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Trinity: The Trinity is a central theological concept in Christianity that describes the trinity of God. According to Christian doctrine, there is one God who exists in three persons Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Trinity is not explicitly mentioned in the Bible.
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Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments.

 
Author Concept Summary/Quotes Sources

Hans-Georg Gadamer on Trinity - Dictionary of Arguments

I 423
Trinity/Language/Gadamer: The interpretation of the mystery of the Trinity, probably the most important task that was set to the thinking of the Christian Middle Ages, is based already with the Fathers and finally in the systematic development of Augustinism in higher scholasticism on the human relationship between speaking and thinking. Dogmatics thus follows above all the prologue of John's Gospel, and as much as it is Greek means of thinking with which it tries to solve its own theological task, philosophical thinking gains through it a dimension closed to Greek thinking. When the word becomes flesh and only in this incarnation is the reality of the Spirit completed, the logos is thus freed from his spirituality, which at the same time signifies his cosmic potentiality. The uniqueness of the event of redemption brings about the entry of the historical being into Western thinking and also causes the phenomenon of language to emerge from its immersion in the ideality of the sense and to present itself to philosophical reflection. For unlike the Greek logos, the word is pure event (verbum proprie dicitur personaliter tantum)(1).
Certainly, human language is only indirectly elevated to the object of contemplation. It is only in the counter-image of the human word that the theological problem of the word, of the verbum dei, namely the unity of God the Father and God the Son, is to emerge. But precisely this is for us the decisively important thing, that the mystery of this unity is reflected in the phenomenon of language. >Language/Gadamer
, >Word/Ancient Philosophy, >Creation Myth/Gadamer, >Word/Augustine.
I 425
Word of God/Creation/Language: The mystery of the Trinity finds its mirror in the miracle of language in so far as the word which is true because it says how things are, is nothing in itself and does not want to be anything in itself: nihil de suo habens, sed totum de illa scientia de qua nascitur. It has its being in its manifestation. This is exactly what is true of the mystery of the Trinity. Here again it is not the earthly appearance of the Redeemer as such that is important, but rather his complete divinity, his equality of essence with God. The theological task is to think in this equality of essence nevertheless the independent personal existence of Christ. For this purpose the human relationship is offered, which becomes visible in the word of the Spirit, the verbum intellectus. It is more than a mere image, for the human relationship of thinking and speaking corresponds in all its imperfection to the divine relationship of the Trinity. The inner word of the Spirit is just as essential to thinking as the Son of God is to God the Father.
I 427
Trinity/Gadamer: The process of thinking is (...) not a process of change
Gadamer I 428
(motus), i.e. not a transition from potency to act, but an emergence ut actus ex actu: the word is not formed only after the knowledge is completed, scholastically spoken, after the information of the intellect by the species is completed, but it is the completion of the knowledge itself. In this respect, the word is at the same time as this formation (formatio) of the intellect. >Word/Thomas, >Word of God/Gadamer.
Word/Language/Thinking/Gadamer: In this way it can be understood that the creation of the Word was understood as a true image of the Trinity. It is a matter of real generatio, and real birth, although here, of course, there is no receiving part next to a begetting one. But it is precisely this intellectual character of the production of the Word that is decisive for its theological model function. There is really something in common between the process of the divine persons and the process of thinking.
Trinity/Gadamer: The mystery of the Trinity, which is to be illuminated by the analogy with the inner word, must ultimately remain incomprehensible from the point of view of human thinking. If in the divine word the whole of the divine spirit is pronounced, then the processual moment in this word means something for which basically every analogy lets us down. If the divine spirit, by recognizing itself, at the same time recognizes all that exists, then the Word of God is the Word of the spirit that sees and creates everything in an intuition. The process disappears in the actuality of the divine All-Wisdom. Creation, too, is not a real process, but only interprets the order of the world as a whole in a temporal scheme.(2)



1. Thomas I. qu 34
2. It is clear that the patristic and scholastic interpretation of Genesis to some extent repeats the discussion about the right interpretation of "Timaios" that was held between Plato's disciples. (Cf. my study of "idea and reality in Plato's "Timaios". (Meeting reports of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences, Philos.-histor. Class, 2nd Abh. Heidelberg 1974; now in vol. 6 of the Ges. Werke, pp. 242-270).

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Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments
The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition.

Gadamer I
Hans-Georg Gadamer
Wahrheit und Methode. Grundzüge einer philosophischen Hermeneutik 7. durchgesehene Auflage Tübingen 1960/2010

Gadamer II
H. G. Gadamer
The Relevance of the Beautiful, London 1986
German Edition:
Die Aktualität des Schönen: Kunst als Spiel, Symbol und Fest Stuttgart 1977


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