Could the Godhead be more than three persons?

[Mike_from_NJ]

We’ve had a few recent topics regarding the Trinity. I didn’t want to veer them off-topic, so I made this new topic.

Most of Christianity teaches that the Godhead, the persons that make up God, has three persons (through there are a few don’t see Jesus and/or The Holy Spirit as part of it). My question is whether there could be more than three persons in the Godhead.

When defending the Trinity/Godhead apologists will usually defend the concept of multiple persons or who should be counted as a person of God, but that’s not material here:

1. If there are more than three persons of God then we’re already assuming Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are part of the Godhead.
2. For argument’s sake we are assuming God can be multiple persons and can interact among each other.

So is there are anything that can be pointed to that shows there can not be more than three persons of God? Sure, in Matthew 28:19 Jesus says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and ofthe Holy Spirit.” But that doesn’t rule out the possibility of further persons. We know in the Old Testament the Father repeatedly only referred to himself, and that didn’t mean that there weren’t other persons as-yet-unrevealed. Also the Church says there could be more revelation to occur after Jesus’ return.

In short, what specifically can believers point to saying there is no way there is a 4th, 5th, 100th person of the Godhead? Can Christians allow there might be more to the Godhead than what has been revealed thus far?

 

[TheLittleLady]

You might want to research the excommunication of the Army of Mary. That group claims that the godhead is 5 persons (Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Mary and the group foundress).

 

[TheLittleLady]

Also, the Church explicitly teaches there is no new revelation, only deeper understanding of what was already revealed:

CCC # 66 “The Christian economy, therefore, since it is the new and definitive Covenant, will never pass away; and no new public revelation is to be expected before the glorious manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Yet even if Revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely explicit; it remains for Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries.

 

[Zaccheus]

@Mike_from_NJ

We have no way of knowing that the Godhead is three Persons, except direct Divine revelation. That is, we know it solely because God told us.
If there were more than three Persons we would have no way to know it except God telling us.
God has told us that He is three Persons. We have no reason to think there are more than three. At the best, this is idle speculation. At worst we have things like the Army of Mary as mentioned by TheLittleLady.

You might want to research the excommunication of the Army of Mary. That group claims that the godhead is 5 persons (Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Mary and the group foundress).

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

You might want to research the excommunication of the Army of Mary. That group claims that the godhead is 5 persons (Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Mary and the group foundress).

Very interesting. Thanks! From what I saw the Church declared that group could no longer be considered Catholic because their beliefs differed greatly from that of the Church. It doesn’t show the group as demonstrably false, except in that they believe the Church is correct. In other words, it doesn’t show how the Godhead could not be more than three persons.

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

Also, the Church explicitly teaches there is no new revelation, only deeper understanding of what was already revealed:

CCC # 66 “The Christian economy, therefore, since it is the new and definitive Covenant, will never pass away; and no new public revelation is to be expected before the glorious manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Yet even if Revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely explicit; it remains for Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries.

Your first sentence contradicts the part of the Catechism you quoted. It doesn’t say that there is no new revelation, just that there is no new revelation until after Jesus returns. As far as I can tell that revelation may include further persons of God.

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

We have no way of knowing that the Godhead is three Persons, except direct Divine revelation. That is, we know it solely because God told us.
If there were more than three Persons we would have no way to know it except God telling us.
God has told us that He is three Persons. We have no reason to think there are more than three. At the best, this is idle speculation. At worst we have things like the Army of Mary as mentioned by TheLittleLady.

I agree that there is no way to say that who is or is not a person of God without God saying so. I already said for the sake of argument I’m allowing for the three persons are God, but there’s nothing that says it’s only those three.

You said there’s no reason to believe there are more than three, but that’s not the point of the topic. I’m asking if there could be more than three and if there is any evidence which shows it could not be more than three. Think about the people of the Old Testament. They knew only one person of God. They had an incomplete understanding of God. What demonstrates that people now don’t also have a complete understanding of God, albeit one with more understanding than the people from the OT?

 

[Zaccheus]

You’re free to speculate, Mike from NJ. Only, I think it’s pointless. You have nothing on which to base your idea.

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

You’re free to speculate, Mike from NJ. Only, I think it’s pointless. You have nothing on which to base your idea.

The reason why I ask these questiono is because when the topic of the Trinity comes up people speak with such confidence about it. My feeling is that if someone can’t say what something isn’t or how that something works, then it’s hard to say what it is and if it exists.

 

[Benadam]

you replaced the word ‘before’ with ‘until’. The manifestation of our Lord is its self a new revelation and that with it comes a manifestation of glory.

Any being that can say " I always was" can stake a claim to being God. Only God can claim to have no beginning. The primary evidence of being uncreated is having always been. Inherent to life that always was is life that will always be.
That is absolute mystery for creatures. Finite beings cannot fathom an existence absolutely and utterly void of creatures. If a being always was, then existence finds it’s source in its self.
A creature cannot fathom a being with no beginning.
It seems to that life without beginning is also being eternal, possessing knowledge of all that is, power over all that is, present to all that is, and because a state of being without created reality is absolutey mysterious to all but those that are being eternal.

any number it seems in this line of thinking would be one in being and could claim to be God to all creation.

