The point of existence and how it refutes the Trinity

by slimboyfat 225 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  Phizzy

  Spot on Kaleb !

  Just because someone believes something it does NOT make it True !

  Truth is only that which has Irrefutable Evidence , no religious claims have that quality of Evidence, and so cannot be True.
• 

  aqwsed12345

  Defending the Trinity from a Thomistic Perspective

  Introduction

  The doctrine of the Trinity – that God is one in essence and three in person – stands at the heart of Christian faith and yet has long been a focal point of controversy and misunderstanding. From the early fourth-century debates with Arians who denied the Son’s full divinity, to Islamic critiques that the Trinity compromises God’s unity, believers have been challenged to explain how one God can subsist as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. At first glance the doctrine may seem paradoxical or even irrational: How can “three” be “one” without violating the law of non-contradiction? A Thomistic approach, drawing on the metaphysical insights of St. Thomas Aquinas, offers a rigorous and coherent framework for addressing these questions. Aquinas’ teachings on divine essence, relation, and procession allow Christians to articulate the Trinity in a way that preserves God’s divine simplicity and unity while accounting for the real distinctions between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In what follows, we will present and defend the Trinity using Aquinas’ metaphysics, explaining how multiple divine persons exist in one essence without division or composition. We will engage historical objections – specifically the Arian claim that the Son is a created being and the Islamic claim that the Trinity implies polytheism – and show how a Thomistic understanding answers these concerns. Throughout, the goal is to demonstrate that while the Trinity is ultimately a mystery of faith, it is not a contradiction of reason. On the contrary, with the help of sound philosophy we find the Trinity to be a sublime truth above reason yet not against it, inviting us to an ever-deeper contemplation of the one God in three Persons.

  Divine Simplicity and Triune Unity

  Central to Aquinas’ defense of the Trinity is the doctrine of divine simplicity, the teaching that God is not composed of parts or diverse properties. In God, there is no composition of matter and form, substance and accident, or essence and existence – God is His own essence and existence, utterly one and indivisible (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)) (Trinity and Simplicity — The Reformed Classicalist). Any division or composition in the Godhead would imply dependency or change, contradicting the absolute aseity and perfection of God. The challenge, then, is how to affirm three persons in one simple divine essence without introducing division. Thomas’s solution hinges on a careful distinction between how things are in God in reality and how we conceive them in our minds. The classical maxim, affirmed in scholastic theology and by the Council of Florence, is that in God “everything is one where there is no opposition of relationship” (Catechism of the Catholic Church | Catholic Culture). In other words, any feature of God that does not involve a relational distinction is identical in all three persons. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one being, one nature, one mind, one will – indeed one God – because they share the same simple essence. There is no partitioning of the divine substance among three “parts”; each person is the fullness of the one God. As one theologian explains, “All that is in God is God,” and the three persons are not composite parts of God but each is the identical divine substance subsisting in a relational way (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)) (Trinity and Simplicity — The Reformed Classicalist). Thus, divine simplicity is not violated by the Trinity: whatever is true of God’s essence (such as eternity, power, goodness, mind, will) is true of the Father, Son, and Spirit equally and indivisibly. The persons are really distinct from one another, but not distinct as separate substances. They differ relationally (as we will see below), not by having different natures or attributes. In God, essence and person are one and the same reality, and only the relations of origin differentiate the persons (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). Aquinas emphasizes that the divine essence “is not really distinct from person” (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)); the Father’s Godhead is numerically identical to the Son’s Godhead and the Spirit’s Godhead. The unity of God therefore remains absolute: one essence, one “God,” in three who subsist in that essence. Any appearance of contradiction (“three in one”) is resolved by understanding that “one” refers to the being or essence of God, while “three” refers to the persons or hypostases, distinguished by their relations. The Trinity is one as to what God is, and three as to who God is – a crucial distinction that keeps us from both polytheism (which would falsely multiply the essences and give three gods) and modalism (which would falsely collapse the persons into mere roles of one person).

  Procession and Relation in Aquinas’ Theology

  How exactly are the divine persons distinguished without compromising God’s unity? Aquinas answers: by relations of origin grounded in two eternal “processions” within God. A procession, in Thomistic terms, is not a movement through space or a coming-into-being (as it is with created things) but an internal emanation that remains within the divine nature (Aquinas) (Aquinas). Christian revelation speaks of the Son as “begotten” of the Father and of the Holy Spirit as “proceeding” from the Father (and, in Western theology, from the Father and the Son). Aquinas seeks to elucidate these truths philosophically. He identifies two and only two processions in God: one by way of the intellect and one by way of the will (Aquinas) (Aquinas).

  The first is the generation of the Son. God the Father eternally knows Himself, and by this perfect act of intellect He generates the Word – an interior utterance or concept that fully expresses His essence (Aquinas) (Aquinas). In John’s Gospel, this divine Logos (Word) is “with God” and “is God” (John 1:1), indicating both distinction and unity. Aquinas explains that when a mind understands something, it forms an inner word or idea, which proceeds from the mind yet remains within it (Aquinas) (Aquinas). In an analogous (though immeasurably higher) way, the Father’s act of self-understanding “proceeds” to a perfect image or Word of Himself – that Word is the Son. This procession is called generation because it is like a parent communicating life to offspring, except here the “nature” communicated is the one divine essence itself. The Father eternally begets the Son by knowing Himself, and in that single act the Father gives the fullness of the Godhead to the Son. There is no “time” when the Son did not exist, for this generation is eternal; nor is the Son a lesser copy, for He receives the identical divine nature. As the Nicene Creed professes, the Son is “God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father.” Thomistic metaphysics reinforces this: because this procession is entirely internal to God, it does not result in another being or a created effect, but rather in another subsistent relation within the one God (Aquinas) (Aquinas). All that is in the Father – the simple divine essence – is communicated to the Son. “All that exists in God, is God,” Aquinas writes, so every internal procession necessarily shares the one divine nature (Aquinas). The Son, proceeding as the Word, is God, co-equal and co-eternal with the Father, distinguished only by being Son (the one who is from another) rather than Father (the one who is from no one).

