Considering the Action and Attributes of God Through the Trinitarian Event
The first task of theology is to talk about God. What I would like to do is start the process of identifying God from the perspective of Christian belief. This means we will need to discuss the Trinity.[1] Christianity thinks that in the Trinity we gain clarification rather than confusion as to the nature of God. The fact that the word “Trinity” is not in the Bible gives the impression within Protestant Christianity that the doctrine is not biblical. It shows that the church has not classically understood the Bible in a wooden or literal way. It has understood the Bible, as the primary witness to revelation, deserving of faithful interpretation in every age and culture.
The Christian notion of the Trinity is the distinctive Christian contribution to identifying God. This means that the Trinity is not the result of philosophical speculation. Christians have not developed a fascination with the number three. Identifying God in a Christian way does not begin with some vague notion of the oneness of God that evolves into a reflection on three modes. Beginning with revelation means that the being of God and the act of God are one. Revelation is the criterion of being. The attributes of God derive from the event of revelation. The being of God, who God is within the nature or essence of God (aseity) has its truth apart from the words we use to describe God. We do not know God so much through intellectual contemplation as through response to the action of God in creation, reconciliation, and in the movement of holy love that brings all things to their completion.[2]
Revelation is an event within history. One can hardly overestimate the importance of the notion of event in theology. One way to get at event is to contrast it with object. In philosophy, an object exists while events occur or happen. Ordinary objects have clear spatial boundaries but vague temporal boundaries. Events have vague spatial boundaries but clear temporal boundaries. We can locate an object in space while co-location of events is common. Objects move while events cannot. Objects are in time and persist through time by being present at every time at which they exist. Events take up time and persist in time by stages at different. However, philosophers like Whitehead, Goodman, and Quine will suggest that objects are four-dimensional entities that extend across time and space. Such a notion rejects the metaphysical distinction between object and event. Event and object are entities of the same kind. The distinction is one of degree. An event will develop rapidly in time while an object strikes us as firm and internally coherent. If one maintains an event and object distinction one will need to explain the relation between them. Yet, an event-based ontology runs the risk of not providing enough structure for events. Regardless of such metaphysical issues, one will need to consider other distinctions. For example, one can distinguish between event and fact. A fact is abstract and a-temporal, (Julius Caesar died) while an event is specific and temporal (Julius Caesar dying violently on a certain date). An event is individual and thus is not a property that recurs. Yet, some events, such as the sun rising each day, recur. Thus, events may be properties of times. Going back to Whitehead, if we think of events as a primitive ontological category, then we can think of them as derived entities. Temporal instants become maximal sets of simultaneous events. Such a notion is congenial with reducing time to relations among events and is thus congenial with the relational conception of time known as space-time.[3]
It would at least appear that theology must give ontological priority to event. An event-based ontology will provide deep connections between who God is from eternity and who God is in revelation. The being of God is self-related being. Being is a structured relationship. This relational structuring of the being of God constitutes the being of God. The relationship structuring of the being God is the expression varying relations and issues of the being of God. The being of God is as the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is thus a being in becoming, which defines the notions of perichoresis and appropriation. God is already our God in advance, since the divine being is a being in becoming from eternity.
The event of revelation we find in Easter helps Christians clarify certain images in the Old Testament. Here are just a few of the images. 1) Wisdom in the Old Testament seems closely related to God almost like a person. 2) “Lord” in the New Testament is a title applied to the exalted Jesus, suggesting the full deity of the Son. 3) The Spirit of God in the Old Testament becomes the medium of communication between Father and Son. The Spirit gave life to creation, inspired the prophets, and was the mode of the presence of God in the ministry of Jesus. 4) Certain images of God in the Old Testament, such as Torah, the name of Yahweh, the glory of God, gain clarity as well. Such notions distinguish God from the mode of the presence of God in the world. They point to a tension between the transcendence and immanence of God in the Old Testament. The only way Christianity can resolve the tension it finds in the Old Testament is to focus upon the event of revelation, out of which arises the distinctions of Father, Son, and Spirit. In classical discussions, the immanent Trinity (the nature of God) and the economic Trinity (the historical revelation of the Trinity) are separate. However, we need to bring them together.
We can see here that the closer we keep to the event of revelation as we discuss the Trinity the further away from vague philosophical speculation we will be.
