The only thing that differentiates the Persons of the Trinity is their relationship to each other–that which answers the question “Who are you?” The answer to the question “What are you?” is exactly the same for each Person, since each Person wholly possesses the one divine nature. God in his nature is one entity. God in his personhood is three persons, but not three entities.
Oh that’s a great explanation, thankyou.
How can their be anything dynamic about pure actuality?
The problem here is in the definitions. I think what FightingFat is getting at is that from a human point of view, forces/relationships of love exist between the “who” of God [Father + Son + Holy Spirit] that define and differentiate the persons of God. This however is only an approximation to the reality of God’s nature, which we can’t fully comprehend (remember the Trinity is a mystery after all).
I recommend F.J. Sheed’s book Theology For Beginners. It has great chapters on The Blessed Trinity, The Three Persons, and The Human Mind and the Doctrine of the Trinity. Well worth a read.
If as you say “we can never understand anything about the infinite God,” then what is even left in the concept you have of your God? It would seem that you cannot have any concept of it since if you did, you would be understanding at least that aspect of it (that aspect which you have formed a concept of). How can one love something of which one has no concept? How can one even meaningfully believe in the existence of such a thing? It would be like saying, “I believe in the existence of this, well I can’t conceptualize it at all whatsover and I don’t understand it at all whatsoever but nevertheless, whatever it is, I think, nay I know it exists! O and furthermore, I love it. I have no understanding whatsoever of any aspect of it, but I love it all the same!” That would be like believing in the existence of an ice cream flavor that one has no concept of and loving that flavor without having any understanding, let alone experience of it.
That also means you are incapable of loving it. You cannot love that which you do not know. To love something is precisely to find desirable that which is apprehended by the intellect. Since you admit that your God cannot be apprehended at all by the intellect (by man’s that is), you have also conceded that your God cannot be loved.
What I was talking about my friend, is our understanding of the Trinity. It cannot be understood by a finite mind because it is infinite. And YES, we can, I can and do love God, Father Son & Holy Spirit, because of what he has done and does do for me. If you do not believe, I am sorry for you and will pray that you receive the gift of faith. As one person much wiser than I put it…for those with FAITH, no proof is necessary. For those without faith, no proof is enough. As no proof will be adequate for you. I will not waste your or my time in an endless exchange trying to show who is more intelligent with words or the use of reason. I will pray for you to receive th gift of faith.
First, I do love God, not just my God, but our God. I love him with every fiber of my being, because I know through revealed truth what he has done for me and wants of me, and that is what I strive to give him. Second. I did not say God could not be apprehended ( I assume here you mean comprehended or known) by the intellect. Read carefully my friend, I said we are incapable of understanding the mystery of the Trinity. Your syllogism is incorrect because your premises are faulty and conclusion incorrect.
Your terminology gives different meaning to what we say and believe. First. Love is not a riddle. Love is objective truth which we, in our finite existence can share and experience. Second, the Trinity is not a puzzle. It is a reality which we cannot understand because of our finite minds. That is why we call it a mystery. i.e., that which cannot be known or understood. Puzzle equates to being a problem that can be solved. No so in this case. Even your very language is inadequate to express the mystery before you. You are totally correct in saying that love is a beautiful reality. It is a reality that will be lived for eternity by those who are united with God for eternity. I pray my friend that you will be among those of us who are striving to attain this reality, .i.e., heaven
In his book, Theology for Beginners, Frank Sheed says “they know with the same intellect, love with the same will” (pg 30). So, although they are distinct, they are not different or separate.
Great question. You point out a problem. We really can’t say what pure actuality is. If we could, we could say what God is. And you are right, dynamic implies change, and God does not change. “Dynamic” is a useful word as an analogy. It is useful because if we think of actus purus as some kind of crass immobility, we might be tempted to think that God is in some kind of holy isolation from the world and indifferent. There is no adequate image that we can draw from our experience to capture what pure act means. In our experience, we experience a composition of act and potency.
Except the procession of the inner word in the intellect, which is an act proceeding from act. (aka the psychological analogy)
I agree that it is doctrinal and solid. But it cannot possibly comprehend the relations of the Trinity. You said it yourself when you called it the “psychological analogy.” “Analogy” is the key word. Whenever we affirm something similarity between God and creatures, we must at the same time affirm infinite difference. It is not that our created concepts are useless, they are very useful, but they are limited to what we can come up with which will inevitably be tainted with creatureliness.
I think that’s exactly what I said above.
