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By Juan Baixeras
This paper deals with the subject of the Trinity, specifically, in relation
to Trinitarian claims that Jesus is fully God and fully man at all times,
his divinity being inseparable from his humanity.
Many Trinitarians will probably stop right here. The reason is that
since their faith in this doctrine is so weak to start off with, they try to
avoid reading anything that contradicts their beliefs. At least that was
my excuse. But what have you got to lose? If you read this paper and
still believe the Trinity is Biblical, then your faith will be even stronger
because it will be based on fact, and not just blind faith. If on the
other hand you find that the Trinity is not Biblical, then your faith will
also be stronger, because you will have removed a false teaching
from your beliefs. It is a win win situation.
This short paper is not going to deal with all the arguments against
the Trinity. It is specifically going to cover several verses which I
consider to be the clearest verses on this topic that do not have any
other ways of being interpreted. This is going to be about as easy as it
gets.
This paper is not going to deal with the fact that Jesus (who
Trinitarians claim is God at all times) has a God himself (Two Gods). It
is not going to deal with the fact that Jesus died and the Bible says
that God is immortal (Did Jesus Really Die?). It is not going to deal
with the fact that Jesus was tempted and the Bible says that God
cannot be tempted (The Temptation of Jesus). It is not going to deal
with the fact that Jesus is not omniscient, yet the Bible says that God
is all knowing (Is Jesus Omniscient?). It is not a going to deal with the
history of the Trinity and its development (A Patristic Study of the
Kingdom of God and the Development of the Trinity). And it is also not
going to deal with explanations to all the verses that supposedly
support the Trinity (Understanding the Father Son and Holy Spirit).
That is the job of the papers mentioned above.
This is not a scholarly work, it is for anyone with an I.Q. above 70. It is
enough information to make you kick-start your curiosity about this
Doctrine. Let us begin.
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about them, with a comment or two from me of course. Please just
read them like you would read the morning paper. JUST READ. Do not
try to guess a hidden meaning in them, just read what they say. For a
few of these verses we do need to understand a couple of meanings.
Don’t worry, they’re easy.
Christ – This is not Jesus’ last name. It is his title. Christ is English for
Messiah. Messiah means anointed. Jesus Christ means Jesus the
anointed. Anointed by what you may ask? Anointed by the Spirit of
God.
Lord (kyrios) - Most people when they hear this title think
immediately of God Almighty. As we covered earlier, God’s name is
YHWH. This should not be confused with the title kyrios (Lord), which
was used for Jesus throughout his whole ministry. Trinitarians will
argue that this title of Jesus’ confirms his divinity, but even before his
resurrection people addressed him as Lord. Why? For the same reason
that many other people in the Bible and in his day were addressed as
Lord. It was a title of authority and respect. Moses is referred to as
lord in Numbers 32:27:
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"The woman said to him, Sir (kyrios), you do not have a bucket and
the cistern is deep."
That’s it for the definitions, whew! I hope that wasn’t too deep. Okay,
one set up verse. Trinitarians will agree that there is only one God
who is called Yahweh. The problem is that they include Jesus as a
member of Yahweh. But for now, we both agree that the only God is
Yahweh.
Isaiah 45:5 – "I am the LORD (YHWH) and there is no other, there is
no God besides me."
Exodus 3:15 – "Thus shall you say to the Israelites: The LORD
(YHWH), the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of
Isaac, the God of Jacob, has sent me to you."
Okay, the God of your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is the LORD
(YHWH).
Acts 3:13 – "The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of
Jacob, the God of our ancestors, has glorified his servant Jesus."
Does this verse imply that Jesus is the God of Abraham etc.? Of
course not! Just read it. The God of Abraham glorified who? Himself?
No! He glorified his servant Jesus. This is not difficult. Jesus is
obviously not the God of Abraham etc. He is the God of Abraham’s
SERVANT. Who is the God of Abraham? YHWH. And YHWH is who? The
ONLY God. So Jesus is not God? Of course not. He is God’s anointed.
Acts 10:38 – "How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy
Spirit and power. He went about doing good and healing all oppressed
by the devil, for God was with him."
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Who anointed Jesus? It doesn’t say the Father anointed Jesus, it says
GOD. You can obviously see that Jesus is not the God that anointed
him. If I said, "The king anointed Bob," would you think that it meant
that Bob is the king? Of course not. Jesus is the servant whom God
anointed to do his will. That is the whole purpose of anointing
someone, to give them the wisdom and power that they will need in
order to serve God. Does it make sense to you that God would anoint
God with God? Let’s look at a Messianic prophecy in the Old
Testament.
