Skeptic Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 I'm on a group on Facebook whose purpose is to get the word out about the religious indoctrination of children. Of course, we occasionally get fundies on there telling us that we're horrible sinners who don't understand the bible, or that they agree that some churches do it but not *their* church, etc. So this one woman comes in and tells us that we don't understand the bible, that Jesus is love and blah blah, and then she says a curious thing: that Jesus is not god. Someone else agreed with her. Is this a new thing, or are these people just people who don't believe in the trinity? I was taught that the trinity is true, so this was very new to me. Anyone have an explanation? I asked her and she didn't answer back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seeker630 Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 No it's not new. I think Mormons are not trinitarian, and maybe JW's too. I was Catholic, and they definitely are. As far as the Trinity goes, I always was confused by it too. Robert Ingersoll had this to say about it-------------------- "Christ, according to the faith, is the second person in the Trinity, the Father being the first and the Holy Ghost third. Each of these persons is God. Christ is his own father and his own son. The Holy Ghost is neither father nor son, but both. The son was begotten by the father, but existed before he was begotten--just the same before as after. Christ is just as old as his father, and the father is just as young as his son. The Holy Ghost proceeded from the Father and Son, but was equal to the Father and Son before he proceeded, that is to say, before he existed, but he is of the same age as the other two. So it is declared that the Father is God, and the Son and the Holy Ghost God, and these three Gods make one God. According to the celestial multiplication table, once one is three, and three time one is one, and according to heavenly subtraction if we take two from three, three are left. The addition is equally peculiar: if we add two to one we have but one. Each one equal to himself and to the other two. Nothing ever was, nothing ever can be, more perfectly idiotic and absurd than the dogma of the Trinity. " You might want to use that the next time someone brings up the Trinity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ouroboros Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 Arianism and adoptionism before 325 CE, and other sects were also Nontrinitarian. Here's some info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nontrinitarianism The trinity really didn't exist as a clear and united doctrine until 325 CE. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deva Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 There have always been all these different ideas about Jesus. Christians can't even get together on the main beliefs. They have tried, with stuff like church counsels, but then the authority just gets blown off and they just do their own thing anyway. Then they expect us to take them seriously. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Looking4Answers Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 There are so many beliefs about Jesus it is not funny. To the Jehovah's Witnesses, he was a man who was possessed by Michael the Archangel. To them, the physical body of Jesus stayed in the tomb and it was Michael that arose and who sits at the right hand of god on high! To the Mormon, Jesus is one of the many (and I mean MANY) spirit children of god the father. Lucifer is his brother. And this father god is none other than Adam, the first man. To top it off, this "father god" is only one among a pantheon of gods and, yes, we can all become god too. To Oneness Pentecostals Jesus is just a manifestation of the one, true god. It's like god wakes up in the morning and asks himself which costume he wants to put on for the day, Jesus, father or ghost. Ghost gets a bit thumbs up around October 31st! To the Gnostics, Jesus is a deity, but he is a little further down on the ladder than the father god. The Gnostic sees the concept of god as a pure being that is out there somewhere. As a being exists closer to our reality, then the less pure it is. Jesus is somewhere in between here and there. A god, but not God. Purer than we are, but not absolutely pure. To the Muslim Jesus was a prophet, but not god and he certainly did not have the final say on matters either, or else Mohamed would not have been sent. So while the Gnostics have Jesus being at least some kind of deity, the Muslims have relegated him to a second class seer! Oh, and there aren't the only views. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ryfka Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 Agreeing with DevaLight here. I think it's just another symptom of having 45464354684864 denominations of Christianity. Every little sect, hell, every person within every sect, picks and chooses what it wants to believe, whether or not it's in the bible. I think I read some passage in the bible once about how Christians shouldn't be divided on anything. Ah yes: Now I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose. -- 1 Corinthians 1:10 Oops... