The Godhead 'changing' after the Incarnation

[FinishedCross]

This is one of those serious 'elephant in the room' topics that har among the most difficult to find clear information on. Similar to the anit-Christ. Please bear with this example or my question wont make sense regarding the Godhead:

Example: "Many have always known that the anti-Christ is literally Jesus himself, because there is only one man of miracles who could even fool the elect if it were possible, and Simon the Magician didnt fool anyone".

OBVIOUSLY, they are NOT talking anout the literal Jesus himself, they are speaking of a false PERCEPTION (image) of the real Jesus. Its just very difficult to word it properly. But due to holy fear of God, and potentially causing the weaker in faith to stumble, they just avoid outright saying who the anti-Christ is, and rather drop many obvious hints. And it is possible their wrong after all. What if they blaspheme? So its DIFFICULT to find sort of OBVIOUS information in plain sight. Finding the truth on this matter contains a HEAVILY signal to noise ratio of non-traditional viewpoints like Obama being the anti-Christ.

With this in mind. i have the most BASIC question to ask. I have been looking into the Filoque controversy and I was reminded of the Pope making some statements (Jun 2017):
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"Dear brothers and sisters, we are never alone. We may be distant, hostile, we may even profess ourselves to be 'without God'. But the Gospel of Jesus Christ shows us that God cannot stay without us"

"He will never be a God 'without man'; it is He Who cannot stay without us, and this is a great mystery! God cannot be God without man: the great mystery is this!" he said.
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Sounds horrible doesnt it? The signal to noise ratio was very high! NON-TRADITIONAL outrage from Seminary professors were calling blasphemy until an UNNAMED theologian put EGG all over their face and some articles were forced to UPDATE their article if I remember. The UNNAMED theologian said:

"Because of The Incarnation of Our Lord Jesus Christ, it is true that God remains eternally joined to mankind through the human nature of Jesus Christ, Second of the Three Divine Persons of The Most Blessed Trinity."

Well when you put it THAT WAY LOL..

Now I ask this: have we been living around non-Christian views of God for so long that we no longer know who God is? Did God not become fully human 2000 years ago as mentioned in John 1?

Did Jesus not say that NO ONE has seen the Father?

Did Jesus not say the Moses mana lead to death and truly truly did NOT come from heaven? (John 6).

Is it not reason enough by this SINGLE fact that Jesus now sits at the right hand of the Father, which surely implies that the Godhead was 'added to/modified/changed-in-specific-aspects/altered/re-subordinated'? Surely this alone implies some change.

What about all the things in plain sight like the Paraclete, Pentecost, Sacramemts, etc?

What about the new calander - new heavens, new earth, new day, new sabbath, new jerusalem, new Kingdom, new King and a new.... HUMAN communion with God made possible only because the Godhead 'changed' (not God the Father necessarily, but the Godhead being 'added to' which ultimately is a change and thus God changed).

This would mean that the Holy Spirit Proceeds from both the Father and Son, which means its possible that.. On second though Im too fearful to say it publicly because that sin will not be forgiven. Anyhow, any comments would be welcomed.Sorry for the long post!

 

[~Anastasia~]

Interesting though I'm not at all sure I correctly understand all of what you mean to say.

Yes, Christ Jesus, God the Son, did become Incarnate at a point in time. Did that change the Godhead though? I don't think it changed the Essence of God. However, it does unite God to man in a very unique way, given that Christ's Divine nature is united to His new human nature (at least if you agree with Chalcedon).

I am reminded though that Christ was "the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world" ... so to me that rather gets in the way of thinking that something about human beings affected a change in God Himself at a fundamental level. I tend to see Him as author instead ...

I'm afraid I don't see the connection that necessarily validates the Filioque here. The Creed is about the nature and Source of and within the Godhead. Orthodoxy affirms the Father alone as the Source of all, which is why the Son is (eternally) begotten of the Father, and the Holy Spirit (eternally) proceeds from the Father.

I'll let Catholics speak for their own understanding, since I keep hearing two different explanations in response, but very often they seem to tend toward explaining the procession of the Holy Spirit as FROM the Father, THROUGH the Son, which Orthodoxy would not disagree with in principle.

However, the authority to alter the Creed is another issue.

I'm not sure if that addresses your points or not, because some I don't wish to make assumptions about.

 

[tdidymas]

In the theology I am familiar with, God is immutable. But it means that God is ontologically immutable, not economically immutable. In other words, God changes in His administration of creation, but not in His divine nature. So then, it seems to me that the filioque controversy has to do with the speculation as to what Jesus meant when He said "proceeds from..." The West chose to interpret proceed as an administrative action, but the East thought it was an ontological event. The whole argument was around God the Father being the only source of divinity. But this is problematic, because if God is triune in nature, then all 3 "Divines" of God are (or is) the source of divinity. If the Father were the sole source of divinity, then the Son and the Spirit would be less than divinity, as They would be derived. Since Jesus also said that He would send the Spirit, I generally agree with the filioque clause. I don't believe the Incarnation changes God's nature, but it does "change" (chronologically) His administration of creation.
TD

 

[gordonhooker]

In the theology I am familiar with, God is immutable. But it means that God is ontologically immutable, not economically immutable. In other words, God changes in His administration of creation, but not in His divine nature. So then, it seems to me that the filioque controversy has to do with the speculation as to what Jesus meant when He said "proceeds from..." The West chose to interpret proceed as an administrative action, but the East thought it was an ontological event. The whole argument was around God the Father being the only source of divinity. But this is problematic, because if God is triune in nature, then all 3 "Divines" of God are (or is) the source of divinity. If the Father were the sole source of divinity, then the Son and the Spirit would be less than divinity, as They would be derived. Since Jesus also said that He would send the Spirit, I generally agree with the filioque clause. I don't believe the Incarnation changes God's nature, but it does "change" (chronologically) His administration of creation.
TD

agreed we only need to read the prologue to Johns Gospel to glean that......

