Re: Christians think that Jesus can be Immortal and Mortal at the sametime they say w
Uh, oh. UH, OH!
hew
I guess I may as well douse this flame before it gets out of hand. Cause I already see it comin'. "Look, there go the Christians disagreeing on the Trinity again!" I do NOT want to go down that rabbit trail again if we can help it...
-----------------------------------------------
GraceSeeker:
Again, you mis-state what it is that Christians actually say with regard to God. In speaking of the Trinity Christians do NOT say that Jesus is co-equal with God or that the Holy Spirit is co-equal with God. You might find us saying that they are co-equal with the Father. But that is not the same as saying they are co-equal with God for that would imply that when we speak of God we are only speaking of the Father. That would actually be a denial of the very concept of the Trinity which is that one cannot speak of God in his singular totality without speaking of the totality of his being which exists as Father AND Son AND Holy Spirit -- 3-in-1. Not 3. Not 1 of 3. Not a totality of 3. But a totality of 1 Being known in three persons. And don't make the mistake of thinking in western terms and equate the term "persons" with "individuals". Those Greek-speaking Christians who originally coined the term "trinitas" and spoke of it as three "personas" where not thinking of discrete and separate individuals beings when they used the term "hypostaeis". For them to exist as God is to be the Father who begets the Son and breathes forth the Spirit all in one combined thought. Therefore, the Trinitarian persons cannot be thought of as disconnected from each other. Not even the idea of "Father" can be conceived apart from the web of the mutual relations of the Three.
Plainly put, every time a Muslims tries to substitute the term Father for God or God for Father when speaking to a Christian, it is the Muslims (not the Christian) who is creating a polytheistic god; one we do not happen to believe in. Therefore, when you wrote above: "The Trinity makes 2 other 'things' co-equal to God---one of those 'things'; that is Co-equal to God is your 'Jesus of Nazareth', if you were thinking of the third person of the Trinity, the Father, as what you meant for us to be thinking of when you wrote "God" you were expressing a very non-Christian concept that we do not hold when we speak of the Trinity. We do not believe that way, and we would not ask you or anyone else to so believe.
I understand what you are trying to say about triunity over and against any tritheism, Graceseeker. I also understand, Christianly speaking, that God the Father is never without His Son and Spirit as 3 hypostases in ONE triune activity. So, essentially we are NOT disagreeing on what the Trinity actually is (Everyone hear that very clearly?)
At the same time, Christians can and do say that God's Word/Son and Spirit are
COSUBSTANTIAL with God the Father. That's straight up Nicea there. It's the COSUBTANTIALITY idea that let them say that the Son/Word and the Spirit were of the same uncreated, divine nature as the Father. What this means is that a Christian, following the Nicene and N-C Creeds, can indeed say that YHWH, the "One God" spoken of in the Shema, is God the Father (ala Jesus and Pauline assertions in Scripture*) who is
never without his COSUBSTANTIAL Word/Son and Spirit. Christianity states that God the Father is the "fount" of divinity and the trinitarian process.
Just so we won't have any diverting problems with this.
-----------------------------------------
“Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.
John 17:1-5
...for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.
1 Corinthians 8:6
Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he (God) has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.
Hebrews 1:1-2
It's OK that Christians disagree. And, YieldedOne, we do disagree. Not on everything. Not even on a whole lot. Indeed I can affirm 98% of what your wrote above.
Yes, I am speaking for triunity over and against any tritheism.
Yes, I agree that the Nicene Creed not only implies, but was written to affirm the co-substantial nature of the Son, the Spirit, and the Father.
BUT, I disagree with your subsequent intepretation regarding what this means.
I disagree that the Nicene Creed is saying that YHWH, the "One God" spoken of in the Shema, is God the Father exclusive of the Son or the Spirit. Indeed, it think it is saying the exact opposite, that God, known to all first-century Jews (not just Christian Jews) as "Father" is also inclusive of the Son and the Spirit. That He (God in the singular) is three-in-one.
I recently shared this with you by PM (though you would not have seen it before you made the above post), but now I also post for all here why I assert that Christianity teaches not just about a relationship between Father and Son, but that they are indeed both referencing the one and the same God, who in Jewish monotheism is known by the name YWHW.
Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 8:4 as clear a statement of Jewish monotheism as one could wish to see: "We know that 'An idol is nothing at all in the world' and that 'There is no God but one'.” This is a total affirmation of the Shema as found in Deuteronomy 6:4 "The LORD our God, the LORD is one." And this is not the only time that Paul makes such an affirmation; the oneness of God is a frequent theme in Paul's writings for those who have eyes to see.
