Moltmann on the at-oneness of the Trinity

I’ve been enjoying reading Jürgen Moltmann’s The Trinity and the Kingdom of God (London: SCM, 1981), which I’ve posted a few quotes from recently. One of Moltmann’s main aims in this book is to argue for a more “social” conception of the Trinity, one which starts from the three Persons — Father, Son, and Spirit — as we encounter them in Scripture, and moves to their unity from that starting point. In consequence, Moltmann suggests, we must understand the unity of the Trinity not as a unity of substance or subjectivity, but of fellowship. Here are some highlights:

… the unity of the Trinity cannot be a monadic unity. The unity of the divine tri-unity lies in the union of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, not in their numerical unity. It lies in their fellowship, not in the identity of a single subject. (p.95)

Strict monotheism has to be theocratically conceived and implemented, as Islam proves. But once it is introduced into the doctrine and worship of the Christian church, faith in Christ is threatened: Christ must either recede into the series of the prophets, giving way to the One God, or he must disappear into the One God as one of his manifestations. (p.131)

If we search for a concept of unity corresponding to the biblical testimony of the triune God, the God who unites others with himself, then we must dispense with both the concept of the one substance and the concept of the identical subject. All that remains is: the unitedness, the at-oneness of the three Persons with one another, or: the unitedness, the at-oneness of the triune God. For the concept of unitedness is the concept of a unity that can be communicated and is open… If the unity of God is not perceived in the at-oneness of the triune God, and therefore as a perichoretic unity, then Arianism and Sabellianism remain inescapable threats to Christian theology. (p.150)

Moltmann on theodicy III

The question of theodicy is not a speculative question; it is a critical one. It is the all-embracing eschatological question. It is not purely theoretical, for it cannot be answered with any new theory about the existing world. It is a practical question which will only be answered through  experience of the new world in which ‘God will wipe every tear from their eyes’. It is not really a question at all, in the sense of something we can ask or not ask, like other questions. It is the open wound of life in this world. It is the real task of faith and theology to make it possible for us to survive, to go on living, with this open wound. The person who believes will not rest content with any slickly explanatory answer to the theodicy question. And he will also resist any attempts to soften the question down. The more a person believes, the more deeply he experiences pain over the suffering in the world, and the more passionately he asks about God and the new creation. (The Trinity and the Kingdom of God, 49).

Moltmann’s theology is very driven by this dynamic of suffering and yearning—to the extent that sometimes, I feel, it overwhelms all other considerations. But he is deeply perceptive into the challenge of this question, and its deep, existential significance. And I think there’s something absolutely essential in Moltmann’s insistence that there is more to come, that the future is in some ways unknown, that we await resolution on so many questions. I am feeling more and more that it is really important not to be over-certain about the future. How do others respond?

Moltmann on theodicy II

Here’s a second excerpt from The Trinity and the Kingdom of God, where Moltmann sets his sights on atheism which justifies itself by arguing from suffering.

But can atheism hold its ground on this rock of suffering if it is only the indictment against God which turns suffering into pain, and makes pain so flinty a rock? That is the other side of the experience of suffering. If it were not for their desire for life, the living would not suffer. If there were no love of justice, there would be no rebellion against innocent suffering. If there were no ‘longing for the Wholly Other’, we should come to terms with the here and now, and accept the absence of what does not exist. If there were no God, the world as it is would be all right. It is only the desire, the passion, the thirst for God which turns suffering into conscious pain and turns the consciousness of pain into a protest against suffering. But the atheism for which this world is all there is, runs aground on the rock of suffering too. For even the abolition of God does not explain suffering and does not assuage pain. The person who cries out in pain over suffering has his own dignity, which no atheism can rob him of. The story of Job makes this evident too. His atheistic wife’s advice, ‘Curse God and die’ (Job 2:9), does not reach the soul of the righteous man at all. He rejects it from the outset. Since that time no atheism can fall below Job’s level. Beneath this level there is no atheism that deserves to be taken seriously; there is merely triviality. (p.48, italics original)

Moltmann on theodicy I

I’ve been reading Jürgen Moltmann’s The Trinity and the Kingdom of God, which includes a brilliant, small section on theodicy early on. I will post a couple of quotes over the next week or so. If you want to read more about Moltmann, have a look at some of the archives on Nothing New Under the Sun – Byron’s got a lot of great stuff on this. Here’s Moltmann on the existential and theological importance of the question of suffering:

It is in suffering that the whole human question about God arises; for incomprehensible suffering calls the God of men and women in question. The suffering of a single innocent child is an irrefutable rebuttal of the notion of the almighty and kindly God in heaven. For a God who lets the innocent suffer and who permits senseless death is not worthy to be called God at all. Wherever the suffering of the living in all its manifold forms pierces our consciousness with its pain, we lose our childish primal confidence and our trust in God. The person who is torn by suffering stands alone. There is no explanation of suffering which is capable of obliterating his pain, and no consolation of a higher wisdom which could assuage it. The person who cries out in pain over suffering has a dignity of his own which neither men nor gods can rob him of. The story of Job makes this evident; and since that time no theology can fall below Job’s level. The theology of ‘Job’s friends’ is confuted. Does Job have any real theological friend except the crucified Jesus on Golgotha? (pp.47-48)

I find reading Moltmann, especially passages like this, a little unsettling. On the one hand I feel that perhaps, at times, he says too much – what of God’s rebuke of Job at the end of the book? But on the other hand, I am conscious that Moltmann is onto something, and very perceptive: suffering does present a deep, disconcerting challenge to “the almighty and kindly God in heaven”. Thoughts?