I have the privilege and blessing of getting to read a lot for my job, in addition to writing (my favorite thing). And I’ve spent a lot of time reading about identity and modern understandings of the self (Charles Taylor, Carl Trueman, and others). One common theme in Christian literature on the topic that I don’t see emphasized enough in public discourse or social media is relationship, specifically our relationship to God. I put together a short video on this for you, but I’ll add another component that isn’t captured there. And it just so happens to come from my favorite doctrine: the Trinity. Scroll down to read what I’ve been learning from David Bentley Hart on this, and to see the newest member of the family.
Identity and Relationship in the Trinity: Insights from DBH
In his book The Beauty of the Infinite, David Bentley Hart writes about the beauty of the Trinity in strikingly relational terms. He brings together who God is with beauty and relationship. Here’s an example:
The Christian understanding of beauty emerges not only naturally, but necessarily, from the Christian understanding of God as a perichoresis of love, a dynamic coinherence of the three divine persons, whose life is eternally one of shared regard, delight, fellowship, feasting, and joy. (p. 155)
Or how about this one:
The trinitarian love of God—and the love God requires of creatures—is eros and agape at once: a desire for the other that delights in the distance of otherness. (p. 20)
Or this one, when talking about the divine persons as eternally “giving themselves” to each other:
The revelation of this infinite condition of person-as-gift . . . is a revelation also of what the only true meaning of person is, even when applied to creatures. (p. 172)
Relationship—the self-giving of one person to another—is at the core of what it means to be a person. So, if we want to talk about who we are as unique persons, we have to talk about our relationships to others, our self-giving: first to God, the ultimate Self-Giver in whose trinitarian image we are made, and then to others.
Certainly, we can’t reduce human identity only to relationships. There are many parts of identity. And the longer we stare at the concept, the deeper and broader is roots seem to grow. But what often gets lost in discussion about identity in the modern, secularized, individualized West is this beautiful biblical truth of relationship and self-giving. And Hart has been reminding me how important it is to see that first in the Trinity and then in creatures made in God’s image.
I wonder sometimes how I might respond if someone asked me, “Who are you?” Like most people, I could focus on myself—my job, my passions, my idiosyncrasies. Perhaps I’d get a bit closer to biblical truth when I start talking about my family. But what would it look like to front my relational identity with God? Maybe something like this.
My name is Pierce Taylor Hibbs, and I’m a relational creature bound for oneness with the relational God through Jesus Christ. Relying on the riches of God’s self-giving, I enjoy giving myself to others by . . .
It probably wouldn’t go smoothly in conversation, would it? But the exercise might do something to get us a bit less focused on ourselves in isolation and more excited about our identity resting in divine relationship, feeding into all our human relationships . . . as well as all our relationships to the rest of creation. That includes dogs.
Speaking of which, here’s Buddy, the newest member of our family. He hasn’t read any of David Bentley Hart yet, but I’m sure he’d appreciate the relational focus. At 12 weeks old, he’s growing in relationship to us each day, and we’re having fun with him :)