‘Should you believe in the Trinity?’ asks this JW article.

‘IF PEOPLE were to read the Bible from cover to cover without any preconceived idea of a Trinity, would they arrive at such a concept on their own? Not at all.

‘What comes through very clearly to an impartial reader is that God alone is the Almighty, the Creator, separate and distinct from anyone else, and that Jesus, even in his prehuman existence, is also separate and distinct, a created being, subordinate to God.’

Here’s an outline of the main argument.

My comments are in italics.

How is the Trinity explained?

Trinitarians claim that God is simultaneously and eternally one God in three persons.  They claim that this is an unfathomable mystery but, rather, it is confused and confusing.  But ‘God is not a God of confusion’ (1 Cor 14:33).  If even academic theologians cannot understand or explain the doctrine, how is it that faithful disciples of Jesus were not religious leaders, but humble farmers, fishermen, tax collectors, and housewives?

Note the twisted logic – ‘The doctrine of the Trinity is confusing.  God is not the author of confusion.  Therefore, the Trinity is not of God.’  It is wrong to suppose that if we cannot completely understand something, we cannot understand it at all.  Repeatedly, the point is made that God cannot be both three and one: but that is the very point in dispute.

Is it clearly a Bible teaching?

In this section – indeed, throughout the entire pamphlet – quotations are plucked from a wide variety of sources (often without proper attribution) with the over-riding purpose, not of critical discussion, but of simply buttressing the author’s own case.  But simply multiplying assertions does not build an argument.  At the same time, the arguments of great Trinitarian thinkers down the ages are ignored.  The quotes citing the Ante-Nicene Fathers are highly misleading.

If the Trinity were true, we would expect it to be clearly and repeatedly taught in the Bible.  But it is not.  The word itself is entirely absent from the Bible.  And numerous scholars agree that even the very idea is not to be found.

Moreover, Trinitarian doctrine was not taught until the end of the 4th century CE.

Justin Martyr (d. 165 C.E.) taught that Jesus was inferior to God and that the prehuman Jesus was, in fact, a created angel.

Justin clearly taught that Christ is God incarnate, and repeatedly refers to him as Theos.  Justin refers to the pre-incarnate Jesus as the ‘Angel of the Lord’ in connection with Gen 18, where he identifies one of Abraham’s three visitors as God, manifested as an angelic being.  This is quite usual within orthodox theology, and certainly does not count against Trinitarian belief.

Irenaeus (d. about 200 C.E.,) said that the prehuman Jesus was separate from God and inferior to him.

As to Christ’s being ‘separate from God’ and ‘inferior’ to God, it is likely, given everything else he says about Christ, that Irenaeus is referring  to the distinctive persons of the first two members of the Trinity, and to the subjection of the second to the first.  (Both of these a standard ideas within mainstream Christian theology).  Irenaeus repeatedly affirms the deity of Christ.

Clement of Alexandria (d. about 215 C.E.) regarded the Son as ‘next to the only omnipotent Father’ but not equal to him.

The view that the Son is ‘next to the only omnipotent Father’ sits comfortably within Trinitarian theology.  The denial of the equality of the Father and the Son is a gloss by the writer of the article.

Tertullian (d. about 230 C.E.) taught that the Father and the Son are distinct, that the Father, having begotten the Son, is the greater of the two.  He said; ‘there was a time when the Son was not. . . . Before all things, God was alone.’

A good Trinitarian will distinguish between the Father and the Son, and will acknowlege the submission of the latter to the former.  As for the assertion, ‘there was a time when the Son was not’, Tertullian clearly believed in the eternal pre-existence of Christ, but that he  later took on the role of Son.  This is not how later Trinitarians would put it, but Tertullian was certainly neither an Arian nor a Modalist.  See this.

Hippolytus (d. about 235 C.E.) said that God alone is uncreated, and that the prehuman Jesus was created by him.

The author of the article states: that, according to Hippolytus, “God is ‘the one God, the first and the only One, the Maker and Lord of all,’ who ‘had nothing co-eval [of equal age] with him … But he was One, alone by himself; who willing it, called into being what had no being before,’ such as the created prehuman Jesus.”

