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what if we could get someone who has never heard of christianity to read the bible on his own? Will finish and develop an understanding that resembles the christian doctrines of "trinity", "sin sacrifice", "original sin" and so on?
Christian doctrine teaches : God is a trinity.
The Bible shows : God and His prophets and Jesus explicitly teach that God is one. Jesus never taught "Hear O Israel, your God is triune".
Christian doctrine teaches : Sin sacrifice; that Jesus died for our sins and that whoever believes so will be redeemed of sin.
The Bible shows : The "sacrifice" was a Roman execution procedure. There was nothing ritualistic about it. Neither God nor His prophets and Jesus ever taught that people are redeemed by believing Jesus died for their sins.
Christian doctrine teaches : Original sin.; all people are tainted with the sin of Adam and Eve.
The Bible shows : God has always distinguished between righteous and evil. Starting from Abel, son of Adam who God was pleased.
We see that none of these doctrines are directly affirmed through a statement by God, Jesus and the prophets... but are instead contradicted.We also see that the doctrines conflict with a biblical theme thats consistent throughout the bible.
So, Christians resort to compositing several unrelated verses from all over the bible, so as to be able to present their doctrine as having biblical basis. This approach is akin to taking a book and cutting/pasting words and sentences around to present a different story.
evolutionofgod.net...
You might think this is impossible. If, like me, you grew up with a Sunday school understanding of the scriptures, then you think of God as not having “taken shape” at all. He was there in the beginning, fully formed, and he then gave form to everything else. That’s the story in the Bible, at least. What’s more, serious scholars, including Yehezkel Kaufmann and many he influenced, have analyzed the Bible and come away with a similarly dramatic account of Yahweh’s birth.
But, this isn’t really the story in the Bible, or at least not the whole story. If you read the Hebrew Bible carefully, it tells the story of a god in evolution, a god whose character changes radically from beginning to end.
There’s a problem, however, if you want to watch this story unfold. You can’t just start reading the first chapter of Genesis and plow forward, waiting for God to grow. The first chapter of Genesis was almost certainly written later than the second chapter of Genesis, by a different author. The Hebrew Bible took shape slowly, over many centuries, and the order in which it was written is not the order in which it now appears. Fortunately, biblical scholarship can in some cases give us a pretty good idea of which texts followed which. This knowledge of the order of composition is a kind of “decoder” that allows us to see a pattern in God’s growth that would otherwise be hidden.
When you put all this together—a reading of the Canaanite texts, a selective “decoding” of the biblical texts, and a new archaeological understanding of Israelite history—you get a whole new picture of the Abrahamic god. It’s a picture that, on the one hand, absolves Abrahamic monotheism of some of the gravest charges against it, yet on the other hand, challenges the standard basis of monotheistic faith. It’s a picture that renders the Abrahamic god in often unflattering terms, yet charts his maturation and offers hope for future growth. And certainly it’s a picture very different from the one drawn in the average synagogue, church, or mosque.…
Here are a few examples :
Christian doctrine teaches : God is a trinity.
The Bible shows : God and His prophets and Jesus explicitly teach that God is one. Jesus never taught "Hear O Israel, your God is triune".
Christian doctrine teaches : Sin sacrifice; that Jesus died for our sins and that whoever believes so will be redeemed of sin.
The Bible shows : The "sacrifice" was a Roman execution procedure. There was nothing ritualistic about it. Neither God nor His prophets and Jesus ever taught that people are redeemed by believing Jesus died for their sins.
Christian doctrine teaches : Original sin.; all people are tainted with the sin of Adam and Eve.
The Bible shows : God has always distinguished between righteous and evil. Starting from Abel, son of Adam who God was pleased.
"There is ample scripture regarding the doctrine of the trinity from genesis", lest they become like "us", to the gospels account of being baptized in the name of the Father, son, and Holy Spirit. We worship God as Father, Jesus as his glorified lamb and savior, and the Holy Spirit is our comforter who Jesus has sent to us in his absence.
Crucifixion was not a practice of the Jews. How else would prophecy be fulfilled lest the Romans hang him from a tree, pierce his side, gamble for his clothes, etc etc etc as we can find in the OT scripture of the account to be of the savior of the world. Also, is John 3:16 enough to refute that final claim?
Righteousness through works was the order of Able's day. Even Abel was required to bring a sacrifice for sin. Our human nature is the sin nature, whereas the nature of God through the Holy Spirit is how we overcome being just animals, attaining unto God's nature.
It's funny how to some the problem with the Bible is that it is so contradictory while to others the problem is that building truth and doctrine based corroborating scripture in perfect unity is derided for being akin to copying and pasting unrelated words and sentences, in which some cases may be correct but not this one.
