Theology Improper: Distortions of the Doctrine of God

The English word "theology" comes from a combination of two Greek words: theos and logos. The Greek word theos means "God," and logos means "word" or "discourse" or "speech." Etymologically, then, "theology" is a word or discourse concerning God. This is why, in systematic theology texts, the section on the doctrine of God is often termed "Theology Proper." It is because "theology," properly speaking, concerns our knowledge of God and our speech about God. Systematic theology texts discuss many topics in addition to the doctrine of God. Are those topics truly theology? Yes, because they are all directly related to the doctrine of God. Bibliology, the doctrine of Scripture, has to do with the word of God. Soteriology, the doctrine of salvation, has to do with the redemptive work of God. Ecclesiology, the doctrine of the church, has to do with the people of God. And so on. All of systematic theology is related in one way or another to the doctrine of God.

Theology Proper, however, deals directly with the very being of our Triune God. In this section of systematic theology texts, one will find discussions of the attributes of God as well as discussions of the three Persons of the Trinity. Even though some systematic theology texts have separate sections for the doctrine of Christ and the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, for Trinitarians both are fundamentally subsections of Theology Proper, the doctrine of God.

Throughout the history of the church, distortions of the doctrine of God have always been among the most serious theological problems the church has had to face because Christians understood that if we get the doctrine of God wrong, we get everything related to the doctrine of God wrong. In other words, if the doctrine of God is distorted, all of our theology will be distorted. There were numerous distortions of the doctrine of God from the first century onward, and the church had to deal with all of them.

Gnostics, for example, imagined a God higher than the God of the Old Testament and also denied that the God of the Old Testament was same as the God of the New Testament. Ebionites denied the deity of Christ, which destroyed the biblical doctrine of the Trinity. Docetists denied the humanity of Christ, which destroyed the redemptive work of God. Tritheists claimed that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were three separate gods, thereby reintroducing polytheism into the church. Modalists claimed that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were simply three ways the one God revealed Himself, thereby introducing an early form of unitarianism into the church. Arians argued that the Son was the first and greatest creature of God and that the Father did not become the Father until He created the Son. Another denial of the biblical doctrine of the Trinity. Subordinationists of various stripes taught that there are degrees of deity and/or degrees of authority in the Godhead. Their rejection of Scripture took most of the fourth century to overcome.

In the fifth century, the battleground focused on the nature of the incarnation of the Second Person of the Trinity. Advocates of what might be called "Two Sons" theology tended to treat the Gospels as if the Son of Mary said and did the human things we read about, while the Son of God said and did the divine things. The problem was that they would not unequivocally say that the Son of Mary is the Son of God. Nestorius's version of this doctrine led to an enormous controversy that consumed the church for decades. On the other hand, there were those, such as Eutyches, who recognized that Jesus is one Person but who concluded on this basis that He must also have only one nature.

All of the early ecumenical councils dealt in one way or another with attacks on the doctrine of God. The fourth century council of Nicea (325) dealt with various forms of Arianism and subordinationism. The council of Constantinople (381) dealt with the same issues and with denials of the person and deity of the Holy Spirit. The fifth century councils of Ephesus (431) and Chalcedon (451) dealt with attacks on the biblical doctrine concerning the second person of the Trinity. In response to Nestorians and Eutychians, Chalcedon affirmed that the Son incarnate is one Person with two natures.

The Reformed confessions of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries incorporated the Nicene doctrine of the Trinity and the Chalcedonian doctrine of Christ. In the sixteenth century, however, attacks on the biblical doctrine of God were revived again by anti-Trinitarians such as the Socinians. In the next several centuries, as many theologians hitched their wagons to various modernist philosophies, the doctrine of God was further distorted. Various forms of deism, unitarianism, and pantheism became serious problems. In more recent centuries, liberal, neo-orthodox, and process theologians, as well as a whole host of cults, all introduced their own distortions of the doctrine of God.

For most of Christian history, those who believed in the inspired Holy Scriptures were on the front lines combatting such heresies and defending the orthodox biblical doctrine of God. Sadly, in the last century, we have witnessed a new phenomenon as those who claim to stand in the line of the defenders of biblical orthodoxy, those who profess to be evangelical and even some who profess to be Reformed, have themselves distorted and undermined the biblical doctrine of God. In other words, we now have evangelical and Reformed theologians doing what used to be done only by liberal theologians.

We see this in the advocacy of open theism and other revisionary approaches to the divine attributes. We see it in the denials of divine immutability, impassibility, and simplicity. We also see it in the so-called doctrine of the eternal subordination of the Son. The irony of witnessing professing evangelical and Reformed theologians promoting all of these radical revisions of the Doctrine of God, is that they are treating theological orthodoxy in exactly the same way it was treated by the theological liberals of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Some of this appears to be the result of ignorance. For example, many proponents of eternal subordinationism say that they are merely teaching what the council of Nicea and the orthodox theologians of the fourth century taught. Given that such an assertion is as blatantly false as the claim that George Washington's presidency of the United States began in 1984 and obviously so to anyone who has read the relevant fourth-century documents, the only charitable interpretation of those assertions is that they are being made in ignorance. That can be corrected by those willing to do the research. Some of this also appears to be the result of evangelicals unwittingly adopting a form of Harnack's Hellenization thesis. Adolf von Harnack (1851-1930) was a German liberal theologian and historian. According to his Hellenization thesis, early Christian theology was radically transformed and distorted by Greek (Hellenistic) philosophy. In effect, the early church replaced the God of the Bible with the unmoved mover of Greek philosophy. So, in order to get back to the biblical doctrine of God, we have to get rid of all the Greek philosophical influences. You can find variations on this Harnackian theme in almost all of the modern revisionary doctrines of God - whether originating in liberal, neo-orthodox, evangelical, or Reformed contexts. This has the potential of being corrected by those who are willing to do the resarch into the overwhelming criticism the Hellenization thesis has received. It can also be correced by those willing to research the exegetical grounds for the orthodox doctrine of God. There are numerous resources for those who are willing to do the work.

In the meantime, at the very least, we can and ought to know what the orthodox doctrine of God is. One document that sums it up nicely is the Westminster Confession of Faith. In chapter 3, titled "Of God, and of the Holy Trinity," we find the following:

1. There is but one only living and true God, who is infinite in being and perfection, a most pure spirit, invisible, without body, parts, or passions, immutable, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty, most wise, most holy, most free, most absolute, working all things according to the counsel of His own immutable and most righteous will, for His own glory, most loving, gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin; the rewarder of them that diligently seek Him; and withal most just and terrible in His judgments; hating all sin; and who will by no means clear the guilty.

2. God hath all life, glory, goodness, blessedness, in and of Himself; and is alone in and unto Himself all-sufficient, not standing in need of any creatures which He hath made, nor deriving any glory from them, but only manifesting His own glory in, by, unto, and upon them; He is the alone foundation of all being, of whom, through whom, and to whom, are all things; and hath most sovereign dominion over them, to do by them, for them, or upon them, whatsoever Himself pleaseth. In His sight all things are open and manifest; His knowledge is infinite, infallible, and independent upon the creature; so as nothing is to Him contingent or uncertain. He is most holy in all His counsels, in all His works, and in all His commands. To Him is due from angels and men, and every other creature, whatsoever worship, service, or obedience He is pleased to require of them.

3. In the unity of the Godhead there be three Persons of one substance, power, and eternity: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. The Father is of none, neither begotten nor proceeding; the Son is eternally begotten of the Father; the Holy Ghost eternally proceeding from the Father and the Son.