We are not required to "understand" the mystery of Trinity, but as Christians, we are required to accept it. Because it is in basic Christian ecumenical creeds (and in the Bible and in the first church writings and a sure part of all orthodox Christianity till today).
Can One Be Christian and Not Believe In The Trinity?
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PS95
Well-Known Member
I can't say that I appreciate that comment, but whatever.
I have maintained extreme caution in all that I accept as truth. that caution alarm is what told me Jws were wrong- and is why I was not baptized as one- and I continue to use that caution which God has given to me.
This has zero to do with souls. It has only to do with His flesh - His body as I have stated. You asked the question and I answered it. No, of course His flesh did not reveal the Lord's grace and truth to John.
How do i apply grace and truth to the Word became flesh? His character is where John saw the Lord's grace and truth- not in his human body. Is this question for real?
We agree here.
I understand that which is why I mentioned that it was futile to further this part of the discussion. I recall you from Carm over 20 years ago. I have no hope in changing your mind on this.
-Prov 8 tricks up many. I also see it as personification-
I also believe that I will be came down from heaven in the person of His Son. But Jesus spoke of His distinct memories of His time in heaven on more than one occasion-- and no plan or idea has a memory - . Therefore He pre-existed. There is no other option.
The difference here is so close- yet apart.
Jesus and Michael the archangel- I have never believed which is one reason I was not baptized a Jw. _ I was raised as one ,unfortunately. They have mounds and mounds of wrong teachings.
PS95
Well-Known Member
You can take it to the bank. God is a Spirit. He does not need to sit. Of course it's not a real throne! You serious?
Do you also think " sit at my right hand is literal"? It means power..
Those are all literal. Let's be real.
PS95
Well-Known Member
Hey. feel free to send any Q's my way. I do not subscribe to the idea that you must believe in the trinity creed to be a believer. It is a complex doctrine and few take the time to really understand what they meant. To be honest, most believers have no idea. That is when they say we can't understand it. What we can't understand is God in His fullness. -We can certainly understand what they were teaching and why.
I do not think we have to believe all of the creed to be true believers.
TrevorHL
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Greetings again PS95,
Kind regards
Trevor
Commendable.
Yes, for real as I consider the word "flesh" as not his skin and bones, but the complete person, the fact that Jesus was a human, the Son of God by birth and character.
I cannot recall much interaction, but I cannot add any posts to Carm as it gives me an error message. I also see John 1:1 "The Word" as a personification.
I am unaware of "His distinct memories".
Kind regards
Trevor
Grailhunter
Well-Known Member
There is no biblical reason to think it is not real.
Mark 16:19: “So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God”.
Hebrews 1:3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
1 Peter 3:22 Who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him.
Grailhunter
Well-Known Member
You are right it is the doctrine of the Roman Ecumenical creeds.....
But not before that....
There are over a hundred scriptures that prove the 3 in 1 definition of the Trinity false.
The word Trinity is not in the scriptures.
The term Trinity was coined in early church writings but not the 3 in 1 formula.
The McKenzie Bible Dictionary explains it this way.... “The Trinity of God is defined by the Church as the belief that in God there are three persons who subsist in one nature. The belief as so defined was reached only in the 4th and 5th centuries AD and hence is not explicitly or formally a biblical belief.” Which hold true to the fact that the word Trinity does not occur in the Holy Bible.
PS95
Well-Known Member
@Grailhunter This is Christians Only section of the board, you are not allowed to attack/dispute Trinity, here. Change your profile religion to "other faith" and question Trinity in the open sections of the board.
"Please note that taking a position contrary to the doctrines outlined in the statement of faith is not allowed for our Christian members. The Trinity, while open to discussion, is not open to dispute, except by other faith members."
www.christianityboard.com
"Please note that taking a position contrary to the doctrines outlined in the statement of faith is not allowed for our Christian members. The Trinity, while open to discussion, is not open to dispute, except by other faith members."
Policy Change - Topics On The Trinity Can Now Be Discussed at CyB Updated - 20/12/2024
Christianity Board has alway prided itself in being a place of scholarly discussion, friendship and an environment where members can grow, learn and share their experiences in Christ. Our team at Cyb have worked hard over the years to ensure that this ethos is maintained and upheld however, we...
www.christianityboard.com
Grailhunter
Well-Known Member
Grailhunter
Well-Known Member
@Grailhunter This is Christians Only section of the board, you are not allowed to attack/dispute Trinity, here. Change your profile religion to "other faith" and question Trinity in the open sections of the board.