  The second procession in God is the spiration of the Holy Spirit, an eternal act of the divine will or love. Just as God perfectly knows Himself, He also perfectly loves Himself. Aquinas describes how in an intellectual nature (like God’s), besides the intellectual word there is also a procession of love: “the object loved is in the lover” through an act of will (Aquinas) (Aquinas). The Holy Spirit is precisely this mutual Love or Gift personified – the love that flows between Father and Son (or from Father through Son) from all eternity. The Spirit’s procession is often called spiration (breathing forth) or simply procession. It is analogous to the way our will, upon knowing something good, produces an inner movement of love toward that good. In God, the Father and Son together breathe forth the Spirit as the one Love that they share. Importantly, this second procession is also entirely internal and does not leave the divine essence; it is the immanent fruition of God’s self-love. Consequently, the Holy Spirit too receives the one indivisible essence – He is God, on equal footing with Father and Son. The three persons are sometimes summarized as lover, beloved, and love, or as mind, word, and will in an infinite, absolute degree. These analogies (going back to St. Augustine) help us grasp how plurality of persons does not entail separation in substance. The processions of intellect and will in God terminate in relationships rather than independent beings, much as a thought or act of love remains within the thinker or lover.

  According to Aquinas, the divine processions give rise to real relations in God: Fatherhood, Sonship, and the relation of Spiration (between the Father and Son on one side and the Spirit on the other). These relations of origin are the only basis for distinction in God. The Father is related to the Son as begetter to begotten; the Son to the Father as begotten to begetter; the Spirit to the Father and Son as proceeding from them. These relationships are mutually opposed – for example, paternity is the opposite of filiation; being the principle of procession is the opposite of proceeding. Such relational opposition is crucial: it allows us to say the Father and Son are truly distinct from each other (because the Father is not the Son (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)), the one begetting is not the one begotten), even though each is the same God. Outside of the opposition of relations, everything in God is identical. Aquinas puts it succinctly: considered in relation to the divine essence, these relations are not really distinct from the essence (since in a simple being, what God has God is); but considered in relation to each other, the relations are really distinct (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). The persons just are the subsistent relations in God’s being (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)) (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). Thus the Thomistic explanation is that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are distinguished by their relations of origin alone – an eternal web of knower, known, and love – and not by any composition or division of the divine substance. The persons co-inhere in one another in perfect unity of being (per the Greek Fathers’ term, perichoresis, and as later Latin theology phrased, “the Father is wholly in the Son and in the Spirit, and likewise the Son in the Father and Spirit, etc.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church | Catholic Culture)). We can say the Father is God, the Son is God, the Spirit is God – each wholly and eternally – without saying the Father is the Son or the Spirit, because “Father” and “Son” designate a relationship, not a separate essence. In sum, by Aquinas’ account the Trinity involves one essence (God) and three subsistent relations (the divine persons). The unity is preserved because essence is one; the plurality is real but resides entirely in the order of relationship. God is not one thing and three things in the same respect, but one infinite reality existing as three relative modes of subsistence. This is how multiple persons exist in one simple essence without violating simplicity: the persons are not extra ingredients or properties added onto the essence, but are the one essence itself, differently oriented by relationship. As the Fourth Lateran Council taught and Aquinas often repeated: it is the relations that distinguish the persons, and apart from the relations, everything is one in God (Catechism of the Catholic Church | Catholic Culture).

  Answering Arian Objections: The Son’s Eternal Divinity

  One of the earliest major challenges to the Trinity came from Arianism, which contended that the Son (and by extension the Holy Spirit) are not co-eternal God but creations or inferior emanations. Arius, a priest in Alexandria in the 4th century, taught that “there was a time when the Son was not,” proposing that the Son was the first and greatest creature but not equal to the Father. To an Arian, calling Jesus divine meant only that he was godlike or heavenly, not that he literally shared the Father’s infinite essence. This view was motivated in part by a desire to protect God’s uniqueness: how could God be one if the Son is also God? Would that not make two gods, or imply that God begot a second divine being? Arius also pointed to passages of Scripture where Jesus seems subordinate to the Father (for example, calling the Father “greater than I,” or appearing limited in knowledge or power during his earthly life). The Arian error, however, stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of what it means for the Son to be “begotten” of the Father. Arius conceived of divine begetting on the model of creaturely causation – as if the Father produced the Son as an external effect or work, thereby creating a second, lesser deity. Aquinas directly addresses this mistake: if “procession” in God were like an effect proceeding from a cause, then indeed the Arians would be right that the Son and Spirit are creatures, not true God (Aquinas) (Aquinas). But divine procession is nothing like creation. The Son’s generation is not an external act of God making something outside Himself; it is an internal act of self-communication, as described above. “Careful examination shows that [Arius and Sabellius] took procession as meaning an outward act… neither of them affirms procession as existing in God Himself,” Aquinas notes (Aquinas). For Arius, the Father begetting the Son was like a craftsman constructing a masterpiece – an act that results in a product separate from the agent. Thomistic theology flatly rejects this scenario. The Father’s begetting of the Son happens within God’s own being, not as an act upon an external object or matter (Aquinas) (Aquinas). Therefore it does not yield another, separate being; it yields a person who is intrinsic to God’s eternal life.