So, even after his conversion to become a follower of Jesus, Paul's theology is still rooted in a classic Jewish monotheism, that there is just one God, YHWH, and that the idols and gods of the pagan world are not gods at all.
Then, writing in 1 Corinthians 8, Paul goes further to explicate his understanding of the full nature of YHWH:
for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live. (1 Corinthians 8:6)
For those who don't see it, notice how Paul takes this classic statement of Jewish monotheism, the Shema, and in the pattern of Jewish rabbis (teachers of the Law) writing midrash makes commentary upon it. In contrast, he says, to the many 'gods' and 'lords' of the pagan world, for us he says, 'there is one god -- the Father, from whom are all things and we unto him -- and one Lord -- Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and we through him'.
To feel the full force of this, let me attempt to set the two texts side by side:
The Lord our God....................One God -- the Father
the Lord is One.......................One Lord -- Jesus Christ
(Deuteronomy 6:4)..................(1 Corinthians 8:6)
"Paul has redefined the very meaning of the words that Jews used, every day in their regular prayers, to denote the one true God. He has quoted the most central and holy confession of [Jewish] monotheism and has placed Jesus firmly in the middle of it. Somehow, Paul believes, the one and only God is now known in terms, at least, of 'father' and 'lord'. All things made by the one, all things are made through the other. He has spied a new meaning of the word 'God', because the person he has firmly in view is Jesus of Nazareth, the crucified and risen one. Paul has taken the word 'God' itself and filled it with new content. Or rather, he would say, he has discovered wht its true content always was." So writes New Testament scholar, N.T. Wright in
What Saint Paul Really Said.
Let us take a look at another monotheistic text of the Tanakh to see how this works out. Not just any monotheistic text either, but Isaiah 40-55, where we find the clearest and most sustained scriptural exposition and explanation of the one true God over all other claimants, and at the same time the stoutest declaration of the sovereignty of the one God.
Isaiah 45:23 declares that in the name of YHWH, Israel's one God: "To me and me alone every knee will bow, every tongue will swear." The whole point of the context is that the one true God does not, cannot and will not share his glory with anyone else. (I think even Muslims can affirm that concept.) YHWH's glory is his alone.
Paul, however, in Philippians 2 declares that this one God has shared his glory -- with Jesus.
How can this be? What on earth is Paul talking about? Has he left monotheism for some new religion that he is borrowing from paganism or creating out of thin air? I argue, No!
Paul begins with an assertion in Philippians 2:6 that Jesus was truly in the form of God, that he was equal to God (the Father). But also that he did not count this equality as something to be grasped (i.e. to exploit). Instead, Paul suggests, Jesus offers the true interpretation of what it meant to be equal with God: he became human (yes, total shirk from a Muslim point of view), and died under the weight of the sin of the world. (And Muslims also reject this, but of course that was the Gospel message that had been passed on to Paul, so that is what he taught.) Thus, Jesus was obedient, submissive to the divine saving plan.
So, if Jesus was on this earth as a servant, why then should he be exalted and given the name "LORD" (a name reseved for God)? Because, Paul argues, Jesus has quite simply done what only the one true God can himself do.
Paul writes elsewhere (Romans 5:8) that "God commends his love for us, in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us." That sentence only makes sense if, somehow, God is fully and personally involved in the death of Jesus. And so Paul sees the love of God, YHWH, the God who made covenant with Abraham and Moses, played out in the death of Jesus in that it was an expression of God's love.
And so we must understand that when Paul writes Philippians 2 it is as much about God himself as it is about Jesus. At the heart of the chapter and at the heart of Paul's theology, indeed the whole gospel message, is the news that the one true God consists through and through of self-giving love. The cross is not a divine punishment, but an act of God's offering of himself for those who have no other means of escape from sin. For God has become human in order that he might die, and die for sinners. And where do we see this mentioned prior to Paul? In that monotheistic text from Isaiah.
At the climax of Isaiah 40-55 is a strange portrait of the servant of YHWH, who does for Israel and the world what only YHWH himself can do for the world. Yes, says Paul: Christ became a servant, and is now exalted in the glory which the one God wil not share with one other than himself. Yet this glory is shared with Jesus. We may be uncomfortable with it, but for Paul, the meaning of the word "God" includes not only Jesus, but, specifically the crucified Jesus.
YieldedOne, you are of course free to accept or reject this view of Jesus. But I submit to you that it is the view held by Paul, and that this view is what was in the minds of those who composed the Nicene Creed as a summary expression of the Christian faith.
