The holy mystery: Trinity (Part 1)
By
Brother Mario O Sujanto
I. Introduction
All
glory is to the one true God in His essence (Greek “Ousia”) together
with His character (Greek “Hypostasis”) as His being.
Wisdom of God (Greek “logos tau theo”) and His living spirit
(Greek “pneuma to hagion”) one in Being with the One true God and
always together in His oneness and cannot be separated with any circumstances.
His Word or Logos, through the Logos all things were made, in the
fullness of time, the Logos became a man (Gal 4:4; John 1:1-3, 14). He who dwells in unapproachable light, , whom no man has ever
seen or can see (1 Tim 6:16), because no one has ever seen God; the Word, who is
in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known. (John 1:18).
In that sense, the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret for
centuries, now is made known by His incarnation becoming a man (Rome 16:25-27).
For Him, the only God full of wisdom, by His Word which is begotten but
not made, in the unity of His holy spirit, all glory, honors and adoration, for
ever and ever, Amen.
Discussing
about Trinitarian from the oneness of God, firstly, we have to realize that this
dogma is not trying to answer questions “how many” is God, but “what is”
God. In the other hand, Trinity is
not the quantity of God, but the quality of God.
Because in the time our Holy church fathers formulate this dogma
(formulating not creating), the
oneness of God is not a subject. Our
Holy Catholic Church is rooted from the Judaism, which have a very strong
believe in (monotheisme). As their
creed says:
“shema
yss-ra’el Adonay eloheinu adonay ehad”
Translation:
Hear,
O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord. (Torah, Hadebarim / Deuteronomy 6:4)
On this paper, I will try to prove, that early council fathers never
created the trinity, but they just formulating it.
The mean for that, the formulation of that faith (which latter known as
“Apostle Creed” and “Nicene-Constantinople Creed”) is pioneer by the
faith of Jesus Apostles, or even greater, by all the Prophets at all the ages.
II. God, His Word and His Spirit in the Old Testament.
As soon as we open our bible, the very first book in the Torah which is
known “Beresyit” (Genesis) 1:1-3, we will find God (Hebrew: “Elohim”)
which is from the beginning of all ages, one essense with His Word (Hebrew: “Omer
Elohim”) and His Spirit (Hebrew: “Ruah Elohim”).
In
the original manuscript:
(1)
beresyit bara elohim et ha samayim we et ha areths
(2)
we ha arets hateyah tohu wa bohu we khosyekh al pene tehom we ruah
elohim merakhefet al pene ha mayim
(3)
wa yomer elohim yehid-or we yehi-or
Translation:
(1)
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth
(2)
The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of
the deep; and the Spirit of god was
moving over the face of the waters.
(3)
And the Word of God, “Let there
be light”; and there was light.
In the Psalms of David, is
says also about the trinity in the matter of God Creation.
In Psalm 33:6, in the original manuscript:
Be
dabar adonay syamayim haasah ube ruakh pew gol tsebatoth
Translation:
By
the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all their host by the breath
(breath = spirit) of his mouth.
Also, in the book of the prophets, Isaiah 63: 8, 10 and 16:
(16)
ki atta adonay abinu, gaalnu me-olam shemekha;
(8)
wayyomer ak ammi hemma;
(10)
we hemma meru we ‘atsebu et ruakh godeshu
Translation:
Thou, O LORD, art our Father, our Redeemer from of old is thy name.
For he said, Surely they are my people……
But they rebelled and grieved his holy Spirit.
(Isaiah 63: 16, 8 and 10. RSV)
From some verses of the Old Testament above, we know that from the very beginning, the only true God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, is always in his essence together with His Word and His Spirit. And been explained also how the Spirit of God together with His Word (Logos), cannot be separated from the essence of God in his Oneness. The Word of God, is to be understand as God Reason (Logos to English: Logic) and also understand as God Wisdom. The spirit is also nothing else than God life itself or His own spirit, which always in the same essence in his being.
Talking about God Word and Spirit, we may easily realize that we are talking about “what is God”, not “how many god”? If we can put it into a philosophy term in the limitation of our humanity, our spirit is our life, our reason is the source of our knowledge, and always together in one essence in our human existence. Without spirit we will die, and without reason we will be a dumb and will be the same as any other non-rational animal. With this parable we can see more clearly, and mostly by what is been formulated by the great fathers of our Holy Catholic Church, that God is one in “ousia” or essence, and always in three “hypostacis” (Dr. Van Niftric and Dr. B.J. Boland translated as “the way of being”). Our Church great theologians formulated the ‘essence’ for Ousia, and the ‘the way of being’ for Hypostacis. This can be explain like this: The essence here show His God-ness as God. Same as our humanity, is our essence for us as human. The essence of God has his own way of being, which explained more clearly in the new testament as a Father, and which in that one being, always stick together with the Word and the Spirit, and which again, as again, his reason and his life. My essence is my humanity, and my being is my flesh and my blood, me is only one, not tree, I’m in the same essence together with my spirit and my reason. But about God, this must be very quickly underline: because God is difference, God being is not flesh and blood, because God cannot be limit by place and time. It is impossible for us human to imagine His holy being, Holy is God away from all human limitations.
