Introduction
The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, the corporate name of the Jehovah’s Witnesses (JWs), has invested significant efforts into developing literature teaching its members about the falsehood of the Trinity doctrine. One of the emotionally loaded arguments against the Trinity is that the doctrine originated from the Devil and was later promulgated by the Catholic Church. While the Catholic perspective will be excluded from the current discussion, it should be argued that JWs grossly misunderstand the doctrine and continue consistently teaching that the Trinity is false.
As noted by Russel in “Studies in the Scriptures,” the JWs see the attempts to “misuse and prevent these our Lord’s words, to make them support the unreasonable and unscriptural doctrine of a trinity-three Gods in one person” as strange. To perpetuate this opinion, most of the JWs carry a popular handout booklet with them called “Should You Believe in the Trinity,” which provides the bulk of most arguments that they use against the “deceived Trinitarians.” Thus, many JWs memorize the main statements made in the booklet.
Defending the Trinity Against Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Arguments
While the JWs’ arguments against Trinitarianism rely on ideas put forth by some biblical scholars and citations from encyclopedias and dictionaries, there is no evidence-based background for supporting the central claim. Most of the arguments in “Should You Believe in the Trinity” contain significant, blatant misrepresentations of early church Fathers, deviations from doctrines, and historical revisionism. Upon further exploration, it became evident that JWs do not engage in independent research outside the libraries of the Kingdom Hall that host regular congregation meetings.
The end of the informational pamphlet states that there can be “no compromise with God’s truths. Hence, to worship God on his terms means to reject the Trinity doctrine.” It contradicts what the prophets, Jesus, the apostles, and the early Christians believed and taught. It contradicts what God says about Himself in his own inspired Word. Thus, he counsels: “Acknowledge that I alone am God and that there is no one else like me.”
Nevertheless, there are several approaches one could take to defend the doctrine of the Trinity against Jehovah’s Witnesses. First, it is essential to undermine the scriptural objections to the doctrine, most notably the loose argument that the word “Trinity” is not mentioned in the Bible. Second, it is necessary to argue against the supposed Pagan origins of the doctrine, as the Watchtower teaches that the concept of God within the Trinity perspective is borrowed from pagan sources.
Third, as the “Should you Believe in the Trinity” tract cites many Anti-Nicene church Fathers who supposedly did not believe in the Trinity doctrine, it is necessary to provide a rebuttal for this argument. Even though the JWs cite scholarly sources and refer to excerpts from the Scripture, their argument is based on misused evidence that is taken out of context. Thus, there is much wishful thinking in the writings of the Watchtower authors, which suggests their argument can be proven wrong.
Scholarship on the Issue
The central argument made by JWs against the Trinity doctrine is that the concept itself is not mentioned in the Bible, which is characteristic of virtually all non-Trinitarian groups. The assumption stems from the idea that what is not stated must not be true, an argument from silence. Moreover, to say that the doctrine of the Trinity is false because the exact word or its definition is not included in the Bible is self-refuting.
If such reasoning were to be accurate, it could follow that the Watchtower doctrine itself could be untrue since the original Greek and Hebrew texts did not contain the word “Jehovah” either. It does not follow that because a specific word is not included in the Scripture, it cannot be used for communicating the truth about God.
The JWs’ argument fails to consider that even the terms “Bible” and “self-existent” are not contained in the Scripture, even though they are biblical truths on which the Watchtower ideology agrees. It should be noted that using unbiblical words goes against the rules of Sola scriptura, which suggests that Scripture alone is not the only and infallible rule of faith, as long as there is consistency between the teachings and their interpretation. Firmly adhering to the Scripture, the early religious organizations would use unbiblical terms to define and explain the biblical data revealed within the pages of the Scripture.
The argument against the Holy Trinity rejects a mere definition of the biblical revelation that is consistent and overwhelmingly found in the Bible. Specifically, in John 1:1, 6:37-40, and 17:5, God the Father sent God the Son, and from the Eternal Word, He became flesh. After that, God the Son died in place of the believer, and with His death, the atonement for the sins of His people came.
