Attributes of God in Christianity

Additionally, God is often described as eternal (without beginning or end) and immutable (unchangeable), indicating a constant and perfect existence.

Other attributes include holiness (moral purity), rectitude (righteousness), justice (fairness), love (compassionate care for creation), mercy (forgiveness and kindness), and goodness (benevolent will toward others).

These attributes provide a framework for understanding how God is perceived to interact with the world and humanity, forming the basis for various theological doctrines.

In Reformed theology, God's attributes are often distinguished between those that can be shared with humans (such as love and justice) and those that cannot (such as omnipotence and omnipresence).

[1] Donald Macleod, however, argues that "All the suggested classifications are artificial and misleading, not least that which has been most favoured by Reformed theologians – the division into communicable and incommunicable attributes.

[3] Sinclair Ferguson distinguishes "essential" divine attributes, which "have been expressed and experienced in its most intense and dynamic form among the three persons of the Trinity—when nothing else existed."

They are: infinity, simplicity, indivisibility, uniqueness, immutability, eternity, and spirituality (meaning absence of matter).

[5] Personal attributes of God are life (fullness, beatitude, perfection), thought, will and freedom, love and friendship.

"[7] The Westminster Larger Catechism adds certain attributes to this description, such as "all-sufficient," "incomprehensible," "every where present" and "knowing all things".

"[12] Many theologians consider the goodness of God as an overarching attribute - Louis Berkhof, for example, sees it as including kindness, love, grace, mercy and longsuffering.

[16] Grudem goes on to say that the whole Bible "is the story of God's involvement with his creation", but highlights verses such as Acts 17:28, "in him we live and move and have our being".

Prominent adherents of open theism include Clark Pinnock, Thomas Jay Oord, John E. Sanders and Gregory Boyd.

Although most Christians historically (saint Athanasius, Augustine, Aquinas, and Calvin being examples) take this to mean that God is "without emotions whether of sorrow, pain or grief", some people interpret this as meaning that God is free from all attitudes "which reflect instability or lack of control.

"[21] Robert Reymond says that "it should be understood to mean that God has no bodily passions such as hunger or the human drive for sexual fulfillment.

"[29] Robert Reymond suggests that it is the fact of his spiritual essence that underlies the second commandment, which prohibits every attempt to fashion an image of him.

Kevin Bidwell argues that this school, which includes Jürgen Moltmann and Miroslav Volf, "deliberately advocates self-giving love and freedom at the expense of Lordship and a whole array of other divine attributes.

"[39] Many theologians see mystery as God's primary attribute because he only reveals certain knowledge to the human race.

Luther's change of mind and subsequent interpretation of the phrase as referring to the rectitude which God imputes to the believer was a major factor in the Protestant Reformation.

More recently, however, scholars such as N. T. Wright have argued that the verse refers to an attribute of God after all - this time, his covenant faithfulness.

[52] The sovereignty of God is related to his omnipotence, providence, and kingship, yet it also encompasses his freedom, and is in keeping with his goodness, righteousness, holiness, and impeccability.

"[53] Other Christian writers contend that the sovereign God desires to be influenced by prayer and that he "can and will change His mind when His people pray.

"[54][55] God's transcendence means that he is outside space and time, and therefore eternal and unable to be changed by forces within the universe.

Triunitarian traditions of Christianity propose the Triunity of God - three persons in one (or triune): Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.

[57] Support for the doctrine of the Triunity comes from several verses on the Bible and the New Testament's trinitarian formulae, such as the Great Commission of Matthew 28:19, "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit".

Also, 1 John 5:7 (of the KJV) reads "...there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one", but this Comma Johanneum is almost universally rejected as a Latin corruption.

An error in the original would be attributable to God Himself, because He, in the pages of Scripture, takes responsibility for the very words of the biblical authors.

Errors in copies, however, are the sole responsibility of the scribes involved, in which case God's veracity is not impugned.