All Trinity discussion goes here!

[Woodrow]

You're right. I was about to post in response to Perseveranze that Mary really has nothing to do with a discussion of the Trinity and will simply sidetrack what is likely to have lots of wandering rabbit trails of its own. So, I'm glad I read through to the end to see you believe that Mary was a part of the understanding of the Trinity in the distant past. I have to say that not only is it not relevant to my understanding of the Trintiy, I've not encountered this in any of my reading on the Trinity nor in any of my reading of Church history. Do you think that an exploration of that idea would be worth discussion in this particular thread?

Best be set aside for another thread. I will agree that no Christians of today consider Mary to be part of the Trinity. But perhaps at some point it could make for an interesting thread. But not as part of this thread.

 

[Danah]

I have never met a single Christian understands the trinity in a simple, precise, accurate way. So if they themselves can't understand it, how we are expecting them to explain it to us. Its like every single person have his/her own understanding of trinity.

Whenever I see a thread in any forum that talks about Trinity I just see the pages of that thread increase day by day without reaching any thing at the end! so I gave up asking about it anymore!!

 

[Perseveranze]

But I've never actually said "God is three." Those are words that non-trinitarians put into our mouths. I continue to say that God is one. I might say that God is three-in-one, but I would never just say that God is three as a simple declarative statement, because I don't believe that is true.
.

Asaamu Alaikum (Peace be with you),

I don't mean to sound like an idiot or anything, but what response do Christians have when someone asks them "If Jesus(pbuh) is God who came down to Earth, then who was controlling the heavens and the Earths and who was Jesus(pbuh) praying to when he postrated?".

You may have an answer, but can you now understand the complexity of this Trinity idea?

 

[Hiroshi]

Best be set aside for another thread. I will agree that no Christians of today consider Mary to be part of the Trinity. But perhaps at some point it could make for an interesting thread. But not as part of this thread.

I think it is significant, though, that the Qur'an mentions the Trinity while the Bible doesn't. This shows that although the Trinity was known at the time of the rise of Islam, it was completely unknown to the writers of the Bible.

 

[Hiroshi]

Does God die? No, God is immortal.

So then, is Jesus God? No, if he was how then could he die for people's sins as Christians believe.

And if Jesus didn't die, why then did he need a resurrection?

 

[Perseveranze]

You're right. I was about to post in response to Perseveranze that Mary really has nothing to do with a discussion of the Trinity and will simply sidetrack what is likely to have lots of wandering rabbit trails of its own. So, I'm glad I read through to the end to see you believe that Mary was a part of the understanding of the Trinity in the distant past. I have to say that not only is it not relevant to my understanding of the Trintiy, I've not encountered this in any of my reading on the Trinity nor in any of my reading of Church history. Do you think that an exploration of that idea would be worth discussion in this particular thread?

Asalaamu Alaikum(peace be with you),

I only asked because I saw it here;

Link - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNahuXygGYw

But Woodrow's explained it.

 

[Grace Seeker]

Asalaamu Alaikum(peace be with you),

I only asked because I saw it here [see above video conversation]


But Woodrow's explained it.

Actually, what Woodrow spoke to was something different than the conversation between the priest (I assume Catholic) and Khalid Yasin.

The priest was talking about a concept in which Mary is referred to as the Theotokos -- which when translated into English literally means "God bearer". It is in the role as God-bearer (i.e. she bore, or gave birth, to Jesus who is believed by Christians to be God incarnate) that she is considered to be the "Mother" of God. She is not mother of God in a genetic sense and she is most certainly not the begetter of God; she is only called the "mother of God" because those who give birth become, simply by the process of giving birth, mothers.

For example, in order to save some endangered species, scientists have taken to placing the fertilized ovum of an endangered animal into the uterus of a related by not endangered animal. When then endangered animal is born, they then see each other as mother and baby. Though they are biologically completely unrelated to each other, the process of going through gestation and birth has made the one a mother of the other.

It is in this sense, and only in this sense, that Mary is thought of as the mother of God -- because she was the instrument used by God to effect the birth of his human incarnation on earth. She is not in any way superior to God, nor is she divine in her own right. She is simply a vessel that makes herself available for God's purposes.


This idea that Mary is the Theotokos is quite a strong teaching within the Roman Catholic Church, and to a lesser extent found among some (not many) protestant groups as well. But it is quite unrelated to the Trinity. What Woodrow spoke of is evidently a concept of a different nature which he says was a teaching of the Eastern part of the church very early on and is somehow tied in with the trinitarian views, but as I already said I have never encountered it even in my reading of the history of the church.

