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Knowing and the Trinity: How Perspectives in Human Knowledge Imitate the Trinity
Once we know from the Bible that God is Trinitarian, we can begin to notice reflections of his Trinitarian character in both general and special revelation. Vern Poythress demonstrates that a number of triads of perspectives (coherent groups of three viewpoints) show analogies to the Trinity. Understanding these analogies helps readers to perceive both the Bible and the world as creations of our Trinitarian God.
- GenresTheology
488 pages, Paperback
Published March 30, 2018
15 people are currently reading
88 people want to read
About the author
Vern Sheridan Poythress
75 books149 followersVern Sheridan Poythress was born in 1946 in Madera, California, where he lived with his parents Ransom H. Poythress and Carola N. Poythress and his older brother Kenneth R. Poythress. After teaching mathematics for a year at Fresno State College (now California State University at Fresno), he became a student at Westminster Theological Seminary, where he earned an M.Div. (1974) and a Th.M. in apologetics (1974). He received an M.Litt. in New Testament from University of Cambridge (1977) and a Th.D. in New Testament from the University of Stellenbosch, Stellenbosch, South Africa (1981).
He has been teaching in New Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia since 1976. In 1981 he was ordained as a teaching elder in the Reformed Presbyterian Church Evangelical Synod, which has now merged with the Presbyterian Church in America.
More information about his teaching at Westminster can be found at the Westminster Seminary website.
Dr. Poythress studied linguistics and Bible translation at the Summer Institute of Linguistics in Norman Oklahoma in 1971 and 1972, and taught linguistics at the Summer Institute of Linguistics in the summers of 1974, 1975, and 1977. He has published books on Christian philosophy of science, theological method, dispensationalism, biblical law, hermeneutics, Bible translation, and Revelation. A list of publications is found on this website.
Dr. Poythress married his wife Diane in 1983, and they have two children, Ransom and Justin. He has side interests in science fiction, string figures, volleyball, and computers.
The family lived on a farm until he was five years old. When he was nine years old he made a public commitment to Christ and was baptized in Chowchilla First Baptist Church, Chowchilla, California. The family later moved to Fresno, California, and he graduated from Bullard High School in Fresno.
He earned a B.S. in mathematics from California Institute of Technology (1966) and a Ph.D. in mathematics from Harvard University (1970).
He has been teaching in New Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia since 1976. In 1981 he was ordained as a teaching elder in the Reformed Presbyterian Church Evangelical Synod, which has now merged with the Presbyterian Church in America.
More information about his teaching at Westminster can be found at the Westminster Seminary website.
Dr. Poythress studied linguistics and Bible translation at the Summer Institute of Linguistics in Norman Oklahoma in 1971 and 1972, and taught linguistics at the Summer Institute of Linguistics in the summers of 1974, 1975, and 1977. He has published books on Christian philosophy of science, theological method, dispensationalism, biblical law, hermeneutics, Bible translation, and Revelation. A list of publications is found on this website.
Dr. Poythress married his wife Diane in 1983, and they have two children, Ransom and Justin. He has side interests in science fiction, string figures, volleyball, and computers.
The family lived on a farm until he was five years old. When he was nine years old he made a public commitment to Christ and was baptized in Chowchilla First Baptist Church, Chowchilla, California. The family later moved to Fresno, California, and he graduated from Bullard High School in Fresno.
He earned a B.S. in mathematics from California Institute of Technology (1966) and a Ph.D. in mathematics from Harvard University (1970).
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
September 27, 2024
I say this with the disclaimer that I am too dumb to properly appreciate this book, but it seemed to me to be overly repetitive and to be concerned with making points so small as to be invisible. A disappointing read.
August 24, 2018
Summary: How various triads of perspectives on both God and the world reflect the Triune God.
John Frame and Vern Poythress are Reformed theologians who have worked together in developing a multi-perspectival, more accurately, tri-perspectival approach to knowledge. This work by Poythress represents, perhaps, the most complete working out of these ideas.
Fundamentally, humans beings are limited to a particular perspective but divine revelation makes it possible to see truth from multiple perspectives. Both Frame and Poythress speak in terms of triads of perspectives which they believe are grounded in the Trinity. One triad on God's Lordship, for example considers the perspectives of authority, control, and presence, relating to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Therefore the first part of this work considers what perspectives are and the types of perspectives that might be identified. Then Poythress moves on to a discussion of the Trinity. A couple of key truths in this discussion that will recur in the book is the coinherence of the Trinity, and the idea of analogy, and that analogies can reveal something both of God and the world because the world reflects or is an ectype of the character or archetype of God. Part three then turns to perspectives on reflections, Trinitarian analogies, ethics, Lordship, and office. In each of these a triad of perspectives are related that coinhere and relate to the persons of the Trinity.
