The Trinity
Is Christianity a monotheistic religion?
To my mind the belief in Trinity does not sit well with monotheism. That evidently was the feeling amount Christian theologians in the early centuries of the CE who agonized over the matter endlessly and came out with some weird and wonderful scholastic explantons using some purpose made theological vocabulary to explain why the Trinity does not contradict monotheism. Incidentally, rivers of blood were shed as a result of schism about this nebulous issue.
The explanation I mostly come across is that the Trinity is simultaneously isame: ‘One n three and three in one’. Well, one on three suggest to me a whole split into three fractions, say a cake cut into three separate segments. (not necessarily equal) whilst three in three suggests a collective term say a musical quartet. I looked up Trinity on Wikipedia. It provided one of the most ponderous and baffling texts I ever read. It relies on some obscure terminology that looks specially created for the purpose.
Anyway, who are the three, and what lines their demarcation lines in terms of function and authority. I have a clear of Jesus whose personality is well described on the New testament.
As for God ( Jehovah as he is refer to in the Old testament), whilst not graphically described, his view and character goes through his many statements in the Bible. Most mysterious is the holy Ghost. I think not even one sentence or act is attributed to him. To me the concept seems to have some nebulous cosmic aspects and were I not been an atheist, he would be my favorite among the three.
It seems to me that the concept of Trinity was created to explain some incoherencies in the scriptures and that over the years became an nonsensical dogme. The tenacity with which Christian churches hold onto this nebulous concept is amazing and could perhaps be explained by Dawkins’ meme theory. However, Christian theologians could draw some comfort from being in the company of equally nonsensical theologies of other religions.
To my mind the belief in Trinity does not sit well with monotheism. That evidently was the feeling amount Christian theologians in the early centuries of the CE who agonized over the matter endlessly and came out with some weird and wonderful scholastic explantons using some purpose made theological vocabulary to explain why the Trinity does not contradict monotheism. Incidentally, rivers of blood were shed as a result of schism about this nebulous issue.
The explanation I mostly come across is that the Trinity is simultaneously isame: ‘One n three and three in one’. Well, one on three suggest to me a whole split into three fractions, say a cake cut into three separate segments. (not necessarily equal) whilst three in three suggests a collective term say a musical quartet. I looked up Trinity on Wikipedia. It provided one of the most ponderous and baffling texts I ever read. It relies on some obscure terminology that looks specially created for the purpose.
Anyway, who are the three, and what lines their demarcation lines in terms of function and authority. I have a clear of Jesus whose personality is well described on the New testament.
As for God ( Jehovah as he is refer to in the Old testament), whilst not graphically described, his view and character goes through his many statements in the Bible. Most mysterious is the holy Ghost. I think not even one sentence or act is attributed to him. To me the concept seems to have some nebulous cosmic aspects and were I not been an atheist, he would be my favorite among the three.
It seems to me that the concept of Trinity was created to explain some incoherencies in the scriptures and that over the years became an nonsensical dogme. The tenacity with which Christian churches hold onto this nebulous concept is amazing and could perhaps be explained by Dawkins’ meme theory. However, Christian theologians could draw some comfort from being in the company of equally nonsensical theologies of other religions.
Comments (74)
So...Christianity is not a monotheistic religion.
I never found the Trinity a very useful concept, and most preachers have difficulty making sense of it to congregations. "It's a mystery" alright.
Unitarian view: there is God. Period.
The contradiction is this:
1. God = Father
2. God = Son
3. God = Holy Spirit
But
4. Father not= Son
5. Son not= Holy Spirit
6. Father not= Holy Spirit
According to 1, 2 and 3 the following should be true:
7. Father = Son = Holy Spirit = God
7 contradicts 4, 5 and 6
The Christians were not the first to have a triple God, and they probably won't be the last. Just consider the Trinity to be a three-person representation of the one and only God.
