Chapter XXIV: Appendix: Critical Notices (3)

Another position of Dr. Thompson is, however, so extraordinary, that it needs more consideration. His fifth proposition is this: “_The high and sacred Fatherhood which the gospel reveals is a Fatherhood in Christ towards those who love him, and not a general Fatherhood of indiscriminate love and blessing for the race._”

A certain want of logical clearness in our author’s mind appears in the very statement of this proposition. He joins together a positive and a negative, which have no antithetical relation. We entirely agree with him, that the Fatherhood of God is _not_ one of _indiscriminate_ love and blessing for the race; but we utterly reject the proposition, that the Fatherhood which Christ reveals is only one towards those who love him. The apostle John tells us that “we love him because he first loved us.” And again: “Herein is love; not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” The doctrine of the apostle is exactly opposite to that of Dr. Thompson. The modern divine teaches that God only loves those who first love him; but the ancient divine teaches that only by God’s loving us first do we come to love him. Nor is this doctrine peculiar to John. It is a fundamental truth of the New Testament, that God’s fatherly love, manifested to the soul, creates an answering love, and that nothing else can create it. Jesus said of the woman, “She loved much; but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.” God’s forgiving love comes first, and creates a grateful love in return. And again we read (John 3:16), “God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son.” He therefore loved the world while it was still alienated from him. And again we are told by the Saviour (Matt. 5:44) to “love our enemies, that we may be the children of our Father in heaven,” who loves his enemies.

Possibly our friend may say, “Yes, God loves the sinner; but he does not love him with a _fatherly_ love, but only with a general love.” Perhaps a copy of the New Testament may be used in the Tabernacle Church, New York, which does not contain the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Only on some such supposition can we account for this assertion of Dr. Thompson, that “the high and sacred Fatherhood which the gospel reveals is a Fatherhood in Christ towards those who love him.” Is that “_high and sacred Fatherhood of God_” revealed anywhere more fully and plainly than in this parable? and does it not teach expressly that the father loved the son, while he was absent, as a son? Is not his joy at the return of his son the evidence of that love which clung to him while he was away? Even after the son returned, he had not begun to love his father as a son: he did not think he had any right to do so. He did not expect that his father would love him again: he only expected to be as a servant. It is evidently, then, utterly false to say that God’s Fatherhood, revealed in the gospel, is only a Fatherhood towards those who love him: it is a Fatherhood to those who hate him and to those who fear him. His love creates theirs, and is not created by it. Such a doctrine as this of Dr. Thompson, if generally believed, would sap the foundations of Christian life, and turn the gospel of reconciling grace into a cold system of retribution.

As a proof of this melancholy opinion,—an opinion which takes the life out of the gospel,—the author relies chiefly on that passage in which Jesus says to the Jews that they were of their father the devil. (John 8:44.) From this he argues that they had no right to regard God as Father, and that no one has that right except pious believers in Christ. But was not God at that very moment their Father, in the same way that the father of the prodigal son was his father while he was yet in the far country? The prodigal son could not see his father’s love: while absent from him, he could not tell how much his father loved him. Only when he returned, and came back to his father’s house, could he behold that blessed countenance and feel that pardoning love. But none the less did his father love him during all that absence; none the less did he desire his return.

When Jesus said to the unbelieving Jews, “Ye are of your father the devil,” was he describing God’s state of mind, or their state of mind? Did he mean that God was alienated from them, or that they were alienated from God? He evidently meant to say that they were in a _devilish_ state of mind; that in their character and feelings they partook of the spirit of the devil, and not of the spirit of God. He was describing their position in relation to God, not God’s position in relation to them. The text, therefore, appears to have no direct bearing on the subject. It teaches, indeed, that they could have no truly filial feeling towards God; but it does not show that he might not have a truly parental feeling towards them. If they could not truly say, “Abba, Father,” he could say, “My son, give me thy heart.”

We dwell on this because our author seems to us to have assumed a position injurious, if not fatal, to the most vital force of the gospel. That which subdues and converts the heart, and makes all things new in the soul, is not to be told, that God will be our Father when we love him, but that he is our Father now. “Herein is love; not that we loved God, but that he loved us.” “God commends his love toward us, that, _while we were sinners_, Christ died for us.” But why multiply quotations to prove that which is written on the face of the gospel, and to which all Christian experience bears testimony? It is God’s love to us, descending in Christ, while we are estranged and far off, which draws up our affection to him: it is not our love which takes the initiative, and draws his down.

The sixth position argues future retribution from the demerit of sin, and asserts that “no punishment equal to the demerit of sin is, or can be, inflicted in the present life.”

The boldness of this proposition is only equalled by the poverty of the reasoning by which it is supported. To assert that it is not in the power of God adequately to punish sin in this world, is to profess a knowledge of the resources of Omnipotence, and an acquaintance with the deserts of man, which it seems to us presumptuous to claim. On this point it is not necessary to enlarge. An _a priori_ argument to prove that God cannot punish sin in this life as much as it deserves to be punished, can carry conviction to no mind which possesses any intellectual humility.

The seventh position declares that “there is no conceivable mode and no revealed promise by which the Fatherhood of God can make one, dying in impenitence and unbelief, holy and blessed in the future world.”