For just understanding this great mystery, we can understand the relation between the essence of God (“ousia”) with tree way of His existence (“hypostasis”), as being explains by the great Father of the Eastern church, St. John of Damascus in his book De Haeresibus (Chap. II, “Pege Gnesioos”).
It is not difficult to understand about God the Father, for that, in the Nicene – Constantinople Creed (325-381 A.D) is been formulated so simple and quite short:
WE BELIEVE IN ONE GOD, THE FATHER, THE ALMIGHTY, MAKER OF HEAVEN AND EARTH, OF ALL THAT IS SEEN AND UNSEEN.
But everything is not so simple when we try to see about the second part, which is the explanation about Jesus Christ. This part is the longest explanation on that creed, compared to the explanation about God the Father and the Holy Spirit. This is happen because this part is the explanation about the pre-existence as a Word of God which eternal together with the essence of God the Father, the incarnation and born by the power of the Holy Spirit through the holy virgin Mary.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only
Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, god from God, Light from Light,
true god from true God, begotten, not made, one in Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
This part so clearly explains the pre-existence of Jesus Christ as a Word of God in the Essence of God the Father, to show the invisible God which is beyond our reach and understanding. As the Gospel according to John, 1:1-3 says:
En arche en ho logos, kai ho logos pros ton theon, kai theos en ho logos; outos hen en arche pros ton theon panta di autou egeneto, kai choris autou egeneto oude en ho gegonen
Translation (RSV):
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with god, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with god; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.
From the Gospel verses above explains:
In verse 2 and 3 shows that the Word of God created all things (Gen 1:3; Psalm 33:6). To keep the mind in the monotheism faith, our Holy Catholic Church from all the ages condemned every heresy teaching which believe that the Word of God been created by God. Council of Nicene (325) and council of Constantinople (381) condemned the teaching of Archbishop Arius in regarding in his teaching which says ‘there is a period of time when the Word of God hasn’t been created yet by God’1, which latter known as ‘arianism’. Let see, if God exist without His Word (reason) even only in a period of time as Arius claimed, that is mean that in the period of time, God is without reason, without wisdom, and without intellect, in the other word, God is dumb.
Because of that reason, the council formulated that the ‘son’ (Word of God) “born before all ages”. We cannot translate the word ‘born’ here as a physical manner, but the real meaning ‘born’ is that the Word exists from eternity with God. God came out from His miraculous being that unthinkable by us through His Word. This matter is been explained so clearly in the Gospel according to John 1:18 :
Theon oudeis hemoraken popote monogenes theos ho on eis ton
kolpon tou patros ekeinos ezegesato
Translation:
No one has ever seen God; the only Son (Son= other ancient authorities read God) who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known.
We can find in the original manuscript (Greek) we couldn’t find the word “Son”, because the word ‘monogenes theos’ mean ‘the only one from God’ (in Arabic: “li wahidin mil al-Al”).
Who know God better than the ‘reason’ of God Himself? Like this, our own reason knows us better compared to any other external outside my being. Maybe you know Mario is my name or probably you meet me already, but when I’m keep silence, never talk to you yet, you will never know who I am and how do I fell. And as a rational animal, from my reason and my intellect, I produce the words that will come out from my mouth. My reason come out through my words, “this is who I am, my knowledge, my will and desire”. In the other word, I show my self through my words.
Through His Word (His reason and His wisdom), God show Himself. Through His Word, God created the universe (Gen 1:3), He spokes to the prophets, and finally came down and becoming human (Heb 1:1-3, John 1: 14). Like our reason is a part of our humanity and not exist as an external part of ourselves, but from inside our being. St.Athanasius, when he defeat the Arianism, with a very beautiful words he explains:
“Like a shine of the sun, truly is the part of the sun itself, but the being of the sun never divided and never be less because of the shines. The being of the sun is complete and absolute, the shine also perfect and absolute. The shines never make the sun less perfect in his eternal bright.
This
is the point that is described and explained in the Nicene – Constantinople
creed, that the Word of God is “light from light, true God from true God”.
Here, not explaining about the pluralism of God, as the shine of the sun
is not a separate being apart from the Sun.
Because the Word of God created all things, so comes out (revealed) the
Word from the being of God, not “made”, but “begotten”.
So the son of God or the Word of God is begotten but not made.
The Word of God is came down from heaven, by the power of the Holy
Spirit, as a flesh, born of the Virgin Mary, and became a man, who been
crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, he suffered, died, and was buried, On the
third day he rose again in fulfillment of the Scriptures; he ascended into
heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father, He will come again in
glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.
This part is explaining that the Word of God who is eternal, came out from the essence of God as “reflect the glory of God” (Heb 1:3) which is eternal, and also keep the oneness of God itself2, now came down from heaven and becoming a human being. This part of creed been influenced by Gospel of John 1: 14 :
Kai ho logos sarks egeneto kai eskenosen en hemin. Kai etheasametha ten doksan autou, doksan hes monogenous para patros, pleres chairos kai aletheias.
Translation:
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father.
The word of God, which is eternal together with the being of God, came down to earth, and became a man. The Word of God that is invisible becoming a flesh of Jesus, which is in his in the spirit, in the soul, and in the body. To defeat the heresy, Council of Chalcedon (451) formulated some point about this incarnation story:
This point can be explained as this, as the Word of God, He is God himself. No one is less perfect or no one is more perfect.