is the trinity a biblical doctrine?

Originally posted by drevill
i think we are very opposite Miriam, i too respoect that you use scripture. The problem we have is that we both feel that each other is misunderstanding.

at first glance, yes that is the problem. and in other discussions i would agree. but we are talking about the trinity. the most unsupported, dogmatically and emotionally defended doctrine in all of christendom.

you arguments must resort to a level of unreasonableness in order to sanely defend this position. and frankly it makes me sad to see this.

reply to post by miriam0566


hello miriam

for me, i am not emotionally charged, im just interested in the truth, where you see no proof i see the proof.

For me it so clear as for Dogma i could charge that at any denomination

but dont stop trying though

Originally posted by drevill
but here we also have Christ saying that we HAVE seen the father

John 14:9

no, jesus is saying that if we saw him (jesus), then we see the father. there is a BIG difference.

its these details that seem to pass your notice.

speaking of jesus.
col 1:15 [15] Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:

what is an image? does jesus being the image of god make him god?

1 cor 11:[7] For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.

so wait a minute. jesus is the image of god, but so is man. how can that be?

because image is the exact word the bible needed to use. look at my avatar for a moment, what are you looking at? can you say that you are looking at me? yes in a way you can. even though LITERALLY seen me, you can say you have seen me through my IMAGE.

really, its not that hard to see that thats what these passages are saying.

besides that, if jesus was god, we wouldnt be god's IMAGE, he would be god.

Originally posted by drevill
reply to post by miriam0566

 

hello miriam

for me, i am not emotionally charged, im just interested in the truth, where you see no proof i see the proof.

i dont think you are emotionally charged, i just dont think you really grasp the face value of certain scriptures

For me it so clear as for Dogma i could charge that at any denomination

unless you can provide specific proves, that statement means nothing to me. im sorry.

reply to post by miriam0566


okay

personally i think you read Jw dogma into a doctrine. Christ as God is a stumbling block. (im not saying you are a JW, i dont care either way)

that aside, re your lastr post. it IS clear that scripture can be interpreted that way, and yet when you take the evidenceof Christ being God there is more to what he is saying

david

Originally posted by drevill
Christ as God is a stumbling block.

is not a stumbling block, its blasphemy. its giving honor and glory where it is not due.

that aside, re your lastr post. it IS clear that scripture can be interpreted that way, and yet when you take the evidenceof Christ being God there is more to what he is saying

you can only read other meanings into it because you want to. im sorry if i sound blunt, i dont mean offence.

if you see passages that bluntly describe jesus and god and separate people, passages that show jesus interacting with god as separate people BOTH on earth and in heaven, passages that show jesus specifically directly worship to his father and not to himself and yet STILL try to assert that somehow the bible is hinting that they are the same person (cause thats what you are doing), then im sorry, but you are blind.

and you cant see that something like the trinity is debunked, then how are you going to see the deeper truths of the bible? just a thought.

im not yelling btw, the caps is for emphasis.

reply to post by miriam0566


Isaiah 43:11

I, even I, am the LORD; and beside me there is no saviour

2 Peter 1:11

For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

Isaiah 42:8

I am the LORD: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another,
neither my praise to graven images.


John 17:5

And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was

Acts 20:28

Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.

