The origin of the Trinity
Sumer
The oldest known triad or grouping of three gods is dated to the middle of the third millennium B.C., appearing in the ancient civilization of Sumer in southern Mesopotamia:
Foremost among the gods was the supreme triad, which comprised the Sky God Anu, remote in his celestial palace, the more important Enlil, who presided over the affairs of gods and men from his temple on earth, and the clever Ea [Enki], who lived in his freshwater ocean beneath the earth (the Ocean Below) and sent the Seven Sages to civilize mankind. (The Epic of)
Sumerian theology of the scholastic period (twenty-fifth to twenty-third century [B.C.]) established the oldest triad (as distinct [different] from trinity) in Anu, Enlil, and Enki, gods of heaven, earth, and water. (Hopper)
The political evolution of the land–certain cities became superior to others and became in turn the centers of extended kingdoms–was translated in the reorganization of the divine personnel [gods], who followed the careers of their cities. Some members of the supernatural society [of gods], without abandoning at first their local attachments and honors, started to play more universal roles. It seems that in this way, starting at least from the middle of the third millennium [B.C.], a type of central pantheon was created, which was recognized by the entire country. The divine population [of gods] was hierarchically structured in this pantheon, with a “triad” at the top of the pyramid that remained preeminent until the very end, despite later avatars [gods]. At the head was An (Anu) . . . . The real ruler of the gods and the world was Enlil . . . . The third place was occupied by Enki. (Bottéro)
Grouping divinities in three was likely a response to familial and political hierarchies that were important parts of everyday life. The Sumerians also viewed their gods as members of divine families:
There would already have to be a number of divinities of either sex, that were perhaps already connected by family ties, as among us: fathers, mothers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, ancestors and descendants. When these villages became organized into larger political units around a city, the divine personalities [gods] must have undergone a mixing analogous to that of the political authorities: the principal god of the city became in a sense the head of the supernatural powers, and grouped around him were the deities of lesser importance, who became in this way assimilated to the high functionaries, in the image of the court and of the royal household. (Bottéro)
In Mesopotamia, where there was originally a plurality of city-states, the situation was not very different from that of Greece. With the growing tendency toward unification, however, the pantheon increasingly became structured based on strong hierarchical relations of subordination, which over time fostered ideas of deep-structural identity. (Assmann, Of God and)
The importance of this same number 3 became greatly enhanced by its early application to the gods [in various cultures]. Many numbers have been used to express divinity or godlike attributes, but either because of its antiquity or because of its numerous simple analogies in the physical and social world, the all-embracing 3 became the most universal number of deity.
The commonest social 3 is the triad of the family; male, female, and child; a simple distinction regardless of the number of children, or of wives for that matter. Since the idea of generation, as Zeller remarks, is the most obvious reason for the existence of the world and the gods, it is a short step from the recognition of the family on earth to the hypothesis of the family in heaven [the gods]. (Hopper)
In ancient Egypt, a corresponding association with the nuclear family is also confirmed:
The deities are summarized in a pluralistic triad: the family. This theological solution of the problem of divine unity and plurality corresponds to the Egyptian conception of man not as a lone individual, but as a member of society. . . . In Egyptian texts and visual material it is noticeable how important to the Egyptians were the relationships within the family unit, of man and wife, mother and child, father and son. As the family unit was so important in Egyptian society, we can understand that Egyptian theologians made use of the family to solve the problems of divine unity and plurality. It is remarkable that the divine family does not impair the triadic structure. Triads contain one child, and no more. The child, usually Horus the child, represents the pharaoh who is the ideal man. (te Velde)
The Egyptians were a gentle people for whom the family was important. Hence, their religion was based on family life. The gods were given wives, goddesses given husbands; both had children.
Temples continued the domestic theme, being called ‘mansions’ of the gods, and architecturally they were based on the house form, with rooms in them for eating and sleeping. The innermost sanctuary was regarded as the bedroom of the god; and it was surrounded by ‘guest bedrooms’ for visiting deities. The daily ritual of the temple was domestic in form: the morning ritual gave the god his breakfast; the evening ritual gave him his dinner. . . . each god lived in peace in his home, the temple, very often as part of a trinity [more accurately, a triad] of deities, a holy family consisting of father, mother and child. (Watterson)
Some may raise the objection that these examples were just triads (groups of three) and not trinities (three that are mystically one), which is a valid point. However, a grouping of three is required in order to form a trinity and this is what these very early examples illustrate. As we move over to Egypt, the philosophical development of the concept of a trinity will become more apparent.
The one and many, or one and three
In various cultures, the numerical concept of 1, 2, and many is prevalent. The number 3 represented many or all, while the number 2 was reserved for duality:
Having invented a term for “pair,” man was in possession of three numerical terms, “1 , 2, many,” and there are tribes today who count in just such a fashion. Through some process not clearly traceable, there came to be an identification of the word for many with the concept of 3, possibly because 3 is the first integer to which the idea of many may be applied, or because, given three terms, “1 , 2, many,” the many word became incorporated as the third integer in a more advanced number system. This stage is reflected in the distinction between the dual and the plural in the Egyptian, Arabian, Hebrew, Sanskrit, Greek, and Gothic languages, or in the common use of positive, comparative, and superlative degrees: good of one, better of two, best of three or many.
The idea of 3 as implying the superlative, or the all, was never lost. It appears in such common phrases as ter felix and trismegistus, in the use of the trident and triple thunderbolt as symbols of greatness and power, in the Egyptian hieroglyphs, where a single bar marking the picture of an object indicates but 1, a double bar 2, but 3 lines indicate 3 or an indefinite number of objects. As Aristotle put it, “Of two things, or men, we say ‘both’ but not ‘all.’ Three is the first number to which the term ‘all’ has been appropriated.” (Hopper)
In many traditions 3 was considered to mean “much,” that is, beyond duality. Thus Aristotle indicates that 3 is the first number to which the term “all” applies. It is cumulative, and it denotes finality: what has been done thrice becomes law. According to Hartner, in ancient Egypt 3 was, at some point, the upper limit of exact counting and at the same time an expression of indefinite multiplicity; the Egyptian sign for the plural, moreover, is 3 strokes. From this viewpoint, 3 can mean a superlative, as in terfelix (thrice happy) or trismegistos (thrice greatest one), and the threefold repetition of a word is used for the superlative as well. (Schimmel)
The essential significance of the number three was simply one of plurality for the ancient Egyptian, as may be seen in the fact that from the earliest times the hieroglyphic script used a group of three pictorial determinatives (later three orthographic strokes | | | ) as the indicator of plurality, just as words of dual number received two identical determinatives or strokes. Thus, by virtue of his or her own written language, every literate Egyptian was conditioned to see the concept of plurality in the number three and its multiples. (Wilkinson, Symbol & Magic)
The concept of the triad suggested plurality; in Egyptian writing three lines denoted the grammatical plural. Plutarch wrote: “We are accustomed to express ‘many times’ also as ‘three times,’ just as we say ‘thrice blest’ and ‘bonds three times as many,’ that is, innumerable.” (Mojsov)
At one point in Egypt’s history all gods were grouped into one god, establishing a “one and many” or “one and all” doctrine. Another way this can be interpreted is “one and three,” since three also meant many or all:
In all three dimensions [of religion], ancient Egypt shows an outstanding and highly original profile. Whereas in the cultic dimension, there is an enormous amount of stability and continuity, fundamental and far-reaching changes may be observed in the fields of theology and lifestyle. The implicit ‘cosmogonic monotheism’ typical of ancient Egypt, deriving everything that exists (including the gods) from one single divine source, the sun god, is made explicit in two ways: in a radically exclusivist form by the revolution of Akhenaten, and in an inclusivist form with the rise of the theological discourse that eventually arrived at the idea that all gods are One. (Assmann, From Akhenaten to)
The culmination of these tendencies was reached when the whole pantheon came to be seen as just aspects of one supreme god. “All gods are three,” we read in an Egyptian text, which then states that these three gods are just aspects of One God:
All gods are three:
Amun, Re, and Ptah, whom none equals.
