by drew sagan 35 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Tri-Gods are so common in Pagan thinking. Why not Christianity? They borrowed pretty much everything else and labeled it okay!
In honesty. I always thought it was an overdone subject with no honest unbiased research to form any opinion that mattered. It always makes for a good fight though among Christians though, when they meet people who disagree with there view and they seem happy in the battle. So I guess I am for making it more open and controversial.
I forgot to answer you on if I think the trinity is a requirement of salvation. I have to say, I am not entirely sure. I think belief in Christ alone for salvation is, and to me that kind of means you would know he is divine if you are totally putting your faith and trust in him. The bible doesn't specifically say that, but Jesus does say he is the only way, truth, and life. I started thinking how can anyone say that if they are only an angel and not God. I started to believe these things, that he is divine, before I could really accept Christ as my Savior and have real faith in him. To me, it would be hard to have faith without believing in his divinity. IMHO.
NowImFree
There is a form of trinitarianism which accepts the subordination of the Son to the Father. That is, while being fully divine and of the same substance as the Father, the Son (and also the Spirit) remains functionally subordinate to Him. The other Two are dependent upon the Father for their existence, but not in our world of space-time. Rather, they are what they are eternally - the Son being eternally begotten of the Father and the Spirit eternally proceeding (likened metaphorically to God's breath).
Arius found a Christian orthodoxy which accepted a degree of subordination, and then went a step further. He demoted the Son to the position of a creature. It was to counter this tendency that the Council of Nicea proclaimed the Son to be homoousios - of the same substance - with the Father. The Trinity doctrine, however, underwent further development. After Nicea there was a party of theologians who thought, since a nonbiblical term had been introduced, that homoiousios (of like substance) would be a better term for the relationship between Father and Son. This was not to deny that the Son was just as divine as the Father, but to safeguard the distinction between the Persons. The view which eventually won out was that of a Trinity of Persons in which there is complete equality in all respects, without a hint of subordination - and that is the view which led to a Christian devotion in which the Son, for all practical purposes, replaces the Father in the hearts of the people.
Finally, one must distinguish between theology and devotion. In practice, it is possible to hold to a view of the Trinity which is just as Father-centered as Arianism is, and this is what I prefer.
I believe that the doctrine developed along strictly theological lines over centuries, slowly at first but never rashly.
I believe that it is the most rational way to reconcile all the factors that the Bible reveals about The Father, Christ, and the Holy Spirit, without doing an injustice to the text by diminishing the substance of what it says in all its revelation.
The Father is God
Christ is revealed in Scripture as God
But He is not the Father
He is subordinate to the Father but not inferior to Him
Being fully God He was also in all respects human but sinless
The Holy Spirit is revealed in Scripture as God
There is only One God
All these statements are revealed truth, but not explicable truth. Because this not so easy to understand, or believe, I feel that that the Bible, and God, has left each one of us as responsible for the expression of our own faith. We will ultimately stand or fall on the basis of our belief.
We can quite easily say: "I don't understand it so stuff it"
Or, "I don't understand it so I'll make it understandable"
Or we can say: "I'm not required to understand, only believe. So I believe"
I will never say that, because I believe therefore you must. It is not my place to determine another individual's belief. It is important that each person embark on his/her own spiritual journey, walking in his/her own shoes. The goal may never be reached, but the quest is what life is about. It is what extends the very meaning of being part of the human species.
Cheers
Essential christianity doctrine is that Jesus is God. That God had taken part in human life through incarnation in Jesus Christ. God became man, two natures in one beeing. This is essential coz without it salvation is not possible. AntiTrinitarians have build their own image of God and rejects the only true Image - Jesus Christ.
Shazard:
God became man, two natures in one beeing. This is essential coz without it salvation is not possible.
Why is it essential?
I personally view the various forms of Trinitarian doctrine as slightly different cristallisations of theological ideas under antagonistic logical and political forces; I think most of their beauty actually comes from the influence of early Gnosticism (as echoed in both Pauline and Johannine literature) to which the high Christology and pneumatology of orthodoxy owes practically everything.
I remember a sort of weird old man I used to visit when I was a very young JW pioneer. He knew the Bible amazingly well, did not believe in it as "God's word" yet defended Trinitarian thought against the JW views. I found that very contradictory back then, but I enjoyed discussing with him. Now I understand him better. Setting the juvenile issue of "truth" aside, I can see an aesthetical superiority of Trinitarian doctrines over the Unitarian ones.
Hey Nark !! Did I read right ???
It's your birthday??
Happy birthday you old sod
Cant remember when I was 45
Cheers
Thanks moggy lover, it is (47 though).
It is said by some that 'Logos' known by many as 'the Word' can actually be translated as meaning Gods wisdom and purpose. It is also said that the 'him' translated in this scripture (strongs #846. autos (ow-tos') can also be translated a number of differant ways including 'it'. With this concept in mind the scripture could actually read:
In the beginning was the purpose, and the purpose was with God, and the purpose was divine. It was with God in the beginning. Through it all things were made; without it nothing was made that has been made. In it was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood[a] it.
Joseph
