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I now ask all of you:Zirkon said:We cannot fully grasp the concept of what the Trinity really is. The relationship between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit as ONE is well beyond our comprehension. I believe he has dumbed it down for us humans.
actually I am a christian, and I hate the term trinity, it gives the impression that we worship three God's. God and Jesus are one, not two, Jesus is God manifested in the Spirit, and the Holy Spirit, (which manifests inside every christian believer) is just the presenceof the Lord,it isnt something to be worshipped. I think many christians place the emphasis away from God and it verges on idol worship. I hope that explained my position !Drynwhyl said:Although Christians wont admit it, the Trinity is not a new concept. The Egyptian sun god Ra had many a different form and name. The three most prominent ones are that of a dung beetle named Ra-Khefri which pushed the sun across the sky, a human form called Amon-Ra, which he used to head the Ennead [council of the gods], and Ra-Atum, the Creator which rose on a lotus flower out of the Waters of Chaos. All of Ras forms were of one god, yet all existed simultaneously. Most of you were expecting the Isis, Horus, Osiris Trinity, but Christians get around that Trinity by saying that they worship one god in three forms. So, Trinitarians, please tell me how your Trinity of Three forms, One God differs from the pagan Trinity of Ra, which is also Three forms, One god.
I am gonna take a stab at this, I think that the term trinity (it is found nowhere in the bible) is a tool of Satan to deceive many, it is a HUGE stumbling block for people trying to understand christianity. I DO understand that God became flesh and died for me. The Jews rejected the messiah (they still are God's chosen people~and they still will receive the rewards that God has outlined for them in the Bible, the covenants he made with them still stand) The prophecies of messiah in the OT state that he (Christ) would be rejected by his own people, which he was.Drynwhyl said:I now ask all of you:
WOULD YOU PUT YOUR FAITH INTO SOMETHING THAT YOU CANNOT UNDERSTAND?
Why would God want us to not be able to comprehend the Trinity? And even if God WAS a Trinity, Why did he make the Jews, His chosen people, Unitarian in their beliefs?
No offense taken!!! actually I agree that the term trinity is wrong, to limit God to only three. I still view God as wholly, and transendant. But does it not say that we WERE made in HIS image, in Genesis? Therfor, our Father, who created us, is easy to relate to, and revere.stillsmallvoice said:Hi all!
We (orthodox Jews) categorically reject the notion of a triune God as conceptually and semantically ill-disguised tritheism. Our great 9th century CE sage, Saadya Gaon (who lived in what is now Iraq, see http://tinyurl.com/3yjtd) said that to believe that God is triune is to define & limit Him by the physical concepts of quantity and number. To believe in a truly transcendant God (that is who transcends all physical constructs/concepts, including those of quantity & number), who is Wholly Other, one must believe that He is One. Since He created all things corporeal, He Himself cannot be, or have been at one time, corporeal; to believe otherwise, Saadya Gaon taught, is to define Him by, & limit Him to, the corporeal form that he presumably chose. I have heard many Christians use the analogy that the three "persons" of the trinity are all one the same way that I, ferinstance, am a father to my boys, a husband to my wife, a son to my parents & a brother to my brother. I would reply that this is a human analogy & as such, it cannot be applied to a transcendant, wholly other, God. The same goes for the ice-water-steam analogy. H20 is a created, physical, corporeal thing & as such, cannot be applied to a transcendant, wholly other, God. The uniqueness of One is that it presumes no self-division. Like the smallest whole number that it, in fact, is, it cannot be broken down into constituent parts. Whereas 3 = 1 + 1+ 1, 1 (simply) = 1; it is in this sense that 1 is transcendant in a way that 3 is not. We believe that the Oneness of God is unbounded both internally & externally.
My personal view is that the early Christians found the (originally) Jewish concept of a transcendant, wholly other God too difficult to grasp and recast Him in our image, i.e. they made Him flesh & gave Him our form and made Him much easier to relate to. It seems to me that this is paganism with a (superficial) non-pagan veneer. (I mean no offense to anyone, God forbid!)
Be well!
ssv
The only difference I would think would be the God that the trinity refers to (that is, assuming there are multiple gods). The triune idea isn't the only thing Christianity 'stole' from pagan religions (which I think is pretty common knowledge) and if Christian's were to shun every pagan-related thing in the faith, there'd not be much celebration since so much of it coincides with something from, as another poster put it, those "indigenous" religions.Drynwhyl said:So, Trinitarians, please tell me how your Trinity of Three forms, One God differs from the pagan Trinity of Ra, which is also Three forms, One god.
Maybe it's the claims that are made that are different than All others?Radio-Free Gnosis said:get over it, and stop whining to the Christians for something everyone does.
BigDrynwhyl said:Although Christians wont admit it, the Trinity is not a new concept. The Egyptian sun god Ra had many a different form and name. The three most prominent ones are that of a dung beetle named Ra-Khefri which pushed the sun across the sky, a human form called Amon-Ra, which he used to head the Ennead [council of the gods], and Ra-Atum, the Creator which rose on a lotus flower out of the Waters of Chaos. All of Ras forms were of one god, yet all existed simultaneously. Most of you were expecting the Isis, Horus, Osiris Trinity, but Christians get around that Trinity by saying that they worship one god in three forms. So, Trinitarians, please tell me how your Trinity of Three forms, One God differs from the pagan Trinity of Ra, which is also Three forms, One god.
Yes.But does it not say that we WERE made in HIS image, in Genesis?
Correct, and Jews were relating to Him (as a Unity) for over 1,200+ years before, and 2,000 years after, some felt the need to resort to all sorts of spiritual/theological/semantical/conceptual three-in-one/three-is-one gymnastics. Instead of seeing us as having been created in His image, those who believe that God has/had a physical body and can be defined by a parent-child paradigm, are recasting Him in our image; this is paganism.Therfor, our Father, who created us, is easy to relate to, and revere.
I've been trying to read about these many many fulfilled prophecies, but every reference I find says they were not fulfilled. Some claims in the NT about them being described in the OT don't show any references in the OT to them, and the ones that do some people show to be unrelated or inaccurate.Blindfaith316 said:...
What then of the first Christians, who were Jews, who saw and believed that Christ was messiah? What of the many many fulfilled prophecies?
They are there, and are being fulfilled even as we live, and society winds down. One of them that is really stark, is the upside down way that society views good and evil. In the last days, good will be thought evil, and evil good. That is where we are today. I have seen it in my own lifetime. .MQTA said:I've been trying to read about these many many fulfilled prophecies, but every reference I find says they were not fulfilled. Some claims in the NT about them being described in the OT don't show any references in the OT to them, and the ones that do some people show to be unrelated or inaccurate.
So my jury is still out on these prophecies.
crystalpc said:They are there, and are being fulfilled even as we live, and society winds down. One of them that is really stark, is the upside down way that society views good and evil. In the last days, good will be thought evil, and evil good. That is where we are today. I have seen it in my own lifetime. .
Isa 5:14 Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure: and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth, shall descend into it.peaceful soul said:MQTA is looking for references that he can read and validate.
I can see your point. I usually just ask people to go to my testimony page, and they can see scriptures fulfilled in my own life.peaceful soul said:I hate to presume too much, but MQTA will need to see how those verses are traced through Bible to arrive at the actual fulfillment. i.e., the verse has to point to other verses and also show the fulfilment of the original verse in a circular manner. I hope that I am clear. As stated, there is no way for MQTA to see their fulfillment. This is highly important to those who may not know Bible very well.
Honestly, the ones that you have quoted are not that telling. They can naturally be applied to almost any era. You need to show some things that are definitive.
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