Thus, God the Father and God the Son directed God the Holy Spirit to empower those teaching the Scripture. As said in John 15:26, “when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me.” Therefore, the Tri-Unity of God is based on biblical data despite the fact that the exact formulation of the doctrine and the emergence of the precise term “Trinity” occurred later.
The second rebuttal issue concerns the claim that the Trinity is derived from paganism. The claim is usually supported by two different arguments. The first points to the comparison between the Trinity and groups of three gods in various ancient religions, thus arguing for the pagan nature of the Christian doctrine. In the article “Do You Appreciate Our Spiritual Heritage?”, the Watchtower authors state that the religious triad was a prominent characteristic of worship in Babylon.
One of the Babylonian triads comprised Sin, Shamash, and Ishtar, a moon-god, a sun-god, and a goddess of war and fertility, respectively. Another example that JWs provide is the Egyptian Trinity of gods, Osiris, Isis, and their son Horus. While from a general standpoint, the links between the ancient pagan trinities and those of the Evangelical tradition may appear similar, further investigation allows for proving otherwise.
Providing such illustrations, the Jehovah’s Witnesses suggest that the belief in the Trinity makes it appear that Jehovah is not almighty and should mean that he is a part of God. To protect themselves from the “false” teaching, they disseminate the idea that “Jehovah our God is one Jehovah.” To be baptized as a genuine Christian and adhere to the Jehovah’s Witnesses doctrine, one must acknowledge the Father’s supremacy as the only God and the authority of Jesus as His Son. The baptism candidate must believe that the Holy Spirit is the active force sent by God and not a part of the Trinity. It follows that the JWs cannot baptize persons who believe in the Trinity.
What is challenging about the arguments put forth by the Watchtower regarding the pagan roots of the Trinity doctrine is that even though they cite historical scholars, the handling of the sources is questionable. For instance, historically, the polytheism inherent to the Babylonian doctrines has no links to the Christian theologies, simply because the Babylonians lived in a different part of the world thousands of years before the church fathers.
Theologically, the only possible comparison point between the Sin, Ishtar, and Shamash deities and the Christian Trinity is the number three. As Breckinridge Warfield states in the essay “The Biblical Doctrine of the Trinity,” divine triads are undoubtedly part of most polytheistic religions developed within different contexts. However, none of the triads, whether Babylonian or Egyptian, resembles the Christian doctrine, which embodies much more than “threeness.” Beyond that, the ancient triads have nothing in common with the Christian doctrine.
When referring to Greek philosophy as another possible explanation for the pagan nature of the Trinity, the Watchtower argues that the church fathers lived in a Hellenistic (culturally Greek) society and knew some of the philosophical terms and categories that were part of the academic community’s vernacular. Those who participated in the discussions about God and His nature spoke Latin, with Trinitarians and non-Trinitarians employing Greek terms.
However, in this discussion, the Watchtower has often misrepresented the work of many scholars to make it seem that the doctrine of the Trinity substituted Greek philosophical beliefs for biblical teachings. For instance, in one of the articles, the JWs stated that “Trinitarian theology required the aid of Hellenistic concepts and categories for its development and expression.”
The article does not mention the statement’s source, which comes from Harold O. J. Brown’s book “Heresies”: The Image of Christ in the Mirror of Heresy and Orthodoxy. In the original statement, the quoted passage follows: “[…] but they were the tools by means of which the implications of the New Testament were realized; they were not foreign concepts upon an essentially simple message.” This illustrates gaps and misrepresentations in the Watchtower’s argument against the Trinity and its pagan roots.
The third point regarding the objections made by the JWs against the Trinity doctrine is that the early church fathers did not believe in it. In its booklets, the Watchtower quotes Anti-Nicene church fathers, including Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Origen, Tertullian of Carthage, and others. The issue with referencing them lies in gross misquoting and misrepresentations of what the fathers said and believed. Moreover, there is a lack of referencing available in the booklets, which points to the argument from ignorance.
An argument against the one set forth by the JWs is that the fathers believed in Christ’s full deity. For instance, Hippolytus is cited as believing that pre-human Jesus was created. The Watchtower does not mention that he was a great Christian apologist and believed in the Trinity. This belief is illustrated in the statement that “a man […] is compelled to acknowledge God the Father Almighty, and Christ Jesus the Son of God, who, being God, became man, to whom also the Father made all things subject (Himself excepted) and the Holy Spirit, and that these are three.”
