The "High" Theology of St. Joseph in Accepted Catholic Piety and Devotion

I have written a great deal on the topic of Roman Catholic Mariology, such as my book-length study, Behold the Mother of My Lord: Towards a Mormon Mariology. Notwithstanding, in acceptable Catholic devotion and piety, there is a very “high” theology of St. Joseph. Note the following from Mark Miravalle:

 

. . . many popes have happily thrown in their own sublime praise of the “Just Man” of the New Testament. Blessed Pius IX declared him the “Patron of the Universal Church” (Quemadmodum Deus, December 8, 1970), which is a title above and beyond that given to any other saint in history, except for Mary. Leo XIII confirms of St. Joseph that “there is no doubt he approached nearer than any other to the superabundant dignity of hers” (Quamquam Pluries, August 15, 1889). Pius XI even speaks of his “all-powerful intercession” (through his relationship to Jesus and Mary) as the true Head of the Holy Family:

 

As. St. Joseph was truly the head r the master of that house [Nazareth], his intercession cannot be but all-powerful. For what could Jesus and Mary refuse to St. Joseph, as he was entirely devoted to them all his life, and to whom they truly owed the means of their earthly existence?” (Papal Allocution, L’Osservatore Romano, March 19, 1938)

 

The papal superlatives go on and on. (Indulge me as I mention a few more.) Saint John XXIII declared St. Joseph the Patron of the Second Vatican Council and inserted his name into the Roman Canon of the Mass (Papal Allocution, March 19, 1961). And more recently, St. Paul Paul II confirmed the unique sanctity and dignity of St. Joseph in his Apostolic Letter Redemptoris Custos (Guardian of the Redeemer), where he identifies him as “the Just Man,” “a perfection of charity” that leads to a harmonious blending of contemplation and action: “In Joseph, the apparent tension between the active and the contemplative life finds an ideal harmony that is only possible for those who possess the perfection of charity”(Redemptoris Custos, n. 27) . . . Even the Mother of God offers testimony to the holiness of her husband and how it’s imperative or the human family, in our present situation, to show proper honor to this greatest male saint. For example, during the Marian apparitions at Fatima when 70,000 people witnessed the historic “solar miracle” on October 13, 1917, St. Joseph appeared with the Child Jesus and blessed the world as a sign of the importance of devotion to St. Joseph for the “Triumph of the Immaculate Heart,” promised by Our Lady of Fatima (12). Also, during the more recently reported revelations of Our Lady of America (revelations strongly supported by Cardinal Raymond Burke and worthy of our consideration as well), the Blessed Virgin refers to the holiness of St. Joseph as the fruit of his constant awareness of the indwelling Trinity. At the same apparition, St. Joseph himself speaks of his unique God given privileges of grace and calls for a new devotion to his “Pure Heart” as well as to his “Fatherhood” (October 1956 Messages of Our Lady of America, www.ourladyofamerica.org). (Mark Miravalle, Meet Your Spiritual Father: A Brief Introduction to St. Joseph [Sycamore, Ill.: Lighthouse Catholic Media, 2015], 12-13, 14)

 

Commenting on the pious belief that, as with Mary in Catholic dogmatic theology, Joseph was bodily assumed into heaven after his death, Miravalle wrote:

 

St. Joseph’s Assumption?

 

Some Doctors of the Church and other ecclesiastical writers see a clue about a possible resurrection and assumption of St. Joseph (not a Church doctrine, but an acceptable theological opinion) indicated by the way the bodily remains of the Old Testament Joseph were returned to Israel at the time of the Exodus.

 

When the People of Israel departed on their historic return to the Promised Land of Israel, they carried the “bones of Joseph” with them into the Promised Land, as Joseph himself foretold: “Then Joseph took an oath of the sons of Israel, saying, ‘God will visit you, and you shall carry my bones from here’” (Gen 50;25; see also Ex 13:19). In light of this, it is possible that St. Joseph, because of his union with Jesus and Mary, would be the first, after the resurrection of Jesus, to be brought body and soul into the eternal “promised land” of heaven (see Mt 27:52).

