Episode 186 of the Misquoting Jesus Podcast (May 12, 2026) was entitled “Is the Trinity Really in the Bible?” In this podcast, skeptical scholar Bart Ehrman explained to host Megan Lewis why the doctrine of the Trinity “ain’t logical”:
The doctrine that emerged is a little bit stranger than that. It’s the doctrine that you have these three figures—Father, Son, and Spirit, all three of them. They are all equally powerful, they’re all equally knowledgeable. They are equal in substance. They are equal in their essence. Uh, and they are distinct persons. They are different from each other. They’re not the same person. They’re different persons. But there’s only one God. So you have three beings who are all independently God and separate from one another, but there’s only one God. And so that that’s the doctrine. (3:30–4:08)
Having thus defined the doctrine of the Trinity, Ehrman chuckles and Lewis giggles about how illogical the doctrine is:
Lewis: It doesn’t look like the doctrine of the Trinity that we ended up with— the separate but also not separate. Yeah— even the one that we’re talking about.
Ehrman: Good luck. Good luck. Look, it’s hard— it’s hard— it’s hard even to say it. It’s even harder to understand it. Like— and the reality is, I mean the point of this whole thing is, you can’t understand it. So people say, well, that ain’t logical. You know, the numbers don’t work there. Yes, that’s right.
Lewis: You are— you are correct. They do not.
Ehrman: But it’s theological logic. It’s not Aristotelian logic and it’s not numerical logic. It’s theological logic. And people say there can’t be something different. Yes, there is. Aristotelian logic is not numerical logic and numerical— and so this is theological logic, right? (6:36–7:25)
I have quoted these comments at some length so that we may be very clear about what Ehrman actually says.
Ehrman’s Faulty Definition of the Trinity
The crucial misstep here is in Ehrman’s definition of the doctrine of the Trinity. Specifically, Ehrman misrepresents the relation among the three divine persons. He begins with an accurate adjective to characterize that relation: distinct. Indeed, Trinitarians commonly say that the three persons are “distinct” from one another. It is also correct to say that the three persons are different persons. The Father is a person, and he is a different person than the Son or the Holy Spirit. However, Ehrman then goes on to conclude that what this means is that the three divine persons are “three beings who are all independently God and separate from one another” (emphasis added). This description is a gross misrepresentation of the doctrine of the Trinity.
Thomas Torrance made the following observation regarding the church fathers of the fourth and fifth centuries: “Against all tritheist and modalist conceptions of the Trinity, they insisted that God really is indivisibly and eternally in himself the one indivisible Being, three coequal Persons which he is toward us in the redemptive missions of his Son and his Spirit.”[1] The Augsburg Confession (1530), the earliest Protestant confession and still a standard in Lutheranism, affirmed in its Article I:
. . . there is one divine essence which is called and is God, eternal, without body, indivisible [without part], of infinite power, wisdom, goodness, the Creator and Preserver of all things, visible and invisible; and that yet there are three persons of the same essence and power, who also are coeternal, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.[2]
The London Baptist Confession of 1689 (2.3) enunciated the same understanding of the doctrine:
In this divine and infinite Being there are three subsistences, the Father the Word (or Son) and Holy Spirit, of one substance, power, and Eternity, each having the whole Divine Essence, yet the Essence undivided, the Father is of none neither begotten nor proceeding, the Son is Eternally begotten of the Father, the holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son, all infinite, without beginning, therefore but one God, who is not to be divided in nature and Being; but distinguished by several peculiar, relative properties, and personal relations; which doctrine of the Trinity is the foundation of all our Communion with God, and comfortable dependence on him.[3]
Ehrman’s characterization of the three divine persons as three beings that are each independently God and separate from one another is, then, contrary to the classic understanding of the Trinity. It is also contrary to the modern reinterpretation of the doctrine known as social Trinitarianism. For example, prominent social Trinitarian Richard Swinburne defines tritheism, “the view that there are three Gods,” as holding that the three persons are “three independent divine beings, any one of which could exist without the other; or which would act independently of each other.” Of course, Swinburne rejects this view. His form of social Trinitarianism, rather, affirms that the three persons possess an “indivisible unity.”[4]
Beyond Comprehension but Not Illogical
It is a commonplace in Christian theology that the doctrine of the Trinity is beyond comprehension. To acknowledge that the doctrine is “incomprehensible” is not, however, the same thing as admitting that it is unintelligible. The doctrine is beyond our capacity to analyze fully using the mental tools of logic, but this does not mean the doctrine is illogical.
