关于神的本质 About the Essence of God
【作者:Jonah George Mourtos】神学 2013.03.24
In the famous film start wars , they talk about the FORCE. The force is a power, and powerful personalities can control it and make it to balance to the good or to evil. The POWER BE WITH YOU, is the wish.
many western Christians have unfortunately have a similar concept about god. And most of the chinese friends I asked they have .. No idea about the essence of god.
When we say ‘essence’ in Greek philosophy we mean what makes things to exist. For example , the book, the table , the chair , the tree , all exist because they are made of wood. So the wood is their essence. We are chinese, japanese etc… but mainly we are humans, so the humanity is our essence.
The essence has characteristics, attributes . For example if you have 4 legs , mouth , tail and you can bark, you are a dog, but if you have 2 legs , 2 hands, no tail, and you can speak you are human. Or if you can fly you are a bird , etc…
But essence does not exists like a material. There is always special and individual. For example, there is not human essence, some material, that you can take and make human beings. There is not human essence separated from human being. It is not like a plastic material, that you can use and make many different things, like plastic caps, coats, plastic chairs , toys etc…
From this point of view , the essence has priority to anything that is produced . The plastic (=essence) has priority over the plastic cups, spoons, clothes chairs etc…
The big misunderstanding
Can we use this ideas for understand God better? We may use , but if we give a new meaning , from the bible and the experience of the church, and not the common philosophical ideas.
We must understand this , because it became the reason of the divisions between Christians.
1 . We can not compare god with man , and take ideas from man to apply to god
2. the knowledge of god is different with the knowledge of human things. To know human things , we compare with other existing things , and create a theory. We have nothing to compare god.
We know god only because god wants to reveal Himself. The highest knowledge of god is by his Son Jesus Christ. (we will say a lot about this later) (Matthew 11:27 All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.
We do not understand things from general ideas but the general ideas from the things. To make it more simple. YOU are mr. or ms. X , you have a name, you are very unique, you are not not just one human being. If I say I am just a human being, some part of the human nature, a number, my id card number, then this is not what I am.
We can not make a list of attributes about ideas (like power, kindness, mercy, immortality…. Etc…) and project those ideas to god and say all those things MAKE GOD TO BE GOD.
The essence
The bible does not makes philosophy. Jesus speaks about a somebody who is very unique, and calls him Father, which means a very unique and special relationship, and gives us the opportunity to enter to this relationship. And he calls him god also.
In bible only once in 2Peter 1:4 is mentioned the word ‘physis’ .
In bible we have persons we act and talk. :
the father
the son
the holy spirit.
We call essence the common things that the 3 persons have.
God the father exists, IS and HAS. This is called essence. For example the father has life, the son has life , the holy spirit has life. The same for power, wisdom etc….
For example matthew 11:27 delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.
John 17:10 , And all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them.
John 16:13Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
But there are not 3 different lives , or 3 different wisdoms or powers, other for the father, other for the son , other for the holy spirit.
There is one life and this life the father shares with the son and the holy spirit. They do not share 1/3 , but each of them has all the life etc….
The essence or the person? The big misunderstanding
Pay attention to the following because is one of the main differences between the christians
What is the most characteristic in god? The power, the life etc… which is the essence or the Persons, the Father, the son and holy spirit, and which of them?
For example the son of god is god because he participates in the essence of god?
as Christians we believe that the Father, the Son the holy spirit are Gods, then how we say that we believe to one god? What makes god to be one?
The answer of the bible, the answer of the life of the church is that what makes god to be one is THE FATHER.
The western people , misunderstood , and influenced of the roman state and law ideas, they say the essence of god ,makes god to be one.
This is opposite to what Jesus revealed to us, and what the bible says.
In exodus 3:14, god says God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you. God does not says I am the essence.
In the old testament , but specially in the new all god is Personal, the Father. Exists by himself, is the self-life, has no origin. But this Father, is the reason by 2 different ways of other 2 persons. The Son and the Holy spirit. We cannot say that he created them, because this means that they did not existed in time, that it was some time that the Son or the Holy spirit did not existed.
So the father is the source of the persons of the Son and the holy spirit. This is the meaning of John 14:28 .. for my Father is greater than I. (greater from human point of view, because Jesus is human, and from God point of view because Jesus is the Son of the Father, the Father is his reason)
Chinese language has different structure from Greek language, in which (greek) the theological concepts and terms are expressed. So by the一 体 what do they mean?
Something like a somebody which has one body and 3 heads, or 3 faces? Actually a roman god Janus was one body but 2 faces. If they mean that this一 体 is the essence of god, is correct, but still needs to be more clear.