In the argument that the church fathers did not support the Trinity doctrine, the JWs quote Arius saying, “there was a time that the Son was not.” An issue with this lies in misrepresenting the Father’s intentions behind such words. He meant that the Word was the Eternal God but still separate in His person from God the Father, thus taking on the “Son” title, a common belief among many fathers, especially the apologists.
Most notably, the JWs missed the fact that Tertullian coined the term “Trinity” (Lat. Trinitas): “for the very church itself—properly and principally—the Spirit Himself, in whom is the Trinity, of the One Divinity: Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.” Considering this fact and the evidence that Tertullian coined the term, it remains unclear why the Watchtower teachings even quote this church father in the first place.
Own Considered Answer
The exploration of the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ argument against the Trinity showed significant gaps in the illustrative reasoning in the works of authors of the Watchtower literature. Even though the formulation of doctrinal words came later, when Christians developed the specific term “Trinity,” it does not mean that the doctrine itself is false.
The same principle applies to other doctrinal terms ranging from “hypostatic union” to “substitutionary atonement,” which came after the apostles’ age, and were used by the church to define the revelation or data clearly included in the Bible. Salvation solely depends on God’s Tri-Unity; for example, drawing from the Covenant of Redemption, “that the Father gives to Christ will come, and He will raise them at the last day.”
Therefore, Jesus can only assume the role of mediator between God the Father and His people if it is true that Jesus is God and a separate Person from the one for whom He is mediating. It remains ineffective to confuse the data found in the Bible regarding the presence of the Trinity with the doctrinal term “Trinity,” which can help define biblical data when arguing against it. Even though there are no mentions of the specific term in the Scripture, it does not mean that it does not align with what the Bible says and teaches about the Tri-Unity of God and the separation between God the Father, God the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, the concept of the Trinity and its current definition, which is being widely used in the Evangelical tradition, is simply an easy and convenient label for describing the basics of Christianity. The Old and New Testaments describe God as having “threeness” and “oneness.” As one delves deeper into the Bible, it is possible to realize that the Trinity illustrates such aspects as deity, difference, and unity at the same time. Deity is reflected in the following passage: “each person is God”, while difference is communicated by saying that “the Persons are distinct from one another.”
Finally, the postulate describes unity as “the Persons are so united that they are ‘in’ one another.” Drawing from this logic, there is no rule that the three hypostases in the Trinity are separated from one another and act independently. Thus, there cannot be a Father without Him having to save the Son, with the Spirit of the Son being impossible to be present without the Son. The Three are not merely incarnations of God but simply constitute one another and have done so since their emergence.
The JW’s argument against the Trinity fails to recognize that the Scripture represents a particular series of transitions throughout life. To be specific, it is the Father who sends the Son onto earth, while the latter does not send the Father. Moreover, the Son obeys the Father, and the latter never does. Jesus is noted to say that “the Father is greater than I,” while Paul said that “God is the head of Christ.”
Such verses never deny the power of God, nor do they suggest that other deities should be ranked as equal to Him. The three identities in the Trinity take on different roles, and it is clear that the authority of the Father dominates above all. Thus, it is unsubstantiated for the anti-trinitarian perspective of the JWs to come to a wholly unwarranted conclusion, that is, the Trinity causing the Son and the Spirit to be lesser beings than the Father.
Such a conclusion can be argued against because the roles of the identities within the Trinity are supposed to be completely different and not exclusionary to one another. For example, it is common to consider one’s employer “greater” because bosses hold a degree of authority over their subordinates. This, nevertheless, does not imply that the employer is a greater being than the workers. Similarly, the parallels can be drawn from the headship point in 1 Corinthians 11, which says that “husbands are the heads of wives as the Father is the head of Jesus Christ.” Besides, this does not mean wives are not equal to their husbands. Instead, it is the commentary on their different roles within a family unit.
Consequently, the roles inherent to the entities in the Trinity do not make the being of the Son or Spirit lesser or the being of Father greater. In contrast, when it comes to Egyptian or Babylonian trinities of gods that the JWs’ writings cite, there is a clear separation between the deities, each with a specific dedicated role, even though one may be the son or the mother of another.
