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One Love
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/30/2003 3:53 PM (GMT -6) |   | Ok. I want to kinda share my perspective and get some input. This will show how I see divine revelation and why it’s important to my take on the Trinity. The 2 scenerios below are to help visualize my issue. USE YOUR IMAGINATION!
Scenario 1:
Imagine that you have a 2d plane fixed in space. This 2d plane perceives all intersections on its surface and records the data. The 2d plane can ONLY perceive things that interesect it. It cannot perceive anything above or below it. Further suppose that you have another object, a 3d perfect sphere, that slowly passes through the 2d plane.
The 2d plane records a point of intersection as a dot that continues to expand in the shape of a CIRCLE. This circle gets larger and larger…and then abruptly gets smaller and smaller until it disappears altogether.
Scenario 2:
Now imagine the same 2d plane fixed in space. Imagine another object that is AMORPHOUS that never intersects the plane, but PROJECTS an “intersection” onto the 2d plane. The 2d plane records a point of intersection as a dot that continues to expand in the shape of a CIRCLE. This circle gets larger and larger…and then abruptly gets smaller and smaller until it disappears altogether.
Now, what is the main difference between the two scenarios? The main difference, in my mind, is that the intersection in Scenario 1 is gives some information about the object that CORRELATES MEANINGFULLY with said object, whereas the intersection in Scenario 2 cannot.
Explaining. The circle produced on the 2d plane as a result of the intersection with the 3d perfect sphere realed something TRUE to the ESSENCE of what the sphere is. A sphere passing through a 2d plane will NOT produce a triangle, square, or anything else. It will ALWAYS produce a circle because of the NATURE of what a sphere is. So, when the 2d plane relays the images of an expanding and contracting circle, what CAN be said is that, whatever caused the phenomenon, it’s essential constitution is such that it produces expanding and contracting circles when intersecting a 2d plane. Now, would this mean that it the 2d plane would have to deduce that it was a perfect sphere? NOPE. It doesn’t have that much information to be able to do that. But what it CAN say for sure is that the production of expanding and contracting perfect circles is a TRUE representation of the object that the 2d plane has come into contact with.
With Scenario 2, the ONLY thing that can be known about the object is in HOW the object portrays itself. The expanding and contracting circle has NO LINE OF CONTINUITY to the amorphous object’s essential existence. Therefore, the only thing that can be said about the object is that the object REPRESENTS ITSELF as expanding and contracting perfect circles.
Ok….
The two scenarios represent ASSUMPTIONS about divine revelation. Scenario 1 assumes that God is NOT completely incomprehensible, in that God’s interaction with the world does CORRELATE MEANINGFULLY through an unbroken line of continuity to who God is essentially. This is NOT saying that God is not mysterious or completely knowable. This would be like the 2d plane deducing a perfect sphere from the intersection data it was given. (Not possible) What this is saying is that SOMETHING core and ESSENTIAL to who God is is being revealed about God in divine revelation.
Scenerio 2 assumes that God IS completely incomprehensible. That God’s interaction does NOT have a unbroken line of continuity to God’s essential existence. To be sure, God’s interactions ARE from God…and so being, are divine. But they are SEPARATE from who God is. Truly, God’s interactions with the worlds would be more of an indication of how God chooses to represent Godself more than God’s essential existence.
I lean STRONGLY towards the 1st scenerio viewpoint, most likely because of my realist tendencies.
The reason that I bring all this up is because I take this line of thinking to the idea of the TRINITY. This is, in my opinion, the ONE THING that I really am very dogged about with respect to divine revelation correlating meaningfully through an unbroken line of continuity to God’s essential existence. Like Karl Rahner, I want to say that the economic trinity IS the immanent trinity. I am inclined to say that the divine persons are PART of the essential existence of God. (This is where POW and I will obviously disagree.) The 3 persons in 1 being revealed in Scripture would be analogous to the expanding and contracting perfect circle to me. And I make the REALIST assumption that there is an unbroken line of continuity being this information and the essential existence of the Being who provided the information….which leads me to say this:
“If I can’t say ANYTHING ELSE about God, I can say that God is in God’s essential existence such that God is INHERENTLY and ETERNALLY triune, meaning 3 persons in 1 being.”