What Hippolytus actually wrote was:

“The first and only (one God), both Creator and Lord of all, had nothing coeval with Himself; not infinite chaos, nor measureless water, nor solid earth, nor dense air, not warm fire, nor refined spirit, nor the azure canopy of the stupendous firmament. But He was One, alone in Himself. By an exercise of His will He created things that are, which antecedently had no existence, except that He willed to make them.”

Thus it can be seen that the reference to ‘the created prehuman Jesus’ has been sneaked in by the author of the JW article.  It does not represent what Hyppolytus actually wrote.

Origen (d. about 250 C.E.) taught that the Father and Son are ‘two substances’, and that ‘compared with the Father, [the Son] is a very small light.’

Origen did not teach that the Father and Son are ‘two substances’.  He taught the exact opposite: the Son is the ‘perfect essense of God the Father’.

Nor did Origen write that ‘compared with the Father, [the Son] is a very small light.’  In Contra Celsus, Origen says that, just as a person who sees the sun, moon and stars would not worship a spark in comparison, so the sun, moon and stars are but as sparks compared with God, who is light, and the Son of God, who is the Light of the World.

For further details on these (mis)quotations see this.

How did the Trinity doctrine develop?

The groundwork was laid at the Council of Nicaea, 325 CE, which asserted that Christ was the same substance as God.  The Council was presided over by Constantine, who was not a baptised believer (his ‘conversion’ was political, rather than spiritual).  His interest was in unifying his empire, rather than in promoting biblical truth.

The Watchtower article maintains that the Nicean Council was not interested in the Trinity, only in asserting the deity of Jesus Christ.  This is not correct.  The Creed itself is strongly Trinitarian: 

We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty…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, of one Being with the Father…We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified…

Far from inventing the doctrine of the Trinity, the Nicene formulation summarised what had been consistently taught in the Bible and by the early church Fathers.

It was at the Council of Constantinople in 381 C.E. that a decision was made to put the holy spirit on the same level as God and Christ.  And so was born Christendom’s Trinity.  But, even then, it was many centuries before the doctrine became widely accepted.

We have already seen that the Nicene Creed had already recognised the place of the Holy Spirit alongside the Father and the Son.

The doctrine of the Trinity was more fully defined in the so-called Athanasian Creed (probably 5th century CE): “We worship one God in Trinity . . . The Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God; and yet they are not three gods, but one God.”  But, once again, it was several centuries before this creed became enshrined in the church’s liturgy.  And the final orthodox definition of the Trinity was more a matter of church politics than of biblical theology.

No: the elements of the doctrine of the Trinity are taught in Scripture, maintained by the early church Fathers, and enshrined in the ecumenical creeds from Ncaea onwards.

The disreputable history of the doctrine of the Trinity accords with what Jesus and his apostles said about the coming apostasy (‘with its “lawless” clergy class’), 2 Thess 2:3,7; Acts 20:29f;  2 Tim 4:3f; 2 Peter 2:1; 1 John 4:1-3; Jude 3, 4.

Given the honourable place of Trinitarian theology in Scripture and in the history of the church, it is entirely gratuitous to label it as a symptom of grievous apostasy.

The doctrine of the Trinity owes more to ancient paganism than to the Bible.  The worship of gods in triads was common: Brahmā, Siva, and Viṣṇu in Indian religion, Osiris, Isis, and Horus in Egyptian religion, and so on.  It is also the case the Platonism paved the way for Trinitarian doctrine.

But a triad is not a trinity.  And, even if a trinity could be found in some pagan religion that does not disprove the Biblical Trinity.

By the 4th century CE, the apostasy foretold by Jesus and his apostles reached its full bloom.  The doctrine of the Trinity was evidence of this.  Christendom entered its dark ages, dominated by its ‘man of lawlessness’ clergy class.

In the doctrine of the Trinity, then, we have a dogma which is nowhere taught in the Bible, was unknown in the first centuries of the Christian era, is touted as an inscrutable mystery, and is derived from paganism and developed largely as a matter of church politics.

What does the Bible say about God and Jesus?

