The Encyclopedia of World Religions

456 S trinity

called the Holy Ghost. Some now prefer the term Creator for the first person of the trinity.) They asserted that these three were distinct persons, equal in glory and majesty and alike in being uncreated, unlimited, eternal, and omnipotent. At the same time, these ancient Christians insisted that there was only one God, not three. They used the metaphors of “begetting” (fathering a child) and “proceeding” (coming out of) to describe how the three persons related to one another. The Son, they said, is “begotten” by the Father, while the Holy Spirit “proceeds” from the Father. Roman Catholics and Protestants, but not Eastern Orthodox Christians, add that the Spirit also pro ceeds from the Son. In the 18th century, some people began to adopt a “unitarian” view of God. These Chris tians denied the teaching of the trinity and taught that God is one. Other Christians admit that the notion of a trinity strains logic, but they feel that the logical difficulties reflect the mystery of God.

have been trickster stories with a rabbit as a cen tral character. That would appear to be the ulti mate origin of stories Joel Chandler Harris pub lished in the late 19th century. He attributed them to an old African-American storyteller he called “Uncle Remus.” trinity The Christian teaching of one G OD in three persons. The B IBLE presents J ESUS as having a particularly close relationship with God, whom he called “Father.” It also speaks of God’s “spirit,” and according to the G OSPEL of Matthew the risen Jesus instructed his followers to baptize “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (28.19). The word “trinity,” however, never appears in the Bible. Later, in the fourth and fifth centuries, Chris tians formulated with great precision the teach ing of one God in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. (In earlier English the Holy Spirit was