Book Write-Up: The Mystery of the Trinity Revealed, by T.R. Bosse

T.R. Bosse.  The Mystery of the Trinity Revealed.  Dove & Word, 2017.  See here to buy the book.

T.R. Bosse has studied the Bible for over forty years.  This book actually addresses a number of subjects.  On the subject that is in the title, the Trinity, Bosse is unclear.  More than once, he refers to the Trinity coming into being.  Coming into being?  Has not the Trinity always existed?  Or is Bosse implying that the economic Trinity (which concerns how the persons of the Trinity relate to the world) came into being?

In terms of prose, the book could have been better written.  The reason that this book deserves at least four stars, though, is its fresh and interesting look at biblical topics.

Some items:

A.  Bosse offers a picture of biblical anthropology and soteriology that tries to take into account the disparate biblical claims about the spirit of human beings, the soul of human beings, the Spirit of God, and the life-giving blood of humans, while merging biblical anatomy with modern scientific understandings of anatomy.  No small order!

B.  Bosse also shows from the Bible that God has a soul and a Spirit.  A number of Christians would not take those passages literally and may say that Bosse’s claim violates the idea of divine simplicity.  Bosse maintains a very literal approach to the Bible throughout this book.

C.  Another interesting discussion was when Bosse argued that Jesus was God’s Word from the heart (or bosom, John 1:18) of the Father.  Words, in Scripture, come from the heart, and Jesus comes from the Father’s heart.  For Bosse, this explains how Jesus could claim to be in heaven (John 3:13, at least in the Byzantine texts), even while he was on earth talking with Nicodemus.

D.  Bosse says that one reason the Trinity is not explicit in the Old Testament is that God did not want Satan to know about his plan of salvation.  I Corinthians 2:8 is one text that Bosse cites to support this, and he interprets the rulers who crucified Christ out of ignorance as demonic entities.  Did Satan in Old Testament times know about God’s plan of salvation through Jesus?  From both the Bible and the church fathers, one can make a case either way.  Some Christians argue that, in the Old Testament, Satan assaults the seed that would become Christ, explaining, for example, Athaliah’s slaughter of the Davidic line when Joash was a child (II Kings 11).  In the New Testament, Satan attempts to instigate Jesus’ death (Luke 22:3), even as he tries to discourage Jesus from the cross (Mark 8:33).  Justin Martyr thought that Satan was aware of the coming Christ, for he attributed the parallels to Christianity in pagan religions to Satan aping the true religion.  Yet, the ransom theory of the atonement seems to depict Satan as clueless about Christ’s identity when he puts Christ to death.  Bosse does not cover all of this territory, but the issue that he raises is profound.

E.  Proverbs 20:7 states: “The spirit of man is the candle of the LORD, searching all the inward parts of the belly” (KJV).  Bosse interprets that to mean that God searches the human heart to see if there are any signs that it is receptive to salvation.  Bosse appears to lean towards the synergistic model of regeneration, though he also seems to imply that humans can come to God from their own volition.

F.  Where Bosse was slightly unconvincing was in his arguments about Jesus’ blood.  According to Bosse, blood is what passes down original sin.  Jesus got his pure blood, not from Mary, but from God.  The risen Jesus forbade Mary Magdalene to touch him because he needed to ascend to heaven to place the pure blood on the altar; otherwise, Mary Magdalene might defile him.  The risen Jesus lacked blood, since he referred only to his flesh and bones (Luke 24:39).  As far as I can recall, Bosse did not offer rigorous evidence from the Bible that original sin is passed through blood.  Still, the speculation that he based upon that premise was rather interesting.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the author through Bookcrash.  My review is honest!