God is consistently referred to in the Bible as one, and not three.  From beginning to end, Scripture is monotheistic.

The Hebrew word Elohim, though plural in form, represents a plural of majesty, not a plurality of persons.

Jesus is a separate creation.  In his prehuman existence, he was a created spirit being, like an angel (‘the first-born of all creation’, Col 1:15; ‘the beginning of God’s creation’, Rev 3:14).  ‘Most scholars agree’ that ‘Wisdom’ in the Book of Proverbs is ‘a figure of speech for Jesus as a spirit creature prior to his human existence’ (Prov 8:12,22,25,26).  As God’s master craftsman (Prov 8:30) through him was created everything else (Col 1:16; 1 Cor 8:6).  God speaks to this master craftsman in Gen 1:26, saying “Let us make man in our image’, without any suggestion that they are co-equal, co-eternal, and co-divine.

In Mt 4:1ff, Jesus is tempted by the devil to be disloyal to God.  But how could God rebel against himself?  But angels and human can rebel against God, and indeed did so.  In any case, it is impossible that God could sin (Deut 32:4) or even be tempted (James 1:13).

A basic principle of justice is that the price paid should fit the wrong committed.  It was as a human person that Adam sinned; therefore, it must be as a perfect but (merely) human person that Jesus paid the ‘corresponding ransom’ (1 Tim 2:5f; 1 Cor 15:22,45).  How could any part of God ever be ‘lower than the angels’ (Heb 2:9)?

Jesus is the ‘only-begotten Son’ of God (Jn 1:14; 3:16,18; 1 Jn 4:9).  How can a son be unbegotten and eternal?  Jesus was God’s ‘only-begotten Son’, just as Isaac was Abraham’s ‘only-begotten son’ (Heb 11:17).  God is the ‘Father’ of Jesus, and is senior to him in time, position, power and knowledge.  Jesus was not the only spirit son of God; but he is ‘only-begotten’ in the sense that he was directly created by God, whereas the others were all created ‘through’ him.

Jesus is not referred to as ‘God’ in the Bible: but rather as ‘Son of God’.  Even the demons knew this, James 2:19; Mt 8:29.  So also the pagan soldiers, Mt 27:54.  He cannot be God, for ‘no-one has seen God’, Jn 1:18.  He is not God, but the ‘one mediator between God and men’, 1 Tim 2:5.

God is superior to Jesus

Jesus himself did not consider himself to be equal to God, but was always distinct from, and subordinate to God.  See Jn 17:3; 20:17; 1 Cor 8:6; 2 Cor 1:3; 1 Tim 5:21.  In Jn 8:17f; Jesus speaks of himself and the Father as two witnesses; but how can there be two witnesses if there is only one entity?  In Mk 10:18 he disaffirms his own goodness, while affirming God’s goodness.

Jesus regarded himself as God’s submissive servant, Jn 5:19; 6:38; 7:17.  The sender is superior to the one who is sent.  Their relationship is illustrated in the story about the vineyard, Lk 20:9-16.  The early believers prayed to God about ‘thy holy servant Jesus’ (Acts 4:23ff).

God is at all times superior to the Son, Mt 3:16f; 20:23; Mk 15:34; Lk 4:18; 22:42; 23:46.  If God could die then Hab 1:12 would be wrong.  And, given that Jesus did die, it must have been God who raised him to life, as Acts 2:24 affirms.  Jesus’ miracles do not prove that he was God, any more than the miracles of Elijah and Elisha prove that they were divine.

Jesus had limited knowledge, Mk 13:32.  How could Jesus, if God, have learned anything (Heb 5:8)?  Even after his resurrection and ascension, Jesus was the recipient, not the source, of divine revelation (Rev 1:1).

Jesus has always been subordinate to God, and continues to be so.  How could he be exalted to God’s right hand (Acts 5:31; cf. Phil 2:9) if he was already an exalted part of the Trinity?  Jesus appears in God’s presence on our behalf; this shows that Jesus and God are distinct from one another.  Stephen saw both the glory of God and Jesus standing at God’s right hand; he saw two individuals, and not a holy spirit, nor a Trinity.  In Rev 4:8-5:7, God is shown seated on his throne; but Jesus is not – he has to approach God to take the scroll from his right hand.  Jesus will be subordinate to God for ever, 1 Cor 15:24,28.