The Trinity is the Christian way of discussing distinction and unity of the divine persons. The sending of the Son and the Spirit by the Father is the biblical basis for discussing movement and fellowship within the Trinity. What we find in the New Testament is reciprocal self-distinction of Father, Son, and Spirit. The Son witnesses to and establishes the lordship of the Father. The Father would not be Father without the relation with the Son. The Son will hand over his work to the Father so that God may be all (I Corinthians 15:24-25). The silence of the Father in the cross is deafening, placing the deity of the Father in question. Yet, it also makes clear the self-distinction of Jesus of Nazareth from the Father. Easter says the Father takes the passion (suffering) of the Son within Trinitarian relations. The unique calling of the Son is to be the suffering servant in obedience to the will of the Father, fully identifying with the lost condition of humanity, who then receives the eschatological and life-giving redemption of his suffering through the power of the Spirit.[4] To come full circle, Easter is the result of the Spirit, who gives life to creation, giving eschatological life to the Son. In the event of revelation, then, we see the relations of the Trinity at work.
Given such distinctions within the Trinity, we also need to explore their unity. We might think of the distinctions as living realizations of separate centers of action. Through their personal characteristics, they dwell in each other and communicate eternal life to each other. Son and Spirit serve the monarchy of the Father. Another way to think of this is that the monarchy of the Father is the result of the common operation of the three persons. The Trinitarian relations mediate the monarchy of the Father.
The event of revelation, then, is internal to deity, thereby uniting the immanent and economic Trinity. There is no rupture between the being and action of God. We know who God is from what God does.[5] We limit what we say of God to the action of God in creating, reconciling, and redeeming the world. God acts with intentionality toward a transformation of the world into a reflection of the holy love that motivates God throughout. This transformation originates with the Father, becomes effective in the Son, and is brought to its completion through the Spirit.[6] The Incarnation is a work of the Trinitarian God that embraces the economy of salvation. Incarnation brings creation within the relations of the Trinity. The Trinitarian God opens divinity to the world and time as the transcendent Father sends the immanent Son and Spirit. The Trinitarian God of salvation history and the event of revelation is the same God of eternity. Humanity will experience this reality fully in the eschatological consummation of history.
Such considerations raise the philosophical question of the relation between essence and history. Our destiny is the completion and fulfillment in God in a way that the world continues to endure. The reconciliation, redemption, and consummation that the Bible envisions embrace our time and history. Such a saving end for humanity addresses the anxiety and dread that dominate so much of human life. The same God who creates is also the destiny toward which God has oriented all things. History has an eschatological orientation toward its emerging essence. This way of thinking about eschatology means the promised end influences the entire journey of the cosmos, human history, and individual life to arrive at that end. The end God has already established is already at work because God at work in opening people to faith, hope, and love. Far from speculation, such a notion has its basis upon the fulfillment of Jewish prophetic and apocalyptic promises reaching substantial fulfillment in Jesus Christ. Based upon that fulfillment, Christians have confidence in the gospel they proclaim. We pray in the Lord’s Prayer, “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” The lordship of God over creation, including humanity, becomes reality. The silence of God in the presence of so much evil and suffering always makes the denial of the lordship of God over creation a possibility. Within the flow of history, we can see anticipations of that lordship. Those who live their lives in fellowship with Christ must do so humbly, recognizing that their decision is always a faith and a hope of the promised end. We have already seen that attempts to replace this notion of the future rule of God with an ethical kingdom (Kant, Ritschl) or fellowship with Jesus that death cannot break (Schleiermacher) is hardly sufficient.
We will have no answers to questions regarding last things so long as we do not clarify the relation of time and eternity. John Wesley, in a sermon “On Eternity,” puzzles about time and eternity.
But what is time? It is not easy to say, as frequently as we have had the word in our mouth. We know not what it properly is. We cannot well tell how to define it. But is it not, in some sense, a fragment of eternity, broken off at both ends? — that portion of duration which commenced when the world began, which will continue as long as this world endures, and then expire forever? — that portion of it, which is at present measured by the revolution of the sun and planets; lying (so to speak) between two eternities, that which is past, and that which is to come.
His suggestion that the time we experience is part of eternity is insightful. What we do with our time has an influence upon eternity. Further, whatever eternity is, it influences our time. One of the ways he sees this influence occurring is that only God everlastingly endures, but God shares limited endurance with the things God has made. I think this quite insightful, for a preacher.
