The Trinity is Bibical

[Rev. Derek Joshua E'Lon]

Is The Trinity Biblical?
From the Christian Research Institute
www.equip.org
The Trinity is a basic doctrine of orthodox Christianity. Yet the word "Trinity" is not found anywhere in the Bible. Is the doctrine of the Trinity really biblical?
The doctrine of the Trinity says that there is one All Mighty One (God) who exists eternally as three distinct persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. I can assure you that the elements of this doctrine are all taken directly from the Bible.
The first plank of the Trinitarian platform is that there is only one All Mighty One (God). The Bible could not be more explicit on this point, which it states explicitly about two dozen times. In Isaiah 44:8 Yahweh (The LORD) says that even He does not know of any other (mighty ones)gods!
Yahshua (Jesus) often spoke of the All Mighty One (God) as His Father, and the apostles frequently spoke of "the Almighty One (God) the Father." But the New Testament also insists that Yahshua (Jesus) is The Almighty One (God). For example, Thomas acknowledged Yahshua (Jesus) as, "My Lord(master) and my Almighty One (God)" (John 20:28), and both Peter and Paul spoke of Yahshua (Jesus) as "our All Mighty One (God) and Savior" (2 Pet. 1:1; Tit. 2:13). Yet the New Testament also makes the distinction between the Father and the Son as two very different persons. In fact they tell us that they love one another, speak to each other, and seek to glorify each other (e.g., John 17: 1-26).
The Old Testament refers often to the Holy Spirit as The Almighty One (God) at work in the world, without distinction from the Father. But Yahshua (Jesus) in John 14 to 16 explained that this Holy Spirit would be sent by the Father at the Messiah’s (Christ's) request. The Holy Spirit would teach and guide the disciples, not speaking on His own initiative, but speaking on the Messiah’s 9Christ's) behalf and glorifying The messiah (Christ). Thus, the Holy Spirit is revealed by The Messiah (Christ) to be a third person distinct from the Father and distinct from the Son.
In short, the doctrine of the Trinity is completely and totally biblical, and it is essential that all the Followers of the Messiah Yahshua (Christians) give assent to this doctrine.

[Archbishop Trevor 'Elihu' Greene]

I hope you took time to actually read what was placed up there concerning what the Apostolic Fathers themselves wrote, instead of just talking. It would be foolish and rude of you to do so. Pay close attention to their words....

[Archbishop Trevor 'Elihu' Greene]

Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna:
Born ca. 69
Died ca. 155, Smyrna
A disciple of and ordained by Apostle John

Saint Polycarp was disciple of Apostle John, and Apostle John ordained him bishop of Smyrna. Here is what he had to say:

For I trust that ye are well versed in the Sacred Scriptures, and that nothing is hid from you; but to me this privilege is not yet granted. It is declared then in these Scriptures, "Be ye angry, and sin not," and, "Let not the sun go down upon your wrath." Happy is he who remembers this, which I believe to be the case with you. But may the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ Himself, who is the Son of God, and our everlasting High Priest, build you up in faith and truth, and in all meekness, gentleness, patience, long-suffering, forbearance, and purity; and may He bestow on you a lot and portion among His saints, and on us with you, and on all that are under heaven, who shall believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, and in His Father, who "raised Him from the dead. Pray for all the saints. Pray also for kings, and potentates, and princes, and for those that persecute and hate you, and for the enemies of the cross, that your fruit may be manifest to all, and that ye may be perfect in Him" [Epistle to the Phillipians, Exhortation To Various Graces, Chapter 12].


Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch:
Born c. 35
Died c. 108, Rome
A direct disciple of Apostle John

St. Ignatius was Bishop of Antioch after Apostle Peter and St. Evodius, who died around AD 67. Eusebius[3] records that St. Ignatius succeeded St. Evodius. Making his apostolic succession even more immediate, Theodoret (Dial. Immutab., I, iv, 33a) reported that Apostle Peter himself appointed Ignatius to the see of Antioch. This is what he had to say:

"For they speak of Christ, not that they may preach Christ, but that they may reject Christ; and they speak of the law, not that they may establish the law, but that they may proclaim things contrary to it. For they alienate Christ from the Father, and the law from Christ. They also calumniate His being born of the Virgin; they are ashamed of His cross; they deny His passion; and they do not believe His resurrection. They introduce God as a Being unknown; they suppose Christ to be unbegotten; and as to the Spirit, they do not admit that He exists. Some of them say that the Son is a mere man, and that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are but the same person, and that the creation is the work of God, not by Christ, but by some other strange power." (Epistle to the Trallians, Ch. VI).



