Please explain the trinity

[Kenny]

I realize not all Christians believe in the Trinity, but for those who do I was hoping someone could explain it to me. I understand they say 3 persons but 1 God, so is it like God the father, Jesus, and the Holy spirit are a fraction of a complete God and when combined they equal the entire God? Or is it like 1 God who wears different hats depending on who he is dealing with sorta like how I am a brother to my siblings, a son to my parents and an employee to my boss at work? Or is it something else? Please explain.

Ken

[Danieltwotwenty]

Hi Kenny, ultimately all analogies will fail at some point, it is a divine mystery kind of similar to the free will vs predestination, both being true yet at the same time being contradictory ideas. I see it like this: in our current existence we are limited to the dimensions we have, God does not have this same restriction. So if we imagine a coin, on one side is God's oneness and on the other is God's triune nature, in our current state we can only see one at a time and catch small glimpses of the other side as we turn the coin, but we can never see both sides of the coin clearly at the same time, both sides of the coin are contradictory and held in furious tension with each other yet they remain apart of the same coin. We see this as a reoccurring theme when it comes to talking about God, one vs triune, free will vs predestination, Jesus' 100% humanity vs Jesus' 100% divinity, God's wrath vs God's grace etc.. etc.. God however can see how all these things work in harmony as he is not restricted in the same way we are. We even see these contradictory ideas within nature like for example a photon being a wave and a particle or quantum particles being in superposition or quantum particles randomly appearing out of nothing.
Ultimately I am happy to say they are all true and that I don't know yet how it all works together, like science progresses and we solve these contradictions so too will our spiritual progression, maybe not in this life but surely in the next.

I hope that is satisfactory, if you want me to expand on anything please feel free to ask.

[WannaLearn]

Why would you want to worship something you completely understand? I don't even understand myself.

[RickD]

Kenny,

Here's some good reading on the subject of the Trinity
http://cmmorrison.wordpress.com/?s=Trin ... mit=Search

[Kenny]

Hi Kenny, ultimately all analogies will fail at some point, it is a divine mystery kind of similar to the free will vs predestination, both being true yet at the same time being contradictory ideas. I see it like this: in our current existence we are limited to the dimensions we have, God does not have this same restriction. So if we imagine a coin, on one side is God's oneness and on the other is God's triune nature, in our current state we can only see one at a time and catch small glimpses of the other side as we turn the coin, but we can never see both sides of the coin clearly at the same time, both sides of the coin are contradictory and held in furious tension with each other yet they remain apart of the same coin. We see this as a reoccurring theme when it comes to talking about God, one vs triune, free will vs predestination, Jesus' 100% humanity vs Jesus' 100% divinity, God's wrath vs God's grace etc.. etc.. God however can see how all these things work in harmony as he is not restricted in the same way we are. We even see these contradictory ideas within nature like for example a photon being a wave and a particle or quantum particles being in superposition or quantum particles randomly appearing out of nothing.
Ultimately I am happy to say they are all true and that I don't know yet how it all works together, like science progresses and we solve these contradictions so too will our spiritual progression, maybe not in this life but surely in the next.

I hope that is satisfactory, if you want me to expand on anything please feel free to ask.

When the Catholic Church came up with the idea of the trinity, do you think they had a complete understanding of it? Or was it a mystry to them too?

Ken

[Kenny]

Why would you want to worship something you completely understand? I don't even understand myself.

Why would you worship, or even follow something you don't understand?

Ken

[Danieltwotwenty]

Hi Kenny, ultimately all analogies will fail at some point, it is a divine mystery kind of similar to the free will vs predestination, both being true yet at the same time being contradictory ideas. I see it like this: in our current existence we are limited to the dimensions we have, God does not have this same restriction. So if we imagine a coin, on one side is God's oneness and on the other is God's triune nature, in our current state we can only see one at a time and catch small glimpses of the other side as we turn the coin, but we can never see both sides of the coin clearly at the same time, both sides of the coin are contradictory and held in furious tension with each other yet they remain apart of the same coin. We see this as a reoccurring theme when it comes to talking about God, one vs triune, free will vs predestination, Jesus' 100% humanity vs Jesus' 100% divinity, God's wrath vs God's grace etc.. etc.. God however can see how all these things work in harmony as he is not restricted in the same way we are. We even see these contradictory ideas within nature like for example a photon being a wave and a particle or quantum particles being in superposition or quantum particles randomly appearing out of nothing.
Ultimately I am happy to say they are all true and that I don't know yet how it all works together, like science progresses and we solve these contradictions so too will our spiritual progression, maybe not in this life but surely in the next.

I hope that is satisfactory, if you want me to expand on anything please feel free to ask.

