Tuesday, 6 July 2010

Trinity and Binary

Language is strange. Do you think there is a difference between 'God is one' and 'there is one God'? Is there a difference between unity and uniqueness?

Larry Hurtado has a video on early devotion to Jesus here. It is quiet scholarship. But like some others he uses a really strange word - binitarian. What happened to God as Spirit? Trinity is of course an equally strange word.

I do agree with the video that the evidence is very early that the risen Jesus was identified with God and as such is considered 'divine' and was attributed glory unique to the trust that belongs to God only. But is this really an exercise in counting? Or is there a good way to express such mystery?

2 comments:

  1. Greetings Bob MacDonald

    Note, what Larry Hurtado saysat the end:
    "A worship of Jesus, I hasten to add, to the glory of GOD.
    Not as a separate God. But as a manifestation and vehicle
    of the one true GOD."


    So there is no breach or violation of Jewish Monotheism, because the Lord Jesus was not being worshiped or venerated or identified as the one true GOD;
    but rather the Lord Jesus was worshiped, venerated & identified as the one true GOD's Messiah,
    the one true GOD's Agent.


    The early church simply was not trinitarian!!

    Therefore,
    for more info on this subject,
    I recommend this video:
    The Human Jesus

    Take a couple of hours to watch it; and prayerfully it will aid you in your quest for truth.

    Yours In Messiah
    Adam Pastor

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  2. Thanks for the pointer, Adam. I am aware of these positions on the one who asked - who do they say that I am? I think divinity and trinity and binary are all misleading. What we have is a man, loved, who demonstrates love, and whose vindication is attested through the resurrection. I also think that unity is misunderstood. But no words for it just yet - apart from my meanderings on the psalms.

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