Clear means to understand that god is ONE, because there is
one reason of the Son and the holy Spirit
One initiator
One source
Out of time
Out of space
The Son is born (not created in time) from the essence of the Father, which means from the Father himself.
But because of the lack of philosophy the Latins specially st Augustine misunderstood the concepts
The trinity and the world
The holy trinity exists independently of the world. There is nothing in the world that can express 100% how is god.
In the world acts IN TIME, and IN SPACE.
What was misunderstood was that the son of god promised to sent the holy spirit. So john 15:26 But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me: , augustin and the western people, because they do not know greek language they thought that son sents the holy spirit also. So the holy spirit has 2 who can sent it. The Father and the son.
But this is very wrong and cannot be accepted. It is wrong because there are 2 different words in greek language, but in latin, english and from this in chinese they undertand as one.
∏εμψω is different from εκπορεύεται.
∏εμψω means send you somewhere
εκπορεύεται. Means comes from, your family. For example you are born in taipei but you εκπορεύεται from HongKong, your family is from there, your pronunciation is from there, but you still are here,
In history, for our salvation, yes, the son sends the holy spirit to us, and vise versa, the holy spirit sends the son. Jesus is born from the holy spirit and Maria, and the holy spirit brings us to Jesus. (Matthew 1:18, 1:20, 1cor 12:3 etc…)
But this has nothing to do with the how the holy spirit exists for ever. The holy spirit has only one reason, the Father, exists because the Father proceeds the Spirit.
If the holy spirit proceeds from the son also (not in the bible) then the Holy spirit has 2 origins, then there are 2 origins in trinity , 2 gods, not one. !!!! This is why the church never accepted it and can not accept it.
The priority of the person over the essence
But for the westerners important is the essence. They say , god is one still, because there is one essence. what is happening in this essence is not so important.
For example even the 3 persons quarrel, still god is one, because there is one essence, the essence makes god to be god.
You may say, the theologians fight for nothing it is not important to you. But actually is very important.
God loves you, PERSONALLY, does not love you generally as one human being, a number. Jesus did not come to save the humanity, abstract, but PERSONALLY ME AND YOU AND ALL.