When I hear about views that propose the complete incomprehensibility or complete indeterminacy of God’s essential existence, this throws my idea of the Trinity into a friggin tailspin! If we were truly to assume the complete incomprehensibility and/or indeterminacy of God…If there truly is a DISJUNCT between the essential existence of God and how God represents Godself to us in Trinity, then HOW could it ever be the case that any human could say that the 3 persons of the Trinity were in loving communion BEFORE CREATION?? How could any being say that God is “ontologically triune”??!?! On what basis could they say such things? On basis of the revelation? No. We can’t do that because we have already dismissed out of hand that ANY of the revelation could truly show God AS GOD IS. The revelation only shows God as God wishes to be known in the ABSOLUTE sense. But things get problematic when you start dealing with what Jesus says about His love relationship to the Father before the foundations of the world. Doesn’t this give us a LINE OF CONTINUITY to God’s actual relationship with Godself before Creation? It would seem to. But this revelation CANNOT be determinate of who God IS in God’s essential existence! Oy vay!
See, y’all. Trinity is the ONE thing in Christian theology that I think the realism/nominalism issue becomes most poignant. I cannot make sense of the eternal, perichoretic, love relationship between the 3 person in 1 being God…IF at the same time, I’m being told that God is COMPLETELY incomprehensible…or that God is COMPLETELY indeterminate in God’s essential existence. It would be different if we were just talking about God’s MORAL ACTIONS or something like that. But in discussing the TRINITY, we are discussing something that ALL QUARTERS of this discussion would say is an ONTOLOGICAL description of who God is. This means a big deal!
What say you, POW? Because I honestly see EO theologizing in the second scenerio camp. The essence/energies distinction to me is EXTREMELY PROBLEMATIC. And NO, it doesn’t ultimately make a difference, IF your sole goal is to just deal with the “intersection” as it stands and participate in that. But for some, CONCEIVABILITY plays a part. It makes no sense to me to say assume that God is completely unknowable and incomprehensible…but THEN say that God is ontological triune!
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To my mind, there MUST be some line of continuity there. Else, the revelation of God being eternally triune makes NO SENSE!
What y’all think?
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 9/30/2003 6:15 PM (GMT -6) | | I can't beleive I'm responding. There is serious family and work stuff to do.
Meph you say way down below that you see EO in the second scenerio. No way. Neither fit. Both grow certainly out of a Western scheme where the emphasis is on essence. What else could make such absolute measurements of "COMPLETELY incomprehensible." This is a linear, imperically oriented thought. (Leads me to wonder whether both Nominalism and Realism are cousins in this respect.)
I recognized the "FLAT LANDS" stage set. (You wrote it very well too, Professor!) Excellent writing.
EO is NOT trying to be a system, nor a theory. It is a holy tradition of the accumulation of saints drawing near to God. It is experiemental and not theoretical. It says only what it learns by drawing near unto God (a title of the Reformed theologian Abraham Kuyper, BTW), and DOES NOT SEEK to know more as per knowledge than what is the "one thing necessary" for relationship with God. In such a pursuit it learns and shares much about creation, fall, redemption, God, Man, etc.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
The two scenarios represent ASSUMPTIONS about divine revelation. Scenario 1 assumes that God is NOT completely incomprehensible, in that God’s interaction with the world does CORRELATE MEANINGFULLY through an unbroken line of continuity to who God is essentially. This is NOT saying that God is not mysterious or completely knowable. This would be like the 2d plane deducing a perfect sphere from the intersection data it was given. (Not possible) What this is saying is that SOMETHING core and ESSENTIAL to who God is is being revealed about God in divine revelation.
Scenerio 2 assumes that God IS completely incomprehensible. That God’s interaction does NOT have a unbroken line of continuity to God’s essential existence. To be sure, God’s interactions ARE from God…and so being, are divine. But they are SEPARATE from who God is. Truly, God’s interactions with the worlds would be more of an indication of how God chooses to represent Godself more than God’s essential existence.