He who hides his name as Amun,
he appears to the face as Re,
his body is Ptah.All gods are three, and these three are encompassed and transcended by a god who is referred to only as “He,” whose name is Amun, whose cosmic manifestation is Re, and whose body, or cult image, is Ptah. Even the name of “Amun,” the “Hidden One,” is just an epithet screening the true and hidden name of this god . . . . (Assmann, From Akhenaten to)
The number three plays a special role here, as a triad to which the plurality of deities can be reduced, and as a trinity in which the transcendent unity of the god unfolds in this world. (Assmann, The Search for)
All gods are three: Amon, Re, and Ptah, and there is no second to them.[11] “Hidden” is his name as Amon, he is Re in face, and his body is Ptah.
[11] The text does not say: “There is no fourth to them.” This is a statement of trinity, the three chief gods of Egypt subsumed into one of them, Amon. (Ancient Near Eastern)
This doctrine was a type of pantheism philosophically reduced to the number three, and subsequently the number one. It gave off an appearance of monotheism, but in actuality was not that. Similar philosophical thoughts occur in Greek philosophy, which is to be expected. As philosophy developed in the West, Greece was cooperating with the much older Egypt on several fronts:
Akhenaten’s “monotheistic” revolution is the radical consequence of this shift from mythical anthropomorphism to “philosophical” anthropocentrism. (Assmann, Of God and)
The discourse of explicit theology arrives at a solution of the problem of how to correlate god and gods that may be summarized by the formula “All gods are One.” This is the form of cosmotheistic and hypercosmic monotheism characteristic of Hellenistic [Greek] and late antique religiosity, and which can also be found in Mesopotamian, Iranian, and Indian texts. Egypt, however, is the civilization where these ideas can be traced back to a much earlier age than elsewhere and where they can be explained as the result of a long development.
The importance of theology within the structure of ancient Egyptian religion cannot be overestimated. The enormous proliferation of important and highly original theological hymns, especially during the New Kingdom, the rapid evolution of ideas that took place within the theological discourse, and the range of their social and political consequences as shown by the Amarna revolution have scarcely any parallel in the ancient world before the rise of monotheism. (Assmann, From Akhenaten to)
By the time of Plato, Athens [Greece] and Egypt were economically linked, with Egypt providing a major source of grain for the city. In the period 395–380 BCE Athenians had supported Egypt against Persia; afterwards in the 360s the Athenian Chabrias served as admiral of the Egyptian fleet under the Saite pharaoh Tachos (or Teos) of the 30th dynasty. Egyptians resident in Athens extended into the privileged classes; they are known from private legal proceedings during the century as well as from Attic comedy. All this suggests, prima facie, that philosophers could have been familiar with Egypt, especially the organizing principles of its state . . . .
It is easy to understand the fascination that Egypt might have held for Athenian intellectuals. It was not only an older, but a far richer culture than Greece, both in material and artistic terms. . . . There are, however, excellent grounds to infer that Greeks may have been engaged in more than economic and artistic exchange with Egypt. (Greco-Egyptian Interactions)
Egypt
Egypt is a civilization that is viewed by scholars as a contemporary of Sumer, developing at roughly the same time or shortly after. When compared to Sumer, Egypt benefited from a more unified history and endured longer (“Comparing Two Ancient”). Expressions of triads have been found more so in Egypt than anywhere else. Not only are triads plentiful there, but the oldest trinitarianism emerges from ancient Egypt as well, as touched on in the previous section:
Egypt has the oldest tradition of triadic groupings of divinities. John Gwyn Griffiths, a British Egyptologist, in an exhaustive work collected all the triadic groupings in Egypt and various parts of the Mediterranean and Mesopotamian regions. He counted fifty-four sites with 115 triadic representations in the form of sculptures, statues, mural carvings, and drawings. . . . Egypt is the only country in the Mediterranean basin where we find an idea of the divine tri-unity, labeled by Hugo Gressmann as “trinitarian monotheism.” It was suggested by Siegfried Morenz, a prominent German Egyptologist, and before him by other Egyptologists, that Egypt has been the influence in the formulation of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, in which the Godhead is believed to exist as a triune divine being. And such was the understanding of the trinity by Morenz. He was not concerned with the Trinity’s substance, which was considered in the Greek philosophical elaboration adopted by the Christian thinkers as we have seen in Justin Martyr and Tertullian. (Hillar)
It seems that Egyptian theologians during the second millennium B.C.E. provided the earliest examples in human history of both monotheism (with Akhenaten) and trinitarianism. Early Indian religion presents a rival trinity, but if we consider the Rig Veda as the earliest Indian text, composed around 1200–1000 B.C.E., the Egyptian tradition has priority. Moreover, the influence of the Indian tradition on the development of the Christian doctrines cannot be substantiated. (Hillar)
Osiris, Isis, and Horus form the best known of celestial families. In Egypt, the local gods had all been grouped in divine families before the beginning of the Pyramid period. Extension of triadic grouping led to the Ennead, triple triad of Heliopolis, which was in turn expanded to include a second dynasty of 9 gods, then a third group, until 9, 18, and 27 gods are recognized as being essentially 3 in spirit and mystically in number. (Hopper)
The number of [Egyptian] deities was large and was not fixed. New ones appeared, and some ceased to be worshipped. Deities were grouped in various ways. The most ancient known grouping is the ennead, which is probably attested from the 3rd dynasty (c. 2650–2575 BCE). Enneads were groups of nine deities, nine being the “plural” of three (in Egypt the number three symbolized plurality in general); not all enneads consisted of nine gods. (Dorman and Baines)
The triple triad or ennead of the Egyptian city of Heliopolis entailed three triads (3 + 3 + 3), no doubt to emphasize potency and the superlative (greatness). Some enneads exceeded the number nine, stressing further that they were meant to convey indefinite plurality:
In the New Kingdom, we encounter a Greater Ennead and a Lesser Ennead at Karnak, both of them dominated by the figure of Amun. The notion of “greater” and “lesser” indicates the relative importance ascribed to each of them, as a function of the deities included in them. At the same time, the group included much more than nine members: we count up to fifteen of them, because for the Egyptians, the actual number of members did not have to add up to nine. What was important to them was the concept of Ennead: plurality in its perfect form. (Dunand and Zivie-Coche)
Nine, three times three, expressed the perfect plural, the plural of plurals, and played an important role in constituting the groups of deities known as Enneads, created either through a succession of generations or as social and hierarchized groups. The value of the number nine could continue to be pregnant even when the actual number of beings composing it surpassed nine. It is also worth noting that the same word for Ennead, pesedjet, was sometimes not written with the ideogram proper to it, but simply with nine netjer signs, indicating divine plurality par excellence.
