Episode 19 - the final segment of the Lewis-Rogers debate: Is the Trinity polytheism?

In this last of our three segments, our debaters each give a second seven-minute rebuttal, and then a five-minute closing argument. This is when they wrap up any loose ends, reiterate their main points, and try to "make the sale."

Are you buying?

They get into questions like:

* Does the Qur'an imply that Christians are not polytheists?

* Does the Bible, both Old and New Testaments, teach that the one God is in some sense multi-personal?

* If Jesus is a god, then must he be a different god than his Father?

In our next episode, I'll weigh in with my evaluation of the debate.

You can also listen to this episode on Stitcher or iTunes (please subscribe, rate, and review us in either or both – directions here). It is also available on YouTube (scroll down – you can subscribe here). If you would like to upload audio feedback for possible inclusion in a future episode of this podcast, put the audio file here.

You can support the trinities podcast by ordering anything through Amazon.com after clicking through one of our links. We get a small % of your purchase, even though your price is not increased. (If you see “trinities” in you url while at Amazon, then we’ll get it.)

Rebuttals are the hardest parts of a debate - the hardest part to perform, and the hardest to listen to.

Opening and closing statements are basically pre-written, and in them, one talks about what one wants to talk about.

In a rebuttal, you are forced to think on your feet, on the spot, and find a way to knock down the arguments your opponent has just given in his opening statement - which you may have just heard for the first time. The best debaters scour heaven and earth to find everything the opponent's ever said, so as to anticipate the opening statement, and pre-prepare for the rebuttal.

Here's the best way you, the thinking person in the audience, can critically listen to this part.

* First, print my summary of the opening arguments. (See something missing or wrong? Add it, or correct it. Click once on the big image to remove it before printing.)

* Now, as you hear each rebuttal - first Rogers, then Lewis - mark the premises of their opponent's argument which they are either denying (so, asserting to be false) or challenging (so, asserting as unknown or unproven).

* Having done that, try to list their reason(s) for challenging each premise.

If they give convincing reasons to doubt or deny at least one premise in each of their opponents' argument, they've done their job. If they've only repeated their opening arguments, or talked about irrelevant things, they've failed.

How, in your view, do our debaters do here?

You can also listen to this episode on Stitcher or iTunes (please subscribe, rate, and review us in either or both – directions here). It is also available on YouTube (scroll down – you can subscribe here). If you would like to upload audio feedback for possible inclusion in a future episode of this podcast, put the audio file here.

You can support the trinities podcast by ordering anything through Amazon.com after clicking through one of our links. We get a small % of your purchase, even though your price is not increased. (If you see “trinities” in you url while at Amazon, then we’ll get it.)

On September 9,  2013, Reformed Christian apologist Anthony Rogers debated Islamic apologist Shadid Lewis. The debate question was: Are trinitarians polytheists? (Entire video here.)

I think this debate is worth thinking through carefully. In this podcast series, I'm breaking up the debate into three listenable chunks. I've also slightly shortened the audio by removing some dead air, etc., but I have not deleted a single word by the two debaters. I will end with a podcast evaluating their arguments. Each episode will also have a blog post wherein I try to accurately summarize and formulate some of the arguments. This episode: opening statements.

Rogers starts off with a problem for his opponent, which I think is best put as an inconsistent triad:

* Trinitarian Christians are polytheists.

* The Qur'an implies that Christians are not polytheists.

* Everything the Qur'an implies is true.

Rogers's argument is that is opponent is committed to 1 and 3. But he hasn't noticed that he's also committed to 2. His views, then, are inconsistent. Rogers will deny 1 (and 3), so he has no problem. But Shadid must, inconsistently, commit to all three. But from any two of them, it logically follows that the remaining claim is false. (Go ahead, try all the combinations.)

In support of 2, Rogers offers:

* Muslim men can marry Christian women (5:5),  but they can't marry polytheistic women. (2:221)

* Muslims can eat food prepared by Christians (5:5), but not by polytheists (6:121).

* 22:17; 98:1, 6; 2:105; 5:82; 3:186; and a hadith from Muhammad imply that no Christian is a polytheist.

On to his positive case, Rogers affirms monotheism. But he adds that both Moses and Jesus, who were both monotheists, also taught that God is multipersonal, as so their monotheism implied multiple "persons" in the one God.

Argument 1:

* Genesis 19:24 mentions two persons called "Yahweh."

* Therefore, Genesis 19:24 implies that there are at least two persons or beings "in God." (This confirmed when the Targums say call the "YHWH" on earth the Memra (Word) of YHWH.)