God and Christ are the same being

reply to post by drevill

I, even I, am the LORD; and beside me there is no saviour

You read words and in your mind, they have certain meanings, according to how you think. God is not inside your head saying these words. There is a constant disconnect between God, his words, and His appearance.
We do not look, and with our eyes see His person directly. What we see is something coming off from Him. Let's say you are an Israelite in the wilderness of Sinai. There is God but you do not see him. What you see is a pillar of fire and smoke. These are coming off of Him but is not actually Him. Somewhere behind all that is a person that we can not see.
God comes down in a cloud of smoke and flames and lightning and loud noises. God speaks to us but it is not his voice. We hear the sound as of trumpets that seem to be saying words.
If you were a holy angel and you were in heaven and God is there, you would still not see Him directly, but would see a glorious appearing and it would take shape and would be of the type of form as God but it is not His actual person. God is talking and giving commands and there is an awful power in it that is an energetic thing and is full of wisdom and understanding. It is not actually the sound of His voice, as if it was the result of Him physically creating sound waves with the personal constituency of His being. It is a spiritual existence that proceeds from his thoughts or will.
All of whatever this is, that you would be aware of as you were in the vicinity of God's throne, would to you, be God, as far as you can perceive Him as having a finite local presence.
If you were the archangel, you would go to earth one day and tell someone that this Spiritual concentration of the manifestation of the power of divinity will come upon you, and you will have a child and it will be called the Son of God.
If you were a person and were standing there while the Angel was speaking, you would think, "Wow, God is talking to me!". Well, He was, in a manner of speaking. Only the angel who was the closest to God would have understood how profound a thing it was that he was announcing. As great as this angel was, and how authoritative he may have seemed, he would have been humbled in the comparison with what we may call, for lack of a better term at the moment, The Word.
As great and glorious of a thing that it is, this God, being of a spiritual nature, would have been imperceptible to ordinary inhabitants of earth, and so, had to become a person to interact with them. Once this person became known and people beheld him as another man, he was still the very expression of the personality of God. Though he was in every way just as much God as he was when he was in heaven, he became something more than that. He became a distinct individual person, in his own right.
God is still God and is, if such a thing could be possible to be understood correctly, on his throne in heaven. (speaking of the time that Jesus was on earth) The real question would have to be; Was the Son of God in heaven too? He said he was, though of course that statement goes right over the heads of anyone who looks at it.
(I think it would have been a minimal non-individual aspect, that would have been of the type that would have been its original existence. John does not say,"Most of the time, the Word was with God".)


[edit on 3-5-2009 by jmdewey60]

the trinity explained

I can never get posting a video here right ... errrg

[edit on 3-5-2009 by holywar]

reply to post by holywar


Sorry but I had to turn that video off. I could only stand about ten seconds. Maybe you could write out the point the video is trying to make. The sound quality is really horrific and is grating on my nerves.
Is this something you take seriously? The few seconds I watched seemed very bazaar to me.

reply to post by drevill


I'm sorry you didn't like my reply to the whole Jesus being looked at as God, but it was just an example. I wasn't literally saying that Jesus has God's genes as a reason for Jesus to look like God. I'm just stating that a father and son share attributes that carry on from generation to generation. If you take that concept and apply it to God, the Father and Jesus, the Son then you are looking at the splitting image of God. Don't speculate too much on this opinion. It was a metaphore that obviously went over your head.

Also, you are finding a few vague verses for your defence on upholding the trinity doctrine. I honestly thought you'd have better firepower than this. My battle involves questions to questions. Why does Jesus pray to the Father, if indeed He is God, the Father? That's a simple answer.

reply to post by Locoman8


hello locoman

i have answered this previously i think

look at what jesus was praying and who was around at the time. Everything Christ did was for our benefit and instruction and example

give me one scripture as an example and we can go through it

all the best

david

Belief amongst Christians who have really studied this subject in detail and don't just listen to clergy, often come to understand that the bible teaches to obey and listen to a unitarian God not a trinity.
For example Locoman who has posted in this thread.

To discuss this subject with some Christians is like :bnghd:

I have had so many discussions with people on the trinity over the years, and they ignore literally dozens of scriptures, or discredit them with "it's a mystery".

Virtually every scripture used to support the trinity has an explanation. It always turns out to be a misunderstanding of scripture.

This has happened with the best of Christ's followers in the past remember when Jesus said drink my blood and eat my flesh, he wasn't talking about cannibalism here was he? Yet some thought he was, and got it wrong, and they were stumbled off the path to the truth, in the 1st century.
Jesus talked a lot in symbolism, so I and the father are one is just as literal as Jesus saying eat my flesh and drink my blood.