  The implications of this for the Son’s divinity are enormous. Because the Son is begotten inside the infinite Godhead, what He receives from the Father is the divine essence itself, not a copy or a lesser nature. The Father gives all that He is to the Son (minus the personal identity of being “Father”). Nothing of the Father’s divinity is held back or only partially communicated. As Aquinas says, in God “the divine nature is communicated by every procession which is not outward” (Aquinas). Thus the Son is consubstantial with the Father – “one in being” or of the same substance. Christian tradition, beginning with the Council of Nicaea (AD 325), forcefully affirmed against Arius that the Son is true God from true God. Scripture itself leaves no room for the idea of Jesus as a semi-divine creature. St. John writes unequivocally: “In the beginning was the Word…and the Word was God” (John 1:1). St. Paul says of Christ, “In him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily” (Colossians 2:9). Aquinas cites St. John’s First Epistle: “that we may be in His true Son, He is the true God and eternal life” (1 John 5:20) (Aquinas) (Aquinas). Likewise, he notes that because Christians are temples of the Holy Spirit, and only God can have a temple, the Holy Spirit must be truly God (cf. 1 Corinthians 6:19) (Aquinas). These biblical testimonies align perfectly with the Thomistic metaphysical insight: if the Son were a creature, not sharing the very being of the Father, Christianity would indeed be guilty of worshipping a lesser god alongside the Supreme God – a form of polytheism or idolatry. But because the Son is of one essence with the Father, when we honor the Son we are honoring the one God.

  Arian objections often cite Jesus’ human limitations in the Gospels or his filial language (“the Father is greater than I,” John 14:28) as proof of inequality. Here we must remember the distinction between Christ’s divine nature and his assumed human nature. Aquinas and orthodox theology teach that the Son, in the Incarnation, took on a complete human nature (body and soul). In that human nature, the Son could say the Father is greater, could experience suffering and ignorance, etc., without detracting from His divine nature. The Arians, lacking the later Christological clarifications, conflated Christ’s humanity with his divinity and thus misunderstood those passages. Properly understood, whenever Scripture speaks of the Son as less than the Father, it refers to the Son in his role as a man and mediator, not to his eternal divine essence. As God, the Son is equal to the Father; as man, the Son is subordinate to the Father (and even to the Spirit, as the Spirit led Jesus in his ministry). The Athanasian Creed succinctly states: “Equal to the Father, as touching his Godhead: less than the Father, as touching his Manhood.”

  Another Arian concern is that asserting two divine persons (Father and Son) compromises God’s unity. But this is addressed by the principle already elaborated: the Father and Son are distinct as persons (relative to each other) but one in being. They are not two gods, but one God, because there is a single divine nature. Their relationship can be understood by analogy to a thought in the mind: my thought is distinct from me in a sense (I can differentiate “I” and “the idea I have conceived”), yet it is not an external thing apart from me – it is an inward expression of myself. So the Son is the Father’s own self-expression, not a second god floating outside the Father. Aquinas goes even further to ensure we do not think of Father and Son as two separate entities composing God: since the divine essence is simple, the Father is that essence and the Son is that essence; they are numerically one God. The only distinction is the relational one of origin (Father as origin, Son as from the origin). Remove that relational opposition, and no distinction remains (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). Therefore, classical Trinitarianism is actually the strongest safeguard against both Arian subordinationism and crude polytheism. It refuses to divide the substance of God in any way. We do not have a hierarchy of greater and lesser gods; we have a communion of coequal persons each of whom is the one infinite God. Arius’s mistake was thinking that calling the Son “God” would violate monotheism unless the Son were demoted to a creature. In truth, it would violate monotheism only if the Son were a separate being alongside the Father. But since Father and Son share the same being, the unity of God is preserved. Medieval theologians captured this by saying the Father and Son are “distinct in person but not distinct in nature.” We can conclude, then, that the Arian objection fails once one understands Aquinas’s insight that the Son’s generation is an internal procession that leaves God’s unity intact. The Son is eternally begotten, not made, and this begetting is an outpouring of the Father’s very substance, not the production of a new lesser substance. Far from being an affront to reason, the orthodox doctrine satisfies both the demands of Scripture and the metaphysical principle that God, as the highest perfection, can communicate His entire being without loss. The Father, in knowing and loving Himself, eternally generates the Son and Spirates the Spirit, and in so doing He does not multiply gods but manifests the richness of life within the one Godhead.

  Answering Islamic Objections: One God in Three Persons

  The Islamic faith, fiercely monotheistic, has from its inception rejected the Trinity as incompatible with the oneness of God (tawhid). The Qur’an insists that God (Allah) has no partners or equals, and it explicitly repudiates the idea that God has a “son.” To Muslims, the Christian confession of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit often sounds like tri-theism – as though Christians worship three separate gods or associate others with God (shirk, the gravest sin in Islam). Islamic theologians historically have argued that the Trinity either introduces parts into God or compromises His unity and simplicity ( Trinity > Judaic and Islamic Objections (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) ). For example, the medieval philosopher Al-Kindi interpreted the Trinity to mean three divine individuals each composed of the one divine essence plus a distinguishing characteristic, and he rightly noted that any such composition would mean those individuals are not eternal or self-sufficient ( Trinity > Judaic and Islamic Objections (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) ). The Muslim critique thus poses a serious question: does the doctrine of the Trinity maintain the absolute unity and uniqueness of God, or does it make God into a committee of three? From a Thomistic perspective, we assert firmly that Trinitarian doctrine, properly understood, upholds God’s oneness in the strongest possible way. The unity of essence in the Trinity means that Christians no less than Muslims affirm there is exactly one God, one ultimate being who alone is worthy of worship. We do not believe in three separate gods, nor in one God who is split into three pieces or modes. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church explains in continuity with ancient councils: “Father, Son, Holy Spirit are not three principles of creation but one principle,” because “each of the persons is that supreme reality, viz., the divine substance, essence or nature” (CCC 258). The threeness of God lies only on the personal level (the relationships of Father, Son, Spirit); it does not multiply the godhead itself. Thus, in Christian understanding, the Father, Son, and Spirit are inseparable in what they are and what they do. There is a beautiful line in the Gospel of John that illuminates this unity: Jesus says of the Father, “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30). The Greek word for “one” here is neuter (hen), indicating unity of nature or essence, not merely agreement of will. Yet Jesus also prays to the Father and speaks to Him – showing He is personally distinct. Early Christian theologians captured this mystery with the formula that the Son is “one in essence” (homoousios) with the Father, even though He is another as a person. The Qur’an appears to misconstrue the Trinity in one verse as “God, Jesus, and Mary” – which is indeed a tritheistic and absurd formulation rejected by all orthodox Christians. In reality, Mary is a creature and not part of the Godhead, and Jesus is not a separate god beside the Father but the incarnate Word of the one God. So the Trinity is not “God plus two others,” as some Muslim polemics imagine, but rather one God in three personal self-distinctions.