Our attempts to identify God continue with a discussion of the unity of God and the attributes of the divine essence. Of course, the inconceivable majesty of God means we will never fully identify God. We will never give a rational account of who God is. We never receive a vision of the inner life of God in its richness and fulness. We know God by the actions of God in creation, reconciliation, and bringing what God has created into a relation of holy love.[7]Yet, God is an active presence in the world, the power of Being as Hodgson puts it. Essence must appear (Hegel). Essence appears in time, becoming a moment of the existence of God. We can see the connection between essence and event.
Essence shows itself in the attributes. With the help of Hegel, we can see qualities like Infinite, Eternal, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, mercy, righteous, and love are such only in relation to the world. If God is merciful, it relates to our experience of mercy. If God is righteous, it relates to our experience of goodness. If God is love, it relates to our experience of love.[8] The attribute of infinity relates the richness and fulness of the divine being, an attribute to which we relate in our experience of life in its fullness or its lack of fullness.[9] Such terms relate to the ontological self-sufficiency of God (aseity), the indivisibility of the divine action in its holy love (simplicity), the constancy and consistency of divine action (immutable), the indefectible movement of the divine purpose toward the fulfillment of creation (impassible), and the guarantee that what God began in creation God will bring to completion (omnipotence).[10]We can use such words regarding self, world, and God because of the redemptive possibilities in language. We can speak truly because of that redemptive quality of language.[11] As Hegel would put it, essence is always in relation to something else.[12] The attributes of God are not parts of God. God is the hidden, secret, and invisible presence that can be a refuge, shield, and hiding place, even when God is no longer part of the plausibility structures of the intellectual work of modernity.[13] God is present in a way that points us toward divine reality. God is power in the sense of holy dynamism, vitality, and life, even when we are suspicious of absolute power. This divine power arises out of divine goodness. We can have confidence in the goodness of divine power.[14] God is knowledge, wisdom, reason, and truth, knowing all future contingents, all possibilities, all concepts and logical relations.[15]
God is personal and communal in the sense that God is the one true and perfect person, whose acts of love and freedom constitute divine personhood in three modes of being or existence. Such modes are moments of relating, modes of being, and shapes of acting. The absolute quality of God includes relation, where the Father (I), Son (You), and Spirit (We as the intersubjective social matrix of relation within God) form the Trinity. Hegel established a dialectic of identity (unity), difference (separation), and mediation (reunification), in common language, thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. Hegel referred to this as the “play of love.” Yet, it includes the serious relation to the world and its suffering. Regardless of the problems such a notion raises, we have opened the possibility of a new discussion of the relation between the divine persons, the divine essence, and the Trinity.
Identifying God will always have a metaphorical dimension. The Bible can refer to God as a rock or light, but it can also refer to God as Spirit, knowledge, and as having a will. Even Hegel viewed the Absolute or Concept as having a creative power to constantly realizing itself, making “it” have personal qualities. We can think of the anticipatory nature of human thought as opening the door for the reality of freedom and the significance of the future. In affirming the knowledge of God, we are saying that nothing in creation has escaped the attention of God. The will of God presses upon with a power oriented toward the creative and life-giving Spirit.
The nature of divine action can be difficult to express. The problem arises in part because of the silence of God while creation and human history is so full of suffering. Christianity can only point to the future consummation and redemption as an action of God in which we will gain clarity. The goal of divine action throughout the course of history is to bring the things God has made into the loving fellowship of the Trinity. We can think of this action as divine self-actualization within the world. Divine action is always a gift of giving and sustaining life toward the things God has made. God is never aloof from creation. In the gift of being, God knows, wills, and relates to every creature. Divine fullness sustains every creature in every moment. The will of God is intentional and always active in each moment of contingent creatures even in the “not-yet” in the unfolding of time.[16]
We can hardly discuss the identity of God without discussing the Infinite, by which we will also mean the holiness, eternity, omnipotence, and omnipresence of God. With this notion, we move toward the unthematic awareness of God. Philosophy offers the notions of the Infinite and Eternal for this unthematic awareness. We move away from the notion of first cause that we find in Aristotle and Aquinas. As Hegel as clarified for us, the Infinite embraces the finite.
Divine holiness embraces the profane and brings it into fellowship with the holy God.