God is the god of persons of Abraham (Matthew 22: 32) not just some power.
If I am just a number, a citizen , this is the dictatorship of the mass to the persons. Now the human nature is a constrain to my freedom. I am human, I can not change this. My nature is sick, I die. But god gives me way to overcome this (john 1:13) what I am is not complete now. It will be in the future. (revel 2:17 3:12)
A man does not love a woman generally, (and vise versa) but a particular woman . But see how tragic it becomes if somebody says , (as happens) I just want a woman to give birth to kids, I do not care who she is.
The essence can not exist without persons.
Why I love somebody? For what he HAS (this is essence) or for what he IS , for his personality (which is a free love, sometimes even out of logic, may be somebody is bad, bur we still love him)
更多正教会文章，请见：http://theological.asia
在着名的电影《星际大战》中，他们谈到了「暴力」。「暴力」是一种力量，然而一个强大的人格就有能力来驾御这股力量，使它在善与恶之间达到平衡。这个力量将与你同在，这个力量，就是智慧。
很不幸地，大部分西方的基督徒对于「神」的概念都很类似。而我所问过的华人朋友当中，大部分的人对「神的本质」都没有任何的概念。
本质是有特徵、有属性的。举个例来说：如果你有四条腿，一张嘴，一个尾巴，而且你只会吼叫，那么你就是条狗。可是如果你有两条腿，两只手，没有尾巴，而且你可以说话，那么你就是个人。或者，例如：你会飞，那么你就是只鸟…等。
但是「本质」存在的方式，和一般物质存在的方式不同。它是特别的、单独存在的。例如，我们无法找出人类的本质，因为，我们无法找到一些物质原料，可以用来创造出人类。离开了人类的「存有」，就没有人类的「本质」了。可见，人的本质与塑胶原料是完全不同的，你可以用塑胶原料制作许多不同的东西，例如：塑胶杯、塑胶外套、塑胶椅子、塑胶玩具…等。
在希腊哲学的领域当中，当我们说「本质」时，指的是「使事物存在的根本原因」。例如：这本书、这个桌子、这个椅子、这颗树，它们都存在因为他们是由木头造成的。所以，木头就是他们的本质。同样的，虽然我们是中国人、日本人…等不同国籍的人，然而，基本上来说，我们都是人。所以「人」就是我们的本质。
从这一点来看， 「本质」是先于所有受造的万物。这个塑胶(=本质)，是先于塑胶杯、塑胶杓子、塑胶衣服、塑胶椅子…等物品的。
天大的误解
是否我们可以利用这个观念，来对「神」有更深入的了解呢？我想，答案应该是肯定的，但是，前提是我们必须从圣经以及教会的体验中，汲取一些新的想法，赋予它一些新的意义，使它不只是一般的哲学概念。
我们必须了解这个观念，因为，它已经成为基督徒分裂的原因了。
1．我们不可以拿神来和人类来比较，不可以把人类的概念直接应用到神身上。
2．神的知识和我们人类的知识有着天壤之别。我们可以知道人类的事物，也可以和其它的存在物做比较，并创造一些理论，然而，我们却无法找到一样东西，可以和神作比较。
我们之所以认识神，只因为神想要向人类显现自己，神的最高知识，是藉由圣子耶稣基督而显现的。（我们稍后还会深入的讨论）(马太福音11:27 一切都由我父交付了我；除了父，没有一个认识子；除了子和子所愿意启示的，也没有一个认识父。
我们无法从一般的概念中理解各别的事物，而是从各别的事物之中得到一般性的概念。让我说得更简单一点。你是X先生或是X小姐，你有一个名字，你是独一无二的，你不仅仅是一个人类。但是，如果我说我只是一个人类，是人类本性的某一个部分，我是一组数字，就像是我的身份证字号一样，那么，这样的东西，并不是真正的我。
我们不可以列出观念上的一堆属性（例如力量，仁慈，怜悯，永恒…等等），就把这些观念投射到神身上，并且说这些属性的综合就是神。
本质
圣经并没有创造哲学。耶稣所说的「那一位」是独一无二的，而且，耶稣称他为「父」，这表达了一个独一无二而且特别的关系，也让我们有机会进入这个关系当中。而且，耶稣也称「那一位」为神。
在圣经中，只有彼得二书1:4 有提到「本性」（physis）这个字。
圣经中，我们谈到的那几位有：
父
子
圣灵
我们把这三位所拥有的共同点称为「本质」。
圣父存在，圣父是…，圣父有…。这就是所谓的「本质」。例如圣父有生命，圣子有生命，圣灵也有生命。其它的例子还有：力量、智慧…等属性。
例如：马太福音 11:27，我父交付我的；除了父，没有人知道子；除了子和子所愿意指示的，没有人知道父。
约翰福音 17:10，凡是我的，都是你的；你的也是我的，并且我因他们得了荣耀 。
约翰福音 16:13，只等真理的圣灵来了，他要引导你们进入一切的真理；因为他不是凭自己说的，乃是把他所听见的都说出来，并要把将来的事告诉你们。
然而，这并不是说，有三个完全不同的生命，或者，有三个完全不同的智慧或力量，还是，有些属于圣父，有些属圣子，有些则属圣灵。事实并不是这么一回事。
