Compare And Contrast Augustine And Social Trinitarianism
1286 Words6 Pages
There are the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and each is God, at the same time all are one God; and each of them is a full substance, at the same time all are one substance. The Father is neither the Son nor the Holy Spirit; the Son is neither the Father not the Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son. But the Father is the Father uniquely; the Son is the Son uniquely; and the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit uniquely. All three have the same eternity, the same immutability, the same majesty, and the same power .
Here Augustine uses the term substance to denote the threeness as well as the oneness of the Trinity .
Even though Augustine and his tradition on the concept of a triune God do not have explicit reference to social trinitarianism, one of the analogies that Augustine provides to support the claim that God is trinitarian is that in God there is lover, a beloved and the love between them. This analogy comes closer to social trinitarian understanding.
Augustine rejects the view that the source of divinity is the Father but the Trinity as a whole.
Augustine presents the Trinity where Father and Son sharing a society of love. De Trinitate 4.8.12. Each of the divine persons is a rememberer, a thinker, a love and a…show more content… Social Trinitarianism is a concept that conceives God as a society of three persons who are perfectly united in their mutual love relationship . It follows analytic method, in the sense that it starts with the three divine persons and then to form the concept of the unicity of God. It is generally believed that the Social Trinitarian view is inspired by the writings of the Cappadocian Fathers: Basil the Great (330-379), Basil's younger brother Gregory of Nyssa (c.332-395), who was the bishop of Nyssa; and a close friend of Basil, Gregory of Nazianus (329-389)