"Please note that taking a position contrary to the doctrines outlined in the statement of faith is not allowed for our Christian members. The Trinity, while open to discussion, is not open to dispute, except by other faith members."
Policy Change - Topics On The Trinity Can Now Be Discussed at CyB Updated - 20/12/2024
Christianity Board has alway prided itself in being a place of scholarly discussion, friendship and an environment where members can grow, learn and share their experiences in Christ. Our team at Cyb have worked hard over the years to ensure that this ethos is maintained and upheld however, we...
LOL
I am not denying the Trinity, just the 3 in 1 formula for it.
Tri-unity, not triune.
Facts are facts.
I don't use wikepedia for my historical theology.
Arius,,,,just like the JWs, believed Jesus was a created being...
NOT the same as God Father.
Such is the genuine doctrine of Arius. Using Greek terms, it denies that the Son is of one essence, nature, or substance with God; He is not consubstantial (homoousios) with the Father, and therefore not like Him, or equal in dignity, or co-eternal, or within the real sphere of Deity. The Logos which St. John exalts is an attribute, Reason, belonging to the Divine nature, not a person distinct from another, and therefore is a Son merely in figure of speech. These consequences follow upon the principle which Arius maintains in his letter to Eusebius of Nicomedia, that the Son "is no part of the Ingenerate." Hence the Arian sectaries who reasoned logically were styled Anomoeans: they said that the Son was "unlike" the Father. And they defined God as simply the Unoriginate. They are also termed the Exucontians (ex ouk onton), because they held the creation of the Son to be out of nothing.
Anything other than the understanding of the Trinity is not orthodox christianity.
1 of 2
2 of 2
@Lambano
The words YOU like to use are in the following:
First among the doctrinal disputes which troubled Christians after Constantine had recognized the Church in A.D. 313, and the parent of many more during some three centuries, Arianism occupies a large place in ecclesiastical history. It is not a modern form of unbelief, and therefore will appear strange in modern eyes. But we shall better grasp its meaning if we term it an Eastern attempt to rationalize the creed by stripping it of mystery so far as the relation of Christ to God was concerned. In the New Testament and in Church teaching Jesus of Nazareth appears as the Son of God. This name He took to Himself (Matthew 11:27; John 10:36), while the Fourth Gospel declares Him to be the Word (Logos), Who in the beginning was with God and was God, by Whom all things were made. A similar doctrine is laid down by St. Paul, in his undoubtedly genuine Epistles to the Ephesians, Colossians, and Philippians. It is reiterated in the Letters of Ignatius, and accounts for Pliny's observation that Christians in their assemblies chanted a hymn to Christ as God. But the question how the Son was related to the Father (Himself acknowledged on all hands to be the one Supreme Deity), gave rise, between the years A.D. 60 and 200, to a number of Theosophic systems, called generally Gnosticism, and having for their authors Basilides, Valentinus, Tatian, and other Greek speculators. Though all of these visited Rome, they had no following in the West, which remained free from controversies of an abstract nature, and was faithful to the creed of its baptism. Intellectual centres were chiefly Alexandria and Antioch, Egyptian or Syrian, and speculation was carried on in Greek. The Roman Church held steadfastly by tradition. Under these circumstances, when Gnostic schools had passed away with their "conjugations" of Divine powers, and "emanations" from the Supreme unknowable God (the "Deep" and the "Silence") all speculation was thrown into the form of an inquiry touching the "likeness" of the Son to His Father and "sameness" of His Essence. Catholics had always maintained that Christ was truly the Son, and truly God. They worshipped Him with divine honours; they would never consent to separate Him, in idea or reality, from the Father, Whose Word, Reason, Mind, He was, and in Whose Heart He abode from eternity. But the technical terms of doctrine were not fully defined; and even in Greek words like essence (ousia), substance (hypostasis), nature (physis), person (hyposopon) bore a variety of meanings drawn from the pre-Christian sects of philosophers, which could not but entail misunderstandings until they were cleared up. The adaptation of a vocabulary employed by Plato and Aristotle to Christian truth was a matter of time; it could not be done in a day; and when accomplished for the Greek it had to be undertaken for the Latin, which did not lend itself readily to necessary yet subtle distinctions. That disputes should spring up even among the orthodox who all held one faith, was inevitable. And of these wranglings the rationalist would take advantage in order to substitute for the ancient creed his own inventions. The drift of all he advanced was this: to deny that in any true sense God could have a Son; as Mohammed tersely said afterwards, "God neither begets, nor is He begotten" (Koran, 112). We have learned to call that denial Unitarianism. It was the ultimate scope of Arian opposition to what Christians had always believed. But the Arian, though he did not come straight down from the Gnostic, pursued a line of argument and taught a view which the speculations of the Gnostic had made familiar. He described the Son as a second, or inferior God, standing midway between the First Cause and creatures; as Himself made out of nothing, yet as making all things else; as existing before the worlds of the ages; and as arrayed in all divine perfections except the one which was their stay and foundation. God alone was without beginning, unoriginate; the Son was originated, and once had not existed. For all that has origin must begin to be.
