Stephen R. Holmes argues in his contribution to Two Views of the Doctrine of the Trinity that “the doctrine of the Trinity is not primarily an ontology, nor does it depend on a particular ontology,” though Holmes admits that it does imply a “modest” set of ontological commitments (35).  The reason for this “ontological modesty” is “the recognition that our thought about God is inevitably limited in precisely this way: God’s essence is simple, incomposite; our thought and speech about it are... Read more

In his contribution to Two Views on the Doctrine of the Trinity, Stephen R. Holmes characterizes the doctrine of the Trinity as a set of hermeneutical guidelines: “What we call the ‘doctrine of the Trinity’ is, I suggest, a formal set of conceptualities developed like this: a set of conceptualities that finally allowed (or at least was believed to allow) every text to be read adequately. As such, it is not a ‘biblical doctrine’ in the sense of being the result... Read more

In his contribution to Two Views on the Doctrine of the Trinity, Stephen R. Holmes characterizes the doctrine of the Trinity as a set of hermeneutical guidelines: “What we call the ‘doctrine of the Trinity’ is, I suggest, a formal set of conceptualities developed like this: a set of conceptualities that finally allowed (or at least was believed to allow) every text to be read adequately. As such, it is not a ‘biblical doctrine’ in the sense of being the result... Read more