05.31.06
Augustine’s Model of the Trinity - Preview Trailer
Summary Diagram of Augustine’s Model of the Trinity - On the Relationship between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit
Read more...The Life of Thomas More by Peter Ackroyd
The public often receives seductive calls coming from religious ideologues who promise us spiritual peace if only we submit to a power alliance between religion and government: Public order will prosper if the unchanging laws of God are implemented, if not imposed, by a central sovereign. Law, politics and religion form a threefold cable that cannot be easily broken and offers itself as a well nigh irresistible seduction to citizens who are disturbed by the breakdown of morality in modern society.
Political power is often legitimized by sophisticated ideological rhetoric. The difficult and delicate task of exposing the damaging consequences resulting from the entanglement between religion and politics requires a close analysis of the dynamics of power struggle between the protagonists. Social conflict is guaranteed precisely because the clerics are rigidly imbued with a sense of righteousness that must impose their religious vision upon pluralistic civil society without compromise and without any regard for citizens of different convictions. What is conflict but a disregard for compromise in the public sphere?
Read more...05.24.06
T. F. Torrance on Perichoresis (Mutual Indwelling of Persons within the Trinity)
Torrance wants to go beyond the category of substance and applies the term perichoresis (πεÏ?ιχώÏ?ησις, co-inherence, inter-penetrating and mutual indwelling) to highlight the dynamic, spiritual and intensely personal relationships in the Trinity. We are reminded of the model of indwelling love proposed by Augustine. Perichoresis refers to that eternal love between the Father (lover) and the Son (beloved) and the Holy Spirit (Spirit of love that binds both the lover and the beloved).
Read more...05.17.06
Exploring the Role of Orientalism
There is defensiveness among some of the Asian literati who wax eloquent on the need for cultural planning and censorship to defend national culture against Western influences. These literati often justify their anxieties by claiming that Western powers have historically exploited the intellectual discipline called Orientalism to undermine not only the dignity and self-identity of Orientals but also the will to resist their colonial masters.
Read more...05.10.06
Greek Trinitarian Terms in the Early Church (Part 2)
A more succinct discussion on Substance (ousia) and Object (hypostasis) is given by G. L. Prestige in his book Fathers and Heretics.
Read more...Greek Trinitarian Terms in the Early Church (Part 1)
My earlier essays on the Trinity focused on demonstrating logical coherence rather than conceptual clarification. Admittedly, discussion of logical coherence is appealing, but such discussion can also be beguiling. The discussion maintains an appearance of austere logic, and follows the suggestion that once the logical structure of the argument is unpacked, there will be agreement.
That agreement seldom happens is because the philosophers covertly smuggle in their own meaning of the terms deployed. This in turn results in different criteria of logical coherence. Inevitably, even the best minds fail to resolve the logic of doctrinal agreement.
It is imperative that we should at least be clear about what we mean if we want to use the terms to analyse of the doctrine of Trinity. In this regard, we need to go back to the original formulation of the doctrine in the early Church.
Read more...05.03.06
Thomas V Morris: The Two-Minds Model of the Incarnation
It must be pointed out that the charge of incoherence of the Incarnation assumes we know the exact nature of human and divine properties to be able to assert that there can be no joining together of human and divine properties in an individual.
John Macquarie’s response to such a presupposition is pertinent, “Part of the trouble with the doctrine of incarnation is that we discuss the divinity and even the humanity of Christ in terms of ready-made ideas of God and man that we bring with us, without allowing these ideas to be corrected and even drastically changed by what we learn about God and man in and through the incarnation.�
Thomas V. Morris’ landmark book, The Logic of God Incarnate suggests the two-minds model as one possible demonstration of the coherence of the incarnation.
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