What is the Trinity?
Page 630 of Today's Dictionary of the Bible, Bethany House Publishers, 1982 defines it:
"Trinity, a word not found in Scripture but used to express the doctrine of the unity of God as subsisting in three distinct persons."
And the Encyclopedia Britannica Online:
"In Christian doctrine, the unity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as one God in three persons."
But does the Bible really portray God "as subsisting in three distinct persons"?
No. The Scriptures clearly show that God is only one person and that person is identified as the Father:
"There is actually to us one God the Father.” (1 Cor. 8:5, 6)
"Hear, O Israel: Jehovah our God is one Jehovah." (Deut. 6:4) ASV
It is interesting that even some trinitarian scholars apparently (inadvertently?) admit that Gal. 3:20 shows God to be one person.
You should be aware, however, that some trinitarian Bibles translate Gal. 3:20 as “a mediator is not for one party only; whereas God is only one.” - NASB. The underlined words (“party” and “only”) are not in the original text, but certain trinitarians insist that something like “party” has to be understood in order for God to be three persons [a “party”] and not just one person.
However, even some trinitarian translators don’t believe such a translation of Gal. 3:20 is correct. For example, the Roman Catholic New American Bible (1970) renders Gal. 3:20 as:
“Now there can be no mediator when only one person is involved; and God is one [heis - masculine singular].”
And the highly trinitarian Good News Bible (GNB) renders it:
“a go-between is not needed when only one person is involved; and God is one.” - also TEV.
Even the extremely trinitarian The Amplified Bible, which often goes to incredible lengths in its attempt to produce trinitarian “proof” scriptures, renders Gal. 3:20 as:
“there can be no mediator with just one person. Yet God is [only] one PERSON.”
For more, see:
God is one, not three
Are there many gods, or is there only one God?
Trinity Indexes
Examining Trinity 'Proof Texts'
Search For Bible Truths - ARCHIVE
Scriptures Index
Search For Bible Truths - Search Guide
1 comment:
Matt13weedhacker
Check out this desperate attempt at disguising the blatant POLYTHEISM of trinitarian belief. Check out the “Oh-So” incriminating title “On NOT THREE God(s)!” Also note the appeal to TRADITION and the standard refuge of a trinitarian “MYSTERY!”
“...In truth, the question you propound to us is no small one, nor such that but small harm will follow if it meets with insufficient treatment. For by the force of the question, we are at first sight compelled to accept one or other of two erroneous opinions, and either to say “there are three Gods,” which is unlawful, or not to acknowledge the Godhead of the Son and the Holy Spirit, which is impious and absurd. … If, then, in the above case, custom admits this, and no one forbids us to speak of those who are two as two, or those who are more than two as three, how is it that in the case of our statements of the mysteries of the Faith, though confessing the Three Persons, and acknowledging no difference of nature between them, we are in some sense at variance with our confession, when we say that the Godhead of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost is one, and (yet) forbid men to say “there are three Gods”? The question is, as I said, very difficult to deal with: yet, if we should be able to find anything that may give support to the uncertainty of our mind, so that it may no longer totter and waver in this monstrous dilemma, it would be well: on the other hand, even if our reasoning be found unequal to the problem, we must keep for ever, firm and unmoved, the tradition which we received by succession from the fathers, and seek from the Lord the reason which is the advocate of our faith: and if this be found by any of those endowed with grace, we must give thanks to Him who bestowed the grace; but if not, we shall none the less, on those points which have been determined, hold our faith unchangeably...” - A SELECT LIBRARY OF THE NICENE AND POST-NICENE FATHERS OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. SECOND SERIES TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH WITH PROLEGOMENA AND EXPLANATORY NOTES. VOLUMES I–VII. UNDER THE EDITORIAL SUPERVISION OF PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D., LL.D., & HENRY WACE, D.D., VOLUME V: NPNF2-05. Gregory of Nyssa: Dogmatic Treatises, Etc. On “Not Three Gods.” To Ablabius.
SOURCE: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf205.viii.v.html
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