Is there hierarchy in the Trinity? Part 3

If you have not read parts 1 and 2 of this series, this part 3 will probably make little sense to you. I suggest you go back and read parts 1 and 2 first.

Why even discuss whether or not there is a hierarchy of authority within the immanent Trinity? For complementarians the reason is to show that there can be absolute equality of being, worth and value together with inequality of authority. Complementarians argue that male headship does not imply a wife’s inferiority. Some egalitarians, presumably all those authoring and signing “The Trinity Statement,” believe the contrary. To them, permanent hierarchy of authority and subordination within the family (between husband and wife) or the Trinity (between Father and Son) necessarily implies superiority and inferiority. Thus, the debate over hierarchy within the Trinity is an example of theology and politics (in its broadest sense) coming together for better or worse.

At the end of part 2 I said I would have trouble signing “The Trinity Statement” without some careful clarification. It does seem to me that both scripture and tradition affirm a certain kind of hierarchy within the immanent Trinity—the monarchy of the Father in the sense that the Father is the fount of divinity from which the Son is begotten (not made) and the Holy Spirit proceeds. Scripture refers to the Son as begotten of the Father (John 1:14). Tradition (the Great Tradition) includes affirmation that the Son and Spirit are generated by and proceed from the Father respectively. Possibly a person could argue that John 1:14 references the birth of Jesus, not the begottenness of the Son from the Father in the immanent Trinity.  However, that would seem wrong. Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, not by the Father. The context of John 1:14 indicates it is talking about the pre-incarnate Logos (“logos asarkos”). And that is how the church fathers understood it.

So, both scripture and tradition do recognize rank within the Trinity—contrary to “The Trinity Statement.” However, the rank recognized within the immanent Trinity has to do with being, not necessarily authority. We all know that firstness in being does not require firstness in authority. An adult son is not under his father’s authority even though he came from his father biologically and ontologically. So hierarchy within the immanent Trinity can be affirmed without necessarily affirming authority over and subordination under.

Personally, I am hesitant to peer into the inner workings of the immanent Trinity. I think the church has sometimes gone too far in speculating about them. For example, the principle opera trinitatis ad extra indivisa sunt (all operations of the Trinity toward what is outside itself are indivisible) seems speculative. It is meant to safeguard the unity of the Trinity, but it is a perfect example of a violation of Rahner’s Rule; it results in making the immanent Trinity make the economic Trinity artificial. However, the monarchy of the Father in terms of the unbegottenness of the Father and begottenness of the Son seems biblically necessary rather than speculative.

So, there is rank within the immanent Trinity. The question is, does it imply a hierarchy of authority? Much depends on how one interprets 1 Corinthians 11:3 (referred to and quoted in part 2). Does kephale mean authority over or source of? Is it referring to the immanent Trinity or only the economic Trinity? I don’t think this can be settled from this passage alone.

I have one question for those who argue there is a hierarchy of authority within the immanent Trinity: What exactly does that mean? Is it even possible to picture it? Go with me, if you can, into the immanent Trinity—the Godhead of Father, Son and Holy Spirit before and apart from any creation. (Imagination required here.)  If we can talk about “the eternal councils of the Godhead,” what do we see and hear? Does the Father give orders to the Son and Holy Spirit? Are the Son and Holy Spirit in need of orders? What does “obey” even mean in a being where the partners are absolutely equal in every sense—to the point that they have one will? (Although I have not discussed this yet, orthodox Christian theology has always insisted that there is only one will in the Trinity. To speak of three wills would be blatant tritheism.) Of what use is authority where there is one will? I suggest that once we have rightly understood the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity (something the complementarians claim to care about believing), the whole concept of authority over and subordination under becomes meaningless. Did the Father order the Son to become incarnate? Why would he have to? Was the Son reluctant? Of course we see that in the economic Trinity—in the Garden of Gethsemane (for a moment, anyway). But this is another reason why the church fathers developed the distinction between the economic and immanent Trinities—to avoid importing into the eternal Godhead the limitations of human existence. (It is also the reason the church fathers and the Great Tradition following them has always insisted that there were two wills in Jesus Christ—human and divine. Jesus’ “Not my will but thine be done” expresses the submission of his human will not only to the Father but also to his own divine will—which is one with the Father’s will.)

I simply cannot conceive of any purpose for authority over or subordination under within the immanent Trinity. The words become empty; they have no references. At least not that we can conceive of.

So, I do not think that rank within the immanent Trinity by itself is heterodox, as some egalitarians suggest. In fact, it seems clear to me that the complementarians are right that there is hierarchy within the immanent Trinity—hierarchy of source and generation and spiration (procession) from that source. But that, by itself, does not imply or require hierarchy of authority. And, in fact, if the three persons of the Trinity are understood to be absolutely equal in the sense of sharing one will (in traditional, orthodox theology “will” is attached to “nature”), there cannot be authority over and subordination under in spite of hierarchical ranking of ontology.

In other words, I do not accuse the complementarians with their hierarchical notion of the immanent Trinity of heresy or even heterodoxy. Rank alone does not imply Arian or Semi-Arian Subordinationism. I am accusing them of nonsense. I literally cannot make any sense of the claim that there is inequality of authority among three who share equally one will.

Is there hierarchy in the Trinity 2

If you haven’t read Part 1 of this series, this won’t make a lot of sense. I suggest you go back and read that first.

In Part 1 I talked about the traditional theological distinction between the immanent and economic Trinities and how everyone agrees there is hierarchy (i.e., subordination of the Son to the Father) within the economic Trinity. But there is an ongoing debate among evangelical theologians about whether there is hierarchy within the immanent Trinity—God in himself (or themselves).

