REPORT: TOL Statement of faith
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Ben Masada
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The first seven days have the implication of the planet being formed, but telling the angels to let such and such happen, and it a recognition of it happening currently, not on the same day. Origen and his logos doctrine?
I would call it, israelism. Jesus wasn't a military leader.
Trust and fear of God aren't Modern Judaism?
There is nothing eternal about death or dying, because neither is permanent.
dodge
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No surprise to a christian that you do NOT believe the Genesis account of creation , because the Jews also did NOT accept their Messiah when He walked among them as many now do not believe.
Jerry Shugart
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What does it mean when it says that the Lord Jesus was eternally begotten of God and not made?
Ask Mr. Religion
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Begetting and Proceeding
Begetting and Proceeding
We are entering deep waters here of the mysteries of God, so let's approach the subject with much fear and trembling.
Think of the phrase, "In the unity of the Godhead."
Western theology begins at this point. One God possessing full Godhead.
The Father is unbegotten. As such God the Father is the ever-flowing fountain of the divine essence. He communicates this essence to the Son. He with the Son communicates this essence to the Spirit. The communication is eternal. It did not happen one time and then stop.
The first communication is called begetting; the second communication is called procession. Call the communication whatever one pleases, it is the communication itself which is important. So we say the Father begets the Son, and the Holy Spirit proceeds from Father and the Son. The begetting is also often termed generation. The procession is also sometimes called spiration.
In his Systematic Theology, Berkhof wrote:
This procession of the Holy Spirit, briefly called spiration, is his personal property. Much of what was said respecting the generation of the Son also applies to the spiration of the Holy Spirit, and need not be repeated. The following points of distinction between the two may be noted, however:
(1) Generation is the work of the Father only; spiration is the work of both the Father and the Son.
(2) By generation the Son is enabled to take part in the work of spiration, but the Holy Spirit acquires no such power.
(3) In logical order generation precedes spiration.
It should be remembered, however, that all this implies no essential subordination of the Holy Spirit to the Son.
In spiration as well as in generation there is a communication of the whole of the divine essence, so that the Holy Spirit is on an equality with the Father and the Son.
The doctrine of the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son is based on John 15:26, and on the fact that the Spirit is also called the Spirit of Christ and of the Son, Rom. 8:9; Gal. 4:6, and is sent by Christ into the world. Spiration may be defined as that eternal and necessary act of the first and second persons in the Trinity whereby they, within the divine Being, become the ground of the personal subsistence of the Holy Spirit, and put the third person in possession of the whole divine essence, without any division, alienation or change.
When one begins with the unity of God these personal properties are the means by which Godhead is understood to belong to a distinct mode of subsistence within the undivided substance.
AMR
Begetting and Proceeding
We are entering deep waters here of the mysteries of God, so let's approach the subject with much fear and trembling.
Think of the phrase, "In the unity of the Godhead."
Western theology begins at this point. One God possessing full Godhead.
The Father is unbegotten. As such God the Father is the ever-flowing fountain of the divine essence. He communicates this essence to the Son. He with the Son communicates this essence to the Spirit. The communication is eternal. It did not happen one time and then stop.
The first communication is called begetting; the second communication is called procession. Call the communication whatever one pleases, it is the communication itself which is important. So we say the Father begets the Son, and the Holy Spirit proceeds from Father and the Son. The begetting is also often termed generation. The procession is also sometimes called spiration.
In his Systematic Theology, Berkhof wrote:
This procession of the Holy Spirit, briefly called spiration, is his personal property. Much of what was said respecting the generation of the Son also applies to the spiration of the Holy Spirit, and need not be repeated. The following points of distinction between the two may be noted, however:
(1) Generation is the work of the Father only; spiration is the work of both the Father and the Son.
(2) By generation the Son is enabled to take part in the work of spiration, but the Holy Spirit acquires no such power.
(3) In logical order generation precedes spiration.
