The Trinity pre-dates Monotheism
- Bible Brian
- 3 days ago
- 6 min read
Did you know the word "Trinity" does not appear in the Bible? If you didn't, you've probably had the privilege of avoiding low-level disputes with people who make an entire case out of this one point. By their reckoning, the absence of a word shows the absence of the concept. Therefore, the Trinity was invented at the Council of Nicaea, and the Bible actually teaches Monotheism.
This choice of words is quite deliberate on my part. On the surface, anti-Trinitarian heretics of all kinds would agree with everything I just said. But I used a very specific word that is similarly absent from Scripture. In fact, it is entirely absent from the first 1600 years of Christian history, from the time of the crucifixion, right up until 1660 A.D. It was at this time, centuries after Nicaea, long after the Reformation, that Henry More became the first man to invent Monotheism.
Of course, there is only one sense in which monotheism is an invention of Henry More. He coined the term, he absolutely did not invent the concept. While there are some exceptions, the overwhelming majority of anti-Trinitarian heresies tend heavily towards monotheism. These typically deny the distinction between the Members of the Godhead (a word which does appear in Scripture), the divinity of a Member of the Godhead, or some blend of the two. Not a single anti-Trinitarian heretic would argue, or accept the argument, that the absence of the word "Monotheism" in Scripture proves (or even implies) the absence of the concept.
By the same token, the absence of the word "Trinity" cannot be taken as evidence that the concept is absent. In fact, unlike the word "Monotheism", the word "Trinity" can be traced all the way back to the third century.
There is nuance here. If you search "when was the word "Trinity" first used?", you will likely be told that it actually goes back as far as the second. And this is actually a valid understanding. Theophilus of Antioch, in book 2 of "Apologia Ad Autolycum" (Apology to Autolycus) writes "In like manner also the three days which were before the luminaries, are types of the Trinity, of God, and His Word, and His wisdom."(1) Here, he explains why he believes the sun, moon, and stars, were created on the fourth day, arguing, in contrast to the pagan astronomers, that the celestial bodies are not divine. By his reckoning, this has typological significance. The sun is a type (representative) of God, and the moon is a type of man. Following from this, the three days prior to the fourth are types of Trinity. That is, they represent God, His word, and His Wisdom.
Most of that is irrelevant, since for now, we're only addressing the word use. There are three main reasons I'm not going to say, definitively, that this is the first use of the word "Trinity".
The first reason is steelman. The first is in order to steelman. Steelmanning is the strengthening of an opponent's case in order to bolster the strength of your own. In this case, the later I can reliably trace the origins of the word "Trinity", the more invented the concept looks. If I can then show that it still has a greater historical precedent than Monotheism, I have thoroughly demolished the idea that the absence of a word proves the absence of a concept.
The second is that, while "Trinity" is a valid translation of Theophilus' word "Trias", he was obviously using it in a less developed sense. Rather than Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, his Trinity consisted of God, His Word, and His Wisdom. It is very easy to argue these are the same thing, and of course later in history this would become standard understanding. But for sake of steel man, we will pretend that Theophilus of Antioch's "Trias" is sufficiently distinct from Nicaean Trinitarianism as to invalidate the translation.
The third is that it allows us to have a little more fun with the etymology of our word "Trinity". In fact, we would have to do this anyway, since the word "Trinity" is an English one. In order to become "Trinity", the word had to actually pass through several languages, until now we say "Trinity" instead of the Old French "Trinité", or the earlier Latin "Trinitas".
As the latter is the word used at the Council of Nicaea, when heretics claim the doctrine was invented, "Trinitas" is the latest word they can reasonably accept, and it must therefore necessarily be accepted as interchangeable with "Trinity". It is this same logic that allows us to talk about what "Jesus" said, even though the English form "Jesus" is only approximately 500 years old.
So, whence commeth "Trinitas"? The earliest known reference to this is Tertullian's "Against Praxeas", in which he uses the term several times. The first is in chapter 3, where he writes "As if in this way also one were not All, in that All are of One, by unity (that is) of substance; while the mystery of the dispensation is still guarded, which distributes the Unity into a Trinity, placing in their order the three Persons— the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost: three, however, not in condition, but in degree; not in substance, but in form; not in power, but in aspect; yet of one substance, and of one condition, and of one power, inasmuch as He is one God, from whom these degrees and forms and aspects are reckoned, under the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. How they are susceptible of number without division, will be shown as our treatise proceeds." (2).
From this, we not only see that Tertullian used the term "Trinity", but long before the Council of Nicaea, explicitly believed that the One God exists in three Members, distinct in aspect, but not in substance. The only real issue here is that Tertullian did hold to a more primitive view of Subordinationism.
Because of this, it is rhetorically sound to assert that the Trinity predates Monotheism. The logic does have to be jiggled slightly to allow for the transition of language. The English term "Trinity" comes from the Latin "Trinitas", but no one disputes that when the Council of Nicaea used the word "Trinitas", that is the original form of the word "Trinity". Using this logic, the absolute latest we can date the word "Trinity" to is 200 A.D.
By contrast, the term "Monotheism" is a compound, invented in the 17th century to help classify religions. The absolute earliest we can place the word is 1660 A.D. Before this time, no document existed containing the word "Monotheism", nor can any pre-1660 document be reasonably translated with the word "Monotheism". This makes the Trinity approximately 1400 years older than Monotheism.
From this, we see how ridiculous the original argument is. The word "Trinity" does not appear in the Bible, but the concept was clearly not absent from Christian thought. But here's the irony: The same thing is true for Monotheism.
See, the doctrine of the Trinity is Monotheistic. Christians believe there is a grand total of one God. There has only ever been one God, there will only ever be one God, and right now, as I write this article, and as you read it, there is only ever one God. And yet, in spite of being distinct from one another, the Father is God (e.g. 1 Corinthians 8:6), the Son is God (e.g. Hebrews 1:8), and the Holy Spirit is God (e.g. Acts 5:3-4).
It would be beyond the scope of this article to go much further than that, but you can find many proofs of the Trinity in the "Defending the Trinity" section. Suffice to say for now, the argument from the lack of the word is thoroughly demolished. The Bible does not use the words "Trinity" or "Monotheism", but the concepts are clearly present. The Monotheistic doctrine of the Trinity is present from Scripture, even as far back as Genesis 1. From this chapter, Theophilus of Antioch even argues for a Triune God as far back as 170 A.D. A little later on, Tertullian would use the very word that would later become our "Trinity" to defend the idea that God is one God, existent in threeco-essential beings. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We see, then, that it is, in fact, the vehement denial of the Trinity that lacks historical precedent. To love God fully is to love the fullness of Godhead, which dwells bodily in Christ (Colossians 2:9).
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