The controversy began over the claim made by some conservative evangelicals, mostly of the “complementarian” crowd, that the permanent subordination of women to men in the home and church (if not also in society) is justified, if not required by, the permanent subordination of the Son to the Father within the immanent Trinity.

Australian theologian Kevin Giles has published two major books on this subject and he has come very close to accusing the complementarian defenders of hierarchy within the immanent Trinity of heresy. The two books are The Trinity & Subordination: The Doctrine of God & The Contemporary Gender Debate (IVP, 2002) and Jesus and the Father: Modern Evangelicals Reinvent the Doctrine of the Trinity (Zondervan, 2006). Giles cites his main opponents in this debate in a lengthy footnote on page 23 of The Trinity & Subordination.  Among them are: George Knight, Susan Foh, James Hurley, Wayne Grudem and Andreas J. Kostenberger. Of course, mentioning a bunch of names tends to mask the differences among them. What they all have in common, according to Giles, is that they believe the Son of God is eternally subordinated to the Father within the immanent, ontological Trinity and that this subordination is in terms of authority and not only derived deity.

This last point is where things get sticky and where we have to focus careful attention and critical thought—the difference between two kinds of hierarchy and subordination (“monarchy of the Father): 1) in terms of derivation of deity, and 2) authority over. Many Christians have agreed with the Cappadocian Fathers and other great Trinitarian thinkers throughout church history that the Father is the “monarch” (sole origin or source) of the Son and Spirit who are generated by and proceed from the Father eternally. Orthodox theologians have always agreed that this by no means implies “Subordinationism” as in the Arian and Semi-Arian heresies that argued that the Son (to say nothing of the Spirit) is created in time so that “There was when the Son was not” (Arius’ slogan). The Cappadocian Fathers very carefully distinguished between the monarchy of the Father and Arian Subordinationism.

The real debate among evangelicals is over whether the Son and Spirit are subordinate to the Father in terms of authority. That is, whether the Son and the Spirit obey the Father within the eternal “councils” of the Trinity. Does the Father’s monarchy within the Godhead mean authority over the Son and the Spirit? The practical issue is whether women should be subordinate to men in terms of obedience because men have authority over them (viz., husbands and pastors) because the Father has authority over the Son. The crucial passage is, of course, 1 Corinthians 11:3 “Now I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.” A related controversy has to do with the meaning of “kephale” (head) in this passage. Does it mean “source” or “authority?” Both are possible translations from the Greek and there has been a long, running debate between evangelical complementarians (e.g., John Piper) and egalitarians (e.g., Berkeley and Alvera Mickelson) over this and it has ended in a stalemate—at least for now. So, the debate has largely shifted to the monarchy of the Father and subordination of the Son.  The claim made by some conservative evangelicals is that 1 Corinthians 11:3 proves that wives should be submissive to husbands because even within the eternal being of God the Son is subordinate to the Father. Giles and other more progressive evangelicals (including Millard Erickson who, in my opinion, is only “progressive” on the women’s issue) have responded that 1 Corinthians 11:3 proves no such thing and does not even address the issue of authority within the eternal, immanent Trinity. Both sides have accused the other of breaking from “the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity” and of distorting the meaning of scripture.

Now—to bring the story up to date—a group of egalitarian evangelicals has produced something called “The Trinity Statement” and circulated it for evangelical scholars to sign. The summary statement is “We believe that the sole living God who created and rules over all and who is described in the Bible is the one Triune God in three coeternal, coequal Persons, each Person being presented as distinct yet equal, not as three separate gods, but one Godhead, sharing equally in honor, glory, worship, power, authority, rule and rank, such that no Person has eternal primacy over the others.” (Go to www.trinitystatement.com/academic-statement/ to read the longer version of the statement and the theological commentary including footnotes.)

This statement would seem to rule out any sense of the monarchy of the Father and thereby fall into conflict with the Cappadocian Fathers’ explanation of the Nicene Creed. However, I cannot believe it means that. The Creed clearly states that the Son is “begotten of the Father.” Unless a person wants to argue that this refers only to the virginal conception of Jesus Christ (an event in the economic Trinity), it would seem to be the case that the Creed itself affirms the monarchy of the Father in terms of the Father being the source, origin, “fount” of the divinity of the Son and Spirit. There goes the affirmation that “no Person has eternal primacy over the others”—depending on what “primacy” means. See how complicated this is?

Perhaps it is the real “mother of all muddles” (as Christianity Today labeled an earlier evangelical debate over the nature of Christ’s resurrection body.)

“The Trinity Statement” is the work of William David Spencer in consultation with several others—all egalitarian evangelicals.

The concluding paragraph of “The Trinity Statement” is particularly strongly worded: “Suggestions that superiority and inferiority of authority eternally exist among the Persons of the Godhead are problematic. All God’s attributes are essential. We should not posit distinctive, unequal attributes that divide God’s substance. If divine attributes are ranked in a hierarchy, then it necessarily follows that the lower ranked are of inferior quality. Therefore, it is contradictory to say that they share the identical substance (ousia), and yet the degree of each attribute can differ according to rank. Such an eternal distinction makes the Son less in authority than the Father, thereby dividing and separating the one God. Such radical social Trinitarianism ends up as tritheism. Affirming one God in three coeternal, coequal Persons is, therefore, necessary to preserve and perpetuate the one faith once given to the saints.”

My natural inclination is to side with these evangelical egalitarians and sign the statement. After all, almost all the people on the other side of the debate are people I regard as neo-fundamentalists (by which I mean no judgment of value on their characters!). However, I have a few qualms that keep me from jumping into this controversy on either side. Those will be the subject of Part 3. Stay tuned.