Every name we give to God illustrates one or more aspects of the one God. So Jesus is God, and so are Thor, Yahweh, Cthulhu, and so on. And if we take three aspects (of God) at one time, and call them "The Trinity", it doesn't really matter, does it?
Maybe you're being too literal? One God can have - or be referred to by - more than one name.
You've first got to define monotheism. While that seems like a simple enough concept, it's really more complex than the idea that there is but one god in all of the universe.
Judaism is considered a monotheistic religion, but that should not be thought to mean the ancient Jews did not believe there was but one god in all the universe. They believed there was only one supreme being who had all the power over all the other gods. Yahweh was not a generic name for God, but was the name of the actual entity that ruled supreme over the universe.
Looking at Exodus chapters 7 to 10, which describe the 10 plagues, God proved his superiority over the Egyptian "sorcerers and magicians" which were able to perform the miracles of turning a staff into a snake, the Nile into blood, and were able to bring forth the plague of frogs. They couldn't do all the things Yahweh did though (like create gnats) and Pharaoh finally relented and freed the Jews when the plague of slaying the first born was laid down.
If there were other mini-gods, capable of supernatural powers, then what makes Judaism monotheistic? We can say that within Judaism, there were not epic battles between the Jewish gods like might exist in Greek mythology, and you didn't have different gods with different powers, where one ruled the earth, the other the sea, and another some other realm. The notion of a single most powerful god, whose power went unchecked, who was the undisputed champion of all events, is what makes Judaism monotheistic.
Going back to Christianity, where you have the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, what you have are three intentionally obscured concepts that cannot be clearly defined. What we do know is that they all are unified for a common cause, they do not do battle with one another, they aren't each given specific duties or realms to rule over, and they all seem to arise out of the same spiritual essence. Because there are three names and perhaps three non-physical entities, (although Jesus was for a time physical)), you can say the religion appears polytheistic, but, there is something quite different from the Christian landscape than the ancient Greek one, where you had a god over the land and another over the sea who were sometimes at odds with one another. The Christian concept presents the trinity in a unified way, as in they all seem to arise out of one another and they all are directed toward the same purpose and good.
I also don't want to summarize Christianity or Judaism as not having differing views on this issue. I am aware, for instance, that Mormonism might have a different take on this, with their belief in a corporeal God and a belief that the trinity is composed of three truly separate entities. Perhaps they are more truly polytheistic, but I'll leave that to a Mormon theologian to explain better than me. From what I understand, the Mormons might admit to a certain degree of polytheism and do not consider it to be a criticism, but I'll defer if there's someone who knows better.
That said, Christian's can rationalize it, avoiding logical contradiction. They do this by defining the 3 "persons" as being of one essence. One approach is to consider "person" as a rational faculty. Another is to treat it as hylemorphism (form/substance dichotomy: one divine substance with 3 forms).
So, while this doctrine is a good reason to doubt Christianity, the problems are not going to convince any Christian's they're wrong.
It is? Why?
[FYI: I'm not Christian.]
Have you never considered religions before? A lack of objective support is normal and expected.
LOL! Indeed I have, and I agree completely.
Mozart was the Holy Ghost.
Beethoven was the Son.
Thomas Jefferson was the Father.
Aaron Burr was the Holy Ghost.
Alexander Hamilton was the Son.
Max Stirner was the Father.
Kierkegaard was the Holy Ghost.
Nietzsche was the Son.
Can you get it?
Yes but the issue exists precisely because people take the whole damn thing literally.
If we approach the Trinity less rigorously then it's a non-issue.
Exactly. So why turn it into one? :chin:
I don't know what to make of it. It's probably one of those occasions where something accidentally slips out of someone's mouth and that someone is deemed infallible and you know the rest.
That makes religion too flexible for some people's tastes and also not entirely true given the current science-religion controversies regarding Creation and the theory of evolution and cosmology.