Again, these are both cousins. Both depend on their common soil of growing out of emphasis on Essence.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
The reason that I bring all this up is because I take this line of thinking to the idea of the TRINITY. This is, in my opinion, the ONE THING that I really am very dogged about with respect to divine revelation correlating meaningfully through an unbroken line of continuity to God’s essential existence. Like Karl Rahner, I want to say that the economic trinity IS the immanent trinity. I am inclined to say that the divine persons are PART of the essential existence of God. (This is where POW and I will obviously disagree.)
Once you and I exchanged a series of e-mails. You were in a hurry to get information quick, in "immenently" useable form, and come to quick conclusions. YOUR QUESTIONS WERE GOOD. BUT THEY WERE PLOWING UP HUGE TERRITORY FASTER AND TO GREATER EFFECT THAN I COULD KEEP UP WITH. AND VAST PORTIONS OF IT I JUST DIN'T KNOW WITH CERTAINY ENOUGH TO GIVE COMMENT. YOU DIDN'T HAVE THE TIME TO WAIT.
What'e the difference between "economic trinity" and "immanent trinity?" Aren't they the same thing -- or close enough? I think I've heard both contrasted to "essential" Trinity. (typo?)
The problem I'd have -- and may stay a probem for you too if you use either of these as a base -- is in operating in this numbers-game of measured=percents=of=known. Thumb's rule: Degrees of unknown, while Lossky or Yannaras says is more than just our own limitations and is also just the trait of God's way of revealing, is also a matter of insignificance. God is too marvelous to care about statistics. Like great Love, who cares if not everything is known at any one moment. Really. Who cares? But the other issue with not knowing is not a created limitation, and that is sin. We know the score on that.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
The 3 persons in 1 being revealed in Scripture would be analogous to the expanding and contracting perfect circle to me.quote:
Dogmatic doctrine of "Trinity" is something that grew out of Christology. Ever wonder why? "Economic trinity" is not symmetical with "essential trinity." The second is theory. The first is experiemental. Recall What Gregory Naz. said about flashes between seeing three and seeing one. DON'T READ THAT AS THEORY!!!! Read it as his reflection on walking with God, on experiencing healing. Etc. Attention to the Spirit, the Heavenly King and Comforter, the giver of Peace...LEADS TO attention on the medium the Spirit uses to bring these to us -- which is the divine, eternal Word, the Son of God. And these "right and left hands of the Father" point us to the ONE Whom the Son is the exact image of, while being the unique Son also. Attention to the one and the one and the one flashes and flames in ONE image of God, ineffable, inconceivable ...
St. John of Damascus, in his "Exact Exposition of the Christian Faith says this:
quote:
We must proclaim, exactly as we shall find them in the words of Scripture, the majesty and functions of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and so debar the heretics from robbing these Names of their connotation of Divine character, and compel them by means of these very Names to confine their use of terms to their proper meaning. I cannot conceive what manner of mind our opponents have, who pervert the truth, darken the light, divide the indivisible rend the scatheless, dissolve the perfect unity. It may seem to them a light thing to tear up Perfection, to make laws for Omnipotence, to limit Infinity; as for me, the task of answering them fills me with anxiety; my brain whirls, my intellect is stunned, my very words must be a confession, not that I am weak of utterance, but that I am dumb. Yet a wish to undertake the task forces itself upon me; it means withstanding the proud, guiding the wanderer, warning the ignorant. But the subject is inexhaustible; I can see no limit to my venture of speaking concerning God in terms more precise than He Himself has used. He has assigned the Names-Father, Son and Holy Ghost,-which are our information of the Divine nature. Words cannot express or feeling embrace or reason apprehend the re suits of enquiry carried further; all is ineffable, unattainable, incomprehensible. Language is exhausted by the magnitude of the theme, the splendour of its effulgence blinds the gazing eye, the intellect cannot compass its boundless extent. Still, under the necessity that is laid upon us, with a prayer for pardon to Him Whose attributes these are, we will venture, enquire and speak; and moreover-it is the only promise that in so grave a matter we dare to make-we will accept whatever conclusion He shall indicate.
I FOUND THE EXTREMES YOU PRESENTED, WHERE ONLY ALL-OR-NOTHING WERE POSSIBLE, TO BE UN-EMBRACABLE.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
And I make the REALIST assumption that there is an unbroken line of continuity being this information and the essential existence of the Being who provided the information….which leads me to say this:
Tom (TGB) has good things to say about this!!!!!
