According to Pope (and I agree with this explanation) ;
"Theologically, Jesus means that the Father is the eternal source in the Trinity. All three persons of the Trinity are co-eternal, co-equal, and equally divine. But the Father is the Principium Deitatis (the Source in the Deity)."
" Hence, Jesus proceeds from the Father from all eternity. He is eternally begotten of the Father. In effect, Jesus is saying, “I delight that the Father is the eternal principle or source of my being, even though I have no origin in time.”
"Devotionally, Jesus is saying that He always does what pleases His Father. Jesus loves His Father; He’s crazy about Him. He is always talking about Him and pointing to Him. By calling the Father greater, He says (in effect), “I look to my Father for everything. I do what I see Him doing (Jn 5:19) and what I know pleases Him (Jn 5:30). His will and mine are one. What I will to do proceeds from Him. I do what I know accords with His will.”
In short ... it's a mystery mathematically unexplainable (OUR fallible minds cannot make one plus pne equal two with this divine mystery)
YOUR response should be (as mine IS .. ) ...
yup !
Too many people (watch this thread do it .. ) can't help but add; "In other words ... " .... words
I think you make good point worth notice:
>>>>Too many people (watch this thread do it .. ) can’t help but add; “In other words ... “ .... words
Words are abstractions, always less than the thing described; how much more so for God? God fully describable in words would not be be God.
The purpose of the councils was to combat heresy, more to describe what was in error in saying God is; not intended to fully capture God in words, but to draw boundaries beyond which error lay.
” Hence, Jesus proceeds from the Father from all eternity. He is eternally begotten of the Father. In effect, Jesus is saying, “I delight that the Father is the eternal principle or source of my being, even though I have no origin in time.”
____________________________________________________________
I would take issue with that in that Jesus is subject to The Father, they are then not co-equal. Elohim is the greater of the three. He commands and They obey His will. Even when Christ didn't want to obey The Fathers will He did. Because of Nicea there have been many contortions of doctrines to try to make the definition of The Trinity as expressed by Nicea 325 fit with scripture but it still doesn't. Nearly all if not all the laborious definitions of the Trinity come after Nicea 325. Christ Himself never makes these contorted definitions. He made sure that even the simplest of peoples could understand what He was talking about. Christ is divine, He is eternal but He was begotten and has inherited what He now has. While we call Him eternal He Himself expresses it a little differently, calling Himself the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. There is no beginning of eternal so that itself could be a subject of much conjecture.