 

Several great Josephite theologians such as St. Francis de Sales, St. Bernadine of Siena, Francisco Suarez, and others taught that while an early, bodily resurrection and assumption of St. Joseph is not a doctrine of the Church, it is still an acceptable theological opinion (for one example of defense of the Assumption of St. Joseph, see St. Francis de Sales, The Spiritual Conferences, 19, 383). Interestingly, St. Pope John XXIII refers to the Assumption of St. Joseph as an acceptable pious belief in a 1960 Homily on the Ascension of Jesus (AAS 52, 455-456).

 

It seems appropriate that if any saint would experience an early assumption of his body, it would be the virginal father of the Savior and spouse of the Immaculate One (not in virtue of an immaculate conception, as was uniquely the case with Our Lady, but due to his interior unity with Jesus and Mary and his pre-eminent sanctity after Mary). (Ibid., 19-20)

 

Commenting on the expansion in piety to St. Joseph in the Middle Ages, Miravalle discusses the work of 15^th-century author, Fr.. John Gerson, chancellor of the University of Paris:

 

This French teacher and preacher wrote the celebrated Considerations on St. Joseph, an extensive Latin poem that expounded upon St. Joseph’s virtues.

 

Gerson also delivered a notable sermon on St. Joseph during the Council of Constans [RB: alt ‘Constance’ in 1415] in the early 15^th century, in which he called the Council fathers to officially invoke St. Joseph’s intercession for the Church (at a time of great trial because of the Western Schism) and to institute a feast of St. Joseph to obtain his powerful intercession for the Church’s unity.

 

Gerson’s starting point and the guiding principle for his theology of St. Joseph was this: Joseph was the true husband of the Mother of God. For Gerson, all of Joseph’s other extraordinary virtues and gifts flowed from this fundamental principle.

 

This French preacher maintained that St. Joseph was pre-sanctified in his mother’s womb (similar to St. John the Baptist); that his sanctity reached higher than the angelic choirs of Seraphim and Cherubim (by virtue of his “proximity” or closeness to Jesus and Mary); and that he was the protector of the Church (which set the foundations for the later papal declarations of St. Joseph as “Patron of the Universal Church” (see Filas, Joseph: The Man Closest to Christ, pp. 139-140).

 

Here's just one example of the beauty of Gerson’s teachings concerning Joseph and his relationship to Jesus:

 

Joseph was the father of Jesus Christ in the people’s opinion, father in his solicitude as foster parent, and father in the generation—not of course on his own part but on the part of his wife, Mary, in whom the Holy Spirit worked and in a certain sense represented joseph not with human seed but with mystical inspiration. Joseph can therefore be called father of the Child Jesus, not the actual but rather the legal father to whom the Holy Spirit raised up a seed more eminent than fleshly seed. Jesus was indeed born out of the land and property of Joseph . . . Should there not be accorded to him in preference to all other men a legal right to the praiseworthy rearing of the Child Jesus since Jesus was born in the flesh and out of the flesh whose possession was truly delivered to Joseph by the right of marriage? (John Gerson, Considerations on St. Joseph)

 

In the 15^th century, an extensive growth in devotion to St. Joseph was visible in the liturgy. Pope Sixtus IV introduced the feast of St. Joseph to the church in Rome and then in churches all across Europe, the faithful began to include the Mass and Office of St. Joseph in their breviaries and missals. (Ibid., 64-65)

 

As with Rome's Mariology, her "Josephite" theology and devotion is very problematic.

In my next post, I will reproduce various prays to St. Joseph in accepted Catholic piety and devotion.

Happy Amazon Wishlist Sharing Day!

 As it is Black Friday in the USA, some bibliophiles have called today "National Amazon Wishlist Sharing Day." As I love books, I thought I might do this, in case someone might feel generous (and/or maybe going through the list might result in you adding a few to your own "to read someday" pile)

Xmas/Birthday

Christology

Eschatology

Hebrew/Greek Resources

Mariology

Mormon Texts

Wish List #1

Wish List #2

As always, one can also make a contribution via Paypal.

