Trinity question: What does the word "person" mean?

[Canuckster1127]

Jac,

I've digested most of what you've said and I don't think we're far out of line with what we're saying. I think where the issue or difference is coming from is one of scope.

I agree that the trinity is supportable using logic based upon scripture if you assume several things. When you look at that picture, what I see you doing, is examining the internal validity and putting a great deal of emphasis and effort into it. That's cool. When I look at it, as is my want, I tend to approach it from a broader scope with the big picture in mind.

This may sound like it's coming out of left field but I spent the better part of a day the last month doing some pretty intense Meyers-Briggs personality testing and then some team building and training around it. It confirmed some things about me that I've always suspected, but couldn't describe. No doubt this will not come as a surprise to you, but it confirmed that I'm a pretty odd duck. If you're at all familiar with MBIT you might know that it used 4 measures to establish a personality type.

Mine is as follows.

I - Introvert
N- iNtuitive
F- Feeling
P- Perceiving

I represent about 1.2% of the population. That type of personality lends itself to a profile that is sometimes described as "the absent minded professor" which my wife tells me is dead-on accurate and after 25 years she should know.

It also makes me someone who is big-picture oriented and not all that interested in getting down into the details of things.

It probably won't surprise you then when I read what you've said above, and all the effort you've made to to try to demonstrate your point, that as far as it goes, I don't have trouble with what you've said, but I look at it with a broader scope and it doesn't make sense to me to limit the scope and ignore the fact that the foundation of what you've built rests on faith. You want to argue that the house is built board by board and has a definited plan and follows that plan and that's why it's structurally sound. I look at the whole house and what it's resting on and I assess the entire things as dependent upon the foundation it rests upon.

I'l still argue that claiming internal validity, while it may indeed be determined as necessary positional, is making a pretty narrow statement and attempting to diminish or direct attention from the reality that intellectual validity doesn't diminish those elements that are seemingly self-contradictory. You can argue that the idea that God is one yet 3 persons is a logically derived position that must be true based upon the premises drawn from Scripture. One can accept that intellectually, but there is a still a high level of cognative dissonance that carries with that statement. Faith in that regard applies not only to the foundation you build upon in terms of what you presuppose, but also to the willingness to accept that cognative dissonance when reason leads you to seemingly contradictory claims that are reconciled in a construct that falls outside our ability to fully explain to the satisfaction of a skeptic who shakes their head.

Anyway, that's my take and where I'm coming from. It may even help explain why you and I butt heads on occassion. If you thought I was weird before, now I've confirmed it for you anyway. Apparently I should be a counsellor or therapist instead of crunching data for Uncle Sam.

blessings,

bart

[Jac3510]

I'm familiar with the test, Bart. Actually, from what little I know you here, I can see you fit that pretty well.

From your vantage, I can see what you are saying. No apologetic is cookie cutter that works for everyone. The only thing I would point out is that I don't think it's as built on faith as you seem to think . . . I've had the pleasure of seeing two non-believers become convinced Christianity is true with that one, for the simple reason that I never once appealed to Scripture. I gave them the standard arguments for God's existence (you know them all), got them to accept that God must be a perfect being, then demonstrated that the only way a perfect being can exist is if He (the pronoun is important, as you can't be a perfect being and not be a person, which I take pains to demonstrate as well) exists as a plurality of persons.

Once that is established, I just asked them a simple question: out of all the religions in the world, which ones have this view of God?

The answer is pretty simple: only Christianity.

At that point, it became much easier for them to look at the biblical claims in a more favorable light. That, plus the moral argument's proof that they needed to be saved by this perfect being and the historical evidence for Jesus' resurrection, and the deal was sealed.

Obviously, I'm not saying that you can argue anyone into the faith. That's all the HS' job, as I'm sure you agree. But I am saying that people can be given perfectly rational reasons to believe in Christianity, and the belief in Trinity is one of those things they can be led to rationally accept. I even came across another argument this morning that proves a plurality of persons within the Godhead based on the need for procession . . . I won't get into it now for time's sake.

I have found that we can use pure reason to prove a LOT about Christianity before ever opening the Bible. Once people come to accept Christian doctrine based on reason, they are usually far more open to believing the Bible . . .

Just some thoughts.

God bless