It is awkward to accept the main results of the ancient trinitarian controversy while thinking that the developmental process had at its heart a fundamentally wrong assumption, namely that the Son and Spirit exist because of the Father.
A major debate in early Christianity (roughly 300s CE) about whether God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit are three separate beings or one being in three forms, and how they relate to each other.
Trinity
# Trinity
The Trinity is the Christian belief that God exists as three distinct persons—the Father, the Son (Jesus), and the Holy Spirit—while remaining one God. These three are understood as co-equal and eternal, working together as a unified divine being. This concept is central to most Christian denominations, though different traditions interpret and explain it in various ways.
For Hasker, the Persons of the Trinity are three divine selves (Chapters 22–5). Against a modern Protestant trend, Hasker insists that a doctrine of processions must be retained, arguing that it enjoys “significant support” from scripture (217), and he points out the awkwardness accepting “the main results of the [ancient] trinitarian controversy” while thinking that this “developmental process…had at its heart a fundamentally wrong assumption”, that is, that the Son and Spirit exist because of the Father (222–3).