Millions: “One who made himself into millions” was one of the epithets of Amun from the Ramesside Period on, and it occurs frequently in the Ptolemaic texts from Thebes. Thus, we pass from nine, the plural, to millions, a manifestation of boundless infinity. (Dunand and Zivie-Coche)
Enneads were at first more widespread in ancient Egypt than independent triads. Triads began to increasingly multiply during Egypt’s New Kingdom period. This, however, does not mean that triads did not exist before the New Kingdom, as the famous Osiris-Isis-Horus triad is attested to from Egypt’s earliest history:
The most common grouping, principally in the New Kingdom and later, was the triad. The archetypal triad of Osiris, Isis, and Horus exhibits the normal pattern of a god and a goddess with a youthful deity, usually male. (Dorman and Baines)
Couples, moreover, were integrated into a family unit made up of three members, a father, a mother, and a child god, who was almost always a boy. In this case as well, the archetypical model [of divine triads] is to be sought in the family Osiris-Isis-Horus, which was constituted in the earliest periods . . . . (Dunand and Zivie-Coche)
Aside from the Osirian triad, the family constellation perhaps played a less fundamental role than would appear at first glance if we remember that it was relatively late and somewhat artificial. But it corresponded to a triune structure of Egyptian thought that expressed itself in many other ways. That is why divine families, far from imitating human ones, were limited to three protagonists, with the god and the goddess representing differentiation; as for the child god, a young boy, his function was to assure legitimate succession, and at the same time, he brought the number to three, which was the mark of the plural. (Dunand and Zivie-Coche)
[Pharaoh] Djoser’s Horus name, Most Divine of the Corporation (Netjerykhet), indicates that as early as Dynasty 3 the Egyptians may have ordered their deities into groups—“corporations”—and perhaps a little later into enneads, though triads did not become popular until the New Kingdom. (Hornung)
Dynasty 3 was ca. 2649–2575 B.C. (Department of Egyptian), which opens up the possibility that the Egyptians began grouping divinities before the tradition first appears in Sumer during the middle of the third millennium B.C., or at least in tandem with the Sumerians. The oldest statuary evidence of triads in Egypt belongs to Dynasty 4, ca. 2575–2465 B.C. (Department of Egyptian; “Triad of Menkaure”):
Egyptian religion also used the number three to signify a closed system which was both complete and interactive among its parts. The many triads of deities which developed from New Kingdom times provide clear examples of this, as do a number of group statues depicting the Egyptian king flanked by two deities — such as the famous Fourth Dynasty triads of Mycerinus [Menkaure] with [the goddess] Hathor and one of the various nome [district] deities. (Wilkinson, Symbol & Magic)
In the funerary complex were found some of the finest sculptures of the Pyramid Age, including a slate statue group of Menkaure and his sister-wife Khamerernebti II and a number of smaller slate triads representing Menkaure, the goddess Hathor, and various nome (district) deities. (Britannica, “Menkaure”)
This makes the Menkaure triads even older than the Pyramid Texts from Dynasty 5 and 6, where Osiris (of the famous Osiris-Isis-Horus triad) is first mentioned. Pharaoh Menkaure was also the builder of the last pyramid of Giza, which together with the other two larger pyramids there number a total of three. Solar symbolism also played an important role here:
Like the other gods, it was in the Pyramid Texts that Osiris was first mentioned in writing. . . .
. . .
The first representation of Osiris was found on a relief of king Djed-ka-ra Isesi of the Fifth Dynasty. (Mojsov)
The texts [Pyramid Texts], inscribed on the walls of the inner chambers of pyramids, are found at Ṣaqqārah in several 5th- and 6th-dynasty pyramids . . . . The texts constitute the oldest surviving body of Egyptian religious and funerary writings available to modern scholars. (Britannica, “Pyramid Texts”)
The kings of the early Old Kingdom built huge pyramid structures to make their power clear, and Sneferu even placed small pyramids throughout the provinces as local statements of the king’s presence. In the late Fifth Dynasty, Pyramid Texts are inscribed in the pyramid chambers and clearly state the identification of the deceased king with that of the god Osiris. (Sabbahy)
The pyramid-building pharaohs of the Old Kingdom considered themselves to be both the living Horus and the son of the solar god Re. From the 4th Dynasty onward their consorts and mothers were equated with Hathor, a solar goddess who had a double link with the Horus king as she could be either the wife of the adult Horus or the protective mother-cow who nourished the infant Horus and, by extension, suckled and protected all of Egypt’s pharaohs. A series of triads recovered from the Giza mortuary temple of Menkaure show the king and Hathor standing with various local deities: Hathor invariably wears a sheath dress and a headdress of cow horns and a solar disk. (Wilkinson, Tausret: Forgotten Queen)
The ancient Egyptian word for the pyramid was Mer. ‘Pyramid’ is derived from the Greek word pyramis which means ‘wheaten cake’, a term used by the Greeks to describe these buildings which they encountered many centuries later. Mer has traditionally been translated as ‘Place of Ascension’, and the pyramid may have been regarded as a means of access for the deceased king to reach heaven and also to return to his burial place where he could receive food offerings. The form of the true pyramid, with its smooth, sloping sides encased in white limestone, may have been an architectural attempt to re-create the sun’s ray descending from heaven to earth, along which the king could travel. The true pyramid appears to have had close connections with the sun-cult . . . . (David)
The proximity of Heliopolis – City of the Sun – to Memphis [capital of ancient Egypt] played an important part in the development of religion. The hold of the priesthood of Ra over the king grew progressively during the Old Kingdom. By the Fourth Dynasty, the worship of the sun emerged as the principal royal cult. Djed-ef-ra was the first to adopt the title Son of Ra. So powerful was the sun-cult that even the divine king did not dare usurp it for himself and was content to remain merely the son of the sun god. Instead, the verb for sunrise, “to appear in glory,” was used to mark the appearance of pharaoh on state occasions.
As the priests of Heliopolis rose in power, the idea of the sun began to dominate Egyptian models of thought. Gods and dead kings were still identified with stars, but the worship of the sun changed the concept of the afterlife. The creation of the true pyramid went hand in hand with the rise of the solar cult. The true pyramid embodied the idea of perfection of the primeval hill illuminated by sunlight streaming down from heaven.
The Egyptian word for pyramid was mer. The word “pyramid” was derived from the Greek pyramis, the original meaning of which is uncertain. The discovery of the true pyramid in monumental architecture was gradual. The first pyramid at Maidum, built by either Huni (2637–2613 BC) or Snofru (2613–2589 BC) in the late Third/early Fourth Dynasty, collapsed because its angle was too steep. It was later restored during the Middle Kingdom, the earliest example of monument conservation. (Mojsov)
Ra (Atum or Re) - The great sun god of Heliopolis whose cult spread across Egypt to become the most popular by the Fifth Dynasty (2498-2345 BCE). The pyramids of Giza are associated with Ra as the supreme lord and creator god who ruled over the land of the living and the dead. He drives his sun barge [boat] across the heavens by day, showing another aspect of himself with each advance of the sun across the sky . . . . Ra was among the most important and popular gods of Egypt. Even when the god Amun rose in prominence, Ra’s position was undiminished and he merged with Amun to become Amun-Ra, the supreme god. (Mark)
To convey a trinity of their highest god, the ancient Egyptians divided the sun into three phases, each representing one aspect of this god:
Sun worship is among the most primitive forms of religion and in his early devotions man apparently distinguished between the rising, the midday, and the setting sun. . . . The Egyptians divided the [sun] god into 3 distinct personalities: Horus, morning; Ra, noonday; and Atun, setting sun. . . .
The triplicity of rising, midday, and setting sun provides another instance where 3 is all: beginning, middle, and end. (Hopper)
. . . there were three aspects to the Egyptian sun god: Khepri (rising), Re (midday), and Atum (setting). In Christianity there is the Trinity of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Plato saw 3 as being symbolic of the triangle, the simplest spatial shape, and considered the world to have been built from triangles. (Stewart)
In Egyptian, three was the plural par excellence; two plus one, this was what the family triads represented. But three had many other implications in the interpretation of the divine system. We may recall that the nature of the gods was marked by a fundamental tripartition: the ba, the cult image, and the body or cadaver, which corresponded to the sky, the earth, and the netherworld. As Jan Assmann has put it, the dimensions of the divine were threefold: cosmic, cultic, and mythic. This triple character was expressed in the very modality of the gods’ existence: the denomination Khepri-Re-Atum encompasses the different aspects under which the sun god appeared, a modal trinity that was also expressed by the metaphor of the child in the morning, the young man at noon, and the old man in the evening. (Dunand and Zivie-Coche)
Triads were an important part of Egyptian religion, appearing either as one god expressed as three separate aspects (for example, the three forms of the sun-god associated with different times of the day), or as three distinct deities associated in a family group. (David)
Finally, the number three may have distinctly cyclical connotations. This undoubtedly resulted from the use of the number in the reckoning of time, for the Egyptian year was divided into three seasons, and each of the twelve months was divided into three tenday periods. Within the day itself, prayers and sacrifices were also offered three times in the temples. Representationally, this cyclical aspect of the number is seen in depictions of the three forms of the solar deity Khepri, Re, and Atum reigning over the morning, noon, and evening of the day, and in a number of other instances. (Wilkinson, Symbol & Magic)
The concept of plurality may also be linked with that of unity. For example, Egyptian art often portrays three forms of the solar deity together — the scarab beetle representing the god Khepri of the morning sun, the solar disk representing the daytime sun Re, and the ram-headed god Atum as the evening sun. In a similar manner, Amun, Re, and Ptah were said to be the soul, face, and body of god. (Wilkinson, Symbol & Magic)
The Egyptians believed that all life evolves from the sun, which generates light and warmth by its radiation and time by its movement. Everything that originates from and through the sun remains dependent on the sun; without the sun there would be no life on earth. Up to this point we ourselves would still subscribe to this view.
