10. The Nestorian controversy broke out A.D. 430. Council of Ephesus (A.D. 431) condemned Nestor. The Nestorians (who [pg 510] were Unitarians) separated entirely from the Church, and became the Church of the Persian empire.
11. The Monophysite controversy broke out. The council of Chalcedon (A.D. 451) decided that there were two natures in Christ; and the Monophysites separated, and formed the Coptic Church. Their formula was, that “God was crucified in Christ.” The Nestorians were too Unitarian, and the Monophysites too Athanasian. The Church decided (against the Nestorians) that Mary was God's mother, but decided (against the Monophysites) that God was not crucified.
12. First Lateran Council was called (in A.D. 640) to settle a new point. It having been decided that there were two natures in Christ, it was now thought best by many to yield to the Monophysites—that there was only one will in Christ. Hence the Monotheletic controversy, finally settled at the,—
13. Sixth General Council (A.D. 680), when two wills in Christ were accepted as the doctrine of the Church.
Thus it appears that it took the Church from A.D. 325 to A.D. 680 to settle the questions concerning the relation of Christ to God. During all this time, opinion vacillated between Arianism on the one hand and Sabellianism on the other. At the end of this period, the Church had become consolidated, and strong enough to compel submission to its opinions: but the relation of the Holy Spirit to the Trinity remained unsettled for several centuries more; and finally the Eastern Church separated altogether from the Western Church on this point. The whole Greek Church remains, to this day, separated from the Latin Church on a question belonging to this very doctrine of the Trinity. So much, then, for Dr. Huntington's assertion, that the Trinity is a doctrine which can almost literally be said to have been believed “always, everywhere, and by all.”
IX. The doctrine of the Trinity is opposed to the real divinity of Christ and to his real humanity; thus undermining continually the faith of the Church in the divine humanity of Jesus Christ the Lord.
Our final and chief objection to the Trinity is, not that it makes Christ divine, but that it does not make him so. It substitutes for the divinity of the Father, the Supreme God, which Unitarians believe to dwell in Christ, a subordinate divinity of God the Son. This is subordinate, because derived; and, because derived, dependent. [pg 511] The Son may be said to be “eternally generated;” but this is only an eternal derivation, and does not alter the dependence, but makes it also to be eternal. The tendency of the Church doctrine of the Trinity is always to a belief, not in the supreme divinity dwelling in Christ, but in a derived and secondary divinity.
How is it, for example, with the Nicene doctrine concerning Christ? Dr. Huntington claims Nice as Trinitarian. (p. 361.)
But what says Prof. Stuart concerning the Nicene doctrine? Listen.
“The Nicene symbol presents the Father as the Monas, or proper Godhead, in and of himself exclusively; it represents him as the Fons et Principium of the Son, and therefore gives him superior power and glory. It does not even assert the claims of the blessed Spirit to Godhead, and therefore leaves room to doubt whether it means to recognize a Trinity, or only a Duality.” (Moses Stuart, Bib. Repos., 1835, quoted by Wilson, Trin. Test., p. 264.)