Need help with understanding the Logos

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Caprotodox

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I’m trying to develop my understanding of the Holy Trinity, and of course I want to do this without falling into a heresy. Would someone be able to look over my thoughts and offer correction where I’m wrong?

From my understanding Christ is the Logos, and by that he is the mind/reason of God the Father. Therefore, Christ on Earth was the personified Logos - both fully man and fully Divine.

Is this understanding correct?
Is Christ the mind of God the Father and then became the personified mind of God the Father when he was born here on Earth?
 
Caprotodox said:
I’m trying to develop my understanding of the Holy Trinity, and of course I want to do this without falling into a heresy. Would someone be able to look over my thoughts and offer correction where I’m wrong?

From my understanding Christ is the Logos, and by that he is the mind/reason of God the Father. Therefore, Christ on Earth was the personified Logos - both fully man and fully Divine.

Is this understanding correct?
Is Christ the mind of God the Father and then became the personified mind of God the Father when he was born here on Earth?
Click to expand...
Your thinking might be okay, but the words you’re using make it unclear. Let me try and lay it out.
When we say that Christ is the Logos, or the “Word”, we don’t mean that He is the faculty of reason or something like that. Let me quote St John of Damascus, then try and explain.
This one sole God (the Father) is not without a Word (trans. ‘Logos’). And, if He has a Word, this word will not be non-subsistent, nor will it have any begining or end of being. For there never was a time when God the Word was not. God always had a Word begotton of Himself- not like our speech, which is non-subsistent and dissipated in the air, but distinctly subsistent, living, and perfect, not passing out from Him but always existing within Him
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WHOOPS I posted too early- give me a chance to edit!
 
Caprotodox said:
I’m trying to develop my understanding of the Holy Trinity, and of course I want to do this without falling into a heresy. Would someone be able to look over my thoughts and offer correction where I’m wrong?

From my understanding Christ is the Logos, and by that he is the mind/reason of God the Father. Therefore, Christ on Earth was the personified Logos - both fully man and fully Divine.

Is this understanding correct?
Is Christ the mind of God the Father and then became the personified mind of God the Father when he was born here on Earth?
Click to expand...
The problematic word here is “personified” which in your post seems to limit this to his time on earth.

But the Word has ALWAYS been a Person. There was never a “time” (we have to use scare quotes here because we’re using the term loosely) when the Word was never a Person.

Jesus Christ is the Word INCARNATE. Not personified.
 
Whoops I exceeded the time limit. Here it is again:
Your thinking might be okay, but the words you’re using make it unclear. Let me try and lay it out.
When we say that Christ is the Logos, or the “Word”, we don’t mean that He is the faculty of reason or something like that. Let me quote St John of Damascus, then try and explain.
This one sole God (the Father) is not without a Word (trans. ‘Logos’). And, if He has a Word, this word will not be non-subsistent, nor will it have any beginning or end of being. For there never was a time when God the Word was not. God always had a Word begotten of Himself- not like our speech, which is non-subsistent and dissipated in the air, but distinctly subsistent, living, and perfect, not passing out from Him but always existing within Him. For where will He be if He is outside of God? Because our nature is mortal and subject to dissolution, for this reason our speech is non-subsistent.But, since God is existing always and is perfect, His Word must be always existing, living, perfect, distinctly subsistent, and having all things that the Begetter has. Now, our speech in proceeding from our mind is not entirely distinct from it. For, in so far as it comes from the mind, it is something distinct from it; whereas, in so far as it reveals the mind itself, it is not entirely distinct from it. Actually, it is identical with it in nature while distinct from it in its subject. Similarly, the Word of God, insofar as He subsists in Himself, is distinct from Him from whom He has His subsistences. But, since He exhibits in Himself those same things which are discerned in God, then in His nature He is identical with God.
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See here, the Word has His own subsistence… it’s not like He is a “part” of God the Father in the way our reason is “part” of us.

About the phrase “personified Logos”: the way you use it seems to imply that the “personification” is the incarnation. Both the Word and God are persons already, so the incarnation is the embodiment of a person, not the personification of a non-person.

I just realized that this is already very long. If you’re willing to work through something pretty dense, I strongly recommend “Orthodox Faith” by St. John of Damascus (which is what I quoted and is a lot easier to understand in context. Reading the whole of it is worthwhile, but Book One (on the Trinity) and Book Three (On the Incarnation) are the most applicable to your questions.
 
