PATRISTIC THEOLOGY OF THE TRINITY

ABSTRACT

My thesis is that Athanasius and Gregory of Nazianzus established eastern orthodox trinitarianism by using a methodology that is both biblically and theologically accurate. These pro-Nicene theologians defeated particularly Arian heresy, fighting mainly against ontological subordinationism (but also against modalism on the other hand), and providing a trinitarian doctrine that is vital for apologetic, christian life, unity, catechism and worship. A final comparison with modern western trinitarianism will be presented, providing both weak and strong points for each approach, and concluding with a personal appraisal.

ATHANASIUS: EXPLANATION AND ASSESSMENT OF HIS TRINITARIAN THEOLOGY

The Arian controversy raised while christians tried to answer Jesus’s question: “who do you say that I am?” (Matt 16:15), avoiding idolatry and thus keeping the monotheistic faith of Israel. Who is Jesus in relation to God? How to keep the unity of God and the status of Jesus? Who must Jesus be in order to really save sinners? Jesus has to be fully God (not inferior to God the Father) and fully man (the last Adam). God has to descend from heaven in order to save sinners, and He did so in Christ (God the Son incarnate) and by the indwelling of God the Spirit, particularly from Pentecost onward. This trinitarian soteriology was developed by Athanasius and the follower Cappadocians who articulated the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity.
Athanasius attended the council of Nicaea 325. They evaluated and then contrasted the Arian theology that conceived Jesus the Son as inferior to God the Father because He was “begotten”, and therefore has to be the first of the creatures. Arius was promoting subordinationism and adoptionism. Athanasius responded to Arius’ pseudo-christian philosophy, starting from the Bible and then adopted a philosophical language for two main reasons. Firstly, to counter attack Arius at the same level, philosophically. Secondly, also Arius used biblical terms, but with very different significance. Athanasius had to use extra biblical terms to clarify the concepts, the interpretation of those same biblical words. Same words can carry different or even opposite meanings, depending on the theological context in which those words are conceived. Same words, different worlds. Athanasius was rooted in christian classical theism but Arius was influenced by Origen and his “platonic christianism”, largely shaped by greco-roman philosophy. Unfair biblicist opponents of Athanasius accused him to abuse philosophy instead of using only the biblical text; but actually Athanasius hold just one important philosophical word: ὁμοούσιος, that for him didn’t mean “the same person” considering the material world, but “the same essence” considering the immaterial world. This talent of Athanasius to clarify the meaning of technical words, like οὐσία and ὑπόστασις, allowed him to stop internal nicene debatesand to standardize the creedal grammar and therefore to cause to reach the ecumenical consensus among orthodox christians on Christology. The Son is ὁμοούσιον τῷ Πατρί, sharing the same divine nature. “the Son is begotten from the same οὐσία of the Father”. Significantly, this is not the οὐσία of the Unoriginate (like the Arians loved to defined God), but the οὐσία of the Father! Not an abstract essence, but a personal nature. This way the distinction of persons is kept. Also note the Son isn’t begotten from the will of the Father, keeping the Son’s divine equality. Later on, Athanasius will state that also the Holy Spirit is ὁμοούσιος with the Father and the Son. There is only a logical order in the Trinity, not a hierarchical order of importance; there is a logical distinction between the three divine persons, not a rank of degrees of divinity. Athanasius gave a “trinitarian home to christological doctrine”. The Son is one with the Father not numerically (against modalism) but in essence, sharing the same divine attributes and perfections. The Father is eternal, so is the Son, even if He is called “begotten”. Everything the Father is, the Son also is, except being the Father who beget the Son in eternity. But for Arius “begotten Son” must implies a “moment” in eternity when the Son didn’t exist, wrongly applying anthropomorphic ideas to God, misusing the analogical human-like language of the Scripture. The Nicene field of debate was mainly biblical hermeneutics. For Arius the generation of the Son was like a human generation: when a human son is begotten, he is inferior to his father and moreover he isn’t eternal, but came to pass in time. Therefore, the Son must be subordinated, not co-eternal, but created ex-nihilo, the first of the creatures. Arius put Jesus Christ in the realm of humanity, under the hard line that distinct between the transcendent God and creation.

