Some proof that there IS a difference between Biblical Trinitarians and Catholics!

[MH84]

I thought I remembered reading about the differences from the following website before. Its a popular one used by Non-Catholic Christians. I can’t belive how clear they contrast their beliefs with that shown in the Nicene Creed. At least they show their beliefs clearly. I have two links you may or may not have visited. Check them out for yourself.

First go to this one which states four different opinions: Those of “Arians” eg Jehovah’s Witnesses, those of “Catholic NIcene Trinity”, those of “Modalism” and those of whom believe in the “Biblical Trinity”

bible.ca/trinity/trinity-start.htm

Then, click this next link which shows why they believe that if you believe in theTrinity of the Bible, you should believe in the subordination of Christ in the Godhead.

bible.ca/trinity/trinity-subordination-christ.htm

Here is a quote from the second link I posted:

Jesus Christ is the creator, not a creature and will always be equal to the Father in this sense. Jn 1:1 says, “and the word was [uncreated] God”. However, sometime around the incarnation, Jesus made a choice to submit to the Father as His head. We call this choice, the subordination (or down-ranking) of Christ to the Father. Jesus did not give up being God, He merely began to obey the Father as though He were a creature. This is called “Biblical subordination”. Bible evidence seems to support the view that the Holy Spirit submits to both the Father and the Son, but it is not a strong case.

Even though they believe the Son is from all eternity, they believe that Christ will be subordinate for all eternity probably because of the Incarnation. I started another thread about this a while ago. But this is some proof in my observation that evangelical Christians who only belive in the bible alone cannot believe in the same concept of Trinity as Catholics, because the the Athanasius and Nicene Creeds aren’t in the bible.

 

[MH84]

This just gets all the more interesting!

Here these bible Christians distance themselves from the “creedal formulations” of the Trinity.

bible.ca/trinity/trinity-catholic-nicene.htm

 

[FaithofAbraham]

This just gets all the more interesting!

Here these bible Christians distance themselves from the “creedal formulations” of the Trinity.

bible.ca/trinity/trinity-catholic-nicene.htm

I don’t even see what the difference is.

 

[mozart-250]

Just for the record this is a website of “Church Of Christ”.

They don’t advertise it as such, of course. But what I did was “Find a Church Near You”. The address it came up with was the address of a “Church Of Christ” church.

The point here is that this web site is representative of only one denomination.

 

[truthsilence]

This is interesting to read, however, I find the accusation of Roman Catholic’s “not believing in the submission of Christ to the Father” to be somewhat of a stretch. Of course we believe in Christ’s submission to the Father. Of course we believe it was he who said “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.” Mt 26:39

I don’t get the distinction they’re trying to make, is what I’m saying. Is there is a difference in being “submissive” and “subordinate”? Hopefully someone with more insight on the Athanasian Creed will weigh in on the matter.

 

[MH84]

I don’t even see what the difference is.

Look at the first link. The difference is that this website claims that Christ since the Incarnation has voluntarily become subordinate to the Father. They also believe that Jesus is now eternally subordinate to the Father, and that maybe the Holy Spirit is subordinate to them both. They base this belief on the bible.

 

[MH84]

This is interesting to read, however, I find the accusation of Roman Catholic’s “not believing in the submission of Christ to the Father” to be somewhat of a stretch. Of course we believe in Christ’s submission to the Father. Of course we believe it was he who said “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.” Mt 26:39

I don’t get the distinction they’re trying to make, is what I’m saying. Is there is a difference in being “submissive” and “subordinate”? Hopefully someone with more insight on the Athanasian Creed will weigh in on the matter.

Well, Ive always wondered myself if Jesus is now forever subordinate to the Father, although He is God from all eternity and they share the same nature. I wonder based on these verses. Answer this one.

No one one this forum has really had a satisfactory answer yet in my books (Im not saying there isnt one).

1 Corinithians 15
24Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. 25For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy to be destroyed is death. 27For he “has put everything under his feet.”[c] Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. 28When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.

I seem to interpret these verses the same way that people on the website do. What fo you think?

 

[Daniel_Marsh]

When dealing with some church of christ groups you need to keep an eye out for homean semi-arianism which maybe what is behind this site – I don’t know this for sure in case of this specific site.

