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CRM_Brother
Guest
I am sorry also. It was a knee-jerk reaction. Denials about how the Early Church conducted itself is one of my biggest pet peeves. Growing up Catholic in South Carolina, I encountered this question quite a bit from friends and people trying to “evangelize” me. Their responses to this argument about Scripture was always, “Nope, that’s not how it was in the Early Church,” and provide no evidence to support their claim.
I apologize for not taking your words within the whole context of your response.
I apologize for not taking your words within the whole context of your response.
No need to apologise - I could probably have worded my post much more clearly !
I get the pet peeve. It happens to me too
ralfyman
New member
One problem with sola scriptura is that Church teachings existed while the Biblical canon was being formed and also informed such.
Also,
Also,
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upant
Guest
where does the concept of the trinity come from? is it explicitly stated in the bible?
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otjm
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You appear to have quot;ed me, but I did not say what your post indicates; - feel free to re-read my post 2/26.
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Ilija
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Yes, already on the first pages in the bible mentions multiple persons of God.
For example:
Genesis 1:26a
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Humility
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Apologist Patrick Madrid gives a good method by which to argue against sola scriptura in this video:
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upant
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How does this define the Trinity? Please show me explicit language that defines the Trinity from a sola scriptura view point
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Ilija
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That was just one example, there are many more verses to backup trinity.
It looks like you’re looking for explicit word “trinity”, for example, OT does not mention name “Jesus” either but name “Emanuel”, so according to you Jesus is not our Lord.
Anyway let’s ignore that about Jesus, please take a look at verse in my previous post again carefully, and tell me, if there is exactly one God, then how is it possible that God talks about him self in plurality?
Just tell me what is God referring to in this particular verse? multiple Gods maybe?
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upant
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there are verses that back up praying to saints but under sola scriptura protestants don’t follow that interpretation. show me the doctrine of the trinity explicitly defined in the bible.
there are verses that go against a trinitarian view.
“…the Father is greater than I” John 14:28
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Ilija
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There is no point to discuss over random verses found in the bible since you didn’t understand the one that is so essential to the doctrine of trinity.
Also you ignored to answer the sub-question that is essential to understand the verse, meaning in addition to not understanding the verse, you also show no interest to at least try to understand it, meaning your primary reason here is to argue and have fun and surely not to understand.
I’m answering you but you refuse to answer me, wait a minute…
You use the term “explicitly” for the second time even though we already know if we interpret all the bible explicitly then we could also conclude that Jesus is not God as already discussed right?
So why would I bother my intellect with such a person?
Yes, because Father sent his Son (not the opposite).
How would that verse go against trinity, does the doctrine of trinity please contradict the nature of God??
According to you for the second time, Jesus is not God because how could anything be in control of God?
If somebody has control over God then what ever is being controlled is not God, because God is supposed to be almighty and thus can’t be controlled.
Your interpretation of “grater” obviously implies “in control of” that’s why you’re making a fundamental and a logic mistake here. it’s nonsense.
OK, I see you have trouble with fundamentals and logic so please at least understand this, any interpretation of the bible that would also indirectly negate Jesus as God is satanic, end of story.
Try to take that into account when doing interpretation next time, otherwise you may miss the whole point.
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I think that what @upant means is that while there are verses in the Bible who point at a trinitarian understanding of God, and give us a glimpse on a part of the relationship between the Father and the Son, the complete orthodox understanding of the Trinity (One Godhead, three hypostases, and the way intratrinitarian relationships operate) is absent from the Bible.
That’s not the point at all, and I don’t think anyone here would negate that the New Testament clearly tells us about Jesus’ divinity.
The point is that saying that Jesus is God is not enough for a correct Trinitarian understanding.
On the contrary, it may lead to all kinds of heresies which stem from a wrong understanding of Jesus’ divinity, like docetism, monophysism or tritheism to name but a few – which all developed from interpreting Scripture.
I see you’re disagreeing with your fellow posters, but could you please try and write with a bit more courtesy and Christian charity ? That’s rude.
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Ilija
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I apologize for ending up rude, maybe I should explain on what’s the reason behind this, also I included a reference link for details.
Behind a scene we wage a dialog, we can think of a dialog in this case as of game, more precisely,
“Dialogical logic”:
The dialog goes this way:
@upand asserted that trinity has no place in the bible:
Here I choose “A”, that is asserting he is wrong, and defending by showing a verse, which in turn is same style of a question which now the upand needs to answer in very same style called “no-A”
Unfortunately, since the Proponent P didn’t defend his assertion, the dialog ended here and the game was over because the rules of a normal dialog were broken.
