Loofs on the Trinity Doctrine

Loofs on the Trinity Doctrine

Thomas Allen

In What Is the Truth about Jesus Christ? Problems of Christology Discussed in Six Haskell Lectures at Oberlin, Ohio (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1913), pages 171-176, Friedrich Loofs identifies three major difficulties or contradictions of the orthodox Trinity Doctrine and its Christology. Dr. Loofs is a professor of church history at the University of Halle-Wittenberg, Germany. His discussion of the difficulties of the orthodox Trinity Doctrine and its Christology follows.

[1] The first one Augustine already experienced as a disturbing element, and the scholastic theology of the Middle Ages tried in vain to get rid of it. If, as Augustine thinks and this has been the orthodox opinion since the distinction of persons in the Trinity is limited to their internal relation to each other within the triune God, how was it possible that only the second person was incarnated? And, on the other hand, if the incarnation of the second person only is certain, how can the oneness of the triune God, i.e., how can Christian monotheism be retained? This unsolvable dilemma, perhaps, may be escaped and the incarnation of the Son only be retained, without endangering monotheism, by emphasizing that the Father and the Holy Ghost were not separated from the incarnated Son.

[2] But then the second difficulty I was going to mention becomes all the greater. Even as it is in itself, the idea of the incarnation, the idea that a divine person became the subject of a human life, restricted with regard to time and space, involves the greatest difficulties. For we cannot imagine the Godhead as being constricted by the limitations of human existence. Then only two alternatives remain. We must either assume that the “Son of God,” when he became man, did not cease, separate from his humanity, to pervade the world in divine majesty. Or, with Luther, we must venture the bold thought that, in virtue of the union of the two natures, the human nature from the first moments of its beginning has been partaking of the divine omnipotence and omnipresence.

This latter view, viz., the Lutheran doctrine of the “ubiquity of Christ’s” leads us to absurdities. If we wish to avoid these really unbearable absurdities we are referred to the former view. But does it not destroy the idea of incarnation? Could we still say of the divine person who was also outside the historical Jesus, pervading the world in divine majesty, that he was in reality incarnated? Is not the idea of the incarnation in this manner really changed into the idea of a divine inspiration, an inspiration such as the prophets experienced without any change in God's position to the world? But then it would be impossible still to say that the second person of the holy Trinity was the acting subject in the historical Jesus. This difficulty evidently becomes greater still if the Father and the Holy Ghost were not separated from the incarnated Son. For in that case it is still more impossible to retain the idea of a real incarnation of the Son. Perhaps these arguments are too difficult to be made intelligible with a few short words. But I may not spend more time on them. I must be satisfied with having just mentioned them. This mention of them was necessary. For here lie the greatest difficulties of the orthodox Christology, which cannot be surmounted by any tricks of reasoning.

[3] More easily understood is the difficulty which I am going to mention in the third and last place. The divine Trinity can, if need be, perhaps be thought of as the one God, the triune God, before the incarnation of the second person. But how is it after the incarnation? It is orthodox doctrine that the incarnated Son of God retained his human form, i.e. the human nature he had assumed, even after his ascension. Can, then, the distinction between the incarnated Son, on the one hand, and the Father and the Holy Ghost, on the other, be conceived of as being confined to the internal relations in which each person stands to the other within the one Godhead? And if this is not the case, the oneness of the Trinity is dissolved after the incarnation; the Trinity has become something different after the incarnation from what it was before. If neither is the case, then the humanity of Christ stands beside the Trinity. And then, also during the earthly life of Jesus, it could not have stood in a real personal union with the second person of the Trinity. Then the idea of the incarnation here again changes into that of an inspiration. Our dogmatics, I think, does not frankly face these difficulties. This, however, does not overcome them. These difficulties alone are sufficient to wreck the orthodox Christology. Augustine, the creator of the Occidental doctrine of the Trinity, when pressed by others, asked himself whether the exalted Christ could see God with his bodily eyes, and he answered the question in the negative. This proves that the difficulties we have discussed broke up the dogma of the Trinity and the closely related Christology even for Augustine himself. And the cause of this was not only that Augustine and the whole church orthodoxy as far as the eighteenth century pictured Christ’s body of glory too much like an earthly body when speaking of the bodily eyes of the exalted Christ; the difficulties, on the contrary, unavoidably remain so long as the humanity of the exalted Christ is conceived as something different from his Godhead. 

More religious articles.

King on a Knock at Midnight

King on a Knock at Midnight

by Thomas Allen

In “A Knock at Midnight,” Strength to Love (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1963, 2010), pages 53–64, Martin Luther King, Jr. discusses various devastations facing mankind with an emphasis on the decline of moral standards, the church, and race. The following is a critical review of King’s essay.

King begins by discussing the potential for a third world war and its devastation. Then, he mentions some of the devastation from which science has saved mankind. Unfortunately, science cannot save mankind from the destructive forces that he now possesses — nuclear weapons.

Such a bleak future causes many people to have emotional and psychological problems. Fear, anxiety, and depression paralyze many.

