According to Trinitarianism, Jesus is a person of the Godhead. As one Trinitarian explained:
(quote)
The Trinity is the teaching that there is only one God who exists as three simultaneous and eternal persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. By "person" is meant the characteristics of self awareness, speech, having a will, emotions, etc. Therefore, there are three persons. … They are not three separate gods and are not three separate beings. They are three distinct persons; yet, they are all the one God. … If any one of the three were removed, there would be no God. … The Trinity is one God in three persons.[1]
(end quote)
Not three gods, but three persons. And, according to the Shield of the Trinity or Scutum Fidei, Jesus is God diagrammatically.[2] Yet, so is the Father and the Holy Spirit. So, we are left with the following: Jesus is not a god but a person of the Godhead, and is God diagrammatically along with the Father and the Holy Spirit, and God is not a person but three persons.
Additionally, Trinitarianism teaches that Jesus, in what is called the “Hypostatic Union,” is “fully divine” and also “fully man.”
Thus, I ask in all sincerity, has Trinitarianism unwittingly denied the divinity of Christ?
[1] Slick, Matt. “The Trinity, the Hypostatic Union, and the Communicatio Idiomatum.”
http://carm.org/christianity/christian-d…
[2] “Shield of the Trinity.” Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shield_of_t…
Update : @ JC Redding, hi there. As you can see, my primary source is not Wikipedia but the Trintiarian website CARM.org. Wikipedia is only sourced for the Shield of the Trinity diagram. :-)
Update 2: @ Annsan_In_Him, hi there. I'm trying to understand this issue as it troubles me deeply. To say that Jesus is fully man now seems to deny his full divinity. How can it not? Please try to focus on my sincere question. Thank you.
Update 3: ============
I see some Trinitarians have a problem with visual representations of the Trinity, like the Scutum Fidei. Perhaps this will be another question I'll ask.
While I appreciate the replies from some Oneness believers, I have some cognitive barriers with 'Oneness-ism'; but that's another topic.
Update 4: @ Annsan_In_Him, hi again. :-) I would like to address three points you made:
>"The three Persons are in eternal relationship with each other. That is why God is love."
But the Trinity is not required for God to be love. A unitarian God can still be love by having it be a primary cardinal attribute.
>"You seem to fail to grasp how the Creator can be far more complex than mere mortals are."
I assure you that is not the issue. I think I understand Trinitarian mechanics better than some Trinitarians do.
>"Do you think your sense of logic must determine what is true about God?"
It must conform to Paul's logic, which it does not seem to when he makes comparisons with the wife being in subjection to the husband like Christ is in subjection to God. (1 Corinthians 11:3) This comparison conforms to our logic, and therefore God's nature must too for Paul to be an authentic apostle, not using irrelevant analogies.
Update 5: @ Joe, hi and thank you for your thoughtful reply. You evidently are interested upholding the divinity of Christ, as am I. However, I noticed what appears to be prestidigitation. To merely say 'it is so' does not necessarily make it so--especially when we are dealing with physical properties (human nature) existing where it ought not, in the divine realm. This my friend is a contradiction, and a sobering one at that.
בַר אֱנָשׁ (bar_enosh)
Yes, that and the absolute almightiness of God the Father. Athanasius was wrong, there cannot be three almightys.
See what mental and verbal gymnastics Trinitarians must perform to give even the least amount of substance to their doctrine. There's nothing like that in the Bible at all. Jesus gave us a pure, true, and simple teaching about the relationship between himself and his Father.
The Bible is clear that the Father is God. Jesus Christ is the Son of God. There's nothing at all about substances and co-equal persons in a Godhead in the Scriptures.
If God exists as three co-equal, co-eternal persons who are each fully God, then the Trinity is composed of three Gods, pure and simple, and Trinitarianism becomes polytheism.
Asker's rating & comment
Thank you my friend, it appears to me that Trinitarianism turns Christ's divinity into a diagrammatical abstraction, and a word game of prestidigitation.
