Eastern Orthodoxy Daily He/Who/Is
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Unitarianism functionally polytheistic despite monotheistic claims
The post argues that Unitarian theology, while professing one God, assigns divine roles to Jesus as a creature, making it functionally polytheistic. The author states that praying to Jesus as "first of all creation" is still praying to a creature, and invoking that creature for salvation assigns it a divine role, elevating it to a lesser deity.
By Islamic standards this constitutes shirk regardless of Unitarian insistence on monotheism. From a traditional Christian perspective, worship belongs only to God; if Jesus is treated as spiritually essential while being denied divinity, religious reliance is placed on a creature. This issue is exactly what early Christians like St. Athanasius argued against when confronting Arian theology.
Jewish critiques come from a different angle: Judaism guards divine unity strictly, so assigning cosmic roles like judgment, mediation, or salvation to a human figure feels like adding another participant into God's authority. Even if technically subordinate, elevating a man into divine function crosses the boundary of pure monotheism.
Philosophically, the author distinguishes between saying there is one God and actually living as if only one ultimate reality exists. A belief system can claim one divine being in theory while in practice spreading devotion across multiple sacred centers. The author concludes that Unitarianism keeps monotheism as an idea but functionally drifts into something that looks more like polytheism in how devotion, authority, and meaning get divided when Christ gets involved.
To Muslims who favor Unitarians, the author promises that Unitarian theology would constitute shirk in Islam because Jesus is not a human or prophet in their theology but far beyond that.
Main points
- Praying to Jesus as first of creation directs worship to a creature
- Traditional Christianity requires Christ's divinity for spiritual reliance
- St. Athanasius opposed similar Arian theology in the early Church
- Judaism rejects assigning divine functions to a human figure
- Islam would classify Unitarian devotion to Jesus as shirk