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If one doesn't accept that Jesus is the Second Person of the Trinity - and thus God since each Person of the Trinity has the fullness of God - I think the only biblically defensible position is that of the Jehovah's Witnesses, whereby Jesus is the firstborn of creation. Multiple verses, including Jesus' own words, make clear that he was with the Father before the creation and it was him (Jesus) for whom and through whom all was created (or, in the JW view, all else was created). There is certainly no room for the view that Jesus was the Son only by virtue of the Virgin Birth or became the Son at his baptism by John. At a minimum, he was preexistent and special enough to be called divine.
If I simply sit and read the NT with no preconceived notions, I frankly end up with the JW position. This was true before I had any idea what the JW position was. (I have read vast swaths of Christian history, theology and apologetics over the past 25 or 30 years, so please don't waste your time trying to educate me.) As anyone familiar with the history of the doctrine knows, the Trinity is a heavily negotiated doctrine with lots of intrigue and political shenanigans (and even violence) surrounding it. For one brief period, the official position shifted from the Trinity back to Arianism. Given this history and the less-than-compelling biblical support, I find it impossible to say that the JW position is flatly incorrect or un-Christian.
Because the Trinity is so well-established in Christian tradition and has considerable theological appeal, I accept the the doctrine without insisting on it as a Christian essential. The essential, I believe, is that Jesus is "divine" (at least in the sense of being the firstborn of creation) and that his Incarnation, Crucifixion and Resurrection were sufficient to accomplish God's plan of salvation.
If a man came to you now and said he is God or son of God, would you believe him? Why not?
What is more likely, some people misinterpreted or lied, or that Jesus is God, King of the Universe?
Two distinct individuals that are ONE as well. The Son sits at the right hand of the Father, I think they are in perfect union to the point they are also AS one individual , sharing the same thoughts, speaking the same thing at the same time if they wanted, etc.
Yup that is the way i see it also because as the Father and the son are one we also will be one with them.
Then let's try to honestly present what the doctrine is, then.
We believe that Jesus is God, the Son. He is and always has been God. There is only one God. There are 3 persons within the Godhead, the Son being one of them, along with God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit. All 3 are completely and 100% God. None of them are less God than the others, and they are all the same God.
Jesus would disagree with you.
The Father is greater then i.
The word "one" can be, and in fact is, used on a number of occasions in the Bible to denote a perfect unity, rather than to denote the lowest cardinal number.
The use of the word "with" (the Word was with God) clearly indicates that there was more than one personage. If God (the Father) was alone, it would have made a lot more sense to simply say, "God was alone."
In other words, you'd not be able to tell them apart had they been standing side by side. When Acts relates the story of Stephen looking into Heaven and seeing God, he saw "Jesus standing on the right hand of God." He saw two personages.
Agreed that is why elohim is plural but used in the singular
When we look at things as being separate, then the concept is difficult to explain, just look at all these threads on the trinity, etc. I've read over and over and believe this as well - we are one. This separate stuff is an illusion. Think of a fabric or blanket thrown over/upon the earth. All life is connected via fabrics (too tiny to see). We are all connected, you , me the trees and plants around us. This fabric of life is God Himself and the force He uses to keep it all together is literal love, nothing in creation is apart from it.
Two distinct individuals that are ONE as well. The Son sits at the right hand of the Father, I think they are in perfect union to the point they are also AS one individual, sharing the same thoughts, speaking the same thing at the same time if they wanted, etc.
Quote:
Originally Posted by pneuma
Yup that is the way I see it also because as the Father and the son are one we also will be one with them.
I realize that having experienced the inexplicable and ineffable Oneness, that I am privileged to completely understand what all this refers to, but I understand the confusion people conditioned to a separate physical existence would have with the concept. I was surprised and confused by the retention of my individuality while being unmistakably part of the Oneness. It is truly inexplicable.
I have toyed with explanations that ranged all over the place. None made any sense until I connected with the marriage theme and the man and wife becoming one. The biblical use of the word "know" to refer to it was key. It is love that unites so when we love we are "conceived by God" in the biblical sense of "know." That led to the "pregnancy meme that I use when referring to us as embryo Spirits conceived by God the Father. YMMV.
We have the writings of the apostle John. We have John 1:1 but we also have John 14:28: "The Father is greater than I."
Both sides have persuasive reasonings from their point of view
It's a long reply but the source isn't from a religious website or those that are inclined to believe one way or another. Rather it's free of the religious bias.
Jason BeDuhn has the academic credentials to come to a credible conclusion. An individual who, by the way, is not associated with those who believe there is One God who was known to the ancient Hebrews as YHWH.“That men may know that thou, whose name alone is JEHOVAH, art the most high over all the earth.”-Psalm 83:18 (King James Bible)
The below is related to the book, "Truth in Translation."
In regard to John 1:1 he writes,
"The Greek phrase is theos en ho logos, which translated word for word is "a god was the word"...
Greek has only a definite article, like our the, it does not have an indefinite article, like our a or an. If a noun is definite, it has the definite article ho. If a noun is indefinite, no article is used. In the phrase from John 1:1, ho logos is "the word." If it was written simply logos, without the definite article ho, we would have to translate it as "a word"
"Now in English we simply say "God"; we do not say "The God." But in Greek, when you mean to refer to the one supreme God, instead of one of the many other beings that were called "gods," you would have to say "The God": ho theos. Even a monotheistic Christian, who believes there is only one God and no others, would be forced to say in Greek "The God," as John and Paul and the other writers of the New Testament normally do. If you leave off the article in a phrase like John 1:1, then you are saying "a god." (There are some exceptions to this rule: Greek has what are called noun cases, which means the nouns change form depending on how they are used in a sentence. So, if you want to say "of God," which is theou, you don't need the article. But in the nominative case, which is the one in John 1:1, you have to have the article.)."
"So what does John mean by saying "the word was a god"? He is classifying Jesus in a specific category of beings. There are plants and animals and humans and gods, and so on. By calling the Word "a god," John wants to tell his readers that the Word (which becomes Jesus when it takes flesh)
belongs to the divine class of things. Notice the word order: "a god was the word." We can't say it like this in English, but you can in Greek."-https://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/b-greek/2003-July/025847.html
He then goes on to say the verse can literally be translated into English as "and the Word was a god." However, he says it could be translated as the "the Word was divine" which in his opinion is less problematic because the literal translation of "the Word was a god" could be mistaken by a modern day reader as polytheism although it isn't.
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