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Explain the Trinity

may

Well-Known Member
rocketman said:
Hello May!

I know all about the various translations of Exodus. My point was that he used that particular name, a name that the Jews knew was associated with one God, especially in light of the 'shema' : "Sh'ma Yisrael Adonai Elohaynu Adonai Echad.." - "Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One".[Duet6:4] This was a very well known saying in Judaism, much like the Lord's prayer to Christians, and it would have sounded like outright blasphemy to the Jews at the time. God's name and the holy use of it has always been important to him, and he constantly empahised this to Israel. It's simply a fact of first century history that it would have sounded to them that he was saying he was God, because the teaching that there was only one God was an absolute to them. That is why they tried to stone him, and again in John 10:33 "'We are not stoning you for any of these,' replied the Jews, '"but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God'". Jesus' subsequent answer has been debated every which way, but there is no doubt what they wanted to stone him for, proof that they believed in only one God. So in a culture like that saying "I AM!" is saying you're God.

It is essential to have a thorough understanding of the day and age that Jesus lived in. One example where Jesus was at his most bold about his status was in Luke 19:44 "..because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you". They were supposed to recognize, as John the baptist did from scripture, this event: "For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." -Is11:6. Also in Isaiah it's interesting to note 42:8 " I am the Lord; that is my name! I will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols" .. and yet doubting Thomas worshipped Jesus as "My Lord and my God".
I think when God told Moses his name [I shall prove to be] he was refering to what he knew he would eventually do as Jesus.

When Jesus was asked what the most important commandment of all was, he said in Mark 12:29 "'The most important one', answered Jesus, 'is this:Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.Love the Lord...". Even the teacher who questioned him said: [v32] "You are right in saying that God is one and there is NO OTHER BUT HIM" [emphasis mine]. Did Jesus correct him? No, he said [v34] "You are not far from the kingdom of heaven". For Jesus to quote the shema to the Jews and not try to spin it in anyway is crystal clear evidence that Jesus thinks there is only one God, and none other but one. Please research what the first century expressions 'son of man' and 'son of God' actually mean. The Jews in the new testament obviously knew, and it's why they wanted to kill him.

I get the feeling, May, that I am not going to change your mind but I'm okay with that. I believe God is one, and frankly if he is then everything in the New Testament still makes perfect sense if you accept a God who can be everywhere at once [in 3 ways?]. Anyway, Jesus is my Lord and Saviour, and that's the important thing, right? Sorry about the long post. Love and peace.
even though they did try to stone him for blasphemy that was their thoughts ,Jesus never claimed to be God he claimed to be Gods son
do YOU say to me whom the Father sanctified and dispatched into the world, ‘You blaspheme,’ because I said, I am God’s Son? JOHN 10;36

(John 14:28) YOU heard that I said to YOU, I am going away and I am coming [back] to YOU. If YOU loved me, YOU would rejoice that I am going my way to the Father, because the Father is greater than I am.............Yes it seems that Jesus knew his place and never claimed to be God and said that the father was greater than him

(John 20:17) Jesus said to her: "Stop clinging to me. For I have not yet ascended to the Father. But be on your way to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and YOUR Father and to my God and YOUR God............... yes Jesus had a God ,as he tells here ,if we stick to the bible we cant go wrong

 

rocketman

Out there...
may said:
even though they did try to stone him for blasphemy that was their thoughts ,Jesus never claimed to be God he claimed to be Gods son

Then he did a woeful job of explaining that there are two God's to a people who clearly only believed in one. Please research expressions 'son of God', 'son of man' in first century Judaisim.

As I indicated, I don't think we're going to agree on this one.
 

Endless

Active Member
Well since folks have been discussing passages from John lets see what John himself - the disciple whom Jesus loved and who spent a good part of three years listening and being taught by Jesus - had to say on this matter.
John 5: 18 For this reason the Jews tried all the harder to kill him: not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
May, John the author acknowledges that Jesus was making himself equal with God - that Jesus was claiming to be God. This was why the Jews wanted to kill him for blasphemy. John wrote these verses you are quoting, i think John trumphs anything you might try to argue to the contrary since he wrote the book.
 

Endless

Active Member
May, you wrote the following:

its not a bible teaching simple as that,
Many persons think the trinity is a Christian teaching based on God’s Word, the Bible. but it is not , the trinity is a false teaching

Jesus Christ and his apostles did not teach the Trinity

the Trinity was unknown to early churchmen. Actually it was some 400 years or more after the death of Christ that the concept of ‘three persons in one God’ was finally formulated by men and introduced into the church........... now that is what i would call unfaithfulness
This cannot be defended from a Biblical point of view - if you are serious about what the Bible says and take it as truth. Let me elaborate a little bit. Equality of Jesus with God was taught by the apostles - as already shown by a few passages in John.

Php 2:5 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus,
6 who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God
,
7 but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men.
8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.
9 Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth,
11 and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
I don't know how much clearer you want the Bible to be...Jesus did not consider it robbery to be equal to God - ie. did not consider it as blasphemy. As confirmed already by what John wrote. It's clearly taught. Was it just the disciples that recognised that Jesus was claiming to be God? No it wasn't:

John 10:33 The Jews answered Him, saying, "For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy, and because You, being a Man, make Yourself God."
Even the non-believers recognised this. John himself teaches this in the very first verse of his book!

Joh 1:1 ¶ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 He was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.
John is talking about Jesus here - stating that he was God. It's clearly taught and there's no way around this. What about the book written to the Hebrews - like John it's the first thing that is taught.

Hebrews 1:2 has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds;
3 who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
4 ¶ having become so much better than the angels, as He has by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.
Again showing that Jesus is in very nature God - Jesus created everything as John also said. Lets look back to Genesis:

Ge 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
Yet we have just been told that Jesus created everything in the beginning - a contradiction? No, because it is clearly taught that Jesus is God. Lastly:

Heb 1:8 But to the Son He says: "Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your Kingdom.
9 You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; Therefore God, Your God, has anointed You With the oil of gladness more than Your companions."
10 And: "You, LORD, in the beginning laid the foundation of the earth, And the heavens are the work of Your hands.
11 They will perish, but You remain; And they will all grow old like a garment;
12 Like a cloak You will fold them up, And they will be changed. But You are the same, And Your years will not fail."

Again God speaking to the Son (Jesus) - calls Jesus 'O God'. Then the second bit in bold God is still speaking - this touches on what you posted regarding Jesus speaking to Mary saying he had to go back to his God. Jesus was returning to God the Father - therefore since he was Jesus' Father he was also Jesus' God. That is all that was meant when Jesus said that.
I could go on, but i think that i have posted up sufficient evidience to show that it is taught throughout scriptures. It was always taught that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit were one - the word trinity was just introduced to help explain this. Even through the Old testament
 

Endless

Active Member
Also the concept of the water is a brilliant analogy to describing the Trinity - it works perfectly. Steam, liquid, solid - all differnt yet all still water.
 

James the Persian

Dreptcredincios Crestin
Endless said:
Also the concept of the water is a brilliant analogy to describing the Trinity - it works perfectly. Steam, liquid, solid - all differnt yet all still water.
I disagree. It's a good analogy for modalism (where Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all modes of the one God) but I don't see how it's a good analogy for the Trinity. Water cannot simultaneously be solid, liquid and vapour so if the analogy were accurate we'd be saying that God is not simultaneously Father, Son and Holy Spirit but rather can become one Person or another as appropriate. That isn't the Trinity at all.

James
 

Endless

Active Member
They can exist in complete equilibrium - it's called the triple point of water. Have a search and you will see.
 
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