Hi Mojobadshah —
A couple of things to consider at the outset ... the first is, if you think you understand the Trinity, then you've got it wrong! God cannot be contained in the human mind, nor can human language adequately speak of the Deity ... so discussing the Trinity will always involve analogy.
Another thing I think is very apposite is Seattlegal's comment ... the Holy Trinity is something like a koan ... I would say it's an eikon, and when one contemplates an eikon, the essence is present if the approach is correct.
Christian is founded on the Trinity and the Incarnation — these are 'mysteries' in the traditional sense — that is, not just something to be conveyed in words, but something to be entered into ... and not necessarily experientially.
In these modern times it is often unrealised that there is more to 'knowledge' than data, and what one knows is no measure of who one is. Christianity, whilst a religion of gnosis par excellence, it is a gnosis of being, not a gnosis that comprises a body of discreet data, the knowledge of which somehow marks the knower as something 'special'.
Lastly, this order of knowledge is not attained in 5 minutes.
So pretty much any Christian I spoke to about this would draw a blank?
It depends what denomination. The Trinity seems to become more nebulous and vague in modern denominations — I think the RC and Orthodox are the last bastions of a full Trinitarian doctrine and teaching.
Nor is a deep 'knowledge' of the Trinity necessary for salvation ... but I have met those who have a deep 'knowing' of the Holy Trinity, without being able to say a single word about it. And, as in everything, there are many who have a lot to say, and no real knowledge at all.
And what does this spirit do? What is the distinction between the roles that the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost play?
The Abrahamic Tradition is unique in three senses (among many others) — one is that God wills to be known by His creature (there is no reason why man should 'know' God as anything more than a viable hypothesis of a First Cause, there are no others, really). Another is that God wills this order of knowing to transcend the human duality of object/subject relation, and become a 'deific' order of knowing and being. The third is that God preserves the integrity of His creation even in union, so Union in the Christian sense does not involve the absorption/sublimation/extinction of the creature in the union (as in 'drop-in-the-ocean' analogies).
God as Father transcends the forms, so how can one know that which transcends every order of knowledge? One can't. So God comes to man, to enable man to come to God. man cannot attain to God under his own steam as it were, any more than man can do anything that lies outside of the capacity of his nature.
God as Son is the Transcendent disclosing Itself in intelligible forms. To the philosophical mind these forms are the transcendentals — The Good, The Real, The True, The Beautiful, The Absolute, The Infinite, and so on. To the mythopoeic mind these forms are more 'substantial' — a Pillar of Fire, a Column of Smoke, a Burning Bush, Manna in the Desert, and so on.
Thus the Son is designated Arche, Logos, Verbum, Word, Wisdom, Memra, Principle ... all of which speak of whereas God the Father is designated Darkness and Deep in the mythopoeic, or the Apeiron (Boundless) in the philosophic.
God as Holy Spirit is the Indwelling Presence that perfects the creature and draws it towards Divine Union, variously and analogously described as a 'nuptial' or 'filial' union. The Holy Spirit is Love.
So, as the Fathers say, the Spirit leads to the Son, the Son leads to the Father. Only in the Spirit can one truly know the Son, and only in the Son can one truly know the Father.
When I read "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name" it just means that the Father will be sending the comforter on Jesus's behalf.
OK, but Jesus wills nothing other than the Father's will, so anything done in Jesus' name is done for the Father's sake.
See that's another definition that sounds totally vague to me.
All definitions will sound vague, because they are all analogies.
Another one:
Father is all that God is.
Son is all that God knows.
Spirit is all that God wills.
But all three are God, the Father is wholly and entirely God, and wholly and entirely in the Son and Spirit; the Son is wholly and entirely God, and wholly and entirely in the Father and the Spirit, the Spirit is wholly and entirely God, and wholly and entirely in the Father and the Son.
Logically, one must be before one can know oneself to be ... but in God there is no time, so God's being, and God's knowing, are simultaneous, even though they can be portrayed as an order of precedence. Scripture does this a lot, and a lot of people confuse themselves as a result.
Would I be wrong if I were to think of it in Zoroastrian terms such that God is the Father, Jesus is the personification of God on earth, and the Holy Ghost is a hypostasis of God,
Yes. The Trinity is prior to creation, so any spatio-temporal determinations are secondary analogies.
for God can not be directly involved in the material world,
I disagree. God can do whatever God wills, God does not depend on man's logic or reason to validate or enable His activities.
Moreover, if what you say is true, then man cannot be directly involved in God's world, and the whole idea of religion / spirituality / whatever is an illusion and an utter waste of time.
and therefore the Holy Ghost is his intermediary between God's spiritual dominion and the material world?
No, the Holy Spirit is God, not an intermediary, or demigod, or demiurge, or whatever ... I would say the Holy Spirit is God's Immanent Presence which sustains and maintains the world from moment to moment, and leads it towards its fulfilment and its perfection.
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I spoke to a friend of mine today who happens to be a Catholic ... but he really had no idea what the Holy Ghost was.
The level of contemporary catechesis is generally very poor. Then, people stop asking questions when they leave school, so stay with their childhood ideas ...
The process of deepening one's faith and understanding is called 'Mystagogia'.
What he did point out was during confirmation the Holy Ghost is supposed to enter into one's heart or something along those lines, but that we are not the Holy Ghost.
Hmm ... Baptism is the first step in the process, but no, we are not the Holy Spirit, nor is the Holy Spirit any part of our nature. The fact that the divine can indwell does not make the creature divine, although the ego delights in assuming that for itself.
This however reminds me of the idea that the Kingdom of God or Heaven is within.
Well remember that is analogous ... for the Kingdom of Heaven is also outside you, and all around you ... I would say the Kingdom of Heaven does not exist in time and space nor in any finite state, Heaven is Infinite, and as such accessible anywhere ...
Almost like when the Holy Ghost Dawns upon a person that they've achieved a sort of enlightenment.
Almost ... the Holy Spirit is the light that enlightens.
Both Zoroaster and Jesus went through it.
Jesus didn't. Jesus was baptised, and there was the sign of the descent of the dove, one of the symbols of the Holy Spirit, but this refers to His humanity, rather than enlightening Him to His own divinity.
In fact, if you want to get really technical, it's the Holy Spirit who
veils the divine nature from the human nature of Jesus Christ so that He might speak and act in faith, as we are called to do ... but that's Christology.
I'm also wondering has anyone ever inferred that when Jesus was seen walking on water whether that was actually the Holy Ghost?
No, it was actually Jesus.
I wondering if maybe this trinity could be more clearly interpreted if the Father was unable to be directly involved in our lives so he sent the Holy Ghost his Spirit and an intermediary between him and the Son, God in his bodily form, susceptible to destruction (which would basically be in keeping with my Zoroastrian model).
It's not that the Father is incapable, the idea of God being incapable of anything is illogical. Rather it's from the viewpoint of man's comprehension. The very idea of God as Father says something in itself, it's just that man doesn't recognise the fact ... it's rather that in the Higher Aspects, there is no object to recognise.
And my question here would be if that is the case that Yahweh appeared in the form of a person why would he need a Jesus or Holy Spirit.
It's not a case of God needing this or that ... God needs for nothing. So there's something else going on.
God bless,
Thomas
{But then again, it might not.}