The Father is not the Son is not the Holy Spirit is not the Father. They are three different persons. However, they are all God. Not part of God. They are all fully the same, one God. The persons differ in their relationship with one another. The Son is begotten by the Father, and the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.

But when Jesus died on the cross, that was not the Father in any way. It was the Son.

Jesus had human body with a human soul who was also, from the moment of his conception, with the Son.
 
porthos11 said:
The problematic word here is “personified” which in your post seems to limit this to his time on earth.

But the Word has ALWAYS been a Person. There was never a “time” (we have to use scare quotes here because we’re using the term loosely) when the Word was never a Person.

Jesus Christ is the Word INCARNATE. Not personified.
Click to expand...
waanju said:
Whoops I exceeded the time limit. Here it is again:
Your thinking might be okay, but the words you’re using make it unclear. Let me try and lay it out.
When we say that Christ is the Logos, or the “Word”, we don’t mean that He is the faculty of reason or something like that. Let me quote St John of Damascus, then try and explain.

See here, the Word has His own subsistence… it’s not like He is a “part” of God the Father in the way our reason is “part” of us.

About the phrase “personified Logos”: the way you use it seems to imply that the “personification” is the incarnation. Both the Word and God are persons already, so the incarnation is the embodiment of a person, not the personification of a non-person.

I just realized that this is already very long. If you’re willing to work through something pretty dense, I strongly recommend “Orthodox Faith” by St. John of Damascus (which is what I quoted and is a lot easier to understand in context. Reading the whole of it is worthwhile, but Book One (on the Trinity) and Book Three (On the Incarnation) are the most applicable to your questions.
Click to expand...
Thanks both of your guy’s posts helped to bring more clarity to me on the issue. I’m still trying to conceptualize it in my head, which is admittedly pretty difficult.

To help bring clarity, do God the Father and Christ hold identical thoughts simultaneously?

It seems that my thinking is in error on two fronts:
  1. The Logos is already a person before becoming incarnate. (But what does “person” mean?)
  2. The use of “personification” since that terms implies that Christ was not a person prior to the incarnation.
I appreciate the book recommendation waaju, I’ll make sure to add it to my already lengthy to-read book list. I think I still need a stronger foundation to be able to understand what he’s writing though.

I appreciate the response, I apologize if my questions/thoughts are noobish.
 
Caprotodox said:
Thanks both of your guy’s posts helped to bring more clarity to me on the issue. I’m still trying to conceptualize it in my head, which is admittedly pretty difficult.

To help bring clarity, do God the Father and Christ hold identical thoughts simultaneously?

It seems that my thinking is in error on two fronts:
  1. The Logos is already a person before becoming incarnate. (But what does “person” mean?)
  2. The use of “personification” since that terms implies that Christ was not a person prior to the incarnation.
I appreciate the book recommendation waaju, I’ll make sure to add it to my already lengthy to-read book list. I think I still need a stronger foundation to be able to understand what he’s writing though.

I appreciate the response, I apologize if my questions/thoughts are noobish.
Click to expand...
First off, no need to apologize. This is really hard stuff- it’s a mystery after all!
God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are perfectly united, so they all have the same “thoughts”. Of course, these “thoughts” are eternal, because God is unchanging and perfectly simple (there is no part in Him), so it’s not like our thoughts. The only way that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit differ is in their relation to one another- The Father begets, the Son is begotten, and the Holy Spirit proceeds from both (this last bit is a little confusing in the book I recommended, since it’s a point of controversy between East and West).
But, Christ incarnate has two wills- a human will and the Divine will. His human will is perfectly subjugated to His Divine will (since He’s without sin), but there are still two wills in the one Person, the second Person in the Trinity.
 
The word logos was well used by the Greeks in philosophy. To add to this confusion it was used differently by them then how John used it in John 1 by giving it a divine meaning.

The ‘logos was God’. The logos is often interpreted by Christians as the ‘Word’. In the book of John he begins by saying “In the beginning…”. This parallels Genesis 1 where it says “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”. In this first account of creation it says God spoke and then it was. In the account from John it says that God and his Word were with each other in the beginning and that all things were created through his Word. It goes on to say that this ‘Word’ that is divine became flesh and dwelt among us.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”. (John 1:1)

So what we know from this is that this ‘Word’ is in someway distinct from God, (because it says the Word was with God), yet he is God in his very nature, (because it says the Word was God). Thus, making the logos divine but distinct from the Father.

