“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
Matthew 28:19
I was reading an article from Catholic.com today on proofs of the Trinity and had a discussion with a catholic guy on the verse. So I thought I’d post some of my thoughts on it here, not that there’s any shortage of Unitarians speaking about this already.
Trinitarians will make 3 major arguments regarding this verse.
1. The three are named together, this must mean they are a Trinity and united in some way.
2. The “name” is in the singular, it does not say “in the names of,” which shows that the Father, son, and spirit all share the same name (they usually leave this ambiguous and never say what the name is, but when they do, the name is either “God” or “Yahweh”).
3. These three are named in the formula for baptism, which is directly linked to salvation. Salvation must come from God, therefore, these 3 must be God.
Response to argument 1. If naming 3 together means they are ontologucally one, then the forefathers of our faith must also be one father. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and named together more often than the trinity. They are not “one” in this sense. Further, there is a sense in which these three are united, but this does not make them God. As Irenaeus puts it, The son and the spirit are the left and right hands of God. That is to say, there’s one God, the Father, and he uses his son and spirit to accomplish his work. That is the unity. But let us not forget that we are also tools for God to preach his gospel through.
Response to argument 2. None of these 3 are names. “Father” is not a name, but a title. “Son” is not a name and the holy spirit is not a name. If we wish to say that there is one name for these three, we have to ask what that name would be. If the name is “Yahweh” then is it proper to baptize someone under this name without uttering the triadic formula? Orthodox Christians would object. God is also not a name. Nor is the divine nature. If we wish to bridge some gap between naming 3 and a singular name, we must give some explanation for what that singular name might be.
“Name” is often not used to refer to a proper name in the Bible. Someone can be sent in the name of the king, and yet not be the king. So if Jesus is sent in the name of God, this does not mean he is God. It means that he comes in the authority and power of God (see Micah 5:4). Jesus himself claims to come in the name of the Father (John 5:43). This does not make Jesus “the Father” even to a trinitarian. If having the name of the Father does not make him the Father, neither does having the name of God make him God (think of titles like “Alpha and Omega” and “first and last”). Further, Jesus sends us in his name. We pray in his name. This does not mean that we adopt the name Jesus. It refers to his authority.
When we look at other baptisms in the Bible, they refer also to a singular name (Acts 2:38). That name is “Jesus.” If the singular name is “Jesus,” then how can we make sense of “the name of the Father” being Jesus? Was the Father ever sent in the name of Jesus? No. Instead, the name is the name of the Father, which Jesus comes in. This is what it means to be anointed by God. The context of Matthew 28 is precisely about authority. Verse 18 “all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. therefore…” The topic is of the authority of Christ which he is given. Likewise, the spirit is sent in the name of the Father (and when Jesus is given the promised holy spirit at resurrection, it is sent by Jesus). We are also sent in the name of the Father. Does this make us God too?
Response to argument 3. If baptism is the washing away of sins to be holy so that we may enter the kingdom of God and receive the spirit of sonship, we must think carefully about why these three are named. To have the spirit of sonship implies we have a Father. God the Father is the party mankind has offended when we sin. To be his child, we must be baptized and be holy as he is holy. But to be washed away of our sins requires a covering of that sin, which is the blood of Jesus. You are baptized into his death (Romans 6:3). Jesus must be man to pay this price. The price of sin is death, and if Jesus’ death paid that price, he must be man. If the offended party is God, then God cannot justly pay a debt he did not incur. And if God died to repay God, this does not seem to show mercy or justice. It was man who died on behalf of man as our representative. By being baptized himself he took on the sins of the world and carried them to the grave with him so that sin might be put to death. Once we have died with Christ, we are raised to new life by the life giving spirit. The holy spirit. We are partakers in the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4) and become children of that nature. Sons of God. It should be no mystery why these three are named here in relation to salvation.
I am aware of the textual variant in this passage, and I may cover that in another post.