Being the "Son of God" denotes a difference of role, even as being the wife instead of the head of the house does, but it doesn't necessarily denote being "lesser."

While the phrase "son of God" does not necessarily denote deity, we have quite a few texts where Christ is called "God" and "Yahweh" ("LORD," "Jehovah").

We have a number of texts that say that the Father created everything through the Son. What exactly that means we are not told, so I don't think we can speculate and say that that means that Christ did not use His own power in creating.

Jehovah's Witnesses don't mind a bit saying that Christ was created, but often trinitarians and self-proclaimed anti-trinitarians will make the distinction that Christ was begotten, not created.

On Colossians 1 :15, I offer the thoughts of John Gill, a trinitarian Baptist commentator of yesteryear:

quote:

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the firstborn of every creature; not the first of the creation, or the first creature God made; for all things in #Col 1:16 are said to be created by him, and therefore he himself can never be a creature; nor is he the first in the new creation, for the apostle in the context is speaking of the old creation, and not the new: but the sense either is, that he was begotten of the Father in a manner inconceivable and inexpressible by men, before any creatures were in being; or that he is the "first Parent", or bringer forth of every creature into being, as the word will bear to be rendered, if instead of protótokos, we read prototókos; which is no more than changing the place of the accent, and may be very easily ventured upon, as is done by an ancient writer {g}, who observes, that the word is used in this sense by Homer, and is the same as protogonos, "first Parent", and protoktistes, "first Creator"; and the rather this may be done, seeing the accents were all added since the apostle’s days, and especially seeing it makes his reasoning, in the following verses, appear with much more beauty, strength, and force: he is the first Parent of every creature, "for by him were all things created", &c. #Col 1:16, or it may be understood of Christ, as the King, Lord, and Governor of all creatures; being God’s firstborn, he is heir of all things, the right of government belongs to him; he is higher than the kings of the earth, or the angels in heaven, the highest rank of creatures, being the Creator and upholder of all, as the following words show; so the Jews make the word "firstborn" to be synonymous with the word "king", and explain it by gdwl wshr, "a great one", and "a prince" {h}; see #Ps 89:27 Heb 1:2,6.

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[ July 02, 2003, 11:09 AM: Message edited by: Bob Pickle ]

Bob, I don’t disagree with you, but your and John Gill’s position seems to conflict with scripture:

"Know therefore this day, and consider it in your heart, that the LORD, he is God in heaven above, and upon the earth beneath; there is no other." Deuteronomy 4:39

"See now that I, even I, am He, and there is no god with me." Deuteronomy..32:39

"I am He, before Me no god was created, neither shall there be after Me." Isaiah 43:10

"Thus saith the LORD, the King of Israel and his redeemer, the LORD of hosts, I am the first, and I am the last, and beside Me there is no god." Isaiah 44:6

"I am the LORD, and there is none else." Isaiah 45:18

Whether we believe this was Jesus making these statements or God the father, it seems to indicate that there are no other God’s; meaning one God and the other two of the trinity don’t exist.

John 8:57,58 is an interesting text to read because here Jesus was questioned by the Jews when Jesus said that He knew Abraham:

quote:

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John 8:57,58
57 Then said the Jews unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham?
58 Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.

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the last words I am are also used in Revelation as well, so it is very possible that we are seeing Christ throughout the Bible, and The Father, and The Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is also mentioned in different parts of the Old Testament for example:
Genesis 1:2,Job 33:4,Psalm 104:30,2 Samuel 23:2,Isaiah 63:10,Micah 2:7,Judges 13:25.
Now with that said we know that The Father , The Son, and The Holy Spirit do exist, and they are One, as mentined in 1 John 5:7. My question is that how was the word "Trinity" made and made to be a doctrine for example what is the history of the word, who came up with it since this may give way to learniong if the doctrine of the Trinity is something that is biblical. Also why is it that in the Bible the apostles, disciples, and converts were of one accord inlike today where people people either believe the Trinity doctrine or not?
We can easily read in the Bible that all 3 are involved in a very deep and special way to lead us to Christ, and to teach us so we bear Fruit. Well thats all I have for now.

God Bless,
Will

Lobo,

That would be one possible way to look at it, but the problem is that very clearly both Christ and the Father are called "LORD" in Scripture. This was so obvious to some ancient Jews, that they called the "angel" Michael or Metatron a second "Yahweh."

quote:

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Genesis 19:24 Then the LORD rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the LORD out of heaven;

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Here is but one example. Christ, who had just been talking to Lot, brought down fire from His Father in heaven. Both are called "Yahweh." There are clearly two beings called "Yahweh" involved in this scene.

Could not then each of the texts you mention be looked upon as both the Father and Son (and perhaps the Spirit) saying that there is no other God than them?