The next step, however, is not so easy for us to take. ‘To be dependent on’ means, in Egyptian thinking, ‘to be governed or ruled by.’ The sun rules as lord or king over the world. It emits not only light and time, but also dominion. We must not forget that the Egyptians founded the first large territorial state in human history, and the theology of primacy dates back to the origin of this state, around 3000 BCE. (Assmann, From Akhenaten to)
In Egypt, beginning at the end of the fourth millennium BCE, one sees the Pharaonic state as a very strong, centralized form of political organization where the king reigns as god, first as the incarnation of the god Horus and then also as the son of the sun and creator god Re. This state of affairs is reflected in the similarly centralized power structure of the pantheon, where Re reigns as king of the gods in the same way that Pharaoh reigns on earth. . . . As soon as Atum, the personification of preexistence, turns into existence and rises as the sun, he starts to rule over all that is emanating from him. (Assmann, Of God and)
The sun was conceived as a sphere that, on occasions, might need wings or a beetle to propel it across the heavens. It was regarded as an eternal and self-renewing force that consistently appeared on earth at dawn and disappeared again at sunset. In the Egyptian universe, this daily cycle was the most important natural event, and the other elements of creation were only present as a setting for the culminating act of creation – the first rising of the sun. (David)
Pythagoras
What is called “Greek philosophy” was not endemic to Greece, although the Greeks standardized the tradition and developed it further (“The History of”). Egyptologist Bill Manley argues for the presence of philosophy in Egypt from ancient texts belonging to Ptahhatp, a “philosopher” in the plainest sense of the word and precursor to the earliest Greek philosophers:
More than simply the oldest book, however, The Teaching of Ptahhatp is also the earliest complete statement of philosophy surviving from ancient Egypt and its author even provides us with the Egyptian phrase merut nefret that literally translates as ‘philo-sophy’ (‘wanting wisdom’ or ‘wanting the ideal’). In other words, The Teaching is the oldest surviving philosophy book from anywhere in the world. By contrast, the first few recorded scraps of Classical Greek philosophy would not appear for nearly two millennia more. . . . The author makes observations about consistent and repeated human behaviour in order to draw conclusions that have ‘not failed on this earth in all of time’. Accordingly, he contends, the world and everything in it have both structure and meaning because they have come into being through a creator’s intention. In other words, the origin of the laws of mathematics and physics that shape the world is also the origin of authority, justice and truth. (Manley)
He [Ptahhatp] provides the earliest—and arguably still the most concise—written statement of the philosophy that this world has a structure made up of certain inherent and unchanging facts, that the unfolding characteristics of reality we know as time and meaning have a purpose, and that we live here and now because there is nowhere else to be. (Manley)
Formally, The Teaching of Ptahhatp is . . . the most influential example of a genre of pharaonic literature titled ‘Teaching’ or ‘Instruction’ (sba’yet) by the ancient Egyptians themselves. The genre has its formal origin in the very earliest Egyptian funerary inscriptions, which became models for presenting yourself to the world after your death, and also offer comments about the final judgment of your conduct in life—comments that rely on truth (ma‘at) as the basis for justice. This funerary connection with ‘Teaching’ is not coincidental, as we shall see. Likewise, ‘Teaching’ insists on testable facts as the rational foundation for knowledge, wisdom and meaning. Particularly in its emphasis on the relationship of meaning to human life, we can recognize ‘Teaching’ as genuine philosophy. (Manley)
We need not agree with The Teaching of Ptahhatp but at least we may recognize that philosophy does not have its exclusive origin in classical Greece—that the determination of truth on empirical grounds, and the resolution of physics and metaphysics, were already possible for people in the so-called Stone Age, and that they are witnessed in Africa many centuries before they are attested in Europe. (Manley)
The influential Egyptologist Erik Hornung also arrived at a similar conclusion from his studies of Egyptian religion:
Central both to Egyptian ethics and to their religious thought was the concept of maat (a term often translated as ‘truth’ or ‘harmony’), which harked back to the original state of tranquillity at the moment of the creation of the universe. Hornung argued that Egyptian religion was among the first attempts to answer universal questions:
Along with the Sumerians, the Egyptians deliver our earliest—though by no means primitive—evidence of human thought . . . As far back as the third millennium B.C., the Egyptians were concerned with questions that return in later European [Greek] philosophy and that remain unanswered even today—questions about being and nonbeing, about the meaning of death, about the nature of cosmos and man, about the essence of time, about the basis of human society and the legitimation of power. (Shaw)
The concept of “maat” or harmonious truth is echoed in Greek philosophy. In Egypt, it was personified as the daughter of the sun god:
In the religion of ancient Egypt, the concept of maat (“order”) was crucial in human life and embraced notions of reciprocity, justice, truth, and moderation. Maat was personified as a goddess—the daughter of the sun god Re—and became the object of a dedicated cult. (Eldridge)
Maat, in ancient Egyptian religion, the personification of truth, justice, and the cosmic order. The daughter of the sun god Re, she was associated with Thoth, god of wisdom. (Britannica, “Maat”)
It should come as no surprise then that Pythagoras of the sixth century B.C., who is recognized by tradition as the first Greek to call himself a “philosopher,” is said to have spent over two decades learning in Egypt. In the centuries following Pythagoras, Egyptian influence continued to flow to Greece and vice versa. Naturally, this gave rise to syncretistic movements that incorporated both Egyptian and Greek features:
Likewise, the story is told of how Pythagoras was indeed the first man to call himself a philosopher. Others before had called themselves wise (sophos), but Pythagoras was the first to call himself a philosopher, literally a lover of wisdom. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
Here in Egypt he [Pythagoras] frequented all the temples with the greatest diligence, and most studious research, during which time he won the esteem and admiration of all the priests and prophets with whom he associated. Having most solicitously familiarized himself with every detail, he did not, nevertheless, neglect any contemporary celebrity, whether a sage renowned for wisdom, or a peculiarly performed mystery. He did not fail to visit any place where he thought he might discover something worthwhile. That is how he vis[i]ted all of the Egyptian priests, acquiring all the wisdom each possessed. He thus passed twenty-two years in the sanctuaries of temples, studying astronomy and geometry, and being initiated in no casual or superficial manner in all the mysteries of the Gods. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
The idea of the world as the embodiment of a soul-like god and of God as a soul animating the world remains central in Egyptian theology even after the New Kingdom and the flourishing of its theological discourse. We are dealing here with the origin of a conception of the divine which was to become supremely important in late antiquity: the “cosmic god,” the supreme deity in Stoicism, Hermeticism, and related movements,
whose head is the sky,
whose body is the air, whose feet are the earth.
You are the ocean.With this last quotation, we have entered another time and another language. This text and many similar ones are in Greek and date from late antiquity. They belong to a syncretistic religion combining elements of Egyptian theology with Stoicism, Neoplatonism, and various other influences.