Phil 2, the Son of God choose to be second in rank to the Father. The Father sent out both the Son and Spirit.
Jesus also sent out the Spirit. Ranks are by choice in the godhead, not by quality as in homean semi-arainism.

Semi-Arainism beleives that sometime before time the Son was begotten – that is there was a point where he did not exist or was simply a thought in God the Fathers mind. Often they will deny the personhood of the Holy Spirit as being simply God the Father’s spirit. Sort of like a human spirit traveling out of the body.

 

[MH84]

Just for the record this is a website of “Church Of Christ”.

They don’t advertise it as such, of course. But what I did was “Find a Church Near You”. The address it came up with was the address of a “Church Of Christ” church.

The point here is that this web site is representative of only one denomination.

I think there are a lot of Christians who think the same as this church, whatever it is.

This is not exactly the same, but I remember reading that Creflo A Dollar, the popular but controversial preacher, who said that that Jesus had to grow into His divine Sonship. IOW, He became God, specifically at the Baptism in the Jordan. Read the link below for a more accurate reflection on what he taught. One point apparently is that “Jesus Didn’t Know that He was the Son of God; He had to Grow into Sonship”.

Check out this link. blackapologist.wordpress.com/2007/05/31/exposing-the-heresy-of-creflo-cashflo-dollar-jesus-became-god/

 

[MH84]

Semi-Arainism beleives that sometime before time the Son was begotten – that is there was a point where he did not exist or was simply a thought in God the Fathers mind. Often they will deny the personhood of the Holy Spirit as being simply God the Father’s spirit. Sort of like a human spirit traveling out of the body.

No, this does not seem to be what this website is saying. They are saying that Jesus is God from all eternity, but that at around the time of the Incarnation, he voluntarily became subordinate, and will be from now on so to speak.

Check the links.

If you ask me, it seems to reconcile Philippians 2 and the verses from 1 Corinthians 15.

 

[truthsilence]

Well, Ive always wondered myself if Jesus is now forever subordinate to the Father, although He is God from all eternity and they share the same nature. I wonder based on these verses. Answer this one.

No one one this forum has really had a satisfactory answer yet in my books (Im not saying there isnt one).

I seem to interpret these verses the same way that people on the website do. What fo you think?

That is a good question MH84, and I’m not sure I have an adequate answer. In my mind, it has something to do with Christ’s willingness to be submissive, subservient, a servant. But I don’t believe it takes away from His oneness or even his equality with the Father, in and from eternity.

Have you looked at the catechism? I don’t have time right now but I’ll take a look and see what I can find a little bit later.

God bless,
Tami

 

[East_and_West]

As man, Christ lived in accordance with God’s laws and submitted himself in perfect accord with God’s will on the Cross. As God, Christ is co-equal with the Father. Christ has two natures people and is, thus, capable of both.

 

[MH84]

That is a good question MH84, and I’m not sure I have an adequate answer. In my mind, it has something to do with Christ’s willingness to be submissive, subservient, a servant. But I don’t believe it takes away from His oneness or even his equality with the Father, in and from eternity.

Have you looked at the catechism? I don’t have time right now but I’ll take a look and see what I can find a little bit later.

God bless,
Tami

A good fellow on these forums recommended that I refer to the CCC from another thread. Its very ambiguous if you ask me:

To better understand 15:25-27, I suggest you read (CCC 1042-50). In the last days Christ will triumph over his enemies and transfer his kingdom over to the father. We see this imagery in Psalm 8:6 and 110:1. Remember that man’s original vocation is to stand above all of creation as ruler and steward. Jesus ultimatedly fulfills this. He is the Messiah who is enthroned at God’s right hand and awaiting the subjection of his enemies. Christ assumed this role at his Ascension, where He reigns until all creation bows in homage and His final adversary, death, is defeated (CCC 668, 1008)

**In verse 28 then, creation and even the incarnate Son will honor the Father as the Lord of all and the absolute Origin of all life. True and subsistent life consists in this: the Father, through the Son and in the Holy Spirit, pouring out his heavenly gifts on all things without exception. **

Hope that helps, that’s all I could find.

The part that I highlighted bold seems to support the theories of the Christian website.

