5. "The dogma of the Trinity is of relatively recent date. There is no reference to it in the Old Testament .... One can even say that it is a conception foreign to primitive [earliest] Christianity." - Professor Louis Reau of the Sorbonne (France's leading university), in Iconographie de l' Art Chretien, v. 2, Book 1, p. 14. (See Awake! 22 Sept. 1962, p. 7.)
5a. "Exegetes and theologians today are in agreement that the Hebrew Bible [the Old Testament] does not contain a doctrine of the Trinity ... Although the Hebrew Bible depicts God as the father of Israel and employs personifications of God such as Word (davar), Spirit (ruah), Wisdom (hokhmah), and Presence (shekhinah), it would go beyond the intention and spirit of the Old Testament to correlate these notions with later trinitarian doctrine.
"Further, exegetes and theologians agree that the New Testament also does not contain an explicit doctrine of the Trinity. God the Father is source of all that is (Pantokrator) and also the father of Jesus Christ; `Father' is not a title for the first person of the Trinity but a synonym for God....
"It is incontestable that the [Trinity] doctrine cannot be established on scriptural evidence alone." - The Encyclopedia of Religion, Macmillan Publishing Co., 1987, volume 15, p. 54.
Entire Study File
Trinity Index
No comments:
Post a Comment