Many years ago, a well-known pastor had a famous (or infamous depending on one’s perspective) ballet at his church. Three ballerinos danced in representation of the “dance of the Trinity.” This was done in order to reflect the inner workings (i.e. intrinsic aspect) of the Trinity in eternity past. Combine this with the commonly expressed idea that love can only be eternal because of the Trinity. “God is love because God is triune,” is the common way to express this. This assumes that if God were not triune he would not be love, which assumes that love requires an object external to self. If love is only possible in the divine economy because of the Trinity, then it must require more than one “lover.” If the “loving” is taking place within the center of each subsistence rather than in the essence, what does that imply about the subsistence? Is there an affection central in the essence or each subsistence? If it centers in each subsistence, is the affection numerically identical or does it differ?
Doctrine flittering about in culture becomes careless, especially in a culture mostly concerned with relevance and therapeutics. Allowing culture to have sway on the approach to the Trinity is certainly a dangerous thing. Relevancy commits scriptural vivisection to discover “what’s relevant to me.” Therapeutic culture does the same to discover “what makes me feel good.” Cultural theology—even that which believes inspiration and inerrancy of scripture—becomes careless because it throws out biblical data that is deemed irrelevant or uncomfortable. The above presentation of the Trinity is driven by relevance and therapeutics. Fred Sanders warns, “. . . the piecemeal proof does not seem to carry its own sense of relevance along with it and may contribute to a heightened demand for personal or social application.”[1]
Jamieson and Wittman write, “It is not going too far to say that ignorance of the Trinity is ignorance of the gospel.”[2] The appropriate way to convey the Trinity should not be swayed by any cultural relevancy or therapeutic felt need. Yet modern Trinitarianism has found an itch to scratch. And, the danger is not just missing some obscure theological mystery, but the very gospel itself. The idea of the social Trinity presents such a danger because it is based on an inadequate biblical reasoning, breaks down theology proper, relies on a modern concept of “person.” This thesis will be established by recovering a historical consensus on biblical reasoning through Jamieson and Wittman’s Biblical Reasoning, by tracing the evolution of the term person and its modern implications, and by exploring theology proper’s interchangeability between the essence and person.
Establishing Biblical Reasoning
Before approaching biblical reasoning, it may be good to establish reasoning first. Early Christians debated on the use of non-Christian philosophies’ application to the faith. This is exemplified by Justin Martyr calling Christianity the “true philosophy” and Tertullian asking, “What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem?”[3] Does philosophy have a place in Christianity? Evans and Manis define Philosophy as a type of thinking. Specifically, they write, “The thinking we call philosophy is an unusually serious kind of thinking, directed to especially serious kinds of problems.”[4]
Christianity is a real, historic, and rational religion. Real in that it seeks to describe what is. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth,” (Gen. 1:1) is not meant to be a poetic scribble of an ancient scroll or the making of some mutable myth, but a description of true cosmogeny. Historic, in that the claims are of that which occurred in the past. The evangelist Luke writes, “In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah. . .” (Luke 1:5). Luke names a specific time and space in history. Certainly, these two former of the triad imply the latter. A real and historic proposition must be rational. Luke could not write, “In the days of Herod and not in the days of Herod at the same time and in the same way,” for this would break the law of noncontradiction and cease to be real. So also Moses could not pen, “In the beginning, nothing brought into existence everything.” Ex nihilo nihil fit. And certainly, this reasonableness flows from God. Louis Berkhof writes, “He is also truth in a logical sense, and in virtue of this He knows things as they really are, and has so constituted the mind of man that the latter can know, not merely the appearance, but also the reality, of things.”[5]
From this triad it can be deduced that philosophy has a place in this religion so long as it describes what is as it is. But this still demands an authority structure to distinguish fact from fiction. What authority determines what is and what is not? Sense perception and pure logic only goes so far in the metaphysical realm. Reason can deduce the “uncaused cause” but cannot determine the personality of the ineffable one. Pure reason cannot create a personal relationship. This being—the only one who does not “exist” but simply is—must reveal himself.
Christians have historically claimed, “the Bible is the authoritative revelation of God to humanity.”[6] Evans and Manis go on to defend the Bible as a source of propositional truths arguing, “there are good reasons for thinking such a revelation would include the communication of propositional content.”[7] Fred Sanders traces the criticism of the propositional approach throughout the nineteenth century. The critical approach to scripture argued the interpreter was the arbiter of fact and fiction in the text of Scripture. The critical approach makes the interpreter of revelation rather than the revelation itself the authority. The neo-orthodox response to this assumed the critic to be correct—the revelation cannot be trusted in all things. However, neoorthodoxy argued that revelation did truly reveal the acts of God. And in those acts, the discerning can find the propositions. Sanders recounts Geerhardus Vos’s warning that, “Such a theory, as a rule, is made a cover for involving the whole teaching of the Bible in the relativity of purely human reflection.” [8] In other words, the problem is the same: the authority is in the interpreter not in the revelation. The only way to have personal, authoritative propositions concerning such a great metaphysical being is his own self-disclosure. If any revelation places propositional authority in the hands of the interpreter, it adds no value to reasonable metaphysical discussion besides placing a graving tool in the hand of Aaron (Exod. 32:4).