Accept that such knowledge as an autonomous Kantian "thang" is not the point, and get back out there on the basketball court.
C U B S
W I N ! ! !
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
“If I can’t say ANYTHING ELSE about God, I can say that God is in God’s essential existence such that God is INHERENTLY and ETERNALLY triune, meaning 3 persons in 1 being.”
Need translations?
I'm not saying this is exact; but I'd be comfortable with: "God in Communion is inherently and eternally triune." LOOKS GREAT TO ME.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
When I hear about views that propose the complete incomprehensibility or complete indeterminacy of God’s essential existence, this throws my idea of the Trinity into a friggin tailspin!
Me too!
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
If we were truly to assume the complete incomprehensibility and/or indeterminacy of God…If there truly is a DISJUNCT between the essential existence of God and how God represents Godself to us in Trinity, ...
I hear you.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
then HOW could it ever be the case that any human could say that the 3 persons of the Trinity were in loving communion BEFORE CREATION?? How could any being say that God is “ontologically triune”??!?!
Well, we both know that is not what gave us those doctrines. There ARE plenty of trinitarian models that are not Christian. But the Christian version is unique.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
On what basis could they say such things? On basis of the revelation? No.
Revelation is relationship. (So, the "phantom basis" is, of course, not from revelation. That is only from philosophy, and theorizing.)
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
We can’t do that because we have already dismissed out of hand that ANY of the revelation could truly show God AS GOD IS. The revelation only shows God as God wishes to be known in the ABSOLUTE sense.
The Lossky or Yannaras quote on page 17 or 18 on this thread does make the reference to God's otherness not being totally based on us. It is also God's choice. Who can argue with Him. But that is not the problematic thing you rightly complain about.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
But things get problematic when you start dealing with what Jesus says about His love relationship to the Father before the foundations of the world. Doesn’t this give us a LINE OF CONTINUITY to God’s actual relationship with Godself before Creation? It would seem to. But this revelation CANNOT be determinate of who God IS in God’s essential existence! Oy vay!
Keep the good. Throw out the bad.
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
See, y’all. Trinity is the ONE thing in Christian theology that I think the realism/nominalism issue becomes most poignant. I cannot make sense of the eternal, perichoretic, love relationship between the 3 person in 1 being God…IF at the same time, I’m being told that God is COMPLETELY incomprehensible…or that God is COMPLETELY indeterminate in God’s essential existence. It would be different if we were just talking about God’s MORAL ACTIONS or something like that. But in discussing the TRINITY, we are discussing something that ALL QUARTERS of this discussion would say is an ONTOLOGICAL description of who God is. This means a big deal!
(The red part is the "rub" alright!!!! Don't stand for it.)
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
What say you, POW? Because I honestly see EO theologizing in the second scenerio camp.
No way!!! (See above for a repeat of what I said. Remember?)
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
The essence/energies distinction to me is EXTREMELY PROBLEMATIC.
I don't follow you here. Continuity between them is not an issue. Just don't let the second become determinative of the first, else you begin to depersonalize God and distance God from his creation. (Read my page 17 quotes on the other thread -- but only if you want to.)
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
And NO, it doesn’t ultimately make a difference, IF your sole goal is to just deal with the “intersection” as it stands and participate in that. But for some, CONCEIVABILITY plays a part.
??? (Sorry, I'm watching the Cubs post-game stuff on TV.)
[quote]Originally posted by MephEternal
It makes no sense to me to say assume that God is completely unknowable and incomprehensible…but THEN say that God is ontological triune!
Not stated as a theory. But as an experience it makes perfect sense. The difference is Huge.
[quote]Originally posted by MephEternal
To my mind, there MUST be some line of continuity there. Else, the revelation of God being eternally triune makes NO SENSE!
But, friend, isn't a "line of continuity" something that pertains to theories?
Stick with experiemental religion. With relationship.
