To avoid any confusion I want to clarify upfront that I am a Trinitarian. I believe The Trinity is Three Co-Eternal Persons with one Divine Essence. I agree with every detail of the original Nicene Creed (including Homoousias which I view as Biblically Supported by Colossian 2:9 which also refutes Partialism). I have a few issues with the Nicene-Constantinople Creed but none of them are based on it's Trinitarianism, I agree with all of it's elaboration on The Holy Spirit.
I agree with the Eastern Orthodox over Latin Denominations on the Filioque question and The Monarchy of The Father.
This is also not a reversal of what I argued in Against Monolatery, I still stand by all of that.
I've looked at every New Testament verse that says "One God" or that "God is One", or "One Lord" or "Lord is One", and none of them use Mono but instead Heis. Some material from my Trinity in the Hebrew Bible and the YT videos I linked to in it are worth remembering here. It's the same with the "are one" references in John 10:30 and 1 John 5:7. And in case you're curious the same is true for the use of "one God" in the opening line of the Nicene Creed.
When Mono is used in the New Testament, in the KJV it partly because of context tends to get translated "Alone" or "Only" instead of simply One. While it may be used close to Theos in the text sometimes it's never directly used of how many Theos exist or that we worship.
According to the Strongs Concordance, Mia is the "irregular feminine" form of Heis. Mia/Heis more specifically means United or Unified not an absolute singular. The "One Flesh" verses in The New Testament use Mia as does the "One Wife" references in the Pastoral Epistles. Eustathius of Antioch used Mia Theos rather then Mono Theos (that some people think that justifies accusing him of Modalism shows how they don't understands the difference between Mia and Mono).
The Christology of the Oriental Orthodox Church is Miaphysite, that is how they self describe themselves firmly rejecting the label of Monophysite. And Chalcedonians consider Cyril's original use of Mia Physis compatible with Chalcedonian Christology.
Modern Trinitarians feeling attached to a desire to claim they are Monotheists is based on Extrabiblical importance Monotheism had obtained in western Philosophy already before Christianity was born. If the Theology I expressed at the top of this post is still Monotheistic from a certain point of view then that's cool, my point is I'm not attached to an ultimately unbiblical term and am not going to let it influence how I interpret Biblical Theology.
It is wrong when people try to claim The Trinity just emerged out of nowhere in the Fourth Century. But it is also wrong for us Nicenes to claim Arianism came out of nowhere in the same century. Justin Martyr and Tatian both had a Logos Doctrine that was fairly Proto-Arian already in the Second Century because of the influence of Middle Platonism. Tatian explicitly says God was Alone before the emanation of the Logos, that to me is a a rejection of Nicene Theology.
Strict Monotheism comes from the Monad Theology of Pythagoreanism.
"But wasn't Stoicism just as Monotheistic as Platonism and you are kind of fan of Stoicism?" You may ask.
1. I find Stoic ideas useful but will always side with The Bible and Trinitarianism if I ever see a conflict.
2. Stoicism looks Monotheistic but in a different way, I myself am far from fully educated on everything there is to know about Ancient Stoic Theology. But it sounds to me like they too may have preferred Mia Theos to Mono Theos.
3. From what I can tell some modern Stoics are flat out Atheists so the number of gods one believes doesn't seem to be the point of anything.
The point of this post is that if I have to choose between Monotheism or The Trinity I will choose The Trinity.
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