Different theology proper consequently produces different soteriology. For Athanasius, “salvation” means that the Triune God must descend toward humanity to rescue from sin and death. This was accomplished by the incarnation of Christ, the fully divine God the Son, who assumed an unfallen human nature. All the great biblical salvific milestones in the history of redemption are downward movements: Sinai (Ex 19), incarnation (Gospels), Pentecost (Acts), new Jerusalem (Revelation). The Triune God comes down to save. Contrarily, Arius had a platonic soteriology. He thought that the perfect and distant God cannot enter in contact with creation and its misery (greek dualism). God can never descend. Humanity can and must climb up the ladder toward heavens by its efforts, following Christ the semi-divine super human who opens the way and shows the path to follow. Athanasius’ soteriology affirmed the Gospel: salvation by Sola Gratia, Sola Fide, Solus Christus, Soli Deo Gloria. Instead Arius taught a legalistic religion of works. For Athanasius the Son is “generated, not created”, distinguishing between divine eternal generation and human creation.
Athanasius’ trinitarian approach was very biblical and theologically appropriate. A. A. Hodge defends the necessity of creeds and confessions to express our personal faith, which aren’t in contrast to the formal principle of Sola Sciptura: “The real question is not, as often pretended, between the Word of God and the creed of man, but between the tried and proved faith of the collective body of God’s people, and the private judgement and the unassisted wisdom of the repudiator of creeds”. In both his masterpieces, “On the incarnation of the Word” and “Four orations against the Arians” (particularly book 1), Athanasius abundantly uses biblical direct arguments, largely discussing many biblical passages and interpreting them in light of biblical theology: when the Bible speaks of Jesus submitting himself to the Father is always in soteriological contexts, where Jesus is seen as last Adam, the incarnate Redeemer in time and history, not referring to God the Son in eternity. As Reeves says: “for the exaltation/ begetting language, Athanasius explains that the Son took on humanity, and that was what was then exalted in Christ’s ascension: united to the Son, the humanity was now exalted to the filial status that the Son had always enjoyed”.
Athanasius also used biblical logic. When Scripture refers to God, the primary reference is to God the Father. But Father of whom? Because the Father is immutable and eternal, then there must exist a Son who is also immutable and eternal with the Father. The eternal Father (ἀρχη) logically demands an eternal couple “Father and Son”, and therefore an eternal Trinity. In fact the very biblical language of Father and Son doesn’t mean “subordination”, but “of the same nature”. The eternal being of the Godhead is at stake: how the incarnation of Jesus the Son reveals the eternal fruitful and life-giving God. God is by nature an eternal “Father” known only and truly via the Son. It is why the Nicene Creed opens with the affirmation: “Πιστεύομεν εἰς ἕνα Θεὸν Πατέρα – we believe in one God the Father”. Another logical argumentation of Athanasius that proves the deity of Christ is that Jesus is the Word of God, the divine Wisdom. The Father, and actually the whole Trinity, made the world in the first Creation of Genesis through His Word. The divine Logos is the agent of Creation. Salvation is a new Creation, also performed by the same divine Logos, Jesus Christ. Because Creation and new Creation are carried out through the very same agent, therefore Jesus is necessarily divine. Another logical argument is the imago Dei soteriology. Men are made after the image of God. After the Fall into sin, they need to be restored. Only God himself can restore humanity to His image. Jesus Christ is defined by Scripture as the very Image of God who is able to do that. Men cannot be saved by angels who aren’t the image of God. Therefore Jesus must be equal to God.
Athanasius’ Christology leads to “deification”, which is union with God in Christ, sanctification in the Holy Spirit. Deification is based on the hypostatic union of the two natures of Christ, divine and human nature in the same person. And what is true for Christ by nature-sonship (divinization of his own flesh by the presence of his own divine nature), is also true for christians by grace-adoption. Athanasius’ deification will become the basis used by the following Cappadocians to establish also the divinity of the Holy Spirit.
Athanasius’s approach help us today to become better biblical interpreters by studying biblical theology, to focus on soteriological elements often neglected (like incarnation), to be more precise in our interpretation of terms, and to get trinitarian balance in order to avoid heretical extremes caused by too much emphasis on unity despite diversity (Sabellianism) or too much emphasis on diversity despite unity (Arianism).

