Trinity, Incarnation, and salvation
Posted: Sat Dec 24, 2022 9:53 am
One more good one...
https://snemes2.substack.com/p/trinity- ... -salvation
Trinity, Incarnation, and salvation
Some persons are convinced that persons who do not accept the catholic doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation are not actually Christians and thus are not saved. Of course, this is hardly a new opinion in the history of Christianity. The Quicunque Vult (or so-called “Athanasian Creed”) asserted this point of view around fifteen hundred years ago. This document says that whoever wants to be saved must hold to “the catholic faith” before all else, and it proceeds to define this “catholic faith” in terms of the Nicene-Chalcedonian doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation. It ends with these ominous words: “This is the catholic faith, which unless a person will have believed it faithfully and firmly, it will not be possible for him to be saved.”
Is there any reason to accept this point of view? I do not think so. Quite to the contrary, I think the “Athanasian Creed” could (perhaps a bit uncharitably) be described as a terroristic document. It threatens people with damnation unless they are willingly to believe “faithfully and firmly” such incomprehensible sentences as this: “So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, and yet they are not three Gods, but one God.” Theologians who have studied these issues in detail know that it is far from obvious that sentences like these make any sense. Karl Rahner, for example, wrote that the doctrine of the Trinity is an absolute mystery that we do not understand even after it has been revealed (The Trinity, p. 50). But what else should one call it, then, when people are threatened with hellfire for their inability or unwillingness to believe things that even the most renowned theologians of the past century cannot agree about or make sense of?
I think that the picture of salvation presented in the Bible is rather different. I will give one example that I think is uniquely illustrative, namely the story of Jesus and Zacchaeus from the Gospel of Luke 19:1–10. Jesus is passing through Jericho when a very rich tax collector Zacchaeus hears about it. He goes to see Jesus, but because the crowd is so great and he is so short of stature, he climbs up a tree in order to be able to see the Lord better. Jesus calls him down and tells him that he has to stay at Zacchaeus’s house for the day. Zacchaeus hurries down and is happy to welcome Jesus into his house. The people gathered around start to grumble at the fact that Jesus is going into the house of a notorious sinner like Zacchaeus. But Zacchaeus himself tells Jesus that he will give half of his possessions to the poor and repay fourfold anyone he has defrauded. In response to Zacchaeus’s words, Jesus says: “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost” (v. 10).
What does this passage teach us about salvation? It seems to me that the image is a very simple and clear one. Salvation is a condition of the heart. Salvation “enters into the house of Zacchaeus” when, in response to Jesus’s preaching about God the Father and his kingdom, he determines to live in righteousness and peace with God and with others. He no longer thinks of others as persons whom he can abuse and defraud for his own personal gain, but rather sees his riches as gifts of God by which he can help those who are less fortunate. In a word, Zacchaeus’s salvation consists in his entering into a condition of lived harmony with God, with others, and with himself through Jesus’s teaching. It is a change in his life and way of experiencing himself and everything else; he is put back “in tune” with the world that God wants to create.
If this is what salvation is, then it seems to me clear that belief in the doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation has nothing to do with any of this. A man can come to love God his Father and live as his child in the world without believing that the divine ουσία subsists in three ὑποστάσεις distinguished only by their personal relations of origin or believing that Jesus is one πρόσωπον in two φύσεις. Certainly Jesus never preached any such things, and yet salvation came to the house of Zacchaeus all the same. Holding such opinions is thus entirely irrelevant to the lived experience of salvation, which consists in the fact of coming to love God and others as is appropriate for a person who understands him- or herself to be God’s child.
The doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation are theoretical constructions intended to make sense of certain things the New Testament says about Jesus and his relation to God the Father and the Holy Spirit. They are interpretations of a set of data. People can disagree about these sorts of things. But Jesus’s preaching is like a medicine which produces salvation in us when it changes how we think and feel about ourselves, about others, and about God. You do not need to know how medicine works in order for it to accomplish its proper effect in you. Scientists can even disagree with each other in their theories about how a particular medicine manages to work—and yet it works all the same, notwithstanding this theoretical disagreement about the mechanism by which it works. The same point can be made with respect to salvation. When Jesus teaches that God is our Father who is more eager to take care of us than we are to take care of our own children (Matt. 7:11), and this message produces in us a love for God and a trust in his goodness and providential care that motivates us to change our way of life, then the medicine has worked and we are healed.