Did Paul Affirm or Deny the Ontological Existence of Other Gods/Lords in 1 Corinthians 8:4-6? Responding to James White

In his most recent (as of 27 Nov 2020) episode of the Dividing Line, James White repeated the time-worn claim that Paul is denying the ontological existence of other gods/lords in 1 Cor 8:4-6 (Paul's Expanded Shema and Important Truths in Handling Scripture). However, in reality, that is not the case. Note the following triad of scholarly witnesses against White's claims:

 

[W]e should note that in [1 Cor 8:6] it is possible to see the inclusion of Jesus Christ in the identity of the God of the Old Testament, but there is no exclusion of the existence of other beings that might in some sense be considered divine. Paul takes seriously the existence of those beings, but he is clear that Christ is far above them in authority, surely more in the category of the one God than of the lesser powers, demi-gods, so to speak . . . Paul does not question [their] existence.(George Carraway, Christ is God Over All: Romans 9:5 in the context of Romans 9-11 [Bloomsbury, 2015], 87, 89 n. 141, comments in square bracket added for clarification).

 

. . . Paul’s thought is in tension, a tension that cannot easily be resolved with ontological categories. Paul, it can be argued, is breathing the same spirit as Deuteronomy 32. Other gods exist, but in another sense they are “no-gods” and “demons”. It is only YHWH that is “God”. Paul too wants to express the theme in relational terms. There are indeed many gods that exist, but for us (ημιν) there is only one God. The absolute terms are confessional, not ontological. (Nathan MacDonald, Deuteronomy and the Meaning of “Monotheism” [2d ed.; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013], 95-96)

 

The second clause in v 5 transfers what is conceded out of the realm of hypothesis into that of actuality. The change from εἴπερ εἰσὶν to ὥσπερ εἰσὶν effects the transfer: 'even if there should be—as in fact there are'. This rules out the view that Paul denies the existence of the gods and recognizes them as forces of evil only because people wrongly believe in them. He thinks they are really there in some sense. (Paul Andrew Rainbow, “Monotheism and Christology in 1 Corinthians 8.4-6” [Oxford, D. Phil. Diss., 1987], 144-45)

 

However, allowing for the sake of argument that Paul did split the Shema, per White, such would not allow for the Trinity. If Bauckham et al., are correct, one would have to render the Shema as follows:

Listen, O Israel, Jesus is our Father, Jesus is One.

It is clearly unintelligible and smacks more of modalism than Trinitarianism. The split Shema idea could only work if one is a proponent of the Father and Son being the same person, which would be antithetical to 1 Cor 8:4-6 and a host of other passages when exegeted carefully.

James McGrath, author of The Only True God and John’s Apologetic Christology (both volumes I recommend to interested readers) wrote the following on Bauckham’s thesis:

One question we need to ask ourselves is whether Paul is likely to have made his most substantial points about the nature of Jesus by quoting or alluding to key texts that were slogans of Jewish monotheism, while at the same time supposedly making subtle but significant additions or insertions so as to (in the words of N. T. Wright) “split the Shema” or (in the terminology of Richard Bauckham) “include Jesus within the divine identity.”…Could someone have heard that Paul “split the Shema” in [1Cor 8.4-6]?

I’ve already noted that the widespread knowledge of the Shema in Paul’s time was a loud, unified voice, and that Paul would have needed to shout vociferously were he disagreeing with that dominant voice in some significant way. Yet he does not do so. It seems advisable therefore to assume that Paul’s earliest hearers would have heard him as joining in unison with those voices, perhaps adding a distinctive descant about the Anointed One, but not dissonantly singing a different note or even noticeably out of tune. Paul would have seemed to be building on that already-established foundation rather than challenging it…

