{"id":3283,"date":"2016-01-06T13:34:02","date_gmt":"2016-01-06T20:34:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/blog\/archives\/"},"modified":"2016-01-08T08:07:31","modified_gmt":"2016-01-08T15:07:31","slug":"rethinking-trinity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/blog\/archives\/rethinking-trinity","title":{"rendered":"Rethinking Trinity"},"content":{"rendered":"

Keith Ward’s new book, Christ and the Cosmos: A Reformulation of Trinitarian Doctrine<\/em>, inspires me. It offers ideas whose basic form I’ve been pondering for some time. But Ward puts those ideas in explicit language and encourages me to think more creatively than I have previously!<\/p>\n

I’ve been asked to write a full-length review\/evaluative article on Ward’s book for an academic journal. But I want to throw out here Ward’s three main ideas and my two quick responses to get feedback.\"Christ-and-the-Cosmos-by-theologian-Keith-Ward-196x300\"<\/a><\/p>\n

First, Ward says the idea that the Trinity is “a society of three subjects of consciousness” is logically and theologically inadequate. The social trinity idea leads not only to tri-theism but creates insuperable problems for Christology. Out with the social trinity, says Ward! Ward says we should still affirm trinity, just not the social version of God revealed in three dimensions.<\/p>\n

Second, the God incarnate in Jesus is revealed as “a dynamic, creative, responsive, and relational God whose nature as love.” Out of love, God creates and loves others. This is an argument I make in my own books. It’s great to read Ward making it central in this book. Affirming a relational God of love is important for thinking afresh about the trinity, because some trinitarian theologies presuppose a wholly impassible deity.<\/p>\n

Third, as creator of the cosmos, God “cannot be fully and finally understood in anthropocentric images familiar to human beings on this planet.” God would likely choose a different creaturely form than human through which to be revealed on planets without humans. Among other things, this means “we should stop thinking,” says Ward, “that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is the one finally true identifying name of God for every inhabited planet in every galaxy and universe.”<\/p>\n

Ward prompts two quick observations of my own:<\/p>\n

The notion of three centers of will and consciousness making up the triune God is deeply ingrained today in the imaginations of many Christians. It will likely take significant deconstruction for them to set aside the social view of trinity. But I agree with Ward that such deconstruction should be done.<\/p>\n

The demise of the social trinity raises the question of how God’s nature is essentially relational love. Those who affirm creatio ex nihilo have said God can relate within social trinity via everlasting give-and-receive love between divine members. But if there is no social trinity and creatio ex nihilo is true, God cannot be essentially relational. For my part, I see this as another good reason to be rid of the nonbiblical doctrine of creatio ex nihilo. If we reject creation from nothing and affirm God’s everlasting love for creation, “God with us” can be essentially and everlastingly true!<\/p>\n

Today’s trinitarian teaser to titillate your theological tastebuds….<\/p>\nKeith Ward's new book is a trinitarian treatise to titillate your theological tastebuds! <\/a><\/span>Share on X<\/a><\/span>\n

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Keith Ward’s new book, Christ and the Cosmos: A Reformulation of Trinitarian Doctrine, inspires me. It offers ideas whose basic form I’ve been pondering for some time. But Ward puts those ideas in explicit language and encourages me to think more creatively than I have previously! I’ve been asked to write a full-length review\/evaluative article […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[17,25,27,57,224,238,281,442,443,444,445,446,447,448,449],"yst_prominent_words":[4520,4529,4528,4527,4526,4525,4524,4523,4522,4521,1234,2548,1921,1773,1771,1756,1750,1749,1468,1401],"class_list":["post-3283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-open_and_relational_theology","tag-god","tag-love","tag-open","tag-creation","tag-keith-ward","tag-creatio-ex-nihilo","tag-trinity","tag-triune","tag-trinitarian","tag-cosmos","tag-christ","tag-christology","tag-intratrinitarian","tag-tri-theism","tag-social-trinity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3283\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3283"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thomasjayoord.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=3283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}