  Aquinas and other scholastics were well aware of the philosophical objection that any real plurality in God seems to imply composition and thus negate simplicity. The answer they give is subtle: the plurality of persons in God is not like any other plurality we know. In creatures, multiple individuals of one species (e.g. three human beings) means three separate substances, each with its own divided portion of a common nature. But God is not a species that can have multiple members; God is infinite being. There cannot be three separate infinite beings, since each, to be distinct, would have to lack something the others have – which is impossible if each is truly God. Therefore, Christianity does not posit three parallel gods. Rather, the three persons share the one infinite being, like three candles all lit from the same flame (an analogy offered by medieval theologians to illustrate how one nature can be wholly in more than one person – though every analogy has limits). Another way to put it: when we say the Father is God, the Son is God, the Spirit is God, we do not mean there are three instances of deity as a genus or class. We mean the one Godhead is simultaneously Father, Son, and Spirit. This admittedly transcends full human comprehension, but it is not logically incoherent. It would be incoherent only if we said something like “three persons are one person” or “three beings are one being” in the same respect. But we do not say that. We say one being is three persons. Personhood and being are different categories: being answers the question “what are you?” whereas person answers “who are you?”. In created things, normally one being equals one person (e.g. a human being is one person). But God is radically different – His mode of being is unique and surpasses created analogies. It is not illogical that the ultimate reality might exist in a way that is one-and-plural on different planes (an analogy from geometry: three distinct coordinates can define one single point in space – here dimensionally different parameters coincide in one point). In God’s case, the “parameters” are not dimensions but the personal relations of origin that we discussed. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are distinct as origin, begotten, and proceeding, yet they coincide in the one divine essence.

  Islamic objectors also charge that Trinity violates simplicity by effectively saying God has “parts” (the persons) or accidents (the relations). The Thomistic answer is that the persons are not parts of God, nor are the relations accidents inhering in a subject. In God, there cannot be accidents or separable parts at all (Trinity and Simplicity — The Reformed Classicalist) (Trinity and Simplicity — The Reformed Classicalist). The persons are best understood as subsistent relations – each person is the one God under a distinct relational aspect. This does not make the relations unreal; on the contrary, Father, Son, and Spirit are really distinct, but their distinction lies wholly in the relations of origin, not in any composition of the divine essence (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)) (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). To a Muslim accustomed to thinking of God as a single-personal being, this is admittedly a foreign concept. The idea of relation as something that can subsist in and as the very being of God comes from Christian reflection on revelation aided by Aristotle’s philosophy of relations. Aquinas notes that in creatures, relations are typically accidents (e.g. the relation of fatherhood in a human is an accidental feature, not the substance of the man). But in God, relations being accidents would indeed compromise simplicity. Therefore, he concludes that in God the relations must be identical with the divine essence (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). That is, God’s very nature is to be Father knowing Himself and Word known, and Love proceeding from both. The relations are “what God is” just as much as the divine attributes are – they are only different in relation to each other, not in relation to God’s essence (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). This profound point shows that the Trinity does not introduce foreign elements into God; it is simply God’s one perfect being, considered in its self-relatedness. As the Council of Florence taught, all such relations are within the single divine substance, essence, or nature, which remains utterly one (Paragraph 2. The Father - The Holy See). If a Muslim interlocutor insists that God cannot have any internal distinctions at all, one might respond that even in Islamic theology God is described by many names or attributes (merciful, just, living, powerful, etc.). How can an absolutely simple being have multiple attributes? Classical Muslim theologians typically say those many names are all really one in God and only seem multiple to our finite minds – a view not far from the Christian understanding that in God’s simplicity, love = wisdom = power = being, etc. The difference with the Trinity is that the “three” are not attributes or acts directed outward, but personal relations of origin. Still, the principle is similar: plurality in God (of whatever sort) does not necessarily violate unity if that plurality does not compose or divide the divine essence. In Christianity’s claim, the “Threeness” is a relational plurality that actually requires the unity of essence as its underlying context. If there were three separate gods, they could not be Father, Son, and Spirit in relation – they would be three unrelated absolutes, which is not the Trinity at all. Paradoxically, only if God is one can He exist as a Trinity of persons, since only with one shared essence can the persons coinhere and love one another in total self-gift. If God were a solitary monad (as in strict Unitarian theology), God could not have the attribute of interpersonal love “built-in” from eternity – He would need creation to have something to love. The Christian vision of God as inherently relational Love (cf. 1 John 4:8, “God is love”) thus preserves God’s self-sufficiency (the three love one another perfectly, lacking nothing) and casts a new light on divine unity: it is not the unity of a lonely being but the unity of a communion. This does not convince by logical syllogism – Muslims and Christians ultimately have differing authorities and starting premises – but it shows that the doctrine of the Trinity is internally coherent and does not amount to tri-theism. No one in Trinitarian theology is asserting “3 gods = 1 god” which would indeed be nonsense. We assert one God in three persons, which is mysterious but coherent when we unpack the meanings of “person” and “essence.” Aquinas even addresses a common-sense worry: if each of the three is God, do we have three Gods? He answers no, because in God “what is” (the nature) is identical with “who is” (the person) only when considering each person singly (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). But since the nature is one, there are not three natures to yield three Gods. The term “God” can be predicated of Father, Son, Spirit in the singular, not as a plural count of gods (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)). Christian thinkers sometimes use the analogy of a triangle: it has three corners, yet it is one triangle. The corners are distinct, but they are not three separate triangles; each corner is a “manifestation” of the whole triangle’s essence under a different aspect. The Trinity is infinitely greater and more mysterious than any geometric shape, but the analogy hints that threeness and oneness need not be incompatible in principle.

