As a theist, however, I do find one item particularly poor: If God exists, is it unreasonable to suppose that there would be at least one irrefutable proof of his existence. One could just as easily justify solipsism to oneself (who else is there?) by saying that if other people really existed (as first-person, feeling beings rather than as automaton’s or figments of my imagination), then there would be at least one irrefutable proof of their existence. Perhaps James is more concerned with the Biblical God, but one need not be a Christian to believe in God (not the biblical imitation).

On a similar question, while I find the doctrine of the trinity ridiculous, I don’t think it could not possibly be true (just that there is no reason to think it true). A better refutation of the trinity would be twofold: 1. Even if the Bible claimed it to be true, that wouldn’t make it so. 2. The Bible doesn’t even claim it. i.e., in the synoptic Gospels Jesus is the son of God, not God, so we have disagreement among the evangelists over this person being part of the godhead, and there is nothing in references to the “holy spirit” that indicates this is a person covalent with God. The Holy Spirit could be just another angel, like Gabriel, or maybe another name for the whole heavenly host of all angels, or who knows what? BTW, I don’t find the concept impossible, because God is indeed beyond comprehension (that’s a reason why no possible Bible could ever allow us to comprehend God), and an analogy would be that if we tried to explain three-dimensional space to a person living,somehow, in a one-dimensional universe, would result in the same bewilderment we feel at the other type of trinity. Space? Dimension? what’s the difference he would say. But I repeat, I see no need for the hypothesis of a trinity.

“But it would be absurd to seek evidence for the existence of married bachelors, since it is conceptually impossible for such beings to exist.”

And then I stopped. Why you might ask?

Let me ask you a question? Do you expect to be able to logically understand God and quantify him mathematically? This is (as you would say) an infinite being. God exists outside of the physical laws and restrictions of the space in which you inhabit. All of your logic is tied to this physical universe, but it wouldn’t restrict God because he isn’t contained by it. Maybe the properties of this space allow a married bachelor. How do you know?

Now, lets ask this question:
“Okay, if God created the universe - who created God?”

Does this question make sense? No? Well, its certainly not a very good one because it assumes that time and causality exist in the same way in the space God inhabits to that in our universe. Causality maybe didn’t exist before the creation of the universe, and maybe didn’t exist in the different properties of the space in which God inhabits, or maybe its completely different. Maybe an event happens first, and then the thing that caused it happened afterwards. We JUST DON’T KNOW.

And this is where we get into problems….For example here
“Let the Father be designated by x, the Son by y, and the Holy Spirit by z. God, as defined by Swinburne, can be designated by G. As Cartwright notes, one way to interpret the creed is to take the verb ‘is’ and understand it to mean ‘is identical with’8, therefore, x = G, y = G, and z = G. But if this is true, then it logically follows (according to Leibniz’s principle of identity, which states: if x is the same object as y then x has exactly the same properties that y has) that x = y, x = z, and y = z. However, the creed will not allow this: (4)-(6). The Father, Son and Holy Sprit are different and distinct from each other.”

You are evaluating something using the mathematics/physics of this space that exists in another space with almost certainly a completely different set of mathematics/physics governing it and expecting to get a sensible answer? Its whole possible that in this space the Creed WILL follow this. Do you think that you should be able to quantify what God is? It doesn’t make sense to assume that the logic of your world also restricts God.

Ultimately, using logic tied to the mathematic space that we know holds true in this universe and applying it to anything which is not wholey contained BY this mathematical space is utterly pointless. We can really reliably infer anything about anything that is not contained wholely and restricted wholey by the nature of the space in which we inhabit. The maths is broken. This is why it will never be possible to be able to look back _beyond_ the singularity at the inception of the big bang, because all physics breaks down and we have no means to do it.

First, “kudos” to MENJ for mirroring Imran Aijaz’ article. Many of his extremely well written pieces were apparently lost as his site underwent revision some time ago, and that is an unfortunate loss indeed, since Imran is one of the most brillian Muslims on the net.

Regarding George’s post from February 15th, one portion which I wish to view in isolation (i.e. unrelated to the rest of the stuff he wrote) is the following:

“the equation is not G = x, G = z, G = y, but G = (x + y + z), which is to my mind perfectly coherent.”

I think this scratches the surface of a proper response to Imran’s argument. I agree with Imran that it is a contradiction to claim that each Person is identical to the Godhead yet not identical to one another. I also agree with Imran that it would be a contradiction to claim that each person is a god yet there is only one god. But there is another solution…

The response to Imran is inspired by William Lane Craig’s approach to the doctrine of the Trinity (cf. his book, “Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview”). It holds that the three Persons are not by themselves deities, but rather divine beings which are each a proper part of a single Deity. When it is said that “Jesus is God,” the copula of such a proposition is interpretated as one of predication rather than identity (i.e. the statement is that Jesus is divine, but not The God [of Abraham]). Interestingly enough, this position has support in the Greek text of John 1:1. Regardless, putting Biblical support (or lack thereof) aside for a moment, I would like to offer a logically coherent version of the Trinity, put forth in the language of formal logic, and then explained.

