My response to Trinitarians who argue that since God is eternally love, he must be triune is the command quoted in Mt 22:39, namely, "You must love your neighbor as yourself."
I concede that God did not become love but IS love eternally [or everlastingly] (1 Jn 4:8): love is Jehovah's essence or nature, as the "Draw Close to Jehovah" book points out. Ergo, why can't a non-created unipersonal being, who is everlasting love, love Himself prior to loving anyone else? If the unipersonal God of the Bible has
always loved Himself, then He has supremely loved the One who is worthy of being supremely adored.
And if I can become a (quasi) object by conducting a rationally inward form of discourse with myself, then why can't the unipersonal God of the Bible make Himself the supreme object by loving Himself as He loves others whom He has created? It seems to me that before I direct my affections toward a particular beloved entity (i.e. an external and
alterior personal object like my son or wife) in a scripturally proper way, I must first have proper love for myself.
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Is It Possible for a Unipersonal Being to Love Himself?
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4 comments:
What puzzles most is the fervour with which Trinitarians attack those who are reluctant to speak in other words than scripture uses, especially as human formulas are just silly. Pre-existence is to say you exist ahem before you exist, eternal generation is to say ahem you are forever being born (is the eternal son eternally a baby?) Surely the notion that God enjoys perfect complacency is why participating in the divine nature is 'heaven' and as Paul's description of the fruit of spirit offers it is the human without the pride that divides, which is the eternal life possible for Adam as God's image but forfeited by him but regained by Christ with this more marvellous provision the way of mercy is ever open because we have an higfn priest who is touched by our infirmities and remains the same yesterday, today and forever. Praise be to God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I appreciate your thoughts and I agree that human formulae are problematic. Just one point of divergence is that preexistence, in theological circles, normally means that the Lord existed as a spirit or as God for Trinitarians before he became human. However, I concur with your point about eternal generation. What sense does it really make for the Son to be born always or timelessly?
Thanks for your reply. To suggest that a rational spirit existed before being reduced to the imbecility of babyhood vitiates against reason and the express claim of Jehovah that he knows no other god, it equally denies Jesus' specific claim that he was man.
The Arian scheme one supposes is an honest attempt to make sense of John's proem and Paul's remarks which seem to attribute to Jesus creative agency. For myself to posit Jesus as God's agent of Creation in the form of the Greek LOGOS and then to suggest that that LOGOS became a foetus in Mary's womb and suffered imprisonment in a human body with its mind subject to human weakness makes nonsense of the claim God is Love. That the same writer who penned God is Love should have this God in mind when he wrote just seems too unlikely.
Trinitarians grasp hold of Paul's remarks when his soul sings at the wonder of Christ and the God who gave or sent him but they don't read their bible moderately, (one is reminded of what Tyndale wrote about RC glosses on scripture in his NT as it seems to me Trinity worshippers do the same) as Paul obviously writes of the ascendant Christ, he knows no other, and as the 'apostle to the Gentiles' the mystery he marvels at is this creation of a new 'being' a living body of spiritual worshippers from both Jew and Gentile of which Jesus is the centre. Paul's gasp of praise is when he meditates on the wisdom and patience of this God who through the long ages as been tending towards this goal, preserving his rebellious people that from them might come forth that deliverer - his true son who would know to love Good and refuse the Evil, or as Paul declares him, 'the measure of a Perfect Man'.
As each disciple spiritually strives to be like this Man God build his kingdom, his new heavens and earth where only the clean can enter for outside are the dogs & co. That this vision of John's took place in AD 70 should be obvious to the reasonable from the fact that it describes an on-going reality. One enters this city through the truth that is present in the Old (the patriarchs) and the New (the apostles) and what is restored is that access to eternal life which Adam forfeit. I am going off point. Regards
Just a couple of brief points. To go from a spirit to a man is not overtly illogical. What is logically impossible (i.e., self-contradictory) about a spirit person becoming human? Nothing at all.
Secondly, the verse in Isaiah about "no other god" doesn't necessarily exclude angels from being called Elohim (i.e., "gods"). Granted, there is some debate abo0ut how Ps. 8:4-5 should be interpreted. Yet there is a long tradition of understanding Elohim as a referent to the angels. The Gospel of John also contains numerous passages that indicate Jesus enjoyed a preexistent life before coming to earth. Finally, how does one make sense of 2 Cor. 8:9 without accepting that he was preexistent?
I'm also wondering how an ordinary mortal became the universal savior.
Best,
Edgar
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