Given the fact that the authority rests in the revelation, how does the interpreter properly approach that authoritative self-disclosure? Stephen Presley argues, “Setting our sights on God is the first step in understanding early Christian biblical theology. Knowing the telos orients us. . .” [9] Then he goes on to argue, “The fathers recognize that any study of Scripture must begin with theology and, specifically, a trinitarian view of reality.” [10] It seems as though it may be begging the question to assume the propositions to uncover the propositions. But the truth of the matter is that all interpreters approach revelation with theistic assumptions and oftentimes, those theistic assumptions affect the interpretation of Scripture. Whether the interpreter strives to be neutral (and in that sense, Presley argues often deistic) or postmodern, the assumption or “social imaginary” with which one approaches the revelation has an inescapable influence on the uncovering of propositions. Presley (or rather, Irenaeus) calls this theology and specific trinitarian perspective the rule of faith. Presley writes, “In both structure and content, the rule exists in a dialogical relationship with Scripture and develops in response to changing cultural circumstances.” [11] It’s this “dialogical relationship” that Jamieson and Wittman expound in their work Biblical Reasoning.
Jamieson and Wittman argue that the text of Scripture is not an inert substance that an interpreter can approach with neutrality. A scientist cannot ethically study a living animal the same way he might study a geological feature. A scientist can dig, tear apart, place under a microscope, and so forth a geological feature. However, he cannot ethically tear apart a living creature, let alone a living human. Imperial Japan’s infamous Unit 731 did such human experimentation calling their human subjects “logs” in order to dehumanize them and allow such atrocities. [12] A proper study of a particular human values humanity as a whole and does not seek to tear it apart. So too, a proper study of Scripture values the “pressure” the text exerts. Jamieson and Wittman argue along those lines, “Scripture is not, therefore, an inert document Jesus leaves behind before taking a holiday. On the contrary, Scripture is a tool in his hands, and as such is “living and active” (Heb. 4:12).” [13]
A classical Arian believes in the authority of Scripture. Arius himself would probably agree with Evans and Manis’s classical propositionalism. Arius argues that Christ is created from the very term “begotten” in Scripture. [14] Evans and Manis are right that the revelation itself is the authority which provides truthful propositions concerning God and his creation. However, they assume neutrality in their approach to Scripture. But the problem is there is no such thing as a “neutral” theistic position. Deism, Atheism and naturalism analyze biblical data to remove the supernatural (as Jefferson famously did). Even gaining more specificity and assuming monotheism cannot be a neutral starting point. What type of monotheism? Unitarian and triune are both forms of unitarianism. In fact, Arius and Sebelius assumed monotheism when approaching the text.
Stephen Holmes argues that monotheism as a modern term with philosophical baggage would not have been assumed by the first century Jew as is often taught in histories of religion. Holmes writes, “monotheism itself is not a biblical category. . .” He goes on to argue that the development and use of that term over time has affected how people study the history of Judaism and the Old Testament. Holmes argues that a better term to describe the truth of the Old Testament is monolatry—the exclusive worship of only one object.[15] Psalm 82:1 states, “God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment.” Assuming monotheism dictates that the term “gods” must be angelic or poetically polemic. Assumed monotheism does not allow for the existence of other gods. However, if Holmes is right that the original audience to the Psalm assumed monolatry, then they would not have automatically discounted the existence of other gods. On the other hand, this is not to argue that the original audience assumed polytheism either. Rather, the point is the metaphysical and etymological assumptions brought to the text inescapably affect the interpretation of the text. So how one conceives of the Trinity will affect the interpretation of biblical data. Does the trinitarian model reflect the canonical pressure exerted by the text, or does it force a modern zeitgeist into the text?
[1] Fred Sanders, The Triune God, ed. Michael Allen and Scott R. Swain, New Studies in Dogmatics (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2016), 174.
[2] R. B. Jamieson and Tyler R. Wittman, Biblical Reasoning: Christological and Trinitarian Rules for Exegesis (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic: A division of Baker Publishing Group, 2022), 4.
[3] Justo L. González, The Story of Christianity: The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation, vol. 1 (New York: Harperone, 2010), 63.
[4] C. Stephen Evans and R. Zachary Manis, Philosophy of Religion: Thinking about Faith, Second Edition (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2010), 21-22
[5] Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (Edinburgh, Uk : Banner of Truth Trust, 2021), 58.
[6] Evans and Manis, Philosophy of Religion, 118.
[7] Evans and Manis, Philosophy of Religion, 124.
[8] Fred Sanders, The Triune God, ed. Michael Allen and Scott R. Swain (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2016).
[9] Stephen O Presley, Biblical Theology in the Life of the Early Church: Recovering an Ancient Vision (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2025), 17.
[10] Presley, Biblical Theology in the Life of the Early Church, 18.
[11] Presley, Biblical Theology in the Life of the Early Church, 22.
[12] Gerhard Baader et al., “Pathways to Human Experimentation, 1933-1945: Germany, Japan, and the United States,” Osiris 20 (2005): 205–31, https://doi.org/10.2307/3655257, 19.
[13] Jamieson and Wittman, Biblical Reasoning, 45-46.
[14] William G Rusch, The Trinitarian Controversy (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2013), 25.
[15] Stephen R Holmes, The Quest for the Trinity: The Doctrine of God in Scripture, History, and Modernity (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2012), 45-47.