In regards to the OP. Ever hear of Hebrew symbolism? No? Didn't think so. The OT is plum full of prophecies about Christ's future sacrifice.
So the Trinity is biblical. You people can believe whatever you want, but it will not be the truth. You might as well just stop using the bible to try and prove your theories. The bible is the Word of God, and it is the Living Word, if you were a believer everytime you pick it up and read it you learn something new, like the words change. You can read one verse, and come back and reread it the next day and it has new meaning, you find revelation.
That book was not written for the unbelievers, it was written for those who accept the covenant, this is why you do not understand what you read.
And how did you come to believe what you believe today? Did you really read the bible all by yourself and understand that it actually taught the trinity and the sin sacrifice?
Would you rather have a non-christian read the bible on his own? Or should somebody else explain what the bible is all about, and inject all those wrong christian doctrines into his mind?
Its like having a novel that I'd really want you to read but I fear you wont understand it, so I'll just narrate my understanding of the book to you i.e - tell you what I understood of the book. How would you know if I ever made a mistake in comprehending the novel.
Originally posted by sk0rpi0n
reply to post by HeFrippedMeOff
"There is ample scripture regarding the doctrine of the trinity from genesis", lest they become like "us", to the gospels account of being baptized in the name of the Father, son, and Holy Spirit. We worship God as Father, Jesus as his glorified lamb and savior, and the Holy Spirit is our comforter who Jesus has sent to us in his absence.
The "ample scripture" you speak of is a number of ambiguous verses that you compile and re-interpret as pointing towards the trinity. This is exactly what I meant when I said Christians resort to compositing several unrelated verses from all over the bible, so as to be able to present their doctrine as having biblical basis.
In reality, there are several unambiguous statements that confirm God is one. So what are you going to do with those scriptures?
Crucifixion was not a practice of the Jews. How else would prophecy be fulfilled lest the Romans hang him from a tree, pierce his side, gamble for his clothes, etc etc etc as we can find in the OT scripture of the account to be of the savior of the world. Also, is John 3:16 enough to refute that final claim?
First off, human sacrifice is abominable to God.
Yet, the animal sacrifices of the OT is mentioned in an attempt to make Jesus' execution into a ritual sacrifice. And I have already shown that the Roman style execution could NOT be a parallel to the ritual animal sacrifices to God.
Righteousness through works was the order of Able's day. Even Abel was required to bring a sacrifice for sin. Our human nature is the sin nature, whereas the nature of God through the Holy Spirit is how we overcome being just animals, attaining unto God's nature.
Hang on, nothing is mentioned about Abel and Cain making "sin sacrifices". Genesis 4 says they just made an offering. When did God command they bring "sin sacrifices"? What sins had Abel and Cain committed to even offer a "sin sacrifice"? Well?
So basically you assumed Abels "offering" was a "sin sacrifice".... then you tied it up with the concept of sin. Again, more verse compositing...
Regarding original sin, I'll stick with the recurring biblical theme that God always distinguished between righteous people and sinners. If original sin was biblically valid, God would have stated that all humans are sinners.
Originally posted by sk0rpi0n
reply to post by HeFrippedMeOff
It's funny how to some the problem with the Bible is that it is so contradictory while to others the problem is that building truth and doctrine based corroborating scripture in perfect unity is derided for being akin to copying and pasting unrelated words and sentences, in which some cases may be correct but not this one.
Corroborating scripture in perfect unity does not mean you neglect crucial verses that DIRECTLY address the particular issues mentioned in the OP.
eg- When a number of verses define God as being "one"... it becomes a biblical theme. Theres no debating that. Instead you compile a number of vague verses to maintain that there is a trinity.
You explain away the statements that directly mention God as being one.... by connecting ambiguous verses here and there to make it look like the overall theme of the Bible is that God is triune.
As I said, doctrine dictates God is father and is one, and Jesus is son, along with the Holy Spirit. Both doctrines exist and do not contradict each other for we worship God as one and Father, Jesus as son, and the Holy Spirit as our Comforter. That is what we do with it
Jesus was fully God and fully man. He is our perfect sacrifice from God. You are seeing through very humanistic eyes here instead of seeing our Father's divine efficacy at work for we who are made in his image and likeness.
According to your line of reasoning there would be no reason for God to reject the offering of Cain. I mean, he did pour out his sweat on the ground to till the field bringing God the firstfruits
but God made clothes of animal skin for adam and eve to cover their nakedness (sin/knowledge of sin). This is why we see Abel's offering as pleasing to God because God required blood sacrifice for sin having had been the first to shed blood
How is it when I provide scripture it is ambiguous and invalid while you can claim recurring biblical themes, presumably based on scripture too, yet you provide none? When has the righteousness of man apart from God ever been anything other than filthy rags before our Father?