It should be remembered, however, that all this implies no essential subordination of the Holy Spirit to the Son.
In spiration as well as in generation there is a communication of the whole of the divine essence, so that the Holy Spirit is on an equality with the Father and the Son.
The doctrine of the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son is based on John 15:26, and on the fact that the Spirit is also called the Spirit of Christ and of the Son, Rom. 8:9; Gal. 4:6, and is sent by Christ into the world. Spiration may be defined as that eternal and necessary act of the first and second persons in the Trinity whereby they, within the divine Being, become the ground of the personal subsistence of the Holy Spirit, and put the third person in possession of the whole divine essence, without any division, alienation or change.
When one begins with the unity of God these personal properties are the means by which Godhead is understood to belong to a distinct mode of subsistence within the undivided substance.
AMR
Last edited:
PneumaPsucheSoma
TOL Subscriber
I get really uncomfortable when Berkhof and others refer to filiation and spiration as "work", implying economy rather than ontology.
This is also compounded by referring to filiation and spiration as being "logically in order", indicating sequence for a God whose incommunicable attributes include eternity and infinity, etc.
All of this distracts from the core truth that the eternal, uncreated Son is God's actual Logos (rather than merely being a titular reference).
What sayest thou?
(And my contention remains that multi-phenomenality is vital to this representation, even if multiple hypostases are retained - which they don't have to be because of multi-phenomenality.)
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Either God is Our Logic or Logic is God
Either God is Our Logic or Logic is God
As to logical ordering I see no issue with confusion related to sequence if one is properly grounded on logic per se. The latter (sequence) would be confusing, given the temporal association. But, our logic is not necessarily God's logic. There is an original, uncreated logic, which is the logic of the triune God. This logic is eternal, infinite, simple, triune, and personal. It is the self-coherence of God; it is the divine, triune, self-consistency. The relationship between the logic of God and logic as we know it, such as Aristotelian logic, is complex. If we take Aristotle’s logic to be identical to God’s logic, we end up with Aristotle’s God. Sigh.
First, logic as we know it depends upon the original logic of God. For example, God is. Therefore, it is false that God is is false. The law of the excluded middle works in the created order because God, as uncreated, eternally is. I would go so far as to say that the act of creation and the continuing providence of the triune God are the sine qua non of logic as we know it.
Second, logic as we know it is often falsely credited with its own self-sufficiency—it is taken to be ultimate; in other words, the above is often denied, implicitly or explicitly. It is denied by non-theistic or anti-theistic writers who claim that logic is, that Christian theism violates the laws of logic, and that, therefore, Christian theism is false, or irrational. This line of thought takes logic as we know it to be ultimate in and of itself, as self-existent.
There are theistic philosophers who take logic as we know it to be the eternal logic of God. This is also a denial of the dependence of logic as we know it upon the original logic of God, since it describes God in terms of logic, rather than describing logic in terms of God: its methodology is creatio-centric. This has to do with those perhaps overzealous defenders of the Creator/creature distinction who claim that logic is a created thing; they also deny the organic dependence of logic as we know it upon the eternal logic of God. They claim that the two are utterly unrelated and unrelatable.
If it is true that the original logic is the (logic of the) triune God, it would seem that one must believe in the triune God to understand logic rightly, or ultimately, or truly, or something like that—to account for it, we might say. If that is the case, the simple truths of logic like the laws of identity, the excluded middle, and non-contradiction, set before us the question of the very foundation of our thinking and our understanding of the world. There appear to be two basic alternatives: recognition of the triune Creator God as Lord and judge of all, or affirmation of the self-sufficiency and ultimacy of the laws of logic. Either God is our logic, or logic is our God.
If we define believability and possibility in terms of logic, if we treat logic as we know it as ultimate—even more ultimate than God—then Christianity faces tough challenges. And it should face problems if we take logic as we know it to be ultimate and self-sufficient. Taking logic as we know it as ultimate is to mistake the analogue (ectype) for the original (archetype), and thus, in effect, to take the (created) world itself as ultimate and self-sufficient.