This is, of course, the very key-stone of the argument in support of the doctrine of everlasting punishment. The burden of proof rests upon those who assert that doctrine. It is not enough that Scripture does not expressly declare that there is an opportunity in the other life for repentance and pardon; for Scripture is dealing with us in this life, and has no occasion to say much of the opportunities of the other. Those who wish to prove that there is no opportunity hereafter must show some text which expressly declares it. No such text is produced, and there is no such text in the Bible. If Jesus had said, “You must repent in this life, for after death there will be no opportunity;” or, “At death, man’s spiritual condition is finally determined;” or, “After this life, man cannot turn from evil to good,”—we should have some distinct proof of the doctrine. But now we have none.

The Parable of Dives and Lazarus is referred to more than once by our author in support of his position. It is sufficient to say in regard to this, that the most Orthodox commentators, provided they are scholars, expressly deny that this refers to the doctrine of everlasting punishment. Olshausen, for instance, says, “Rightly to understand the whole delineation, we must, above all, keep clearly in view, that it is not everlasting salvation or condemnation which is here described, but the middle state of departed souls, between death and the resurrection.” “In our parable, there is no possible reference to the everlasting condemnation of the rich man, inasmuch as the germ of love, and of faith in love, is clearly expressed in his words.” The word translated “hell” in this parable is not Gehenna, but Hades.

Our author says, and says justly, that we can form no opinion as to another probation hereafter from _a priori_ reasoning, but that the question must be answered only from Scripture. Having said this, he immediately proceeds to argue it, _a priori_, stating that there are only three conceivable modes by which those dying impenitent can be saved; and then tries to show that neither is possible. After this, he quotes a few passages bearing only indirectly, and by inference, upon the question. The Parable of the Ten Virgins is one of these, because in it it is said, “The door is shut;” and, “Depart! I know you not.” With regard to this parable, also, Olshausen says that “the words ‘I know you not’ cannot denote eternal condemnation;” that the foolish virgins were “saved, but not sanctified;” and that the parable does not distinguish between the penitent and the impenitent, but between the penitent believers who watch and those who do not watch.

Of course, we have not been able to notice all the arguments of this book, or all the texts referred to; but we have perhaps said enough to show that its positions are not all tenable, and that its arguments are not absolutely unanswerable. This book of Dr. Thompson, though able, cannot be called conclusive.

§ 5. Defence of the Trinity, by Frederick D. Huntington, D. D.

The last section of this Appendix shall be devoted to an examination and criticism of Dr. Huntington’s sermon, printed some time since, in defence of the Trinity. The course of our argument will be as follows. We shall give the reasons which have induced Unitarians to reject the Church doctrine of the Trinity; also examining Dr. Huntington’s positions and arguments in its support.

The principal reasons, then, for rejecting the Church doctrine of the Trinity, as assigned by Unitarians, are these:—

1. That it is nowhere taught in the New Testament.

2. That every statement of the Trinity, which has ever been made, has been either, (1.) Self-contradictory; (2.) Unintelligible; (3.) Tritheistic; or, (4.) Unitarian, in the form of Sabellianism, or of Arianism.

3. That the arguments for it are inadequate.

4. That the arguments against it are overwhelming.

5. That the good ascribed to it does not belong to it, but to the truths which underlie it.

6. That great evils to the Church come from it.

7. That it is a doctrine of philosophy, and not of faith.

8. That we can trace its gradual historic formation in the Christian Church.

9. That it is opposed to a belief in the real divinity of Christ, and to a belief in his real humanity; thus undermining continually the faith of the Church in the divine humanity of Christ Jesus the Lord.

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Proceeding, then, to an examination of these reasons, we say,—

I. The Church doctrine of the Trinity is nowhere stated in the New Testament.

To prove this, as it is a negative proposition, would require us to go through the whole New Testament. But we are saved this necessity by the fact that we have a statement on this point from one of Dr. Huntington’s own witnesses, and one on whom he mainly relies. He brings forward Neander, the great Church historian, as a believer in the Trinity (p. 361), and again (p. 378), by an error which he has since candidly admitted, quotes him as saying, “It is the fundamental article of the Christian faith,”—which is just what he denies in the following passage. We call Neander to the stand, however, _now_, to have his unimpeachable testimony as a Trinitarian (and a Trinitarian claimed by Dr. Huntington with pride) to the fact, that the doctrine of the Trinity is nowhere stated in the New Testament. This is what Neander says of the Trinity, in the first volume of his great work on Church History (p. 572, Torrey’s translation):—

“We now proceed to the doctrine in which Theism, taken in its
connection with the proper and fundamental essence of
Christianity, or with the doctrine of redemption, finds its
ultimate completion—_the doctrine of the Trinity_. This doctrine
does not strictly belong to the fundamental articles of the
Christian faith, as appears sufficiently evident from the fact,
that it _is expressly held forth in no one particular passage of
the New Testament_; for the only one in which it is done, the
passage relating to the three that, bear record (1 John 5:7), is
undoubtedly spurious, and in its ungenuine shape, testifies to the
fact, how foreign such a collocation is from the style of the New
Testament Scriptures. We find in the New Testament no other
fundamental article than that of which the apostle Paul says, that
other foundation can no man lay than that is laid—the annunciation
of Jesus as the Messiah.”

