Oh goody, someone to actually try to help me with this one. Everyone else says "oh, the trinity is a holy mystery". Blah, blah blah.
I know I will never fully understand or be able to explain God. However, I need to clarify this point specifically, because I need to know who to pray to. As it goes now, I only pray to God; approaching him in the name of his son. Anyway, here goes more:
Jesus was a fully practicing jew. He followed the commandments, as he had been raised. What he did to cause a stir amoungst the heads of the jewish faith, was to not follow what they had laid out for jews to do. Judaism itself is not a man made religion. It was given to them, by God. Where they went astray was that they failed to recognize the second covenent in Jesus.
Again, I realize, I can never fully understand God. But in this day and age, when miracles are not abundant such as in Abraham's time, I need more sound reasoning than "you must do it/believe it on faith alone." That is what people say when they're at a loss for words. I would not sacrifice my child, because the head of a church (even one I believed to be truly from God) gave me the reasons given to Abraham.
If one is to believe what the witnesses teach, then "us" refered to in Genesis is where Jehovah is speaking to Jesus, about creating man, together. With Jesus being the very first creation, the only one directly created by God, thus the "only begotten".
What verse says the very first creation is Jesus? Can't answer really until I know, sorry.
I can't give the scripture that Witnesses use to claim Jesus was the very first creation.... I've been out too long. Perhaps this is where someone else could step in and answer this one.
Isaiah 48:13 Indeed My hand has laid the foundation of the earth,
And My ri ght hand has stretched out the heavens;
When I call to them,
They stand up together.
Again it is contraversal for Jesus to be part of creation if he is not God (as part of the Trinity) as scripture reveals, for example shown in Isaiah above, that Gods hand created.
Good question. This is something that was never satisfactorily answered to me by my study guides in the Witness faith. My only response to this is that I have only read this verse in english. I need to do further studying into hebrew and read the translation myself. There are many ways of understanding a word, and the ways it may be used in a sentence. I am not refuting this argument of yours, only stating my opinion. But this verse alone does not convince me that God=Jesus.
We all have a body, soul and spirit. I can find you verses to prove this if you wish. Which is a trinity!
Please elaborate on the body, spirit, soul comment. How is the spirit different from the soul? Aren't they the same thing? And are you using this to show trinity in humans? I guess I was trying to point out that many themes throughout the bible repeat themselves. The trinity issue would be unique, as its theme is not repeated in the bible. Indeed, the question of the trinity isn't raised until the new testament. If God is three, why did he only become three later in the history of the world. The Jews would have worshipped a biune God if this were the case; God and the Holy Spirit. To understand this point better, it is important to understand shekinah, the word for holy spirit in. It is refered to in a feminine term, and understood by Jews to be God's active power. They never worshipped it, though. No more than a man's hand is given credit for what he creates.
And if Jesus was God, coming to earth, what would that have proved? The question raised by Satan was God's headship, and his right to rule over his own creation. Why would he have come to earth to die for us? We already know his perfection. A perfect human dying in place of our sins is a true equivalent. Not God dying for puny humans. What would that spectacle have been about? He doesn't need to prove anything to us. Why did Jesus call out to his father and beg his father to relieve his suffering if possible? God would have been talking to himself.
And I don't know much about Messiah prophesies, but to my knowledge they only ever expressed his coming in "human" terms. God, in the flesh or not, is God. He would never have been human.
You may have noticed I place a lot of weight with the beliefs of the Jews. It is the one religion I believe God gave to humankind. Unfortunately they failed to recognize the messiah when he came. (As was foretold.) Therefore, what they believe about God and his word, is what I believe. Jesus was a Jew. However I believe Jesus was the savior promised to his people. This is why I am a christian, not a jew. I respect the first covenent for what is was, but I place my faith in the promise brought about by Jesus.
Your turn,
~A