In our time, many of us have heard the Shema far less frequently than the Nicene Creed. This cannot but be an influence, even on scholarly interpreters who make an effort to avoid reading our assumptions and contemporary influences into the texts we study…historical study seeks to hear Paul’s voice not as an expression of a Nicene orthodoxy that had not been defined as such in his time, but as a specific voice of his own time in an earlier period (Dunn, New Testament Theology: An Introduction). Paul’s journey may well have been on the same road that eventually led to Nicaea and Chalcedon, but the debates and conflicts of the intervening centuries suggest that the road from Paul to Nicaea was often uphill and frequently rocky, and by no means an instance of a casual linear stroll through flat, familiar terrain…

…it seems overwhelmingly probable that Paul echoes the Shema and other monotheistic passages so as to support his monotheism, rather than to redefine it or transform it into something radically new. (J.F. McGrath, “On Hearing [Rather Than Reading] Intertextual Echoes: Christology and Monotheistic Scriptures in an Oral Context”)

One should compare White's criticisms of LDS theology with respect to 1 Cor 8:4-6 to his rejection of Joseph Smith's understanding of the Divine Council. As White wrote in one of his books:

Every LDS person who embraces these words as true must realize how they sound to the ears of an orthodox Christian. God calling a council of the gods? Concocting a plan to create the world and people it? Such words are so far removed from historical Christian belief that many struggle to react properly to them. (James R. White, Is the Mormon My Brother? Discerning the Differences between Mormonism and Christianity [2d ed.; Birmingham, Ala.: Solid Ground Christian Books, 2008], 73)

One must wonder if 1 Kgs 22:19-23, where God concocts a plan with the divine council, is part of the Bible he uses? I will quote from the 1995 NASB which he is rather fond of:

Micaiah said, "Therefore, hear the word of the LORD. I saw the LORD sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by Him on His right and on His left. "The LORD said, 'Who will entice Ahab to go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead?' And one said this while another said that. "Then a spirit came forward and stood before the LORD and said, 'I will entice him.' "The LORD said to him, 'How?' And he said, 'I will go out and be a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.' Then He said, 'You are to entice him and also prevail. Go and do so.' "Now therefore, behold, the LORD has put a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; and the LORD has proclaimed disaster against you."

John Peter Lange, in his A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical with Special Reference to Ministers and Students, who himself would agree with White on various issues, not just Trinitarianism, admitted that this council resolved a then-open question:

The only question which still remained open was as to the way in which his fall should be brought about. “Who is able to delude Ahab, so that he may march against Ramoth to his own destruction?”

Furthermore, Yahweh presiding among the “hosts” is evidence in favour of the plurality of the gods concept. Commenting on the related term “Yahweh Sabaoth ” (alt. "Yahweh of Hosts") and how it shows belief in the ontological existence of other deities besides Yahweh, James S. Anderson wrote:

Yahweh Sabaoth

Besides the widespread invectives against the worship of the Baals and of the Asherahs, the frequent use of the term “Yahweh Sabaoth” to designate the head god of Israel and Judah presupposes a panethon (see Tryggve N.D. Mettinger, “Yahweh Zebaoth,” DDD, 923). Yahweh of Hoss led armies (Sabaoth) of heavenly soldiers, since the term “Sabaoth” is found besides references to the divine council:

Who in the clouds ranks like Yahweh? Who among the sons of gods is like Yahweh, a God feared in the council of the council of the holy ones, great and awesome above all that are around him? Yahweh God of hosts, who is as mighty as Yah? (Ps. 89.7-9 [Eng. 6-8])

The heavenly host was the original referent for the pantheon. The Hebrew Bible stresses Yahweh’s primacy, while recognizing the occurrence of other gods. For instance, Micaiah’s vision in 1 Kgs 22.19 depicts Yahweh “sitting on his throne with all the host of heaven standing beside him to the right and to the left of him.” The presence of these other gods is necessary to uphold Yahweh’s supremacy. Before Yahweh could be conceived of as alone, he first had to be viewed as the greatest. Hence the Hebrew Bible is riddled with polytheistic presuppositions (for instance Gen. 1.26; 3.22; Exod. 15.11; Deut. 32:8-9; Job 1.6; 2.1; Ps. 82; Jer. 23.18 and Zech 14.5).