With this authority we might be content. But Dr. Huntington differs from Neander in thinking that Jesus has himself stated the doctrine of the Trinity, and stated it clearly and fully, in the baptismal formula. (Matt. 28:19.) He says that this is “a clear and full declaration of the fundamental article of Christian belief.” He says, “Now, if ever, Christ will distinctly proclaim the doctrine of Christendom;” and he then declares that Christ, in this passage, told his Church to baptize “in the Triune name.”(90)

Not in the Tri_une_ name, certainly. This is an assumption of our friend. He may think that this is implied; that this is to be inferred; that this is what Christ meant; but certainly it is not what Christ said. Christ gives us here _three_ objects of baptism, no doubt; but he does not say that they are one. How far this baptismal formula is “a clear and full declaration” of the doctrine of the Trinity will appear thus. The doctrine of the Trinity declares,—

1. That the Father is God.

2. That the Son is God.

3. That the Holy Ghost is God.

4. That the Holy Ghost is a person, like the Father and the Son.

5. That these three persons constitute one God.

Of these five propositions, all of which are essential to the doctrine of the Trinity, _not one is stated in the baptismal formula_. Christ here says _nothing_ about the deity of the Father, the Son, or the Holy Ghost; _nothing_ about the personality of either of them; and _nothing_ about their unity: It is difficult to conceive, therefore, how Dr. Huntington can bring himself to call this a command to baptize in the Triune name.

Dr. Huntington adds, “Our faith is summoned to the three persons, of the one God.” But nothing is said of three _persons_; nothing is said of their being one God.

He says, “No hint is given that there is any difference of nature, dignity, duration, power, or glory, between them.”

We admit it, but also say, that no hint is given of any _equality_ of nature, dignity, duration, power, or glory, between them. Which way, then, is the argument? Christ does not state, on the one hand, that the three are unequal or different: he does not state, on the other hand, that they are equal and the same. The inference of proof from this fact seems to us to be this: If the apostles, when Christ spoke to them, were already full believers in the church doctrine of the Trinity, the fact that Christ did not deny it would be an argument in its favor; but if the apostles were, at that time, wholly ignorant of the Trinity, then the fact, that he did not assert it distinctly, at least shows that he did not mean to teach it at that time. That inference appears to us a very modest one. But Dr. Huntington will admit that they did not know the doctrine; for he tells us that it was the purpose of Christ to teach it to them at that time. To which we can only reply, If he meant to teach the doctrine, why did he not teach it?

That the _word_ TRINITY is not to be found in the New Testament, and that it was invented by Tertullian, is a matter of little consequence; but that the doctrine itself should be nowhere stated in the New Testament we conceive to be a matter of very great consequence. We have seen that Dr. Huntington’s attempt to show that it _is_ stated in the baptismal formula is a failure. If not stated there, we presume that he will not maintain that it is stated anywhere. We therefore agree with Neander in saying, that, whether the doctrine be true or not, it is not taught distinctly in the New Testament. If taught at all, it is only taught inferentially; that is, it is a matter of reasoning, not a matter of faith. It is metaphysics: it is not religion.

II. The second reason why Unitarians reject the Church doctrine of the Trinity is this:—

That every statement of the Trinity has proved, on examination, to be either, (1.) A contradiction in terms; or, (2.) Unintelligible; or, (3.) Tritheistic; or, (4.) Unitarianism under a Trinitarian form.

Let us examine this objection. What is the general statement of the Trinity, as made by the Orthodox Church, Catholic and Protestant? Fortunately, this question is easily answered.

Orthodoxy has been consistent since the middle ages in its general statement, however much it may have varied in its explanations of what it meant by that statement.

The doctrine of the Trinity, as it stands in the creeds of the churches, is this:—

There is in the nature of God three persons,—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost,—and these three are one being. They are the same in substance, equal in power and glory. Each of these three persons is very God, infinite in all attributes; and yet there are not three Gods, but one God.

According to the general doctrine of Orthodoxy, the unity of God is in being, essence, and substance; that is, God is one being, God is one essence, God is one substance. The threefold division stops short of the being of God: it does not penetrate to his essential nature: it does not divide his substance.

What, then, is the Trinity? It is a Trinity of persons.

But what is meant by “person,” as used in this doctrine? According to the common and familiar use of the word at the present time, three persons are three beings. Personality expresses the most individual existence imaginable. If, therefore, the word “person” is to be taken according to the common use of the phrase, the doctrine of the Trinity would be evidently a contradiction in terms. It would be equivalent to saying, God is one being, but God is three beings; which again would be equivalent to saying that one is three.

Now, Trinitarians generally are too acute and clear-sighted to fall into such a palpable contradiction as this. It is a common accusation against them, that they believe one to be three, and three one; but this charge is, in most cases, unjust. This would be only true in case they affirmed that God is three in the same way in which he is one; but they do not usually say this. They declare that he is one being,—not three beings. They declare that the threefold distinction relates to personality, not to being, and that they use the word “person,” not in the common sense, but in a peculiar sense, to express, as well as they can, a distinction, which, from the poverty of language, no word can be found to express exactly. Thus St. Augustine confessed, long ago, “We say that there are three persons, not in order to say anything, but in order not to be wholly silent.” _Non ut aliquid diceretur, sed ut ne taceretur._ And so Archbishop Whately, in the notes to his Logic, regrets that the word “person” should ever have been used by our divines; and says, “If _hypostasis_, or any other completely foreign word, had been used instead, no idea at all would have been conveyed, except that of the explanation given; and thus the danger, at least, of being misled by a word, would have been avoided.”