In spite of all these changes, however, the theological discourse continues, and there is a remarkable consistency of questions and answers. Their most explicit codification is to be found in the texts forming the Corpus Hermeticum. The “pantheistic” motif of the One and the millions appears in the Greek texts as the One and the All, to hen kai to pan, or hen to pan, and so on, and in a Latin inscription for Isis as una quae es omnia. (Assmann, From Akhenaten to)
Pythagoras accustomed the minds of his successors to certain mysticisms, including philosophical notions about the number three. His nearest and likeliest inspiration would have been Egypt. These ideas were carried forward by Greek philosophy and made their way into early Christianity:
In the early part of the twentieth century, the great German Egyptologist Kurt Sethe showed that quite a few numbers were regarded as sacred or “holy” by the Egyptians, but this element of sanctity and significance was accorded the numbers themselves only inasmuch as abstract principles had become associated with them. This is especially true of some of the primary integers which serve as the basic building blocks of most computation and numerical description — especially 2, 3, and 4 (and also 7) and their direct multiples, for most other numbers with symbolic significance for the Egyptians are simply multiples or combinations of these.
. . . The number one, for example, quite naturally appears as a symbol of individuality or pre-eminence in many contexts, and especially in relation to the deities who are described in terms of their unique importance and “oneness,” particularly when the god is viewed as being primary in the process of creation — the monad from which all else descended. But even here the one contains a plurality, for although the creator god initially stands alone, he soon produces offspring who are inherent within him and eventually makes himself into millions. The one contains and becomes many, and one may thus represent the unity of many as much as it represents individuality or uniqueness. The number one may also be seen as a fusion of two or more separate entities or principles, and there are thus androgynous deities such as Atum and Neith containing male and female aspects, or gods embracing apparent opposites such as the single deity, Heruifi, with the head of both Horus and Seth, or Osiris and Re fused as the body and spirit of one god — with the mummiform body of the netherworld god and the ram’s head of the sun god. (Wilkinson, Symbol & Magic)
In what may be the earliest attempt to trace specific doctrines to the Near Eastern sojourns traditionally ascribed to Pythagoras, Plutarch suggests the possibility that Pythagoras’s numerological, dietary, and other teachings had Egyptian origins. He says, in an essay about the Egyptian gods, that “the wisest of the Greeks” (Solon, Thales, Plato, Eudoxus, Pythagoras, and perhaps Lycurgus) had traveled to Egypt and spent time with its priests. According to Plutarch, Pythagoras in particular developed a close relationship with Oenuphis and other priests, admiring and emulating them. In the Pythagorean association of certain numbers with certain Greek gods (Apollo [the sun god] is one, Athena is seven, and Poseidon eight), he finds echoes of Egyptian numerological beliefs. Plutarch is also fascinated by, and detects Egyptian influence in, Pythagoras’s habit of encapsulating wisdom in enigmatic or abstruse sayings. (Joost-Gaugier)
In our cultural sphere, that is, the Jewish, Christian, and Islamic one, the interest in numbers and their specialties is mainly based on foundations laid by the Pythagoreans. Born in the sixth century B.C.E. on the island of Samos, Pythagoras emigrated in 532 B.C.E. to Kroton in southern Italy to escape Polycrates the tyrant. He may have lived for some time in the East, particularly in Egypt, where he would have learned something of the mathematical knowledge of the ancient East.
Every school child learns the Pythagorean theorem of the right triangle . . . but just as this formula is part and parcel of our mathematical knowledge, other ideas of the master and his disciples have influenced religious, literary, and even magical works. (Schimmel)
With the beginnings of Biblical exegesis in Alexandria[,] Pythagorean and Platonic methods were introduced by Philo Judaeus to help interpret biblical numbers. In the hands of Augustine [of Hippo] numerical exegesis became a sophisticated technical skill. . . . Numerical exegesis went far beyond interpretation of the obviously significant biblical numbers. Every number used in the Bible in however seemingly trivial a context was scrutinised for its meaning. . . . The Pythagorean Decad acquired new Christian connotations, and numbers not necessarily stressed in the Bible became significant, for example 3 (the Trinity—a non-biblical doctrine perhaps influenced by Pythagoreanism), 4 (the gospels), 33 (the years of Christ’s life). (Rivers)
. . . the groups of 3 that are found throughout the Bible and other literary sources, both elite and popular, function as round numbers rather than “mystical” ones, whether these are the 3 sons of Adam or Noah, the 3 best knights, the 3 strongest giants, or the 3 best lovers. (Schimmel)
As the founding axiom of every mathematical theology, this doctrine of the mathematical Trinity – God as unity, equality, and connection – merits special attention.
We can spy the origins of this triad in the first stirrings of Greek Neopythagoreanism, well before the Neoplatonism of Plotinus. . . . Augustine [of Hippo] . . . casually repeats a similar triad in De doctrina christiana: “In the Father there is unity (unitas), in the Son equality (equalitas), and in the Holy Spirit a harmony (concordia) of unity and equality.” (Brill’s Companion to)
Ancient Christian theologians did not shy away from mathematical language about Christ, despite concerns that Neopythagoreanism was a crypto-Gnosticism. (Brill’s Companion to)
The Pythagoreans revered numbers and identified the number three as the “Triad”:
The earliest known systematic cult based on the rule of numbers was that of the Pythagoreans. Pythagoras was a Greek who thrived in the 6th century BCE. . . .
The Pythagoreans invested specific numbers with mystical properties. The number 1 symbolized unity and the origin of all things, since all other numbers can be created from 1 by adding enough copies of it. . . . A single point corresponds to 1, a line to 2 (because a line has two extremities), a triangle to 3 . . . . (Stewart)
The same reasons apply to their use of other numbers, which were ranked according to certain powers. Things that had a beginning, middle and end they denoted by the number Three, saying that anything that has a middle is triform, which was applied to every perfect thing. They said that if anything was perfect it would make use of this principle, and be adorned according to it; and as they had no other name for it, they invented the form, Triad, and whenever they tried to bring us to the knowledge of what is perfect they led us to that by the form of this Triad. So also with the other numbers, where were ranked according to the same reasons. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
. . . the Triad not only binds together the Two, but also, in the process, centrally reflects the nature of the One in a “microcosmic” and balanced fashion. . . .
What we have seen in this example of Pythagorean paradigm, based on the universal principles of pure Number and Form, is the emergence of Duality out of Unity, and the subsequent unification of duality, which in turn results in a dynamic, differentiated image of the One in three parts一a continuum of beginning, middle and end, or of two extremes bound together with a mean term. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
Because Pythagorean science [philosophy] possessed a sacred dimension, Number is seen not only as a universal principle, it is a divine principle as well. . . . It should be very firmly emphasized, however, that for Pythagoras the scientific [philosophical] and religious dimensions of number were never at odds with each other. . . .
The Pythagoreans believed that Number is “the principle, the source and the root of all things.” But to make things more explicit: the Monad, or Unity, is the principle of Number. In other words, the Pythagoreans did not see One as a number at all, but as the principle underlying number, which is to say that numbers—especially the first ten—may be seen as manifestations of diversity in a unified continuum. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
Number is the first principle, a thing which is undefined, incomprehensible, having in itself all numbers which could reach infinity in amount. And the first principle of numbers is in substance the first Monad, which is a male monad, begetting as a father all other numbers. Secondly the Dyad is a female number, and the same is called by the arithmeticians even. Thirdly the Triad is a male number; this the arithmeticians have been wont to call odd. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
Curiously, and in line with Pythagorean number mysticism, Egyptian triads were often composed of a male (father), a female (mother), and a male (child).
