Wednesday, November 17, 2021

Lossky on the term "person" with regards to the Trinity

Purged of its Aristotelian content, the theological notion of hypostasis in the thought of the eastern Fathers means not so much individual as person, in the modern sense of this word. Indeed, our ideas of human personality, of that personal quality which makes every human being unique, to be expressed only in terms of itself: this idea of person comes to us from Christian theology. The philosophy of antiquity knew only human individuals. The human person cannot be expressed in concepts. It eludes all rational definitions, indeed all description, for all the properties whereby it could be characterized can be met with in other individuals. Personality can only be grasped in this life by a direct intuition; it can only be expressed in a work of art. (Vladimir Lossky, The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church, 53)

On the doctrine of God, some of the new Thomistic Classical Theists have stated that the term "person" as used in the Trinity is different from the modern notion of "person." Whether that is so is an interesting question to be explored. What we can say however is that, according to Eastern Orthodox theologian Vladimir Lossky, the modern notion of "person" comes from Christian theology when "purged of its Aristotelian content." If what Lossky says is true, then the current attack against so-called "Social Trinitarianism" may be robbed of one of its argument concerning what a "person" is in the persons of the Trinity.

No comments: