For Thomas, the advantage of explicating the Trinity by reference to knowing and willing was that these are two human processes that remain within the soul. They remain within the realm of praxis. Jenson notes that the great achievement of Barth’s Trinitarian theology is to start . . . . Continue Reading »
Gregory of Nyssa identifies Arianism as a form of tragic metaphysics. They go astray because they “define God’s being by its having no beginning, rather than by its having no end . . . . If they must divide eternity, let them reverse their doctrine and find that mark of deity in . . . . Continue Reading »
Is God’s being in His becoming? We might not want to say that. But we can’t avoid the question, if we want to continue the patristic project of “evangelizing metaphysics.” For the Greeks, Jenson writes, “Being” is “what satisfies the . . . . Continue Reading »
Barth argues that the Trinity is not a challenge or a qualification of monotheism, but the only true form of monotheism. Antitrinitarianism always collapses either into the denial of God’s revelation or of God’s unity. Denial of revelation because “To the degree that it . . . . Continue Reading »
Here’s my best effort to summarize Robert Jenson’s take on God-and-time, written with faux-Jensonesque pithiness. Is God eternally and infinitely the eternal and infinite God that He is? Of course. He’s God. Is God dependent on creation for His fulfillment? Of . . . . Continue Reading »
Jenseon writes: “The Crucifixion puts it up to the Father: Would he stand to this alleged Son? To this candidate to be his own self-identifying Word? Would he be a God who, for example, hosts publicans and sinners, who justifies the ungodly? The Resurrection was the . . . . Continue Reading »
Athanasius appeals to the baptismal formula to show that the Son must be Creator: If he re-creates in baptism along with the Father, He must have created from the beginning. But this raises the question, Is the Father insufficient in Himself? Athanasius, strikingly, does not answer by . . . . Continue Reading »
From Gregory’s fifth oration, defending the divinity and consubstantiality of the Spirit: “What was Adam? A creature of God. What then was Eve? A fragment of the creature. And what was Seth? The begotten of both. Does it then seem to you that Creature . . . . Continue Reading »
In his brilliant, flawed These Three are One: The Practice of Trinitarian Theology (Challenges in Contemporary Theology) , David Cunningham notes how the doctrine of the Trinity implies retroactive causality: “At first, we might assume that a father precedes his son, both logically and . . . . Continue Reading »
Augustine’s trinitarian account of love is often understood as a purely formal correspondence: Love requires three - the lover, the beloved, and the love itself - and, whaddya know?, there are three Persons in the God who is love. Augustine sometimes sounds like that: “Love means loving . . . . Continue Reading »
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