Christians who have doubts about the doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation or who do not believe them should not allow themselves to be terrorized by would-be gatekeepers who insist that such doctrines are necessary for salvation. Such persons are rather acting like the Pharisees and scribes whom Jesus criticized for tying up heavy burdens and placing them on the shoulders of others (Matt. 23:4). People who love Christ and who trust in God their Father they threaten with damnation and exclusion from the community for not believing things that many honest professional theologians admit cannot be understood or made sense of. Once again, in my opinion, this is a kind of religious terrorism, even if it is not intentionally so. Jesus never granted to his disciples nor to any who would come afterwards any other authority than that of passing on his own teachings (Matt. 28:18–20), and he never teaches those doctrines in such clear and plain words as would merit insisting upon them so strongly.
Have you come to know that God is your Father who loves you? Do you trust in him with your whole life? Do you see other human beings as your brothers, fellow children of God the Father whom you must love as yourself? Then salvation has entered into your house, irrespective of whether you affirm the consubstantiality of Father and Son or any other such notion. The medicine has worked, regardless of whether you understand how it did so. You do not need to worry about the threats and empty bluster of heresy-hunters. They are like the crowds who complained that Jesus was going into the house of a sinner like Zacchaeus. But Jesus ignored them because he does not judge things as people do. What people despise, he loves. What Jesus wants is the salvation of the lost, which salvation means their reconciliation with God and with their neighbors by a change of their hearts. And if this reconciliation has taken place in you, then you can safely ignore those who demand you believe things that even they do not understand.
I have a PhD in theology, and I studied under some of the most world-renowed theologians alive today. I understand very well what is involved in these disputes from a biblical, historical, theological, and philosophical point of view. I can say for myself that salvation—a new heart, a new life, a new experience of oneself in relation to God and others—is worth more than all the theological knowledge in the world. And I think that anyone will agree who knows what I am talking about and who has experienced that salvation in him- or herself.
Salvation is not something you believe you have because you believe all the right things and check all the right boxes. It is something you know you have because you experience it in yourself, and no one can take that away from you (cf. John 16:22), nor do you need anyone to teach you about something you are experiencing for yourself (cf. 1 John 2:27). The experience speaks for itself, and it seems to me clear that what brings about this experience is being told—not that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are coequal in all things except in the begetting, the being begotten, and the proceeding, nor that the Son is a single ὑπόστασις in two φύσεις rather than being a single φύσις in two unequal modes of existence, but that God is your Father who loves you and takes care of you, and that your neighbor is your brother, equally God’s child whom you are to love as yourself. One could say that salvation means feeling at home in God’s world because you are his child, and the doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation have nothing to do with that.
https://snemes2.substack.com/p/trinity- ... -salvation
Trinity, Incarnation, and salvation
Some persons are convinced that persons who do not accept the catholic doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation are not actually Christians and thus are not saved. Of course, this is hardly a new opinion in the history of Christianity. The Quicunque Vult (or so-called “Athanasian Creed”) asserted this point of view around fifteen hundred years ago. This document says that whoever wants to be saved must hold to “the catholic faith” before all else, and it proceeds to define this “catholic faith” in terms of the Nicene-Chalcedonian doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation. It ends with these ominous words: “This is the catholic faith, which unless a person will have believed it faithfully and firmly, it will not be possible for him to be saved.”
Is there any reason to accept this point of view? I do not think so. Quite to the contrary, I think the “Athanasian Creed” could (perhaps a bit uncharitably) be described as a terroristic document. It threatens people with damnation unless they are willingly to believe “faithfully and firmly” such incomprehensible sentences as this: “So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, and yet they are not three Gods, but one God.” Theologians who have studied these issues in detail know that it is far from obvious that sentences like these make any sense. Karl Rahner, for example, wrote that the doctrine of the Trinity is an absolute mystery that we do not understand even after it has been revealed (The Trinity, p. 50). But what else should one call it, then, when people are threatened with hellfire for their inability or unwillingness to believe things that even the most renowned theologians of the past century cannot agree about or make sense of?
I think that the picture of salvation presented in the Bible is rather different. I will give one example that I think is uniquely illustrative, namely the story of Jesus and Zacchaeus from the Gospel of Luke 19:1–10. Jesus is passing through Jericho when a very rich tax collector Zacchaeus hears about it. He goes to see Jesus, but because the crowd is so great and he is so short of stature, he climbs up a tree in order to be able to see the Lord better. Jesus calls him down and tells him that he has to stay at Zacchaeus’s house for the day. Zacchaeus hurries down and is happy to welcome Jesus into his house. The people gathered around start to grumble at the fact that Jesus is going into the house of a notorious sinner like Zacchaeus. But Zacchaeus himself tells Jesus that he will give half of his possessions to the poor and repay fourfold anyone he has defrauded. In response to Zacchaeus’s words, Jesus says: “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost” (v. 10).