I’m not trying to defend rude talk here and I do apologize for this, all I’m trying to do is state that it was not possible to normally wage a dialog with questioner because the rules of a dialog were broken.
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I think you’re misunderstanding @upant’s position.
That means : is there a Bible text which clearly defines God as a Triune God in three hypostases, one single essence but three distinct persons ? To my knowledge, there isn’t. Trinitarian formulas aren’t definitions. When the Gospel of John talks about the relationship between Jesus and the Father, what we have is a glimpse of the whole, not the whole. That’s true also of the christology of the Epistle to the Hebrews. All that supports a Trinitarian understanding of God, but it doesn’t define it.
The Trinity as we profess Him was defined in the 4th century – so, long after the New Testament texts were put into writing.
The Bible is not enough to have an orthodox Trinitarian theology, and if the Bible is our sole basis for defining Trinity, then we may end up professing heresies – which, of course, did and does still happen.
If you want to have an orthodox understanding, then you need both the Biblical premisses – the seeds revealed in the Bible – and the hermeneutical framework of tradition – where these seeds fully grew and flowered.
It is no coincidence that there have been so many Trinitarian heresies and controversies throughout the history of Christian faith. Had Trinity been clearly defined in Scripture, it might have been different.
No, that’s not it. The questions were :
That doesn’t mean that @upant thinks that the Trinity is completely unbiblical, or that there are no Bible verses which support a Trinitarian understanding of God.
That means : is there a Bible text which clearly defines God as a Triune God in three hypostases, one single essence but three distinct persons ? To my knowledge, there isn’t. Trinitarian formulas aren’t definitions. When the Gospel of John talks about the relationship between Jesus and the Father, what we have is a glimpse of the whole, not the whole. That’s true also of the christology of the Epistle to the Hebrews. All that supports a Trinitarian understanding of God, but it doesn’t define it.
The Trinity as we profess Him was defined in the 4th century – so, long after the New Testament texts were put into writing.
The Bible is not enough to have an orthodox Trinitarian theology, and if the Bible is our sole basis for defining Trinity, then we may end up professing heresies – which, of course, did and does still happen.
If you want to have an orthodox understanding, then you need both the Biblical premisses – the seeds revealed in the Bible – and the hermeneutical framework of tradition – where these seeds fully grew and flowered.
It is no coincidence that there have been so many Trinitarian heresies and controversies throughout the history of Christian faith. Had Trinity been clearly defined in Scripture, it might have been different.
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Ilija
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@ OddBird
The original question contains:
Denying to answer any question just isn’t how to have a dialog.
And as already said, unless we have a quality dialog which is in line with “Dialogical logic” and unless I get the answer to counter-question, there is no way I will participate in this debate.
Otherwise I agree with you on all other points.
The original question contains:
I don’t particularly follow protestant interpretation, but unless upant gives us an answer on how protestants interpret Genesis 1:26a, it makes no sense to argue much over trinity since we have no opinion nor feedback on something that we consider essential to answer.
Denying to answer any question just isn’t how to have a dialog.
And as already said, unless we have a quality dialog which is in line with “Dialogical logic” and unless I get the answer to counter-question, there is no way I will participate in this debate.
Otherwise I agree with you on all other points.
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There are plenty of ways of doing that. One of the commonly offered possibilities (from my exegesis classes at a Reformed seminary) is that Genesis 1’s “we” is what is called a “plural of majesty” – a single monarch addressed with, or expressing himself with, a plural pronoun.
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Ilija
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Problem with that interpretation is that it is not in line with “sola scriptura” which means the bible a lone, and the OP wants “the bible a lone” option, not church teaching across history.
For example (unless I’m wrong) no where else in the bible does some King, human person or God address him self as “WE” or “US”, so that we can safely conclude it’s valid to address single person as “WE” or “US”
While on the other side, we have many places in the bible that would justify interpretation of trinity.
For example (unless I’m wrong) no where else in the bible does some King, human person or God address him self as “WE” or “US”, so that we can safely conclude it’s valid to address single person as “WE” or “US”
While on the other side, we have many places in the bible that would justify interpretation of trinity.
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Not necessarily, no.
From upthread :
ETA : I’ll bow out that discussion now, because it’s becoming circular, and I think there are too many misunderstandings here on your part about what other posters mean for a fruitful discussion.
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Ilija
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Yes me to, obviously it makes no sense.
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