My basic point remains: if you argue for EFS and/or reject (or even regard as negotiable) eternal generation, then you stand outside the bounds of the historic Nicene Christian faith as set forth at Constantinople in 381 and held thereafter by the church catholic. I understand that many hold these views sincerely, without realizing the historical/theological/creedal implications…”.
R. Scott Clark
R.Scott Clark is the President of the Heidelberg Reformation Association, the author and editor of, and contributor to several books and the author of many articles. He has taught church history and historical theology since 1997 at Westminster Seminary California. He has also taught at Wheaton College, Reformed Theological Seminary, and Concordia University. He has hosted the Heidelblog since 2007.
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If the E in EFS were to stand for Everlasting, then EFS would be scriptural, 1 Cor 15:28. He will forever be subject to the Father, because He is Man. But before He became Man, whilst Begotten from eternity (Eternal Generation – Nobody contradicted Nebuchadnezzar when he identified Him as the Son of God in the fiery furnace), He was not subordinate from eternity (past, *z*l in the semitic sources I’m familiar with), but He will be subject for eternity (future, *b*d in said sources).
While EFS is not traditional terminology, the distinctions between the divine persons – Unbegotten, Begotten and Proceeding – most definitely are. I think it would be helpful for those who oppose EFS in the name of opposing subordinationism would affirm the primacy of the Father in the eternal Trinity. http://venerable-bede.blogspot.ru/2016/06/the-primacy-of-father-contribution-to.html
Russell,
The problem is that those making this case have blurred and sometimes ignored the distinction between economic or the voluntary submission of the Son and ontological subordination, thus placing at risk Nicene-Constantinopolitan orthodoxy.
It is one thing to speak of the primacy of the Father in order, another to make that primacy a matter if essence or being.
To complicate things further, some of those who are making these arguments, are also denying the simplicity of God and his immutability. Thus, we are faced with a sort of wholesale, biblicistic, quasi-Socinian revision of the doctrine of God.
What is EFS again?
Eternal Functional Subordination. It’s not traditional terminology. It’s language invented by proponents of the analogy between their view of ontological subordination of the Son and male/female relations (in defense of complementarianism).