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hereticzero Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 ... Jesus is not god. Someone else agreed with her. Is this a new thing, or are these people just people who don't believe in the trinity? I was taught that the trinity is true, so this was very new to me. Anyone have an explanation? I asked her and she didn't answer back. There are many denominations that still do not believe Iesus is God. The notion Iesus is God, is theology becoming doctrine. It is definitely nothing new but more and more Protestant denominations are taking up the Bible 'true and without error' doctrine, which calls for a more word for word belief in what is written in the Bible and because of that doctrine, more churches are now taking up the mantra Iesus is God, so they can keep in line with the book of John. Most of what we hear as drivel from Protestants as to what they believe, comes from the mouthiness of Southern Baptists speaking to others as if they carry the voice of Christianity. So. Baptist primarily believe in the Trinity and that Iesus is God, and that a person is 'once saved, always saved.' One belief does not necessarily transfer from one denomination to another. The mouthiest ones are those who cause confusion as to what others may or may not believe. The trinity and the Logos come from the writings of the Greek Philosopher Heraclitus who wrote of the Logos some 500 years before Iesus. The philosophy was well known in biblical times but Heraclitus was not a Jew but a Gentile writing of the Logos as Zeus, not the Hebrew god. It was supposedly from a gentile convert that the Logos was written as the Book of John with a Christian spin on the Logos as Iesus. The entire concept in the Book of John, comes almost word for word from the writings of Heraclitus. This writing is what also developed into the teachings of the Trinity in later years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShackledNoMore Posted April 6, 2009 Share Posted April 6, 2009 No it's not new. I think Mormons are not trinitarian, and maybe JW's too. I was Catholic, and they definitely are. As far as the Trinity goes, I always was confused by it too. Robert Ingersoll had this to say about it-------------------- "Christ, according to the faith, is the second person in the Trinity, the Father being the first and the Holy Ghost third. Each of these persons is God. Christ is his own father and his own son. The Holy Ghost is neither father nor son, but both. The son was begotten by the father, but existed before he was begotten--just the same before as after. Christ is just as old as his father, and the father is just as young as his son. The Holy Ghost proceeded from the Father and Son, but was equal to the Father and Son before he proceeded, that is to say, before he existed, but he is of the same age as the other two. So it is declared that the Father is God, and the Son and the Holy Ghost God, and these three Gods make one God. According to the celestial multiplication table, once one is three, and three time one is one, and according to heavenly subtraction if we take two from three, three are left. The addition is equally peculiar: if we add two to one we have but one. Each one equal to himself and to the other two. Nothing ever was, nothing ever can be, more perfectly idiotic and absurd than the dogma of the Trinity. " You might want to use that the next time someone brings up the Trinity. The ironic thing is that except for the last sentence where he calls this explanation idiotic and absurd dogma, or that it is attributed to Robert Ingersoll, it would not be obvious whether these were the words of an agonstic/atheist, or a xian. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reverend AtheiStar Posted April 7, 2009 Share Posted April 7, 2009 I'm on a group on Facebook whose purpose is to get the word out about the religious indoctrination of children. Of course, we occasionally get fundies on there telling us that we're horrible sinners who don't understand the bible, or that they agree that some churches do it but not *their* church, etc. So this one woman comes in and tells us that we don't understand the bible, that Jesus is love and blah blah, and then she says a curious thing: that Jesus is not god. Someone else agreed with her. Is this a new thing, or are these people just people who don't believe in the trinity? I was taught that the trinity is true, so this was very new to me. Anyone have an explanation? I asked her and she didn't answer back. I was never taught that Jesus was God. I was taught that Jesus was only his son. I wasn't taught about the very strange Trinity concept, either. I only learned about that after I became Atheist. I guess I was a pretty slack Christian, huh? lol... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reverend AtheiStar Posted April 7, 2009 Share Posted April 7, 2009 No it's not new. I think Mormons are not trinitarian, and maybe JW's too. I was Catholic, and they definitely are. As far as the Trinity goes, I always was confused by it too. Robert Ingersoll had this to say about it-------------------- "Christ, according to the faith, is the second person in the Trinity, the Father being the first and the Holy Ghost third. Each of these persons is God. Christ is his own father and his own son. The Holy Ghost is neither father nor son, but both. The son was begotten by the father, but existed before he was begotten--just the same before as after. Christ is just as old as his father, and the father is just as young as his son. The Holy Ghost proceeded from the Father and Son, but was equal to the Father and Son before he proceeded, that is to say, before he existed, but he is of the same age as the other two. So it is declared that the Father is God, and the Son and the Holy Ghost God, and these three Gods make one God. According to the celestial multiplication table, once one is three, and three time one is one, and according to heavenly subtraction if we take two from three, three are left. The addition is equally peculiar: if we add two to one we have but one. Each one equal to himself and to the other two. Nothing ever was, nothing ever can be, more perfectly idiotic and absurd than the dogma of the Trinity. " You might want to use that the next time someone brings up the Trinity. I love this quote! I love it so much; I put it in my book! It's on page 132, I'm proud to say. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skeptic Posted April 7, 2009 Author Share Posted April 7, 2009 The church I attended before I deconverted split from the Presbyterian church over this. They're trinitarians and the Presby. church apparently isn't. They apparently got the memo that the whole trinity is confusing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seeker630 Posted April 7, 2009 Share Posted April 7, 2009 No it's not new. I think Mormons are not trinitarian, and maybe JW's too. I was Catholic, and they definitely are. As far as the Trinity goes, I always was confused by it too. Robert Ingersoll had this to say about it-------------------- "Christ, according to the faith, is the second person in the Trinity, the Father being the first and the Holy Ghost third. Each of these persons is God. Christ is his own father and his own son. The Holy Ghost is neither father nor son, but both. The son was begotten by the father, but existed before he was begotten--just the same before as after. Christ is just as old as his father, and the father is just as young as his son. The Holy Ghost proceeded from the Father and Son, but was equal to the Father and Son before he proceeded, that is to say, before he existed, but he is of the same age as the other two. So it is declared that the Father is God, and the Son and the Holy Ghost God, and these three Gods make one God. According to the celestial multiplication table, once one is three, and three time one is one, and according to heavenly subtraction if we take two from three, three are left. The addition is equally peculiar: if we add two to one we have but one. Each one equal to himself and to the other two. Nothing ever was, nothing ever can be, more perfectly idiotic and absurd than the dogma of the Trinity. " You might want to use that the next time someone brings up the Trinity. I love this quote! I love it so much; I put it in my book! It's on page 132, I'm proud to say. I liked it too. It's one I used when I delivered a "sermon" before a UUA congregation about 4 years ago, that was a biographical sketch of his life. He was quite an orator. Are you aware that there are actual recordings of him done by Thomas Edison when he first developed his gramaphone? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neon Genesis Posted April 8, 2009 Share Posted April 8, 2009 Oh, and there aren't the only views.Aren't there some people who believe Jesus went to India when he was a teen and met up with some Hindu gurus or something and taught him about reincarnation? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PandaPirate Posted April 8, 2009 Share Posted April 8, 2009 Oh, and there aren't the only views.Aren't there some people who believe Jesus went to India when he was a teen and met up with some Hindu gurus or something and taught him about reincarnation? Absolutely and he was called Saint Issa. They called him an "avatar." There's a book called The Yoga of Jesus that explains scriptures from a Yogic point of view and they actually sound more logical then the way christian theology explains them. It's not a bad book. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neon Genesis Posted April 8, 2009 Share Posted April 8, 2009 But I was watching this video interview with Bart D Ehrman on youtube awhile back and they asked him about this and he said that's it not true and there's no evidence Jesus ever went to India and that Jesus likely spent his teenage years working with his father as a carpenter. Here's the whole debate: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cK3Ry_icJo The question about this was asked towards the end of it. I'm just curious to know where they got this idea from. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PandaPirate Posted April 9, 2009 Share Posted April 9, 2009 I have a really bad hangover. I'll have to get back to you on that one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R. S. Martin Posted April 10, 2009 Share Posted April 10, 2009 I'm on a group on Facebook whose purpose is to get the word out about the religious indoctrination of children. Of course, we occasionally get fundies on there telling us that we're horrible sinners who don't understand the bible, or that they agree that some churches do it but not *their* church, etc. So this one woman comes in and tells us that we don't understand the bible, that Jesus is love and blah blah, and then she says a curious thing: that Jesus is not god. Someone else agreed with her. Is this a new thing, or are these people just people who don't believe in the trinity? I was taught that the trinity is true, so this was very new to me. Anyone have an explanation? I asked her and she didn't answer back. Not all Christians use that language. Where I come from, they definitely believe in the trinity, but they never say "Jesus is God," because each person of the Godhead is a separate person while all are one. That agrees with the creeds. Thus, God is God, Jesus is Jesus, and the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit, and all are part of the Holy Trinity or Godhead. I never heard the statement "Jesus is God" until I was on these forums. It sounded like blasphemy to me. But then exChristians are allowed to blaspheme; I did not realize Christians said it. As for that woman not replying. Some Christians seem to think it is wrong to discuss theology with "unbelievers." How we are supposed to "convert" if we are not allowed to understand the religion is beyond my comprehension. I think it is inevitable that fundamentalist Christianity is headed for some kind of major over-haul--or extinction. Too many people are deconverting and confronting their former churches with their questions. We are not backing down because they no longer have any power over us. We demand answers. If they fail to produce answers, we come to our own conclusions and answer our own answers and we push those answers in their faces. We may or may not do it literally. You say some of you have formed a group and these Christians come in. Excellent strategy. They feel a need to correct what they see as a misunderstanding of their theology. They feel a need to defend what they see as their own property, i.e. Christian theology, the Bible, and the Judeo-Christian God. (I've got news for you: The almighty, all-powerful Ruler and Creator of the Universe cannot defend himself, his Word, or his Chosen People.) Anyway, as more and more of us develop logical answers for fundamentalist Christianity's unanswered