Hi DrBubbelLove,
What happened lately, I missed you friend.
Haven't we been at this topic before? Jesus could not have been fully man if he did not have had some shortcomings which are common to a fully man. To be fully man means having tendencies to sin, making mistakes, to cheat and other negative characteristics. If Jesus was fully God then we must accept that God died on the cross, which is unacceptable because God is immortal. Only a fully man with all his shortcomings can be accepted as having died on the cross.
I happen to believe that God could provide a perfect, sinless man who otherwise is exactly like every other man. If Jesus was only a man He could not have saved mankind.
Psa 49:6-9
(6) They that trust in their wealth, And boast themselves in the multitude of their riches;
(7) None of them can by any means redeem his brother, Nor give to God a ransom for him
(8) (For the redemption of their life is costly, And it faileth for ever),
(9) That he should still live alway, That he should not see corruption.
This whole issue of Jesus having been both, fully man and fully God, is part of the Trinity doctrine which is not only confusing, but man made 325 years after Jesus left us. God is not the author of confusion, man is. (1.Cor. 14:33)
The Trinity was not made in 325 AD. The Nicaean council was held in 325 AD, the Trinity was never mentioned at that council. The Trinity is not confusing, There is one God. The Father is God but he is not the Son or the Holy Spirit. The Son is God but he is not the Father or the Holy Spirit.The Holy Spirit is God but he is not the Son or the Father. There is one God.
The same applies to 1. John 1:1. How anyone can read into a word being a person escapes my sensible thinking. A word is simply an expression coming from an entity such as a person or God himself. In John 1:1 we recognize that it was the word of God who ordered the universe to come into existence.
Kutte
I think you meant John 1:1. How do you explain the rest of John 1:1? And the rest of the passage?
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Joh 1:1-4
(1) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with [toward] God, and the Word was God.
(2) The same [the Word] was in the beginning with [toward] God.
(3) All things were made through him[the Word] ; and without him [the Word] was not anything made that hath been made.
(4) In him [the Word] was life; and the life was the light of men.
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The Greek speaking early church understood John 1:1 to be saying Jesus was/is God.
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Theophilus Of Antioch. [A.D. 115-181]
And hence the holy writings teach us, and all the spirit-bearing [inspired] men, one of whom, John, says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God,” showing that at first God was alone, and the Word in Him. Then he says, “The Word was God; all things came into existence through Him; and apart from Him not one thing came into existence.” The Word, then, being God, and being naturally produced from God, whenever the Father of the universe wills, He sends Him to any place; and He, coming, is both heard and seen, being sent by Him, and is found in a place.
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Clement Of Alexandria [A.D. 153-193-217] Exhortation To The Heathen
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But before the foundation of the world were we, who, because destined to be in Him, pre-existed in the eye of God before, — we the rational creatures of the Word of God, on whose account we date from the beginning; for “in the beginning was the Word.” Well, inasmuch as the Word was from the first, He was and is the divine source of all things; but inasmuch as He has now assumed the name Christ, consecrated of old, and worthy of power, he has been called by me the New Song. This Word, then, the Christ, the cause of both our being at first (for He was in God) and of our well-being, this very Word has now appeared as man, He alone being both, both God and man — the Author of all blessings to us; by whom we, being taught to live well, are sent on our way to life eternal.
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Fragments Of Clemens Alexandrinus
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Following the Gospel according to John, and in accordance with it, this Epistle also contains the spiritual principle. What therefore he says, “from the beginning,” the Presbyter explained to this effect, that the beginning of generation is not separated from the beginning of the Creator. For when he says, “That which was from the beginning,” he touches upon the generation without beginning of the Son, who is co-existent with the Father. There was; then, a Word importing an unbeginning eternity; as also the Word itself, that is, the Son of God, who being, by equality of substance, one with the Father, is eternal and uncreate. That He was always the Word, is signified by saying, “In the beginning was the Word.” But by the expression, “we have seen with our eyes,” he signifies the Lord’s presence in the flesh, “and our hands have handled,” he says, “of the Word of life.”
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That is a still grander statement which you will find expressly made in the Gospel: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” There was One “who was,” and there was another “with whom” He was. But I find in Scripture the name LORD also applied to them Both: “The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit Thou on my right hand.” And Isaiah says this: “Lord, who hath believed our report, and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?” Now he would most certainly have said Thine Arm, if he had not wished us to understand that the Father is Lord, and the Son also is Lord. A much more ancient testimony we have also in Genesis: “Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven.” Now, either deny that this is Scripture; or else (let me ask) what sort of man you are, that you do not think words ought to be taken and understood in the sense in which they are written, especially when they are not expressed in allegories and parables, but in determinate and simple declarations?
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Tertullian 6. On The Resurrection Of The Flesh [A.D. 145-220.]
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“That,” says John, “which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life.” Now the Word of life became flesh, and was heard, and was seen, and was handled, because He was flesh who, before He came in the flesh, was the “Word in the beginning with God” the Father, and not the Father with the Word. For although the Word was God, yet was He with God, because He is God of God; and being joined to the Father, is with the Father
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Tertullian 8. Scorpiace
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By thus attaching the Son to Himself, He becomes His own interpreter in what sense He stretched out the heavens alone, meaning alone with His Son, even as He is one with His Son. The utterance, therefore, will be in like manner the Son’s, “I have stretched out the heavens alone,” because by the Word were the heavens established. Inasmuch, then, as the heaven was prepared when Wisdom was present in the Word, and since all things were made by the Word, it is quite correct to say that even the Son stretched out the heaven alone, because He alone ministered to the Father’s work. It must also be He who says, “I am the First, and to all futurity I AM.” The Word, no doubt, was before all things. “In the beginning was the Word;” and in that beginning He was sent forth by the Father.
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Hippolytus [A.D. 170-236] The Refutation Of All Heresies Book 5
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This, he says, is the great beginning respecting which Scripture has spoken. Concerning this, he says it has been declared: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. This was in the beginning with God, all things were made by Him, and without Him was not one thing that was made. And what was formed in Him is life.” And in Him, he says, has been formed Eve; (now) Eve is life. This, however, he says, is Eve, mother of all living, — a common nature, that is, of gods, angels, immortals, mortals, irrational creatures, (and) rational ones. For, he says, the expression “all” he uttered of all (existences).