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Tritheism
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The heretical teaching about the Trinity which denies the unity of substance in the Divine Persons. The name is used especially of the teaching of a group of 6th-cent. Monophysites, including John Philoponus. He taught that the common nature shared by the three Persons is an intellectual abstraction, and that though the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have a common nature and substance, they are as individuals distinct substances or natures and are distinct in their properties. This teaching was condemned as tritheism at the Council of Constantinople (680–81). Roscelin and Gilbert de la Porrée were both accused of tritheism and condemned.