source: CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Arianism
@Lambano
The words YOU like to use are in the following:
First among the doctrinal disputes which troubled Christians after Constantine had recognized the Church in A.D. 313, and the parent of many more during some three centuries, Arianism occupies a large place in ecclesiastical history. It is not a modern form of unbelief, and therefore will appear strange in modern eyes. But we shall better grasp its meaning if we term it an Eastern attempt to rationalize the creed by stripping it of mystery so far as the relation of Christ to God was concerned. In the New Testament and in Church teaching Jesus of Nazareth appears as the Son of God. This name He took to Himself (Matthew 11:27; John 10:36), while the Fourth Gospel declares Him to be the Word (Logos), Who in the beginning was with God and was God, by Whom all things were made. A similar doctrine is laid down by St. Paul, in his undoubtedly genuine Epistles to the Ephesians, Colossians, and Philippians. It is reiterated in the Letters of Ignatius, and accounts for Pliny's observation that Christians in their assemblies chanted a hymn to Christ as God. But the question how the Son was related to the Father (Himself acknowledged on all hands to be the one Supreme Deity), gave rise, between the years A.D. 60 and 200, to a number of Theosophic systems, called generally Gnosticism, and having for their authors Basilides, Valentinus, Tatian, and other Greek speculators. Though all of these visited Rome, they had no following in the West, which remained free from controversies of an abstract nature, and was faithful to the creed of its baptism. Intellectual centres were chiefly Alexandria and Antioch, Egyptian or Syrian, and speculation was carried on in Greek. The Roman Church held steadfastly by tradition. Under these circumstances, when Gnostic schools had passed away with their "conjugations" of Divine powers, and "emanations" from the Supreme unknowable God (the "Deep" and the "Silence") all speculation was thrown into the form of an inquiry touching the "likeness" of the Son to His Father and "sameness" of His Essence. Catholics had always maintained that Christ was truly the Son, and truly God. They worshipped Him with divine honours; they would never consent to separate Him, in idea or reality, from the Father, Whose Word, Reason, Mind, He was, and in Whose Heart He abode from eternity. But the technical terms of doctrine were not fully defined; and even in Greek words like essence (ousia), substance (hypostasis), nature (physis), person (hyposopon) bore a variety of meanings drawn from the pre-Christian sects of philosophers, which could not but entail misunderstandings until they were cleared up. The adaptation of a vocabulary employed by Plato and Aristotle to Christian truth was a matter of time; it could not be done in a day; and when accomplished for the Greek it had to be undertaken for the Latin, which did not lend itself readily to necessary yet subtle distinctions. That disputes should spring up even among the orthodox who all held one faith, was inevitable. And of these wranglings the rationalist would take advantage in order to substitute for the ancient creed his own inventions. The drift of all he advanced was this: to deny that in any true sense God could have a Son; as Mohammed tersely said afterwards, "God neither begets, nor is He begotten" (Koran, 112). We have learned to call that denial Unitarianism. It was the ultimate scope of Arian opposition to what Christians had always believed. But the Arian, though he did not come straight down from the Gnostic, pursued a line of argument and taught a view which the speculations of the Gnostic had made familiar. He described the Son as a second, or inferior God, standing midway between the First Cause and creatures; as Himself made out of nothing, yet as making all things else; as existing before the worlds of the ages; and as arrayed in all divine perfections except the one which was their stay and foundation. God alone was without beginning, unoriginate; the Son was originated, and once had not existed. For all that has origin must begin to be.
source: CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Arianism
Those that have no desire to hold to Christian teachings will not understand scripture about Jesus,,,
but they will actually try to defend their point of view with the bible itself.
The same bible that calls Jesus MY LORD AND MY GOD.
Thomas crying to Jesus.