In my view, as a believer but not a Christian, those believers who oppose science on its own ground - with literal/objective claims, and the like - are mistaken and wrong. God can take care of Herself, and doesn't need zealots proclaiming Her objective existence in the scientific space-time universe without evidence. There is no disagreement between science and religion that cannot be simply resolved by reasonable and fair-thinking people. IMO.
I agree but this common ground between science and religion seems to be impossible to find and this is probably due to, as you said, zealots on both sides of the issue.
It depends upon the religion, though. Those who look at the Bible, for instance, as historically accurate will have serious problems making those views compatible with science, particularly with the creation story and the flood story (among others). It's also not clear what the purpose of prayer would be under a scientific model. Other than satisfying psychological needs, it's pretty clear you're not going to be able to arrive at an empirical study that proves prayer works.
If you approach religion from a very abstract view, I'm sure you can make it compatible with science, but such vague religious beliefs (like simply believing in a nebulous higher power) do not usually form the basis for an organized religion. Unless you're further willing to say that those who are part of organized religion are simply not "reasonable and fair thinking people," then I don't you can say that all reasonable and fair thinking people can resolve their religious/scientific conflicts.
Many are, but some are not. As I said:
Quoting Pattern-chaser
Religion doesn't cover the same area of thought/culture/life as science does (although the odd overlap does exist). The two are complementary, IMO.
This just defines true blue religious believers pejoratively as zealots. Is it really a zealot who believes that if he prays for his dying friend, his friend may receive divine intervention? I think that's a mainstream belief among believers, but it's obviously not compatible with science. If prayer actually worked, then those results would be published in the New England Journal of Medicine and would become prescribed treatment, right?
I think it was clear from the original text that it includes, er, committed atheists too.
Quoting Hanover
What can science say about prayer? Only that such experiments as have been performed have not detected any effect. But the comfort it gives to believers is not visible to science either. There is no significant contradiction here, unless a believer were to assert that prayer does have a literal and measurable effect on recovery. For there is no evidence for that. ... Today. In the future, who knows? We already know about the placebo effect. Shouldn't prayer have exactly such an effect, in some cases at least? :chin:
The point is that no study has shown the effectiveness of prayer in offering a cure for the illness. Having cancer and feeling calm about it because of the prayer isn't a cure for the cancer. The placebo effect can always be accounted for using proper methodology.
Consider this:
Group A - 100 sick people are prayed for by 100 people and the sick people are told about it.
Group B - 100 sick people are prayed for by 100 people and the sick people are not told about it.
Group C - 100 sick people are not prayed for.
The results could be used to determine if there were a statistically significant difference among the groups and it controls the placebo effect.
If A and B > C, then prayer works.
If A and B < C, then prayer hurts.
If A > B, but B = C, then the placebo work.
If A = B = C, then prayer doesn't work and there's no placebo effect.
If B > A and C, then prayer works only when you don't tell people about it.
Anyway, you get the picture. Such a study can be done to account for whatever variables you have.
I think the rational basis of the Trinity is actually derived from Plato's tripartite soul, and this happened to fit well with the Church dogma, that held Jesus as Son of God. From Wikipedia I notice that the Nicene creed, which established Jesus as Son of God had to be later amended to add the third part, Holy Spirit.
St. Augustine's "On the Trinity" is consistent with Plato's tripartite soul. He speaks of the three parts of the intellect, memory, reason, and will. The intellect, as one thing, is composed of these three parts.
Not my intention to insult anyone but it does take extreme ''enthusiasm'' to insist that something is true/false AND demand that ALL parties accept it as so. It's these people, who give no leeway to accommodate people of a different hue I'm referring to. Surely such people could be labeled with ''zealot''. Some might prefer ''fanatic''.
:grin: Nicely put. :up: :smile:
It seems like you are giving an argument similar to the one below:
1. If Christianity is a monotheistic religion, then it should only have one god.
2. Christianity does not have one god but rather three, namely Jesus, Jehovah, and the Holy Ghost.
3. Therefore, Christianity is not a monotheistic religion.
I would disagree with premise two of this argument which claims that the Trinity, i.e. Jesus, Jehovah, and the Holy Ghost, do not constitute as one god in Christianity but rather as more than one.