Clement of Rome
Papacy (Bishopric) began c. 92
Papacy (Bishopric) ended c. 99

Pope Saint Clement I, also known as Saint Clement of Rome (in Latin, Clemens Romanus) was the first Apostolic Father of the early Christian church. Early succession lists name Clement as the first, second, or third successor of Apostle Peter (This may be because Bishops were not singular in cities as big as Rome). He may be the Clement mentioned in Paul's letter to the Philippians. This is what he had to say in his letter to the Corinthian Church:

The church of God which sojourns at Rome, to the church of God sojourning at Corinth, to those who are called and sanctified by the will of God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to you, and peace, be multiplied, from Almighty God through Jesus Christ.

For Christ is of those who are humble, and not of those who Lord over his flock. Our Lord Jesus Christ, the sceptre of the majesty of God, did not come in pomp of pride or arrogance, although He might have done so, but in a humble state. (16).

Let us look steadfastly to the Father and Creator of the universe. (19).

All these the great Creator and Lord of all has appointed to exist in peace and harmony, while He does good to all, but most abundantly to us who have fled for safety to His compassions through Jesus Christ our Lord, to Whom be glory and Majesty for ever and ever. Amen. (20)

Let us, therefore, approach him with holiness of spirit, lifting unto him pure and undefiled hands, loving the kind and compassionate Father who has made us a part of his elect. For it is thus written, 'when the Most High divided the nations...'" (29).

Called by His will in Christ Jesus, we are not justified out of ourselves, nor by our own wisdom, or understanding, or godliness, or works which we have worked out of holiness of heart, but by that faith through which, from the beginning, Almighty God has justified all men, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen. (32).

How blessed and marvellous, beloved, are the gifts of God....The Creator and Father of all worlds ages, the Most Holy, alone knows their amount and their beauty. (35).

Christ therefore was sent forth by God, and the apostles by Christ (42).

Have we not one God and one Christ? Is there not one Spirit of grace poured out upon us? (46).

May God, who sees everything, and Who is the Ruler of all spirits and the Lord of all flesh, Who chose our Lord Jesus Christ and us through Him to be a peculiar people, grant to every soul that calls upon His glorious and holy name, faith, fear, peace, patience, longsuffering, self-control, purity, and sobriety, to the well pleasing of His Name, through our high priest and protector, Jesus Christ, through whom be to Him glory, and majesty, and power, and honour, both now and for evermore. Amen. (58).

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you, and with all everywhere that are the called of God through him, through whom be to Him glory, honour, power, majesty, and eternal dominion, from everlasting to everlasting. Amen. (59).


All three were trained by the Apostles, and all three speak clearly of a Trinity/Triunity of GOD the Father, the LORD JESUS CHRIST, and the HOLY SPIRIT.

[Caral]

Amen!, Trevor

The church is a pillar and foundation of truth (1 Tim 3:15)

[Archbishop Trevor 'Elihu' Greene]

They disregard historical documents and only go by opinion! They try to blame Constantine for everything wrong in the Church, and yet they don't even truly pick up a book and find out for themselves!

Della's chart jumps over 300 years of history and didn't mention ONE BIT OF IT!

[Caral]

Or maybe they believe that God withdraw His holy Spirit from the church for the last 1900 years, just sat waiting for them to come along. I know the JW's believe that.

[Archbishop Trevor 'Elihu' Greene]

Its interesting to note that the JW's are among the few that disregard the Trinity as well! Great company!! LOL

[Della Morton]

Trevor YOU ARE BELIEVING THE TRINITY DOCTRINE THAT WAS STARTED BY MAN! NOT THE BIBLE.

2 Peter 1:20-21 (King James Version)

20Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.

21For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

God Bless. Love In Christ DELLA MORTON

[Caral]

So Della

The trinity can not have been started by man, because it is of God. As is blatantly clear in the scriptures. As you brought 2 Pet 1:20-21 are you denying that all of the Fathers of the faith, were not moved and led by the Holy Spirit. Why is it you and the oneness people are of a private interpretation, because only you see it. The rest of us don't.

[Della Morton]

Caral awhile back you posted Something like this picture of YOUR Interpretation of the Trinity.
Here it Is:

Here is an article I found and I think All the readers might find it Interesting.

