Non-Trinitarianism
Outside historic orthodoxy
Any teaching that denies the one God exists eternally as three persons, usually by denying that the Son or the Spirit is fully God.
Also called: Non-Trinitarian, Nontrinitarian, antitrinitarian, Unitarianism, Unitarian
What it means
Non-Trinitarianism is a broad label for teachings that reject the doctrine of the Trinity. Some hold that only the Father is God and that Jesus is a created being, however exalted, or a man especially empowered by God. Many also teach that the Holy Spirit is not a person but God's power or influence. Unitarian groups, and several religious movements that arose in the nineteenth century, hold forms of this view.
Those who hold it often believe they are restoring a simpler, purer faith that later councils corrupted. They usually appeal to the oneness of God and to passages that describe the Son's dependence on the Father.
Historic Christianity has always confessed that the Son and the Spirit are fully God with the Father. The church did not invent the Trinity at Nicaea; it put into words what the apostles preached and what Christians had always done in worshiping Jesus and being baptized into the name of the Father, Son, and Spirit.
What Scripture says
The Word was with God and was God, not a lesser being.
Thomas confesses Jesus as "my Lord and my God," and Jesus accepts it.
Believers wait for the appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.
To lie to the Holy Spirit is to lie to God.
The Lord says he is the first and the last, and besides him there is no God.
Jesus calls himself the First and the Last, the title the Lord claims in Isaiah.
What is wrong with it
Scripture gives the Son the names, works, and worship that belong to God alone. He is called God, he created all things, he forgives sins, he receives worship, and he bears the title "the First and the Last" that the Lord claims for himself. The Spirit is lied to as God, grieved as a person, and named alongside the Father and Son in the one name of baptism. To deny their deity is to set aside large parts of the New Testament.
How it undermines the truth
It undermines the gospel. Only God can save, and only one who is truly God could bear the weight of sin and satisfy divine justice. A created Christ could not reveal the Father fully, could not give eternal life, and could not be worthy of worship. If the Spirit is only a force, he cannot indwell, intercede, or love us as a person. And to worship Christ, as the church always has, would be idolatry.
How it can harm a church
A church that denies the Trinity is not a Christian church in the historic sense, however warm or moral it may be. Its members are taught to trust a Savior who is not God, and to approach God without the Mediator he provided. They are cut off from the worship, prayer, and assurance that flow from knowing the Father through the Son by the Spirit.
This page describes a teaching, not the faith of any person who holds it.
Where it comes up
Confessions: Nicene Creed; Athanasian Creed; WCF 2.3; LBCF 1689 2.3
On this site: Trinity
Related terms
TrinityHistoric orthodoxy
There is one God, eternally existing in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each fully and equally God.
ArianismOutside historic orthodoxy
The ancient teaching that the Son of God is the first and greatest created being, not eternal and not fully God.
ModalismOutside historic orthodoxy
The teaching that God is one person who appears in three modes or roles, as Father, Son, and Spirit, rather than three distinct persons.
AdoptionismOutside historic orthodoxy
The teaching that Jesus was an ordinary man whom God adopted as his Son, usually at his baptism or resurrection, rather than the eternal Son who became man.
Nicene CreedHistoric orthodoxy
The creed of the councils of Nicaea (325) and Constantinople (381), confessing that the Son and the Spirit are fully God with the Father.