The Trinity... is it a false teaching as the WTBTS claims?

by Honesty 146 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  Leolaia

  first Dagon and Asheroth [female goddess, wife of YHWH according to some jewish myths] not Ashteroth, were both called ELOHIM just like YHWH was

  Where is the word 'lhym ever applied to Dagan (who was an agricultural god, the father of Baal) and Asherah (creator-goddess, wife of El in the Canaanite pantheon and possibly wife of Yahweh in henotheistic Yahwism) in the OT or other ANE texts? Usually 'lym and the like are applied to the members of the divine council in ANE texts. Philo of Byblos, in his Phoenician theogony, names the Eloim as the allies of Elus (i.e. El) in his war against Shamayn (i.e. the father of El, if I recall correctly). In most of the OT, 'lhym is mostly used to refer to a single god (i.e. Yahweh, hence the singular verbal agreement), tho there are some residue of the earlier polytheistic sense here and there.
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  Apostate Kate

  Does it really matter if Jesus is God? What if the trinity idea was not the headache inducing, theological
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  It matters when religious leaders use a twisted version of Jesus to control people. The true Jesus offers unconditional love. He gave his life for ours. All the sins that we ever commited, all the sins we ever will commit in the future, all of them, Jesus died for. The true biblical Jesus did the time for all our crimes. Cults will twist this full grace into "undeserved kindness" implicating that forgivenss is something that takes work and can be deserved. The biblical Jesus offers a free gift that can not be earned or deserved. But otherwise it doesn't matter what your personal full understanding of who Jesus is. He will reveal himself to anyone who asks with an open mind and an open heart.
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  Narkissos

  Where is the word 'lhym ever applied to Dagan

  Juges 16:23, dâgôn 'elohéyhem, Dagon their god.

  1 Samuel 5:7, dâgôn 'eloheynu, Dagon our god.

  'elohim + singular is not restricted to Yhwh in Biblical Hebrew.
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  Leolaia

  Thanks Narkissos, that is quite fascinating....and now that I think of it, I recall that the ghost of Samuel was an 'lhym as well. This seems to suggest that the shift in meaning occurred prior to monotheism, and was also not associated with marking plurality-within-one as it was later understood (or as the "majesty" of the one God, as others construe it).

  Still, I don't recall a similar phrase used with Asherah. Is there one?
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  Narkissos

  Asherah is never unambiguously depicted as a goddess in the OT afaik -- probably too embarrassingly close to Yhwh.

  Otoh Ashtart (MT `ashtoreth) is 'elohe çidonim ("god[dess] of the Sidonians") in 1 Kings 11:5,33 -- no mark of the feminine gender -- LXX "translates" bdelugma, "abomination," which doesn't help.

  Perhaps the older henotheism played a part in the specific Hebrew use of the plural 'elohim for Yhwh, the application of the same form to other elim being secondary. However it is clear that for the Bible writers and redactors (Deuteronomistic for instance) it was not an exclusive theological word for Yhwh.

  Btw I think 'elohim is more usually explained today as a plural of abstraction (approximately "deity," cf. chayyim, "life," or ne`urim, "youth") than majesty.
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  Leolaia

  Thanks for the text on Ashtoreth (= Astarte/Athtart), that must have been who zen nudist was thinking of, rather than Asherah (since I think he stated things the other way around).

  The more abstract concept of "deity" is attractive when compared with the other examples you mentioned, but how does this apply to specific cases....e.g. was Saul communicating with Samuel's divinity or ...? The semantics might be an interesting question to explore deeper.
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  Narkissos

  I think in most cases this etymological hypothesis wouldn't make any semantic difference in BH: practically 'lhym = god, no more no less.

  Although there is a good case for a more abstract sense ("deity") for some late uses with the article, e.g. in Qoheleth (ha-'elohim = "the divine / the deity").