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 9/30/2003 6:18 PM (GMT -6) | | John of Damascus wrote:
quote:
Words cannot express or feeling embrace or reason apprehend the re suits of enquiry carried further; all is ineffable, unattainable, incomprehensible. Language is exhausted by the magnitude of the theme, the splendour of its effulgence blinds the gazing eye, the intellect cannot compass its boundless extent. Still, under the necessity that is laid upon us, with a prayer for pardon to Him Whose attributes these are, we will venture, enquire and speak; and moreover-it is the only promise that in so grave a matter we dare to make-we will accept whatever conclusion He shall indicate.
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One Love
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/30/2003 6:59 PM (GMT -6) | | POW:
quote:
EO is NOT trying to be a system, nor a theory. It is a holy tradition of the accumulation of saints drawing near to God. It is experiemental and not theoretical. It says only what it learns by drawing near unto God (a title of the Reformed theologian Abraham Kuyper, BTW), and DOES NOT SEEK to know more as per knowledge than what is the "one thing necessary" for relationship with God. In such a pursuit it learns and shares much about creation, fall, redemption, God, Man, etc.
Wait a second. It better NOT be THIS simple…
If what EO is trying to say is that we cannot EXPERIENTIALLY know God’s essential existence, then YES, I’d get with that. That would be analogous to me saying that I can only know another person by their words and actions (energies) though I could never know them EXPERIENTIALLY as they truly are in their mind (essence). For me to do THAT, I’d have to be IN their mind…and I can’t do that. So, their words and actions are truly THEM…but they only POINT to but never REACH their “essence”. And I can only participate in relationship with them to the extent that I participate with their words and actions to me.
If THIS is all that’s being said, then I have no problem. This is not a METAPHYSICAL ASSERTION as much as it’s an EXPERIENTIAL REALITY about dealing with God.
Is that what they are doing?
If so, there’s still an issue. Like so. If you have a person that says “I have a bad case of hemmorroids and they hurt badly right now.”, all you can do is listen to them. You cannot crawl inside their head (or anyWHERE else!) and see what’s in there to verify what they say. But the fact still remains that either they HAVE hemmoroids or they don’t. So, this revelation reveals something TRUE about their physical and mental state. The disjunct between words/actions and what’s in the mind/body doesn’t make the issue go away. To the extent that one BELIEVES the words/actions, one has certain BELIEFS about the mind/body. Same way with the Trinity. To the extent that our experiences with God attest to God being ETERNAL and INHERENT communion in Godself…and we TRUST those experiences…, we have reason to say that there is a LINE OF CONTINUITY between what is revealed and what IS the case in God’s essential existence. See what I’m saying?
[Digression: About the Flatland stuff. Would you believe that I came up with that idea in 2001, never having read Flatland…and THEN found out later that someone had done it LONG BEFORE. That plain depressed me…cuz I thought the idea was really cool!  ]
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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One Love
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Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/30/2003 7:05 PM (GMT -6) | | Don't forget we've been here before...
Meph's Crazy Take on the Trinity
http://www.christusvictorministries.org/gbfront/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1468
I'm much more in line with the process theists than the Orthodox that you cite on page 2 of that thread. | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 10/1/2003 11:49 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
POW:
quote:
EO is NOT trying to be a system, nor a theory. It is a holy tradition of the accumulation of saints drawing near to God. It is experiemental and not theoretical. It says only what it learns by drawing near unto God (a title of the Reformed theologian Abraham Kuyper, BTW), and DOES NOT SEEK to know more as per knowledge than what is the "one thing necessary" for relationship with God. In such a pursuit it learns and shares much about creation, fall, redemption, God, Man, etc.
Wait a second. It better NOT be THIS simple…
If what EO is trying to say is that we cannot EXPERIENTIALLY know God’s essential existence, then YES, I’d get with that. That would be analogous to me saying that I can only know another person by their words and actions (energies) though I could never know them EXPERIENTIALLY as they truly are in their mind (essence). For me to do THAT, I’d have to be IN their mind…and I can’t do that. So, their words and actions are truly THEM…but they only POINT to but never REACH their “essence”. And I can only participate in relationship with them to the extent that I participate with their words and actions to me.
If THIS is all that’s being said, then I have no problem. This is not a METAPHYSICAL ASSERTION as much as it’s an EXPERIENTIAL REALITY about dealing with God.