GREGORY NAZIANZEN: EXPLANATION AND ASSESSMENT OF HIS TRINITARIAN THEOLOGY

Gregory of Nazianzus is one of the theological heirs of Athanasius, who continued his trinitarian work and led it to completion. While Athanasius focused more unto the Father-Son divine equality, due to the Arian controversy, Gregory focused much more unto the Holy Spirit equality with the Father and the Son, because of the historical context. Athanasius, in his last years, had already written against the Macedonian heresy (pneumatomachi) that denied the divine equality of the Holy Spirit. Athanasius attributed also to the Spirit the term ὁμοούσιος and therefore included Him in the divine category, above the hard line, together with the Father and the Son. Gregory further developed Athanasius’s work, culminating in the Nicene Creed of Constantinople (Nicene-Constantinopolitan, 381), based on the Creed of Nicaea 325. Gregory’s biblical methodology is the same of Athanasius: in the Nicene Creed’s words, the Spirit shares the Father/Son titles (τὸ κύριον – the Spirit is Lord), shares the same divine activities (τὸ ζῳοποιόν – giver of life), shares the same divine attributes and shares the same exclusive monotheistic adoration and legitim worship without idolatry (τὸ σὺν Πατρὶ καὶ Υἱῷ συμπροσκυνούμενον καὶ συνδοξαζόμενον – with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified). Gregory theologically led the Nicene Creed (381) to confirm the same extra biblical word ὁμοούσιον τῷ Πατρί to explain the divine relationship between God the Son and the Father. Also the Holy Spirit is included in the same exclusive, transcendent, eternal, divine category, even if, sadly, the specific word ὁμοούσιον isn’t applied directly the the Spirit in the paragraph of C. Divine equality between the three ὑπόστασις, who share the same οὐσία, is due to divine relationships, described by theological parallelism that draws both similarities and also distinctions: as the divine Son is begotten (γεννησις) from the Father, so the divine Spirit proceeds (ἐκπορευσις) from the Father (and the Son – filioque). This isn’t merely an extra biblical doctrinal formulation because it uses the very same words of the Gospel of John itself. In Scripture, salvation is realized only by God descending on Earth, through the incarnation of God the Son and the indwelling of God the Spirit in the heart of believers. Soteriology and the economical Trinity displays the divinity of the Holy Spirit. Only God can unite us to Him in salvation, so the Spirit must be God. Both Athanasius and Gregory draw their theological conclusions firstly from the text, and then from biblical theology and finally from systematic theology: the Creeds systematised the belief with precise words, by a sound trinitarian grammar. Biblical and theological methodology at its best. The Nazianzen deservedly gained the nickname “the theologian” and was considered one of the best orators of all time, a powerful preacher, a great example for all of us today: we need pastor-theologians like him. Gregory along with the constantinople ecclesiastical body, expressed his pastoral concern for the church, producing the Nicene Creed in its final form (381) that suits well for ordinary local churches, not just for philosophical high theologians, but it is designed for pastoral catechism, to clarify and teach the universal, catholic christian faith, and also for liturgy, in order to guide the assembled church to properly worship the Triune God.