Argument 2:

* In John 8, Jesus says "I am," and so claims to be the eternal, divine Son who appeared to Abraham. (Also John 1, 20:28.)

* [But John also teaches that the Father is an eternal,

Paul calls Jesus "the one Lord." What does this mean?

In episode 15, we saw why we can't take Paul to mean that Jesus is Yahweh himself. In this episode, we see what, according to the New Testament, it means for Jesus to be "the one Lord."

Sir Anthony Buzzard has helpfully covered Psalm 110:1 many times. See this blog post and this video, in addition to his published works. See also this discussion between Dr. Joe Martin and pastor J. Dan Gill, who also discuss Peter's use of this text in Acts 2, and other relevant texts.

The commanding voice of Paul in this and the last two episodes is Mr. Dominick Baldwin. Be sure to contact him if your business or church etc. is looking for a voice-over that makes Warf sound like a little girl.

Books quoted in this episode:

* Larry Hurtado, How on Earth Did Jesus Become a God?* James Dunn, The Theology of Paul the Apostle.* Samuel Clarke, The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity.* James McGrath, The Only True God: Early Christian Monotheism in Its Jewish Context.* Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel.

Paul calls Jesus "the one Lord." What does this mean?

In episode 15, we saw why we can't take Paul to mean that Jesus is Yahweh himself. In this episode, we see what, according to the New Testament, it means for Jesus to be "the one Lord."

Sir Anthony Buzzard has helpfully covered Psalm 110:1 many times. See this blog post and this video, in addition to his published works. See also this discussion between Dr. Joe Martin and pastor J. Dan Gill, who also discuss Peter's use of this text in Acts 2, and other relevant texts.

The commanding voice of Paul in this and the last two episodes is Mr. Dominick Baldwin. Be sure to contact him if your business or church etc. is looking for a voiceover that makes Warf sound like a little girl.

You can also listen to this episode on YouTube (scroll down – you can subscribe here). If you would like to upload audio feedback for possible inclusion in a future episode of this podcast, put the audio file here.

You can support the trinities podcast by ordering anything through Amazon.com after clicking through one of our links. We get a small % of your purchase, even though your price is not increased. (If you see “trinities” in you url while at Amazon, then we’ll get it.)

Books quoted in this episode:

* Larry Hurtado, How on Earth Did Jesus Become a God?

* James Dunn, The Theology of Paul the Apostle.

* Samuel Clarke, The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity.

* James McGrath, The Only True God: Early Christian Monotheism in Its Jewish Context.

* Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel.

(click for image credit)

In 1 Corinthians 8:6, Paul says,

...yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.

Is this statement by Paul a gift to unitarians (who hold that the one God is the Father, but not Jesus), or does he here imply that Jesus and the one God, the creator, are one and the same?

In this episode we look more deeply at this latter interpretation, and investigate two arguments offered by Dr. Richard Bauckham and others. They are:

* If Paul meant the one Lord to be someone other than (not numerically identical to) the one God, then he would be asserting two gods, and so denying monotheism.

* Paul is not here denying monotheism.

* Therefore, Paul doesn't mean the one Lord here to be someone other than (not numerically identical to) the one God - which is to say that he means the one Lord and the one God to be numerically identical. In other words, the one Lord is the one God himself.

And,

* Jesus created the cosmos.

* Only God created the cosmos.

* Therefore, Jesus is God.

He we begin to evaluate these arguments, and consider this interpretation in light of other things Paul says about God and Jesus.

Sources quoted in this episode:

* Bowman and Komoszewski, Putting Jesus in His Place: The Case for the Deity of Christ.

* Chapter 6 of Richard Bauckham's Jesus and the God of Israel.

* "The Apostle Paul a Unitarian" in Sixteen American Unitarian Tracts.

* The Racovian Catechism.

The apostle Paul famously says,

...for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist. (1 Corinthians 8:6)

Is this passage a radical transformation of, or a redefinition of Jewish monotheism? Is it an insertion of Jesus into the Shema confession, that "The LORD is our God, the LORD alone"? In this way, is Paul saying that Jesus is God himself, Yahweh, or that he is "in the divine identity," or at any rate that Jesus is divine? Is there, in short, some trinitarian juice that can be squeezed from this orange?

Unitarian Christians don't think so. In fact, this is one of their favorite verses, even suitable for a book title. Why?

Clearly, at least one side here is quite mistaken. In this episode, we hear from proponents of each side. In the next, we'll try to weigh their arguments.