Isaiah 61:1 – "The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the
LORD (YHWH) has anointed me."
By reading this verse it is plainly clear that the person who is being
anointed is not YHWH. YHWH is anointing this individual. Now watch
how Jesus uses this verse to refer to himself. Jesus uses this verse to
say that he is the one that the Scripture spoke about. That he is the
one whom YHWH has anointed. Who is YHWH by the way? That’s
right, the ONLY God.
Luke 4:18-21 – "He (Jesus) unrolled the scroll and found the passage
where it was written: ‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he
has anointed me,’…He (Jesus) said to them, ‘Today this Scripture
passage is fulfilled in your hearing."
Okay now, don’t panic, this is simple. Look at Isaiah 61:1, YHWH
anoints someone other than YHWH. Jesus in Luke claims that he is
that person whom YHWH has anointed. Next!
1 Cor. 8:6 – "Yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom all
things are and for whom we exist, and one Lord (This Lord is not a
translation of YHWH, it is kyrios i.e. master, king etc.) Jesus Christ."
It doesn’t get any easier than this. Who is the one God? The FATHER!
That’s it, period! The Father is the only one who is considered God.
Jesus is our Lord (master, king). You will always see that the only one
who is referred to as God is the Father. From the passage above, do
you honestly read that and come away with the fact that Jesus is the
one God? It is obvious that the one Lord is not the one God. Only the
Father is God. It never says, "Peace from God the Father and God the
Son." Why not? Didn’t the Apostles know that the Son is God? Not
even close! Now get comfortable, and look at the following:
1 Cor. 1:3 – "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the
Lord Jesus Christ."
2 Cor. 1:2 – "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the
Lord Jesus Christ."
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Philippians 1:2 – "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and
the Lord Jesus Christ."
2 Thessalonians 1:2 – "Grace to you and peace from God our Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ."
2 Thessalonians 2:16 – "May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God
our Father, who has loved us."
Philippians 4:20 – To our God and Father, glory for ever and ever.
Amen."
1 Timothy 1:2 – "Peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our
Lord."
2 Timothy 1:2 – "Peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our
Lord."
Titus 1:4 – "Peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our savior."
Philemon vv. 3 – "Peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ."
Galatians 1:3 "Peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."
So who is the ONLY one who is referred to as God? That’s right, the
Father. There is no way that in these sentences you can come out with
the idea that Jesus is God. They always say, "peace from God AND, I
repeat, AND the Lord Jesus Christ." They are separate individuals.
Jesus Christ is not considered by any stretch of the imagination, "God"
by these authors. If I said,
"Peace from John our president and the chief of staff Mike."
"Peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ." (for
comparison)
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Is there anyway that you would read the verse above and come away
thinking that Mike, the chief of staff is the president? No way! But
wait, it gets even better.
In these next verses, Jesus, who Trinitarians claim is fully God at ALL
times, has a God. How can this be? These must all be typos. No, all
the Bibles in the world have been tampered with.
1 Peter 1:3 – "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ."
2 Cor. 1:3 – "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ."
2 Cor. 11:31 – "The God and Father of the Lord Jesus knows, he who
is blessed forever, that I do not lie."
Revelation 1:6 – "Who has made us into a kingdom, priests for his
God and Father."
Ephesians 1:3 – "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ."
Ephesians 1:17 – "That the God of our Lord, the Father of glory."
Wow! The Apostles must have drunk a little too much wine when they
wrote this. Don’t they know that Jesus is God? How can God have a
God? He can’t. That’s why when I ask this question to pastors the only
answer they can give me is that it’s a mystery. Do you know how
naïve and gullible that sounds?
Micah 5:3 – "He shall stand firm and shepherd his flock by the
strength of the LORD (YHWH), in the majestic name of the LORD, HIS
GOD."
The Christ will have a God? Yes! Who will it be? Look at the verse
above, YHWH. Does Jesus know that he is supposed to have a God? Of
course he knows! Look below, these verses are all Jesus speaking:
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John 20:17 - "I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God
and your God."
Matthew 27:46 - "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?"
Revelation 3:2 - "For I have not found your works complete in the
sight of my God."
So Jesus did know that he has a God. As sure as bees buzz. Jesus
really needed his God in order to resurrect.
Hebrews 13:20 – "May the God of peace, who brought up from the
dead the great shepherd of the sheep by the blood of the eternal
covenant."
