Is 1st John 5:7 valid?

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Hi,
So today is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity and I was discussing it with some friends who happen to not believe in the Trinity. I told them about 1st John 5:7 and they said that verse was added to Bible. Is this true and what is the Catholic stance on this? Also what are some Bible verses that support the idea of the Trinity that I may use for future reference? Thank you.
 
Never heard that argument before. The burden of proof is on them to show when/how it was added.
But never mind that, how about the Baptism of Jesus (Luke 3:21-22)? You have the Father’s thunderous voice, the Son coming out of the water and the Holy Spirit descending in the form of a dove, all at the same time. That’s the Trinity right there.
 
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The Trinity does not hinge on 1 verse of the Whole Bible.
It is manifest through many verses also it was debated at length by the Church through Councils to flesh out how this mistery could be.
The Trinity of GOD is NOT something the human intellect could come up with through reason. The Existence of THE GOD can and has been deduced by reason alone.
Anyhow as others pointed out let them bring forth their proof that the Trinity is not real.
Peace!
 
The Haydock Bible commentary on has the following:
"The Socinians object that this verse is wanting in many Greek manuscripts; and even Erasmus in one edition, and Mr. Simon in his Critics, have questioned it, or rejected it, as a false reading, but without any sufficient proofs and grounds, as hath been shewn by many learned Catholics, and also by Protestant writers, who receive in their translations this verse as canonical… And that it was only by the mistake and oversight of transcribers may further appear, because we find part of the seventh verse, to wit, and these three are one, cited by Tertullian, …twice by St. Cyprian,… The Socinians also object that this passage is not brought by St. Athanasius and some other fathers against the Arians, …St. Fulgentius …
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Go to the link for the full commentary. 1 JOHN 5
(finally found a link that works! 🙂 )
 
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Anonymous9 said:
Hi,
So today is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity and I was discussing it with some friends who happen to not believe in the Trinity. I told them about 1st John 5:7 and they said that verse was added to Bible. Is this true and what is the Catholic stance on this? Also what are some Bible verses that support the idea of the Trinity that I may use for future reference? Thank you.
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That is a creative attempt to refute Sacred Scripture that laughably falls flat on its face.
 
Anonymous9 said:
I told them about 1st John 5:7 and they said that verse was added to Bible. Is this true and what is the Catholic stance on this?
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There is a discrepancy at this point between the Greek text and the Vulgate. The Vulgate is longer. The link below shows Ronald Knox’s translation of this chapter, with his brief footnotes. The Jerusalem Bible has a longer footnote for v. 7:

Vulg. Vv. 7-8 read as follows ‘There are three witnesses in heaven: the Father the Word and the Spirit, and these three are one: there are three witnesses on earth: the Spirit, the water and the blood’ . The words in italics (not in any of the early Greek MSS or any of the early translations or in the best MSS of the Vulg. itself) are probably a gloss that has crept into the text.

https://www.newadvent.org/bible/1jo005.htm
 
Greetings,

Have you looked at the Catholic Answers site for this question? They have a ton of articles concerning the Trinity. I am attaching the links for three of them. They should provide you will much information to discuss with your friends concerning the Trinity.




There are many more articles on the web site. Just go to catholic.com and type in “trinity” (or whatever else you might want to look for) and the articles will pop up.

If you have any other questions, write back and I’m sure one of us will be able to help you.

Pax
 
Anonymous9 said:
So today is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity and I was discussing it with some friends who happen to not believe in the Trinity. I told them about 1st John 5:7 and they said that verse was added to Bible. Is this true and what is the Catholic stance on this? Also what are some Bible verses that support the idea of the Trinity that I may use for future reference? Thank you.
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You are, of course referring to these verses:

‘For there are three that bear record in heaven , the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness in earth , the spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one.’ (1 John 5: 7-8).

The words shown in bold are known as the ‘Comma Ioanneum’.

The ‘Comma Ioanneum’ is not found in the earliest manuscripts, and yet for centuries the Church approved its inclusion in 1 John 5; on the grounds that it had become official Church teaching.

In 1927, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith declared: ‘After careful examination of the whole circumstances that its genuineness could be denied’ (Ludwig Ott: ‘Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma’, page 56 - my emphasis).

This is why one of my Catholic Bibles (the Jerusalem Bible) reads: ‘So there are three witnesses, the Spirit, water and blood; and the three of them coincide.’ By the way, another of my Catholic Bibles – the Douay Rheims – still contains the ‘Comma’.
 
Johannine Comma from Wikipedia will tell you most of what you might want to know about that passage. It is probably a 4th century interpolation into the Latin Vulgate, since it does not appear in other Mss for 1000 years.
 
It was almost certainly added to later manuscripts (as others have pointed out). That is true of lots of other things currently in the canon, such as John 8:1-11, the current ending of Mark, and others. The fact that it was later added is both important and interesting, but does not necessarily call the validity of the teaching into question.
 
Dan_Defender said:
Never heard that argument before.
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This is actually a pretty well known fact about 1 John 5:7-8, the Comma Johaneum. This verse does not appear in the Greek manuscript tradition, and in numerous ancient translations such as Syriac and Coptic. It appears in the Latin translations sometime in the 5th - 6th Century. No Greek manuscript has this verse until the late medieval period. That being said, the doctrine of the Trinity by no means rests upon the viability of the Comma Johaneum.
 
Interesting. This verse is not significant enough to prove or disprove, but I didn’t know about its absence in some codices.
 
Dan_Defender said:
Interesting. This verse is not significant enough to prove or disprove, but I didn’t know about its absence in some codices.
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Yeah, it is considered as unreliable for good reason. However, as you stated, the verse doesn’t “prove” the Trinity. It is interesting that the verse was not used by the early Church Fathers to defend the various doctrines that comprise the Trinity. This includes guys who were extremely knowledgeable of scripture such as Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Novatian, Tertullian, and the Cappadocian Fathers.
 
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