A person and his word are closely linked. By associating Jesus as God’s logos means John is associating Jesus closely with God, and as being God in very nature, having originating from him, and, even associating with him divine qualities like being the Creator of all things.

In the Trinity the Father is considered the origin of all. The Son is eternally begotten from the Father. And, the Holy Spirit eternally proceeds from the Father and through the Son.

All things were also created by God through the Son.
 
Here is an excerpt from a Catholic commentary on John 1 which may help us in understanding this mystery.

"The sacred text calls the Son of God “the Word”. The following comparison may help us understand the notion of “Word”: just as a person becoming conscious of himself forms an image of himself in his mind, in the same way God the Father on knowing himself begets the eternal Word. This Word of God is singular, unique; no other can exist because in him is expressed the entire essence of God. Therefore, the Gospel does not call him simply “Word”, but “the Word”. Three truths are affirmed regarding the Word—that he is eternal, that he is distinct from the Father, and that he is God. “Affirming that he existed in the beginning is equivalent to saying that he existed before all things” (St Augustine, De Trinitate, 6, 2). Also, the text says that he was with God, that is, with the Father, which means that the person of the Word is distinct from that of the Father and yet the Word is so intimately related to the Father that he even shares his divine nature: he is one in substance with the Father (cf. Nicene Creed).

To mark the Year of Faith (1967–1968) Pope Paul VI summed up this truth concerning the most Holy Trinity in what is called the Creed of the People of God (n. 11) in these words: “We believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Son of God. He is the eternal Word, born of the Father before time began, and one in substance with the Father, homoousios to Patri, and through him all things were made. He was incarnate of the Virgin Mary by the power of the Holy Spirit, and was made man: equal therefore to the Father according to his divinity, and inferior to the Father according to his humanity and himself one, not by some impossible confusion of his natures, but by the unity of his person.”

“In the beginning”: “what this means is that he always was, and that he is eternal. …] For if he is God, as indeed he is, there is nothing prior to him; if he is creator of all things, then he is the First; if he is Lord of all, then everything comes after him—created things and time” (St John Chrysostom, Hom. on St John, 2, 4)."
 
From another Catholic commentary we read about the Logos:

“The term “the Word” (Gk. logos) conveys the notion of divine self-expression or speech and has a rich OT background. God’s Word is effective: God speaks, and things come into being (Gen. 1:3, 9; Ps. 33:6; 107:20; Isa. 55:10–11), and by speech he relates personally to his people (e.g., Gen. 15:1). John also shows how this concept of “the Word” is superior to a Greek philosophical concept of “Word” (logos) as an impersonal principle of Reason that gave order to the universe. And the Word was with God indicates interpersonal relationship “with” God, but then and the Word was God affirms that this Word was also the same God who created the universe “in the beginning.” Here are the building blocks that go into the doctrine of the Trinity: the one true God consists of more than one person, they relate to each other, and they have always existed.”
 
Caprotodox said:
Thanks both of your guy’s posts helped to bring more clarity to me on the issue. I’m still trying to conceptualize it in my head, which is admittedly pretty difficult.

To help bring clarity, do God the Father and Christ hold identical thoughts simultaneously?

It seems that my thinking is in error on two fronts:
  1. The Logos is already a person before becoming incarnate. (But what does “person” mean?)
  2. The use of “personification” since that terms implies that Christ was not a person prior to the incarnation.
I appreciate the book recommendation waaju, I’ll make sure to add it to my already lengthy to-read book list. I think I still need a stronger foundation to be able to understand what he’s writing though.

I appreciate the response, I apologize if my questions/thoughts are noobish.
Click to expand...
The simple way to understand what a person is versus a nature is to say that a person is who someone is and a nature is what someone or something is. A nature is something’s essence. Like rock is the essence of a stone. A person is answering the question of identity. Who is it? A nature is answering the question of essence. What is it?

Thus, in the Trinity the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each distinct Persons. They each have different answers to the question of ‘who is it?’. Whereas all three have the same nature. They have the same answer to the question of ‘what is it?’. All three are God. They all have the same essence. Yet, not 3 essences, but only one essence. 3 Persons and one nature.
 
fisherman_carl said:
. . . In the Trinity the Father is considered the origin of all. The Son is eternally begotten from the Father. And, the Holy Spirit eternally proceeds from the Father and through the Son. All things were also created by God through the Son.
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Thank you for your contributions.
You may be presenting an Orthodox view from what I recall.