Who raised the great shepherd from the dead? The God of peace, the
God of our ancestors (which we covered earlier). The Trinitarian
alternative is that God raised himself from the dead. But how can God
raise himself if he is dead. Then God was not really dead. For that
matter, how can you kill God?
Do you honestly read that verse and think that the great shepherd is
God? Remember Micah? The shepherd has a God called YHWH.
Micah 5:3 – "He shall stand firm and shepherd his flock by the
strength of the LORD (YHWH), in the majestic name of the LORD, HIS
GOD."
By the way, what happened to the Holy Spirit in all these greetings? I
guess he must have been the least favorite of the Apostles because
he’s not mentioned even once in those verses. I wonder why? It’s
because the Holy Spirit has always been considered to be the
presence and power of God, i.e. the mind of God. Psalm 139: 7
states:
"Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your
presence?"
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So Jesus is not God, he is a man anointed by God? Are you sure about
this? As sure as woodpeckers peck. How do you understand the
following verses?
Now you tell me which part of this verse is hard to understand. What
is Jesus according to Peter?
a. A Godman
b. A God
c. A man
If you chose answer c, you are correct! If you chose any other answer,
you need to read it again. Well, Peter probably meant something else.
What? I don’t know. That must be the only verse in the New
Testament that says that. Not quite.
Acts 17:31 – "God has overlooked the times of ignorance, but now
He demands that all people everywhere repent because He has
established a day on which He will judge the world with justice
through a MAN He has appointed, and He has provided confirmation
for all by raising him from the dead.
1 Timothy 2:5 – "For there is one God and one mediator also
between God and men, the MAN Christ Jesus."
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He is not the mediator between himself and men, but between God
and men. You can see that Jesus is not considered in the term "God."
Acts 10:38 – "How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the holy
Spirit and power.
It’s easy once you get the hang of it. The problem with Trinitarians is
that in order to substantiate the Trinity, they have to read a passage
like this and then say that Jesus is God. You can read, can’t you? It
doesn’t say that Jesus is God. But they have to stick to it or their
whole doctrine is ruined. So basically they end up with the following
interpretation of such a simple verse
Is that what you get out of it? As Isaiah pointed out earlier, the
Messiah is a man anointed by YHWH. He is supposed to be a
prophet from among their own kinsmen. The following is a Messianic
prophecy spoken by none other than Moses.
Deuteronomy 18:18 – "And the LORD (YHWH) said to me, I will raise
up for you a prophet like you FROM AMONG YOUR OWN KINSMEN,
and will put my words into his mouth; he shall tell them all that I
command him."
Did the Apostles know that Jesus was a MAN from among their own
kinsmen? Of course they did. They quoted this verse in reference to
Jesus in Acts.
Acts 3:20-22 – "And that the Lord may grant you times of
refreshment and send you the Messiah already appointed for you, For
Moses said; A prophet like me will the Lord (YHWH), your God raise up
for you FROM AMONG YOUR OWN KINSMEN."
Wow! They did know! Of course they knew. This is what the Old
Testament predicted of the Messiah. Let's now look at the famous
suffering servant of Isaiah 53 states:
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Isaiah 53:3 – "He was spurned and avoided by men, a MAN of
suffering."
Now other things are starting to make sense. Trinitarians claim that
since Jesus is fully God at all times, that he is omniscient. That’s a big
word. It means all knowing. It means Jesus knows everything about
everything. But that’s not what these simple verses say. Revelation’s
opening verse states;
Rev. 1:1 – "The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him."
Mark 13:32 – "But of that hour, no one knows, neither the angels in
heaven, NOR THE SON, but only the Father."
Do I need to say anything about the verse above? Does Jesus know
the hour? Nope. Then he is not omniscient.
John 17:3 – "Now this is eternal life, that they may know you, the
only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ."
1.Who does Jesus consider the first "you" to be? The ONLY true God.
If Jesus did not consider himself to be God, why should we? Jesus
always pointed us to the one who is greater than he, The God of
Abraham. Here is probably the simplest verse in the whole Bible on
this matter.
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If you have trouble with this one, I do not think there is much else I
can say. Does this sound to you like Jesus believes himself to be God?
The verses that we have covered are not verses that are difficult by
any stretch of the word. They are not even disputed. But ask a
Trinitarian to explain one of these simple verses and watch what
happens. It’s better than television!
With this knowledge, the Bible is going to start making sense to you
like never before. You will no longer have to do mental gymnastics
mixed with painkillers for your headaches anymore.
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