The Pythagoreans also associated the number three with the form of the triangle and three-dimensionality, something Egyptian pyramids are visual representations of:
The three-in-one idea was given its simplest expression by the Pythagoreans, who adopted the triangle, “the most perfect geometrical figure, inasmuch as it was the first form complete in itself.” It was only natural therefore that the number 3, being graphically represented by the Greek mathematicians by a triangle (a figure composed of 3 lines, 3 angles, its angles measured in 3 ways, and only 3), which was regarded as perfect, should on account of this representation also come to be regarded as the perfect number. There were also other considerations that tended to deepen this conviction, the fact that 3 is the sum of the mystic 1 and of the mystic 2, that is, could not be divided, and was therefore like the gods, immortal, perfect, sacred. (Lease)
At any rate, 3 is particular and special beyond all other numbers in respect of being equal to the numbers which precede it. (Iamblichus)
. . . geometry falls under the triad, not only because it is concerned with three-dimensionality and its parts and kinds, but also because it was characteristic of this teacher [Pythagoras] always to call surfaces (which they used to term ‘colors’) the limiters of geometry, on the grounds that geometry concerns itself primarily with planes, but the most elementary plane is contained by a triad, either of angles or of lines; and when depth is added, from this as a base to a single point, then in turn the most elementary of solids, the pyramid, is formed, which (even though in itself it is encompassed by at least four angles or surfaces) is fitted together by virtue of three equal dimensions . . . . (Iamblichus)
The pyramid itself, the “radiant place of the king,” was seen as a physical expression of the otherworldly realm. . . . The pure, geometric shape had become the architectural equivalent of the cosmic perfection. The proportions suggested the majestic, immutable existence to which the king would ascend. The orientation of the pyramids and the chambers inside them reflected the movement of the sun and the stars. . . . The soul descended into the netherworld in the west, came to rest in the sarcophagus chamber – “the most secret place” – and rose with the sun in the east. (Mojsov)
With the addition of the third pyramid of Menkaura [also Menkaure] (2532–2503 BC) the sight of Giza was complete. It was a heroic vision, the perfect, geometric shapes and the human-faced lion [the Great Sphinx] towering above the sands in the blazing sun. (Mojsov)
Another important geometric shape corresponded to the number one (the Monad), represented as a point and three-dimensionally as a sphere. Pythagoras and his followers chose this primordial point or sphere for the shape of the world, the gods, etc. Like the theological developments in ancient Egypt, Pythagoras worshipped many gods, but at the same time one god (the Monad):
Pythagoras worshipped the One [Monad], but was still able to discern, beside the One, enveloped by the One, the changing many . . . . (Hack)
The Pythagorean world view is a graduated, hierarchical one, with every stage filled by appropritate [sic] beings: Divinities [gods], lesser Gods, daimons, heroes, geniuses. [sic] etc. . . . Far better to worship the One [Monad] within, but to recognize and cooperate with those beings who have to maintain the world against mankind’s best efforts to spoil it. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
He [Pythagoras] ordained that his disciples should speak well and think reverently of the Gods, daimons, and heroes, and likewise of parents and benefactors; that they should obey the laws; that they should not relegate the worship of the Gods to a secondary position, but should perform it eagerly, even at home; that to the celestial divinities [gods] they should sacrifice uncommon offerings, and ordinary ones to the inferior deities [gods]. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
In speaking of superior natures [gods], he [Pythagoras] used honorable appellations, and words of good omen, on every occasion mentioning and reverencing the Gods; so, while at supper, he performed libations to the divinities [gods], and taught his disciples daily to celebrate the superior beings [gods] with hymns. He attended likewise to rumors and omens, prophecies and lots, and in short to all unexpected circumstances. Moreover, he sacrificed to the Gods with millet, cakes, honey-combs, and fumigations. . . .
Another indication of the honor he paid the Gods was his teaching that his disciples must never use the names of the divinities uselessly in swearing. (The Pythagorean Sourcebook)
The Monad was identified with fire and light, like the all-encompassing sun god in ancient Egypt:
Pythagoras, working thus far along the same line of thought, proposed divine Fire as the cosmogenetic god, the source of immortal life and the substance of the universe. And then Pythagoras identified the divine Fire with the divine One [Monad], and by this puzzling identification of substance with number caused endless trouble to all who attempt to understand Pythagoreanism without being Pythagoreans. (Hack)
The obvious contrast to the One [Monad] is the many . . . and “the many” is the regular expression employed by Greek philosophers to signify the multitude of diverse things in the universe. The Pythagorean One is not a mere number; it is an affirmation of divine causal Unity set against the plurality of changing things within the cosmos. When Pythagoras asserted that the supreme god was the One, he did not in the least intend to deny that the supreme god was Fire and was the source of all life and of the universe; he accepted all these beliefs, and sought to improve the definition of the supreme god, thus obtained, by emphasizing his conviction that the supreme god was also the One and the source of all unity, as well as the first cause of all numbers and the determining principle in all diversity. (Hack)
Our supreme god [in Pythagoreanism] is the one Fire [the Monad]; the Stars, the Planets, and the Sun are clearly of kindred fire, and are the principal subordinate gods . . . . (Hack)
Three, when added together with the preceding two (the Dyad) and one (the Monad), resulted in six (the Hexad), the first perfect number to the Pythagoreans (not excluding three, of course, which preceded it and was also regarded as perfect); interestingly, the addition occurs once three is reached and is suggestive of unity in three. Six, exalted three times in Egyptian and Pythagorean fashion, gives 666:
The hexad is the first perfect number; for it is counted by its own parts, as containing a sixth, a third and a half. (Iamblichus)
Moreover, the triad makes 6 by the addition of the monad, dyad and itself, and 6 is the first perfect number. (Iamblichus)
. . . the triad’s perfection is also found contingently in the hexad (for 2+2+2 is again beginning, middle and end), but the hexad’s perfection is not to be found in the triad (for its parts are defective in relation to the whole); and we find that, by nature and not by our own hypotheses, quantities occur in triads and that in the adding of numbers these quantities give the total aggregate, right up to infinity, a hexadic identity. For the first triad of quantities, 1, 2, 3, is given its identity by the hexad itself . . . . (Iamblichus)
By a wonderful conjunction of mathematical coincidences, 6 is both the sum (1 + 2 + 3) and the product (1 × 2 × 3) of the first three numbers. It is therefore considered “perfect.” In mathematics, a perfect number is one that equals the sum of its divisors (excluding itself), and 6 is the first perfect number in this sense because its divisors are 1, 2, and 3. (Stewart)
The Stoics
The Stoics were among a group of philosophers encountered by Paul in Athens (Acts 17:18), the intellectual center of Greece. They taught Stoicism and believed in a god that was many gods, similar to the aforementioned Egyptian and Pythagorean concepts:
Meanwhile, [in Athens] the philosophy schools flourished. Plato (c. 428–348/347 BCE) established himself in the Academy, a gymnasium that had existed since at least the 6th century BCE in the great olive grove about a mile west of the city. Plato himself had a house and garden nearby. Aristotle and his Peripatetics occupied the Lyceum, another gymnasium, just outside the city to the east, and his successor Theophrastus lived nearby. Antisthenes and the Cynics used the Cynosarges gymnasium to the southeast of the city. Zeno held forth in the heart of the city, in the Stoa Poikile, in the Agora, and his followers were therefore known as Stoics. Epicurus and his followers had a house and garden in town. (Vanderpool and Ehrlich)
The Stoic answer to the question of the nature of god, or the gods, is rather complex and can be characterized as an at first sight perhaps surprising mixture of pantheism, theism, and polytheism. According to a famous common Stoic description of god, god is
an immortal living being, rational, perfect and thinking in happiness, unreceptive of anything bad and provident with regard to the cosmos and the things therein. But he is not of human form. He is the demiurge of the whole and as it were the father of all things, both in general and insofar as the part of him is concerned which pervades all things, and which is called by many names, corresponding to its powers.
The first part of this description is clearly tailored to fit a monotheistic conception of a single cosmic god. The last sentence, however, makes room for a form of polytheism as well, in allowing also the visible partial manifestations of this one god to be called by many names. Indeed, Zeno [the founder of Stoicism] already appears to have argued that the stars, but also years and months – in short, spatial and temporal parts of the one and eternal god – may be considered as gods. This explains why in Stoicism ‘god’ or ‘the gods’ are in many contexts interchangeable. (The Cambridge Companion)
Zeno [the founder of Stoicism] argued that the cosmos taken as a whole is God, and declared that the parts of the cosmos, especially the aether and the heavenly bodies, are gods. Cleanthes [a Stoic philosopher], who composed his famous Hymn and wrote an On Gods, declared the aether and the mind and soul of the cosmos and the heavenly bodies to be God and gods. (The Cambridge History of Hellenistic)
But they [the Stoics] found a place for the Olympian [Greek] pantheon by interpreting the individual gods as names of natural phenomena (Hera or Juno is ‘air’) which are divine manifestations of the one ultimate deity, Nature, whose name is also Zeus. Fundamentally, Stoic theology is pantheist. (Long)
Understandably, Paul chose to summarize the philosophers as a superstitious bunch:
Acts 17:21-23
King James Version
21 (For all the Athenians and strangers which were there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing.)22 Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars' hill, and said, Ye men of Athens [philosophers], I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious.
