Rational proofs of the Trinity never convinced informed non-Christian disputants

Evidence

Some polemists of the high scholastic period and later put these comparationes forward as logical proofs, ignoring the opinion of their greater contemporaries that the Mystery of the Trinity is not susceptible of rational proof, as distinct from rational illustration. The great scholastic theologians did not attempt ‘proof’. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 977 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Alan of Lille used explanations in his polemic against both Jews and Muslims; for example, unity begets itself, and between the begetting unity and the begotten unity there is a certain equality, so that there are three unities in one. Again, there is the vestige of the Trinity in the human soul which recollects, and loves, and understands, like candles burning with a single light. Alexander III’s development of the theme is classic: the ineffable Trinity ‘has so much more nicely the merit of faith that it is difficult to believe’. His approach was far removed from that which thought to ‘prove’. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 975 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Muslims rejected the Trinity as polytheism and carnal generation; Lull never sincerely engaged actual Muslim objections to the Trinity; Later polemicists mistook Trinity analogies for logical proofs their predecessors rejected — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 977 (+1 more)

Related

• Medieval theologians distinguished rational illustration of the Trinity from rational proof (similarity 0.93)
• Later polemicists mistook Trinity analogies for logical proofs their predecessors rejected (similarity 0.93)
• Even Lull doubted laypeople could grasp his Trinitarian proofs (similarity 0.85)
• Theologians thought proving the Trinity rationally was impossible (similarity 0.85)
• Lull pushed rational argument for the Trinity beyond medieval theological limits (similarity 0.85)
• Lull never sincerely engaged actual Muslim objections to the Trinity (similarity 0.85)
• Trinity doctrine was argued through supposedly rational criteria rooted in Latin influence (similarity 0.84)
• Lull taught lay Christian merchants to prove the Trinity to Muslims (similarity 0.84)
• Lull argued Muslim monotheism was incomplete, not false, and only the Trinity proved it. (similarity 0.83)
• Medieval polemicists coerced the Qur’an’s own terms into proofs of the Trinity (similarity 0.83)
• Muslims rejected the Trinity as polytheism and carnal generation (similarity 0.82)
• Medieval thinkers treated any non-Trinitarian concept of God as wholly defective (similarity 0.81)
• Medieval theologians cited the Qur’an as implicit proof of the Trinity (similarity 0.80)
• Scholarly polemic failed because it never spoke in terms Muslims could recognize (similarity 0.80)
• Trinity disputes dominated Christian thinking about Islam rather than God’s unity (similarity 0.80)

Broader Connections

• Later polemicists mistook Trinity analogies for logical proofs their predecessors rejected #corroborates (0.85) — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 977
• Medieval theologians distinguished rational illustration of the Trinity from rational proof #corroborates (0.85) — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 975