Modalism Handout Flashcards
What is Modalism attempting to solve?
The dual teachings of God as an essential unity and God as a three-part Holy Trinity.
What does the Orthodoxy agree about?
That God is a unitary essence consisting of three coequal Persons, the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit.
`Why is this debate important?
This is not a non-doctrinal or matter of indifference type debate. This strikes at the core of Christian teachings.
What is Sabellianism?
A modalism where God reveals His three different natures at three distinct points in redemptive history.
What is simultaneous/uniperson modalism?
That all three manifestations of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are present at the same time but they are like three different hats.
What is the two different views on the issue?
Ontological approach (who God is in His being), and epistemological approach (how we conceive of God in our minds).
What is the contention of every major Evangelical Biblical scholar concerning the doctrine of the Trinity?
That the most common sense approach is the correct one, not complication.
What are some major passages that refute modalism?
Baptism of Jesus (Matt 3:16-17) The description of the word (John 1:1) Jesus prayer to the Father (John 17:5).
Do any major systematic theology Evangelical works put modalism in their works?
No.
What is the issue with using the term “Persons” to explain the Trinity?
The use of the term intends to convey that the Father is not the Son or the Holy Spirit, the Son is not the Father or the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is not the Father or the Son.
Does God use the term “Persons”?
Yes but we still know little of what that truly means and modalism does not solve that for us.
What are the Names “Father”, “Son”, and “Holy Spirit”?
They are not Ontological distinctions between the Godhead but rather just three different ways of looking at one being of God.
What are the purposes of these different ways of looking?
They are simply outworkings of an eternal relationship between the three persons, and they are essential to God himself.
What is the problem with Redemption that Modalism cannot escape?
Patripassionism: a heretical view of the early church that “it was the Father who became incarnate, was born of a virgin, and who suffered and died on the cross.”
What is the problem with Modalism’s view of Biblical Revelation?
That they say there is pride in saying humans can conclude that God actually intended for humans to understand who he is to a limited extent. Modalism would say that everything below the iceberg is arrogance to claim to know, that this is unknowable. But by claiming this Modalists arrogantly define God in a way that seems like an undefining of God.