 

[Grace Seeker]

Asaamu Alaikum (Peace be with you),

I don't mean to sound like an idiot or anything, but what response do Christians have when someone asks them "If Jesus(pbuh) is God who came down to Earth, then who was controlling the heavens and the Earths and who was Jesus(pbuh) praying to when he postrated?".

You may have an answer, but can you now understand the complexity of this Trinity idea?

Yes, I can see how one might perceive the idea of the Trinity as being complex. And you certainly don't sound like an idiot for asking that question or any other question about it, when that question is asked seriously and as a search for understanding.

And when I say search for understanding, I don't mean to imply that you must understand it or see it as logical. I only mean that you are seeking to understand what it is that those who speak of the Trinity mean by it and wrestle with its implications.

And depending on one's concept of God, one of those implications could very well be that if God has come to earth, incarnated in a human body, that God could therefore not also be in heaven or running the universe. I don't know if that is what you inferred would have to be the case if the incarnation were so. But it is not something that I infer. My understanding of the nature of God is that there is no place that one can go that God is not.

7 Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.

(Psalm 139:7-10)

So, if there is no place that one can go that God is not. Then there is no problem with God being on earth and in heaven at the same time. There is no problem with God being incarnated in a human body and God being on the throne of heaven at the same time. There is no problem with God being in a body that is laying on the ground prostrated in prayer, or for that matter being in a body that is dying on a cross, and at the very same time still be quite alive and well, ruling heaven and earth.

To say that God could not be in both places and doing both things at the same time is to limit God in a way that I am not prepared to limit him. It would be to attribute finiteness to God, when I believe God to be infinite. So, while I can understand why given our human perspective of the way things are for us, one might infer that there would be a problem with God being on earth and doing human things that would preclude him from controlling the heavens and Earth, for me that implications of that inference ultimately result in saying that God is something less than he is. Let us not forget that God is Al-'Azim, The Imcomparably Great, to compare him with our limitations and infer that he could not be incarnate and controller of heaven and earth at the same time is to make him less than he actually is. He is after all Al-Qadir, The Omnipotent and Able one.

 

[Grace Seeker]

I think it is significant, though, that the Qur'an mentions the Trinity while the Bible doesn't. This shows that although the Trinity was known at the time of the rise of Islam, it was completely unknown to the writers of the Bible.

It is true that the word Trinity was completely unknown to the writers of the Bible. There are many other things that were unknown to the writers of the Bible (or at least unmentioned by them): the Americas, the ice age, kangaroos. But one must be careful not to infer from the lack of the mentioning of these things that they did not exist, the best one could infer is that they were unfamiliar with them. But even that would be a stretch. For surely the writers of scripture were familiar with Julius Caesar and Aristotle or Plato and neither of them is mentioned. Maybe we should just say that they didn't mention things that were not relevant to them. But to say that Roman Caesars and Greek philosophers were not relevant to the writers of scriptures seems a stretch.

So, I suggest that we need to be careful and not infer too much from what is and is not mentioned in the scriptures. We can say that the writers of the scripture were unfamiliar with the term "The Trinity" as the term itself would not be coined until a few hundred years after the last writings that are part of the scriptures were completed. But the ideas that gave rise to that term may or may not be found in the scriptures. That is just one of many things that I hope to explore in more detail as we take our time to explore what it is that we are talking about when we speak of the Trinity over the course of this thread.

 

[Ramadhan]

she is most certainly not the begetter of God; she is only called the "mother of God" because those who give birth become, simply by the process of giving birth, mothers

GS, you are speaking in sentences that most would get lost in.

Maybe i could simplify it for others?

Did Mary pbuh give birth to Jesus pbuh? YES

Did Jesus pbuh suckle on Mary pbuh? YES

Is Jesus pbuh, according to christians, God? YES

Is Mary pbuh then become the Mother of God? YES

simple as that, no?

This I don't get about christians: They always make simple and easy things so difficult to understand.
This following is for example:

For example, in order to save some endangered species, scientists have taken to placing the fertilized ovum of an endangered animal into the uterus of a related by not endangered animal. When then endangered animal is born, they then see each other as mother and baby. Though they are biologically completely unrelated to each other, the process of going through gestation and birth has made the one a mother of the other.

What an interesting analogy!
Was God an endangered animal and need to be cloned?
astaghfirullah.