(1.) _The Unintelligible Statement._

The Trinitarian thus avoids asking us to believe a contradiction; but, in avoiding this, he runs upon another rock—that, namely, of not asking us to believe anything at all; for if “person” here does _not_ mean what it commonly means, and if it be impossible, from the poverty of language, to define precisely the idea which is intended by it, we are then asked to believe a proposition which Trinitarians themselves are unable to express. But a proposition which is not expressed is no proposition. A proposition, any important term of which is unintelligible, is wholly unintelligible.

To make this matter clear, let us put it into a conversational form. We will suppose that two persons meet together,—one a Unitarian, the other a Trinitarian.

_Trinitarian._ You do not believe the Trinity? Then you cannot be saved. No one can be saved who denies the Trinity. It is a vital and fundamental doctrine.

_Unitarian._ Tell me what it is, and I will see if I can believe it. What is the Trinity?

_Trin._ God exists as one being, but three persons.

_Unit._ What do you mean by “person”? Do you mean a person like Peter, James, or John?

_Trin._ No; we use “person” from the poverty of language. We do not mean that.

_Unit._ What, then, do you mean by it?

_Trin._ It is a mystery. We cannot understand it precisely.

_Unit._ I have no objection to the doctrine being mysterious; I believe a great many things which are mysterious; but I don’t want the _language_ to be mysterious. You might as well use a Greek, or a Hebrew, or a Chinese word, and ask me to believe that there are three _hypostases_ or three _prosopa_ in Deity, if you do not tell me what you mean by the word “person.”

_Trin._ It is a great mystery. It is a matter of _faith_, not of _reasoning_. You must believe it, and not speculate about it.

_Unit._ Believe _it_? Believe _what_? I am waiting for you to tell me what I am to believe. I am ready to exercise my faith; but you are tasking, not my faith, but my knowledge of language. I suppose that you do not wish me to believe _words_, but thoughts. I wish to look through the word, and see what thought lies behind it.

Now, it seems to us that this is a very fair demand of the Unitarian. To ask us to believe a proposition, any important term of which is unintelligible, is precisely equivalent to asking us to believe no proposition at all. Let us listen to Paul: “Even things without life, giving sound, whether pipe or harp, except they give a distinction in the sounds, how shall it be known what is piped or harped? For, if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself for battle? So likewise ye, except ye utter by the tongue words easy to be understood, how shall it be known what is spoken? _for ye shall speak into the air_.... For, if I know not the meaning of the voice, I shall be unto him that speaketh a barbarian; and he that speaketh, a barbarian unto me.”

It is of no use to talk about mystery in order to excuse ourselves for not using intelligible language. That which is _mysterious_ is one thing; that which is _unintelligible_ is quite another thing. We may understand what a mystery is, though we cannot comprehend _how_ it is; but that which is unintelligible we neither comprehend nor understand at all. We neither know _how_ it is, nor _what_ it is. Thus, for example, the fact of God’s foreknowledge and man’s freedom is a mystery. I cannot comprehend how God can foreknow what I am to do to-morrow, and yet I be free to do it or not to do it. I cannot comprehend how Jesus should be delivered to death by the determined counsel and foreknowledge of God, and yet the Jews have been free agents in crucifying him and accountable for it. These things are mysteries; but they are not unintelligible as doctrines. I see what is meant by them. There is no obscurity in the assertion that God foreknows everything, nor in the other assertion that man is a free agent. I can see clearly what is implied _in both statements_, although my mind cannot grasp both, and bring them together, and show the way in which they may be reconciled. So, too, infinity is a mystery. We cannot comprehend it. Our mind cannot go round it, grasp it, sustain it. Our thought sinks baffled before the attempt to penetrate to the depth of such a wonderful idea. But we understand well enough what is meant by infinity. There is nothing obscure in _the statement_ of the fact, that the universe is unbounded. So the way in which a flower grows from its seed is mysterious. We cannot comprehend how the wonderful principle of life can be wrapped up in those little folds, and how it can cause the root to strike downward, and the airy stalk to spring lightly upward, and the leaves to unfold, and, last of all, the bright, consummate flower to open its many-colored eye. But certainly we can understand very well _the statement_ that a flower grows, though we do not comprehend how it grows.

Do not, then, tell us, when you have announced a doctrine, the language of which is unintelligible, that you have told us a mystery. You have done no such thing. Your proposition is not mysterious: it is unintelligible. It is not a mystery: it is only a mystification.

(2.) _The Tritheistic Statement._

Leaving, then, this ground of mystery, and attempting to define move clearly what he means by three persons and one substance, the Trinitarian often sinks the Unity in the Triplicity, and so runs ashore upon Tritheism. This happens when he explains the term “person” as implying independent existence; in which case the Unity is changed into Union. Then we have really three Gods: the FATHER, who devises the plan of redemption; the SON, who goes forth to execute it; and the HOLY SPIRIT, who sanctifies believers. If there are these three distinct beings, they can be called one God only as they are one in will, in aim, in purpose,—only as they agree perfectly on all points. The Unity of God, then, becomes only a unity of agreement, not a unity of being. This is evidently not the Unity which is taught in the Bible, where Jesus declares that the _first of all the commandments is_, “Hear, O Israel! the Lord our God is ONE Lord.”

