Cheryl Schatz

Hi Kyle,

Welcome to my blog! Thanks also for your kind remarks.

The begetting of the Son is related to 1 Cor. 11:3 which is Christ not the LORD of hosts. The humanity of Jesus was begotten of the Father and even in His resurrection he is said to be begotten. As far as the LORD of hosts in the Trinity, since He is equal with the LORD God and had no beginning and no end, there is nothing that can be generated that wasn’t there before.

To be “generated” something is brought into existence. It is understandable that the body of the Lord Jesus was prepared by God and Jesus took on flesh Himself, but as far as His Spirit there can be no generation and “eternal generation” becomes nonsensical.

However having said that I understand that those who use this language do not really believe in a “begetting of the Spirit” as if that there would be a beginning rather than fully God. I do think that one can believe in the “eternal begetting” without having to believe in an eternal subordination. I believe that most just accept this as an eternal relationship rather than a bringing into existence something that wasn’t there before. I don’t know if anyone has ever really understood or explained how in eternity there could be a begetting without a beginning. I personally think that it is a regrettable term. But since the idea behind the term is fundamentally about an eternal relationship, I don’t make a big deal about it. But if we are going to be technical an eternal begetting or eternally begotten are two terms that are basically nonsensical in anything other than relationship.

Does this make sense?