To be a surrogate mother of a different animal, they still have to be biologically related of some sort to each other. They cannot be completely unrelated. For example, it is not biologically possible for human to be surrogate mother to animals. So GS, I don't think you know that much of biology, so my advice is may be next time you shouldn't use biology to explain christian concepts, because it actually only further the confusion, instead of illuminating the point you were trying to make.
Maybe you can come up with other, better, analogy?

It is in this sense, and only in this sense, that Mary is thought of as the mother of God

I don't understand why you deny your own facts:
you consider Jesus pbuh is God
Mary pbuh gave birth to Jesus pbuh.
So Mary is God's mother.
That's (your own) fact.
Why the backtracking and saying that "Mary is thought of as the mother of God"?

 

[Ramadhan]

There is no problem with God being in a body that is laying on the ground prostrated in prayer,

So why did God prostrate and pray to himself?

It would be to attribute finiteness to God, when I believe God to be infinite

You claim God is infinite.
You also claim that Jesus is God.
But we know that Jesus was finite.

I see there is a little conflict there (pardon my euphimism).

How do you explain that?

 

[Ramadhan]

Maybe we should just say that they didn't mention things that were not relevant to them.

I don't know about you, but I find it very relevant (and absolutely important) that identity of God is cleared up in he scripture. Don't we have to know whom we worship?
Current christians consider that the identity of God is 3-in-1
This is the crux of modern day christianity.
So I am perplexed that you said the bible writers did not consider it relevant.

 

[Hiroshi]

We can say that the writers of the scripture were unfamiliar with the term "The Trinity" as the term itself would not be coined until a few hundred years after the last writings that are part of the scriptures were completed. But the ideas that gave rise to that term may or may not be found in the scriptures.

Basic important doctrines such as the resurrection of the dead and the ransom sacrifice are explained in great detail in the NT. It would be astonishing if the Trinity was indeed the central doctrine of Christianity as the churches claim, and yet the teaching itself was nowhere explicitly explained in scripture. But I don't find a single statement anywhere to say that there are three persons in one God.

 

[siam]

"But the ideas that gave rise to that term may or may not be found in the scriptures. "---exactly---Christianity is nothing but contradicting doctrines that evolved over time and in which the "Church" has had to do linguistic, logical and mental acrobatics to fit together into an absolutely incoherent whole.

 

[Grace Seeker]

Basic important doctrines such as the resurrection of the dead and the ransom sacrifice are explained in great detail in the NT. It would be astonishing if the Trinity was indeed the central doctrine of Christianity as the churches claim, and yet the teaching itself was nowhere explicitly explained in scripture. But I don't find a single statement anywhere to say that there are three persons in one God.

The Trinity is not THE central doctrine of Christianity. I know of no church that makes this claim. An important understanding yes, but central?

The incarnation and the deity of Christ -- that is central and (I believe, though I know you will disagree) is explicitly set forth in the scriptures (John 1:14, John 20:28).

Salvation by grace through faith -- that is central and explicitly set forth in the scriptures (Ephesians 2:8-9).


But the Trinity is something inferred. And though I believe it is true and is taught by he who "correctly handles the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2;15), it is not central. It is possible to be saved and not only not understand the Trinity, it is not even necessary (IMO) to profess belief in the Trinity, "for God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy" (Romans 9:18). As the scriptures declare of God, “I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people; and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved one” (Romans 9:25). So, what is central is more what God believes with regard to us, than what we believe with regard to God. To that end the most important verses of scripture really are John 3:16-17 -- "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him." No mention of the Trinity there, but there is enough mention of the monogenes to send us on a search of the rest of the scriptures to help us to understand his nature. And when we do, we find that Jesus is the unique manifestation of the one and only God that no one has ever seen, "but God the only Son, who is at the Father's side, has made him known" (John 1:18).

So, important, but not central. And while not explicity stated, those who read scripture allowing for God to be who he is and not how we determined him to be can see that the God is just one being, yet known to us in three persons.

The first of those declarations, that God is one, is central. The second of those, that God is known to us in three persons, is equally true, but is only important for those who are willing to let God be God and seek to know him as describe himself, rather than what we determine for him to be.

If seeking to know God is what anyone here desires, then be advised there actually is more than one way to do this. Many lives bear testimonty to the reality that one can know and worship the one God without the full insight into his nature and depth of understanding that the Trinity can help to provide. I don't deny it. Such a person will know God as one knows a set of facts. But knowing God in a personal way, knowing that comes out of a relationship with God in Christ Jesus and through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit provides, in my experience, a deeper and more intimate relationship with the Father, than anything I experienced prior to coming to that awakening in my own life. If you seek that, I invite you to enter that journey through coming to entering into a personal relationship with God where you heart becomes his home. And not saying what will be true for you, but what I found was true for me, was that this relationship led me to experience the one God as explicated in the doctrine of the Trinity.