John 20:28
OUR GREAT GOD AND SAVIOR [JESUS]
Titus 2:13
The NT is not easy to understand and those that do not accept Christian theology will misunderstand a lot of scripture.
JESUS IS THE FIRST BORN OVER ALL CREATION.
Since you want to be a member of the Christian RELIGION...
You might want to learn and accept what it teaches.
Here is a good explanation of the above statement in Col 1:15
The description "firstborn of all creation" speaks of Christ’s preexistence. He is not a creature but the eternal Creator (John 1:10). God created the world through Christ and redeemed the world through Christ (Hebrews 1:2-4).
Note that Jesus is called the firstborn, not the first-created. The word "firstborn" (Greek word "prototokos") signifies priority. In the culture of the Ancient Near East, the firstborn was not necessarily the oldest child. firstborn referred not to birth order but to rank. The firstborn possessed the inheritance and leadership.
Therefore, the phrase expresses Christ’s sovereignty over creation. After resurrecting Jesus from the dead, God gave Him authority over the Earth (Matthew 28:18). Jesus created the world, saved the world, and rules the world. He is the self-existent, acknowledged Head of creation.
Finally, the phrase recognizes Him as the Messiah: "I will make Him [Christ] My firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth" (Psalm 89:27).
Six times the Lord Jesus is declared to be the firstborn of God (see Romans 8:29; Colossians 1:15, 18; Hebrews 1:6; 12:23; Revelation 1:5). These passages declare the preexistence, the sovereignty, and the redemption that Christ offers.
source: What does it mean that Jesus is the “firstborn” over Creation? | GotQuestions.org
You're funny stuff Armour.
STILL INSULTING.
You are NOT a Christian UNLESS you believe Christian theology and the core tenets of the Christian religion.
If you want to be Jewish, you must accept what Judaism teaches.
If you want to be Muslim, you must accept what the islamic religion teaches.
If you want to be Christian, you must accept what the Christian religion teaches.
You've most probably never pondered this before....
You are NOT A CHRISTIAN because you do not understand the Trinity...
many do not.
You are NOT A CHRISTIAN because you DO NOT ACCEPT the Trinity.
And yes, you DID make a lame statement.
The lame statement is:
THE WORD TRINITY IS NOT IN THE BIBLE.
So?
But the concept is.
That statement is a lame excuse for not accepting the number one core tenet of the CHRISTIAN RELIGION.
It does sound as if the bitterness is on your end.
Grailhunter
Well-Known Member
What is orthodoxy?
Orthodox Christianity is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes the preservation of the original faith, sacred tradition, and true worship as handed down from the apostles.
The original faith does not support the 3 in 1 formula and the first 300 years do not support the 3 in 1 formula for the Trinity. The branch you are talking about accepted the Roman Catholic doctrine of the Trinity. And we know what happened to that branch.
In the study of false beliefs the 3 in 1 formula is the most common. The 3 in 1 concept skews the meaning of a lot of the Gospels. Yahweh begot a Son that was a full-fledged God. Yeshua had a Father that is a God and Yeshua said the Father is greater than I. And that God said He was pleased with His Son. Again Yeshua explained the oneness concept but false beliefs have power.
GH
orthodoxy is not Orthodoxy.
orthodoxy (small c) means what is taught in MAINLINE Christianity.
What is officially accepted as belonging to the Christian RELIGION.
It's what this whole thread is about.
It's not about any denomination such as Orthodoxy.
It's not about the Christian FAITH,,,which is personal between a person and God.
It's not about salvation.
I DON'T UNDERSTAND why the OP is not well understood by some.
It might be because we have become used the the idea that anyone could believe whatever they want to believe and STILL BE DEFINED AS CHRISTIAN.
THIS IS NOT TRUE.
If a person wants to adhere to ANY club....
he must adhere to the rules of that club.
You wish to believe there are three Gods.
Why?
Because the NT (and the OT) does indeed speak of 3 Gods.
BUT
There is only ONE GOD.
So how to reconcile these two plain and clear conflicting facts that the NT presents?
THE TRINITY.
VOILA'
Weren't the ECFs super intelligent ?!
Armour of God
Well-Known Member
I accept the trinity exists and i accept that some people believe it. But many people don't accept that some people don't understand it. Maybe I'm not a Christian after all. Maybe i should just call my self a theist instead
You do not need to understand the mystery of Trinity, how it technically works. You do not even need to know the creeds from memory or something.
But when you are provided the creeds, you cannot reject them and still call yourself an orthodox Christian.
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