What does this passage teach us about salvation? It seems to me that the image is a very simple and clear one. Salvation is a condition of the heart. Salvation “enters into the house of Zacchaeus” when, in response to Jesus’s preaching about God the Father and his kingdom, he determines to live in righteousness and peace with God and with others. He no longer thinks of others as persons whom he can abuse and defraud for his own personal gain, but rather sees his riches as gifts of God by which he can help those who are less fortunate. In a word, Zacchaeus’s salvation consists in his entering into a condition of lived harmony with God, with others, and with himself through Jesus’s teaching. It is a change in his life and way of experiencing himself and everything else; he is put back “in tune” with the world that God wants to create.
If this is what salvation is, then it seems to me clear that belief in the doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation has nothing to do with any of this. A man can come to love God his Father and live as his child in the world without believing that the divine ουσία subsists in three ὑποστάσεις distinguished only by their personal relations of origin or believing that Jesus is one πρόσωπον in two φύσεις. Certainly Jesus never preached any such things, and yet salvation came to the house of Zacchaeus all the same. Holding such opinions is thus entirely irrelevant to the lived experience of salvation, which consists in the fact of coming to love God and others as is appropriate for a person who understands him- or herself to be God’s child.
The doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation are theoretical constructions intended to make sense of certain things the New Testament says about Jesus and his relation to God the Father and the Holy Spirit. They are interpretations of a set of data. People can disagree about these sorts of things. But Jesus’s preaching is like a medicine which produces salvation in us when it changes how we think and feel about ourselves, about others, and about God. You do not need to know how medicine works in order for it to accomplish its proper effect in you. Scientists can even disagree with each other in their theories about how a particular medicine manages to work—and yet it works all the same, notwithstanding this theoretical disagreement about the mechanism by which it works. The same point can be made with respect to salvation. When Jesus teaches that God is our Father who is more eager to take care of us than we are to take care of our own children (Matt. 7:11), and this message produces in us a love for God and a trust in his goodness and providential care that motivates us to change our way of life, then the medicine has worked and we are healed.
Christians who have doubts about the doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation or who do not believe them should not allow themselves to be terrorized by would-be gatekeepers who insist that such doctrines are necessary for salvation. Such persons are rather acting like the Pharisees and scribes whom Jesus criticized for tying up heavy burdens and placing them on the shoulders of others (Matt. 23:4). People who love Christ and who trust in God their Father they threaten with damnation and exclusion from the community for not believing things that many honest professional theologians admit cannot be understood or made sense of. Once again, in my opinion, this is a kind of religious terrorism, even if it is not intentionally so. Jesus never granted to his disciples nor to any who would come afterwards any other authority than that of passing on his own teachings (Matt. 28:18–20), and he never teaches those doctrines in such clear and plain words as would merit insisting upon them so strongly.
Have you come to know that God is your Father who loves you? Do you trust in him with your whole life? Do you see other human beings as your brothers, fellow children of God the Father whom you must love as yourself? Then salvation has entered into your house, irrespective of whether you affirm the consubstantiality of Father and Son or any other such notion. The medicine has worked, regardless of whether you understand how it did so. You do not need to worry about the threats and empty bluster of heresy-hunters. They are like the crowds who complained that Jesus was going into the house of a sinner like Zacchaeus. But Jesus ignored them because he does not judge things as people do. What people despise, he loves. What Jesus wants is the salvation of the lost, which salvation means their reconciliation with God and with their neighbors by a change of their hearts. And if this reconciliation has taken place in you, then you can safely ignore those who demand you believe things that even they do not understand.
I have a PhD in theology, and I studied under some of the most world-renowed theologians alive today. I understand very well what is involved in these disputes from a biblical, historical, theological, and philosophical point of view. I can say for myself that salvation—a new heart, a new life, a new experience of oneself in relation to God and others—is worth more than all the theological knowledge in the world. And I think that anyone will agree who knows what I am talking about and who has experienced that salvation in him- or herself.
Salvation is not something you believe you have because you believe all the right things and check all the right boxes. It is something you know you have because you experience it in yourself, and no one can take that away from you (cf. John 16:22), nor do you need anyone to teach you about something you are experiencing for yourself (cf. 1 John 2:27). The experience speaks for itself, and it seems to me clear that what brings about this experience is being told—not that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are coequal in all things except in the begetting, the being begotten, and the proceeding, nor that the Son is a single ὑπόστασις in two φύσεις rather than being a single φύσις in two unequal modes of existence, but that God is your Father who loves you and takes care of you, and that your neighbor is your brother, equally God’s child whom you are to love as yourself. One could say that salvation means feeling at home in God’s world because you are his child, and the doctrines of Trinity and Incarnation have nothing to do with that.