After proposing a classification system for perspectives, Poythress then applies tri-perspectivalism to a variety of theological questions from transcendence and immanence to human responsibility. Each is grounded both in biblical texts and triads of perspectives relating to the Trinity. Part six then applies the nature of perspectives to our reasoning about God. Part seven shows how a few starting perspectives serve as the basis for deriving further perspectives in a grid-like structure of perspectives on perspectives. Appendices deal with a variety of other short subjects and applications pertaining to perspectives.
I find the basic idea of tri-perspectivalism intriguing, particularly in thinking about how the world and even our knowing may reflect the triune nature of God. I must confess however that the logical working out by Poythress can get confusing at times when he writes about perspectives on perspectives or triads within triads. The diagrams in the text are critical if one is to have any hope of keeping it all straight (alas, my e-galley version did not have these--a major barrier to understanding the architecture of tri-perspectival thought Poythress is erecting and very logically delineating). Throughout, he both derives triads of perspectives from prior triads, and recurs to earlier triads in applicative discussions.
Perhaps the best part of the work is that Poythress is devoting himself to the classic work of the theologian of thinking great thoughts about God rooted in God's revelation of God's self. While one encounters a good deal of close reasoning, it is quite apparent that for Poythress, God never remains an abstraction, with many chapters ending in a paean of praise for God in all of God's glory.
This is a work to be studied slowly and carefully, pen and notebook in hand. Each chapter ends with a series of questions as well as key terms that may be found in a glossary at the end of the book. The questions force one to review chapter content and formulate one's understanding of the material. This rigor of theological thinking may not be something all are given to, and not all will appreciate Poythress's approach. But for those who give this the time it properly demands, they will be ushered into thinking deeply and long about the Triune God. One might well ask, particularly for those who lead and teach God's people to know and follow the living God, whether or not this is essential work that cannot be neglected.
____________________________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
John Frame and Vern Poythress are Reformed theologians who have worked together in developing a multi-perspectival, more accurately, tri-perspectival approach to knowledge. This work by Poythress represents, perhaps, the most complete working out of these ideas.
Fundamentally, humans beings are limited to a particular perspective but divine revelation makes it possible to see truth from multiple perspectives. Both Frame and Poythress speak in terms of triads of perspectives which they believe are grounded in the Trinity. One triad on God's Lordship, for example considers the perspectives of authority, control, and presence, relating to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Therefore the first part of this work considers what perspectives are and the types of perspectives that might be identified. Then Poythress moves on to a discussion of the Trinity. A couple of key truths in this discussion that will recur in the book is the coinherence of the Trinity, and the idea of analogy, and that analogies can reveal something both of God and the world because the world reflects or is an ectype of the character or archetype of God. Part three then turns to perspectives on reflections, Trinitarian analogies, ethics, Lordship, and office. In each of these a triad of perspectives are related that coinhere and relate to the persons of the Trinity.
After proposing a classification system for perspectives, Poythress then applies tri-perspectivalism to a variety of theological questions from transcendence and immanence to human responsibility. Each is grounded both in biblical texts and triads of perspectives relating to the Trinity. Part six then applies the nature of perspectives to our reasoning about God. Part seven shows how a few starting perspectives serve as the basis for deriving further perspectives in a grid-like structure of perspectives on perspectives. Appendices deal with a variety of other short subjects and applications pertaining to perspectives.
I find the basic idea of tri-perspectivalism intriguing, particularly in thinking about how the world and even our knowing may reflect the triune nature of God. I must confess however that the logical working out by Poythress can get confusing at times when he writes about perspectives on perspectives or triads within triads. The diagrams in the text are critical if one is to have any hope of keeping it all straight (alas, my e-galley version did not have these--a major barrier to understanding the architecture of tri-perspectival thought Poythress is erecting and very logically delineating). Throughout, he both derives triads of perspectives from prior triads, and recurs to earlier triads in applicative discussions.
Perhaps the best part of the work is that Poythress is devoting himself to the classic work of the theologian of thinking great thoughts about God rooted in God's revelation of God's self. While one encounters a good deal of close reasoning, it is quite apparent that for Poythress, God never remains an abstraction, with many chapters ending in a paean of praise for God in all of God's glory.