23 For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, To The Unknown God. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you.
Philo
As the early church spread from Jerusalem, it made its way to nearby Alexandria, Egypt. Like Athens, Alexandria was a great intellectual center, attracting philosophers. Philo Judaeus was a Jewish philosopher from Alexandria and a contemporary of Paul. He fused Judaism with Greek philosophy by skillfully borrowing from Pythagoreanism and other related philosophies:
The church spread with astonishing rapidity. Already in the Acts of the Apostles its movement from one headquarters to another can be traced: Jerusalem, Damascus, and Antioch; the missions of St. Paul to Asia Minor (Tarsus, Iconium, Ephesus, and Cyprus); the crossing to Macedonia (Philippi and Thessalonica) and Achaea (Athens and Corinth); and the beginnings in Rome. Other early evidence tells of more churches in Asia Minor and of Christians in Alexandria. (Britannica, “history of early”)
The history of Christian philosophy begins not with a Christian but with a Jew, Philo of Alexandria, elder contemporary of St Paul. (The Cambridge History of Later)
This high ethical monotheism [of Judaism] Philo fuses with the transcendentalist theology of Platonism. Strictly speaking, Philo is uncommitted to any single set of philosophical principles. He is an eclectic, and although he has swallowed a great deal of Plato he is not uncritical. For the most part, however, his eclecticism is not his personal construction. Before him philosophers had found it possible to reconcile the vitalistic cosmos of the Stoics with the transcendentalist world-view of the Platonists. His Jewish monotheism made especially congenial to him both the Stoic conception of the immanent divine power pervading the world as a vital force and the transcendent, supra-cosmic God of Plato. So he takes for granted the broad Platonic picture of this sensible world as an uneven reflection of the intelligible order; and he also looks beyond Plato to Pythagoras, the mystique of whose name had been steadily growing during the previous century. Pythagoreanism was particularly liked by Philo for its cryptic symbolism, its allegorical interpretations of poetic myth, its gnomic morality, its advocacy of self-discipline as a preparation for immortality, and above all its speculations about the mysterious significance of numbers . . . . Philo was no dabbler in the occult (as some Neopythagoreans were). But to represent Judaism as resembling an esoteric and slightly exotic philosophical tradition of pre-Platonic origin was skilful apologetic to the contemporary Hellenistic world.
Accordingly, Philo sets out to unite the personalist language of much of the Bible with the more impersonal and abstract terminology of the Platonists and Pythagoreans. God is the One or Monad, the ultimate ground of being beyond all multiplicity. (The Cambridge History of Later)
The next important phase of Platonism, Middle Platonism or pre-Neoplatonism, was significant through the influence that it exerted in more than one direction. In the direction of Jewish culture . . . it formed the Greek philosophical background of the efforts of Philo Judaeus (Philo of Alexandria) to create a philosophical system on the basis of the Hebrew Bible heritage. Though the origins of Middle Platonism are obscure, its main direction became clear in the 1st century CE. It seems to have been linked from the beginning with the closely related revival of Pythagoreanism (a philosophy holding that reality is number, and sometimes showing, after the revival, a tendency to superstitious occultism). (Armstrong and Blumenthal)
The association of gender to numbers, the infatuation with perfect numbers, triangular numbers, square numbers, etc., and the general imbuing of numbers with specific qualities was an integral part of Pythagorean “mathematics”. Plato, who maintained that mathematics is a crucial tool in uncovering universal truths, played a significant role in inspiring others to study mathematics; his metaphysical use of mathematics continued the Pythagorean tradition. (Architecture and Mathematics)
In Philo, the Jewish school of Alexandria reached its height. In his writings, Philo, an orthodox Jew, tried to reconcile Judaism with Greek philosophy. (Mojsov)
Given the thriving philosophical climate of Alexandria, it is no surprise Philo leaned heavily into philosophy to answer doctrinal questions:
The thought of ancient Egypt, sifted through the cosmopolitan culture of Alexandria, had found its way into the future. Although Alexandria had become no more than a provincial capital after the Roman conquest, her philosophy thrived. All three groups of her citizens – Egyptians, Greeks, and Jews – gave a significant contribution to the new religions and philosophies that sprang up around the turn of the era. (Mojsov)
Thus, Alexandria can be viewed as the bridge between Egypt and later Roman Christianity:
Without abandoning our principle that Egyptian influence made itself felt as an undercurrent throughout Hellenism [Greek heritage and ideals], we may nevertheless claim pride of place for Alexandria and so consider Alexandrian theology as the intermediary between the Egyptian religious heritage and [Roman] Christianity. (Morenz)
A number of Christians were convinced that there was much of value in Greek philosophy and that it was capable of providing insights into Christianity itself. Biblical passages were invoked to reinforce this attitude: just as the Lord had instructed Moses to plunder the wealth of the Egyptians (Exodus 3:22, 11:2, and 12:35), so Christians might use pagan thought to better comprehend Sacred Scripture. Moreover, just as David slew Goliath with the latter’s own sword (1Samuel 17:51), so should Christians use the words and ideas of the pagan philosophers . . . .
From such ideas, Christians developed the concept that philosophy and science are “handmaids to theology,” an idea that had been developed earlier by Philo Judaeus (ca. 25 BC–AD 50), a Hellenized Jew who lived in Alexandria, Egypt. Philo had urged that Greek philosophy be used to understand revealed theology. Numerous Greek Church fathers – among whom were Clement of Alexandria, Gregory Nazianzen, Saint Basil, John of Damascus (John Damascene) – embraced this attitude toward pagan learning. In addressing his fellow Christians, Clement, for example, declared “We shall not err in alleging that all things necessary and profitable for life came to us from God, and that philosophy more especially was given to the Greeks, as a covenant peculiar to them, being, as it were, a stepping-stone to the philosophy according to Christ.” (Grant)
Those who were instrumental in shaping the attitudes of the early Church toward pagan philosophy, and especially natural philosophy are known collectively as the Church Fathers. (Grant)
Tertullian
The word “Trinity” (“Trinitas” in Latin) is not found anywhere in Scripture and was first introduced by Tertullian, a leader of the early church in Africa. How Tertullian arrived at this new vocabulary is very telling:
. . . as the initiator of ecclesiastical Latin, [Tertullian] was instrumental in shaping the vocabulary and thought of Western Christianity. He is one of the Latin Apologists of the 2nd century. (Wilken)
Tertullian emerged as a leading member of the African church, using his talents as a teacher in instructing the unbaptized seekers and the faithful and as a literary defender (Apologist) of Christian beliefs and practices. (Wilken)
Tertullian was the first who coined the Latin term trinitas [trinity] for the description of the three divine entities in his doctrine of the Trinity. . . .
The term triad must have been in common use in philosophy and religion for the definition of principles in the world and for the worship of gods.[64] Greek philosophy abounds in the concept of triads or three entities. The term was also used to describe various abstractions, for example, “flesh, souls, spirit,” and “the sacred Triad faith, hope, love.” It goes back to Pythagoras and can be found in many cultures as representing groupings of three divinities. . . .