By the way you can access the CCC from here: scborromeo.org/ccc/p123a12.htm#1042

(The link starts at paragraph 1042)

I need to say this again, sorry. How can evangelicals say that by using the bible alone, they can have the same concepts of the Trinity as the Catholic Church, or at least as the Nicene Creed?! The Church defined the Trinity in a way the Bible only hints at. …thankyou :yawn:

 

[MH84]

As man, Christ lived in accordance with God’s laws and submitted himself in perfect accord with God’s will on the Cross. As God, Christ is co-equal with the Father. Christ has two natures people and is, thus, capable of both.

Please tell me, why will Jesus will be subjected to the Father at the end of time (according to St. Paul)? I can understand Jesus lowering Himself in a sense while on earth, but why at the end of time (I suppose in eternity)?

In case you missed the verses:

1 Corinithians 15
24Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. 25For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy to be destroyed is death. 27For he “has put everything under his feet.”[c] Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. 28When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.

www.biblegateway.com

…submitted himself in perfect accord with God’s will on the Cross. As God, Christ is co-equal with the Father…

Don’t you mean He submitted himself in perfect accord with His Father’s will (not God)? Because isnt “God”, what the nature of the Father is, not who He is? Who He is, is the Father. Otherwise there is a contradiction isnt there? Because you are saying God (the nature of the Son) submitted Himself in accord with God’s (the nature of the Father) will ? In other words, when you were talking about the Son, you were talking about who He is (the Son/Jesus), but when you were talking about the Father you were talking about what He is (God).

I hope you understand me.

 

[MH84]

1 Corinithians 15
24Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. 25For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy to be destroyed is death. 27For he “has put everything under his feet.”[c] Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. 28When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.

The best explanation Ive found so far is para 668 of the CCC. But it doesnt satisfy my question. It does refer the reader to Ephesians 1:20-22:

20…which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, 21far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. 22And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church,…

But I already know that God (I presume the Father) will put all things under the feet of His Son. I still don’t know why after the Son receives everything, He will then be subject to the Father. This seems to me that the Son will be eternally subordinate to His Father, just like the website in the OP was talking about.

 

[MH84]

I found this from another Christian website. Please read the rest of the article so that this is not out of context, because I picked a part that supports what the other website was saying, and also what Im starting to think.

answering-islam.org/Shamoun/q_jesus_subject.htm

What Paul is saying in 1 Corinthians 15:28 is that Christ will become subject to the Father once again at the end of the age. Paul’s statement seems to imply that the Lord, after his ascension, received more than just the authority that he had voluntarily set aside when he became a man. The text seems to suggest that Christ is currently enjoying a position of honor in which he is not functioning as the Father’s subordinate, but as one holding equal authority with the Father. It is only at the end of the age that Christ will then assume his role of subordination, a role which was his even before he became man by virtue of his being a Son.

After all, sons are equal in essence and nature with their fathers, but subject to them in rank and authority. Likewise, Jesus as God’s Son is equal to him in essence and nature but subject to him in rank and authority.

(my emphasis)

I will quote some points from the defence in my next post.

 

[MH84]

This is continued from my previous post. Basically, I think here is the defence of the Nicene Creed interpretation presented by the author. Here is one part I’ll include:

It becomes clear from the foregoing that the term “submit” or “subject” does not necessarily imply that the person that is submitting is inferior in nature and essence to the other. It can simply refer to a person being in a lesser position of authority including a voluntary submission to somebody who has no natural or enforceable position of authority, like one Christian to another.

Moreover, the context of 1 Corinthians 15:28 indicates that the Greek passive hupotageesetai should be taken as a middle voice. This would mean that the Son is not being made subject, or that someone is forcing him to submit. Rather, the middle voice suggests that the Lord Jesus is voluntarily subjecting himself to the Father. As Greek NT scholar Spiros Zodhiates noted:

The translation of the verb as “the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One” is very misleading. It is taken as a passive, whereas the exegesis demands that it should be taken as a middle voice which means that the Lord Jesus Christ at the completion of His mediatorial work subjects Himself to the One who had subjected all things unto Him. It is a voluntary act and not a compulsory subjugation of one person of the Trinity to the other. This is not something which took place while the Lord Jesus was the God-Man on earth, but it is something that will take place in the future when all people will be made subject unto Christ, and then He will finally subject Himself with the finished work of redemption before God the Father. One of the greatest difficulties of the translation of the N.T. lies in discerning when the passive form should be taken with the passive meaning or the middle voice meaning, as, for instance, Jesus Christ “is made subject” or He “subjects Himself.” (Spiros Zodhiates, New American Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible [AMG Publishers, Chattanooga, TN, 1990], p. 1530)

In another part the author compares the Genesis story of Joesph and Pharoah, saying that they each had a human nature, but Joseph was still lower in rank. I find it a bit suspect, because Ive heard that humans each have a different nature to each other, while the Persons of the Trinity each possess the same nature.

