John 1 shows the belief Jesus is incarnation of the preexisting One who was with God and was God. You are trying discount the passages that show the deity of Christ. The problem is that you do not have sufficient arguments to deny the preexistence of Jesus as being with God and being God. Plus there are too many passages pointing the same way. It is the ambiguity that you resolve as a way of denying Christ rather than making sense of who he is.
Christendom's Trinity: Where Did It Come From?
- Thread starter Alter2Ego
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Runningman
Active Member
You miss how the entire Bible makes no mention of God incarnating or Jesus pre-existing. You are still importing and projecting your personal beliefs onto the Bible, meaning what you're proposing isn't Scripture. So what you're proposing is a heretical pagan idea that the early Jews and Christians didn't even have the vocabulary describe. However, you have already been shown this, but the Word is not God. The Word is a thing (1 John 1:1-3 says so) and the grammar of John 1:1 makes the Word indefinite or qualitative because it isn't The God. Context and grammar are against you on that one.
The whole Bible does not have to highlight what would be shown in the NT. Like I noted, you are trying to live like a Sadducee in the OT while denying the power of God. If you call all teaching of John and Paul as pagan ideas, you have quite an argument you will have to make.
the issues against your point is that you are arguing from Unitarian grammar instead of true biblical grammar. I showed the fallacy of your point of saying the Word is godly. haha. but you keep it up. You can do that as long as you want your arguments sidelined instead of convincing.
Runningman
Active Member
Yes the Bible has to say the things you claim it does. If it does not state your ideas then leave the Bible out of it. You are free to represent your views as the anti-Biblical views they are, the traditions and privately-held beliefs of your organization. If you frame your argument differently then maybe you will get a better result about how it is received. As far as the Bible goes, it is strictly monotheistic and doesn't contain the germ of polytheism that your beliefs do. The Bible is the Unitarian's handbook, God is a singular person as the Bible says. You can't make it go away just by changing the subject or poisoning the well with your non-Biblical ideas.
synergy
Active Member
Trinitarians are not Modalists so why in the world are you accusing us of that nonsense?You mean how the Word isn't The God in John 1:1?
This clearly proves that you can't even get past John 1:1 without unitarianism being bombed out of existence.
Runningman
Active Member
The difference between theos with and without the article occurs in John 1:1, which has two occurrences of theos: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with the theos, and the Word was theos.” Since the definite article (“the”) is missing from the second occurrence of “theos” (“God”) the most natural meaning of the word would be that it referred to the quality of God, i.e., “divine” “god-like” or “like God.” The New English Bible gets the sense of this phrase by translating it “What God was, the Word was.” James Moffatt, who was a professor of Greek and New Testament Exegesis at Mansfield College in Oxford, England, and author of the well-known Moffatt Bible, translated the phrase “the logos was divine.”Trinitarians are not Modalists so why in the world are you accusing us of that nonsense?
This clearly proves that you can't even get past John 1:1 without unitarianism being bombed out of existence.
Thanks @Peterlag
Your failure at Greek Grammar proceeds you.
The highest expert on Greek Grammar, Daniel Wallace , notes that the translation "What God was, the Word was" is sort of the best way to express the translation. The concept then is that if God is the almighty, creator, glorious One, then the Word is the same.
You can read a bit about that at -- https://www.ntgreek.org/answers/answer-john1_1.htm
For Unitarian interpretations to be true, God would have to be reduced to language and words. So the unitarian must decrease who God is so that they can decrease who Jesus is. What is also bad is that unitarians have to distort grammar to do this distortion.
Runningman
Active Member
The anarthrous θεός in John 1:1 indicates qualitative meaning, describing the nature of the Word, something not identical to ὁ θεός (the Father). Fortunately we still have the Greek manuscripts so there isn't a way for you trinitarians to win John 1:1. Argue you all you wish, but John 1:1 is in line with Jesus not being an incarnate being, which is never stated in all of scripture. So you present a flawed argument. You need to overcome John 1:1 and provide examples of Jesus pre-existing or statements about God incarnating from Scripture if you are trying to argue for your side.
like i mentioned, you are following unitarian greek grammar instead of basic greek grammar. You can make up as many interpretations as you want but that will not make them correct
Runningman
Active Member
As previously shown, the Biblical evidence is against your claims. You just cite English translations that seem to say what you claim they do on the surface, but your claims don't stand against scrutiny and are without wide Biblical support.
haha. You do not just have to deny the English translation. You have to deny greek grammar. The next step is just to be a JW. To have it your way, you will need to convince scholars that you have new insight into greek grammar.