. . . The question arises, however, whether Tertullian developed this idea of a triune divinity by himself or was inspired by other sources. Tertullian shows in his writings enormous erudition and knowledge of cultures and literatures of his time, a familiarity with Egyptian religion and with mystery religions, Greek as well as Egyptian. He mentions in De Corona, De Pallio, and in Adversus Marcionem the story of Osiris and Isis. In his Apology he mentions the triad of Sarapis, Isis, and Harpocrates. In De Anima he alludes to the Egyptian hermetic writings. So it is only natural and logical to infer that he was influenced by the surrounding culture with which he was intimately acquainted. He found useful the Egyptian concept of the trinity for interpretation of the Christian biblical mythology and, at the same time, explained it in metaphysical terms using the Middle Platonic Logos doctrine and the Stoic logical categories.
[64]Aristotle in his De Caelo says: “For, as the Pythagoreans say, the world and all that is in it is determined by the number three, since the beginning, middle and end give the number of an ‘all,’ and the number they give is the triad. And so, having taken these three from nature as (so to speak) laws of it, we make further use of the number three in the worship of the Gods.” . . . (Hillar)
Finally, there is the Egyptian tradition, where we find for the first time in the Mediterranean region the religious mythical concept of the tri-unity, thus operating an approach to God at a personal level. Tertullian combined this with Greek abstract thought into a trinitarian synthesis. (Hillar)
The Shema and the one God of Israel
The Shema is considered the most important commandment, confirmed by Christ himself:
Mark 12:28-34
King James Version
28 And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first [most important] commandment of all?29 And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord:
30 And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.
31 And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.
32 And the scribe said unto him, Well, Master, thou hast said the truth: for there is one God; and there is none other but he:
33 And to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.
34 And when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly [wisely], he said unto him, Thou art not far from the kingdom of God. And no man after that durst ask him any question.
Notice the use of singular male pronouns to identify God as a single individual, namely the father of Christ. Had the scribe above been incorrect in his understanding of who God was, Christ would have certainly corrected him, but instead he commended him:
That the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is the one God of Israel is both assumed and asserted throughout the Synoptic Gospels and Acts. Clear examples of this come in the references to the Shema, which begins: ‘Hear, O Israel: YHWH our God, YHWH is one’ (Deut. 6:4). (The Oxford Handbook)
Neither the word “Trinity” nor the explicit doctrine appears in the New Testament, nor did Jesus and his followers intend to contradict the Shema in the Hebrew Scriptures: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord” (Deuteronomy 6:4). (Britannica, “Trinity”)
It is noteworthy that the Shema appears in Deuteronomy, after Israel’s departure from Egypt. Having lived extensively in Egypt, the Israelites must have been very familiar with the abounding concept of triads/trinities, urging God to clarify the record about who he was.
There are numerous places in Scripture which make apparent that the God of the Bible, who no one has seen, is the very real father of Christ:
John 1:18
King James Version
No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.
Matthew 5:8
King James Version
Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God [the Father].
Revelation 22:1-4
King James Version
1 And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God [the Father] and of the Lamb [Christ].2 In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
3 And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him:
4 And they shall see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads.
Revelation 14:1
King James Version
And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four thousand, having his Father's name written in their foreheads.
John 8:54
King James Version
Jesus answered, If I honour myself, my honour is nothing: it is my Father that honoureth me; of whom ye say, that he is your God:
John 4:23
King James Version
But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him.
John 5:22-23
King James Version
22 For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son:23 That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him.
Colossians 1:12-21 King James Version 12 Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light:
13 Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:
14 In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins:
15 Who is the image of the invisible God [the Father], the firstborn of every creature [Christ]:
16 For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:
17 And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.
18 And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence.
19 For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell;
20 And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.
21 And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled
22 In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight:
2 Corinthians 11:3-4
King James Version
3 But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.4 For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him.
Mark 10:17-18
King James Version
17 And when he was gone forth into the way, there came one running, and kneeled to him, and asked him, Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?18 And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God [the Father].
John 14:28
King James Version
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 20:17
King James Version
Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.
Mark 13:31-33
King James Version
31 Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my words shall not pass away.32 But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but [only] the Father.
33 Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is.
Matthew 24:36
King James Version
But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.
Far from a mystery, the Bible plainly states that the identity of God has been revealed and this was in fact included in the mission of Christ, his very son from before the world was established:
1 John 5:20
King James Version
And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him [God] that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God [the Father of Christ], and eternal life.
1 Corinthians 8:5-6
King James Version
5 For though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be gods many, and lords many,)6 But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.
Acts 7:55-56
King James Version
55 But he [Stephen], being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God [the Father],56 And said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.
Ephesians 1:10-13
King James Version
10 That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he [the Father] might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:
12 That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.
13 In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,
1 Corinthians 15:23-24
King James Version
23 But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming.24 Then cometh the end, when he [Christ] shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.
1 Corinthians 15:28
King James Version
And when all things shall be subdued unto him [the Father], then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.
Colossians 1:2-3
King James Version
2 To the saints and faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colosse: Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.3 We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you,
Ephesians 1:2-3
King James Version
2 Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:
1 Timothy 2:3-5
King James Version
3 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour;4 Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.
5 For there is one God [the Father], and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;
Malachi 2:10
King James Version
Have we not all one father? hath not one God created us? why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, by profaning the covenant of our fathers?
Ephesians 4:6
King James Version
One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.
James 2:19
King James Version
Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.
Romans 3:29-31
King James Version
29 Is he [the Father] the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also:30 Seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith.
31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.
This presents an obvious problem for most of Christianity and trinitarianism, and so to solve it the Roman Catholic Church rejects what the ancient Hebrews plainly say on the matter:
The Trinity is a mystery of faith in the strict sense, one of the “mysteries that are hidden in God, which can never be known unless they are revealed by God”. To be sure, God has left traces of his Trinitarian being in his work of creation and in his Revelation throughout the Old Testament. But his inmost Being as Holy Trinity is a mystery that is inaccessible to reason alone or even to Israel’s faith before the Incarnation of God’s Son and the sending of the Holy Spirit. (Catechism of the)
Conclusion
The beginnings of the Trinity can be felt most notably in Egypt, where the concept of “one and many” triads or trinities was first advanced. Triads also appear there more often than anywhere else. Starting in Alexandria, Egypt, these philosophical notions began encroaching into Judaism thanks to Philo Judaeus. Centuries after Philo, once again in Alexandria, the matter of the identity of God and of Christ was debated, this time by a certain Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria. His influence and the events that followed are quite complex and difficult to cover in closing, but they resulted in the Trinity becoming a normative belief within Roman Christianity, supported by the prior notions of Greek philosophy and the latent influence of ancient Egypt.
The [Protestant] Reformation, though it produced a radical movement focused on reforming the theological doctrines, in its main core movement it did not reform the main theological doctrines. Thus, the Protestant churches inherited the Catholic trinitarian doctrine. . . .
. . .
Many theories were developed trying to interpret mythical statements found in the scriptures according to the feelings, attitude, and intellectual background of the author. Christian writers tried to reconcile these statements using the various religious and philosophical doctrines current at the time of the interpreter. In the time of Tertullian, we already find fully developed Logos theories based on Middle Platonic doctrines. . . . The proper approach would be to find out what the statements found in the scriptures meant for the writers of these scriptures. However, this was not the chosen approach and each author interpreted the scriptures and developed his own theory according to his emotional or intellectual preferences. (Hillar)
Our opponents sometimes claim that no belief should be held dogmatically which is not explicitly stated in scripture (ignoring that it is only on the authority of the Church we recognize certain Gospels and not others as true). But the Protestant churches have themselves accepted such dogmas as the Trinity for which there is no such precise authority in the Gospels. . . . it is our [the Church] claim that Tradition alone—founded on the Apostles’ teaching, analyzed and reflected on through the ages by the Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit promised by Christ—illumines the full and true meaning of the Scriptures. (Greene)
Leviticus 18:2-3
King James Version
2 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, I am the Lord your God.3 After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt, shall ye not do: and after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall ye not do: neither shall ye walk in their ordinances.
Joshua 24:14
King James Version
Now therefore fear the Lord, and serve him in sincerity and in truth: and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the flood, and in Egypt; and serve ye the Lord.
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