You can also listen to this episode on Stitcher or iTunes (please subscribe, rate, and review us in either or both – directions here). It is also available on YouTube (scroll down – you can subscribe here). If you would like to upload audio feedback for possible inclusion in a future episode of this podcast, put the audio file here.

You can support the trinities podcast by ordering anything through Amazon.com after clicking through one of our links. We get a small % of your purchase, even though your price is not increased. (If you see “trinities” in you url while at Amazon, then we’ll get it.)

Books and videos quoted or mentioned in this episode, in order:

* Patrick Navas's Divine Truth or Human Tradition.

* William Christie's Dissertations on the Unity of God. (And his later Discourses on the Divine Unity.)

* Dr. James Dunn's Christology in the Making.

* Dr. Gordon Fee's Pauline Christology

Dr. Richard Bauckham is a prominent biblical scholar and theologian. He is best known for his claim that the whole New Testament reflects a "christology of divine identity," most famously perhaps in his book God Crucified.

Many evangelical apologists and theologians have bought into Bauckham's theory. Also, N.T. Wright seems to be saying many of the same things. But other U.K. Heavyweight scholars, Dunn and Hurtado, do not agree. And with perhaps a few exceptions, I've observed that Christian philosophers and analytic theologians are unwilling to make the deal. I think that my paper, presented in this episode, brings out why.

Note that despite my own developed theological views, I argue 100% from premises to which any Christian - me, Dr. Bauckham, or your aunt Sally - is committed, by either the Bible or common sense. Philosophers, as undergraduates, are trained in the simple logic of identity - uncontroversial reasoning which I employ here, as non-technically as I can. I tried very hard to make this paper accessible to non-philosophers. Still, you may want to read it and not merely listen to it. (Here's the official version you can cite.) It gets a bit convoluted at the end - sorry - but this is only because I'm struggling to be fair to Dr. Bauckham and not misread him.

Abstract

Richard Bauckham argues that every book in the New Testament contains a ‘‘christology of divine identity,’’ according to which Jesus is ‘‘included in the divine identity.’’ He also argues that traditional Christians may avoid or dissolve a large number of theoretical problems by embracing this thesis. Here I clarify the concepts of personal identity, numerical identity, and identifying features, and critically examine Bauckham’s thesis and his arguments for it in light of these analyses. Of central importance is the self-evident truth that a thing cannot at one time differ from itself (the indiscernibility of identicals). It is argued that Bauckham’s thesis is unclear, and that on one interpretation it is manifestly self-inconsistent, while on the other it is too thin in content to do the work Bauckham assigns it, which is expressing ‘‘the highest possible christology.’’ I thus argue that the theoretical costs of Bauckham’s theory outweigh its theoretical benefits. Section I summarizes the touted benefits. Section II clarifies the aforementioned concepts. Section III applies these analyses to Bauckham’s work. In Section IV I weigh some reasons for thinking that the interpretation of Section III is mistaken. Section V continues the interpretive struggle, and VI draws a negative conclusion.

You can also listen to this episode on Stitcher or iTunes (please...

The Apostles' Creed is one of the most beloved and most widely used creeds in the Christian world.

Is it really by Jesus's original twelve apostles? Why is it so popular? Is it the one truly uncontroversial creed, something which all Christians - Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, pentecostal, etc. can agree on? And is it the most ancient Christian creed we possess?

We'll answer these questions in this, our 12th (!) episode.

Many thanks to my friend Caroline for her reading here. The Lamson quote at the end is from this book.

This episode is a recording of my talk on September 20, 2013 in Prague, Czech Republic, at the conference "Analytical Theology: Faith, Knowledge and the Trinity."

Our Czech hosts were Roman Catholic philosophers, interested in both contemporary analytic philosophy and early modern Catholic scholastic philosophy. It was an excellent conference, and we all enjoyed our conversations, as well as seeing some of one of the world's most beautiful cities, and some surrounding countryside. Special thanks to Vlastimil, Lukáš, and Petr and Daniel for their hospitality, papers, and conversations.

My talk is called "Tertullian the unitarian". Though he's the first on record to use the Latin word trinitas, I show that he was in fact a sort of unitarian, a kind I have elsewhere called "subordinationist."

Here are my conference slides, in case you want to follow along.

These ideas are relevant, of course, far beyond Tertullian. But here I want to set the record straight, because there's a lot of mistaken stuff out there about Tertullian, in realms such as apologetics, church history, and the history of theology.

Update: this paper has now been revised and published.