  Finally, Muslims argue that God revealing Himself as a Trinity introduces a “mystery” that offends the clarity of pure monotheism. Islam prides itself on a simple, comprehensible creed: There is no god but God; Muhammad is His messenger. Christianity agrees there is only one God, but adds richness to that statement by confessing Father, Son, Holy Spirit within the Godhead – something we could not know without God telling us. Aquinas concedes that the Trinity is not discoverable by natural reason; it is known only by divine revelation (through Christ and the apostolic witness) ( Trinity > Judaic and Islamic Objections (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) ) ( Trinity > Judaic and Islamic Objections (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) ). But once revealed, it is fitting and reasonable in the highest sense – it does not violate reason, it transcends it. If one believes God is an infinite, transcendent reality, it is not surprising that aspects of His inner life exceed the grasp of finite human logic. Rather than contradicting monotheism, the revealed mystery of the Trinity elevates our understanding of the unity of God, showing it to be a living, fruitful unity, not a barren singularity. Many Muslim thinkers hold that God’s oneness is so absolute that even attributes like knowledge and will are only nominally distinct (lest God appear composed). Ironically, this can make God almost impersonal – a pure will with no inherent relationality or love. The Trinity, in contrast, presents a God who is super-personal – not less than personal, but a communion of Persons. This is a unity that is dynamic and fecund (the Father eternally generates the Son, and the Father and Son breathe forth the Spirit), yet it remains one being. Christianity thus maintains, just as firmly as Islam, that there is only one God, even as it invites people to know this one God more intimately as Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit. The charge of polytheism only sticks if one misunderstands what the doctrine actually teaches. When correctly understood via the Thomistic metaphysical distinctions, the Trinity emerges as a profound mystery that in no way compromises the oneness, simplicity, or sovereignty of God.

  Mystery and Rationality: Triune Truth as Accessible to Reason and Faith

  To human reason alone, the inner life of God as Holy Trinity would have remained unknown. Aquinas teaches that the truth of the Trinity “surpasses the capacity of human reason,” and thus had to be revealed to us ( Trinity > Judaic and Islamic Objections (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) ). Nevertheless, he also insists that this mystery, once revealed, is not irrational or absurd. The Trinity is a mystery, meaning it is a truth that is inexhaustibly deep and cannot be comprehended fully by our finite minds. But a mystery in the theological sense is not a logical contradiction; it is a reality whose inner workings we cannot completely grasp, yet we can approach by analogy and be confident it contains no error or inconsistency. In fact, part of the task of Christian theology (especially in the Thomistic tradition) is to show that mysteries of faith are at least negative mysteries – they do not force us to believe something contradictory, even if we cannot imagine exactly how it is so. For example, the statement “one God in three persons” sounds paradoxical, but through careful definitions of one (essence) and three (persons), we see it is not the same kind of “one” and “three,” and thus not a direct contradiction. Reason can affirm that the doctrine is internally coherent (when terms are properly understood) (Ye Olde Trinity Diagram: The Shield of Faith – Trinities) (Ye Olde Trinity Diagram: The Shield of Faith – Trinities). Reason can also illuminate fitting analogies (mind-word-love, etc.) to partially illumine the mystery. Yet reason will also humbly acknowledge its limits: we cannot prove the Trinity by logical deduction, nor can we fully comprehend how one divine essence is entirely possessed by three distinct persons. We rely on God’s self-revelation in Christ and the Holy Spirit’s guidance of the Church to know that the Trinity is real.

  Aquinas famously said that in this life we are like wayfarers who know God “as in a mirror, dimly” – our concepts and analogies fall short of the divine reality (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)) (Aquinas). But he also believed that our analogical knowledge is true as far as it goes. For instance, knowing God as intellect and will (by analogy to our soul) is a true insight, even if God’s intellect and will are one and the same in a way ours are not. Likewise, understanding the Son as the Word of the Father and the Spirit as the Love of Father and Son gives us a genuine, if analogical, glimpse into why God is triune. It shows that the Trinity, rather than being an arbitrary conundrum, actually corresponds to God’s nature as the highest intellect and highest love. It would be unworthy of God to be a solitary thinker without a Word, or a lover without an eternal Love. The Trinity reveals that God is not a solitary distant deity, but an eternal communion of truth and love. Human reason, reflecting on this, can see a profound beauty and consistency in the doctrine. It seems contradictory only if we impose on God the limitations of created beings (e.g. assuming that three persons must mean three separate beings, which holds for finite creatures but not for the infinite Creator). Once we allow that God is in a category of His own (“His ways are above our ways”), the Trinity can be accepted as a unique mode of existence that has no exact parallel elsewhere – and yet leaves traces in creation (like the image of God in man as rational and loving, which points to a triune original).

  It’s worth noting that Christian theology does not ask us to check our rationality at the door; rather, it asks us to enlarge our intellect by faith. Faith and reason work together (fides et ratio). The mystery of the Trinity is first received by faith in God’s revelation. But faith seeks understanding, and so we use reason to explore and clarify what we can. Aquinas argued that while natural reason cannot demonstrate the Trinity, it can show that the Trinity is fitting (conveniens) and free from contradiction ( Trinity > Judaic and Islamic Objections (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) ). For example, he demonstrates that having only two processions (intellect and will) in God avoids an infinite regress of persons (Aquinas), and that because “whatever is in God is God,” an internal procession implies consubstantiality (Aquinas). These rational reflections reassure the believer that the doctrine hangs together and does not ask one to believe “three equals one” in a simplistic way. In a sense, reason acts as the handmaiden of faith here: it tidies up our language, refutes misunderstandings, and draws out implications, even as the core truth remains a gift beyond unaided reason.

