"Ungodly perversions"

CORAM DEO SAID:

“The objection at hand is the violation of God's prohibition against human beings' efforts to image Him contra the 2nd Commandment. This crystal-clear position is also echoed by the voice of the Westminster divines, the Three Forms of Unity, the overwhelming consensus of the Reformers and Puritans, and most of the orthodox, confessional, creedal Reformed churches today.”

i) Of course, that’s the last-ditch resort of somebody who doesn’t have a real argument. And it’s interchangeable with the modus operandi of Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox apologists. Strange bedfellows.

ii) Triablogue takes sola Scriptura seriously. We don’t use Scripture to rubberstamp our favorite traditions.

iii) To my knowledge, the OPC and PCA don’t enforce the Puritan theory of worship. Not to mention the Reformed Anglican tradition, which is not aniconic.

“God has condescended to express Himself in His Word in many wonderful and glorious ways. His Word is His highest and fullest self-expression to mankind.”

Actually, God expresses himself in many different ways. In his Word. Theophanies. The tabernacle. The Incarnation.

“Thus human efforts to image the 2nd Person of the Triune Godhead is prohibited by the 2nd Commandment.”

So you’re accusing the Apostle John of violating the 2nd Commandment by using picture language to depict Jesus (Rev 1:13-16).

“Any effort to image Christ's ‘divinity’ fails miserably since the ineffable deity of the One True and Living God cannot be imaged.”

So the Incarnation “failed miserably” inasmuch as human observers couldn’t detect the ineffable deity of Christ from his physical appearance.

“Any effort to image Christ's humanity fails miserably since He was a unique human being with unique features, and no one knows what He looked like during His humiliation.”

i) That would only be a miserable failure if a visual representation is supposed to be photographically realistic. And where’s the argument for that assumption?

ii) Is Rev 1:13-16 a photographically realistic depiction of Jesus, or does that include some symbolic details? If the latter, does that make Rev 1:13-16 a miserable failure?

“Furthermore any effort to image Christ's humanity apart from His divinity is to slip into functional Nestorianism since such would be to bifurcate the God-man.”

Well, according to the Fourth Gospel, Jesus’ miracles are divine indicia. And Western art frequently depicts the miracles of Jesus. In so doing it bears witness to the divinity as well as humanity of Christ.

“Therefore any and all representations of any of the Persons of the Godhead are pure speculation, the product of a sinful human being's sinfully corrupted imagination.”

So Daniel’s picturesque description of the Father (Dan 7:9) is pure speculation, the product of a sinful human being's sinfully corrupted imagination.

“With this in mind it becomes clear that all endeavors to defend or offer counterarguments against God's 2nd Commandment prohibition against human efforts to image Him are sinful, and sinfully motivated. Thus those who image God, and their erswhile apologists (or e-pologists), enablers, and defenders are partakers of the same bitter root of sin.”

So we should eject Daniel and Revelation from the canon (not to mention other Scriptures containing sinful and sinfully motivated throne visions).

“With this in mind it becomes obvious that all involved in this type of sinful behavior are to be rebuked and called to repentance for their ungodly perversions.”

With this in mind it becomes obvious that Daniel, John, et al. are to be rebuked and called to repentance for their ungodly perversions.