Note (166.) to "History of the 'Christian' Trinity - HIST)"

166. Another way of looking at this might be summed up by Paul’s words at Gal. 1:8, 9:

“But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!” - NIV, Zondervan, 1985.

“Preaching the Gospel” applies to

“the declaring of all the truths, precepts, promises, and threatenings of Christianity” - p. 266, Today’s Dictionary of the Bible, Bethany House Publ., 1982.

Appropriately enough, the early English word ‘Gospel’ literally meant “the story concerning God” and in the Bible it can be understood to be “embracing all [Jesus’] teachings” - p. 1281, vol. 2, The International Standard Bible Encyclopaedia, Eerdmans Publ., 1984 printing.

So, Paul’s words above certainly (as should be obvious, anyway) include the teaching of exactly who God is and exactly who and what Jesus is.

“Jesus looked up to heaven and said: ‘Father, .... This is eternal life: to know thee who alone art truly God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.’ “ - Jn 17:3, NEB, Cambridge University Press, 1970.

In fact, Paul himself taught that the glorified Lord Jesus in heavenly blazing fire will:

“punish those who do not know God and do not obey the Gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction.” - 2 Thess. 1:7-9, NIV.

So Paul is telling us at Gal. 1:8, 9 above that what he had already taught about (1) God and Jesus and (2) what we must do to inherit eternal life was not to be expanded upon.

It might be worthwhile to see what the majority of members of the highly-respected trinitarian UBS textual committee said when discussing the original text for Romans 9:5:

“nowhere else in his genuine epistles does Paul ever designate ho xristos [‘the Christ’] as [theos: ‘God’ or ‘god’]. In fact, on the basis of the general tenor of his theology it was considered tantamount to impossible that Paul would have expressed Christ’s greatness by calling him God blessed for ever.” - p. 522, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, Rev. Bruce M. Metzger, United Bible Societies, 1971.

Well, since Paul would not have taught (of course!) that the one God is three persons, it is clear that that is a gospel other than the one Paul taught!

“even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned!”

(Please review HIST INTRODUCTION and Notes 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24.)

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