Consider...
God has determined whatsoever comes to pass.
Man’s moral acts are things that comes to pass.
Therefore man’s moral acts are determined and man is not responsible for them.
Clearly from the point of view of a non-Christian logic like the above, the Reformed faith can be bowled over by means of a single syllogism.
For if we are treating logic as the self-sufficient determiner of possibility, we’d have to surrender either moral responsibility or the full sovereignty of God (See Rom 9:19 and forward). The simple fact that Scripture won’t allow us to surrender either of these to the demands of "logic" is an indication that logic as we know it must be leading us astray somehow.
I think the way through such apparent difficulties is to understand logic as derivative and reflective (ectypal) of the original uncreated logic (archetypal) of the eternal triune God, and to remember that we should not, therefore, take logic to be the independent determiner of possibility and believability, particularly when Scripture invites us not to.
According to Scripture, the triune God is the creator of this one-and-many universe. It is because the one-and-many God is self-consistent and self-existent that logic works. At the same time, it is because God the creator and sustainer is Himself essentially one-and-many that reality is too rich to be captured, or much less governed, by syllogisms and propositions and laws of logic.
For example, after the flood, the Lord renews His covenant with Noah. Part of the re-creation language in that renewal goes like this: “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease” (Gen 8:22). This is an extraordinary utterance. It appears to be a divine utterance that is essentially and irreducibly one-and-many: In a single word and with a unified declaration, God has determined that history should be a certain way, and that way, notice, is change and variation—plurality.
The richness of the one-and-many fabric of the created order is beyond the explanatory power of logic, but logic is a tremendously powerful tool; indeed, it is sublime, and, if understood rightly, reflective of the nature and the majesty of God. The unbeliever takes for granted the ultimacy of the universe. This is a helpful insight, yet problems emerge when logic as we know it is treated as ultimate, as self-sufficient and self-existent, particularly when we’re dealing with Scripture. Logic itself is sometimes thought to be the first and the last, that through which all things were made and in which all things hold together; but that honor belongs to Our Lord alone.
Note: The above is liberally borrowed from:
http://reformedforum.org/christianity-and-the-rules-of-reason/
A good read laying the foundations: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BFW3ER8
AMR
Either God is Our Logic or Logic is God
I get the issue with "work", but am at a loss for a better term. Perhaps "property" would be a better substitute as it retains the ontological aspect.
As to logical ordering I see no issue with confusion related to sequence if one is properly grounded on logic per se. The latter (sequence) would be confusing, given the temporal association. But, our logic is not necessarily God's logic. There is an original, uncreated logic, which is the logic of the triune God. This logic is eternal, infinite, simple, triune, and personal. It is the self-coherence of God; it is the divine, triune, self-consistency. The relationship between the logic of God and logic as we know it, such as Aristotelian logic, is complex. If we take Aristotle’s logic to be identical to God’s logic, we end up with Aristotle’s God. Sigh.
First, logic as we know it depends upon the original logic of God. For example, God is. Therefore, it is false that God is is false. The law of the excluded middle works in the created order because God, as uncreated, eternally is. I would go so far as to say that the act of creation and the continuing providence of the triune God are the sine qua non of logic as we know it.
Second, logic as we know it is often falsely credited with its own self-sufficiency—it is taken to be ultimate; in other words, the above is often denied, implicitly or explicitly. It is denied by non-theistic or anti-theistic writers who claim that logic is, that Christian theism violates the laws of logic, and that, therefore, Christian theism is false, or irrational. This line of thought takes logic as we know it to be ultimate in and of itself, as self-existent.
There are theistic philosophers who take logic as we know it to be the eternal logic of God. This is also a denial of the dependence of logic as we know it upon the original logic of God, since it describes God in terms of logic, rather than describing logic in terms of God: its methodology is creatio-centric. This has to do with those perhaps overzealous defenders of the Creator/creature distinction who claim that logic is a created thing; they also deny the organic dependence of logic as we know it upon the eternal logic of God. They claim that the two are utterly unrelated and unrelatable.