只有一个生命，而这个生命是由圣父与圣子、圣灵所共享的，他们并不是只分到其中的1/3，而是他们每一位，都拥有完整的生命，其它如智慧，力量等等…，也以此类推。
本质？位格？天大的误解
请注意接下来的讨论，因为这是基督宗教之间最主要的差异之一。
神最主要的特徵是什么？是力量、生命…等吗？那一个才是神的本质？是圣父、灵子、圣灵，还是这三位都是？
举个例来说：神之子就是神，因为他分享了神的本质？
身为一个基督徒，我们相信，圣父、圣子、圣灵都是神，但是，我们如何能够说我们相信的是一个神？是什么因素使神成为一个？
圣经上的答案以及教会生活中的答案一致认为：使神成为「一个」的因素是「圣父」。
西方人受到罗马政府和法律概念的影响，产生了误解，所以，他们说：是神的「本质」使他成为「一个」神。
这个观念，和耶稣给我们的启示完全相反，也和圣经所说的不同。
在出埃及记 3:14中，神对摩西说：「我是自有的。」又说：「你要对以色列人这样说：『那自有的打发我到你们这里来。』」神并没有说「我就是本质」。
在旧约里，特别是一些晚出现的经典里，所提到所有的神都是「那一位」，也就是「圣父」。神自存者，他本身就是生命，没有其他的源头存在。但是，藉由两种方式，还有另外两位，也就是「圣子」和「圣灵」的存在，圣父成为万物存在之「因」。然而，我们不能说，圣父创造了他们，因为这里所说的「他们的存在」，超越了时间的概念，所以，我们不能说，在某一个时间点，圣子、圣灵并不存在。
所以，「圣父」是「圣子」及「圣灵」的源头，这也是约翰福音 14:28的意义。因为「父」比我大(「比较大」这个概念是从人类的角度出发的，因为耶稣是人，而从神的角度来说，因为耶稣是「圣父」之子，「圣父」就是他的因)。
三位一体并不是指 三位 + 一体 = 四个个体（1/2）
中文和希腊文的结构并不相同，而这个神学的概念却是由希腊文所陈述的，那么，「一体」所指的究竟是什么呢？
这就好像有一个人，他有一个身体，但却有三个头或三张脸？事实上，在罗马的神雅努斯，就是拥有一个身体但却有两张脸的神，如果他们用这个概念来说，一体就是神的本质，那么是正确的，只是说的还不够清楚。
说得清楚一点，我们说「神是一体」，那是因为：
神是圣子及圣灵唯一的因。
神是唯一的创始者。
神是唯一的源头
超越时间
超越空间
圣子是从圣父的本质里诞生的(不是在时间的概念中诞生)，意思是说，圣子来自于圣父本身。
因为拉丁民族在哲学概念上的缺乏，所以圣奥古斯汀误解了这个概念。
圣三位一体与世界
「圣三位一体」是独立于世界之外而存在的。这个世界没有任何的事物可以百分之百的表达神。
因为世界是在时间及空间里运作的。
若说圣子允诺要派遣圣灵，这也是一种误解。因为约翰福音 15:26说：「当护慰者，就是我从父那裏要给你们派遣的，那发于父的真理之神来到时，他必要为我作证。」奥古斯汀因和西方的人，因为他们不了解希腊文，所以他们认为圣子也可以派遣圣灵。若如此，圣灵就会受到两位的派遣，也就是圣父及圣子。
然而，这是一个非常严重且不可被接受的错误，错误的原因在于，在「希腊文」中，这是两个不一样的字，可是在「拉丁文」、「英文」以及由这两种语言所翻译过来的「中文」，都被理解为同一个字。
∏εμψω和εκπορεύεται是两个不同的字。
∏εμψω的意思是「将你送到某处」。
εκπορεύεται的意思是「来自你的家庭」。举个例来说：你在台北出生，但是，你εκπορεύεται于香港，意思是「你的家庭是从香港来的」，你的发音也是来自香港的口音，可是你现在却是在台北。
在历史上，为了我们的救赎，圣子送圣灵到我们这里来，反之亦然，正是圣灵送圣子来的，耶稣是藉由圣灵和圣母玛利亚才诞生，圣灵为我们带来了耶稣。(马太福音1:18，1:20，哥林多前书 12:3 …等等)
然而，这与圣灵是如何存在却一点关系也没有。圣灵只有一个「因」，那就是圣父，因为，圣父发出圣灵而使得圣灵存在。
如果圣灵也可以由圣子发出(这不是圣经的关点)，那么圣灵就有两个源头，圣三位一体也将会有两个源头，那就会有两个神，而不是一个神！这也是为何教会无法接受这个论点，也绝对不能接受这个论点。
「独一无二的那一位」优先于「本质」
然而，对于西方人来说，「本质」才是最重要的。他们会说，神是唯一的，因为神只有一个「本质」，但是，在这个「本质」里究竟发生了什么事就不那么重要了。
举个例来说：即使是这三个人彼此争吵，神仍然是唯一的，因为他们的只有一个本质，这个本质使的神成为神。
你也许会说，神学家只是在做无用的争吵，这对我一点都不重要。然而，事实上，这的确是非常的重要。
神爱你，他所爱的是「独一无二」的你，而不是把你当成人类的一部分或者某一个编号来爱。耶稣并不是在抽象意义上拯救人类，而是要具体的拯救每一个个体，包括：你，我，以及所有的人。
神是亚伯拉罕的神、以撒的神、雅各的神(马太福音 22:32)，神不只是一种力量。
如果我只是一个公民，拥有自己的编号，那么，对这个群体来说，这个人就是一种独裁的政权。现在，人性已经约束了我们的自由。我是人类，这是无法改变的。我的天性是一种病态，所以我会死亡。可是神给我一条道路来克服这种病态(约翰福音 1:13)。现在的我并不是完全的我，在未来，我将会变成完全的我。(启示录 2:17 3:12)
一般来说，一个男人并不会随便一个女人都爱，而是只爱特定的一个女人，反之亦然。然而，如果一个人说，我只想要一个女人来为我生小孩，我并不在乎她是谁(这样的情形确实发生过)，这是多么可悲的一件事啊。
如果没有「独一无二的那个人」，本质是无法存在的。
为何我会爱某个人？是因为他有什么(这就是「本质」)或者，他是什么？我想，我们之所以爱上一个人，是因为他的人格(这是一种自由的爱，有时这是超出逻辑的，尽管某个人非常的差劲，但我们却仍然爱他)。
更多正教会文章，请见：http://theological.asia
●作者为基督正教会(the Orthodox Church)的李亮神父(Jonah George Mourtos)