Jake the Muslim Metaphysician Destroys Jake the Muslim Metaphysician

Read Time: 7 Minutes

In a desperate attempt to score points, Jake the Muslim Metaphysician has destroyed himself. But first, let’s recap as to how we got here.

I made a video demonstrating how the early church fathers taught Trinitarian theology. This upset Jake (who knows why) and he decided to respond and argue some of the fathers were not trinitarian. He focused on Origen, Tertullian, and Justin Martyr. This did not go well for him. Since I already admitted Origen was a subordinationist in his Trinitarian theology we focused on Tertullian and Justin Martyr and we effectively demonstrated Jake did not do a serious analysis of the church fathers. Justin and Tertullian did teach trinitarian theology that fits within orthodoxy.

I expected Jake to reply and try to defend his interpretation, but I was giving him too much credit. Instead, he resorted to character assassination. He uploaded a video arguing I took two (Edgar Foster and Marian Hillar) of the many scholars I cited out of context. I responded on Rob Rowe’s channel and pointed out Jake did not pay attention. I never said that either Edgar Foster or Marian Hillar argued Tertullian or Justin were trinitarian. I cited them on specific points of agreement to show even they admitted Jake’s arguments were bad. Jake also went through Foster’s thesis and tried to claim other scholars that Foster cited agreed Tertullian was not a trinitarian. 

To quote from Jake starting at 19:21 of his video, “Now he [Foster] quotes Harnack as having the same position. He’s going to quote two others so we’re going to get a four for one… We have it there, we’ve got Edmund Fortman, we’ve got Edgar Foster, who’s the scholar that Michael claimed to quote and read, and we’ve got Harack. Now here comes the fourth scholar, ‘Stead, “Further discerns that Tertullian depicts God as a mind containing Word in the sense of a plan or thought…”’”

So I pointed out Jake did not do his homework. Harnack is outdated (more on this later) and another one of Foster’s sources, Christopher Stead, a scholar of patristics, explicitly taught that Tertullian was a trinitarian. Edmund Fortman also explicitly stated Tertullian was a trinitarian (see below).

At this point, things were looking bad for Jake. He doesn’t seem to want to defend his original argument regarding the church fathers and now he has been caught not checking his sources. But Jake couldn’t stop there. He needed a victory. Well, last month, out of the blue, Edgar Foster wrote a blog post on the livestream Rob Rowe and I did.

Jake, without taking a second to evaluate the situation, did a video on this blog post and called it “Scholar says Inspiring Philosophy is a Dishonest Actor.” But the blog post does not help Jake at all. Remember, Jake claimed in his video that Stead agreed with Foster that Tertullian was not a trinitarian. But Foster says the opposite, “At no time did I say or imply that Stead agreed with my worldview or theology.” Later in the post, he says, “Again, one has to be careful to distinguish my words and beliefs from those of Stead: I did not conflate the two.”

Jake was so desperate to score some kind of victory he didn’t realize Foster agrees with me, that Christopher Stead did teach Tertullian was a trinitarian. This is easily seen if you read Stead’s book, Divine Substance:

“Tertullian’s Trinity the una substantia represents the stuff or reality, called Spiritus, which the Second and Third Persons derive from the First; whereas Hermogenes positively denies that matter proceeds from God; it is formed by him, but not created, much less emitted as an offspring” (p. 203).

So Jake, in citing this blog, does not seem to have realized that Foster has refuted his point and demonstrated that Jake did not check his sources. If I am a “dishonest actor” for misrepresenting Foster’s view, then so is Jake, because he said in his video that Foster was citing Stead and Fortman as if they were in agreement with him. They are not. Jake has effectively exposed himself and demonstrated for us all how little research he does. He really should have thought this one through.

