I’ve just never got all that excited about trying to understand the Trinity.
For me, the Trinity is like the internal combustion engine. Guys explain it to me and I just nod and try to look cool but I don’t really care. The Trinity works for me if I don’t look at it too closely.
But when people starting talking about how the different persons interact within The Person… Or worse yet when they talk about an egg, or steam and water and ice I just get all glazey-eyed. Sometimes the Emergent crowd talks about the perichoretic dance. All that comes to mind is Aaron Copeland’s Appalachian Spring.
Even so, I don’t want to dismiss the mystery. God exists in the realm of the unseen and unknowable together with particle physics and cell phone transmissions. I like it that way. I like getting brain cramps trying to fit the Old Testament Big Mean Deity in the same box with Jesus Surrounded By Happy Children. They don’t fit. But that says more about my box than it does about God.
Nick Norelli has inspired a wonderful collection of essays by bloggers on the subject of the Trinity. You can access all the articles by starting here: 2008 Trinity Blogging Summit (TOC). I’m looking forward to reading all these articles and maybe, just maybe, I might join in on the perichoretic dance.
I leave you with one of the most beautiful Trinitarian statements in the Bible, 2 Corinthians 13:13:
Ἡ χάρις τοῦ κυρίου Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ
καὶ ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ θεοῦ
καὶ ἡ κοινωνία τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος
μετὰ πάντων ὑμῶν.
In honor of Nick and the Trinitarian essayists, today I recorded a setting of those words to music. I composed this about six years ago but have never got around to recording it. This is a rough demo and I’d appreciate suggestions on pronunciation. If I’m lucky I might try to get into a studio next week and do a prettier recording.
Use this player to listen to the 29 second demo:
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You can download the mp3 here (458K):
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Lovely musical rendition of the verse, Lingamish. It feels like it could have been sung close to the time when it was written.
That is outstanding, my dear sir! And it would even work, I believe, with the “native” Greek pronunciation. I shall have to try it.
(And whatever you do, please, do not join “perichoretic dances” of any sort whatsoever.)
Thank you both. I sang this with a group of Bible translators once but they weren’t very fond of it.
Sometimes the Emergent crowd talks about the perichoretic dance. All that comes to mind is Aaron Copeland’s Appalachian Spring.
More like Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring to my ears…
Cool song.
Perichoretic Dance. That sounds interesting. Is it better than sign language hand dancing, which you enjoy making fun of?
I just looked it up, and now I’m even more confused about what it is. From the little I understand, it sounds like it might be more like mental gymnastics than something you do with your body..
[...] Tripping on the Trinity has a pseudo-choral rendition of 2 Corinthians 13:13. [...]