The Godhead

[path_of_one]

I can't quite explain it, but I suppose I believe simultaneously in the trinity and in the One God. And this is not the same as just believing in the trinity forming one God.

It is the relationship aspect, as Thomas points out, that I think is truth in the trinity. Christianity was not the first religion to have the idea of a triplicate or triune deity, and I do think the fundamental concept of one, other, and relationship in between speaks to a deep spiritual truth.

If God is Love, yes- the Love itself is God, yet it implies a relationship. It is not to say that God cannot exist as One, just as Love itself, but that the implication is there that there is a "we-ness" to God that allows that Love to eternally be expressed.

To define Love itself is problematic, because while some think it is an essence or feeling, others, including myself, think it is at least as much an action verb as a noun, which requires an object, even if it is just the self.

Yet underneath the "we-ness" of God, the same "we-ness" that is present in Genesis when God (in plural form) says that they create man in their image, there is also the One. The One is the the We and yet, in my experience, it is much easier to say "God in three Persons, blessed trinity" than it is to really grasp it mentally once it is experienced.

For this reason, I would hesitate to say that I believe in any other than the One God. And yet, I have myself experienced this One God in the form of Creator, Christ, and Spirit, and the experiences have been quite different. Further, these have included masculine, feminine, and neuter/non-gendered (and even non-human) representations of such in my own visions and dreams, so even the three persons are, at least in on my spiritual path, clearly non-gendered and quite beyond human understanding.

Therein lies the mystery of the Godhead, and I believe that is really the point. The reason for the mystery is to give us a sense of... mystery. I don't think it is a puzzle to be solved, to determine the rules by which God can be simultaneously One and yet more than one. Rather, I think it is a truth to be experienced, to keep us in awe of God and to remind us of our limitations in mental capacity to understand God. A way to bring us back to the foundation of our faith- our experience of and relationship to God. And, perhaps, a glimpse of what we should be striving for as Christians- a harmony between ourselves and other beings such that we, too, become simultaneously one and yet many and so that, with the indwelling of the Spirit, we become self and yet not-self, pouring out our own egos so that we can be filled with the Spirit.

[mee]

Originally Posted by BlaznFattyz

the one that anonymous watchtower people rewrote stripping jesus from being the word of god, with god, as god... no thanks, I'll pass.

the pure word of God is the way to go with no tradtions of man to cloud the thought.............yes please

[mee]

Originally Posted by BlaznFattyz

this personal name of god that is yahweh, that is god interacting personally with man is through the son and through the spirit. there is no personal saviour other than the love of god that is made manifest in jesus christ, and we are spiritually reborn through the spirit if we accept jesus as lord, which allows us to come to the father. you cannot seperate the personal saviour jesus from yahweh, they are the one true living god. god has proclaimed his son's name from the beginning, the son's name is above all names.

yes ,Jesus plays a very big part in the out working of Jehovahs purpose for the earth.
For God loved the world so much that he gave his only-begotten Son, in order that everyone exercising faith in him might not be destroyed but have everlasting life. For God sent forth his Son into the world, not for him to judge the world, but for the world to be saved through him. John 3;16-17 and when Jesus has done everything that his father Jehovah wants to be done ,Jesus will hand the kingdom back to his father.
Next, the end, when he hands over the kingdom to his God and Father, when he has brought to nothing all government and all authority and power. 25 For he must rule as king until [God] has put all enemies under his feet. 26 As the last enemy, death is to be brought to nothing. 27 For [God] "subjected all things under his feet." But when he says that ‘all things have been subjected,’ it is evident that it is with the exception of the one who subjected all things to him. 28 But when all things will have been subjected to him, then the Son himself will also subject himself to the One who subjected all things to him, that God may be all things to everyone...1 corinthians 15; 24-28 yes Jesus plays a very big part in bringing paradise condtions back to the earth, and the last enemy will be death itself will be got rid of ............ yes, taking in knowledge about Jehovah and Jesus leads to everlasting life as Jesus himself told us
This means everlasting life, their taking in knowledge of you, the only true God, and of the one whom you sent forth, Jesus Christ. John 17;3

[Thomas]

Hi Path_of_One –

It is the relationship aspect ... that I think is truth in the trinity.
So do I.

Christianity was not the first religion to have the idea of a triplicate or triune deity, and I do think the fundamental concept of one, other, and relationship in between speaks to a deep spiritual truth.

I think Christianity plumbs this relationship to the absolute (human) limit – in its very principle. This is what sets the Christian Trinity apart from all other triunes in my book.