The eternity of God embraces time and becomes the basis for our experience of time. Eternity is the simultaneous and perfect presence of unlimited life (Plotinus, Boethius). We experience life with anticipation of its wholeness. A melody has a sequence of notes, but we hear the whole. Speech is a sequence of syllables, but we hear it as a whole. True eternity includes this possibility, the potentiality of time. True eternity has the power to take time to itself. In virtue of Trinitarian differentiation, the eternity of God includes the time of creatures in its full range, from the beginning of creation to its eschatological consummation. The eternity of God accompanies time. Time may also accompany the eternity of God which creates it and in which it has its goal. The eternity of God goes with time. The eternity of God is in time. Time itself is in eternity. Its whole extension from beginning to end, each single part of it, every epoch, every life-time, every new and closing year, every passing hour, are all in eternity like a child in the arms of its mother. Time does not limit eternity. Eternity is in the midst, just as God is in the midst with us. It is not a divine preserve. On the contrary, by giving us time, God also gives us eternity. Our decisions in time occur with a responsibility to eternity that is not partial but total, and we may and must understand and accept the confidence with which we can undertake them as a complete confidence that we gain from eternity. Having loved us from eternity, and granted us from eternity our existence, fellowship with God, life in hope and eternal life itself, God also loves us here and now, in the temporality ordained for us from eternity, wholeheartedly and unreservedly. We move to God as we come from God and may accompany God. We move towards God. God is, when time will be no more.
With the notions of the omnipresence and omnipotence, we can see the Infinite as the presence and power of God as comprehending all things. The Trinity makes the transcendence and immanence of God compatible. To turn aside from the source of life is to fall into nothingness, while the omnipotence of God shows that God can save the creature from the nothingness the creature chooses.
With the Christian notion of God, it seems appropriate to conclude with a discussion of the God of love. The traditional notion of the simplicity of God is understandable in this context as that which unites the trinitarian relations.[17] A doctrine of God that does not call a reader to love, even long for the taste of love, would not serve God well. God is love in the way Paul describes in I Corinthians 13. Regardless of relation, God is love and loves.[18] One can examine John 3:16, Romans 5:5ff, and Romans 8:31-39. We can also refer to Hosea 11:1ff, 14:8, Jeremiah 31:3, Deuteronomy 7:8, 10:15. Further, in I John 4:8, 16, God is love. God and love are identical ontologically. Love is the power or spirit that animates the relations of the Trinity. If “spirit” is like the scientific description of field theory, the divine Spirit is the power and fire of love glowing through the divine persons, uniting them and radiating from them. The divine Spirit fulfills itself as love. Among the many gifts of the Christian notion of Trinity is that its discussion of the divine persons led to a relational understanding of the human being as person. Love is also a divine attribute in Exodus 34:6, Psalm 103:8, and 145:8. In order to further understand divine love, we can discuss goodness and mercy, righteousness, faithfulness (leaving room for becoming in God because time matters), patience (in moving creation toward the saving purpose of God), and wisdom in divine governance of the world (which is always in question due to the unreconciled nature of the history).
The difficulty anyone would have in believing what I have written is that the world and humanity do not correspond to the living will of the creator. Once again, we need to bring eschatology into the discussion. The consummation of the world in the rule of God will mean that divine love has reached its goal. Yet, on the way to the goal of history, atheism remains a live option. Failure to admit this option as a possibility on the part of any religion would be proof that its claim to truth is false.
Of course, this view of the identity of God will contrast strongly with both Jew and Muslim.
A hymn often sung on Trinity Sunday is Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise.
I will not bother to recount some harmless humor regarding the Trinity.
I will not bother with the debate between Athanasius and Arius.
The historic creeds are the basis for my reflections, even if I am re-thinking in light of our new historical setting. For those denominations who are suspicious of creeds, confessions, and articles of religion, they are attempts to summarize biblical teaching.
[1] This entire section moves against a theological tradition known as the negative way. It is a form of unbelief, seeking God prior to and other than through the incarnation and sending of the Spirit. We might say the same of the whole programme known as analogy, because it is tied up with it. Because we fail to realize that the (human) love that Jesus is is at the same time the love of God in action, we fail to accept the univocal language which it licenses, indeed, requires, and seek instead a form of language that effectively ively ignores the means given.
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[12] For some thinkers, God simply is the identified attributes, regardless of relation. God is omnipresent, of course. God is knowledge, power, and love, regardless of relation.
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[16] Robert F. Fortuin, https://afkimel.wordpress.com/2016/12/06/is-god-living-up-to-his-potential/
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