questions, and as more and more of their educated young people see for themselves that what they are taught to believe does not measure up with the embedded standards by which they are taught to believe the dogma, something is going to give someday. On William Lane Craig's forums I keep seeing this and that young person (properly raised and educated by ID theology and schooling) coming up with questions challenging William Lane Craig's own brainchild. They do this on his own grounds with his own tools. Some are committed to believe but they do insist on answers that make logical sense. Other have concluded that sense cannot be made on Christian grounds but they insist on discussion before coming to an absolute decision. Oops! I wandered way off-topic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seeking Posted April 13, 2009 Share Posted April 13, 2009 Not all Christians use that language. Where I come from, they definitely believe in the trinity, but they never say "Jesus is God," because each person of the Godhead is a separate person while all are one. That agrees with the creeds. Thus, God is God, Jesus is Jesus, and the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit, and all are part of the Holy Trinity or Godhead. I never heard the statement "Jesus is God" until I was on these forums. It sounded like blasphemy to me. But then exChristians are allowed to blaspheme; I did not realize Christians said it. Interesting. I grew up in a Baptist church (northern, not Southern) and have also attended Presbyterian, Lutheran, and non-denominational churches. ALL of them firmly stated that Jesus IS God. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted April 14, 2009 Share Posted April 14, 2009 But I was watching this video interview with Bart D Ehrman on youtube awhile back and they asked him about this and he said that's it not true and there's no evidence Jesus ever went to India and that Jesus likely spent his teenage years working with his father as a carpenter. Here's the whole debate: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cK3Ry_icJo The question about this was asked towards the end of it. I'm just curious to know where they got this idea from. Of course not. Myths don't do things. Besides (from wiki): Notovitch claimed that, at the lamasery or monastery of Hemis, he learned of the "Life of Saint Issa, Best of the Sons of Men." His story, with the text of the "Life," was published in French in 1894 as La vie inconnue de Jesus Christ. It was translated into English[9], German, Spanish, and Italian. But wait: Edgar Goodspeed describes the debunking of Notovitch's claims as a hoax. Notovitch's writings were immediately controversial and after the German orientalist Max Mueller corresponded with the Hemis monastery Notovitch claimed to have visited, and J.Archibald Douglas visited Hemis Monastery, and neither found any evidence that Notovich (much less Jesus) had even been there himself, his claims were widely rejected. The head of the Hemis community signed a document that denounced Notovitch as an outright liar.[10] The story of his visit to Hemis seems to be taken from H.P. Blavatsky's Isis Unveiled.[11] In the original, the traveler with the broken leg was taken in at Mount Athos in Greece and found the text of Celsus' True Doctrine in the monastery library. The idea that Jesus was in India was also inspired by a statement in Isis that he went to the foothills of the Himalayas.[12] There's more: One of the skeptics who personally investigated Notovich's claim was Swami Abhedananda, who journeyed to the monastary determined to either find a copy of the Himis manuscript or to expose it as a fraud. His book of travels, entitled Kashmir O Tibetti, tells of a visit to the Himis gonpa and includes a Bengali translation of two hundred twenty-four verses essentially the same as the Notovitch text. In 1925, the Russian philosopher and a distinguished scientist, Nicholas Roerich, also journeyed to the monastary. He apparently saw the same documents as Notovitch and Abhedananda. Both Abhedananda and Roerich were thereby convinced of the authenticity of the Issa legend. So which is it? It's crap. Why? All we have after all this effort is translations of some non-existent document. No one studied it. No one apparently copied it. No preservation efforts were made. No one did anything. There's no scholarship here. It's just crap. A forgery by some wannabe. As for calling "jesus" an "avatar" that would be because he was supposedly an incarnation of Vishnu. Quite a nifty role to be cast. Everyone wants a piece of this turd and they polish him up all nice for their particular religion. Personally I tend to flush my shit. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneralJet Posted April 15, 2009 Share Posted April 15, 2009 once again, the Bible only confuses the issue. At one point Jesus says that he is God, via, "I AM", and I and the father are One and the same." At another He say the Father is greater then I, and"Why do you call me good, only God is good?" Who knows.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shyone Posted April 6, 2010 Share Posted April 6, 2010 One such item was the divinity of Christ. Two out of three didn't think Jesus was god. A similar percentage thought that Jesus was a sinner just like the rest of us, and that he died on the cross for his own sins. I don't remember there being any questions directed at their notions about the trinity, but if these kids can't get simple concepts right (according to the teachings of their faith) I think we can trust that they wouldn't get the hard ones right either. I always take delight whenever I think about this. Do as much as you like to undermine Xtianity, but I think they're helping undermine themselves--it'll just take some time to come to fruition their way. Dawkins was stunned that about 20% of people polled about science thought that the Earth went around the sun every month. Life is a bell curve. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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