In his excellent study on Christian iconography, Adolphe Didron carefully maps the clear evolution of the Trinities in both art and architecture. In the most primitive extant examples, symbols of the Godhead may include the hand of God reaching from the clouds, the cross, the lamb, or the dove. No paradigmatic Trinitarian representation exists until the 4th century, and no instances are to be found either in the catacombs or upon ancient Christian sacrophagi (Didron 35). Many of the earliest works that combine these symbols present them in vertical descent, with a hand representing God the Father, a dove representing the Holy Spirit, and the cross representing Christ, the Son. The order significantly communicates an elementary tenet of germinal Trinitarianism, the notion that Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and not the Son. This doctrinal position is still held by the Eastern Church while the Roman Church believes that the Spirit proceeds from both Father and Son. In any case, the earliest examples of Trinities are comprised of mere symbols.

During the 9th to 12th centuries, however, Trinities took on anthropomorphic form, and the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost assumed human attributes. For centuries, Christ had been depicted as a young man. Remarkably, the Father and Spirit were also portrayed as young men, essentially identical to the Son. In fact, it is often difficult to distinguish between the persons, undoubtedly an effort to harmonize the artwork with the Athanasian concept of the cosubstantiality of the members of the Trinity.

In reality, these artistic representations reveal the core contradiction of Trinitarian dogma, that One God exists as three persons. The clear corporal disconnectedness of the three in many examples of art and architecture exaggerates the concept of the Trinity and destroys the scriptural unity of the Godhead, presenting, instead, three gods with no apparent cohesion.

In some Trinities, the Father, who is elderly, supports the Son suspended on the cross. In these cases, the Spirit is most often figured by the dove and proceeds from the mouth of the Father. Similarly, illustrations of Christ’s baptism generally employ the same vertical declension and the dove.
The Trinities and the artists’ innovations also took other forms. The introduction of geometrical shapes, predominantly triangles and interlocked circles, emphasized the triplicity of persons, and three became an important number in Gothic architecture. The trefoil, the silhouette of the three interlocked circles, implicitly conveys the Trinity and appeared in church windows and arches.
Such misrepresentations of the Godhead metamorphosed into the monstrous with the amalgamation of the Trinity into a one-headed being with three faces, sometimes having three or four eyes and three mouths atop a single body. While such examples flourished and attempted to portray, at least tenuously, the unity of the Father, Son, and Spirit, Pope Urban VIII prohibited such Trinities in 1628 and ordered that examples be destroyed (Didron 61). Whether his anathemization was aesthetic or theological is historically unclear, but these Trinitarian representations stand in stark contrast to other examples where each person is completely individualized.

More disturbing are historical examples of Christian art in which Satan himself is depicted as a claw-footed, unholy trinity with three faces, often with three horns. Such pieces evidence the radical theological distortions of Trinitarianism and presents the devil as God’s equal opposite.

Of particular interest to modern Oneness believers is a 16th Century example of a three-faced Trinity, which includes an intricate schema using the inverted triangle capped by circles to represent the Trinity (Figure 2). The circles labeled Pater (Father), Filius (Son), and Spiritus Sanctus (Holy Spirit) are interpolated with the words “non est”, reading literally: “Father is not Son; Son is not Holy Spirit; Holy Spirit is not Father.” This is important because it was apparently created to rebut those who believed that the Father, Son, and Spirit were not personally Separate but yet in Unity.

Ultimately, artistic representations of the Trinity create images of a God divided and do not and indeed cannot preserve His unity. In all cases, three gods are figured, whether in symbol or person, revealing the impossible oxymoron of the underlying idea of a triune God. The inability of artists and architects to represent the complex doctrine without making an image of three gods further condemns the false notion of Trinitarian dogma and visually displays the ultimate departure of Trinitarian doctrine from essential monotheism of the ancient Jewish faith and the New Testament Apostolic Church.

Sources:

Didron, Adolphe Napoleon. Christian Iconography: the History of Christian Art in the Middle Ages. Trans. E.J. Millington. Frederick Ungar Publishing Co. New York: 1886.

~ by mcshaw2 on 10 July, 2008.

[Caral]

Hi Della

The diagram I put up was the Scutum Fidei or the shield of the Trinity. Thanks for the above icon, notice there is just one God, but with three faces. I am quite a fan of Christian Iconography.


Here is how the shield of the trinity was used.

From William Peraldus' Summa Vitiorum, ca. 1255-1265. Includes e converso ("vice versa") in the link captions to clarify that links are bidirectional.

[Archbishop Trevor 'Elihu' Greene]

Did you even read what I posted from the Apostolic Fathers, or did you disrespectfully ignore it? What gets me is that you hate the Council of Nicea and all the Apostolic Fathers, but you read only 66 books of the Bible. If you disregard Nicea and all the Apostolic Councils, then why are you regarding their Canon of Scripture?

[Della Morton]