the three Persons of the Trinity are manifestations of the Godhead, the Divine Essence of the pure Absolute, which, as the Ultimate Reality, transcends all properties, qualities and descriptions, including both being and non-being as well as even the Persons of the Trinity.
According to Meister Eckhart:
"In so far as He is One and Indivisible, He is neither Father, Son, nor Holy Ghost and yet is something which is neither this nor that.”
“For though the Godhead has in it all things, it has them all in one, not piecemeal. It begets not, so it is not Father; it receives not, so it is not Son nor Holy Ghost.”
“The Godhead is an abstract simple thing, omnipotent above all Persons as well as having the power of the inseperate three Persons: giving to none, receiving from none, save as therein subsisting.”
This position concerning the Godhead or Divine Essence vis a vis the Persons of the Trinity does not conflict with Christian orthodoxy. The Athanasian Creed speaks of the single, undivided Essence of the Divine Persons which is the basis for the Unity within the Trinity. The Fourth Lateran Council also confirm that the Divine Essence does not beget, nor is begotten nor proceeds:
“We, however, with the approval of this sacred and universal council, believe and confess with Peter Lombard that there exists a certain supreme reality, incomprehensible and ineffable, which truly is the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, the three persons together and each one of them separately. Therefore in God there is only a Trinity, not a quaternity, since each of the three persons is that reality – that is to say substance, essence or divine nature – which alone is the principle of all things, besides which no other principle can be found. This reality neither begets nor is begotten nor proceeds; the Father begets, the Son is begotten and the Holy Spirit proceeds.”
Christian thinkers articulated the emergence of Being from Beyond-Being using the analogy of the spoken word. Father, Son and Holy Ghost are different modes of the Divine Word.