It seems to me that that the doctrine of the Trinity is not something given just to circumvent incoherencies in Scripture, but rather a way to describe the main parts of who God is. This means that it is not that case that Jesus, Jehovah, and the Holy Ghost are all different entities, but rather that they are just parts of one being manifested in different ways so as to perform different essential functions.
To give an example, think about it in terms of a normal human body. It would seem absurd to claim that because we have two arms, two legs, a torso, and a head that we are not one person but many. Each respective body part plays a different role and performs a different function, but is still ultimately a part of only one human body. In the same way, it seems that the one God of Christianity manifests Himself in different ways so as to perform different functions, which are seen in the three parts of the Trinity.
In conclusion, it seems that under this view, in contradiction to the one given by you and expressed in my argument above, the doctrine of the Trinity can be coherent with Christianity being a monotheistic.
(Additionally, if you are looking for material for where the Holy Ghost is mentioned in the Bible, the book of Acts in chapter 2 is a great place to start.)
This is an application of the equivocation fallacy. If each leaf of the three is a separate leaf, then the three together is not "a leaf" but a conglomeration of leaves. If the three parts form one leaf, the the three parts are not individually leaves each but parts of a leaf.
There is a concept-mangling in the St. Patrick explanation of the H. T.
This would stand, if and only if God, Jesus and the HOLY SPIRIT appeared or existed while the other two did not exist. But all three can and do exist concurrently according to Christian tenets. Therefore your claim of these beings a manifest of the one god in different ways, fails. However, if you insist that they are manifests of one god, then there is no trinity; and you are a heretic. In fact, if you insist that there is a one-ness, and it was the accepted norm of looking at the faith, then the word trinity never would have been coined.
‘God’, Divine Human, and Spirit, to boot,
All structured on wishes—what a hoot!
Angels added, too, and Devils haunting.
All as supposed, so, their doings are moot.
By "the truth of Christianity", I am referring to key doctrines of Trinitarian Christianity being true. In particular, that Jesus actually existed, was executed (died), and was resurrected (he lived again, walking the earth), and that Jesus is God (of the same substance as "God the father", and the "Holy Spirit". This does not apply to non-Trinitarians, such as Jehovah's Witnesses.
Bless your soul with tongues of fire; Holy Spirit burn;
Leave no trace of man’s desire; Holy Spirit turn.
Oh, man, why detest thy constitution;
Doth thou think Nature has a lot to learn?
So Nature got it wrong, the pious say,
In man’s constitution, erring its essay,
Granting so many ways to go astray.
Well, then, Who, do they say, penned this world’s play?
(I believe p) = (I believe p is true).
Sorry I thought it was obvious that the 3 leaves made up the one shamrock. Because that is what he meant.
Quoting hachit ... one LEAF? one SHAMROCK?
If the three leaves make up one shamrock, then the analogy to the holy trinity completely fails, as the holy trinity consists of three manifestations of the one and same god, and the shamrock is not three manifestation of the one and same shamrock, but it is of three leaves.
Let me put it this way. Each member in the holy trinity is god. But each member of the three leaves is not a shamrock. Each leaf is a leaf, not a shamrock. But in the trinity each constituent of the three is god. And the three constituents make one god.
So your analogy, as re-written by your correcting my reading of the first instance of the wise saying, is not applicable to the holy trinity.
You only need to read the first sentence of
this article. It defines the term "belief", as the word is commonly used among english speaking philosphers. Yes, under this definition, it is universally true. It seems you use a nonstandard definition. Please provide it, and give me an example of something you believe, but do not believe to be true.
Let me start from the bottom.
God is one entity with 3 parts but each one of it parts is not the other. Father, Son, Holy spirit.
They are of one substance, three minds, and three bodys.
Whatever the substance is, that is what makes them God and it is shared between them.
