What really happened at Nicea(Nicaea)?

a reply to: adjensen

A deacon to the circumcised
[Rom 15:8 RSV] 8 For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised to show God's truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs,

Instead of allowing Christ/The Spirit (The Lord is the Spirit, where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty) to be the head of your body, and of the corporate body you would rather have the security of another mans perception of the reality of Christ. Indulgences and Inquisitions are one end of the spectrum. To place another man in the place of Christ as your mediator, aka your Father/Priest or Pope, you are allowing a man to supersede Christ. There can be no unity in the body when men are placed on separate levels. Yes there are many different parts to the body, but one does not lord it over the other that it is the elbow instead of the armpit. Yet that is what happens in manmade hierarchy.

That does not mean there aren't leaders, shepherds, mature ones who take you under their wing. But the power given to the clergy is not only unwarranted biblically but detrimental to the health of the church.

Even there, our conception of church differs. You see an organization as the church. With its buildings and its wealth (how wealthy is the RCC?) and its structure just like a corporation (with its corporate rules, that get dictated by the board of directors who were voted in just like any other corporation).

This is nothing more than a revamp of the Jewish temple system, with its tributes and Sanheidren. Its sacrifices and burnt offerings. That temple was torn down.

Don't you know you are the temple of God. You are the body. You are the bride. You are the New Jerusalem. You do not need an anti-christ in your temple (another man dictating your relationship to the Father). You worry about anything goes. Why don't you go directly to the Father and ask Him to lead you. Those men with their robes are not more holy than you, they don't have a direct link to God anymore than you do. We are all partakers of the divine nature (2 Peter?). Thats not that we don't need each other, and others to be a part of our lives.

I mean no offense, I hope you know. I have no issue with the loving men and women within the institutions. It is the institutions themselves and their harlot nature that I stand against.

a reply to: zardust

I mean no offense, I hope you know.

Oh, I take no offense, but I doubt that we will ever see eye to eye. As an historian, I've studied the early church extensively, as well as "alternative Christianities" and the Church Fathers and theologians through the centuries, like Augustine, Thomas Aquinas and Gregory of Nyssa, and the conclusion that I have come to is that the truest Christianity is what is taught in the Catholic and Orthodox Catholic churches. Comparing what they teach to what was taught in the earliest churches finds the closest match (though the Lutheran and Anglican churches also come pretty close.)

For 2,000 years, some of the most brilliant minds on the face of the earth have struggled to come to grips with Christ and what he taught, and I lack the arrogance to say that I am on a par with that. There are things that I appreciate in other faiths, and I think that they have all (including the Catholic church,) gone off the rails at one point or another. But I'm not going to chuck history in the bin and declare that I've figured it out and can go it alone.

I think that the belief that anyone can pick up the Bible, read it, and, without any other input from anyone, can correctly interpret it and find "true Christianity," is exactly what is wrong with Christianity today. These guys say you have to worship on Saturday. These guys say you have to work for social justice. These guys say you can't baptize infants. These guys say you have to confess your sins to another person. These guys say that sins don't matter. These guys say that some people are condemned to hell before they were born and there's nothing you can do about it. These guys say that everyone gets saved.

It's madness.

I prefer the comfort and structure of a church with a hierarchy and regulated teaching authority, but that's just me. I'm obviously a minority on ATS, where anti-Catholics are legion.

a reply to: adjensen

I never said true christianity comes from the bible. Because I don't believe it does. It comes like rain from the Father. (He sends rain on the just and unjust, the early and latter rains, the Dew of Hermon psalm 133)

Who do you say that I am?

You are the Christ, The son of God

Blessed are you Simon Bar Jonah for flesh and blood did not REVEAL this to you, but my Father in heaven.

AND ON THIS ROCK, I will build my church

The rock that the church is built on is the Revelation from The FAther to see the Son.

You search the scriptures daily for in them you think you will find eternal life, but it is these that testify of me.

The Scriptures are for a sign, they are a marker, a map, but they are not the reality. They bear the marks of fallible men along with the doctrines of men (infallible popes???). They are completely dead save for the life giving Spirit. You and I are given the Spirit as down payment along with the Pope, Billy Graham, Mother Theresa, your priest, my pastor.

I am not saying we are to be lone rangers, for that is not the design. But the unity in the Spirit cannot be achieved when certain men are given privilege over others

Matt 23
1Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples, 2saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses; 3therefore all that they tell you, do and observe, but do not do according to their deeds; for they say things and do not do them. 4“They tie up heavy burdens and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are unwilling to move them with so much as a finger. 5“But they do all their deeds to be noticed by men; for they broaden their phylacteries and lengthen the tassels of their garments. 6“They love the place of honor at banquets and the chief seats in the synagogues, 7and respectful greetings in the market places, and being called Rabbi by men. 8“But do not be called Rabbi; for One is your Teacher, and you are all brothers. 9“Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. 10“Do not be called leaders; for One is your Leader, that is, Christ. 11“But the greatest among you shall be your servant. 12“Whoever exalts himself shall be humbled; and whoever humbles himself shall be exalted.


Eight Woes

13“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven from people; for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in. 1

Broadened phylacteries: fancy bishop robes, gold crosses, giant ornate churches, 20 million dollar buildings that sit empty 90% of the time but house a bunch of rich white folk drinking their starbucks on sundays.

