As the theologian Anthony Rogers pointed out, the trinity is found throughout the entire warp and woof of the Old Testament. In the book of Proverbs, we are introduced to the wisdom of God personified as a woman. It is these verses, in part, that lay down the foundation for the doctrine of the Trinity. In Images of the Spirit, Meredith Kline observes the diverse forms of theophanies, where the Angel can appear with or without the Glory phenomena of the Spirit. These are passages where the Lord speaks of himself or the Messiah in a repetitive, reduplicative way: The repetitive expressions of God in some Old Testament passages may point to various persons in the Trinity. Here are some traditional proofs (some more compelling than others) for the presence of the Trinity in the Old Testament. Quite the opposite! For more information on the Trinity, please see What is the Trinity? A rereading of Genesis 1 is enriched by the knowledge that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob created the heavens and the earth. Rereading is a mode of the New Testament’s use of the Old. For instance, from the early church, Christian thinkers have seen a shadowy witness to the Trinity in the “let us” of Genesis 1:26. God’s Spirit also seems to dwell with God’s followers, and seems to act as an objective personality. The Bible teaches a plurality within the Godhead in both the Old and New Testaments. Rereading is a crucial exegetical practice. ): In the Beginning, The Triune God Creates the Universe. The Old Testament gave glimpses of the Trinity, and no passage of Scripture contradicts the doctrine. It is not only an interpretive practice to be embraced by the consumers of the Bible, but because of the cumulative character of the biblical canon, rereading is a crucial element in the production of Scripture. The eye of the mind can scan the whole, ranging backward and forward in it. Right at the very beginning of Genesis, you have two different ways of talking about God during the act of creation. Basil the Blessed on Moscow’s Red Square. This personification is a speaking agent who is difficult to distinguish. There’s a whole set of traditional ways to find the Trinity in the Old Testament—and it’s kind of a mixed bag. It is here that, as we follow the New Testament’s guidance, we can see the fullest revelations of the Trinity in the Old Testament. A rereading of Genesis 1 is in this case enriched by the knowledge that the God of the Exodus created the heavens and the earth. Probably the clearest statement on the Trinity in the Old Testament is Isaiah 48:16, because it demonstrates an Old Testament belief in the three Persons of the Trinity. Second, God creates as the maker of concrete reality, the one whose hands formed the dry land, who holds all things in order. Christ is not merely an exalted heavenly being, but he performed the work of creation itself as God. In Gen .1:26 God (elohim) said “let us make man in our image, according to our likeness…” those engaged in this conversation were all the same in nature and image. Pursue a deeper knowledge of God through self-paced college- and seminary-level online courses in Old and New Testament studies, theology, biblical Greek, and more. While the word Elohim has the distinct im ending that marks it as plural, Elohim seems to be an agent of singular verb actions. That assumption can be summarized in this question: “Why is the one God called both Elohim and Yahweh?” These older theologies keep working at that question until getting to a trinitarian distinction. ‘Do not do anything to him. Nontrinitarianism is a form of Christianity that rejects the mainstream Christian doctrine of the Trinity —the teaching that God is three distinct hypostases or persons who are coeternal, coequal, and indivisibly united in one being, or essence (from the Greek ousia). Most people in the world have no experience of lasting joy in their lives. In light of this revelation, can we expect to see traces of the Trinity revealed in the Old Testament as well? Perhaps one of the most distinctive features of such passages is their careful use of prepositional rather than substantial distinctions between the persons of the Trinity — “from” the Father, “through” or “by” the Son, “in” the Holy Spirit — presenting us with a single yet internally differentiated act of one God in three persons. Please consider this request from John Piper and become a monthly partner by December 31 the Father talking... 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