Thanks for the explanation, hachit.
Where does one body start, and the other end, when you say god is omnipresent? I can see that Jesus is of a typical human's physical body, so his limits of extent in the physical world are given. But what about the Father and the Holy Spirit? God is omnipresent; is either one of the two omnipresent, or both of them?
They have three minds. This presupposes that they have different thoughts, different memories, different knowledge. Which of the three is omniscient? Which has more memory, and which is the one that is all
good? And the other two have how much knowledge memory, and goodness? Maybe some of the three are not all good? If all the three are all good, and all knowing and have all memory, then their minds are not separate.
That is to say that it is the substance that the three share that has omniscience, omnsophia and omnimemory. If yes, then they don't have different minds. So the three share among them one body limited in size, two infinitely large bodies, and one mind. Which is not what you claimed they have among the three of them.
As far as the phenomenal description of the Trinity, don't get too hung-up on the incoherence part, as you say. Remember, our own conscious existence (and the nature thereof) is not coherent.
That's one reason why Christianity (Jesus) is more relatable to us humans.
As far as wich ones are omnipresent, that is something I do not know all I know is that it wasn't always that way. Not that God could not have been he just wasn't.
As for the all knowing, that is the the father for Jesus openly emitted that only he know when the world will end.
And the holy spirit is the divine power of God.
So we are back to the start. They are all god. And together they make one god. This means that they are all singularly omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent. So three make one -- much like my criticism precisely said, three of one something can't make one SAME something. There is more if there are three, yet you say the three are each the same as the sum of the three.
In effect, therefore, you say "1 + 1 + 1 = 1". At least this is how I read your first claim. If I misread it, or you wanted to say something different, then I apologize, and I humbly ask you to please clarify it for me.
In the rest of your post here in the last reply you make it clear, and you also admit, that you are oblivious to the characteristics of each god.
Your closing says Quoting hachit
But the holy spirit is the god. (According to your first claim.) So the divine power is the divine power of the divine power? a bit of a recursive finite regress, with a meaning I can't comprehend. Also, you seem to sugget that Jesus and the Father are not the divine powers of god. That makes them less than god. So are they god, or not god? You have to make up your mind sometime sooner or later. If they are god, then they also are the divine power of god. If they are not god, then why the Holy Spirit having only this power?
God is omnipotent, all-powerful; therefore Jesus is all power ful, and so is the Father, since they are gods. But you say only the Holy Spirit is the divine power.
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You said in your very first reply that this is very simple. Yet I am somehow confused; I am not so simple as to understand your concepts as you have penned them, @hachit.
No, I can't remember that. If I am incoherent, I don't have a memory, do I? So if I don't remember that, I am incoherent, but I can't remember that I am incoherent, so I must be coherent. If I am coherent, as you say, then I must remember, but I don't remember, since I am incoherent, as you say.
Can you get me out of this infinite flip-flop switch, @3017amen? You put me in there, so you must rescue me too.
Ha, indeed, indeed!
Let me try to get you out of this pickle; this pickle of self-consciousness (self-reference):
Socrates: "What Plato is about to say is false."
Plato: "Socrates has just spoken truly."
Which statement is true?
(Also I misrepresented the Holy Spirit by giving you his definition and expecting you to know what that meant)
The best way, I think, is to describe the concept is in sets and subset. You have the set of God, within this set are other sets called subsets. Jesus, God the Father, and The Holy spirit. None of the subsets overlap.
Sorry if I'm hard to understand sometimes. I'm better when I'm speaking.
I never said anything about it BEING true. What I said was:
(I believe p) = (I believe p is true).
... which is consistent with the article. Bizarrely, you took issue with this, and now you're conflating (I believe p is true) with (p is true).