Rabbi: Father, Priest, Pastor, Reverend, Bishop, Prophet, Evangelist, lord, master, masta'

Burdens: morality codes, heresy hunts, in and out, guilt, shame

It is the institution that Jesus rails against here. The religion. Which happens to be the same as now. He comes out and tells them that Moses is wrong, that they did not see the Father, that the Law is wrong, He is echoing the prophets who railed against the Sacrifice demanding god they called YHWH.

Just after the woes to the Pharisees in Matt 23, we see Matt 24 where Jesus speaks of the temple being torn down. Every brick. Every layer of religion will be torn down. And when it was rebuilt from His blood that spilt onto the ground it was not another dead religion, with its brick buildings, and burdens, and Rabbi's, and clergy and laity. It was a living body.

You might be thinking "hold up, you're telling me christianity doesn't come from the bible, but now you're quoting it to support your point" Yes because we have the words of Jesus and the Apostles condemning that old way of thinking. That we need a structure, and these old books to tell us about God. They are saying look at the full revelation of the Father, Jesus Christ. The exact image.

Peter was not reading the bible when the revelation came that Jesus was the Son of God, that was the rain of life flowing down from the Father directly to Peter. The revelation means unveiling, the removing of the veil, which is over our eyes, that blinds us to the glory of God. Aka we cannot see who Jesus is, which is the exact image of the Father. That rock upon which the church is built does not require the bible, or a priest, or a bishop, or a pastor. Those are things that keep people from the kingdom of heaven.

That is not to say that within the Roman church or the baptist church or any of the 22,000 denominations that there aren't people operating within the kingdom of heaven. Very much so, there are many great brothers and sisters who have contributed greatly. But that does not necessarily justify the institution.

I know you don't agree, and that is fine. I hope you understand when I say these things that I have nothing but love for all mankind. I just don't agree with the system. I believe that is part of the kingdom of this world. I know you don't see it that way. I'm not anti-catholic, I'm pro-living body. I believe there is a better way. The seed is within all men

Just as Christ is, so are you in the world-- Paul

a reply to: zardust

So on one hand, true Christianity doesn't come from the Bible yet you are using Biblical verses to prove your point? Oxymoron much? This is the reason why Christians don't take the railing accusations of the Zeitgeist movement seriously. They don't believe the Bible is literally true in anything it says and that its nothing but a book of astrology. They don't believe Jesus was a historical character, yet they have the nerve to use the Bible as proof of this claim, with no legitimate non-Biblical sources whatsoever that backs up what they said. What other source do you have outside of the Bible to actually prove your statement that Christianity doesn't come from the Bible?

a reply to: adjensen

Pardon my late reply...

What "later additions"? Do you have a copy of the Bible that doesn't include them?

It seems the additions predate any compilation of the NT...

The argument about the johannine comma has been raging for millennia...

Apparently the passage is absent from every known Greek manuscript except eight... all of which are no earlier then the fifth century... and the passage was not used in the Arian controversies... Which... IF it were present or available, would have prompted an immediate halt to any argument...

And personally I don't believe the proof text from Matthew 28 is original either... Eusebius quotes the passage in his writing several times, and it says "in my name" not the traditional Father/son/spirit formula...

The Trinity is implicit in the New Testament (and foreshadowed in the Old,) probably because the authors of the Gospels didn't see the need to spell it out

rather speculative....

the early Christians worshipped Christ as God, and that's probably because it was taken for granted that that's who he was.

There is only one reference to him actually being God... coming from Thomas... that's hardly saying that because one person called him that... all of the rest of his followers also thought he was God

They knew him as the son of God, even the messiah... But John was the one who claimed he was God in the flesh... Jesus did not consider himself that... or even close to that

The actual Doctrine of the Trinity came about as later generations, who didn't have first hand experience with Christ or the Apostles, started to wonder why the earlier generations worshiped Christ as God, if he was distinctive from the Father and the Holy Spirit, and questions arose as to the monotheistic nature of Christianity.

Yes, but the trinity was not taught by any of the apostles, or Paul... or Christ for that matter...

In other words, those closest to Christ simply understood him to be God, as time went past, people needed something to explain it.

IF that is the case, which I highly doubt... it was obviously a misunderstanding quite similar to the fact that the gospels show... in many cases they didn't have a clue what he was talking about, and it can even be shown that Jesus was curious as to why they didn't get what he was saying... but one thing is absolutely clear, He did not consider himself Equal to God... or God in the flesh for that matter

Tertullian was one of the first Christian writers to directly address the matter and was the one who coined the term "Trinity", well over a hundred years prior to Nicaea.

All that shows is that he was one of the first Trinitarians... what it doesn't explain is why the trinity teaching is absent from the NT...

And this fact is confirmed by many Scholars

a reply to: BlackManINC

Did you read my post? No I'm sure you didn't. For I addressed this. But you won't get it any way so I'm not sure why I'm even replying to you. Shouldn't you be out delighting over the destruction of the wicked?

I'm not going to go round the mountain again with you on this. You enjoy your dead letter reading of the bible. I'll take the Spirit filled life.

Peace