If God is a Trinity, should He be referred to as “He/Him” or “They/Them”?

[TedT]

A man and his wife are one flesh because of the intimacy they share - they are not one person.

Not the point which is obviously that echad can refer to a unity.

 

[TedT]

no one one seems to want to directly answer.

Missed post #11, eh?

 

[Runningman]

Missed post #11, eh?

My apologies, I did miss post #11. You did explicitly say God is a they and I see you voted as well. Thank you! I'm curious why you think God is a they since no one referred to Him as such anywhere in the Bible. I think that's significant and represents how people viewed God and how many still do now.

 

[Believe]

So is God a “He/Him” or “They/Them” in your beliefs?

God is one being in three co-equal, co-eternal persons: the Father, the Son (Jesus Christ), and the Holy Spirit. It signifies that while there is only one God, God exists as three distinct divine persons within the one Godhead.

Not “He/Him” or “They/Them”

Be respectful and use their Names. Not them guys.

 

[TedT]

My apologies, I did miss post #11. You did explicitly say God is a they and I see you voted as well. Thank you! I'm curious why you think God is a they since no one referred to Him as such anywhere in the Bible. I think that's significant and represents how people viewed God and how many still do now.

It resonates in my soul as the truth... I used to refer to YHWH as THEM in my writings to emphasise my faith in a divine Lord but it short circuited topics too often so I stayed with accepted use.

I think that many doctrines are of the hidden variety in which the meaning must be inferred from interpretation and context and received by the work of the Holy Spirit.

You know what I mean because this is the way some of our favourite doctrines were not taught but were hidden for centuries including the Deity of the Messiah:
- the teaching that the OT was NOT the end of all scripture, (as per Deuteronomy 4:2 Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish [ought] from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.) but would include the NT writings and the new revelation hinted at in Rev 10:8-11.
- that God would incarnate as a man,
- that the Messiah would be an intermediary for prayer,
- any hint of Adamic sin before the NT.
- including his and our pre-earth existence
- and also including the words for doctrine that we use that are not in scripture: Trinity, omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, incarnation, rapture

So, scriptural doctrine without having a precise scriptural reference is a time honoured procedure, and depends upon rightly dividing the word of truth aka the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

 

[amazing grace]

Not the point which is obviously that echad can refer to a unity.

If it wasn't a point then why did you reference it?

Just to show you that a husband and wife become one through intimacy . . .
Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never! Or do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, “The two will become one flesh.” [1 Cor. 6:15,16]

ImCo:
Deut 6.4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is One [echad].

Genesis 2:24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one [echad] flesh.

Echad, can refer to the word one and to the word unity, as Gen 2:4 indicates.
<snip>

I can't seem to find a Concordance or Lexicon which defines echad as a unity.

 

[Runningman]

God is one being in three co-equal, co-eternal persons: the Father, the Son (Jesus Christ), and the Holy Spirit. It signifies that while there is only one God, God exists as three distinct divine persons within the one Godhead.

Not “He/Him” or “They/Them”

Be respectful and use their Names. Not them guys.

Thanks for defining the way you see the trinity. So God is the being and He is omnipresently in the persons. That would make God Unitarian, but what you're describing is modalism, i.e., the persons aren't God, but rather the God in them is God.

 

[TedT]

If it wasn't a point then why did you reference it?

umm, you're kidding, right?

You got the point wrong... I did not get the meaning of the reference wrong.

 

[TedT]

I can't seem to find a Concordance or Lexicon which defines echad as a unity.

I know, sad for you...

 

[amazing grace]

umm, you're kidding, right?

You got the point wrong... I did not get the meaning of the reference wrong.

Accusations are pointless when you just accuse and not explain how or where I got the reference wrong.

I know, sad for you...

Well, if you know of one you should reference it.

 

[Runningman]

It resonates in my soul as the truth... I used to refer to YHWH as THEM in my writings to emphasise my faith in a divine Lord but it short circuited topics too often so I stayed with accepted use.

I think that many doctrines are of the hidden variety in which the meaning must be inferred from interpretation and context and received by the work of the Holy Spirit.

You know what I mean because this is the way some of our favourite doctrines were not taught but were hidden for centuries including the Deity of the Messiah:
- the teaching that the OT was NOT the end of all scripture, (as per Deuteronomy 4:2 Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish [ought] from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.) but would include the NT writings and the new revelation hinted at in Rev 10:8-11.
- that God would incarnate as a man,
- that the Messiah would be an intermediary for prayer,
- any hint of Adamic sin before the NT.
- including his and our pre-earth existence
- and also including the words for doctrine that we use that are not in scripture: Trinity, omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, incarnation, rapture

So, scriptural doctrine without having a precise scriptural reference is a time honoured procedure, and depends upon rightly dividing the word of truth aka the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

So no one in the Bible is on record coming out and confirming the several tings about what you believe regarding the trinity one way or another, but based on what you read it seems to be what is accurate from your perspective. What if the prophets already thought ahead and just gave it to us straight in their writings? No hidden doctrines, just the straightforward truth about God. Do you think that's possible?

 

[TedT]

What if the prophets already thought ahead and just gave it to us straight in their writings? No hidden doctrines, just the straightforward truth about God. Do you think that's possible?

When Paul went up to the third heaven he told us he learned things he was not supposed to talk about, 2 Corinthians 12:2-4 ... The things he heard were inexpressible, things that man is not permitted to tell. inexpressible could mean ineffable but the next phrase telling us that he was not allowed to tell them defines inexpressible. Iow, there would have been no need to forbid him from telling them if they were too untellable anyway.

I do tend to think that more of the bible should be taken at face value but is corrupted because of prior commitment to bad doctrine. I understand Rom 1 to say that everyone knows the truth but because they love sin more than the truth, sinners deny the truth they know for indulgence, sigh.