This is a work to be studied slowly and carefully, pen and notebook in hand. Each chapter ends with a series of questions as well as key terms that may be found in a glossary at the end of the book. The questions force one to review chapter content and formulate one's understanding of the material. This rigor of theological thinking may not be something all are given to, and not all will appreciate Poythress's approach. But for those who give this the time it properly demands, they will be ushered into thinking deeply and long about the Triune God. One might well ask, particularly for those who lead and teach God's people to know and follow the living God, whether or not this is essential work that cannot be neglected.
____________________________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
October 8, 2020
This book by the eminent Bible scholar and theologian Vern Poythress is a fascinating examination of developing a new way to think about and understand the Trinity. The author's goal here is to provide a different framework to examine the relations within the Trinity, then flowing out to God's relationship with humans. He proposes uses perspectives - points of view - to do this. He makes the case that people use perspectives all the time in examining themselves and the world around them, and we are certainly hearing a lot in society today about learning to see life, ethnicity and culture from differing perspectives.
Poythress first describes the three types of perspectives he uses in examining the Trinity, and then he begins to apply those three forms of perspectives to an examination of the Trinity. Within this examination, Poythress also shows how the use of thinking and defining in terms of perspectives can help with questions that have long puzzled Christians, such as how God is both transcendent and immanent, understanding the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and balancing the soveriegnty of God with human responsibility for their actions.
This book is by no means an easy and quick read, but careful and methodical reading of the ideas that Poythress presents will provide benefits and understandings that make the effort well-worth the time and energy. Highly recommended!
Poythress first describes the three types of perspectives he uses in examining the Trinity, and then he begins to apply those three forms of perspectives to an examination of the Trinity. Within this examination, Poythress also shows how the use of thinking and defining in terms of perspectives can help with questions that have long puzzled Christians, such as how God is both transcendent and immanent, understanding the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and balancing the soveriegnty of God with human responsibility for their actions.
This book is by no means an easy and quick read, but careful and methodical reading of the ideas that Poythress presents will provide benefits and understandings that make the effort well-worth the time and energy. Highly recommended!
August 6, 2020
Dr. Poythress shows how utilizing a variety of biblically faithful perspectives give us a fuller understanding of God. And, any starting point is fine because each starting point is related and coinherent because our God is one and cannot, strictly speaking be divided.
"Each attribute, when properly understood in the context of the full revelation of God, implies the others and in a sense includes the others. God’s omnipotence is an omnipresent, holy omnipotence. God’s omnipresence is a holy, omnipotent omnipresence. And God’s holiness is an omnipresent, omnipotent holiness. In other words, the attributes are coinherent." (p197-198)
The challenging thing is keeping it all straight. There are numerous diagrams throughout the book to help you, but it is still difficult. This can also make it feel a bit repetitive as he shows how each characteristic implies the other and so on.
He does this succinctly and clearly. If you want more a more detailed explanation, then start John Frame's massive 4-volume series on Theology of Lordship.
"Each attribute, when properly understood in the context of the full revelation of God, implies the others and in a sense includes the others. God’s omnipotence is an omnipresent, holy omnipotence. God’s omnipresence is a holy, omnipotent omnipresence. And God’s holiness is an omnipresent, omnipotent holiness. In other words, the attributes are coinherent." (p197-198)
The challenging thing is keeping it all straight. There are numerous diagrams throughout the book to help you, but it is still difficult. This can also make it feel a bit repetitive as he shows how each characteristic implies the other and so on.
He does this succinctly and clearly. If you want more a more detailed explanation, then start John Frame's massive 4-volume series on Theology of Lordship.
June 30, 2018
"Once we understand that God is Trinitarian, we can see numerous reflections of His Trinitarian character in general and special revelation." This as his initial goal, Vern Poythress has masterfully done. We can discern God's "fingerprints" all over creation in every part of human existence. Dr. Poythress has accomplished this in such a way that we are challenged in our perspectives of God as it relates to our understanding of epistemology and human knowledge. He takes John Frame's triperspectivalism of knowledge (knowledge of self, knowledge of God, and knowledge of the world) a step further in relating all of life and knowledge to an understanding of the Trinity.
June 10, 2024
This work is probably the most thorough presentation of perspectivalism as a theological method. Poythress writes clearly and effectively communicates complex ideas, but at times can be repetitive. Overall, this work presents a unique methodology for systematic theology that is explicitly rooted in the Trinity and Scripture. Whether this methodology is water-tight and completely plausible/persuasive is another question.
May 13, 2021
Too many of the triad structures seemed strained for me, and the subsequent relationships to other triads even more so. It felt like the triangles and graphs were already drawn and the labels were made to fit afterwards.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews