@APAK calls "the common
altered version of Matt 28:19" (emphasis mine). That's quite a conspiracy theory! And such a conspiracy would have had to hatch long before Nicaea, because we can see the apparent influence that Matthew's triadic version had on second-century Christian usage -- in the
Didache 7:1-4, in Justin Martyr's
First Apology ch. 61, in Irenaeus'
Against Heresies Book 3 ch. 17, in Tertullian's
On Baptism ch. 13.
Well not nearly as a conspiracy theory as you may think for the reason I already proposed. And then so many are apt to brush it off and walk away from the subject so easily without further questioning Matt 28:19b as a later scribe insertion into the text. The real conspiracy is the Trinity-biased scribes and the power behind their hands and nibs, that kept producing this err in practically all Bible translations.
Let me expand on it a bit.
Scripture only supports the baptism in Jesus Christ, the Lord Jesus, his spirit only, in his name. It is cited in Luke 24:46-47; John 20:31; Romans 1:4-5; Acts 2:21, 2:38; 3:6, 4:10, 8:12, 8:16, 9:27, 9:29, 10:48, 16:31, 19:5, 19:17, 22:14-16.
There are dozens of sources pointing to the same conclusion, that Matthew 28:19b is not in the original language text and inserted into scripture later, deliberately to somehow support the Trinity.
Here are some few examples:
1. The Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics states, ‘..and the triune formula is a later addition.’
2. The Catholic Encyclopedia, II, Page 295 states, “The baptismal formula was changed from the name of Jesus Christ to the words Father, Son, and Holy Spirit by the Catholic Church in the second century.”
3. The term Trias was first used by Theophilus of Antioch about 180 AD, according to the Hastings Dictionary of the Bible 1963, page 1015.
4. The New Revised Standard Version Bible says that ‘Modern critics claim this formula is falsely ascribed to Jesus and that it represents later (Catholic) church tradition, for nowhere in the book of Acts (or any other book of the Bible) is baptism performed with the name of the Trinity..”
5. The Catholic Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger says “the basic form of our profession of faith took shape during the course of the second and third centuries in the connection with the ceremony of baptism. So far as its place of origin is concerned, the text (Matt 28:19) came from the city of Rome.” (XVI 2004)
Consequence of this fabrication: One must be repentant and baptized, bathed or immersed into Christ only, not into the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The former receives the spirit of Truth, the latter does not and is not converted. One is repentant and believe they have also been crucified in their sins as Christ (who was sinless), not by a crucified Father, and his own Holy Spirit.
As Galatians 3:27 states, “..who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourself with Christ.” We are never spiritually clothed or immersed into the Father, Son and Holy Spirit! That would be nonsense!!
More source that says Matt 28:19 is a forgery.
The Roman Catholics say, "The baptismal formula was changed from the name of Jesus Christ to the words Father, Son, and Holy Spirit by the Catholic Church in the second century."[1]
New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) says this about Matthew 28:19: "Modern critics claim this formula is falsely ascribed to Jesus and that it represents later (Catholic) church tradition, for nowhere in the book of Acts (or any other book of the Bible) is baptism performed with the name of the Trinity..." [2]
The Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics: As to Matthew 28:19, it says: It is the central piece of evidence for the traditional (Trinitarian) view. If it were undisputed, this would, of course, be decisive, but its trustworthiness is impugned on grounds of textual criticism, literary criticism and historical criticism. The same Encyclopedia further states that: "The obvious explanation of the silence of the New Testament on the triune name, and the use of another (JESUS NAME) formula in Acts and Paul, is that this other formula was the earlier, and the triune formula is a later addition."
[3]
Edmund Schlink, a Lutheran Theologian said, "The baptismal command in its Matthew 28:19 form cannot be the historical origin of Christian baptism. At the very least, it must be assumed that the text has been transmitted in a form expanded by the [Catholic] church."
[4]
In,
The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries, it says: "It is often affirmed that the words in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost are not the ipsissima verba [exact words] of Jesus, but...a later liturgical addition."
[5]
Wilhelm Bousset, a German Theologian said,: "The testimony for the wide distribution of the simple baptismal formula [in the Name of Jesus] down into the second century is so overwhelming that even in Matthew 28:19, the Trinitarian formula was later inserted."
[6]
[1] (The Catholic Encyclopedia, II 1907-1913)
[2] (New Revised Standard Version 1989)
[3] (Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics 1908-1927)
[4] (Schlink 1972)
[5] (France 2009)
[6] (Bousset 1913/ 1970 English)
This is all from my Book still in work for years now....should get it done is few more years.