Under the radar: A deficient Trinity report
By Gerrit Dawson, pastor, First Presbyterian Church ,Baton Rouge, La., May 19, 2006
Suppose you are the teacher. Your student turns in a thirty page paper on the American Revolution: Key Documents, Personalities and Issues. Inside, however, is no mention of the Declaration of Independence, no more than one sentence on George Washington and nothing on the Boston Tea Party. Then suppose that in the documents that were cited, you found more than twenty improper uses of the historical material, from altering quotations to missing their context? Could you possibly give the paper an acceptable grade? No matter how long the student worked on it and how much other material filled the pages? Of course not.
This is the situation facing the General Assembly with the submission of The Trinity: God’s Love Overflowing. A task force worked on it for nearly six years. They filled over thirty pages. They wrote with passion and sincerity. But they failed to mention the key Scriptural texts! They passed over the mines in which are theological gems may be found. The paper purports to celebrate rich and varied imagery but is ultimately mired in the shallows.
I simply cannot imagine how one could write a foundational document for the church on the Trinity and not enter sustained engagement with John 14-16, when Jesus describes his relationship with the Father, promises the gift of the Spirit and affirms that we can be included in the Triune life. How could the baptism of Jesus be mentioned only in passing when that episode is absolutely basic to our apprehending God as Triune? Matthew 11:27 and Luke 10:22 are crucial in anchoring the Father/Son relationship in the synoptics, yet these passages are ignored. Peter’s Pentecost sermon describes each of the three Persons working in dynamic relationship. Acts 2:32 is a treasure trove for Trinitarian theology, yet it is never discussed.
Moreover, in discussing Naming the Triune God, how could one fail to consider the questions, “How does God name himself in Scripture? How does Jesus teach us to name God?” Wouldn’t the Lord’s Prayer be a rather obvious text to turn to when consider what to call God? If our Lord says, “When you pray, say…” that would seem to me a basic source for naming God. But there is not even cursory discussion of that prayer.
Even more, I have ennumerated over twenty lapses in basic scholarship (www.theologymatters.com) – from altered quotations to incorrect citations, from using writers such as Hilary of Poitiers out of context to failing to finish the sense of a Scriptural passage cited, TGOL makes errors that would be unacceptable in an academic paper.
How can this be? It’s simple, really. The lacuna and the errors all point in one direction: towards diminishing the Father/Son relationship at the heart of the gospel and towards advancing a more object-oriented, metaphorical naming of God. Even the changes between drafts of TGOL evidence this agenda.
I recognize that my claims are strong, even harsh. But I believe you will see that in the current issue of Theology Matters, I prove my case. In addition, Andrew Purves and Charles Partee explore the significance of critical realism in theology in relation to TGOL. Though PUP is getting all the attention, we must not let TGOL go without scrutiny. For no matter how long it took to create this paper, it is not acceptable to the church. We need the real depths of our heritage.