For that matter, Christianity (as well as Judaism) historically has insisted that God by his very nature is incomprehensible, i.e., beyond our ability to comprehend fully. This is so for the simple reason that God by nature is not a finite being within the parameters of created existence. Thus, Christian theology affirms many things about God that exceed our ability to analyze or comprehend in all respects. Here are just a few examples:
- God is eternal; this means he did not have a beginning to his existence. We can make some sense of this idea, but we cannot fully comprehend what it means for a being to exist without beginning.
- God is incorporeal in his essence, occupying no space, yet he is infinite being who is omnipresent in this universe of immense space.
- God is omniscient, i.e., he knows all things including things that have not yet occurred, yet he is free to do whatever he chooses in his limitless wisdom.
All of these affirmations of classic theism (affirmed by both traditional Christianity and Orthodox Judaism) defy our complete, comprehensive understanding. This isn’t a bug; it’s a feature! Theism affirms that a self-existent Being brought everything else into existence including us with our finite experiences and minds. If that’s true, we would expect God to be beyond our total comprehension. Given that such a Creator exists, we should hypothesize that many things about this Creator would defy our analysis. A fully comprehensive (to us) yet infinite Creator—now that would be illogical.
The same principle applies to the doctrine of the Trinity, which simply exhibits the same pattern. A finite object’s “identity” is defined by its boundaries, its limitations—its separateness from other finite things in the matrix of the created world. I am a separate being from you because we occupy different bodies, began our existence separately, have had different locations and movements as well as different experiences (thoughts, feelings) throughout our lives, have differing abilities, opinions, and interests, and so on. What if the three Persons of the Trinity co-exist eternally, are incorporeal and omnipresent, are omniscient, are omnipotent, and are absolutely perfect in wisdom and goodness? Then each knows every thought of the other two. Each is present at all times with the other two, not just proximately but interiorly. Each has all of the same abilities as the other two. Each is certainly in agreement with the other two regarding all things. Suppose three Persons share this eternal, incorporeal, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent nature. Then, in some way that defies easy analysis (for us!), it would appear that they are ontologically one even though they are also relationally or personally distinct from one another.[5]
Ehrman’s podcast polemic illustrates a common pattern. Skeptical criticisms of the doctrine of the Trinity almost never critique the real doctrine. Instead, they nearly always attack a strawman version of the doctrine.
Notes
[1] Thomas F. Torrance, The Christian Doctrine of God, One Being Three Persons, Cornerstones (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2016), 115, emphasis in original.
[2] In Philip Schaff, ed., The Creeds of Christendom: With a History and Critical Notes, 3 vols., 6th ed., rev. David S. Schaff (New York: Harper & Row, 1931; reprint, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985), 7, emphasis added.
[3] In W. J. McGlothlin, Baptist Confessions of Faith (Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society, 1911), 232, emphasis added.
[4] Richard Swinburne, The Christian God (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), 180–81, emphasis in original. See further my paper, “Social Trinitarianism and Mormon Theology,” Evangelical Theological Society annual convention, San Antonio, TX, Nov. 16, 2016.
[5] This paragraph adapted from my article, “Dale Tuggy and the Biblical Basis of the Trinity, Part 2: Is the Doctrine of the Trinity Incoherent?,” RobertBowman.net, April 18, 2019.