No one knows the Father but the Son

He brings up the Mandelbrot set. This is an abstract object. It doesn’t have parts, but rather members. Is he suggesting that the Trinity is a set, with members rather than parts? That it has infinite members? I don’t know.

i) Tuggy doesn’t seem to be trying very hard. My replies are pegged to his objections.

He suggested that on my view, the Trinity is “a complex whole, a compound Self who has three parts (the three divine selves), and these three parts are exactly alike one another.”

I countered with the Mandelbrot set to point out that this erroneously defines a “complex” entity as a “compound” entity with a part/whole relation.

That would be true for a complex concrete object, viz. an object with spatial and/or temporal divisibles.

But assuming that God subsists outside of space and time, then even if God were a complex entity, that wouldn’t make him a compound entity, with a part/whole composition.

ii) Moreover, God is analogous to abstract objects in certain respects. Like abstract objects, God subsists outside of space and time. Like (some) abstract objects, the divine nature is imitable. Take the Medieval exemplarist tradition.

So abstract objects are, in fact, one way to model God. Like any theological model, that has limitations.

iii) Furthermore, as I mentioned at the time, the Mandelbrot set has the property of internal self-similarity. In that respect it’s like the Trinity. 

So it’s a counterexample to his statement.

Then, a digression about analogy. Of course, my point was: don’t you think God is literally a self? (Not: Is God analogous to a self?)

Perhaps he assumes that all terms that apply to God do so only analogically. I think that’s obviously false; we have terms that express concepts abstract to be satisfied by either God or a creature. e.g. “exists,” “conscious,” “similar to God.”

It’s odd for him to set “similar to God” in contrast to analogies. What’s similarity if not an analogy?

I conclude, then, that in his view there are three, not four conscious beings here, and three points of view. It’s just that each also can (and always does, I assume) adopt the viewpoint of both the others.

That’s one thing he got right.

About his “data” of revelation; he’s unable to see that some of these are precisely what are at issue. In other words, he begs the question, because he’s not able to adopt the perspective of those he would refute.

i) Of course, that’s mere assertion on his part. It hasn’t the semblance a counterargument.

ii) I’m the one, not Tuggy, who’s been doing the exegetical spadework in this debate.

This looks to me basically like a poorly developed “social” Trinity theory.

We have three beings here, each of which fully has the property of divinity. Thus, it looks like we have three gods. Yes, I know that surely he intends it to be monotheistic. So, the theory seems inconsistent.

Are they three “beings”? I already discussed the ambiguities of that characterization in a previous post. Try again.

What is the Trinity? A group? A composite thing? A set with members? A quasi-self? He doesn’t know. But it seems that he wants to deny the one God to literally be a self. If so, he goes hard against the Bible, throughout. God knows, acts, gets mad, makes and carries out plans, stands in an I-thou relationship to Jesus, as well as to disciples of Jesus. Further, I’m willing to bet that like just about all Christians, he interacts with God as a self to a self.

But that’s so pitifully one-side. Yes, the Bible uses “self-ish” descriptors for God, but it also uses “selv-ish” descriptors for God–as Tuggy  defines selfhood. "Selves" as well as "self."

Not only do we have I-thou language between God and man, but we have I-thou language within the Godhead. Take the I-thou language between the Father, Son, and Spirit in Jn 14-17. And that’s just for starters.

Selfhood doesn’t preselect for a unitarian reading of the Bible over a Trinitarian reading of the Bible. Of course, Tuggy will deny that the Son and Spirit are divine parties, but that’s a separate argument, which invites a separate counterargument.

Evidently, Steve hopes that positing perfect mental access between the three deities will somehow imply their being one god.

Evidently, Tuggy can't follow his own argument.

I didn’t posit that to show how they are one God. Rather, Tuggy raised the issue of “selfhood,” which, among other things, he defined in terms of whether the Trinity has one, three, or four viewpoints. That’s what I was responding to.

But, that has not been shown. It looks like a picture of three gods with perfect access to each others’ minds.

I think this is all a poor fit with the Bible.

I think that’s a pretty good fit with the Bible. The Father, Son, and Spirit enjoy exhaustive knowledge of each other:

No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him (Mt 11:27).

10These things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God (1 Cor 2:10-11).

But laying aside that, is it creedally orthodox? Not clear. While the creeds say that all three must be “homoousios”, they also say that the Son is true God from true God. In Steve’s theory, does the Son derive his existence or divinity from the Father? I don’t know. All he’s said is that all three equally and fully possess divinity. So, I don’t know if his theory is orthodox by (small-c) catholic standards.

Several issues here:

i) Tuggy fails to distinguish between an orthodox analogy and an orthodox doctrine. Any analogy involves a degree of disanalogy.

For instance, the Bible is full of theological metaphors for God. Metaphors are analogies. Are these analogies orthodox?

Take the father/son analogy. If you press that analogy beyond its intended scope, then that would be a heterodox analogy.

When we use analogies to illustrate the Trinity, our analogies will be incomplete, like any analogy. If you isolate the analogy, refuse to make allowance for the limitations of the analogy, overextend the analogy, then you could say that’s a heterodox analogy.

But any theological analogy or metaphor will fall short in some respect or another. And that’s true of analogies in general, not just theological analogies.

Yet it’s an elementary mistake to confuse a heterodox illustration with the doctrine it illustrates. In principle, a heterodox illustration can illustrate an orthodox doctrine. The inherent limitations of the illustration in no way impugn the orthodoxy of the doctrine.

The truth or falsity of a doctrine is logically independent of whatever analogies may be used to illustrate a doctrine. That’s a datum of divine revelation. The illustration doesn’t make it true or false. The illustration is simply a comparison designed to facilitate understanding or present a counterexample to a particular type of objection.

Moreover, the illustration is only heterodox if one misapplies the illustration in a wooden manner. An illustration is just that–merely illustrative.

ii) I don’t say unitarianism is heretical because unitarianism runs counter to historic creeds. Rather, unitarianism is heretical because it runs counter to the Bible. And does so on a matter of central importance.

I’m Protestant. My rule of faith is sola Scriptura.

iii) As a matter of fact, I do reject the traditional dogma or theologumenon which makes the Father the fons deitas. I’ve defended my position elsewhere.