Building on the standardised trinitarian terminology formulated by Athanasius, the Nazianzen reaffirmed God’s divine simplicity: God’s οὐσία is just one, not composed, and therefore the distinction between divine persons Father, Son and Spirit are something external to the concept of οὐσία. The three ὑπόστασις aren’t different in divine attributes, but differ in relations. “Father, Son and Spirit” are names pointing to divine relationships, not to essences, because the three have the same divine status, neither to energies, because the three are truly persons, distinct yet inseparable. The Nazianzen writes: “Father is a name neither of substance nor of activity, but of relationship”. “Eternally being begotten” for the Son and “eternally proceeding” for the Spirit aren’t characteristics but instead are relational properties, not attributes of the unique essence but distincts of the different persons. In fact, there aren’t two different set of divine attributes, the first set in common to all the three persons and the second set peculiar to each person distinctively. No, there is only one single category of divine attribute of the whole Godhead, and then there are just relational distinctive functions. The ontological being of the Trinity (attributes – ὁμοούσιος) and the eternal ontological relational Trinity (eternal generation and processions, along with the doctrine of perichoresis, the mutual indwelling of the three persons). The Nazianzen also distincted between the Trinity in eternity (unity of the ontological Trinity, one in being and not just in will and moral) and the Trinity as revealed in redemptive history (the economical Trinity): only the Father sent the Son, only the Son became incarnate in the fullness of time (Gal 4:4), only the Spirit came down at Pentecost. Unity with diversity, one and three at the same time. The Cappadocians could maintain all the three ὑπόστασις (Father, Son and Spirit) partaking of the divine simplicity, against Arians (Arius and Eunomios) who could accept the Father in divine simplicity, excluding instead the Son and the Spirit, and later against Macedonians who excluded the Spirit.
Gregory reached one of the best theological balances of all church history about God one and three. The “problem” of Trinitarian theology is the problem of “unity and diversity”, or “distinction within the oneness”. If the unity of the Trinity is too much emphasised and the distinction of the three divine persons is neglected, then we fall into modalism. If instead the distinction is highlighted, but the unity neglected, we fall into subordinationism or even tritheism. Gregory avoided those heretical extremes, providing one of the best balanced trinitarian formulations and theological treatments of all times. Eastern ancient theologians dedicated most of their energy focusing on the Trinity and primarily insisting on the relational order of the persons. The trinitarian balance is achieved in the dynamic consideration of the oneness and the triuneness, like a divine pendulum that comes back and forth, again and again. The taxis forward movement, expresses the distinction of the three persons of the Godhead: there is one God, God the eternal Father the source or monarch, who eternally beget God the eternal Son and from whom God the eternal Spirit eternally proceeds (the “ungenerated” Being τὸ ἀγέννητον, the “generated” Being τὸ γεννητόν and the “proceeding from the Father” Being τὸ ἐκ τοῦ πατρὸς ἐκπορευόμενον). And then, the perichoresis backward movement of the pendulum: all the three persons are in dynamic united movement, converging back towards the source.
Moreover, Gregory further clarified the full humanity assumed by God the Son in incarnation, who assumed not just a human body but also a human soul and mind (against apollinarianism). Jesus is fully God and fully man, because “for what the Logos hasn’t assumed, hasn’t saved – Το γαρ απρόσληπτον και αθεράπευτον”: what isn’t assumed cannot be redeemed, but Jesus assumed a complete human nature, in order to redeem human beings completely.
Finally, Gregory fought against Eunomian rationalism, defending the incomprehensibility of the essence of God. They argued that it is possible for the human mind and logic to grasp and fully understand God. But Gregory opposed them, asserting that the human mind is limited and must operate only within the limits drawn by God’s self revelation.

