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Since Judaism and then from it Christianity have always been monotheistic, am unclear how someone could believe Scripture teaches polytheism. So as for me I would leave that notion as absurd.Listen, either Jesus Christ is an exact copy of the Father, or he is a lesser image and expression of the Father. Scripture teaches he is the latter, so take it or leave it.
Ok call it heresy, only three syllables. Does that make it less funny?That always clears things right up
Yes, cgaviria has said he is sinless.
No idea what that is as far as a sound like.Sounds like modelism
Ok call it heresy, only three syllables. Does that make it less funny?
I prefer calling what it was called the first time someone thought it clever to change the teachings of Jesus through His Apostles.
Everyone is entitled to an opinion. The post is what it isNo idea what that is as far as a sound like.
Rather, my post is from scripture and uses scripture .
Editing to add: I double checked to make sure my understanding on the periphery of the definition of Molinism was correct.
Having done so it is my opinion, and since I wrote the post you critiqued as sounding like Molinism, it is not at all a reflection of that doctrine.
Spin Julie, spinnnnnn!That always clears things right up
Forgive me, but I don't see how any participant in this discussion can possibly claim that. We are all sinners, which is why this thread and others like it have periodically undergone cleanups by the mods, and why there is a palpable sense of loathing and bitterness in many posts from persons on either side.
I understand that they do believe it. And yet they don't consider the application of the world, "Monotheism" , as pertains to that category in which Christianity falls.
Yes, Jesus did exist as God incarnate. Jesus was the son of God because that terminology refers to a sire.God is a Holy Spirit so that covers what some imagine are two separate entities of states of being in scripture. Jesus came as God in flesh to show that this material world is transitory and those who are imbued, or basically for those who are born of mortals, channel the power of God through the imbuing of the Holy Spirit can do all that Jesus did. As Jesus told people.
Further, the plural pronouns aren't used in scripture so as to truly identify a three fold being. Jesus was flesh which he cast off after death so as to show his spirit, the spirit of God, for 40 days after his resurrection. Resurrection. Yeshua("deliverer") conquered the flesh. He did that because he was God wearing flesh.Jesus' father was God. He was delivered through a mortal woman, Miryam. (מִרְיָם).
Jesus was not a man. He was God appearing as a man. The Old Testament informed one cannot look upon God, a spirit if we also recall scripture, and live. Quite the predicament if God intends to offer salvation to the lost mortals on earth by delivering his new testimony, testament, in person.
However, encased in flesh it was accomplished.
Jesus=Yeshua stated in first person in John 6:51,”I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever;” ["I am", is found also in John 8:23,John 14:6, John 15:5, *More scriptures*)
A man can't promise that. But God did. And when we recall the Old Testament and Exodus 3:14 God refers to himself first "person" so that Moses could understand. "I am that I am..." . Jesus=Yeshua was reiterating what the Jews of his time would know was scripture in that "Old Testament".
He wasn't saying, "I'm Jesus, a mere man, and I am the living bread...." . No man was or is. Only God is the bread of life. The Biblical meaning of bread is the food of life. Which is God.
Yeshua=Jesus then as the son of man is exactly that. He appeared as the son of Joseph and Miryam/Mary. But he was telling people in his preaching that he was I am. And God being a spirit, of course a holy spirit, was Jesus wearing flesh. Therefore while there was one man delivering God's message it was actually the spirit of God delivering his holy message to man. There was only one. Otherwise, it is a fallacy for any Christian to claim Christianity is monotheistic. (a single all powerful God).
Here's a worldly secular example anyone here can relate to. What's your name? What do you do for a living? Do you have a family?
OK. So, let's sum those up then. (Example) "You" (impersonal 'you') are Steve Fakeperson, who has a wife and three children and works for General Motors as an Executive Officer.
Steve Fakeperson
Husband-Father
Executive Officer
Are you three people? Or are you one who is in relationship with three other duties?
Yeshua=Jesus in the New Testament told his disciples he always spoke in parables so that not all would understand. Jesus also said in other scripture that the well do not need a physician only the sick. Paraphrasing of course.
Those who needed him were those for whom his words would have meaning. He spoke in parables, riddles of sorts, so that those who were chosen by him(God), which was related in other scripture as The Elect, would find their way to him. (no one comes to the Father save through ...the Father ...who sent himself. I.E. John 14:6)
What is sad is that in discussions like this it doesn't remain an impersonal debate or dialog concerning Exegesis. Rather, while every Christian who enters into such a discussion is personally involved in faith, it seems to become an adversarial situation wherein it is inferred what is actually taking place is an attempt to reduce, alter, or revoke, someone's personal faith. Be it in matters of this subject, those who hold the Trinity is true and Biblical. Or those who do not believe the Trinity is true and supported by scripture.
I think that is why very often it happens that such threads are closed. Because what should remain impersonal and simply a dissection if you will of Exegesis invariably evolves into an adversarial stand off among participants.
For my part, Trinity is man-made due to errant or even intentional misunderstanding, or distortion respectively, of scripture. Not by those in this thread I must emphasize. But rather of early forefathers of the churches, or those invested in the exclusive pursuit of teaching the Trinity doctrine.
This isn't to say I'm here thinking I'll change Trinitarian's mind. Rather, I think what is important, and as far as my participation goes, is that we look behind the words and to the spirit of I am's message.
If we accept that the ancient Hebrew scripture was the origin of our Christian faith today, because the Messiah in the Hebrew sacred texts was fulfilled according to our faith in the coming of Yeshua=Jesus, then we have to, I think, accept the method that was used in the writing of the ancient Hebrew scripture.
Meaning, words weren't simply words.
Words had meaning, numbers had meaning, names had meaning. And they all painted a picture for the faithful that unfolded in a perfect tapestry of truth in the message behind what was written on the scrolls.
There was a reason Yeshua=Jesus walked the earth for 40 days after he resurrected from the grave that should have been the end for the flesh.
There was a reason he fasted for 40 days, etc... It's the meaning of 40 in the ancient Hebrew Tanakh.
Recalling Jesus saying, again, why he spoke in parables I think we have to look deeper than what we imagine is simply a relating of the number 3 in matters of days in the tomb, when Jesus was in the tomb for three days. Why there were three women bearing witness of his crucifixion at the foot of the cross. And then the Trinity (3) doctrine and what the difference is to mean between those 3's for us as Christians.
(I realize I wrote a book there but the spirit moved me and it had to be said. If you've read this far, respect. And thank you for your patience.)
The problem, Berean777, is that if you take of the social theory of the trinity, the notion that there are three distinct personalities, then really you are positing three gods and so polytheism.
Also, teh doctrine of teh two natures of Christ, affirmed at the Council of Chalcedon in 451, presents problems. Accordingly, only teh human nature could suffer, whereas the divine nature, the God part of Christ, is passionless and therefore cannot experience any emotion, most especially suffering. If so, then both God and man appear but separate parts of some larger, all-inclusive whole, that includes each and yet transcends any one of them. That being teh case, what do you call this larger whole? An even knottier problem here is how we can have any kind of faith in a blissfully indifferent, dispassioned Deity.
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