Will,

It looks like the doctrine of the Trinity took shape in the 4th century, according to the Encylopedia Britannica. I don't know about when the word came to be.

The encylopedia says that the controversies that developed this doctrine arose because of the introduction of Neoplatonism (Greek philosophy akin to Plato's) into Christianity.

(It was Greek philosophy that gave us immortality of the soul and eternal torment.)

Specifically, the encyclopedia says that the Neoplatonic doctrine of hypostases influenced those debates. But I am having a hard time making sense of of what it says. I don't see the connection, unless Neoplatonism made church leaders hypersensitive to the issue of what kind of ousios Christ had.

Bob, I see your point and you may also be interested in this passage from Psalms 110:

“1 The LORD says to my Lord:
"Sit at my right hand
until I make your enemies
a footstool for your feet."

2 The LORD will extend your mighty scepter from Zion;
you will rule in the midst of your enemies.
3 Your troops will be willing
on your day of battle.
Arrayed in holy majesty,
from the womb of the dawn
you will receive the dew of your youth.

4 The LORD has sworn
and will not change his mind:
"You are a priest forever,
in the order of Melchizedek."

5 The Lord is at your right hand;
he will crush kings on the day of his wrath.
6 He will judge the nations, heaping up the dead
and crushing the rulers of the whole earth.
7 He will drink from a brook beside the way;
therefore he will lift up his head.

quote:

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(It was Greek philosophy that gave us immortality of the soul and eternal torment.)

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Bob, this is not an accurate statement. In the Jewish oral tradition, long before the rise of the Roman empire, they believed in conditional immortality of the soul. This believe is slightly different in that Israel believed that the soul can exist separately from the body but that this is conditional in that God grants this existence, it’s not based on some inherent quality that exists in the soul.

For example, Jews feel that the following text indicates that man’s soul will not die because nothing that God creates will ever cease to exist:

“14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that men will revere him. 15 Whatever is has already been, and what will be has been before; and God will call the past to account.” Ecc 3

Notice also that verse 15 seems to indicate that all things have already been in existence. In other words, our souls existed before our bodies were born. You may think this was some new-age idea, or a pagan Roman idea, but it actually is Jewish.

Here is another passage they use to support the doctrine of resurrection through reincarnation:

“7 All streams flow into the sea,
yet the sea is never full.
To the place the streams come from,
there they return again.
8 All things are wearisome,
more than one can say.
The eye never has enough of seeing,
nor the ear its fill of hearing.” Ecc 1


The SDA belief about death and the soul is very close, if not identical to, the Sadducees of Jesus day.

These were the two major Jewish views of thought at that time. The Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection (Mtt 22:23) or the existence of the soul after death. They did not believe these things because they did not support the Jewish oral tradition (law). The Pharisees, on the other had, believed in the resurrection, the conditional immortality of the soul, and the oral tradition. Many of them also believed in Jesus as the messiah (Acts 15:5).

Also, an interesting note, the Sadducees were considered by most mainstream Jews as apostates and most of their beliefs died out after the destruction of the temple in 70AD. All modern Jews descend from the Pharisees, or Hakamim as they call themselves, since they believe the term "Pharisee" was actually a term which was used for those Jews that were deemed to be "extremists".

Anyway, I have strayed from the topic. I just think that we many times attribute Christian teachings that we don’t like or believe in to Greek or pagan origins when they actually originated from Israel.

RE: Ps. 110. When you have two persons called Yahweh in one scene, there needs to be some sort of way to differentiate the two. That text in Gen. 19 uses location to do so. Ps. 110 instead assigns a different title to the Son.

RE: Jewish teachings. It has been my understanding that the Pharisees who believed in consciousness in death got that from Platonic philosophy.

Vol. 1 of Froom's Conditionalist Faith goes into the subject in depth. He cites intertestmental Jewish works that strayed from the old paths, and works that still taught the truth on the question. It seems that it was particularly the Jews in Alexandria that went astray.

The false concepts on death started penetrating Christianity later rather than early, as far as their writings indicate. It seems hard for me to imagine that these later Christian writers got their ideas from Jews rather than Greeks.

Lobo and Bob Pickle:

I copied the portions of your posts relating to the state of the dead in the other topic that exists here in this same forum at:

http://www.maritime-sda-online.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=57&t=000129&p=2#000045

Please continue this aspect of your discussion there.

Where are we in this topic?

It is interesting how the devil uses paganism to confuse the truth with error or vice-versa.

The origination of something pagan doesn't make truth into error as it doesn't make error into truth.

As far as the word Trinity goes, it is not a biblical word, but the word Godhead is a biblical word, therefore, why do we confuse things with the use of non-biblical words to describe a Bible doctrine.

We learned what the word Trinity means and where it originated from.

We know where the word Godhead originated from, but what does it mean?