 

[Luke-Suncook]

asdfh qery qwru tu wruj

 

[Benadam]

inherent to believing Jesus is God is believing God is a Trinity of persons one in being

 

[Wesrock]

The number of persons in the godhead is not considered something that one would come to through pure reason from knowledge of the natural world. I know that you would disagree with whether the arguments work, but the cosmological arguments are intended as arguments of pure reason from the natural world that God exists. No such argument from reason exists for the Trinity, at least, not apart from divine revelation that this is so. (A Christian may argue that once you’re a theist, it’s most reasonable to be Christian given its divine revelation, but that’s not an argument based solely on reason from the natural world). Anyway, the number of person’s in God is something that’s been revealed, not something that’s been deduced. On the basis of divine revelation, in both scripture and tradition, there cannot be more than three persons in the Godhead.

But, all that said, Thomas Aquinas did have thoughts on how this can be confirmed through reason (even if not arrived at only through reason). The Son is a generation of self-knowledge via the Intellect, and the Holy Spirit is a procession of love via the will. He explains this in great detail and why he believes there cannot be more than one Son and more than one Spirit, or any other persons, in Part One of the Summa Theologica, 27 through 30 at a minimum.

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1.htm

 

[Luke-Suncook]

sdfgjegy wru etyiti et

 

[Benadam]

To you then Jesus is ‘a’ god not God.?

 

[NeedImprovement]

. . . you replaced the word ‘before’ with ‘until’. The manifestation of our Lord is its self a new revelation and that with it comes a manifestation of glory. . .

It might also be a good idea for the OP to replace the word " after " with until in this part:

”. . . Also the Church says there could be more revelation to occur after Jesus’ return. . .

• Because at the Parousia time as we know it shall cease. How could there be an “after” if time no longer exists ?

Furthermore St. Thomas Aquinas has already dealt with, in depth, why there are only three persons in the Holy Trinity - a snippet in the following post . . .

 

[NeedImprovement]

From the First Part of the Summa ; Question 30 . More can be read by clicking HERE

I answer that, As was explained above, there can be only three persons in God. For it was shown above that the several persons are the several subsisting relations really distinct from each other. But a real distinction between the divine relations can come only from relative opposition. Therefore two opposite relations must needs refer to two persons: and if any relations are not opposite they must needs belong to the same person. Since then paternity and filiation are opposite relations, they belong necessarily to two persons. Therefore the subsisting paternity is the person of the Father; and the subsisting filiation is the person of the Son. The other two relations are not opposed to either of these, but are opposed to each other; therefore these two cannot belong to one person: hence either one of them must belong to both of the aforesaid persons; or one must belong to one person, and the other to the other. Now, procession cannot belong to the Father and the Son, or to either of them; for thus it would follows that the procession of the intellect, which in God is generation, wherefrom paternity and filiation are derived, would issue from the procession of love, whence spiration and procession are derived, if the person generating and the person generated proceeded from the person spirating; and this is against what was laid down above (I:27:3 and I:27:4). We must frequently admit that spiration belongs to the person of the Father, and to the person of the Son, forasmuch as it has no relative opposition either to paternity or to filiation; and consequently that procession belongs to the other person who is called the person of the Holy Ghost, who proceeds by way of love, as above explained. Therefore only three persons exist in God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

 

[Wesrock]

The Seven Spirits of God (seven representing completeness, and so therefore, God’s spirit, the Holy Spirit) are before the throne but do not bow before it like the rest, and the water of life flows out of the throne like a river, and the living water, the water of life, is a term used for the Holy Spirit in Johannine theology. It can’t be said that the spirit is shown to be nowhere near the throne, that’s just not true. The Book of Revelation isn’t the end all of theology, either.

 

[NeedImprovement]

. . . Think about the people of the Old Testament. They knew only one person of God. They had an incomplete understanding of God. What demonstrates that people now don’t also have a complete understanding of God, albeit one with more understanding than the people from the OT?

I’m thinking here that you meant to say -“don’t also have an incomplete understanding of God”
. . . Does that sound right ?.

In the Old Testament, God still hadn’t become one of us and died for us. For those of us who believe that God , in His infinite humility, would become one of us and die for us , it isn’t logical that Christ - who loves us so intimately would need to hide an, as you say, additional person of the Godhead from us.

 

[Wesrock]

From the First Part of the Summa ; Question 30 . More can be read by clicking HERE

I answer that, As was explained above, there can be only three persons in God. For it was shown above that the several persons are the several subsisting relations really distinct from each other. But a real distinction between the divine relations can come only from relative opposition. Therefore two opposite relations must needs refer to two persons: and if any relations are not opposite they must needs belong to the same person. Since then paternity and filiation are opposite relations, they belong necessarily to two persons. Therefore the subsisting paternity is the person of the Father; and the subsisting filiation is the person of the Son. The other two relations are not opposed to either of these, but are opposed to each other; therefore these two cannot belong to one person: hence either one of them must belong to both of the aforesaid persons; or one must belong to one person, and the other to the other. Now, procession cannot belong to the Father and the Son, or to either of them; for thus it would follows that the procession of the intellect, which in God is generation, wherefrom paternity and filiation are derived, would issue from the procession of love, whence spiration and procession are derived, if the person generating and the person generated proceeded from the person spirating; and this is against what was laid down above (I:27:3 and I:27:4). We must frequently admit that spiration belongs to the person of the Father, and to the person of the Son, forasmuch as it has no relative opposition either to paternity or to filiation; and consequently that procession belongs to the other person who is called the person of the Holy Ghost, who proceeds by way of love, as above explained. Therefore only three persons exist in God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

And just to add a clarifying point to this, this excerpt from Chapter 30 builds upon the concepts and explanations about filiation and spiration given in 27 through 29.