I still don't get this. You say Jesus is god. Yet it is less than god. Because God has three subsets, which don't overlap. So Jesus does not overlap with Father does not overlap with Holy Spirit. So... if they are not overlapping, they are different. They are gods; yet they are different from each other... and yet there is one god. A ONE god can't be DIFFERENT from itself. If you insist on one god, then Jesus, Father, and the Holy Spirit must be overlapping. If they are gods (which you say they are) and are not overlapping, then the three form three different gods, with the fourth god being formed by their entire set.
Incongruent with logic. Your application of the set theory somehow was inadequate.
How can you believe in one god and three gods at the same time? I think you have to make up your mind, and design a totally different system of gods in your view.
What you say is not what you say, and what you not say is what you say. This is your belief.
You, and other Christians have to ask yourself: can I believe in something that all logic says is not possible to exist? If I can believe it, am I completely gone, or am I just denying the fact to myself that my belief makes no possible sense? If my god is not possible to be, who is the real god whom I have been falsely avoiding to worship because I have been too much wrapped up in NOT thinking my faith through?
Also the problem you having is with the fact God is transcendent. I'm trying to explain a concept where best I can in human turmes.
And if you want to know what we believe look no farther than the Nicene Creed
Also you don't understand set's and subsets
Just a quick thought if I might. I never understood why people argue that, since there is phenomena in the world that defies logic; cosmology, consciousness, logic of self reference, law of excluded middle/half truth's existing, etc..
So in that sense, since we have these unexplained things happening, why is it such a leap to conclude that the supernatural exists?
Of course, Metaphysics are in large part theories, however, experience combined with inductive reasoning can connect the dots and make things plausible/probable. No?
Hey Tim, I think your post is in response to 'God must be an atheist's' quote. I didn't say ...." or am I just denying the fact to myself that my belief makes no possible sense?"
He said that.
Because then that answer becomes all the more explained and so then a higher explanation is needed, over the lesser one, and so forth. So, perhaps the simple is First, with complexity becoming later on.
Sure Poetic, that's one reason why I posted earlier:
Socrates: "What Plato is about to say is false."
Plato: "Socrates has just spoken truly."
How can we resolve the truth value of those statements, and why do they exist...
Well, of course we don't know why a lot of things in nature exist, including ourselves. So maybe a better or more intriguing question is: how is it that we are able to produce unresolved paradox's like those 2 statements above.
Thus the analogies of brute mystery, unexplained phenomena, supernatural, et.al.
They misleadingly stated unpredictables as fact.
Quoting 3017amen
Existence had no alternative and so what is here now was inherent.
Hey Poetic:
That's pretty good! But, I wonder :
1. How were they mislead (?)
2. If they were misled, is the statement a half-truth? That of course is logically impossible.
3. Were thier predictions based upon an inference of sorts I wonder?
4. Why do I even care to wonder?
Maybe Darwin could help us! After all, he said that abstract concepts ( like mathematics ) help us survive in the jungle LOL ( only kidding of course).
Here's an inference of sorts, maybe they were misled just like the metaphorical tree of knowledge! We are barred from perfect truth and the true nature of things...
Anywho, to that end regarding the last point about the mystery of existence and the nature of things:
Ah, existence is existential then! Sounds like the book of Ecclesiastes...
Well, we have to mention the Trinity to stay on topic. Newton spent much of his life railing against the Trinity. Ironically, he worked at Trinity College. OK, that's done.
Existence isn't a mystery, since it has no alternative; it has to be, with no option not to be.
1. The concept of the trinity is logically impossible
2. The nature of our existence remains unexplained
3. The integer of consciousness and subconsciousness is logically impossible
4. The nature of our consciousness is unexplained
Feel free to parse and ponder
It doesn't matter, really, as it is not surly established and is already once removed from its base upon a 'God' that isn't established either, as an unknown, for then only the idle chatter of nebulous abstracts of word salads pour forth… even from Newton.
Quoting 3017amen
Cosmic and biological evolution noted over 14 billion years satisfies this.
Quoting 3017amen
Quoting 3017amen
We're not able to inspect the first person private aspect from a public view. Yet, nature made it, as in (2).