The sheer quantity of further texts in favor of a native pantheon in the Hebrew Bible precludes a comprehensive presentation. Unproblematic hints that presuppose a heavenly realm populated by several or many deities can be found in the expression “God of gods” (Ps. 136.2-3). Even the expression “our god” in the charter of biblical monotheism, the Shema Israel, admits that other gods exist for other peoples. It insists that Yahweh is Israel’s only god, without negating the existence of other divinities for Israel’s neighbors. The occurrence of other gods is necessary, or the point made in Judg. 11.24 would fail. Addressing the Ammonite king, Jephthah asks: “Should you not possess what your god Chemosh gives you to possess? And should we not be the ones to possess everything that Yahweh our god has conquered for our benefit?” Jephthah’s understanding of monotheism implies that each kingdom venerates its own god. Monotheism in this case applies only to the level of individual kingdoms. As this view is reflected in the non-corrected version of Deut 32.9 [see this blog post], the writer does not present Jephthah as a less than orthodox follower of Mosaic monotheism, though Jephthah belongs to the ambiguous figures of the Book of Judges. This kind of territorial monotheism is deemed normative or at least sufficient to justify Israel’s presence in Canaan. That this kind of territorial monotheism clashes with universal monotheism is not considered problematic. (James S. Anderson, Monotheism and Yahweh’s Appropriation of Baal [Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 617; London: T&T Clark, 2015], 24-25, comment in square brackets added)

Anderson referenced T.N.D. Mettinger’s entry, “Yahweh Zebaoth” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons. S Mettinger wrote the following about the term and how it assumes the ontological existence of other divinities:

. . . it should be noted that the root ṢB’ appears in contexts which draw upon both its royal and its celestial connotations. Like terrestrial kings, the heavenly monarch has a court and council. Among the Heb terms for the divine council we find precisely ṣābā’ (1 Kgs 22:19-23, Pss 103:19-22; 148:1-5; Dan 8:10-13). The fact that the Zebaoth designation occurs in passages in which the divine council plays a role corroborates this association. Ps 89:6-19 is an obvious case. Just as the Davidic king is the highest of the kings on earth (v 28), so Yahweh is the supreme monarch in the divine assembly (vv 6-9) and thus merits the designation Yahweh Zebaoth (v 9). Isa 6, with the Zebaoth designation in vv 3.5, is another example. Yahweh’s question “who will go for us?” (v 8) contains an allusion to the deliberations of the divine council. (Karel Van Der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. Van Her Horst, eds. Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible [2d ed.; Leiden: Brill, 1999], 923).

Other evidences presented by Anderson for the ontological existence of (true) gods include the following:

Greater But Not Alone

When Exodus 18.11 claims that Yahweh is greater than all the gods (מכל יהווה גדול האלהים), it also implies the presence of these other deities besides Yahweh. The same applies to the claim that all gods bow down before Yahweh in Psalms 92.7. While the Hebrew grammar, especially in poetic contexts, cannot be evoked to assert that this statement envisages that the supremacy of Yahweh will be recognized in heaven in the future, Zech. 14.9 clearly understands that “Yahweh will be one” only on the day when “Yahweh will become king over all the earth.” As part of a prophetic oracle, the expression “on that day” (ביום ההוא) looks forward to a future accomplishment and the verb יהיה (he will become) is an unaccomplished form. Therefore, Zechariah 14 supports the view of an evolutionary process in which monotheism gradually evolved towards an understanding of Yahweh as a universalistic monotheism. (Anderson, Monotheism and Yahweh’s Appropriation of Baal, 26)

With respect to Gen 1:26-27, a “divine council” text, Anderson wrote:

Let Us Make!

