Peter Kirby wrote: ↑Mon May 08, 2023 2:52 pm
I'd like to start collecting here whatever could be considered a "Trinitarian" interpolation, clarifying or correcting or expanding on earlier unitarian, binitarian, or subordinationist views [the views that God is one, that God is two, that God properly refers to the Father, or that the Son is not equal to the Father in some respect ... all of which are various different non-Trinitarian positions] or just passages that are more ambiguous originally.
I'd be inclined to argue that the orthodox Christian Trinitarian doctrine evolved over the course of the 4th century and its beginnings can be traced to the philosophical controversy that arose with the Arian controversy and the reported arguments from the Nicene council.
I'd argue that the Nicene epoch philosophers (chiefly Platonists) pointed out that there was a complete omission in the NT canonical literature of any description of the divine essence. The only essence οὐσία described in the NT is the material essence of property, inheritance and church money. One of the key element of (Arian) controversy was about defining the divine essence of Jesus. The definitions involved philosophical arguments. During the Nicene epoch there was a strong representation of Platonist philosophers.
Was this divine essence of Jesus the same as, or similar to, the divine essence of "god". Was it "homoousion" (lit. 'same in being, same in essence', from ὁμός, homós, "same" and οὐσία, ousía, "being" or "essence")? Or rather was it "homoiousios" (hómoios, "similar" and οὐσία, ousía, "essence, being")? Constantine chided the argument and decided it should be the same. And that was where it remained.
However the mainstream Christian paradigm has been to view this comparison (whether same or similar essence) as the comparison between the divine essence of Jesus and the divine essence of the "god" who is featured in the LXX and in the NT as the father of Jesus.
I'd offer an alternative scenario in that this comparison was that between the divine essence of Jesus and the divine essence of the "god" as found in the books of Plato. That is the "One" - of the Platonists. There is some reasonable evidence which may support this contention. If anyone is interested it can be presented and discussed. This includes the Phillip of Side fragments on the Nicene Council.
Philip of Side, 5th century
Fr. 5.6
[Supporters of Arius at the Council of Nicaea]
Anonymous Ecclesiastical History 2.12.8-10 [p. 47, lines 5-19 Hansen][160]
(8) When these things were expressed by them
or rather, through them, by the Holy Spirit
those who endorsed Arius' impiety
were wearing themselves out with murmuring
(these were the circles of Eusebius of Nicomedia
and Theognis of Nicaea, whom I have already pointed out earlier),
and yet they were looking with favor on
the "hirelings" of Arius,
certain philosophers who were indeed very good with words;
Arius had hired them as supporters of his own wickedness,
and arrived with them at that holy and ecumenical council.
(9)
For there were present very many philosophers;
and having put their hopes in them, as I have said just now,
the enemies of the truth were reasonably caught,
along with the one who actually taught them their blasphemy.
The Holy Scripture was fulfilled in him and in them, which says,
"Cursed is everyone who has his hope in a mortal man,
and whose heart has departed from the Lord."[161]
(10) For truly, the blasphemous heart of the fighter against God, Arius,
and of those who shared in his impiety, departed from the Lord
they dared to say that the Son of God, the creator of the universe
and the craftsman of both visible and invisible created natures,
is something created and something made.
https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/phil ... gments.htm
Basically I am arguing that it is reasonable to therefore surmise that this controversy eventually lead to the formation of the Christian trinity. At its foundation is the Platonic "trinity" espoused in the Enneads by Plotinus as "the One Spirit Soul". At the end of the 4th century Augustine finds that
"only a few words and phrases" need to be changed to bring Platonism into complete accord with Christianity.