COMPARISONS BETWEEN PATRISTIC TRINITARIANISM AND MODERN TRINITARIAN APPROACHES FROM SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGIANS AND TRADITION’S STATEMENTS

There is both continuity and discontinuity between ancient trinitarianism and modern approaches. Many modern trinitarian theologians are in line with the ancient Nicene approach. Both Athanasius and Gregory articulated their trinitarian theology stating that the Son and the Spirit are at the same level of God the Father, share the same nature, identical divine substance (οὐσία) even in three different divine persons (ὑπόστασις) because Father, Son and Spirit share the same divine titles, names, attributes, perfections and works. The way the Bible presents the three as one, in a natural unity, inevitably leads the careful reader and interpreter to classify them in the same unique category labelled “Godhead”. The one true and living God of the monotheistic faith of Israel is a Triune God. Even if Athanasius and Gregory used few extra biblical terms to explain what Scripture really means, against the twisted Arian-like heresys, their methodology is biblically rooted and exegetically sound. Many contemporary theologians today follow their same trinitarian and christological approach. Stephen Wellum resumes well what the patristic trinitarian approach consisted in:

To understand correctly the biblical Jesus, we must first locate him within the interpretive framework of Scripture; otherwise, we are left with a Jesus of our own imagination. Essential to doing this is thinking through the Bible’s plot movements. For example, think of “creation” and the specific theistic and metaphysical framework it establishes, grounded in theology proper, and especially the Creator-creature distinction. Jesus’s identity is tied to this God, and it is within this framework that Christ’s identity is unveiled. Thus, for example, when the NT teaches Jesus’s deity; it does so by identifying him with OT Yahweh texts and applying them directly to him. Also, when the NT applies Theos texts to Jesus, when set within the Bible’s theistic framework, this identifies Jesus with God, which entails trinitarian formulation and a two nature Christology. Regarding the former, in biblical thought, no creature can share the attributes of God, carry out the works of God , receive the worship of God, and bear the titles and name of God unless he is God equal with God, and thus one who shares the one, identical divine nature. Regarding the latter, since Jesus is also human, and given the Creator-creature distinction, the only way we can think of the incarnation is in terms of a two nature Christology…Scripture identifies Christ as God the Son incarnate and the nature of his work. We cannot understand the Jesus of the Bible apart from the Bible’s own content, categories, and framework. In this way, the entire Bible speaks of Jesus as the human son (Gen 3:15; Matt 1:1), yet he is also the eternal, divine Son of the Father, identified with the LORD who has come to save his people from their sins. This last point is especially pertinent since Jesus can only save us from our sins if he is also the divine Son of the Father who assumed our human nature so that he could bear our sin and make this world right by the ratification of a new covenant in his blood…Out of the biblical teaching, Christological formulation arose, and what the church confessed at Nicaea and Chalcedon is simply a further reflection and theological “construction” of what the entire Bible teaches.

THE RELATIONAL TRINITY AGAINST AN ABSTRACT AND IMPERSONAL GENERAL VIEW OF GOD
A relevant difference between the eastern theologians (Athanasius and the Cappadocians) and the western main confessional statements (for instance the Westminster Confession and the 1689BLCF, starting from Augustine onward) is that eastern trinitarianism starts with the three divine persons, particularly the Father as source, emphasising very much the relational aspect of each divine ὑπόστασις and then going toward unity; instead western augustinian trinitarianism starts with the oneness of the Godhead and then going to the relational aspect.