  Thus, the Trinity is mysterious but not absurd. We call it a rational mystery – not in the sense that reason can exhaustively explain it, but in the sense that reason can see the mystery’s contours and affirm its possibility. This stands in contrast to a square circle, which is a true contradiction that no amount of higher understanding can salvage. The Trinity is not like that; it’s more like light split through a prism – appearing as three colors but coming from one pure light. To a mind that only knew monochrome, the spectrum might seem impossible, yet deeper insight shows it to be real and consistent. Similarly, the prism of divine revelation shows us plurality in the one divine Light. Aquinas’ metaphysics – with its concepts of simplicity, relation, substance, personhood – acts as a kind of intellectual prism that helps us make sense of what we are seeing, assuring us it is not nonsense or a trick, but the real nature of the divine being, however ineffable.

  Conclusion

  From a Thomistic perspective, the doctrine of the Trinity emerges as a sublime harmony of unity and plurality in God. We have seen that by deploying the concepts of essence, procession, and relation, St. Thomas Aquinas provides a framework in which Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are understood as distinct persons precisely through their relations of origin, and yet as one being by virtue of the one simple divine essence they each are. Divine simplicity is upheld: God is not composed of parts or lesser elements, and the three persons do not partition the Godhead. Rather, as Aquinas showed, the divine relations are the divine essence in its relational mode, so that “in God, the essence is not really distinct from the person” (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)) and “there are one essence and three persons” (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39)) without contradiction. We addressed the Arian objection by clarifying that the Son’s generation is an internal communication of the fullness of deity, not the creation of a secondary god. The Son is begotten, not made, eternally receiving the one identical divine nature from the Father, and thus He is fully God, co-equal with the Father – a truth rooted in Scripture and articulated at Nicaea against Arius’s subordinationism. We then engaged the Islamic objection, affirming that the Trinity does not compromise God’s oneness: it is a doctrine of one God in three persons, not three gods. Thomistic analysis underscores that the unity of God’s essence is absolute, and the distinctions of person are real but relational. Hence, the Trinity does not entail polytheism or any division in the divine substance. It remains a profound mystery, yes, but one that is coherent in itself and fitting to the nature of a God who is Love and Word eternally. The relational opposition of Father, Son, and Spirit allows for personal differentiation without breaking unity – “everything (in God) is one where there is no opposition of relationship” (Catechism of the Catholic Church | Catholic Culture).

  In the end, the Trinity invites us to adore a God whose inner life is an everlasting communion of love, knowledge, and gift. Aquinas would remind us that our concepts can only go so far; we navigate between the errors of tritheism and modalism by sticking closely to the language of one essence and three relational subsistences, even if we cannot imagine a created example of such a thing. The seeming paradox of the Trinity humbles our intellect, but does not humiliate it – rather, it elevates reason to consider realities above its natural reach. In the Thomistic vision, faith perfects reason, and reason, in turn, finds the Trinity to be not an enemy but a luminous mystery that both satisfies and surpasses our deepest philosophical longings. We conclude that the doctrine of the Trinity, defended on metaphysical grounds by thinkers like Aquinas, stands as a internally consistent and theologically compelling portrayal of the one true God. It is not irrational – indeed, it would be irrational to claim exhaustive understanding of an infinite God. The Trinity is a mystery, but one accessible to reasoned insight and entirely worthy of belief. In the final analysis, the Thomistic approach helps us echo with understanding what Christians have confessed for centuries: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit – the Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity, one God forever and ever. (SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The persons in relation to the essence (Prima Pars, Q. 39))
• 

  slimboyfat

  Hence are we called atheists. And we confess that we are atheists, so far as gods of this sort are concerned, but not with respect to the most true God, the Father of righteousness and temperance and the other virtues, who is free from all impurity. But both Him, and the Son (who came forth from Him and taught us these things, and the host of the other good angels who follow and are made like to Him), and the prophetic Spirit, we worship and adore, knowing them in reason and truth, and declaring without grudging to every one who wishes to learn, as we have been taught. Justin Martyr, First Apology 6.
• 

  aqwsed12345

  @slimboyfat

  JWs and other Arians frequently attempt to co-opt early Christian sources in support of their heretical Christology, particularly their belief that Jesus is actually Michael the Archangel. Now you cite Justin Martyr’s First Apology, chapter 6, where Justin refers to the Father, the Son, and "the host of the other good angels." You suggest that this proves Justin thought of Jesus as one of the angels, perhaps even identifying him with Michael. However, this interpretation distorts both the grammar and theology of the passage and misrepresents Justin’s own clear Christology throughout his works. The original Greek text reads:

  ἀλλ’ ἐκεῖνόν τε καὶ τὸν παρ’ αὐτοῦ υἱὸν ἐλθόντα καὶ διδάξαντα ἡμᾶς ταῦτα, καὶ τὸν τῶν ἄλλων ἑπομένων καὶ ἐξομοιουμένων ἀγαθῶν ἀγγέλων στρατόν, πνεῦμά τε τὸ προφητικὸν σεβόμεθα καὶ προσκυνοῦμεν...

  A literal translation:

  "But Him [the Father], and the Son who came forth from Him and taught us these things, and the host of the other good angels who follow and are made like to Him, and the prophetic Spirit — these we venerate and worship."

