The only explicit references to the Trinity in the New
Testament according to the KJV, Matthew
28:19 (“Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of
the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost”) and 1 John 5:7b (“…in heaven,
the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one”) are widely
recognized as later interpolations.
Regarding the first of these, several scholars and
theologians have pointed out that the Doctrine of the Trinity was not
formulated until third and fourth century.
Several sources demonstrate that the original baptismal formula until
the fourth century was not “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the
Holy Spirit” but “in the name of Jesus Christ”.
Even then Cardinal Ratzinger has admitted that this is the case.
In the case of the second, a footnote in the New
International Version, in which the phrase is omitted from the body of the
text, states that it exists in no manuscript earlier than the sixteenth
century. It is omitted from nearly every
translation not dependent on the KJV.
The fact that these are both “piously fraudulent”
interpolations does not mean the terminology they use is invalid, however.
The closest non-interpolative phrase in the New Testament
whose validity as original is in little or no doubt is 2 Corinthians 13:13: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love
of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.” Here we have three Persons but no definite
statement that the three are one. It is
used as the opening greeting at the beginning of the Anaphora (or Canon of the
Mass or Prayer of Consecration or Eucharistic Prayer) in all the Eastern
liturgies instead of “The Lord be with you” that most Western rites use.
My purpose in highlighting the “pious fraud” inherent in
these two passages is to show that there being no validly Biblical terminology
for the Persons of the Trinity because the Trinity is mentioned nowhere in the
Bible, and that therefore it is not sacrilegious to use other terms than the
traditional but possibly out-of-date and therefore less meaningful.
Many Christians today have a strong preference for
gender-neutral terms for the Persons of the Trinity over the traditional
“Father, Son, and Holy Spirit”.
Almost all of these refer to the First Person as “Creator”.
For the Second Person, various formulae use “Savior”,
“Redeemer”, “Word”, even “Sustainer” to replace “Son” on general principle in
the pursuit of gender-neutral deity references, though I am fairly certainly
Isho bar Yosef (Jesus bar Joses) had a penis and produced androgen.
For the Third Person, the traditional “Holy Spirit” sounds gender-neutral, but to Jews has
always been femine. When Christians became
more Gentile than Jewish, they gave the Third Person a sex change, at least in
pronouns. Other more decidedly
gender-neutral terms have been used to harmonize with those used for the other
Persons include “Sanctifier”, “Sustainer”, “Comforter”, and “Transformer”.
Interesting that both the Second and the Third Persons of
the Trinity are referred to as “the Sustainer”, though in different formulae.
My favorite of formula is “Creator, Redeemer, and Transformer”, partly because I came to it
myself without realizing many Christians had been using it for fifteen or
twenty years. I like it even better
because I came to it partly by way of Hinduism.
I was trying out the more traditional, to Hindus, formula
for their Trinity of “Creator, Preserver, Destroyer” to see how it tasted after
learning that the Hebrew word translated into English as the “Almighty”
actually means “the Destroyer”, or at least derives from the same root.
While studying this, I discovered many Hindus were now using
the title “Transformer” for the Third Person of their own Trinity (more often
called the “Trimurti”); i.e. “Creator, Preserver, and Transformer”, for the
whole. For Christians, “Transformer”
better describes what the Third Person is to them than any of the other
descriptors.
Searching through dictionaries and definitions in working on
the most apt term for the Second Person, I learned that the title “Redeemer”
included connotations nearly every other title substituted for “Son”: Savior,
Preserver, Sustainer.
Thus, my preference for “Creator, Redeemer, and
Transformer”. For example: “Glory be to the Creator, through the
Redeemer, in the Transformer: As it was, is now, and always will be, unto aeons
of aeons.”
In some ways, the terminology for the First Person in
situations outside the Trinitarian formula is more problematic. Many prayers of the Church, the Lord’s Prayer
to cite the most notable example, are addressed to the First Person as
“Father”. The word “Creator” doesn’t
have quite the same connotation as you’re the “Adam of your labors” speaking of
or to Dr. Victor von Frankenstein. The
word “Parent” sounds too clinical, and still brings to mind “Mom and Dad”.
The only word in the English language that comes close to
being adequate as a stand-n for “Father” that is gender neutral and avoids
calling to mind “Mom and Dad” is the word “Progenitor”. Its use in the valid phrase spuriously
inserted into 1 John 5:7 would render
that formula “Progenitor, Word, and Holy
Spirit”. For example: “In the Name
of the Progenitor, and of the Word, and of the Holy Spirit” and “Progenitor, we
sanctify your name”.
If “Progenitor” feels too clinical or too awkward as a term
by which to address the First Person in prayer, use “Beloved”. While this at first may seem too familiar,
check out the verse Hosea 2:16. In here, God tells that prophet that the
people of Israel one day in the future will no longer call him “Baali” but
rather “Ishi”. Despite other
interpretations, both terms were in fact used by wives to refer to husbands,
Baali meaning husband as “my Master” and Ishi meaning (or at least having the
connotation of) husband as “my Beloved”.
Thus we would get, “Beloved, we sanctify your name”.
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