Moreover, against such a Trinity as this there are insuperable objections, from grounds of reason as well as of Scripture. For God is the Supreme Being, the Most High; and how can there be _three_ Supreme Beings, three Most High Gods? Again: God is the First Cause; but if the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are each God, and all equal in power and majesty, and have each an independent existence, then there are three first causes; which is evidently impossible. Again: one of the attributes of God is his independent or absolute existence. A being who depends on another cannot be the Supreme God. The Father, Son, and Spirit, therefore, cannot depend on each other; for each, by depending on another, would cease to be the independent God. But, if they do not depend on each other, then each ceases to be God, who is the First Cause; for that being is not the First Cause who has two other beings independent of him. Other arguments of the same kind might be adduced to show that there cannot be three necessary beings. In fact, all the arguments from reason, which go to prove the Unity of God, prove a unity of nature, not of agreement.

“But why argue against Tritheism?” you may say. “Are any Tritheists?” Yes: many Trinitarians are in reality Tritheists, by their own account of themselves. There are many who make the _Unity_ of God a mere unity of agreement, and talk about the society in the Godhead, and the _intercourse_ between the Father, Son, and Spirit.(91)

Opposed to this kind of Trinity is another view, in which the Unity is preserved, but the Trinity lost. According to this view, God is one Being, who reveals himself in three ways,—as Father, as Son, as Spirit,—or sustains three relations, or manifests himself in three modes of operation. The Trinity here becomes a nominal thing, and is, in reality, only Unitarianism with an Orthodox name. This kind of Trinity also is very prevalent, and is the one really maintained by men of high standing in the Orthodox Church, both in Europe and America. According to this view, the word “person” in the doctrine of the Trinity means the same as the corresponding word in Greek and Latin formerly meant; namely, the outward character, not the inward individuality. Thus Cicero says, “I, being one, sustain three persons or characters; my own, that of my client, and that of the judge”—_Ego unus, sustineo tres personas_.

This view of the Trinity is commonly called Modalism, or Sabellianism, and is also widely held by those who call themselves Trinitarians. It is, in fact, only Unitarianism under a Trinitarian name.(92)

(3.) _The Subordination View._

Avoiding these two extremes, and yet wishing to retain a distinct idea of Unity and Tri-personality, the Trinitarian is necessarily driven upon a third view, in which the Father is the only really Supreme and Independent Being, the Son and the Holy Spirit subordinate and dependent.

This view, which is called the subordination scheme, or Arianism, is Unitarianism again in another form; and this view also is entertained by many who still retain the name of “Trinitarians.” According to this view, the Son and the Holy Ghost are really God, but are so by a derived divinity. God the Father communicates his divinity to the Son and the Holy Ghost. This is the view really taken in the Nicene Creed, though adopted in opposition to the Arians, and was the doctrine of the earliest Church Fathers before the Arian controversy began. In the Nicene Creed, we read that the Son is “God of (ἐκ) God, Light of (ἐκ) Light, true God of true God;” the “_of_” here being the same as “from,” and denoting origin and derivation.

This doctrine seems, in reality, to have less in its favor than either of the others. By calling the Son and Holy Spirit God, it contrives to make three distinct Gods, and so is Tritheism; and yet, by making them dependent on the Father, it becomes Unitarianism again. Thus, singularly enough, this attempt at making a compromise between Unity and Trinity loses both Unity and Trinity; for it makes three Gods, and so loses the Unity; and yet it makes Christ not “God over all,” not the Supreme Being, and so loses the Trinity.

Between these different views, between Tritheism, Sabellianism, and Arianism, the Orthodox Trinity has always swung to and fro,—inclining more to one or to the other according to the state of controversy in any particular age. When the Arian or Tritheistic views were proclaimed and defended, the Orthodoxy of the Church swung over towards Sabellianism, making the Unity strong and solid; and the Trinity became a thin mode or an airy abstraction. When Sabellianism, thus encouraged, came openly forward, and defended its system and won adherents, then Church Orthodoxy would hasten to set up barriers on that side, and would fall back upon Tritheistic ground, making the Threefold Personality a profound and real distinction, penetrating the very nature of Deity, and changing the Unity of Being into a mere Unity of Will or agreement. We will venture to say, that there has never yet been a definition of the Trinity which has not been either Tritheistic or Modalistic; and Church Orthodoxy has always stood either on Tritheistic or on Sabellian ground. In other words, the Orthodox Trinity of any age, when searched to the bottom, has proved to be Unitarianism, after all—Unitarianism in the Tritheistic or in the Sabellian disguise; for the Tritheism of three coequal, independent, and absolute Gods, is too much opposed both to reason and Scripture to be able ever to maintain itself openly as a theology for any length of time.

The analogies which are used to explain the Trinity are all either Sabellian or Tritheistic. Nature has been searched in all ages for these analogies, by which to make the Trinity plain; but none have ever been found which did not make the Trinity either Sabellianism or Tritheism. They are either three parts of the substance, or else three qualities or modes of the substance.