  You imply that the phrase "the host of the other good angels who follow and are made like to Him" implies that Jesus is also an angel. However, this is a misreading. The phrase does not say that Jesus is one of the angels. It says the good angels follow Him and are made like to Him — clearly distinguishing Christ from the angels, not identifying Him as one of them. You don't follow or become like someone if you're already ontologically the same as them. The angels are other beings who imitate Christ. If Justin had meant to classify Christ among angels, he would not have placed the Son distinctly before mentioning the angels nor described them as followers of Him.

  Your implication hinges on the term “other” (ἄλλων), suggesting that angels are grouped with the Son as a class. But again, Justin writes of “the host of the other good angels who follow Him and are made like to Him”. The "other" applies to angels, not to the Son. It assumes the existence of one being whom the others follow and imitate — the Son — and places the angels in the category of “other” than Him. In other words: if A is imitated by B and B is called “the other,” then A is not part of the same group as B.

  Though Justin occasionally calls Christ the Angel of the Lord (as in Dialogue with Trypho, chapter 56), he does so in the biblical sense of “messenger” (from angelos) — not to assert that Christ is a created spirit being like Michael. In fact, Justin is clear that Christ is God Himself in multiple places:

  • “He is called God, and Lord of hosts, and Jacob saw Him as man.” (Dialogue with Trypho 61)
  • “We reasonably worship Him, having learned that He is the Son of the true God Himself.” (Dialogue with Trypho 63)
  • “Therefore these words testify explicitly that He is both God and Lord of hosts...” (Dialogue with Trypho 126)

  Far from suggesting that Christ is a created angel, Justin explicitly identifies Him with the pre-existent God who appeared in the Old Testament — the same one called Lord and God. Justin writes in 1 Apology 6:

  “But both Him [the Father], and the Son... and the prophetic Spirit, we worship and adore…”

  To worship the Son is to recognize Him as God, not a created being. Arians deny that worship is due to Jesus, but Justin affirms it boldly. If Justin thought Jesus were an angel like Michael, this would be blatant idolatry — which is unthinkable in a Christian apologetic work aimed at defending the faith before pagan authorities. Also, note: Justin distinguishes between worship due to God and honor given to angels elsewhere:

  “We do not honor with worship those who are only angels, but we honor only the God who is above all…” (Dialogue with Trypho, 6)

  Even critical scholars who analyze Justin’s theology — including those not aligned with Catholic orthodoxy — acknowledge that Justin believed in Christ’s pre-existence and divinity. He refers to the Logos (Word) as:

  • "God" (θεός)
  • "Begotten before all creation"
  • "Agent of creation" (cf. Trypho 62)

  Justin does use subordinationist language, typical of the second century (prior to the full Trinitarian clarification at Nicaea). But subordination in role or order, not essence, was common in pre-Nicene theology and does not imply inequality in nature. Justin’s vocabulary is developmental, not heretical.

  The claim that Justin Martyr taught that Jesus is an angel, or that he identified Christ with Michael, is baseless and misrepresents his theology. Justin:

  • Clearly distinguishes Christ from created angels
  • Teaches the worship of Christ
  • Identifies Him as God, Lord of hosts, and the Logos who appeared to the patriarchs
  • Asserts His pre-existence and divine mission

  Justin is a witness to Christ’s divinity, not a proponent of the Watchtower’s demotion of Christ to a created archangel.

  Bonus: What Do Other Church Fathers Say?

  • “He is Himself in His own right, God and Lord and Eternal King, the Incarnate Word.” - Irenaeus (Against Heresies 3.3.4):
  • “The Son is God of God, and the Word of the Father.” - Tertullian (Against Praxeas):
  • “Do you not understand that this is the God who appeared to Abraham?” - Hippolytus (Against Noetus 10)

  None of these Fathers believed Christ was “just” an angel. The patristic consensus is clear: Christ is true God, consubstantial with the Father, not a created being.
• 

  Duran

  Furthermore, Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25). He claimed to be the resurrection Himself; He has absolute authority over life and death (Revelation 1:18). Jesus is God. He could say He would raise up His body on the third day because He, being God, has power over death.

  SB, you say what you say based on what you read there in John and Rev.

  Do you believe that an angel visited Muhammad and gave him the info to write the Quran?

  Do you believe that an angel visited Joesph Smith and gave him the info for the book of Mormon?
• 

  Blotty

  "our claim that Justin merely meant “a god” in Ex.7:1/Ps.83-sense by using allos theos (another god) is another misreading." - " merely meant “a god” in Ex.7:1/Ps.83" bro is so theologically motvated he thinks I mean something completely different
• 

  peacefulpete

  Again as has been pointed out in detail there is nothing incompatible with the Son being addressed as both God and an Angel. That is the very foundational concept that developed into a second power theology. The angel/man that was also addressed as God in the Genesis theophanies.
• 

  slimboyfat

  You imply that the phrase …

  I’m not implying anything. Justin Martyr’s words speak for themselves, as do your attempts to make his words mean the opposite of what he said.

  I shall attempt to persuade you, since you have understood the Scriptures, [of the truth] of what I say, that there is, and that there is said to be, another God and Lord subject to the Maker of all things; who is also called an Angel, because He announces to men whatsoever the Maker of all things— above whom there is no other God — wishes to announce to them. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, 56
• 

  aqwsed12345

  @slimboyfat

  Many modern Arians, like Jehovah’s Witnesses, claim that early Christian thinkers like Justin Martyr denied the full divinity of Christ and instead viewed Him as a lesser god, or even a created angel like Michael. In particular, they appeal to Dialogue with Trypho 56, where Justin refers to “another God and Lord subject to the Maker of all things” who “is also called an Angel.” They allege this proves Justin taught subordinationist or semi-Arian theology. However, this interpretation collapses under close scrutiny — grammatically, contextually, and theologically. When we read Justin in full and in light of the developing tradition of the Church, we find a consistent affirmation of the Son's true divinity, pre-existence, and distinct personhood within the one divine essence.