But first let me describe some of the symbols I weill employ:

G’x will represent that x is a member of the class of things which are “God” in a sense of predication (i.e. divine or in possession of some of the attributes of deity) and proper
parts of the Godhead.

The similar looking construction Gx (the difference between this and the above might be vocalized G-prime-of-x and G-of-x, respectively) will state something different, namely that x is a deity.

I will use the constants f, j, h, and ixGx to represent the Father, Jesus, the Holy Ghost and the Godhead, respectively (with regard to ixGx, this is taken from Brian Leftow’s employment of Russell’s definite description operator, but if anyone objects, they can simply replace ixGx with g).

x –> y will represent “if x, then y”

~ will represent negation (e.g. ~x means not-x)

= will be used to represent identity

& will be used as the conjunctive connective

x y will represent the biconditional (i.e. both if x then y as well as if y then x)

x.P.y will represent the relation function such that x is a proper part of y

{x,y,z} will represent the set/class containing x, y and z

x.U.y will represent x and y being united within the Godhead in some way

(x) will represent the universal quantifier (i.e. for all x)

(Ex) will represent the existential quantifier (i.e. for some x, or there is at least one x such that)

With that, the doctrine might be written as follows:

1. (x)(Gx (x = ixGx))
2. ~(Ex)(Gx & ~(x = ixGx))
3. (x)(G’x –> x.P.ixGx)
4. (x)(y)((x.P.ixGx & y.P.ixGx) –> x.U.y)
5. G’f
6. G’j
7. G’h
8. ~Gf
9. ~Gj
10. ~Gh
11. (~(f = j) & ~(f = h)) & ~(j = h)
12. {f,j,h} = ixGx

ELUCIDATION: The first proposition notes that anything which is identical to the Godhead is a deity, and the second proposition notes that there does not exist any being which is a deity and not identical to the Godhead. In other words, the first two propositions are statements of Monotheism (there is only one deity, and that is the Godhead). The third proposition notes that any being which is God in a sense of predication (i.e. divine or in the possession of some of the attributes of deity) is a proper part of the Godhead (and it logically follows by denying th consequent that those beings which are not proper parts of the Godhead are not “God” in a sense of predication). The fourth proposition states that any two (or more) beings who are proper parts of the Godhead are united within the Godhead. I make no attempt to explain *how* they are united; rather I am simply asserting that they are united in some way. The fifth, sixth and seventh propositions note that the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are each God in a sense of predication. The eighth, ninth, and tenth propositions specifically deny that any of these persons are deities by themselves, nor is any of them (by virtue of the first proposition) identical to the Godhead. The eleventh proposition notes that none of the three persons are identical to one another. The twelfth proposition notes that the Godhead is identical to the combined set of the three persons in toto. Note however that this is for these constants specifically - no hard and fast rule was stated where an object is necessarily identical to the collection of its member parts. The point is that an object *can* be identical with the collection of its proper parts in toto, and in this case it is. This doctrine is logically coherent (i.e. there is nothing self contradictory about it).

However, I agree totally with Arnold, and I think that his example is very appropriate indeed. It is of course only a parable (but I’m sure that God has nothing against parables): the Father is the Mind, the Son is the Body, and the Holy Spirit is the Soul. They are all aspects of God, and all three aspects are eternal, or better: co-eternal.

In other words, the equation is not G = x, G = z, G = y, but G = (x + y + z), which is to my mind perfectly coherent.

The question is if God experiences Himself as three persons, or he is tripartite only in the eyes of the mortal human who is not able to grasp the whole nature of God in one thought. (The similarity with the Dumézilian three functions is perhaps not accidental, but a possible consequence of the same organising principle of the human mind.)

The answer must be that He experiences himself as one because He is able to overview all eternity in one glance; at the same time, the omnipotent God is also able to reduce Himself to the infinitely insignificant being of a mortal man if that is what He wants to. And as a man, though still God, He must have seen Himself as three persons. To deny the power of God to do so if He for some reason wants to, is equivalent to denying His absolute omnipotence.

thanks for your reply. however, you still haven’t answered my question. when ‘you’ die and your mind, body and soul separates, how many ‘yous’ will there be? the point of this question is that each of the components you just mentioned need the other two to become ‘you’. by analogy, it would mean that each of the persons of the trinity cannot be God by itself without the other two. therefore, it is more appropriate to say that the sonis 1/3 God, and so on. astagfirullah! God forbid! you say that He is beyond comprehension. so what is the business of the whole athanasian creed then?