If misunderstanding of literal and symbolic discussion could take place when Jesus was actually on the earth teaching the people directly, how much more could it happen today.
Break free from your emotional attachment to false doctrine, emotional attachment and admitting you are wrong in the face of overwhelming scripture is tough to do for many people. But thousands have done it.
Humility needs to be shown in regards to knowledge, Jesus emphasized that quality to those that would serve and obey him and his father when he washed his apostles dirty feet. Some times admitting we are wrong about strongly long held beliefs is like what Jesus did in washing all those dirty feet, it shows we are willing to humble ourselves just like the Christ did when he came to earth.

reply to post by jmdewey60


Just thought I would add some humor to this thread. It's supposed to be funny, he is obviously being sarcastic. I don't expect everybody to find it funny, I happen to think it's hilarious, maybe I have a weird sense of humor.

its good that you are tying scriptures together. it shows that you understand that the bible must be taken in its fullest context.

so im going to add some scriptures to your tie-ins so that we can get a bigger picture.

Originally posted by drevill
Isaiah 43:11

I, even I, am the LORD; and beside me there is no saviour

2 Peter 1:11

For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

isaiah is right. besides GOD, there is no savior. yet why do we call some "savior"

talking about the judges...
neh 9:[27] Therefore thou deliveredst them into the hand of their enemies, who vexed them: and in the time of their trouble, when they cried unto thee, thou heardest them from heaven; and according to thy manifold mercies thou gavest them saviours, who saved them out of the hand of their enemies.

so see from this scripture that god sent saviors to isreal in the form of judges. does this mean that god is giving up his "saviour" title to another? not at all. the credit still goes to god for sending them in the first place. GOD is still the one who saved, simply through an agent.

isaiah (who you quoted) himself testifies to this form of saving.

isa 19:[20] And it shall be for a sign and for a witness unto the LORD of hosts in the land of Egypt: for they shall cry unto the LORD because of the oppressors, and he shall send them a saviour, and a great one, and he shall deliver them.

the apostles understood that jesus wasnt just saving them, they acknowledged that jesus was sent by god.

acts 13:[23] Of this man's seed hath God according to his promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus:

the credit still goes to god, even though jesus was the one who died.

consider this, if GOD was literally the only saviour, then that implies that moses, the judges and even some angels that preserved people alive were in fact god. we know that doesnt make sense.

so no, calling jesus a saviour does not make him GOD.

Isaiah 42:8

I am the LORD: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another,
neither my praise to graven images.

John 17:5

And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was

notice that jesus is not asking for god's glory, he's asking back the glory he had before.

2 peter 1:[17] For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.

glory can be praise, pride, admiration... jesus has his own glory which he received from the father. this doesnt mean that GOD is giving jesus HIS glory.

other people receive glory too.

ephesians 1:[18] The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints,

so no, jesus having glory does not make him god.

Acts 20:28

Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.

1 cor 11:[3] But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.

so by your logic, a husband and wife are the same person. this scripture actually shows a hierarchy of who is in charge of who.

yes, GOD paid for the ransom with his own blood, his son's blood.

i think english has the phrase " your blood is running through my veins" . usually its said to a relative you are arguing with.

god is a spirit, he does not have literal blood, but jesus was his only begotten (literally "meaning only born")

so no, god paying the ransom does not mean jesus is god.

Originally posted by drevill
look at what jesus was praying and who was around at the time. Everything Christ did was for our benefit and instruction and example

what about the night before jesus' death when he was praying and the apostles kept falling asleep? did he not continue praying? who was he setting the example for then?

who was there to benefit from this prayer? -

matt 14:[23] And when he had sent the multitudes away, he went up into a mountain apart to pray: and when the evening was come, he was there alone.

or this prayer.....

mark 1:[35] And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.

what about this one....

mark 6:[46] And when he had sent them away, he departed into a mountain to pray.

luke 5:[16] And he withdrew himself into the wilderness, and prayed.

luke 6:[12] And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God.

for someone who prayed for "show", he sure did it alone alot...