As for Foster’s complaint that I misrepresented him, I will say something I have said in the past, everyone has a right to clarify what they mean by their words. However, Foster’s original wording in his thesis is unclear and it seems like he is saying Stead did agree with him. After all, this was my impression, as well as Jake’s. Both of us thought Foster was claiming Stead agreed with him. However, Foster doesn’t seem to want to call out Jake for this, which is a double standard. Here is the relevant section that Jake cited:

“Stead further discerns that Tertullian depicts God as a Mind (nous) containing Word in the sense of ‘plan’ or ‘thought’ within it. Moreover, he further states: ‘This latter is sufficiently distinct to be addressed as a ‘partner in dialogue. Yet this Sermo does not become Son until God utters the words, ‘Let there be light’ (fiat lux) as recorded in Gen 1:3. Stead writes that it is only at this point that one can speak of Discourse (Sermo) as Son in the fullest sense. It might, therefore, be inaccurate to argue that Tertullian thinks the Son is a timeless res et persona internal beside God” (p. 70).

The wording of the original thesis does not explicitly indicate Stead was not agreement with Foster’s findings. Regardless, Foster does have a right to clarify his position, even though it seemed to both myself and Jake thought Foster was claiming Stead agreed with him. The relevant passage is ambiguous and this is evident from the fact that, based on Foster’s wording, Jake assumed Stead was on Foster’s side.

Also in the blog post, Foster defends the position that Tertullian was not an orthodox trinitarian. However, we have already addressed this thoroughly in the first reply to Jake, and in the stream on Rob’s channel. Tertullian taught the Word was eternal and with God, therefore God was not alone (Against Hermogenes. 3, 5, 7), and that they are one substance (Against Praxeas 2). This is not subordinationism (although we admitted this is not perfectly in line with the Nicene formulation of the Trinity). Scholarship since Harnack has demonstrated this (e.g. Eric Osborn, Bryan M. Liftin, Christopher Stead), which we cited in the two streams. 

Foster then cites Fortman to argue Tertullian was not an orthodox Trinitarian, but now it seems he is taking Fortman out of context. He says, “Edmund Fortman also concludes that the preeminent Son of God: ‘was generated, not from eternity but before and for creation, and then became a second person.’” 

But if you read the context of the quote in his book, “The Triune God” we see Fortman goes on to say, “But if the possession of ‘divine substance’ is a norm of divinity, then perhaps the Son will still be divine in Tertullian’s theology. And so it is. For he writes: ‘we have been taught that He proceeds forth from God, and in that procession He is generated; so that He is the Son of God and is called God from city of substance with God . . . Thus Christ is God of God, as light of light is enkindled . . . so, too, that which has come forth out of God is at once God and the Son and God, and the two are on’ (Apol. 21)” (p. 111). 

Fortman affirms Tertullian thought the ‘Logos/Son’ is God and one with the Father. This is why Fortman goes on to say on the next page, “These last two works probably belong to [Terullian’s] Pre-Montanist period and yet in all three we find the same trinitarian coordination of the Spirit with the Father and the Son, the same belief in the Holy Spirit as the Third in the Godhead” (p. 112). 

As we noted in the first stream, Tertullian thought the Word (i.e. Jesus) didn’t take on the title of Son until He was generated out from God, but He was still eternally the Word before taking on this new role. Fortman is not contradicting that assessment if you read him in context.

Now, if you remember, in Jake’s other video he also claimed that Edmund Fortman, like Stead, agreed with Foster. This is not true. Jake did not check his source carefully and merely took Foster’s word. Fortman did affirm Tertullian taught trinitarian theology. We can add this to Jake’s list of errors.

The important point is, in rushing to make a video to attack me, Jake did not realize that Foster demonstrated that he made a big error. Jake claimed Stead agreed with Foster and denied that Tertullian was a trinitarian. This is false, as Foster showed. Additionally, none of this supports his original claim that Tertullian or Justin Martyr denied trinitarian theology. This has been nothing but a mess for Jake. His goal now is not even to defend his original argument but to try to make his opponents look bad so people will forget his awful mistakes.

All references are in hyperlinks within the blog post.