The Jews were the first religion, I think, to rteally get to grips with the relationship between the human and the Divine – if you compare the myths of Judaism to their contemporaries, the Flood for instance, then the theology of the Jews just leaves everything else in kindergarden. They managed to see God as absolutely Immanent and absolutely Transcendant without contradiction.

+++

I was looking at semiotics last night, and one wiki entry spoke of 'triunes everywhere' ...

+++

To define Love itself is problematic, because while some think it is an essence or feeling, others, including myself, think it is at least as much an action verb as a noun, which requires an object, even if it is just the self.

Oh Yes! (Jumps up and down with excitement) We cannot really know, comprehend, understand (etc.) God as noun ... as a thing, an entity, precisely because God is beyond all and any determination or condition...

But as a dynamism ... that is the Mystery of the Divine Name JHWH – 'I am' – it's a dynamic name, from the verb 'to be'.

The Theology of the Trinity plunges into the Principle according to Itself, the Mystery from which all else flows.

Thomas

[JosephM]

Originally Posted by cyberpi

Why do you state this with authority? I could understand why a person might say it by assuming omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, etc... but I submit that it is very wrong to say: omni-possession.

A gift is a gift... I'm not going to reject it. I am sure that dark opinions will form, but I say it with zero malice or disrespect to the creator. I will simply own the next few seconds in a given space and a given time. It is surely a gift but I will possess it and spend it. I author something with a free-will. As an example, I have not designed any cars in this universe but when I drive one I possess it.

Cyberpi,

Yes, I did state it with authority as you perceive. I make no excuses and stand by what I said. God is complete, in need of nothing, and in possesion of all things. I understand that all may not grasp that statement at their present understanding and I have no problem with that. No offence was given.

Love in Christ,
JM

[Dondi]

One pecular OT verse interests me in regard to the concept of the Trinity: Isaiah 49:16:

"Come ye near unto me, hear ye this; I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it was, there am I: and now the Lord GOD, and his Spirit, hath sent me."

To get a clearer picture of this, one has to identify the speaker and the subjects of this verse. We can deduce that the "I" refers to a being who has been "from the time that it was" as someone who has been here at the beginning. The context of the entire passage suggests the the speaker is God.

Once we have established the speaker here is God, the context at the end of the verse actually show three subjects. "from the time that it was, there am I" refers to the speaker (that is God), "and now the Lord GOD" (quite obviously God) and, "and his Spirit" (Who's Spirit? the Lord GOD's), and finally, "hath sent me" (back to the speaker, God)

Now I suppose that it could be argued that this a literary device in which God speaks in third person, but that would be like saying that God sent himself, which doesn't make logical sense if there were only one being described here.

But it does make logical sense if one holds to the concept of the Trinity. That is, "the Lord GOD (the Father) and His Spirit (the Holy Spirit), hath sent me (the Son)."

Yet how does one still keep with the idea that God is One?

Well, I've been thinking in the area of metaphysics. If God is eternal, the He exists outside time and space. He knows the beginning from the end ("...I am the first, I also am the last." vs 12). Let me propose that God the Father occupies eternity. But Jesus came into the world, which means, if Jesus is also God, then He entered into the time/space continuum. So we now have God the Father in the eternal and Jesus in the temporal. So what of the Holy Spirit. Could it be possible that the Holy Spirit is a conduit, of sorts, between the eternal and the temporal? That God's Power is expressed in the Holy Spirit from the eternal and into temporal, and therefore this is how God enters the into the universe. Jesus, born of the Holy Spirit, born of a woman, is the result of God completing the process of bringing Himself in the world.

So instead of viewing God as three separate beings, it is actually God coming through from the eternal via the Holy Spirit, who is the go between.

I sorta got this idea by what I learned from the properties of light, for scientists will tell you that light seems to act a particle whilst at the same time acts like a wave, depending on how it is observed. There is also the concept in quantum mechanics something called quantum entanglement, "in which the quantum states of two or more objects have to be described with reference to each other, even though the individual objects may be spatially separated." (Source: Wiki - Quantum entanglement).

Would it be a far stretch to apply this phenomenom to the idea of the Trinity? It certainly appears to solve the issue of the Three-in-One concept.

What do you think?

[Thomas]

Hi Dondi –

Well I for one think that's a very workable idea.

The Catholic West generally has tended to focus on Christology in Theology, some might say at the expense of the Holy Spirit – this was the driving force behind Vatican II – to focus on the Spirit in the life of the Church:

"Amen, amen, I say to you, he that believeth in me, the works that I do, he also shall do: and greater than these shall he do."
John 14:12

Only 'by the Power of the Holy Spirit' as we say, can such works be done.

Thomas

[Thomas]

Not true ... It may be abstract but Love is an essence, 'a state of being' and requires no subject/object relationship.