Runningman
Active Member
The Greek grammar of John 1:1 is where I am planting my flag lol. That's where you lose your "The Word is God" claims. It also doesn't even help the trinity. Using your literalist's interpretation of John 1:1, it would say that the "Word was with the Trinity" or if the Word is Jesus, as you say, then "Jesus was with the Trinity" and that "Jesus is the Trinity" since you define "God" as a trinity. Context, grammar are not your friends on this verse. I can't think of any verse where you would have a shot at making a good point and I am being honest. I would try to help you if I thought I found something to make your beliefs work.
i see your confusion. you cannot keep points together. You add Trinity doctrine explaining how there are not multiple gods and try to put as a synonym for God. Please avoid pushing your confusion.
Like shared, you have to say that God is just mere words an not a conscious creator of the universe. You make faith as something you have in words rather than something trusting a conscious creator who exists before creation. I trust scripture rather than you.
Runningman
Active Member
It's funny how you seem to have to deny the trinity to make John 1:1 work for you. One less god in your pantheon is a step in the right direction. Are you now a binitarian?
really? You are planting your flag on errant greek grammar and a novel, new, gnostic, private interpretation.
I suppose we could say you sloppily put ideas together in your attempt to put "trinity" in there. Jesus is the incarnation of the One with God in John 1:1. That way is more accurate. Of course since you do not follow the progression of John 1, you miss that the body of Jesus is not presented until verse 14
Runningman
Active Member
John 1:1 wasn't written yesterday so it isn't new. No idea what you're talking about by saying Scripture is gnostic. Gnostic means secret, esoteric, or mystical knowledge. You're saying that there is a pre-existent being known as the Word who you say is God but the Bible doesn't say that anywhere else, making your interpretation of John 1:1 all alone on an island by itself, meaning it is unlikely, unprecedented, and unscriptural so what you are saying is gnostic. The precedent that exegesis is built on is that God created alone (not with another as you say) and that God is a singular person, not a they or a them. So yeah the Greek grammar of John 1:1 is where I am planting my flag. It fits perfectly with the Bible's narrative of God being Unitarian and this is not secret knowledge.
Really? You are getting desperate in denials. Of course God alone created all things. It is not whether God creates all but who God truly is. That is where your denials start kicking in. John 1 reveals that the eternal One being designated as Word became flesh but was not some second God. To miss that is to miss all of the NT. Since you are offering a new interpretation, you hold responsibility for sharing a reasonable argument. But you have not done that, so your interpretation remains private and presumably gnostic.
Runningman
Active Member
This is where your denials of Scripture or misunderstandings come in. How do you conclude God is more than one person when the Bible directly says He isn't? More than one person wouldn't be God creating a lone, more than one person isn't a He, Him, His, I. More than one person contradicts the Father's exclusive deity as the one and only true God. For your wildly unconventional logic to work, it would require reinterpreting the Bible to make it say something it never once explicitly states, making your interpretation private. Also, you interpretation ignores all precedent. It's eisegesis to say that the Word is literally God without any precedent in John 1:1, totally out of the blue, for it to never be repeated again by anyone else, and contradicted by John himself in Ats 4:23-24,27 and dozens of other points in Scripture. This is what happens when one's foundation isn't the Bible, this is indoctrination run wild Mike. You don't have to be in bondage to it forever.
Peterlag
Active Member
The Bible teaches that God is the “head” of Christ...
“But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God” (1 Corinthians 11:3). The Trinitarian explanation of this verse is that God was the head of Christ only while he was on the earth, but the Bible never says that. In fact, the Bible shows us the opposite: God is still the head of Christ and directing him even after he ascended into heaven. God can be seen to be greater than the Messiah in Psalm 2 when God’s Messiah is called “his anointed” and God says “I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill." The Messiah is not being shown to be a co-equal ruler with God, but God’s under-ruler. God says He fathered the Messiah: “You are my Son; today I have begotten you." It's clear the Messiah was begotten at a specific time in history and that means he's not “eternally begotten” even if commentators argue about which day “today” refers to.
“But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God” (1 Corinthians 11:3). The Trinitarian explanation of this verse is that God was the head of Christ only while he was on the earth, but the Bible never says that. In fact, the Bible shows us the opposite: God is still the head of Christ and directing him even after he ascended into heaven. God can be seen to be greater than the Messiah in Psalm 2 when God’s Messiah is called “his anointed” and God says “I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill." The Messiah is not being shown to be a co-equal ruler with God, but God’s under-ruler. God says He fathered the Messiah: “You are my Son; today I have begotten you." It's clear the Messiah was begotten at a specific time in history and that means he's not “eternally begotten” even if commentators argue about which day “today” refers to.
Rockerduck
Active Member
The Cross of Christ represents the Trinity. Without the Holy Spirit you can't read it in the scriptures. Logic does not work in spiritual matters.
1 Corinthians 1:18 - For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
1 Corinthians 1:18 - For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
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