For that, western approach tends to lose its trinitarian character. In fact, many modern systematic works dedicate many pages to the attributes of the unique God, and then write some pages about the Trinity, as if it is almost an appendix rather than the totality of the doctrine of God. Among them Charles Hodge, Louis Berkof, J. I. Packer, Francis Turrettins, Smalley and Beeke, Wayne Grudem (probably the best selling among modern systematic theologies), Michael Horton and even Herman Bavinck, who is one of the most careful to the trinitarian aspect. Karl Barth strangely dedicates 142 pages to the Trinity (348-490) not in his volume on theology proper (Vol. II.1) but in his volume on God’s revelation (Vol. I.1).
Today, there are very few theological works with strong trinitarian structure; they start and develop with the Trinity right from the beginning, intentionally communicating that the Trinity is the main focus in the study of God, not an afterthought. Among them: Gerald Bray dedicates a large amount of material to the persons of the Trinity (59 pages: 165-224) after just 29 pages (135-164) on the attributes of the Godhead; Douglas Kelly framed his whole systematic theology by a trinitarian framework; Robert Letham starts his systematic reasoning with the persons of the Trinity (88 pages: 66-154) and after dedicates 86 pages (155- 241) to the attributes of the Godhead, but always with a very strong trinitarian emphasis; Stephen Wellum study the Trinity starting with biblical theology, in patristic style, and after he develops the trinitarian theology proper, considering the attributes, covenants, decrees, creation and providence as trinitarian locus; interestingly, the “Reformation theology” volume, edited by M. Barrett, puts “the Holy Trinity” locus prior to “the being and attributes of God” chapter.
The eastern insistence on the persons of the Trinity avoid an abstract idea of God and a modalistic conception, in favour of a relational and trinitarian Godhead. On this point, I would say that the cappadocian approach to the Trinity is more biblical than the modern western approach. In fact, today western christianity sees an increasingly growth of the heresy of unitarianism and modalism. The vital doctrine of the Trinity is displaced from the core of worship, to a shadowy and forgotten corner of distant christian theology. The vision of God is a vision of someone distant, more similar to the islamic monad (deism) than the personal Triune God (christian theism). I believe the charismatic movement was born from the necessity to recover the personal and intimate dimension with God, especially the Holy Spirit, in front of the aridity and abstractness of modern theology that conceived God as distant.
To be fair, the main cause of this trinitarian poverty in liturgy and worship isn’t due primarily to Augustine’s philosophical treatment of the doctrine of the Trinity but, according to Bray, to protestant liberalism. The Enlightenment (rationalism) has produced Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834) who affirmed that “the pure teaching of Jesus had been corrupted by the Greek philosophy and Roman legalism, which between them had produced the great theological systems of classical orthodoxy”, for instance the Nicene Creed, that are to be rejected. In fact, until Reformation and post-Reformation era, theology was built on classical trinitarian theology. But modern romanticism and anti-authoritarian mindset have fought against any sort of creed and doctrinal authority.
Having said that, today an intentional trinitarian theology should be displayed in worship through trinitarian prayers, liturgy (recovering the use of Creeds, in line with the regulative principle of worship), hymns, expository preaching, simply because true biblical worship is not primarily our adoration to God, but it is a gift from the Triune God to us: we are put in union with Christ the “true worshipper” par excellence and therefore we can participate in adoration to the Trinity. Worship, as salvation, belongs to the Lord! Biblical worship comes from the Trinity and comes back to the Trinity. God makes us worthy to worship Him. We have to consider: if our worship would fit well even in a synagogue, a mosque or a unitarian service without causing “troubles”, are we really adoring the biblical Triune God or an idolatrous surrogate?
Moreover, eastern trinitarianism rightly places the emphasis specifically on the divine person of the Holy Spirit, at the same level of the Son and the Father. For the western world, the Spirit oftentimes is just a force that is related to the persons of the Father and the Son, but for the Fathers the Holy Spirit is equally God as the Father and the Son. Eastern trinitarianism helps us to recover the proper and fuller vision of the whole Trinity.
On the other hand, patristic trinitarianism, if not carefully studied, could lead to subordinationism more easily than western theology. So again, the balance between the oneness and the triuneness of God is key (unity and diversity). Personally, in evaluating the two different approaches to the Trinity, I agree with Dr. Kelly:

Neither approach is necessarily contradictory to, nor exclusive of, the other. It is valid to start with the oneness of essence or to start with the threeness of personhood as long as both oneness and threeness are considered of equal ultimacy within the Godhead…​​In both popular heresies (Arianism and Sabellianism), one is left with a unitarian God; not the Triune God of Holy Scripture and Christian tradition. The Greek Fathers fought these same heresies in one way, and Augustine and his followers in the West fought them in a somewhat different way (at least as far as their terminology is concerned).

Having said that, it seems to me that the progressive unfolding of the divine revelation in Scripture tends to focus in the Old Testament portion very much on the uniqueness and transcendence of the living God against idolatry. And then, after the incarnation, inaugurating the New Testament, the clearer revelation of the triune nature of God is displayed and therefore we are able to consider the eternal ontology of God in one essence existing in three persons, and the divine relationships and economy. Economic Trinity reveals ontological Trinity. So, I would prefer the western approach, but paying much more attention to the relational and personal character of the Trinity: God is a covenantal Lord and Father, who engages with his chosen.
On the same point, Calvin and Gerald Bray, in line with the Fathers, support the opposite view. For them, biblical theology primarily reveals progressively the three persons, first the Father in Old Testament, then the Son in the New Covenant and after the Spirit ,beginning from Pentecost onward, continuing in the present age; only “secondarily” the Bible teaches the unity of the Three. Personally I don’t fully agree with this eastern approach, particularly developed by Gregory of Naziansus, because I would prefer the systematic theological approach. The Bible itself, in various New Testament passages, presents the unified presence and work of the whole Trinity throughout the whole canon. The Trinity always acts indivisibly. Therefore, it seems to me more “biblical” to pass from the unity of the whole Trinity acting through the Old Testament, to the clear revelation of the three divine persons after the New Testament incarnation and Pentecost. Maybe from a biblical theological perspective the Fathers are more accurate in their trinitarian theology, but from a systematic theological perspective, the majority of modern statements are more systematically precise. But for sure, patristic trinitarianism help us to rethink on the relational aspect of God that today we have forgotten: the Triune God is a relational God, from eternity by inter-trinitarian relationships, and also with His creation, adorned with vestigia trinitatis, and especially with men created in His own image. We can and must live a living relation with God the Father, the Son and the Spirit, both individually and corporately in the local church through a proper trinitarian liturgy and worship.