If it is true that the original logic is the (logic of the) triune God, it would seem that one must believe in the triune God to understand logic rightly, or ultimately, or truly, or something like that—to account for it, we might say. If that is the case, the simple truths of logic like the laws of identity, the excluded middle, and non-contradiction, set before us the question of the very foundation of our thinking and our understanding of the world. There appear to be two basic alternatives: recognition of the triune Creator God as Lord and judge of all, or affirmation of the self-sufficiency and ultimacy of the laws of logic. Either God is our logic, or logic is our God.
If we define believability and possibility in terms of logic, if we treat logic as we know it as ultimate—even more ultimate than God—then Christianity faces tough challenges. And it should face problems if we take logic as we know it to be ultimate and self-sufficient. Taking logic as we know it as ultimate is to mistake the analogue (ectype) for the original (archetype), and thus, in effect, to take the (created) world itself as ultimate and self-sufficient.
Consider...
God has determined whatsoever comes to pass.
Man’s moral acts are things that comes to pass.
Therefore man’s moral acts are determined and man is not responsible for them.
Clearly from the point of view of a non-Christian logic like the above, the Reformed faith can be bowled over by means of a single syllogism.
For if we are treating logic as the self-sufficient determiner of possibility, we’d have to surrender either moral responsibility or the full sovereignty of God (See Rom 9:19 and forward). The simple fact that Scripture won’t allow us to surrender either of these to the demands of "logic" is an indication that logic as we know it must be leading us astray somehow.
I think the way through such apparent difficulties is to understand logic as derivative and reflective (ectypal) of the original uncreated logic (archetypal) of the eternal triune God, and to remember that we should not, therefore, take logic to be the independent determiner of possibility and believability, particularly when Scripture invites us not to.
According to Scripture, the triune God is the creator of this one-and-many universe. It is because the one-and-many God is self-consistent and self-existent that logic works. At the same time, it is because God the creator and sustainer is Himself essentially one-and-many that reality is too rich to be captured, or much less governed, by syllogisms and propositions and laws of logic.
For example, after the flood, the Lord renews His covenant with Noah. Part of the re-creation language in that renewal goes like this: “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease” (Gen 8:22). This is an extraordinary utterance. It appears to be a divine utterance that is essentially and irreducibly one-and-many: In a single word and with a unified declaration, God has determined that history should be a certain way, and that way, notice, is change and variation—plurality.
The richness of the one-and-many fabric of the created order is beyond the explanatory power of logic, but logic is a tremendously powerful tool; indeed, it is sublime, and, if understood rightly, reflective of the nature and the majesty of God. The unbeliever takes for granted the ultimacy of the universe. This is a helpful insight, yet problems emerge when logic as we know it is treated as ultimate, as self-sufficient and self-existent, particularly when we’re dealing with Scripture. Logic itself is sometimes thought to be the first and the last, that through which all things were made and in which all things hold together; but that honor belongs to Our Lord alone.
Note: The above is liberally borrowed from:
http://reformedforum.org/christianity-and-the-rules-of-reason/
A good read laying the foundations: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BFW3ER8
AMR
Last edited:
Nang
TOL Subscriber
Agreed, so far.
Isn't that just what Berkhof (AMR) just claimed?
I would request to be told how this is wrong . . .
Seems to me, this is an attempt to conflate faith in the divine and ultimate logic of God as revealed in Holy Scripture, with all the variant (non-Christian) human philosophies as adopted by mankind.
Clearly from the point of view of a non-Christian logic like the above, the Reformed faith can be bowled over by means of a single syllogism.