Next, King discusses the moral crisis. “Moral principles have lost their distinctiveness.” (P. 55.) For many people, absolute right and wrong become what the majority accepts. “Right and wrong are relative to likes and dislikes and the customs of a particular community.” (P. 55.)

Continuing, King remarks that the cardinal sin has become “Thou shalt not be caught.” Consequently, “the cardinal virtue is to get by.” (P. 55.) He writes, “The Darwinian concept of the survival of the fittest has been substituted by a philosophy of the survival of the slickest.” (P. 55.)

Then, King comments on the church. Church membership has grown, yet moral standards, i.e., not only sexual morality but also honesty, integrity, etc., have declined. (The church has continued to fail to achieve one of its important missions: instill high moral standards. Today, moral standards continue to decline along with church membership. Not only is sexual immorality rising, but so are lying, stealing, etc.)

King blames the rise of immorality on a loss of faith. “[M]en have lost faith in God, faith in man, and faith in the future.” (P. 57.) For many people, life is meaningless. Yet, without hope, a person cannot really live.

Next, King writes, “Everybody wishes to love and to be loved. He who feels that he is not loved feels that he does not count.” (P. 58.) (A person wants people whom he knows to love him — especially the people whom he loves. He seeks love in the concrete instead of in the abstract. King implies that people desire to be loved in the abstract. Abstract love is the type of love that abolitionists gave the slaves. Once the slaves were free, most abolitionists offered them no personal love or assistance. On the other hand, most slave owners loved their slaves, and most slave owners cared about their slaves when they were freed, and many tried to help them.)

Then, King discusses the plight of the Negro. Patiently, the Negro has knocked on the door of the Christian church begging for social justice. He chastises the church for not condemning racial segregation and failing to promote integration. (Today, King would praise the church. With rare exceptions, all churches condemn racial segregation and promote integration. The few who question integration are mostly mute. A strong correlation seems to exist between the church promoting integration and social justice and the decline of the relevance of the church and the rise of immortality [stealing, lying, sexual perversion, etc.]. Has the church’s replacement of the gospel of Jesus with the gospel of King made the country better?)

Continuing, King states, “What more pathetically reveals the irrelevancy of the church in present-day world affairs than its witness regarding war?” (P. 59.) (If King means to bring about peaceful solutions, he is right. If he means supporting bellicosity, he is wrong. Today, most churches seem to prefer war to peace — especially when Israel is involved.) He notes that during World War II, churches endorsed and supported the warmongers.

Next, King condemns the church for not siding with the poor over the rich. (That is, the church does not promote forced wealth distribution, the welfare states, a guaranteed income, etc. that King advocated as the solution to what he considered economic injustice. Most churches today advocate King’s economic policies. Nevertheless, such promotion has hastened rather than slowed the church’s decline into irrelevance.) King condemns the Russian Orthodox Church because it “became so inextricably bound to the despotic czarist regime that it became impossible to be rid of the corrupt political and social system without being rid of the church. Such is the fate of every ecclesiastical organization that allies itself with things-as-they-are.” (P. 59.) (Today, most likely, King would praise these churches that have allied with the federal government in implementing most of King’s social and economic recommendations. Does this explain the decline of the church into irrelevancy? These churches have to be abolished before people can free themselves from King’s crippling policies.)

Then, King remarks that the church is “the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state and never its tool.” (P. 59.) (Throughout the Civil Rights Era, the church has been a poor conscience. It has been more of a tool than a guide or critic.) According to King, if the church does not actively advance the struggle for peace, economic justice (the welfare state), and racial justice (integration, quotas, etc.), it will atrophy into an irrelevant social club. (Although the church has failed as a peacemaker, it has ardently advanced King’s economic and social justice. Still, it has atrophied into an irrelevant social club.)

King condemns the notion of a Negro church and a White church. The church should be fully integrated. (Apparently, King prefers a mongrel church and wants to destroy an important part of the Negro culture: the Negro church. Contrary to what King believes, Whites did not initiate racially separate churches; Negroes did — at least in the South. In the South, Negroes used to attend the same churches that Whites attended. However, they wanted their independence, so they established their own churches.)

Continuing, King describes two types of Negro churches. “One burns with emotionalism, and the other freezes with classism.” (P. 60.) The emotional church reduces “worship to entertainment, places more emphasis on volume than on content and confuses spirituality with muscularity.” (P. 60.) The class church “has developed a class system and boasts of its dignity, its membership of professional people, and its exclusiveness.” (P. 60.) Its “worship service is cold and meaningless, the music dull and uninspiring, and the sermon little more than a homily on current events.” (P. 60.) (King’s objection to both types of churches seems to be that they did not fervently preach King’s economic and social justice.)

King writes, “The church today is challenged to proclaim God’s Son, Jesus Christ, to be the hope of men in all of their complex personal and social problems. Many will continue to come in quest of answers to life’s problems.” (P. 61). (Many churches are failing this challenge because they preach the gospel of King and his disciples.)