HALLEY, NEWTON, AND HOOKE
Halley was a sea captain, a cartographer, a professor
Of geometry, a deputy of the Royal Mint, an astronomer,
And the inventor of the deep-sea diving bell,
And wrote some on magnetism, tides,
Planet motions, and fondly on opium.
He invented the weather map and actuarial table ages,
Even proposed methods to work out the Earth’s old age,
Its distance from the sun, even how to keep fresh fish,
But one thing he didn’t do was to discover Halley’s comet,
For he merely noted that it was yet another return of it.
He made a wager with Robert Hooke, the cell describer,
And with the great and stately Christopher Wren:
They bet upon why the planets’ orbit were ellipses.
Hooke, a known credit-taker,
Claimed he’d solved the problem,
But had to conceal it
So that others could yet know the satisfaction.
Well, Halley became consumed with finding the answer,
So he called upon the Lucasian Mathematics Professor.
Isaac Newton was indeed brilliant beyond measure,
But was solitary, joyless, paranoid—no pleasure.
Once he had inserted a needle in his eye and poked around,
Far inserting the bodkin between the eye and the bone.
Another time, he’d stared at the sun for so very long
That he had to spend many days in a darkened room.
Frustrated by mathematics, Isaac invented the calculus,
And then for twenty-seven years kept it hidden from us.
Likewise, he did the same with the understanding of light
And spectroscopy, keeping it for thirty years in the dark.
For Newton,
Science was but a partial part of his life’s routes,
For much of his time
Was given to alchemy and religious pursuits.
He was wholeheartedly devoted
To the religion of Arianism,
Whose main tenet was
That there could be no Holy Trinity.
Ironically, he worked as a Professor at Trinity College,
The only one there who was not Anglican.
He also spent an inordinate amount of time studying
The floor plan of the lost temple of Solomon the King,
Even learning Hebrew, the better to scan the texts.
Another single minded quest was
To turn base metals into precious ones,
His papers revealing this preoccupation
Over optics and planetary motions and such mentations.
Well, Halley asked Newton what the curve would be
If the planets’ attraction toward the sun was
The reciprocal to the square of their distance from it.
Newton promptly answered, of course, an “ellipse”.
Not finding his calculations of it, Newton not only rewrote it,
But retired for two years to produce his master work,
The Plilosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica.
To Halley’s horror,
Newton refused to release the crucial third volume,
Without which the first two would make little sense.
There had been a dispute between Newton and Hooke
Over the priority of the inverse square law in the book.
That solved by Halley’s diplomacy, the Royal Society
Had pulled out from the publication, failing financially,
For, the year before, there had been a very costly flop
Called The History of Fishes; so, Halley himself popped
The funds for the publication out of his own pocket.
Newton contributed nothing,
As usual, and, to make matters worse,
Halley had just taken a position as the society’s clerk,
They failing to pay the promised 50 pounds to his purse,
Paying him only with very many copies of
The History of Fishes!
"Newton contributed nothing"
I think that sums it up Poetic! Unless I am missing something, my propsitions remain largely unanswered. But that's ok. The tree of life and knowledge had suggested that.
(Like you, I want to respect the original OP about the Trinity, unless you'd like to start another thread...).
Christianity is a monotheistic religion in which there is 1 God, the Trinity, which is composed of 3 Divine Persons. Although each Person has all the intrinsic properties of perfection such that they are all at the top of the ontological ladder, they are not in themselves God apart from the other Persons; and there never was an instant in time when one existed apart from the others.
To escape the objection that the 3 Persons are one and the same through the Principle of Identity of Indiscernibles, each Person differ not in their intrinsic properties, but by the relationship each has with the other two Persons. The Father "begets" (creates a thing of the same nature) the Son, the Son is begotten by the Father, and the Holy Spirit "proceeds" from the Father and the Son (in which the term "proceed" is quite technical so I won't describe here).