THE CHARISMATIC MISINTERPRETATION OF THE PERSON AND WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
Today, charismatics wrongly seek prophecies and “supernatural” work of the Holy Spirit, ignoring the perichoretical relationship of the economic Trinity. Christ is never untied to the Father, so the Spirit is never disassociated from the Son: the Spirit glorifies Christ, who glorifies the Father. This patristic “chain of glory” is necessary to properly understand the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

GOD’S TRANSCENDENCE AGAINST OPEN THEISM AND REVISIONIST THEOLOGY
According to Carter, contemporary trinitarianism has lost the transcendence, immutability and impassibility of God. Many trinitarian views conceive God as mutually mutable with creation. Rationalism leads to reject supernaturalism. Moreover, postmodernism affirms relativism, and therefore absolutes don’t exist anymore. Therefore, divine absoluteness and transcendence are unacceptable, because biblical metaphysic is “scientifically” unprovable. Carter affirms:

Modernity rejects the theological metaphysics of Nicaea and replaces these ideas with pagan metaphysical ideas that were considered and rejected by the church fathers…In a culture dominated by pagan metaphysics, the cosmos is all that exists…God as identical with the whole of the cosmos, and so we find pantheism all over the world in various cultures, from India to Greece to the modern West.

For Schleiermacher the Triune God is adapting himself, based on the relation He has with the world (theistic mutualism or revisionist theology). As Carter explains:

Both Spinoza and Schleiermacher were pantheists, and the entire liberal project is oriented toward reconceiving God in a way that leaves behind genuine biblical transcendence as a figment of Greek metaphysics. The liberal project leads to a neopagan view of God and to the return of ancient mythology in place of a biblical metaphysics.

This is the trinitarian contemporary approach that we find in many churches. Enlightenment caused to eclipse the patristic trinitarianism, in favour of a distorted conception of God:

Twentieth-century theology, for the most part, tended to be preoccupied with the economic Trinity while ignoring the immanent Trinity. There was a desire for a doctrine of God based entirely on biblical themes, but what came to prominence was a doctrine of God that lost its grip on divine transcendence, ​​thereby losing what is most distinctively and uniquely biblical.

Moltmann (1926-2024) affirmed that the Trinity changes himself according to creation, in a mutual relation: the german theologian is one of the best example of this idolatrous trinitarian degeneration. Athanasius heavily criticized Arius, saying that he was worshipping a “god” who is not the biblical Trinity, therefore an idol. Gresham Machen hold the same apologetics against liberalism, following the line of the apostle Paul in Galatians and of Athanasius: if someone deviates from the biblical teaching, he is preaching another “gospel” that is not the Gospel, and therefore he worships an idol.

Patristic trinitarianism is vitally important today in order to restore our vision of God as the triune, personal, relational God, to regain a biblical conception of the economic Trinity, therefore to have clear what is the role of the Father, Son and particularly the Holy Spirit in history and in our life today, and finally to keep a high view of the sovereign and transcendent God of heaven and earth. This will ignite again our love for God, sharpen our preaching, recalibrate our worship and boost our evangelism. We must urgently study Athanasius and Gregory Nazianzen as two of the best examples of biblical theologians with accurate trinitarianism and effective methodology.

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Tematiche: Teologia storica