According to the Nicene Creed:
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son
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.
I am addressing this because it reveals the nature of God as being Love itself, transcendent and eternal.
 
waanju said:
God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are perfectly united, so they all have the same “thoughts”. Of course, these “thoughts” are eternal, because God is unchanging and perfectly simple (there is no part in Him), so it’s not like our thoughts. The only way that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit differ is in their relation to one another- The Father begets, the Son is begotten, and the Holy Spirit proceeds from both (this last bit is a little confusing in the book I recommended, since it’s a point of controversy between East and West).
But, Christ incarnate has two wills- a human will and the Divine will. His human will is perfectly subjugated to His Divine will (since He’s without sin), but there are still two wills in the one Person, the second Person in the Trinity.
Click to expand...
I feel that this needs further clarification.

There are three distinct characteristics or attributes of personhood: intellect, will and love (or the capacity thereof). What this means is that each member of the Trinity, each being distinct persons, have therefore each a distinct intellect and distinct will and distinct love. They are distinct, but not different.

In other words, there isn’t a singular mind and will of God that is shared by each member. Rather, there are three minds and wills in God, but they are fully united and one. They do not in any way disagree. There is perfect inner unity among them. Nevertheless, they remain distinct.
 
Aloysium said:
Thank you for your contributions.
You may be presenting an Orthodox view from what I recall.

According to the Nicene Creed:
.
I am addressing this because it reveals the nature of God as being Love itself, transcendent and eternal.
Click to expand...
It’s also a Catholic view! 😃

Yes, you can say from the Father and the Son. I am just using the more technical term that has been accepted more recently by saying and through the Son. Yes, this is a more ecumenical phrase with the Orthodox. But, I think it also speaks to the point that while the Holy Spirit does proceed from the Son, the Father is considered the origin of all, and this includes being the origin of the Son. Since the Son is eternally begotten from the Father.

Yes, the Trinity is the perfect example of love. The Holy Spirit is often described as the love between the Father and the Son. The Trinity means that God is not solitary from eternity, but can be an example of love, since love requires a beloved. God being a multiplicity of persons makes sense philosophically for this reason. If he was solitary how could he be an example of perfect love from all eternity? Thus, the Trinity makes more sense philosophically than any other monotheistic version of God.

catholic.com/quickquestions/how-can-the-nicene-creed-expressions-and-the-son-and-through-the-son-mean-the-same-th
 
God the Father being the origin of the Son does not make the Son inferior to the Father because the Son shares in the same divine nature of the Father. The same with the Holy Spirit. They are equal because they are the same, except in identity. They have the same essence. Each of them possesses that essence fully.

The Son may be subordinate to the Father in his role that is associated with his identity as the Son, symbolized by being seated at the right hand of the Father, but he is not inferior. He is co-equal, being of the same substance.
 
note: Subordination is the heresy that the Son is subordinate to the Father in being. That is not what I was talking about when saying the role of the Son is subordinate to the Father. The Son obeyed the Father, becoming a man, and dying on the Cross. He was subordinate to the will of the Father. That is what I mean. Also, being at the right of the Father could also be interpreted as being one with the Father in glory. Scripture uses the phrase in conjunction with Christ’s reward for being obedient to the Father. Thus, the Father rewards the Son’s obedience.

Also, to complicate things the Son by becoming man is now truly God and truly man. Both his human nature and his divine nature was one in being obedient to the will of the Father. Thus, God raised Jesus from the dead and seated him at his right hand.
 
John uses the word Logos or the Word to describe the Son with the Father from eternity. This term is probably inadequate to describe the Son as is any term we could use. When you think of this term it gives us an immaterial and abstract connotation for a Person. Which I think then contrasts or highlights nicely with when John says the Word became flesh. Or the Word became material. Or this immaterial Word or eternal Person takes a material human body.
 
How they could have the same thoughts and be divine if only Father knows the end of time?
 
Bahman said:
How they could have the same thoughts and be divine if only Father knows the end of time?
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The Church has always recognized that when Jesus was speaking there, He was speaking from His humanity. His human nature is limited, as all human nature is. It cannot, therefore, contain all of the knowledge of God, and so could not know when the end was.
 
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