 

[FinishedCross]

So we agree that the Godhead DID indeed 'change' permanently 2000 years ago?

(note: In our times, 'Change' is often not a desirable word by modern religious/political influence. But please see past that as I'm simply using the word 'change' as a 'catch-all' word in order to make the statement factual. If I said the Godhead was 'changed' 'altered', 're-organized'' 'added to' or other more specific wording it can open-up contentions. However this happened, we can atleast agree the Godhead did indeed change 2000 years ago.)

..Lest we take on the non-Christian view that the Godhead was always changing along with humanity - this is an old early Church heresy, but still a very core belief of an Old Testament religion who believe God repents, regrets, negotiates, changes his mind, has moodswings. and changes all the time essentially pouring out new Spirits even. Basically a god of energies and forces which is always changing, morphing, leaning, etc. I used to believe in their God because I didnt understand who Jesus was and his relation to the Godhead.

In North America obviously i've been completely influenced by non-Christian views of God. 'In God we trust' is even on our money. So, I just assumed it was our God. But this mocks and LITERALLY, openly defies Christ when he decreed a separation of God being written on physical currency (i read this in an article once).

And especially when there are two Masters to follow - the wrong one being the God of money. So, the place Gods name on money? And it says in Latin 'New world Order' spelled incorrectly and also 'may He be pleased with our work' if i remember. Jesus instructed his children to bring about revolutions and a new world order in the 20th century from America? Really? God said this?

And why is there a male cross-dresser statue called Liberty acting as a guiding light? I thought John lead the way to Christ the True Light who leads his disciples through the night? Or Mary. She carried the True Light over to Elizabeth. And John leaped in the womb!

But what is a cross dressing man doing holding a false guiding light? A lesser light. That is the EXACT trnalsation of Lucifer from the latin. - light bearer. They spoke Latin at that time. How could they not have known this?

I've leaned through all this, God can mean absolutely anything. But when you come to realize the great pearl of the Godhead changing 2000 years ago which now has Our risen Lord Jesus Christ himself at the right hand inside the Godhead, well this 'solidifies' things for me. And I now realize that God really is a 'Christian' God (although I prefer to use the other term that describes our Faith as where i'm from the Christian can also mean absolutely ANYTHING.

I'd say, the objective, True God of all humanity can only be known properly within God's established Faith which belongs to the Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant - The group of Churches who accept the Creeds. and have a valid baptism. Outside of this, God can be anything. Jesus can be anything.

And now I understand, that yes, it is indeed very fitting to say the Holy Spirit also proceeds from the Son as the three are eternally bound to one another - even if the Holy Spirit does technically proceed from the Father. I've seen first hand the damage saying otherwise has done. I though all religions had the Holy Spirit because their books mention it. Even if they openly deny Christ. Thats because I didnt really understand God or why he came.

I will attempt not let the Old Testament or the teachings from those christians outside the Faith teach me about God. Many reject the creeds and faith. i'd urge the Orthodox to soften their position and just accept both versions. That seems fair to me. The Catholics accept both as the Eastern Catholics use it without filoque.

Maybe one day in our lives there can be unity once again with all three Churches coming together as one because we are all one body - even with the impediments and errors. Even at its worst, is not being at leadt partially part of a body, still indeed part of the body? Who can be part of two seperate bodies at once? Not even a husband and wife can for they are also one.

But we must never allow ourselves to fully fall off the body by moving ourselves to a different body, different faith; and a different head - a different god. This body rejects the basic foundations of the Creed as pointed to at tue top right of this website.

Ie: More or less than one baptism violates this creed and we shall no longer be part of the true body. The body we were once part of will continue on without us. So we shall learn to despise it and try to tale it down throwing stones at it along with others in our mist who are strange to us. Those we do not trust who were not of us, but we find ourselves submitting to. The fight against the true body is a losing one. Our Lord Christ decreed this. But the good news is we all have time to change...

Lest.. we be left behind.

 

[hedrick]

So we agree that the Godhead DID indeed 'change' permanently 2000 years ago?

No. The whole point of the Trinity is that God is eternally Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Obviously the human being Jesus only came into existence 2000 years ago. But whatever that implies about God himself was true from the beginning.

I do believe that a God that becomes incarnate is different from a pure monad such as some religions believe in, who couldn't possibly appear as a human being. But God was always that way. He was, although not exactly incarnate, "incarnatable," not just the Father, but the Son.

I don't accept some of the more extreme forms of immutability that have been posited of God. Sometimes it goes far enough that God can't feel anything or react to us. That's contrary to Scripture. The Incarnation was a change of form, but nothing fundamental. I wouldn't call it a change to the "Godhead," since Godhead is typically used to speak of God's eternal essence.