controversy. What difference does it make to say whether the Holy Spirit proceeds only from the Father, or from both the Father and the Son? What do those even mean?
(BTW: I don’t mean to sound dismissive of religious beliefs. It’s just that I genuinely have trouble understanding some important ones.)
AS with most ideological controversies, the practical differences are not inherent in the alternative sides but in the ferocity with which various sides hold to their views. These debates ended up having enormous conseuqences when the Roman imperial apparatus began to enforce a certain kind of orthodox and applied political and economic power to assert its theological will (fourth century Arian controversies after Constantine, e.g.). As to the incorporation of the filioque clause, I’m afraid that’s about six hundred years after my expertise starts to die out, though of course it starts earlier. I suppose without the clause it might appear that the FAther was superior to the Son, but I don’t really know the ins and outs.
What difference does it make to say whether the Holy Spirit proceeds only from the Father, or from both the Father and the Son? What do those even mean?
Well, in Christian belief, the Son is begotten of the Father, right? And not vice-versa? What does that mean? In Orthodox belief, just as the Son is begotten of the Father, the Holy Spirit ‘proceeds’ from the Father. That doesn’t mean either is lesser, or that they are not co-eternal with the Father.
One moment where it comes to particular prominence is Pentecost. There, when the Twelve were filled by the Holy Spirit, did that come from Jesus, or the Father? The Orthodox would say just the Father. One can see this reflected in medieval artworks depicting the scene. Orthodox works depict the Father as the source of the Holy Spirit, Catholic works depict Christ in that position.
It really seems that Jesus was inserted into an already formed belief system (that adapted) rather than an already formed belief system that adopted Jesus into it.
I understand the arguments over the Father and the Son, but how did they work the Spirit into this? Is it possible that other concepts of a trinity (Indian, perhaps?) made them think they needed one?
In Catholic school I recall having this explained in terms of a personified relationship: If you have two “things” then there must also be a third “thing”, which is the relationship between those two “things” and if the two things are divine beings, then the relationship must also be a diving being. So, you can have a monad, but not a dyad. Not that this really makes a bit of sense or even holds a drop of water, so to speak… the trinity is grotesque no matter how you try to explain it.
I realize we haven’t worked our way to Nicaea yet but the discussion of modalism and “patripassianism” reminds me of an old conundrum.
Is there any experience that one of the persons of the Trinity can have that is not shared by the others? If you say ‘yes’ then how are they of one substance? If you say ‘no’ then how are they separate persons?
I guess identical twins can have different experiences…. Being of one substance does not mean being the same identical person. The doctrine of the trinity explicitly presupposes that htey are different *persons* and have had different experiences. Only the son, e.g., becomes incarnate.
Dr Ehrman off the topic question. Why scholars accept 1 Thessalonians Paul’s earliest letter? What are the main reasons ?
Long story. But both Paul and Acts have chronologies of what Paul did what, when, and with whom, and when you track it carefully and put the letters against it, 1 Thessalonians looks earlier than Corinthians, and Galatians, etc.
It seems that this era of Roman rule seem to lack intellectualism if this was such a major topic of discussion. The history tends to lean towards the Roman Empire utilizing the Greek culture for most of its intellectual existence. They used Greek for its language,literature base, and Religous base. It would seem that Christianity would become an item that The Roman Empire would be able to claim as its own creation. Beside its efficient use of the short sword, they seem to establish themselves on other cultural inputs , many from whom they conquered. Could this be why they chose to critique and intellectualize the forging of this religion to maintain and proliferate its rule as the Super Power of thier day? So many inconsistencies in these Gospel accounts, and Pauls letters seem to favor Romes acceptance, and eventual hijacking of this Jewish cult!
Ah, if you think these were not intellectual arguments based on deep knowledge of philosophical discourse — I’d suggest you read some of the fourth and fifth century disussions.
Or go back to the second century and read Celsus’s arguments against Christianity!
Celsus was Greek.
I would agree that many of the debates over schisms and creeds became very detailed in how to view and probogate the beliefs, but they all seem to feed into an eventual political scheme. Considering the fact that the “Faith” started from a Jew in Palestine who tried to consolidate Jews and create an uprising against the very same “State”! ……Paul, who claim status as a Roman citizen, seem to provide the narrative that allowed the Roman Government to eventually form the movement into an establishment that would eventually propel the Roman Empire far beyond its term as an empire that ruled by the sword! Dogma has always been the formula that attracts peoples commitment to support an establishment! …My $ .02…..Still yet…. A brilliant plan!.. History does not provide ALL the pieces, extrapolation will differ based on each persons rationale. ….. This is indeed, a well spent blog that insights deep thought!……………..Kudos, Doc!
Unthinkable that God could suffer; yet our behaviour pains him so, that he is going to roast us in hell for all eternity.
Prof Ehrman,
In a very brief summation, please how best will you describe Paul’s Christology?
Christ was a pre-existent divine being who became a human and who was exalted to a position equal with God himself at the resurrection.
Prof Ehrman
Do you believe that:
“Christ was a pre-existent divine being who became a human and who was exalted to a position equal with God himself at the resurrection.” ?
Do I personally believe that? No, I’m not a Christian. But I do think that Paul absolutely thought that.