It seems you present argument against any deserved adherence to a scriptural/theistic logic, due to the philosophical errors,(of which are many!) that are ignorant of or deny a message of the reality of an eternal logic (Truth) attributed to the essence of Creator/God, cannot be reasonably held by men at all. Not even Christians.
I believe the sole purpose of the Logos coming in flesh form, was to reveal the reasonable Truth of God to His creatures, through His Word. Successfully so! His Elect possess the reasonable, logical knowledge of the essence of their Creator/God, as revealed by His Word and the Incarnation of the Christ.
How off track am I from what you have presented from Berkhof?
(I would also add that I think this discussion moves beyond the STICKY, and probably deserves its own thread on ECT.)
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PneumaPsucheSoma
TOL Subscriber
To AMR:
I would add for clarity that I am possibly the most anti-Aristotelian human who has ever lived, and that's not hyberbolic drama. If one human (and their influence) could be removed from the historical landscape of humanity, I would easily choose Aristotle.
(This is relative to the subject of logic above.)
I would add for clarity that I am possibly the most anti-Aristotelian human who has ever lived, and that's not hyberbolic drama. If one human (and their influence) could be removed from the historical landscape of humanity, I would easily choose Aristotle.
(This is relative to the subject of logic above.)
PneumaPsucheSoma
TOL Subscriber
I get the issue with "work", but am at a loss for a better term. Perhaps "property" would be a better substitute as it retains the ontological aspect.
As to logical ordering I see no issue with confusion related to sequence if one is properly grounded on logic per se. The latter (sequence) would be confusing, given the temporal association. But, our logic is not necessarily God's logic. There is an original, uncreated logic, which is the logic of the triune God. This logic is eternal, infinite, simple, triune, and personal. It is the self-coherence of God; it is the divine, triune, self-consistency. The relationship between the logic of God and logic as we know it, such as Aristotelian logic, is complex. If we take Aristotle’s logic to be identical to God’s logic, we end up with Aristotle’s God. Sigh.
First, logic as we know it depends upon the original logic of God. For example, God is. Therefore, it is false that God is is false. The law of the excluded middle works in the created order because God, as uncreated, eternally is. I would go so far as to say that the act of creation and the continuing providence of the triune God are the sine qua non of logic as we know it.
Second, logic as we know it is often falsely credited with its own self-sufficiency—it is taken to be ultimate; in other words, the above is often denied, implicitly or explicitly. It is denied by non-theistic or anti-theistic writers who claim that logic is, that Christian theism violates the laws of logic, and that, therefore, Christian theism is false, or irrational. This line of thought takes logic as we know it to be ultimate in and of itself, as self-existent.
There are theistic philosophers who take logic as we know it to be the eternal logic of God. This is also a denial of the dependence of logic as we know it upon the original logic of God, since it describes God in terms of logic, rather than describing logic in terms of God: its methodology is creatio-centric. This has to do with those perhaps overzealous defenders of the Creator/creature distinction who claim that logic is a created thing; they also deny the organic dependence of logic as we know it upon the eternal logic of God. They claim that the two are utterly unrelated and unrelatable.
If it is true that the original logic is the (logic of the) triune God, it would seem that one must believe in the triune God to understand logic rightly, or ultimately, or truly, or something like that—to account for it, we might say. If that is the case, the simple truths of logic like the laws of identity, the excluded middle, and non-contradiction, set before us the question of the very foundation of our thinking and our understanding of the world. There appear to be two basic alternatives: recognition of the triune Creator God as Lord and judge of all, or affirmation of the self-sufficiency and ultimacy of the laws of logic. Either God is our logic, or logic is our God.
If we define believability and possibility in terms of logic, if we treat logic as we know it as ultimate—even more ultimate than God—then Christianity faces tough challenges. And it should face problems if we take logic as we know it to be ultimate and self-sufficient. Taking logic as we know it as ultimate is to mistake the analogue (ectype) for the original (archetype), and thus, in effect, to take the (created) world itself as ultimate and self-sufficient.
Consider...