Thus we have instances in which the three are made the three parts of one being, or substance; as in _man_,—spirit, soul, body; thought, affection, will; head, heart, hand.

One Being with three distinct faculties is Tritheism: one Being acting in three directions is Sabellianism.

Time is past, present, and future. Syllogism has its major, minor, and conclusion. There are other like analogies.

St. Patrick took for his illustration the three leaves of trefoil, or clover. Others have imagined the Trinity like a triangle; or they have referred to the three qualities of space,—height, breadth, width; or of fire,—form, light, and heat; or of a noun, which has its masculine, feminine, and neuter; or of a government, consisting of king, lords, and commons; or of executive, legislative, and judiciary.

This survey of Church Trinity shows that it is either one in which,—

1. The persons are not defined; or an unintelligible Trinity.

2. Or which defines person and Unity in the usual sense; or a contradictory Trinity.

3. Or which defines person as usual, and the Unity as only Union; or Tritheism.

4. Or which defines person as only manifestation; or Sabellianism.

These four are all the views ever hitherto given, and are all untenable. We might stop here, and say that the Trinity is utterly unsupported. There is no need of going to the Scripture to see if it is taught there; for we have, as yet, nothing to look for in Scripture.

The Trinitarian’s difficulty appears to be in defining person. But possibly he may say, “I cannot, indeed, give a positive idea of person; but I can give a _negative_ one. I cannot say what it _is_; but I can say what it is _not_. It is _not_ a mere _mode_ on the one hand; and not _being_, on the other. We must neither confound the persons nor divide the substance.”

We will, then, go further, and say, as Trinitarians have never yet defined person, without making it either a mode or a being, so they never can define it otherwise. There is no third between being and mode. They _must_ either confound the persons or divide the substance.

Again: that which differences one person in the Deity from another must be either a perfection or an imperfection. There is nothing between these. But it cannot be an imperfection; for no imperfection exists in God: and it cannot be a perfection; for then the other two persons would want a divine perfection, and would be imperfect.

III. The arguments in support of the Trinity are wholly inadequate. Since, according to Neander, the Trinity is not stated in the New Testament, it follows that it is a doctrine of _inference_ only; that is, a piece of human reasoning. Now, we have, no doubt, a perfect right to infer doctrines from Scripture which are not stated there; but, as Protestants, we have no right to make these inferences fundamental, or essential to the religious life. They may, indeed, be metaphysically essential; that is, essential to a well-arranged system; but they are not morally essential; that is, not essential to the moral and spiritual life of the soul.

But this is just what Dr. Huntington attempts to do. He tries to show that there is a doctrine essential to the life, peace, and progress of man, which the New Testament has omitted to state; which is neither distinctly stated by our Saviour nor by any of his apostles; which has been left to be inferred, and inferred by the mere processes of unaided human reason.

What arguments does he allege for this?

His first and principal argument is the _universal belief of the Christian Church in the doctrine of the Trinity_.

On this Dr. Huntington lays great stress. He says,—

“Truth is not determined by majorities; and yet it would be contrary to the laws of our constitution not to be affected by a testimony so vast, uniform, and sacred as that which is rendered by the common belief of Christian history and the Christian countries to the truth of the Trinity. There is something extremely painful, not to say irreverent, towards the Providence which has watched and led the true Christian Israel, in presuming that a tenet so emphatically and gladly received in all the ages and regions of Christendom, as almost literally to meet the terms of the test of Vincentius,—believed always, everywhere, and by all,—is unfounded in revelation and truth. Such a conclusion puts an aspect of uncertainty over the mind of the Church, scarcely consistent with any tolerable confidence in that great promise of the Master, that he would be with his own all days.” (p. 359.)

To which we answer,—

(1.) That, according to Dr. Bushnell (Dr. Huntington’s own witness), there never has been, nor is now, any such belief in the doctrine of the Trinity as he asserts. The largest part of the Church have always “divided the substance” of the deity, and another large portion have “confounded the persons;” and so the majority of the Church, while holding the word “Trinity,” have never believed in the Triunity at all.

Dr. Huntington summons Dr. Bushnell as a witness to the practical value of the Trinity; and we may suppose something such an examination as this to take place:—

_Dr. Huntington._ Tell us, Dr. Bushnell, what instances you know of persons who have been converted or deeply blessed by the holy doctrine of the Trinity.

_Dr. Bushnell._ I have known of “a great cloud of witnesses,” “living myriads,” “who have been raised to a participation of God in the faith of this adorable mystery,” (Huntington, p. 413.)

_Dr. H._ Mention some of them.

_Dr. B._ “Francis Junius,” “two centuries and a half ago,”—a professor “at Heidelberg (Leyden?), testified that he was, in fact, converted from atheism by the Christian Trinity;” also “the mild and sober Howe;” “Jeremy Taylor;” also “the Marquis de Rentz;” “Edwards,” and “Lady Maxwell.” (Huntington, p. 414.)

_Unitarian._ Say, Dr. Bushnell, whether, in your opinion, the majority of Christians really believe in the Church doctrine of the Trinity.

_Dr. B._ “A very large portion of the Christian teachers, together with the general mass of disciples, undoubtedly hold three living persons in the interior nature of God.” (Bushnell: “God in Christ,” p. 130.)