  First, let’s clarify Justin’s vocabulary ("Theos kai Kyrios heteros"). In Dialogue with Trypho 56, Justin writes:

  "There is, and there is said to be, another God and Lord subject to the Maker of all things, who is also called an Angel..."

  The Arian reading fixates on the phrase “another God” and concludes that Justin believed in a second, lesser divine being — a created god in the mold of Michael the Archangel. But this distorts Justin's meaning in several ways.

  The Greek phrase “theos kai kurios eteros” does not imply a separate nature or essence. Rather, Justin is using the language of relational distinction, not ontological separation. In context, he is explaining to a Jewish interlocutor how the Old Testament's theophanies — appearances of "the Lord" distinct from “God Most High” — are to be understood. He is not saying Jesus is ontologically different from the Father, but that He is a distinct divine Person within the Godhead. "Another" (eteros) refers to another person, not another being. The Son is distinct from the Father not in nature (essentia), but in relation. This is precisely what Trinitarian theology would later clarify using the language of "hypostasis" and "ousia": one essence, three persons. Justin is expressing the real personal distinction of the Logos, in a time before the Church had developed precise metaphysical vocabulary.

  Yes, Justin says the Son is “subject” (hupotagmenos) to the Maker. But this is not a statement of ontological inferiority. Classical theology distinguishes between order and essence. In the Trinity, the Son is from the Father (as begotten), and so we can speak of an order or relation of origin. But He shares the same divine substance. Thomists recognize this as the basis for the doctrine of eternal generation. Even Thomas Aquinas teaches that the Son is from the Father, but not less than the Father: "In God, to be from another does not imply inferiority, but only distinction of origin." (ST I, q.42, a.4) So when Justin says the Logos is subject to the Father, he is speaking in terms of personal distinction, not inequality in nature.

  Much confusion stems from Justin’s use of the term angelos (ἄγγελος, “angel”) to describe the Son. But to conclude that Justin thought Jesus was ontologically an angel — a created, subordinate being — is simply false. Justin is explicit: the Son is called an angelos because He announces the will of the Father, not because He is a creature:

  "...who is also called an Angel, because He announces to men whatsoever the Maker of all things... wishes to announce." (Dialogue with Trypho, 56)

  This is "angel" as function, not as nature. The term “angelos” here simply means “messenger,” and Justin applies it in this sense to Christ because He is the Logos — the revealer of the Father’s will. This is consistent with biblical usage (e.g., Malachi 3:1 — “the Messenger of the Covenant”), not with Arian or JW theology which conflates messenger with created angelic being. Jesus Christ is true God and true man, in the unity of his divine person. Not an angel, but the eternal Son, made flesh.

  Far from viewing Christ as a created spirit being, Justin teaches:

  • The Logos always existed in God as His Reason (λόγος ἐνδιάθετος) and was begotten into personal existence (λόγος προφορικός) without division (Trypho 61).
  • The Logos is God Himself: “This same one who was begotten by the Father… is very God.” (Trypho 63)
  • The Logos is worshipped, alongside the Father and Spirit (1 Apology 6). Justin knew well that worship is due to God alone.

  These statements are utterly incompatible with Arianism. A created being — no matter how exalted — is not due latria (divine worship). That Justin includes the Son in Christian worship is a powerful testimony to his belief in Christ’s full divinity.

  When Justin speaks of “another God and Lord,” he is not teaching polytheism or henotheism. In Trypho 61, he explains that the Logos is begotten from the Father “not by abscission, as if the essence of the Father were divided,” but by communication of the same essence. Justin here refutes any materialist or literalistic notion of begetting that would imply separation or inequality. Thus, Justin’s “another God” should be read in light of the Johannine “the Word was with the God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). The Son is distinct in person, but consubstantial in essence. Justin affirms the same truth in pre-Nicene language. Even critical scholars who are not Catholic agree with this reading. Denis Minns, O.P., writes:

  “Justin affirms the real personal distinction between the Father and the Son, while insisting on their shared divinity… this is not Arian subordination, but the seed of Trinitarian faith.” (Justin Martyr: Philosopher and Martyr)

  A favorite Arian talking point is Justin’s statement that the Son occupies “second place” to God (1 Apology 13). But again, this speaks to order, not essence. St. Thomas Aquinas writes similarly: “The Son is second to the Father in order of origin, not in nature or dignity.” (ST I, q.42, a.4 ad 3) Even modern Trinitarian theology maintains the taxis (order) within the Trinity: the Father is unbegotten, the Son begotten, the Spirit proceeds. This order does not entail subordination in essence.

  Conclusion: Justin Is No Arian

  • He affirms the eternal pre-existence of the Logos
  • He identifies the Logos as God and Creator
  • He says the Logos is to be worshipped
  • He calls the Logos “begotten,” not “created”
  • He affirms that the Logos shares in the same divine nature
  • He uses “angelos” functionally, not ontologically
  • He distinguishes persons within the divine essence

  Thus, Justin Martyr is not an Arian precursor. He is a pre-Nicene Trinitarian in seed form, articulating the mystery of Father, Son, and Spirit using the philosophical tools and terminology available to him. His theology anticipates the Nicene Creed, and cannot be harmonized with Arian heresy. To claim Justin believed Christ was a created angel like Michael is not only inaccurate — it is a gross distortion of one of the Church’s earliest defenders of Christ’s deity.

  St. Justin Martyr, pray for us, that we may defend the deity of Christ with courage and clarity.
• 

  slimboyfat

  Many modern Arians, like Jehovah’s Witnesses, claim that early Christian thinkers like Justin Martyr denied the full divinity of Christ …

  Do you know of many modern Arians apart from JWs? Can you point me to non-JW Arians who make this “claim”? There probably are, I just don’t know where they are of what they’ve written. I’d be interested to know.