In the Christian perspective of the Trinity, the Persons are wholly and indivisibly united, and one cannot think of the Father without His Son or the Spirit without the Father. There is no “being” of God that is being hidden underneath or besides the three Persons. God as a being is the only one, the unified love of which Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit share. Because the relationship between the Persons in the Trinity constitutes the unified being of God, there is no “greater” or “lesser” being.
Personally, I consider it anyone’s own right to believe in what they want to believe, including the belief that the Trinity should not exist or that Jesus is the Son of God but not part of the Trinity. However, if there is no evidence to support such a belief in the religious teachings, one should say so without providing false evidence or making arguments from ignorance and blanket statements.
This problem is starkly evident when looking at the JWs’ arguments regarding early church Fathers. Some of them were martyrs of their faith and vigorously sought to uphold the teachings of Jesus and his apostles in the New Testament. When initially developing the doctrine of the Trinity, they established a view of God radically different from the earlier Greek philosophical notions regarding the divine.
In doing so, the church Fathers employed language categories common to their Hellenistic culture for expressing the teachings of the New Testament, which is far from the pagan doctrine that the Watchtower authors illustrated. Thus, offering misused or incomplete evidence to substantiate beliefs is self-serving and ineffective for developing a doctrine one will follow. In JWs’ arguments against the Trinity, even the slightest degree of criticism allows for an effective rebuttal using evidence from scholarly literature and the Scripture.
To conclude, it is necessary to restate that the doctrine of the Trinity has never been a denial of monotheism, that is, the belief in one God. Instead, it represents a revelation of the three divine components (persons) contained in one God: the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Thus, when reading the Scripture, one will notice that the passages devoted to the Holy Spirit refer to it as “spirit” and not “Spirit,” thus teaching that it is a force rather than a divine person. The Spirit is no more God than the Son or Father, even though the JWs try to suggest otherwise.
Practical Application of the Topic
The mission stemming from the current analysis concerns communicating with the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ representatives and persuading them that the Trinity is a valid concept that aligns with the principles of the Christian faith. Besides, the investigation allows for tracing differences between the JWs’ doctrine and that of Evangelical Christians.
Even without direct observation, the Jehovah’s Witnesses consider the Bible to be the next highest authority. Thus, even though there are no direct mentions of the Trinity, the analysis revealed multiple passages in Scripture that point to God’s ” threeness.” Any Christian belief that contradicts the Bible must be seen as irrelevant, whether it is popular or unpopular.
It must be argued that the concept of the Trinity is a matter of simplifying terms to make the nature of God more understandable. If a Jehovah’s Witness ignores some passages in Scripture that support the Trinity, their argument falls short. Moreover, commenting on the applicability and context of anti-trinitarian verses may be a good persuasive tactic.
Furthermore, it is necessary to refer to the available JWs’ publications to illustrate that they are taken out of context and are often missing some passages to offer support to the arguments being made. Simply by showing the complete quotes and context of statements made by the church fathers that the JWs cite in their writings, it is possible to persuade them of the Trinity. Overall, offering an unbiased and well-researched perspective on the topic under discussion is necessary to show that the JW’s arguments against the Trinity fall short in several crucial areas.
Conclusion
To conclude, the three arguments the Jehovah’s Witnesses make against the Trinity do not stand after introducing a degree of criticism and analyzing their faults in detail. First, JWs argue that the term “Trinity” is nowhere to be found in Scripture; thus, it must be abandoned. Even though the term appeared later, multiple points of evidence in the Bible comment on the “threeness” of God, such as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Second, JWs point to the alleged pagan roots of the Trinity, suggesting that there is no place for it in Christianity, even though Jesus is the Son of God. However, some detailed research revealed that the Trinity has no similarities to the Egyptian or Babylonian trinities of gods apart from the number three. Finally, the JWs cite church Fathers as sources to provide an argument against the Trinity, but their efforts boil down to historical revisionism. In fact, Tertullian of Carthage was the one who coined the term “Trinity,” but the JWs cite him as one of the alleged opposers of the principle.
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