Is that what they are doing?
That's what they are "doing." But Christianity does MORE too. IN Christ we participate in the divinity of God. We do not become members of the Trinity. But since Christ has drawn our humanity so closely to his divinity that he made it his own, his humanity that he gives back to us to heal us carries with it not only His own human heart and soul but also the very heart of God. Christianity says that we can participate in the very perichoresis of the Trinity.
We do not do this by joining the trinity and being divine by nature. We do not proceed or beget from the Father. But IN Christ we do participate BY GRACE, AND NOT BY NATURE.
So, I'd say that there is a far more possitive, and daring thing going on than just what you said in the first part I quoted here above from you!
(I was reading Nicholas Cabasilas this afternoon. "The Life in Christ." I recommend it!!!!)
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
If so, there’s still an issue. Like so. If you have a person that says “I have a bad case of hemmorroids and they hurt badly right now.”, all you can do is listen to them. You cannot crawl inside their head (or anyWHERE else!) and see what’s in there to verify what they say. But the fact still remains that either they HAVE hemmoroids or they don’t. So, this revelation reveals something TRUE about their physical and mental state. The disjunct between words/actions and what’s in the mind/body doesn’t make the issue go away. To the extent that one BELIEVES the words/actions, one has certain BELIEFS about the mind/body. Same way with the Trinity. To the extent that our experiences with God attest to God being ETERNAL and INHERENT communion in Godself…and we TRUST those experiences…, we have reason to say that there is a LINE OF CONTINUITY between what is revealed and what IS the case in God’s essential existence. See what I’m saying?
I don't have ANY problem with this.
The Communion-in-God par excelance (sp?) is, of course, "Communion." 
Take it early, and take it often. (paraphrase of a Chicago voting adage)
quote:
Originally posted by MephEternal
[Digression: About the Flatland stuff. Would you believe that I came up with that idea in 2001, never having read Flatland…and THEN found out later that someone had done it LONG BEFORE. That plain depressed me…cuz I thought the idea was really cool! ]
Yep. I remember you saying that. (But then I, along with thousands of others, "invented" the knock-knock joke where you ask the other guy to begin. Try it.) Great minds think alike.
P.S.
quote:
...our experiences with God attest to God being ETERNAL and INHERENT communion in Godself...
Our experience is greatest in the Eucharist. So, it stands to reason --- don't you think -- that "experimentially" THAT is your greatest laboratory? !!!!!
Your two concurrent experiments are -- as you list them above -- (1) God's eternality, and (2) God's being Communion.
Both experiements, from my experience have definitively possitive results. (Basil's DeSpiritu says that he knows the Spirit is God experientially.)
God's eternality is related to God giving life, rebirth/divinization. Search the NT (and OT) for descriptions on this by other Christians, and by Christ.
God's communion is, I think, experienced two-fold: the cooperation of the Spirit and the Son in carrying out the will of the Father; and, the fact that the love that we receive from God is that very same ecstatic love of the Trinity. We know that about God's love as per its content and its organizationality. (Who knows if that is even a word -- I don't care. Don't tell my wife!)
I hope that this helps.
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 10/1/2003 12:21 PM (GMT -6) | | Meph, think on this:
quote:
== footnote 6 == Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 4. 38. 1. Further, Irenaeus explains: “God had power at the beginning to grant perfection to man; but as the latter was only recently created, he could not possibly have received it, or even if he had received it, could he have contained it, or containing it, could he have retained it.” Against Heresies, 4, 38, 2
SEE THE IMPLICATIONS?
From: dlibrary.acu.edu.au/research/theology/ejournal/Issue3/Casey.htm
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 10/1/2003 12:25 PM (GMT -6) | | This is from the very end of your "CRAZY take" thread:
quote:
This is the eternal glory which belongs to the Three Persons, which the Son "had before the world was." And when we speak of the divine energies in relation to the human beings to whom they are communicated and given and by whom they are appropriated, this divine and uncreated reality within us is called Grace.
(Lossky, "Procession", just before section 8 -- www.jbburnett.com/auctor/lossky/lossky_img4-process-filioq.pdf)
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