I'm also more in favor of Hopkins' poem as an expression of the trinity than I am of the images you shared. The abstract, diagrammatic image is my favorite of the three; it's almost like some sort of inverted Venn diagram.
When I was a kid I had a book that discussed the Trinity using the metaphor of an apple: skin, flesh, seed are separate yet all are parts of the same apple. Even that description is flawed, though: there is plenty of room for heresy here, as is the case, it seems, with all our human thought about God!
Faced with the impossibility of doing justice to the reality of the Trinity through visual means, perhaps we ought to refrain from even trying to do so—although perhaps that is my Calvinism-informed suspicion of images coming to the surface! Thanks for sharing and commenting on these pictures.
Human approaches being lacking is not reason to stop trying. I would suggest it is healtier for us to continue finding new metaphors while graciously pointing out the limitations of human modes of expression. (Hopefully I was gracious in my post! I know my tone can sometimes err on the side of glib but it is a glibness that is born of love for my brothers and sisters who try to wrestle with the infinite! Oh, how we all fall short.)
I am not a Calvinist. I find the suspicion of images a bit funny because, especially the written word, is a series of images. As in, they are signs that then bring to mind metaphors. Metaphors are images as well. All words are founded on experienced phenomena in reality. Meaning they are abstractions of sensed things. This is why the "I Am" is such a non-descriptive way to use a word to describe something. One might call it poetry.
Suffice to say, Calvin might say no one image can perfectly re-present God, and I would agree. I would rejoinder and say, no word, no sentence, no paragraph, no essay, no novel, no 1600 institute can either. Images are easy to single out, just like a single quotation can always be used to construct a straw man.
It seems healthier, in both word and image, to try to find new songs and celebrate old songs. All the while realizing that the songs will never end as there is no end to God.
Which reminds me of a great poem by Emily Dickinson with a notion that we need to come at truth from an angle. She says we need to tell it slant. In the case of the rainbow it is 42 degrees slant.
I'm also more in favor of Hopkins' poem as an expression of the trinity than I am of the images you shared. The abstract, diagrammatic image is my favorite of the three; it's almost like some sort of inverted Venn diagram.
When I was a kid I had a book that discussed the Trinity using the metaphor of an apple: skin, flesh, seed are separate yet all are parts of the same apple. Even that description is flawed, though: there is plenty of room for heresy here, as is the case, it seems, with all our human thought about God!
Faced with the impossibility of doing justice to the reality of the Trinity through visual means, perhaps we ought to refrain from even trying to do so—although perhaps that is my Calvinism-informed suspicion of images coming to the surface! Thanks for sharing and commenting on these pictures.
Thank you for the thoughts!
Human approaches being lacking is not reason to stop trying. I would suggest it is healtier for us to continue finding new metaphors while graciously pointing out the limitations of human modes of expression. (Hopefully I was gracious in my post! I know my tone can sometimes err on the side of glib but it is a glibness that is born of love for my brothers and sisters who try to wrestle with the infinite! Oh, how we all fall short.)
I am not a Calvinist. I find the suspicion of images a bit funny because, especially the written word, is a series of images. As in, they are signs that then bring to mind metaphors. Metaphors are images as well. All words are founded on experienced phenomena in reality. Meaning they are abstractions of sensed things. This is why the "I Am" is such a non-descriptive way to use a word to describe something. One might call it poetry.
Suffice to say, Calvin might say no one image can perfectly re-present God, and I would agree. I would rejoinder and say, no word, no sentence, no paragraph, no essay, no novel, no 1600 institute can either. Images are easy to single out, just like a single quotation can always be used to construct a straw man.
It seems healthier, in both word and image, to try to find new songs and celebrate old songs. All the while realizing that the songs will never end as there is no end to God.
Being ‘at the correct angle’ is the key
Which reminds me of a great poem by Emily Dickinson with a notion that we need to come at truth from an angle. She says we need to tell it slant. In the case of the rainbow it is 42 degrees slant.