If you do not seek that, and are satisfied with the guidance you have received thus far in your life, then I do not condemn you, but ask God's continued blessing on you. I also encourage and applaud you in your efforts to be obedient to the revelation that you have. And ultimately I trust in God and God's mercy to effect in your life that grace which he can provide to be sufficient for that to which he has called you.

 

[Hiroshi]

The Trinity is not THE central doctrine of Christianity. I know of no church that makes this claim. An important understanding yes, but central?

I disagree. Just google the words: "trinity", "central" and "doctrine" and you will find countless statements posted on the internet saying that the Trinity is central to Christianity.

For example:

http://omega77.tripod.com/centraldoctrine.htm

 

[Grace Seeker]

I disagree.

It won't be the first time you and I have disagreed.

Just google the words: "trinity", "central" and "doctrine" and you will find countless statements posted on the internet saying that the Trinity is central to Christianity.

The internet can help you glean information, but it is no arbitrator of what is and is not truth.

For example, your example:

http://omega77.tripod.com/centraldoctrine.htm

This site is operated by Omega Countdown Ministries which is a spurious offshoot of the followers of Ellen G. White and the Seventh Day Adventists. I would caution you also, that some groups that post on the internet use terms rather loosely so that they have dozens, perhaps hundreds, of "central" doctrines.

However, I will grant that the New Advent Encyclopedia, a credible source for the teachings of the Roman Catholic faith, makes a claim similar to yours that the Trinity is "the central dogma of the Christian religion." So, despite your examples, nevertheless, your point is itself well taken.

Now, if the New Advent Encyclopedia had just quoted The Catechism of the Catholic Church and said, "the central mystery of the Christian faith is the mystery of the Holy Trinity" I would have agreed. For, to me, while the statements "central dogma" and "central doctrine" would have the same meaning, "central mystery" would be something else.

Be all of that as it may, I still contend that belief in the Trinity per se is not essential to salvation. That the only thing essential to salvation is the grace of God. And that God bestows his grace on whomsoever he pleases. Perhaps this means that my beliefs fall outside the norm. So, readers take that into whatever consideration you desire as you read my comments. I don't deny the importance of the doctrine of the Trinity, and I do myself believe in it, what I deny is its essentialness. Here is why:

There are some persons, known as Oneness Pentecostals, with whom I disagree regarding their view of the Trinity, but still extend to them the right hand of fellowship as brothers in Christ. If they are to be understood as Christian, and I am not alone in my view that they are, then that means that the Trinity is not THE central belief of the Christian faith. If these non-trinitarian followers of Jesus as the incarnate God come to dwell among us are to be understood as being just as Christian as I, then it follows that there is something even more central to our faith that we have in common than the Trinity. The belief that we share is an understanding of Christ as God incarnate. Hence, such a belief would be more central than belief in the Trinity.

Of course, once I make a statement of faith in Christ as God incarnate, for me at least, an understanding of the Trinity flows directly out of that belief. But others who are indeed Christian don't go there with me, so it seems that acceptance of the doctrine of the Trinity is not essential to be Christian. Can something that is not essential to salvation be seen as central? That appears to be what those who would hold for its centrality would be saying. I am not among them.

So, I think that those writers of the New Advent Encyclopedia and every other statement you found posted on the internet saying that the Trinity is central to Christianity erred and mis-spoke. If there is one statement that I find to be at the center of the Christian faith, it is the affirmation, the proclamation: "Jesus is Lord!" That is a doctrine you will find explicitly stated in scripture.

 

[siam]

"The belief that we share is an understanding of Christ as God incarnate."---like an Avatar?---there is One supreme God who manifests himself in "forms" either human or nonhuman......so God-Christ is an Avatar of God come to earth.........

 

[siam]

and lets not forget the other Avatar of God---the Holy Spirit that apparently takes the form of a Dove ----or some such. ----But this Avatar does something called "indwelling"---I suppose that means it invades the human body and makes itself at home......Does that make each Christian 100% human and a 100% God?.....like their other Avatar God-Christ?......

 

[Ramadhan]

GS, is a christian allowed to pray solely to jesus pbuh?

or

is a christian allowed to pray solely to holy spirit?

I assume they can, because both jesus and holy spirit are god, but I'd like to know the correct answer from a pastor.