reply to post by miriam0566

John 17:5

And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was

Spiritual beings, like angels, as they came into existence, would have been witness of a glorious apparition, which would have been the representation of God. It would have been spiritually discernible for what it was, and an uncorrupted spiritually awake being would acknowledge it as being exactly what it is.
Ordinary material beings, like us, when confronted by the material representation of God, did not seem to have a good time of it, concerning realizing what it was, exactly, they were witnessing.
Corrupted spiritual beings had somehow lost the correct perception of God by being blinded by their own brilliance. They could look at the arch-typical spirit being, lets call him Lucifer, and think, "Here is someone who appears just as glorious as the Son. Why should we not give him as much distinction?"
Where God may have been somewhat harsh towards them, because their corruption was of their own making, He was more lenient to men because their own personal corruption was more by inheritance than by their active will. God, through His son, became someone on the level with men and lived among us, to see if anyone would recognize him. One person did, but he just so happened to be the greatest prophet who ever lived. In order for others, who had a lesser spiritual connection already, to have any sort of perception of who they were in the presence of, God spoke to the people gathered there. Some people understood it and some thought they only heard thunder. So much for that method of glorification of the Son.
A method that could be more ultimately persuasive was working miracles. Even this, to some people could be rationalized away. This did not seem to work with people predisposed to disbelief.
Doctors of law felt they could test him for superior understanding of the law and doctors of philosophy wanted evidence of superior intellect. Jesus pointed out how they needed a spiritual discernment to perceive God.
Jesus eventually accepted the inevitable fact that he would have to carry out the final step in the attempt to be recognized, by his own death and resurrection. He had to cry out to his Father that what he was about to undergo would be of benefit, no just to those who would be witness to it, but to all subsequent generations to come. The "glory" was not for his own benefit, but would have been something similar to what his work was before he ever came to this world. What the purpose of his work was, is to be the exact likeness of God.
"Death and taxes" are the inevitabilities of mankind and Jesus demonstrated his exemption from both. He could have his disciple pull a coin out of a fish to pay the tax and Jesus could come back from the dead, by virtue of his nature of being God incarnate, and the Son of God, to be specific.


[edit on 4-5-2009 by jmdewey60]

reply to post by jmdewey60


im sorry but you bringing up more and more points and ideas that are found nowhere in the bible.

Originally posted by jmdewey60
"Death and taxes" are the inevitabilities of mankind and Jesus demonstrated his exemption from both. He could have his disciple pull a coin out of a fish to pay the tax and Jesus could come back from the dead, by virtue of his nature of being God incarnate, and the Son of God, to be specific.

Not completely inevitabilities. If you leave your job, like his disciples did, then you won't be making any money, thus, you don't need to pay taxes.

To explain that further, we work to have money to buy things. And Jesus said, to follow him, you must sell all your things and give the money to the poor. If we aren't supposed to get anything with money, then we don't need to work and to pay tax. It's only a matter of choice, not impossibility. Albeit a very difficult choice to make though.

And death is not our absolute fate, inheriting eternal life is also a choice.

And before we get crazy with what this implies. It's not that bad to live with nothing, not even half bad. You will have nature, and the beauty and power of the Universe at your side

Originally posted by miriam0566
reply to post by jmdewey60

 

im sorry but you bringing up more and more points and ideas that are found nowhere in the bible.

To me, you have three choices: 1 Jesus is God and shut up! 2 Jesus has always been Jesus, in some form or another. 3 Jesus was born and before that, there was no such person.
Apparently number three is very unpopular on this thread, so I feel I need to go into some in-depth explanation to make it seem in the least bit a reasonable option. Listing a bunch of verses does not seem especially persuasive. On the Bible Forum, people routinely make whole posts that are nothing but quotes. I think,"OK, but what do you think?" I got to where I just ignore those posts because they are not interesting without some sort of context.
Besides quotes have to maintain a certain standard that does not allow alternative understandings. Do you think Jesus quoted exactly, word for word, straight out of the officially sanctioned version?