The plural forms used for Elohim’s creative activity in Genesis 1:26a lean toward the native pantheon approach. Although Elohim is synonymous with Yahweh in the final form of the Hebrew Bible, the phrase, “Let us make” (נעשׂה) humankind in our image” (בצלמנו), according to our likeness (כדמותנו),” originally reflected the divine council or the mythology of the divine couple. Likeness to the divine includes the creation of humankind as a male and a female (verse 27). The divine as being male and female would reflect vestigial Asherah mythology where the consort has not been thoroughly excised from the text. The personification of Lady Wisdom in Prov. 3.13-18 has long been thought to have a connection with Asherah. When the pantheon collapsed, it was necessary to interpret these texts as representing wisdom personified rather than a goddess. This shift in understanding was necessary to be consistent with later monotheism. Nevertheless, a feminine dimension for Yahweh should stand out as a clue that Yahweh has appropriated the domain of his former consort, Asherah. Whether the third person plural suffixes in Genesis 1 signify Asherah in conjunction with God/Yahweh, or denotes the divine council, either way they reflect a plurality of gods. (Ibid., 26-27; for a discussion of this text and other texts [e.g., John 4:24; Acts 7:55-56] and how it relates to the corporeal nature of God, see Lynn Wilder vs. Latter-day Saint (and Biblical) Theology on Divine Embodiment)

James White is way out in left field with his comments against Latter-day Saint theology. For someone who has been engaging Latter-day Saints since the 1980s, this is rather embarrassing and also, rather telling.

Further Reading

C.J. Labuschagne on the language of "incomparability" in the Old Testament and Literature of Surrounding Cultures and

Refuting Jeff Durbin on "Mormonism"

Church of England Critic of Trinitarianism from 1786 on Hebrews 13:8

  

Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever. (Heb 13:8)

 

One 18^th century critic of the Trinity wrote the following about Heb 13:8:

 

Heb xiii 8 Jesus Christ, the same Yesterday, and Today, and for ever

 

That the Person of Christ is the same, yesterday and today, and for ever, may be admitted as true, but that is not the meaning of this particular verse, for the Apostle is here speaking not of the Person, but the Doctrine of Christ. Be pleased to read what goes before, and follows after Remember them which have the Rule over you, who have spoken unto you the Word of God, while Faith follow, considering the End of their conversation Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and for ever. Be not carried away with divers and strange doctrines, that is, adhere stedfastly to the faith of the Apostles, and be not perplexed with Doctrines brought in by other teachers, arising after them. For Jesus Christ is the same Saviour, and his Gospel the same Gospel to them at first, and to you now, and to all Generations that are to come hereafter. To preach Christ according to many Passages of the New Testament, signifies to preach the Doctrine of Christ. It is farther urged in Proof of Christ's supreme Godhead, that such works are ascribed to him in Scripture, as are peculiar to the Great God of Heaven and Earth, namely, Creation and Preservation. (The Doctrine of the Athanasian Creed Analyzed and Refuted; By a Member of the Church of England to which are added, Benjamin Ben Mordecai’s Queries Respecting that Doctrine [Newry, 1786], 47)

 

One should compare the above with the following from two modern Evangelical Protestant commentators:

 

v 8 is not to be interpreted as an acclamation of Jesus' timeless ontological immutability, corresponding to the assertion that the Son remains ὁ αὐτός, "the same," in 1:10–12 (as asserted by H. Montefiore, 242; P. R. Jones, RevExp 82 [1985] 400; cf. Grässer, Glaube, 23; Buchanan, 233). The reference is rather to the immutability of the gospel message proclaimed by the deceased leaders in the recent past (see Michel, 490 and n. 2; P. E. Hughes, 570–71). Although the preachers change, the preaching must remain the same. The unchangeableness of the revelation is a consequence of the transcendent dignity of Jesus Christ, the originator of the preaching (2:3) (so Thurén, Lobopfer, 183). (William L. Lane, Hebrews 9-13 [Word Biblical Commentary 47B])

  