Jesus never claimed to be God, Jn 14:28; cf. 1 Cor 11:3.  This is being recognised ‘by an increasing number of scholars’.  His various titles – Son of God, Christ, Son of Man, Lord and so on, do not mean that he was God, but that he did God’s work.

The Holy Spirit is God’s active force

The Holy Spirit should be regarded, not as a separate person within the Trinity, but as God’s active force.  This is suggested by the underlying meanins for the words translated ‘spirit’  – ‘wind’, ‘breath’, ‘spirit’.  As such, it was active in creation, Gen 1:2, in enlightening people, Psa 143:10; Num 11:17, in guiding prophets, 2 Pet 1:20f; 2 Sam 23:2; Joel 2:28, 29; Lk 1:67; Acts 1:16; 2:32, 33.  The holy spirit impelled Jesus to go into the wilderness, Mk 1:12.  It energised God’s servants, enabling them to speak with boldness, Mic 3:8; Acts 7:55-60; 18:25;  Rom 12:11; 1 Thess 5:19.  God carries out his judgment by his spirit,  Isa 30:27, 28; 59:18, 19.  God’s spirit reaches everywhere, Psa 139:7-12.

God’s spirit provides ‘power beyond normal’ to those who serve him, Judges 14:6; Mk 1:10; Lk 5:17; 2 Cor 4:7.  In none of these case are we to understand that divine person seized control of or entered a human being.  God’s spirit also enabled the disciples to do miraculous things, Acts 2:1-4.

While it is true that while the spirit is sometimes spoken of in personal terms, this should be regarded as personification (cf. ‘wisdom’s children’, Lk 7:35; ‘sin crouching at the door’, Gen 4:7).  But the Bible generally speaks of the spirit in an impersonal way, likening it to fire or water.  People are urged to be filled with the spirit instead of wine, Eph 5:18; in the same way that they might be ‘filled’ with wisdom, faith and joy (Acts 6:3; 11:24; 13:52).  In 2 Cor 6:6 the spirit is a quality, not a person.  Some texts refer to the spirit as speaking, but others show that this was done through humans or angels, Mt 10:19, 20; Acts 4:24, 25; 28:25; Heb 2:2.  When Mt 28:18 refers to the ‘name’ of the holy spirit, this is not a personal name, but ‘name’ in the sense of power or authority (as when we say, ‘In the name of the law…’.

In Jn 14:16, 26; 16:13, the word translated ‘helper’ is masculine, but ‘spirit’ is neuter, and therefore should be referred to as ‘it’.

The holy spirit appeared as tongues of fire and as a dive – but never as a person.

The holy spirit as the third person of the Trinity was not affirmed until the Council of Alexandria in 362, and the Council of Constantinople of 381.

What about Trinitarian ‘proof texts’?

Mt 28:19 – ‘Go, therefore, make disciples of all nations; baptise them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.’

1 Cor 12:4-6 – ‘There are many different gifts, but it is always the same Spirit; there are many different ways of serving, but it is always the same Lord. There are many different forms of activity, but in everybody it is the same God who is at work in them all.’

2 Cor 13:13 – ‘The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.’

But merely listing three things, or persons, together does not prove that they are a trinity (any more than listing Tom, Dick and Harry, or Abraham, Isaac and Jacob together affirms them as a trinity).  None of these texts proves the personality, equality or divinity of those mentioned.

If Jesus was anointed with the holy spirit at his baptism, how could he have been one with the spirit within the godhead from all eternity?

1 Jn 5:7 – not in the original text of the Bible.

Jn 10:30 – “I and the Father are one” – but this is about unity of thought and purpose, not of essential being (cf. Jn 17:21f; 1 Cor 3:6,8).  In Jn 10:31-36 Jesus argues forcefully that he was not claiming to be God.

Phil 2:6 – ‘Who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God.’  But most translations point in the direction of Jesus not claiming equality with God.