When the Catholic Church came up with the idea of the trinity, do you think they had a complete understanding of it? Or was it a mystry to them too?

Ken

Read the Nicean creed which we all affirm, it is called the mystery of our faith and we proclaim it as such.

[Danieltwotwenty]

Why would you want to worship something you completely understand? I don't even understand myself.

Why would you worship, or even follow something you don't understand?

Ken

Because a true God would be incomprehensibly more complex than it's creation. If we could understand God completely then it would not be God but rather some lesser being. How can a being who is constrained by time, space and his intellect understand a being that is not bound by time, space or intelligence.

[Kenny]

Hi Kenny, ultimately all analogies will fail at some point, it is a divine mystery kind of similar to the free will vs predestination, both being true yet at the same time being contradictory ideas. I see it like this: in our current existence we are limited to the dimensions we have, God does not have this same restriction. So if we imagine a coin, on one side is God's oneness and on the other is God's triune nature, in our current state we can only see one at a time and catch small glimpses of the other side as we turn the coin, but we can never see both sides of the coin clearly at the same time, both sides of the coin are contradictory and held in furious tension with each other yet they remain apart of the same coin. We see this as a reoccurring theme when it comes to talking about God, one vs triune, free will vs predestination, Jesus' 100% humanity vs Jesus' 100% divinity, God's wrath vs God's grace etc.. etc.. God however can see how all these things work in harmony as he is not restricted in the same way we are. We even see these contradictory ideas within nature like for example a photon being a wave and a particle or quantum particles being in superposition or quantum particles randomly appearing out of nothing.
Ultimately I am happy to say they are all true and that I don't know yet how it all works together, like science progresses and we solve these contradictions so too will our spiritual progression, maybe not in this life but surely in the next.

I hope that is satisfactory, if you want me to expand on anything please feel free to ask.

When the Catholic Church came up with the idea of the trinity, do you think they had a complete understanding of it? Or was it a mystry to them too?

Ken

Read the Nicean creed which we all affirm, it is called the mystery of our faith and we proclaim it as such.

So they didn't have a comlete understanding of it either?

Ken

[Kenny]

Why would you want to worship something you completely understand? I don't even understand myself.

Why would you worship, or even follow something you don't understand?

Ken

Because a true God would be incomprehensibly more complex than it's creation. If we could understand God completely then it would not be God but rather some lesser being. How can a being who is constrained by time, space and his intellect understand a being that is not bound by time, space or intelligence.

If you don't understand something, how do you know it's the truth?

Ken

[PeteSinCA]

Why would you want to worship something you completely understand? I don't even understand myself.

The idea that the Creator is vastly greater than a creature can understand does not trouble me. Creatures who say they can have a god in their own image that is too small.

The Scriptures identify three persons as God: the Father; the Son; the Holy Spirit. The Scriptures make clear they are three distinct persons, not different names for a single person. The Scriptures make clear there is only one God.

When the Catholic Church came up with the idea of the trinity, do you think they had a complete understanding of it? Or was it a mystry to them too?

The teaching of the Trinity is an effort to express with some degree of clarity these facts of Scripture. Those facts have been expressed by Scripture from the penning of each book, and the extant writings of early Christian leaders show that those facts were recognized from the time of leaders who were trained by the Apostles and other authors who wrote the books of the New Testament. That the word "Trinity" was not used until a few centuries later means basically nothing (except as a historical footnote): the same could be said, for example, of the words "Eucharist" or "communion".

[Danieltwotwenty]

So they didn't have a comlete understanding of it either?

Ken

We have a complete understanding of there being one God but being three seperate persons working in perfect relationship, how this works is a divine mystery that all Christians affirm through the Nicean creed.
So yes the Catholics call it a divine mystery as far as I am aware because they are Christian brothers and sisters.

[Danieltwotwenty]

Why would you want to worship something you completely understand? I don't even understand myself.

Why would you worship, or even follow something you don't understand?

Ken

Because a true God would be incomprehensibly more complex than it's creation. If we could understand God completely then it would not be God but rather some lesser being. How can a being who is constrained by time, space and his intellect understand a being that is not bound by time, space or intelligence.

If you don't understand something, how do you know it's the truth?

Ken

I don't understand all the ins and outs of the laws of thermodynamics but I hold it to be true, same can be said of many many things.

[B. W.]

If you don't understand something, how do you know it's the truth?

Ken

Is there any man or woman who understands the entire universe completely?

Yet it still exists...

Kenny, your question presents a existential fallacy from a fallacy of many questions by presenting a false dilemma...

Have a good day


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[RickD]

I know my wife exists as a person. And I definitely don't understand her.