_Unit._ Is that scriptural or Orthodox?

_Dr. B._ No. It is only “a social Unity.” It is “a celestial Tritheocracy.” It “boldly renounces Orthodoxy at the point opposite to Unitarianism.” (Bushnell: “God in Christ,” p. 131.)

_Unit._ Do I understand you to be now speaking of the properly Orthodox ministers and churches generally?

_Dr. B._ “Our properly Orthodox teachers and churches, while professing three persons, also retain the verbal profession of one person. They suppose themselves really to hold that God is one person; and yet they most certainly do not: they only confuse their understanding, and call their confusion faith. This I affirm on the ground of sufficient evidence; partly because it cannot be otherwise, and partly because it visibly is not.” (_Ibid._ p. 131.)

_Unit._ Do you believe, Dr. Bushnell, that spiritual good can come from such a belief in the Trinity as you describe to be “undoubtedly” that of “the general mass of disciples”?

_Dr. B._ “Mournful evidence will be found that a confused and painfully bewildered state is often produced by it. They are practically at work in their thoughts to choose between the three, sometimes actually and decidedly preferring one to another; doubting how to adjust their mind in worship; uncertain, after, which of the three to obey; turning away, possibly, from one with a feeling of dread that might well be called aversion; devoting themselves to another, as the Romanist to his patron saint. This, in fact, is Polytheism, and not the clear, simple love of God. There is true love in it, doubtless; but the comfort of love is not here. The mind is involved in a dismal confusion, which we cannot think of without the sincerest pity. No soul can truly rest in God, when God is in two or three, and these in such a sense that a choice between them must be continually suggested.” (_Ibid._ p. 134.)

_Unit._ This state of mind is undoubtedly that of the general mass of the disciples?

_Dr. B._ It is. (_Ibid._ p. 130.)

_Unit._ Are there others, calling themselves Trinitarians, who hold essentially the Unitarian doctrine?

_Dr. B._ Yes. “It is a somewhat curious fact in theology that the class of teachers who protest over the word ‘person,’ declaring that they mean only a _threefold distinction_, cannot show that there is really a hair’s breadth of difference between their doctrine and the doctrine asserted by many of the later Unitarians. They may teach or preach in a very different manner; they probably do: but the theoretic contents of their opinion cannot be distinguished. Thus they say that there is a certain divine person in the man Jesus Christ; but that, when they use the term ‘person,’ they mean, not a person, but a certain indefinite and indefinable distinction. The later Unitarians, meantime, are found asserting that God is present in Christ in a mysterious and peculiar communication of his being; so that he is the living embodiment and express image of God. If, now, the question be raised, ‘Wherein does the indefinable _distinction_ of one differ from the mysterious and peculiar _communication_ of the other?’ or ‘How does it appear that there is any difference?’ there is no living man, I am quite sure, who can invent an answer.” (_Ibid._ p. 135.)

_Unit._ Is it not true that both of these views are sometimes held alternately by Trinitarians?

_Dr. B._ “Probably there is a degree of alternation, or inclining from one side to the other, in this view of Trinity, as the mind struggles, now to embrace one, and now the other, of two incompatible notions. Some persons are more habitually inclined to hold the three; a very much smaller number, to hold the one.” (_Ibid._ p. 134.)

_Unit._ But can they not hold the Unity with this Trinity?

_Dr. B._ “No man can assert three persons, meaning three consciousnesses, wills, and understandings, and still have any intelligent meaning in his mind, when he asserts that they are yet one person. For, as he now uses the term, the very idea of a person is that of an essential, incommunicable monad, bounded by consciousness, and vitalized by self-active will; which being true, he might as well profess to hold that three units are yet one unit. When he does it, his words will, of necessity, be only substitutes for sense.” (_Ibid._ p. 131.)

(2.) But suppose that the belief of the Church in the Trinity was as universal as Dr. Huntington asserts and Dr. Bushnell denies, what would be its value? His argument proves too much. If it proves the Trinity to be true, it proves, _a fortiori_, the Roman Catholic Church to be the true Church, and Protestantism to be an error; for Martin Luther, at one time, was the only Protestant in the world. Suppose that a Roman priest had come to him then. He might have addressed him thus:—

“It is certainly an impressive testimony to the truth of the Church of Rome, that the Christian world have been so generally agreed in it. Truth is not determined by majorities; and yet it would be contrary to the laws of our constitution not to be affected by a testimony so vast, uniform, and sacred as that which is rendered by the common belief of Christian history and the Christian centuries to the doctrines and practices of the Roman Catholic Church. We travel abroad, through these converted lands, over the round world. We enter, at the call of the Sabbath morning light, the place of assembled worshippers; let it be the newly planted conventicle on the edge of the Western forest, or the missionary station at the extremity of the Eastern continent; let it be the collection of Northern mountaineers, or of the dwellers in Southern valleys; let it be in the plain village meeting-house, or in the magnificent cathedrals of the old cities; let it be the crowded congregation of the metropolis, or the ‘two or three’ that meet in faith in upper chambers, in log-huts or under palm-trees; let it be regenerate bands gathered to pray in the islands of the ocean, or thankful circles of believers confessing their dependence and beseeching pardon on ships’ decks, in the midst of the ocean. So we pass over the outstretched countries of both hemispheres; and it is well nigh certain—so certain that the rare and scattered exceptions drop out of the broad and general conclusion—that the lowly petitions, the fervent supplications, the hearty confessions, the eager thanksgivings, or the grand peals of choral adoration, which our ears will hear, will be uttered according to the grand ritual of the Church of Rome. This is the voice of the unhesitating praise that embraces and hallows the globe.”

