In the March 4, 1988 issue of Christianity Today, Dr. Neal Plantinga, professor of Dogmatics at Calvin Seminary, in an article entitled “The Perfect Family . . . seeks to cast some new light on the doctrine of the Trinity. This by itself is laudable because the more light we receive on the age-old doctrines of the church, the better. Surely, no one believes that the last word has been spoken on the doctrines which the church professes. When one then reads an article of an able young theologian on this subject, he rejoices.
In the past there have been various attempts to shed more light on this very difficult doctrine. Often psychological analogies were used to clarify what the church has believed these many years. In this century, says Dr. Plantinga, there have been more attempts to give some sociological analogies of the Trinity. These social theorists emphasize the fact that God is not to be thought of as a single “Self,” but, rather as a society, as a community. Some of the Latins thought that there would have to be a plurality of persons in God for love to be true. In the last decades some theologians even offer some ethically and politically ambitious Trinity statements. These tend to associate Monotheism with oppression. In the doctrine of the Trinity they find implications for life in community and even for socialism.
The German theologian Moltmann believed that the Trinity, especially in the Easter weekend, was a model of suffering love and of solidarity in the face of the evil that love must suffer. The Trinity, to him, is the model of “social personalism” or “personal socialism” in human community.
After Dr. Plantinga has given us an interesting short review of the thinking of others on the doctrine of the Trinity during the past ages, he seeks to give his own view of the matter. He realizes that we must be very careful regarding the views he has reviewed. As he puts it nicely concerning the Social Trinitarians: “they do not linger long over Scripture.” Some scarcely mention the Scriptures. Many of them make a God in their own image. This is a real danger, because the liberation theologians would thus be able to use the doctrine of the Trinity to advance their political views. Some other Social Trinitarians believe that the right view of the Trinity is that it is like the nuclear family. Adam, Eve and Seth form this family in the Biblical history and Eve represents the Holy Spirit!
Dr. Plantinga will have nothing to do with the–excesses of the Social Trinitarians he has mentioned. But, he says, shorn of these excesses, the analogy of the social Trinity is probably the most Biblically fruitful and theologically redolent theory now available. Much of Western Trinitarianism, he says, reduced the three persons of the Trinity to roles or modes of one person. This certainly does not do justice to the Biblical view of the Trinity. He continues: “The precincts of heaven are occupied by more than one divine person. Christian Monotheism must include more than one divine thinker, doer, actor, lover. Their unity is more like a marriage in which two persons become one flesh, or like persons bound together in a single community.”
If the New Testament suggests any analogy, says Plantinga, it is in John 17:21–23. This is a model for social Trinitarianism. Just as Father and Son, though distinct, are “in” each other, so the new community must be unified both vertically and horizontally. As the three persons are yet communally one God, so the church, though many members, is still only one church. The author says that the Holy Trinity is a transcendent church family. So viewed, he says, the idea of the image of God takes on new and richer meaning.
I have tried to do justice to the article of Dr. Plantinga. I have quoted as much of his article as I thought necessary and, not being able to quote the whole article, quoted enough to give the meaning of the writer, I believe.
The first major doctrine the church sought to set forth in the New Testament times was the doctrine of the Trinity. The church felt that this doctrine was basic to all the others. The “God-concept” had to be made clear to all men. The Old Testament people of God had been taught in the clearest possible terms that there was only one God (Deut. 6:4). The people of Israel were not to fall into the error of the surrounding peoples who served many gods. The God who had created them was the same God who provided for them. We have often been taught that the Old Testament gives various proofs for the Trinity. It is true that there are many passages in the Old Testament that point in that direction but a clear proof is lacking. God did not confuse Israel by telling them that there was but one God and then telling them that there were three persons in this Godhead!
When the New Testament age dawned the people still held to the idea that there was but one God. They had to continue to believe this, but a fuller revelation now came. When Jesus came into the world the question naturally arose: Who is He? The same is true concerning the coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. Now the church was faced by the problem: There is but one God, but the Father has spoken, He has sent His Son and the Spirit completes the work of redemption. The New Testament gives clear proof that God is Triune even though the word is not used. When the church began to reflect on this problem it was difficult to make a clear statement which would do justice to Scripture and be understandable (as far as possible) to the members of the church. Tertullian and Origen had both spoken of the Trinity but their views did not do justice to the teachings of Scripture. Not until the council of Nicea in 325 was a definitive statement drawn up concerning this doctrine. Especially in the Athanasian Creed the terms tumble over each other to try to give the accurate Biblical teaching. This doctrine will always remain a mystery. It must be believed.
Dr. Plantinga has given us a clear picture of the teachings of the various theologians as they have wrestled with this doctrine. He does not want to fall into the errors into which many of them have fallen. I wonder, though, whether he has not fallen into some of the pit-falls which surround an interpretation of this doctrine?
There is and there has always been the danger of rationalizing a doctrine such as this one. As a child in the Christian school, I can remember, we were told that there are many examples of Trinity in the world of nature. The familiar H20 as solid-ice, liquid-water, and gas-steam. This simply is not true. I do not believe that there are any illustrations of the Trinity which do justice to the teaching of the Scriptures. Nothing here below is like the Trinity above and, surely, nothing in the Trinity above is a model of anything here below. This doctrine is unique-it is the only one there is. It is revealed! Man would never have come to this conclusion. It cannot be defined because a definition places it, first of all, into a class. Here there is no class into which the Trinity fits. To liken the Trinity to the family does not do justice to the revelation. The doctrine of the Trinity is basic to all that we believe. The fundamental question is: Who is your God? The only answer comes from Scripture.
H. Vander Kam is a retired Christian Reformed pastor living at Orange City, Iowa, who has taught at Mid-America Reformed Seminary.