Joseph was lord over all of Egypt and was second only to the pharaoh. Thus, both pharaoh and Joseph ruled over Egypt and the world, with one of them being subject to the other. What’s more, both were equal in essence and nature since both were fully humans!

These biblical facts bear repeating: In light of the clear NT teaching that the Lord Jesus is fully and essentially God, submission in reference to Christ in so far as his Deity is concerned can only be viewed in terms of authority, that Christ is subordinate to the Father by virtue of his being a Son. It does not show that the Son is inferior to the Father as far as Christ’s Divine nature and essence is concerned, or that he cannot therefore be God also.

Furthermore, Christ is also subordinate by virtue of his having the nature of a creature, humanity, a nature which is vastly inferior to God’s eternal, uncreated essence.

answering-islam.org/Shamoun/q_jesus_subject.htm

CONT.

 

[MH84]

This is stated at the end of the article:

We conclude with Edmund J. Fortman’s summation of Paul’s Christology since he does a wonderful job of piecing it together:

At times Paul writes as if Christ is ‘subordinate’ to the Father. For he tells us that ‘God sent forth his Son to redeem’ (Gal 4.4) and ‘did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all’ (Rom 8:32). And in a notable passage he declares that ‘when all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things under him, that God may be everything to every one’ (1 Cor 15.28). Taken by themselves these passages might warrant the conclusion that Paul held a merely subordinationist view of Christ and did not place Him on the same divine level with the Father. But if they are taken together with the passages cited above in which Paul does put Christ on the same divine level as the Father by presenting Him as the creator of all things and the ‘image of the invisible God’ who was ‘in the form of God’ and equal to God, it becomes clear that Paul views Christ both as subordinate and equal to God the Father. Possibly he thus means merely to subordinate Christ in His humanity to the Father. But more probably he wishes to indicate that while Christ is truly divine and on the same divine level with the Father, yet there must be assigned to the Father a certain priority and superiority over the Son because He is the Father of the Son and sends the Son to redeem men, and there must be ascribed to the Son a certain subordination because He is the Son of the Father and is sent by the Father. Nowhere, however, does Paul say or imply that the Son is a creature, as the Arians subordinationists will say later on. On the contrary, he makes it clear that the Son is not on the side of the creature but of the Creator and that through the Son all things are created … (Fortman, The Triune God — A Historical Study of the Doctrine of the Trinity [Wipf and Stock Publishers: Eugene, Oregon, February 1999], p. 18)

You can read the rest of the article for yourself
answering-islam.org/Shamoun/q_jesus_subject.htm

So, I think what he (the author of the article) is saying is that the Son will be voluntarily lower in authority than the Father at the end of time, because He is His Son after all, and possibly because for this reason: “Christ destroying every other and opposing rule so as to make all things subject to God shows that the Lord Jesus’ subjection is done for the purpose of bringing everything into perfect harmonious fellowship with God as the Sovereign head of creation.” However, He is still of the same nature an equality with the Father as He always was.

(Someone correct me if I’m wrong here)

You know, I’m not sure about all this. The Trinitarian belief in light of 1 Corinithians 15 requires so much explaining and defending, that I don’t know what St. Paul or any of the other Christians really thought. Maybe Paul didnt have full understanding of what he was writing considering that the Holy Spirit was working through him. Anyway, I think I’ll read this article more closely.

 

[truthsilence]

MH84, you have provided a lot of reading and I think you’ve posted something that deserves to be given some thought. I look forward to reading more of what you discover.

BTW, I don’t put too much emphasis on what Protestants have to say, when they’re looking to point out what is wrong with the RCC. However, I appreciate their exegesis to a point. I find that much of it is worthwhile and enlightening.

 

[HannahLisa]

Uhm…I’ve been to Bible/nondenominational churches before which say the Nicene Creed. The Foursquare church I currently attend says a different version stating the same things. The church where “Christians worship” is a church I’ve never heard of.

I do not think this website is representative of all Bible church’s beliefs.