Ὁ αὐτός* belongs with the previous phrase, which would otherwise be virtually meaningless; it is understood to be repeated with the following words. The use of this term as a noun, and without comparison, recalls 1:12 = Ps. 102(LXX 101):27, which is applied to Christ. Cf. αὐτός, reverentially of Christ, 2:14; ὁ γὰρ αὐτὸς κύριος πάντων with similar ellipsis, “the same [Lord] is Lord of all,” Rom. 10:12; ὁ αὐτὸς κύριος, 1 Cor. 12:5 of Christ; cf. v. 6, ὁ αὐτὸς θεός. The meaning recalls the theme of “abiding” (μένω, vv. 1, 14), especially that of Christ as “high priest for ever,” → 7:3, though the precise phrase εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας*, here emphatic by its separation from the rest of the verse (Mt. 6:13 v.l.; Lk. 1:33, 55; Rom. 1:25; 9:5; 11:36; 2 Cor. 11:31), does not occur elsewhere in Hebrews; cf. the fuller form in v. 21; the plural is used for a singular (MHT 3.25). (Paul Ellingworth, The Epistle to the Hebrews: A Commentary on the Greek Text [New International Greek Testament Commentary; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1993], 705)

 

William of Alton's Commentary on Isaiah 6 and seeing with "the eyes of the heart" Paralleling the 19th century understanding of "Spiritual Eyes"

Commenting on the 13^th century theologian William of Alton’s understanding of how Old Testament figures could see God in bodily form, Timothy Bellamah noted:

 

While reflections on prophecy show up throughout the corpus of his biblical commentary, the most prolonged one appears in his commentary on Isaiah, specifically, in his exposition of the account of the prophet’s vision in the sixth chapter. His exegetical interests in this passage are several. Primary among them is to make sense of Isaiah’s claim to have seen the Lord (Vidi Dominum) without prejudice to the understanding, generally held by Jews and Christians alike, that no flesh may see God, at least not this side of the grave. More broadly, he tries to provide a general framework for prophecy capable of account for the various theophanies experienced by the patriarchs, prophets, and, notably, St. Paul 9cf. 1 Cor 12:2-4). Then, he situates his account between two opposing erroneous propositions, first, that Isaiah (and by implication the other prophets) saw the divine nature, and second, that the angels and the blessed in heaven do not. Put another way, while asserting that the prophets normally had no beatific vision while living in this world, William is concerned to avoid implying that the same holds true for the blessed in patria:

 

Therefore he says IN THE YEAR THAT KING UZZIAH DIED, I SAW THE LORD SITTING etc. Note that according to the Glossa on 2 Corinthians 12 (4), concerning the rapture of Paul, there are three kinds of visions. One of them, evidently, is corporeal, by which God is seen in a created subject by corporeal eyes. So it was that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses saw him, as Jerome explains in the original of his exposition of this passage. Another is imaginary, by which God is seen by the eyes of the heart under an imaginary figure, just as Isaiah saw him in this passage, Daniel in chapter 7, and Ezekiel in chapter 1. The third is intellectual, by which God and spiritual creatures are seen in a wondrous revelation by the gaze of the pure mind. So it was that Paul saw him in 2 Corinthians 12 (4). In heaven (in patria) this vision will be perfect, on the way (in via) imperfect and only in a few. Therefore, the Glossa’s statement here that Isaiah saw God is to be explained as by the eyes of the heart, i.e., it happened by an imaginary vision, which was by the eyes of the heart, not those of the flesh. Concerning what the Glossa saws below in chapter 38 (1), it should be said that this is magisterial. Or that reading in the Book of Foreknowledge is seeing God not in his substance, but in an illumination or in a locution from spirit to spirit. Concerning Chrysostom’s statement: “Not even an angel can see God in his nature,” one is to understand—as fully as the Son.

