Source: The Trinity — Evidence and Issues, Robert Morey Chapter 13, p. 197ff
So far in our study, we have found in the Old Testament the crucial concepts which form the basis of the doctrine of the Trinity. The one true God of Israel is tri-personal in nature and is identified as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
We have also seen that the personhood and divinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit stand or fall together. If the personhood and divinity of one member is denied, then it must be denied for all. It is a classic case of all for one and one for all. The same arguments which led us to conclude that the Father is a person and not an impersonal force and that He is true deity also led us to the same conclusions about the Son and the Holy Spirit.
In this chapter, we will examine several passages in the Old Testament which reveal how the three members of the Trinity function together as One. The unity of the Trinity is revealed as they work together to accomplish common goals.
That we would finds such passages in the Old Testament does not surprise us in the least. This is the sort of thing that Trinitarians expect to find. But Unitarians will be quite surprised because such passages do not fit in with their a priori assumptions. They have the impossible task of explaining away the obvious.
That God is the Maker of heaven and earth is so fundamental to the biblical vision of God that any attempt tot tamper with this concept automatically self-destructs. The Being who created the universe out of nothing and made all things to work together for His glory, has to be omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent. No finite creature has the wisdom, knowledge, and power to create ex nihilo. This is something that the Bible tells us that only God can do (Isa 20: 18-28).
That the Father is the Creator (i.e., Isa 40:28) is not challenged by anyone, not even by the Unitarians. But that the Son and the Spirit are also identified in the Old Testament as the Creator of the universe will come as a surprise to some.
In the book of Isaiah, the "Servant of Yahweh" is the Messiah, the Son of God, as well as the nation of Israel (Isa 42:1; 52:13-15, 53, etc.). In Isaiah 48:16, the Messiah says:
"Come near to Me, listen to this: from the first I have not spoken in secret, from the time it took place, I was there. And now the Lord GOD has sent Me, and His Spirit."
In the context, who is the One speaking? The Speaker is identified in the preceding verses:
Isaiah 48:12-13 (NASB) "Listen to Me, O Jacob, even Israel whom I called; I am He, I am the first, I am also the last. 13 "Surely My hand founded the earth, and My right hand spread out the heavens; when I call to them, they stand together.
If we interpret verse 16 in light of its literary context, the Speaker is clearly the Creator of the world. The divine work of creation is, thus, attributed to the Messiah in this passage.
Then in the book of Job we read:
Job 33:4 (NASB) "The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.
The parallelism in the Hebrew text is striking. The Holy Spirit is designated by two different words (רוּחַ ruach and נְשָׁמָה neshamah). God is given two different names (אֵל El and שַׁדַּי Shaddai); and there are two different verbs used to designate the act of man's creation (עָשָׂה ʻâsâh and חָיָה châyâh).
The verb עָשָׂה ʻâsâh "made me" refers to an act of divine creation. It is the word used for the creative acts of God in Genesis 1:31; 2:2; 3:1; 5:1, etc. It is even translated "Maker" in Job 32:22. Job's choice of this particular Hebrew word is significant because it clearly reveals that he understood in some sense the Spirit of God is God.
Job is echoing Genesis 1:2, where the Spirit is introduced as the one who actually formed the earth:
Genesis 1:2 (NASB) The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.
The word for "was moving" is a participle and means to hover over something. It is used in Deuteronomy 32:11 to describe an eagle hovering over its young in the nest. It reveals that the Spirit of God was the one who superintended each new phase of the Creation.
We, thus, arrive at the situation where the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all identified as the Maker of heaven and earth. No wonder the author of Ecclesiastes said:
Ecclesiastes 12:1 (NASB) Remember also your Creators [lit. Heb.] in the days of your youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near when you will say, "I have no delight in them";
The Creation of the universe involved the joined effort of the three Persons—the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Anyone who reads Isaiah 48:16 cannot escape the impression that the Sender is obviously the Father, nad that the Son and the Spirit are the Ones who are sent:
Isaiah 48:16 (NASB) "Come near to Me, listen to this: from the first I have not spoken in secret, from the time it took place, I was there. And now the Lord GOD has sent Me, and His Spirit."
Notice that all three members of the Godhead are present and accounted for. This is the kind of passage which led to the formulation of the doctrine of the Trinity by the early Church. Given such passages, who can blame them?
Isaiah 61:1 (NASB) The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners;
The Servant of Yahweh, the Messiah, is sent by His Father to deliver the oppressed. In order to aid Him in His work of redemption, the Spirit of Yahweh is sent to empower Him. Notice once again that all three members of the Godhead are present and accounted for.