God has determined whatsoever comes to pass.
Man’s moral acts are things that comes to pass.
Therefore man’s moral acts are determined and man is not responsible for them.
Clearly from the point of view of a non-Christian logic like the above, the Reformed faith can be bowled over by means of a single syllogism.
For if we are treating logic as the self-sufficient determiner of possibility, we’d have to surrender either moral responsibility or the full sovereignty of God (See Rom 9:19 and forward). The simple fact that Scripture won’t allow us to surrender either of these to the demands of "logic" is an indication that logic as we know it must be leading us astray somehow.
I think the way through such apparent difficulties is to understand logic as derivative and reflective (ectypal) of the original uncreated logic (archetypal) of the eternal triune God, and to remember that we should not, therefore, take logic to be the independent determiner of possibility and believability, particularly when Scripture invites us not to.
According to Scripture, the triune God is the creator of this one-and-many universe. It is because the one-and-many God is self-consistent and self-existent that logic works. At the same time, it is because God the creator and sustainer is Himself essentially one-and-many that reality is too rich to be captured, or much less governed, by syllogisms and propositions and laws of logic.
For example, after the flood, the Lord renews His covenant with Noah. Part of the re-creation language in that renewal goes like this: “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease” (Gen 8:22). This is an extraordinary utterance. It appears to be a divine utterance that is essentially and irreducibly one-and-many: In a single word and with a unified declaration, God has determined that history should be a certain way, and that way, notice, is change and variation—plurality.
The richness of the one-and-many fabric of the created order is beyond the explanatory power of logic, but logic is a tremendously powerful tool; indeed, it is sublime, and, if understood rightly, reflective of the nature and the majesty of God. The unbeliever takes for granted the ultimacy of the universe. This is a helpful insight, yet problems emerge when logic as we know it is treated as ultimate, as self-sufficient and self-existent, particularly when we’re dealing with Scripture. Logic itself is sometimes thought to be the first and the last, that through which all things were made and in which all things hold together; but that honor belongs to Our Lord alone.
Note: The above is liberally borrowed from:
http://reformedforum.org/christianity-and-the-rules-of-reason/
A good read laying the foundations: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BFW3ER8
AMR
I take a much more direct path to logic and ontology, as odd as that will seem to you because of my verbosity and GrEnglish.
It begins with understanding that the one true and living God is the Father, who is Spirit and whose Logos is the Son. Rhema is both objective and subjective, being the thing thought and spoken about and that which stands for the thing thought and spoken about. The Rhema is both scabbard (objective) and sword (subjective). Signified and sign. The means of intelligent rational reason and pondered comprehension and apprehension of object as subject is Logos.
Since God alone is eternal and uncreated, there is nothing (no thing) else with phenomenal existence to think and speak about. God is the sole foundational underlying substantial objective reality of existence (hypostasis). This "who"ness underlies His ousia as the "what"ness that is His divine wealth of existence (ousia).
So when God speaks to create, it is by His Logos that all objective reality of created existence is instantiated. This is the foundation (literally) for logic. The Father's hypostasis. His very underlying reality as eternal, uncreated self-conscious self-existence.
This is what ties Ontology, Epistemology, Economy, and Methodology together (Being, Knowing, Doing, and "Way"ing). And there is only one way in which the Son can be the eternal and uncreated Logos (and vice versa).
It means perpetually begotten in English.
Me? I'd probably take out Philo Farnsworth.
Just a caution; We are humans, and when we in our effort to understand God start talking about TIME we are talking about something we do not understand in exactly the same way a fish does not understand WATER. The bible is written with words and words that humans 3000 years ago understood. We have in the last 50years learned enough about Time to finally understand that time can't be explained in words! To start to understand time we need heavy duty Math. We don't have the tools for the job. We need people who can work with relativistic math. Those folks are scientists not theologians. These are two groups that rarely overlap and when we have a rare scientifically literate theologian we need to listen to them.