 

In evidence here is a more explicit formulation of the same three fold typology wherein God manifests himself variously by way of corporeal creatures, imaginary representations, and direct intellectual contact. William evidently regards the second mode as the most common. Here, it is Isaiah, Daniel, and Ezekiel whom he credits with such perception of imaginary representations by the “eye of the heart.” Elsewhere, he describes the visions of Jeremiah and Abraham in similar terms. (Timothy Bellamah, The Biblical Interpretation of William of Alton [Oxford Studies in Historical Theology; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011], 108-9, emphasis in bold added)

 

 Reading the above, one was reminded of the "spiritual eyes" comment from Martin Harris that has been misinterpreted/misrepresented by the likes of Grant Palmer. On this, see:

"Spiritual Eyes" in pre-1830 Literature

George Lamsa on People Seeing God with "Spiritual Eyes"

An Examination of the "Trinity Shield"

The entry for "Trinity" in the Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has recently (20 Nov, 2020) been updated. One can find it here. It is a very useful overview of the multitude of problems of various Trinity theologies.

The following is a common image used to explain/defend the Trinity (the "Trinity Shield"):

Under section 1.4 Trinity as Incoherent, we find the following discussion of the problems therein:

 

If each occurrence of “is” here expresses numerical identity, commonly expressed in modern logical notation as “=” then the chart illustrates these claims:

1.     Father = God

2.     Son = God

3.     Spirit = God

4.     Father ≠ Son

5.     Son ≠ Spirit

6.     Spirit ≠ Father

But the conjunction of these claims, which has been called “popular Latin trinitarianism”, is demonstrably incoherent (Tuggy 2003a, 171; Layman 2016, 138–9). Because the numerical identity relation is defined as transitive and symmetrical, claims 1–3 imply the denials of 4–6. If 1–6 are steps in an argument, that argument can continue thus:

7.     God = Son (from 2, by the symmetry of =)

8.     Father = Son (from 1, 4, by the transitivity of =)

9.     God = Spirit (from 3, by the symmetry of =)

10.  Son = Spirit (from 2, 6, by the transitivity of =)

11.  God = Father (from 1, by the symmetry of =)

12.  Spirit = Father (from 3, 7, the transitivity of =)

This shows that 1–3 imply the denials of 4–6, namely, 8, 10, and 12. Any Trinity doctrine which implies all of 1–6 is incoherent. To put the matter differently: it is self-evident that things which are numerically identical to the same thing must also be numerically identical to one another. Thus, if each Person just is God, that collapses the Persons into one and the same thing. But then a trinitarian must also say that the Persons are numerically distinct from one another.

But none of this is news to the Trinity theorists whose work is surveyed in this entry. Each theory here is built with a view towards undermining the above argument. In other words, each theorist discussed here, with the exception of some mysterians (see section 4.2), denies that “the doctrine of the Trinity”, rightly understood, implies all of 1–6.

 

Related to this is the following (from 1.6 Analogy to an Extended Simple):

 

The prima facie trinitarian claims which generate a contradiction are as follows, where each “is” means numerical (absolute, non-relative) identity.

1.     The Father is God.

2.     The Son is God.

3.     The Holy Spirit is God.

4.     The Father is not the Son.

5.     The Father is not the Holy Spirit.

6.     The Son is not the Holy Spirit.

If the three Persons are numerically distinct (4–6), then it can’t be that all of them are numerically identical to some one God. (1–3) Pickup proposes to understand these using person space concepts. Using p1, p2, and p3 for different points in person space, the points which correspond to being, respectively, the Father, Son, and Spirit, claims 1–3 are read as:

1.     The occupant of p1 is God.

2.     The occupant of p2 is God.

3.     The occupant of p3 is God.

These claims entail the 1–3 we started with, understood as claims of numerical identity. But this method of interpretation transforms 4–6, which become:

4.     p1 is not p2.

5.     p1 is not p3.

6.     p2 is not p3.

In other words, “4. The Father is not the Son” is not understood as asserting the numerical distinctness of the Father and the Son, but rather, as asserting the distinction of the Father’s person space from the Son’s person space. (And similarly with 5, 6.) The point of all of this is that the six interpreted claims seem to be coherent, such that possibly, all of them are true. Notably, this account accepts what we can call “Person-collapse”, the implication of 1-3 that the Father just is the Son, the Father just is the Spirit, and the Son just is the Spirit. (In other words, those are numerically identical.) Thus, unlike many Trinity theories, this one is arguably compatible with a doctrine of divine simplicity.