Jn 8:58 – “Before Abraham ever was, I Am.”  Jesus does not use this as a name or title, but rather a claim to pre-existence.

Jn 1:1 – ‘n the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word  was God.’  Someone who is ‘with’ another person cannot be the same as that other person.  In ‘the Word was God’, the definite article is absent, indicating that ‘the Word’ is ‘a god’, or that he is ‘godlike’, but not to be equated with Almighty God.  Questonable grammatical rules aside, this is consistent with the overall teaching of the Bible.  The idea that Jesus is ‘a god’ is consistent with references to other mighty creatures as ‘gods’, as in Psa 8:5; Jn 10:34f (cf Psa 82:1-6); 2 Cor 4:4.  Jesus may even be referred to as ‘Mighty God’ in Isa 9:6, but this is capitalised because it is a proper name, and only God himself is ‘Almighty’.

Jn 20:28 – ‘God said, “My Lord and my God!”‘  Thomas thought that Jesus was like ‘a god’, given the circumstances of his utterance.  Alternatively, we may regard it as an exclamation of astonishment, spoken to Jesus was directed to God.  Just three verses later, the matter is clarified further: ‘These have been written down that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God’ (not, ‘that he is God’).

Worship God on his terms

This includes accurate knowledge, Jn 17:3; 1 Tim 2:4.  We will then not be among those who have ‘a zeal for God; but not according to accurate knowledge’ (Rom 10:2f; cf. Rom 1:28).

It is dishonouring to God (1 Sam 2:30) to regard anyone as his equal.

Trinitarians have often been guilty of the kinds of offences mentioned in Rom 1:29-31.  They have often persecuted and killed non-Trinitarians – and one another.  But Jesus said: “By this all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love among yourselves” (Jn 13:35; cf. 1 Jn 3:10-12).

Christendom’s spiritual condition fits Paul’s words in Tit 1:16 – ‘They publicly declare they know God, but they disown him by their works, because they are detestable and disobedient and not approved for good work of any sort.’

Trinitarian Christendom will be judged by God for her God-dishonouring actions and doctrines, Mt 24:14, 34; 25:31-34, 41, 46; Rev 17:1-6, 16; 18:1-8, 20, 24; 19:17-21.

Trinitarian theology is confused and confusing.  It is more in keeping with the work of Satan, the ‘god of this world,’ who ‘blinds the minds of unbelievers’ (2 Corinthians 4:4).

Trinitarian doctrine serves the interests of clergymen who wish to maintain their hold on people by making it appear that only theologians can understand it.

Accurate knowledge of God sets us free (Jn 8:32), free from false teaching and free from organisations that have apostasised.

By honouring God as he should be honoured, we can avoid the judgement that is coming upon apostate Christendom, 1 Jn 2:17.

A one-sided version of ‘Christendom’ – This part of the discussion gets quite nasty.  It is one thing to blame professing Christians for wickednesses perpetrated in the name of Christ (I could name many).  But it is another thing to fail to give any recognition to the amazing things that God has wrought through godly Christians down the ages.  Additionally, the writer of the article clearly ‘has it in for’ the clergy of the mainline Christian churches, regarding them as motivated by a desire to ‘hold on’ to their flocks.  But this is rich, coming as it does from a representative of a religious organisation which seeks to maintain a tyrannical hold over its members.  Individual thought is discouraged, and members are advised against reading, or even forbidden to read, the works of ex-members of the Society.

Further comment

The author of this article is right in regarding the doctrine of the Trinity as of immense importance.  He rightly appeals to the Bible as the only reliable source of knowledge about God.

Proof-texting – I’m not opposed to all so-called ‘proof-texting’.  But care needs to be taken.  Many obscure Bible translations are cited uncritically, and the motive is evidently simply to buttress the point being made.  This way of proceeding also means that ‘dots’ are connected in strange and unwarranted ways.

Unexamined assertions – e.g. that Jesus was originally a created spirit being (angel).

Misplaced confidence – A complete lack of self-criticism, or sense of provisionality, or concession to an alternative point of view.  But this, after all, is a leading characteristic of cultic thinking.