What would Luther have replied to that? He would have said, “Truth must have a beginning. It is always, at first, in a minority. The gate of it is strait, the path to it narrow, and few find it. All reforms are, at the beginning, in the hands of a small number. If God and truth are on our side, what do we care for your multitudes?” We can make the same answer now.

Dr. Huntington proceeds to give his own creed in regard to the Trinity,—to state his own belief.

God, in himself, he declares, we cannot know at all. We know him only, in his revelation. “Out of that ineffable and veiled Godhead—the groundwork, if we may say so, of all divine manifestation; a theocracy—there emerge to us, in revelation, the three whom we rightly call persons—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.”

We can only conceive of God, he says, in action; and in action we behold him as three. But action and revelation take place in time. The Trinity, therefore, according to Dr. Huntington, is only known to us in temporal manifestation: whether it exists in eternity or not, we cannot tell. And yet, in the next sentence, he goes on to say that “the Son is eternally begotten of the Father,” and “the Holy Ghost proceeds out of the Father, _not in time_;” which is the very thing he had a moment before professed to know nothing about. It is very difficult, therefore, to tell precisely what his view is. With regard to the incarnation of the Son, he is still more obscure. He says that “Christ comes forth out of the Godhead as the Son;” that he “leaves the glory he had with the Father;” that, while he is on earth, the Father alone represents the unseen personality of the Godhead, and that therefore the Son appears to be dependent on him, and submissive; that temporarily, while the Son is in the world, he remains ignorant of what the Father knows, and says that his Father is greater than he. “He lessens himself to dependency for the sake of mediation.” “All this we might expect.” This he calls an “instrumental inequality between Son and Father:” it “is wrought into the biblical language, remains in all our devotional habit, and ought to remain there.”

In other words, Dr. Huntington believes that the Infinite God became less than infinite in the incarnation. The common explanation of those passages, where Christ says, for example, “My Father is greater than I,” does not satisfy him. He is not satisfied that Jesus said it “in his human nature.” No. It was the divine nature which said it; and it was really GOD THE SON, who did not know the day nor the hour of his own coming. He lost a part of his omniscience. He ceased to be perfect in all his attributes. We should say, then, that he ceased to be God; but Dr. Huntington maintains that he was God, nevertheless; but God less than omnipotent,—God less than omniscient; God the Son, so distinct from the Father as to be ignorant of what the Father knew, and unable to perform what the Father could do.

Dr. Huntington (p. 366) ascribes it to “condescension” in Christ, to say that “of that day and hour knoweth not the Son.” “_It is condescension indeed!_” says he. But this word “condescension” does not well apply here. One does not condescend to be ignorant of what he knows: still less does a truthful person condescend _to say_ he is ignorant of what he knows. We may wisely condescend to help the feeble, and sympathize with the lowly, but hardly to be ignorant with them, or to pretend to be ignorant. It is a badly chosen word, and seems to show the vacillation of the writer’s thought.

IV. The arguments against the doctrine of the Trinity are unanswerable.

We infer that they are unanswerable from the fact that they are not answered. It is to be presumed that Dr. Huntington, having been for so many years a preacher of Unitarian doctrine, is acquainted with our arguments. It is a remarkable fact that, in this sermon, he has nowhere attempted to reply to them. He has passed them wholly by. You would not know, from reading the discourse, that he had ever been a Unitarian, or had ever heard of the Unitarian objections to the Trinity; still less that he had himself preached against it. Unitarians, for instance, have said, that _if the Trinity be true, and if it be so important to the welfare of the soul as is contended, it would be somewhere plainly taught in the New Testament_. Does Dr. Huntington answer this argument? No; he answers the argument from the _word_ “Trinity” not being in the Bible, and his answer is sufficient; but he does not answer the argument from the fact, that the doctrine itself is not anywhere distinctly taught, and that none of the terms which have been found essential to any Orthodox statement of the doctrine are to be met with in the New Testament.(93)

Nor does Dr. Huntington anywhere fairly meet the Unitarian argument from the impossibility of stating the doctrine in intelligible language. He tells us, with his usual eloquence, what we have often enough been taught before, that there are many things which we do not understand, and that we must believe many facts the _mode_ of which is unintelligible. But when we say, “Can we believe _a doctrine_ or proposition which cannot be distinctly stated?” He has no answer. The Trinity is _a doctrine_, and must therefore be distinctly stated in order to be believed. It has not been distinctly stated,(94) and therefore cannot be believed. To this objection Dr. Huntington has no reply; and we may conclude that it is an unanswerable objection.

Dr. Huntington uses an unnecessary phrase about those who object to mystery. He calls the objection “shallow self-illusion,” and proceeds with the usual declaration, that all of life is mysterious. Can he have been a Unitarian preacher for twenty years, and not have known that Unitarians object to mystery only when it is used by Trinitarians as a cover for obscurity and vagueness of statement?