In closing, King comments on the bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama.

Like many people, King is good at identifying problems but poor at providing solutions. Although King does not offer specific solutions for most of the problems that he discusses, he implies that implementing what he advocates will solve them. However, his solutions only exacerbate the problems rather than alleviate them. One of his problems is believing that the Bible teaches integration and amalgamation. On the contrary, it teaches segregation and separation.

Copyright © 2024 by Thomas Coley Allen.

More social issues articles.

Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson 

Thomas Allen

On pages 88–89, in Facts and Falsehoods Concerning the War on the South 1861-1865 (Memphis, Tennessee: A. R. Taylor & Co., 1904), George Edmonds gives a good description of President Andrew Johnson’s emotional demise as president. He compares Johnson, who was deceived to abandon his State, with the Confederate soldier who honorably defended his State and country.

Johnson joined the enemy of his kindred. However, those whom he joined turned against him. Consequently, he pined away in melancholy. He illustrates what happens to a person whose envy drives him to hatred.

Edmonds writes:

“With one of these little pardon papers in his pocket, though his fields were laid waste, his peach-trees cut down, his cattle killed, his cotton gins, barns, stables, dwelling houses, all heaps of ashes, over which stood the chimneys ‘lone sentinels over the ruin;’ despite all this devastation, the poor Confederate soldier returned to his despoiled home with a feeling of satisfaction in the thought that at least the ground under his feet would be a resting spot for wife and little ones to stand on and work in, and look up from to the blue heavens above, and they thanked God for that much saved from the awful deluge of blood and the awful waves of flame that had swept over their country. My brother described the striking change he had observed in Mr. Johnson, the difference in the man since last they parted, the one to enter the camp of his people’s deadliest foes, and the other to take up arms in defense of home, country, life, liberty; all that men hold dear. Then Mr. Johnson was a strong, vigorous man, fronting the world and fate, hopefully expecting high success in life. He was now in the highest office in the land, but his aspect, his eyes, showed no pleasure in that success. A deep depression seemed to weigh upon him; hope, happiness seemed to have fled. The whole man seemed to be weary, care-worn; yet in spite of all that might be seen the man’s grim resolution to hold his own to maintain at the risk of his life the policy he had determined to pursue. Though Johnson was on the conqueror’s side and my brother on the conquered, the latter was more to be envied. He felt that satisfaction which comes from having performed a duty to the best of his ability. His soul was tortured by no remorse. He yielded to the inevitable without a murmur, realizing, as all the men of the South did, that it is no new thing in the sad history of humanity for the wrong to triumph over the right. The writer of this believes that Andrew Johnson did not join hands with the Republican party for any purpose of despotic rule. He abandoned his people because he was deceived into the belief that Republicans were fighting to restore the Union of our fathers. Though a man of strong native abilities. Johnson’s faculties and information were within limited boundaries. He knew but little of the Southern people beyond his own East Tennessee. In his own State, Johnson’s political enemies had accused him of anarchistic tendencies of intense hatred of the wealthy class. One orator had boldly, from the stump, said ‘Andrew Johnson so hates rich men, he curses God in his heart because He had not made him a snake, that he might crawl in the grass and bite the heels of rich men's children.’ One can imagine the horror that must have overwhelmed Johnson when he discovered that the party to serve which he had abandoned his own people and State, was monarchistic to its heart core, and had no intention of restoring the Union of our fathers; instead was determined to kill it, and erect on its ruins an Imperial Government. And to aid these men he had played traitor to his own State, to his own people! Who does not believe when Johnson came to know the truth, remorse, like a venomous serpent, lifted its head in his breast and fastened its fangs in his heart and gnawed and gnawed night and day. He had forever forfeited the affections of his own people, and now the men of the party he had served during the war hated him as fiercely as they hated the conquered ‘Rebel’ lying with iron fetters on his feet in the dungeon cell of Fort Monroe. Though every day of his life a thousand curses were hurled on the name of that ‘Rebel’ in Fortress Monroe, though iron chains and ball abraded and tortured him, though he was on the conquered side and Johnson among the conquerors, there is reason to believe that patient prisoner was a less miserable man than the man in the White House. The former felt no pangs of remorse; he well knew the more he was cursed and reviled, the tenderer and stronger would be the love of his own people. He was threatened with the death due to felons and assassins, but he knew no accusation of his enemies would abate one jot the reverence, the esteem his own people gave him. What recompense had Johnson? Where could he look for affection, for sympathy? Not one particle of pride or pleasure did Johnson derive from the high office he was in. The same Nemesis which had struck down his predecessor as he was about to take his seat for another four years on the throne of power, had upon Johnson her sleepless eyes, and, as he set his foot on the first step of Power’s throne, that Nemesis touched it with her fatal finger, and lo! it became like unto red hot iron, scorching, shriveling, tormenting his very soul day and night during the whole period of his stormy term.”

Copyright © 2024 by Thomas Coley Allen.

More Southern articles.