Isaiah goes on to give us yet another passage which models the Trinity. In Isaiah 63 we read:
Isaiah 63:8-10 (NASB) For He said, "Surely, they are My people, sons who will not deal falsely." So He became their Savior. 9 In all their affliction He was afflicted, and the angel of His presence saved them; in His love and in His mercy He redeemed them, and He lifted them and carried them all the days of old. 10 But they rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit; therefore He turned Himself to become their enemy, He fought against them.
There are three distict persons in this passage. There is the Speaker who sent the Messenger. That makes two Persons. Then the Holy Spirit was grieved. That makes three Persons.
In the Hebrew text of verse 9, the words "the Messenger of His presence" literally translate as "the Messenger of His face." It was an idomatic expression which meant the Messenger who is His face, i.e., who is the outward expression of His essence. The classic German commentator Carl Wilhelm Nagelsbach explains:
For by "the angel of His face" who saved them, the suppliant evidently intends "Angel of God" by whom the redemption of the people from Egyption slavery was effected. The expression "angel of His face" refers immediately to Exo 33:14-15, where to the request of Moses that the LORD would let him know whom He intends to send with them (verses 12, 13), the answer is given... Moses there upon rejoins: "If thy Face go not, carry us not up hence.
Because Moses wanted to know whether God Himself would be with them, he asks whether God's "face" would be with them. The divine Messenger who appeared to Moses and the Patriarchs was the "face" of God. As Delitzsch rightly points out:
"the face of God" is His self-revealing presence. The genitive "face", therefore, is not to be taken objectively in the sense of "the angel who sees His face," but as explanatory, "the angel who is His face, or in whom His face is manifested."
This has been pointed out by modern commentators as well. E. J. Young comments:
This angel (the word means messenger) God had promised to send to His people (Exo 23:20-23) and actually did send to them (Exo 14:19; Num 20:16). He is the Lord's angel (Exo 33:14-15) and is actually the Lord (Yahweh) Himself (Exo 33:12).
The "Messenger of His face" is clearly the "Messenger of Yahweh" who is Yahweh in human form. Who else could be described with such terminology? Even the pre-Christian Jews understood this quite clearly. Thus, the Septuagint renders Isaiah 63:9 as:
... out of their affliction; not by an ambassador, or an angel but the Lord Himself saved them through His love.
The Alexandrian Jews in their paraphrase of this verse, pointed out that the "Messenger of His face" was not a human ambassador (presbus) or a mere created angel (angelos), but Yahweh Himself.
Since we have already exegeted the reference to the Holy Spirit in verse 10, suffice it to say that there is a clear reference to the third Person of the Trinity. We, thus, end up once again with a passage in which all three members of the Trinity are present and accounted for. As Nagelsbach pointed out:
the light of the relation of the Trinity breaks through even in the Old Testament...
Plumptre comments:
Here, and in Psa51:11, as in the "Angel of the Presence," we may note a foreshadowing of the truth of the triune personality of the unity of the Godhead.
Delitzsch is even stronger on this point:
Hence Jehovah, and the angel of His face, and the Spirit of His holiness, are distinguished as three persons ... we have here an unmistakable indication of the mystery of the triune nature of God the One, which was revealed in history in the New Testament work of redemption.
Dr. E. J. Young, who wrote the foremost 20th century commentary on Isaiah states:
The Spirit is here distinguished as a Person by the fact that He can be grieved and so feel grief. Upon the basis of this passage Paul utters his remarkable statement: "Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God" (Eph 4:30). Thus, in these two verses there is a distinction of the three persons of the Triune God. He [Yahweh], the angel of His presence, and the Spirit of His holiness. In the history of the chosen people each Person of the Trinity was active.
The prophet Isaiah should be remembered not only as the "fiery" prophet but also as the "Trinitarian" prophet.
The Old Testament reveals the Personhood, true deity, and unity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in a way that is truly remarkable. The passages we have examined are exactly what we would expect to find if the Bible were written by Trinitarians. A Unitarian would have never written the Bible the way it is.
The only way to avoid this fact is to take the attitude, "Don't confuse me with the facts. My mind is already made up!" But is it not better to bow before the God who tells us in scripture who and what He is than to give our own vain speculations?
Isaiah 8:20 (NASB) To the Law and to the Testimony! If they do not speak according to this Word, it is because they have no light.