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Answer
The Trinity is the most distinctive, defining, incomprehensible, and awe-inspiring mystery of Christianity. It reveals the true identity of our Almighty Creator—not merely a deity, but an infinite Being existing eternally as three co-equal, infinite Persons, sharing the same essence yet remaining distinct. The doctrine of the Trinity originates from the Bible, even though the term “Trinity” is not explicitly used in the Scriptures.
All orthodox Christians affirm that the doctrine of the Trinity teaches that God is one essence in three Persons; God possesses one nature, but three distinct centers of consciousness; God is a singular What, yet three Whos. Some non-believers mistakenly perceive this as a contradiction. However, the doctrine of the Trinity is a divine mystery unveiled through God’s Word. A true contradiction would be asserting that God has only one nature while simultaneously having three natures, or that He is a single Person but also three Persons.
From the early days of the church, Christians grasped the enigma of the Trinity, even before adopting the term “Trinity.”
For instance, the earliest Christians understood that the Son was the Creator (John 1:1-2), the “I Am” of the Old Testament (Exodus 3:14;John 8:58), equal to the Father «Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? », (John 14:9), and the Judge of all the earth (Genesis 18:25;John 5:22), deserving of worship as only God is to be (D
Deuteronomy 6:13; Luke 4:8; Matthew 14:33).
The initial Christians understood that the Holy Spirit was a distinct Person with His own thoughts and will “However, when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth: for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.”, (John 16:13), who intercedes for us with God “And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”, (Romans 8:27), demonstrating that He is a distinct Person from God the Father—since intercession involves at least two parties (no one intercedes with himself). Additionally, a person can be forgiven for blaspheming against God the Son, but not for blaspheming against God the Holy Spirit “Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.”, (Matthew 12:32).
The writers of the New Testament frequently mention all three Persons of the Trinity together (e.g., Romans 1:4; Romans 15:30; 2 Corinthians 13:14; Ephesians 1:13-14; 1 Thessalonians 1:3-6). The early believers understood that the Father and the Son sent the third Person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit—“another counselor”—to dwell in our hearts (John 14:16-17, 26; 16:7). These mysteries were fully embraced by the early church as revealed truth, yet without t
The concept of “the Holy Trinity” is a significant label.
The Old Testament provided hints of the Trinity, and no Scripture passage denies the doctrine. For instance, in Genesis 1:26, God speaks in the plural, saying, “Let us make mankind in our image.” God affirms that He was entirely alone when He created everything, extending the heavens and spreading the earth “by myself” «Thus saith the LORD, thy redeemer, and he that formed thee from the womb, I am the LORD that maketh all things; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself; », (Isaiah 44:24). However, Jesus was the means of God’s creation (John 1:1-3;Colossians 1:16), accompanied by the Holy Spirit who was hovering over the ancient waters «And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. », (Genesis 1:2). Only the Trinity doctrine can clarify it all.
The Torah suggested the concept of God existing in multiple Persons and foretold His incarnation. The Old Testament contains prophecies of a future world leader «The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, Nor a lawgiver from between his feet, Until Shiloh come; And unto him shall the gathering of the people be. », (Genesis 49:10) to be born in Bethlehem «But thou, Beth-lehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting. », (Micah 5:2), who was not only God’s Son «Fo
Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” (Isaiah 9:6), but a Messiah who would be God in the flesh (Isaiah 7:14;Zechariah 2:8-11). However, the Jews were looking for—and, under Roman occupation, desperately hoping for—a triumphant, conquering Messiah, not a lowly, suffering Servant (Isaiah 53). Israel failed to recognize the Son of God due to His ordinariness (Isaiah 53:2;Matthew 13:54-58;John 10:33), and they killed Him (Zechariah 12:10;Acts 2:36).
In the years after the death of the last apostle, John, there were many attempts by Christian theologians to define and explain God to the church. Explanations of spiritual reality to earthly beings will always fall short; some teachers’ explanations were a bit off, while others sank into heresy. The errors put forward in post-apostolic times ranged from Jesus being all God and only appearing to be human (Docetism), to His being created rather than eternal (Adoptionism, Arianism, and others), to there being three separate gods in the same family (Tritheism), to the one God playing three different roles at different times (Modalism, Monarchianism).
As no religion can exist without knowing who or what its followers worship, there was a great need to define God in a way that all followers of Christianity would agree upon as “official” or orthodox doctrine. And, if Jesus were not God, all Christians were heretics for worshiping a created being.
It seems that the church father Tertullian (AD 160–225) was the first to apply the term Trinity to God. Tertullian uses the term in Against Praxeus, written in 213, to explain and defend the Trinity against the teaching of his contemporary Praxeus, who espoused the Monarchian heresy. From there, we can move forward over a century of church discussion, schisms, and debate to the Council of Nicea in 325, when the Trinity was officially confirmed as church doctrine.
A final observation: Theology is the attempt by flawed humans to understand the words of the Bible, just as science is the attempt by flawed humans to understand the facts of nature. All the facts of nature are true, just as all the original words of the Bible are true. However, humans are limited and make many mistakes, as history continually shows. So, where there is error or disagreement in science or theology, both disciplines have methods of correction. The history of the early church reveals that many sincere Christian believers “got it wrong” when it came to defining God’s nature (a great lesson on the need for humility). But, through a careful study of God’s Word, the church was finally able to articulate what the Bible clearly teaches and what they knew to be true—God exists as an eternal Trinity.
