Thursday, August 30, 2012

James R. White: you should have stayed out of "the deep water" - part 2


At the 13:30 ff. mark of the NCE-E1 video linked to in my previous thread, James White said:

And it would be very easy—would have been absolutely simplistic—to, to press T. D. Jakes to come up with a meaningful response to one simple question—which I would think would be just obvious to a church leader at least—uhh, and that is this: Did the Son as a divine person pre-exist his birth in Bethlehem? Not as an ideal idea; not as, as concept in the mid of the Father; but, did the Son as a divine person exist prior to his birth in Bethlehem? Did he have interaction with the Father...

And a bit later at 15:00 ff.:

All you have to do to recognize modalism, and to, and to unmask modalism, is to, is to say: Do you believe that the Son as a divine person pre-existed his birth in Bethlehem? Was in relationship with the Father; there was communion and love between the Son and the Father before the incarnation. That question was not asked.

I discern two significant problems with the above comments by James: first, modalists believe "the one Being that is God" (I am using James' own phrase, from his book The Forgotten Trinity, here) pre-existed His incarnation, "as Father, Word, and Spirit." James' "absolutely simplistic" question is easily side-stepped by historic/traditional modalists. Second, a number of Evangelical theologians (including Reformed folk) deny that the second person of the Trinity existed as the Son prior to the incarnation !!! (See THIS THREAD for documentation.)

Maybe it was just on 'off-day' for James (I sincerely hope that in his debates with modalists his arguments were substantially more accurate and solid); but with that said, I shall end this post by recommending that a good portion of his presentation in the NCE-E1 video should be Forgotten as soon as possible...


Grace and peace,

David

2 comments:

Lockheed said...

You actually quote Dr. White saying "Did the Son as a divine person pre-exist his birth in Bethlehem?" but then seem to ignore this fact when you take from The Forgotten Trinity an unrelated quote.

You then note that some "Evangelical theologians" (ignoring the historical context of the term Evangelical), deny the second person of the Trinity existed as a person prior to the incarnation. Not sure what that has to do with anything Dr. White said. You seem to only be stretching for a reason to disprove.

David Waltz said...

Hello Lockheed,

Thanks for taking the time to respond; you posted:

==You actually quote Dr. White saying "Did the Son as a divine person pre-exist his birth in Bethlehem?" but then seem to ignore this fact when you take from The Forgotten Trinity an unrelated quote.==

Me: I must disagree; modalists maintain that the divine person, incarnate in the Son (i.e. Jesus Christ) pre-existed, and was "the one Being that is God". For example, David Bernard wrote:

"We can resolve most questions about the Godhead if we properly understand the dual nature of Jesus. When we read a statement about Jesus we must determine if it describes Jesus as a man or as God. Moreover, whenever Jesus speaks in Scripture we must determine whether He is speaking as man or as God. Whenever we see a description of two natures with respect to Jesus, we should not think of two persons in the Godhead or of two Gods, but we should think of Spirit and flesh...we must always remember that is fully God and not merely an anointed man." (The Oneness of God, pp. 87, 88.)

For Bernard, and other modalists, it was "the one Being that is God" that became incarnate; as such, my statement is definitely related.

==You then note that some "Evangelical theologians" (ignoring the historical context of the term Evangelical), deny the second person of the Trinity existed as a person prior to the incarnation. Not sure what that has to do with anything Dr. White said. You seem to only be stretching for a reason to disprove.==

Me: Once again, I must disagree. If one presses a modalist on the issue of whether or not the Son was pre-existent, all he needs to do is bring up the fact that number of respected Evangelical theologians deny the eternal Sonship of the Logos, maintaining that there was no "Son of God" prior to the incarnation.


Grace and peace,

David