God & Jesus

Jesus & the Trinity

Christians believe in one God in three persons, and that Jesus is the second person of the Trinity. Muslims believe in one God with no partner, and that Jesus is his messenger. This page sets out how Jesus himself speaks about God, and how the doctrine of the Trinity came to be defined.

1The question

How did Jesus describe God and himself, and does his teaching point to the Trinity or to strict oneness?

2What Christians believe

Christians believe that there is one God who exists eternally as three persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The three are not three gods, and not three parts of God, but one God sharing one divine nature. Jesus, the Son, became fully human while remaining fully God.

Christians draw this belief from the whole New Testament. John’s Gospel opens with “the Word was God” (John 1:1), Jesus says “I and my Father are one” (John 10:30), Thomas calls him “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28), and the disciples are sent to baptise “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” (Matthew 28:19).

The church set out the doctrine in formal words at the councils of Nicaea (325) and Constantinople (381). Christians see those councils as putting into clear language what the apostles already taught, not as adding something new.

3What the texts say

The oneness Jesus taught

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:
Deuteronomy 6:4 · KJVRead in context →
And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord:
Mark 12:29 · KJVRead in context →
And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
John 17:3 · KJVRead in context →

Jesus speaks of the Father as greater

Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I.
John 14:28 · KJVRead in context →
But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.
Mark 13:32 · KJVRead in context →

Verses Christians cite for the Trinity

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1 · KJVRead in context →
I and my Father are one.
John 10:30 · KJVRead in context →
Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:
Matthew 28:19 · KJVRead in context →

4What scholars say

The word “Trinity” does not appear in the Bible. The Greek word trias is first used of God by Theophilus of Antioch around 180, and the Latin trinitas by Tertullian around 200. The full doctrine was worked out over the next two centuries.

R. P. C. Hanson (The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God: The Arian Controversy 318–381, 1988) shows how long and bitter the fourth-century debates were, and how many bishops held views that later counted as heresy. Lewis Ayres (Nicaea and Its Legacy, 2004) argues that the councils drew on a real tradition of reading scripture, even though their language was new.

Scholars of every background agree on two points: Jesus prayed to the Father and spoke of him as “the only true God” (John 17:3), and the formal doctrine of three persons in one being was defined centuries after him.

5The Islamic perspective

Islam teaches that God is one, without partner, son or equal. Jesus is honoured as the Messiah, a word from God and one of the greatest prophets, but not as God. The Qur’an speaks directly to Christians about the Trinity:

Say: He is Allah, the One! Allah, the eternally Besought of all! He begetteth not nor was begotten. And there is none comparable unto Him.
Qur’an 112:1–4 · PickthallRead in context →
O People of the Scripture! Do not exaggerate in your religion nor utter aught concerning Allah save the truth. The Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, was only a messenger of Allah, and His word which He conveyed unto Mary, and a spirit from Him. So believe in Allah and His messengers, and say not "Three" - Cease! (it is) better for you! - Allah is only One Allah. Far is it removed from His Transcendent Majesty that He should have a son. His is all that is in the heavens and all that is in the earth. And Allah is sufficient as Defender.
Qur’an 4:171 · PickthallRead in context →

Muslims see Jesus’s own creed, “The Lord our God is one Lord” (Mark 12:29), as the same message as Surah 112. When Jesus calls the Father greater than himself (John 14:28) and says that only the Father knows the hour (Mark 13:32), Muslims read the words of a servant of God, not of God.

6Objections and responses

“Matthew 28:19 names the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost together, so Jesus taught the Trinity.”

Response: Naming three together does not make them one God. Paul names God, Christ Jesus and the angels together (1 Timothy 5:21). And when the apostles actually baptise in Acts, they do it “in the name of Jesus Christ” (Acts 2:38), not with the threefold formula.

“The Trinity is a mystery. Human reason cannot fully understand God.”

Response: Muslims agree that God is beyond our full understanding. But the basic truth about who God is was made plain by every prophet: “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD.” The Qur’an asks Christians not to go beyond that: “say not ‘Three’ … Allah is only One Allah” (4:171).

7Conclusion

Both sides agree that Jesus taught that God is one, prayed to the Father, and that the formal doctrine of the Trinity was defined in the fourth century. Christians hold that the councils rightly explained what the New Testament teaches. Muslims hold that Jesus’s plain words, the one God and “the only true God”, need no addition.

Read Mark 12:28–34 and John 17:1–5, and ask what Jesus himself says about God.

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