God does not require anything, but by definition love does – love can only exist in relation, without relation, there is no 'reason' for love and no mode of activity.

I would go further to say we cannot 'know' God in any comprehendable fashion outside of a subject/object relationship – and this is what Eckhart was pointing at – Union with God transcends the limit of subject/object so that both 'disappear' or 'cease to exist' but it is patent nonsense to suppose that at the height of Christian mystical experience is ... nothing ... Eckhart was many things, but not agnostic – his God was beyond knowledge in all comprehendable terms, but not in experiential terms ... when people assume that Eckhart means what Zen means, they miss the point.

Thomas

[Silas]

Originally Posted by mee

yes Jesus was unique because he was the only one created by Jehovah alone , everything else in the universe was created through Jesus christ. he certainly was the unique son of God.
For God loved the world so much that he gave his only-begotten Son, in order that everyone exercising faith in him might not be destroyed but have everlasting life. For God sent forth his Son into the world, not for him to judge the world, but for the world to be saved through him. JOHN 3;16-17

(Romans 8:32) He who did not even spare his own Son but delivered him up for us all, why will he not also with him kindly give us all other things?

(1 John 4:9) By this the love of God was made manifest in our case, because God sent forth his only-begotten Son into the world that we might gain life through him.

(Proverbs 8:22) "Jehovah himself produced me as the beginning of his way, the earliest of his achievements of long ago.

(Colossians 1:15) He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation;

You must be a Mormon or a JW. Only cults seem to get this messed up. Jesus was not Created, He is and was and will be the Great and Eternal I Am. How do you understand what Jesus did? The fact that He has all of God's attributes, the fact that He forgives sins and does only what God is said to do, etc.? Do you get tripped up because He obeyed His Father's commands? Why? Do you not see that He's showing us how to live by example? He did the Father's will in operation with the Holy Spirit, like we ought to do. This is so simple and really shouldnt be argued over...you just dont want to believe, as all sinners. Anway, check out the greek word for firstborn in Col. 1:15...It doesnt mean that Jesus was made.

[17th Angel]

Originally Posted by Thomas

Well, this might sound a bit philosophical, but me...

Love cannot exist in a vacuum. Love is a meaningless abstract, unless there is someone who loves, and someone who is loved. And when you have a lover and the loved, they are both equally aware of the love they have for the other.


Thomas

So how there is violence and hate growing stronger... day by day, that is god losing? Or his power drawing away... Fading? Because you say god is love... But if there is no love, then is there no god?

Originally Posted by Silas

This is so simple and really shouldnt be argued over...you just dont want to believe, as all sinners.

But you just love to argue the point?... *tuts* just like all SINNERS.

[path_of_one]

Originally Posted by Thomas

I would go further to say we cannot 'know' God in any comprehendable fashion outside of a subject/object relationship – and this is what Eckhart was pointing at – Union with God transcends the limit of subject/object so that both 'disappear' or 'cease to exist' but it is patent nonsense to suppose that at the height of Christian mystical experience is ... nothing ... Eckhart was many things, but not agnostic – his God was beyond knowledge in all comprehendable terms, but not in experiential terms ... when people assume that Eckhart means what Zen means, they miss the point.

Thomas

Oh, yes. This is what I was getting at. The experience, at least for me, is a simultaneous dissolution of subject/object relationship and yet the experience of relationship.

I think this is why I can so easily feel an affinity with Buddhism, but ultimately I can't make the leap away from belief in the One God. Having experienced it, I can see how most of our "selves" are, indeed, false and empty, and yet I also deeply believe and have experienced that beyond this false self there is something... not nothing. There is the opportunity for that emptiness to be filled by Christ.

I absolutely believe no religion, including Christianity, will ever really understand God. It is like being a tiny fish in the ocean- you experience the ocean, it is in every breath- but you can't fathom how it operates or how big it is or even what it looks like. I believe we are in God- this is God's immanence. But because of this immanence we can't possibly grasp Him. And yet, like the fish, we can experience Him. Comprehension impossible, but experience very possible.

[Thomas]

Godhead – a conundrum ...

There is a common metaphor for Divine Union or mystical experience that likens the individual to a drop of water, and the Divine to the ocean ... the union/experience is when the former becomes one with the latter so that there is no distinction between the two – Eckhart's 'Ground' –

Try an experiment:
Take a pint of water.
Take a drop of water.
Put the drop of water in the pint of water.

... now get it out again.

If, in this Union/Experience, all difference, all self/other, all I/Thou dissolves, how does the one become two once more?

How does the drop find itself apart from the Ocean once the Eternal Moment has passed?

Put another way - Divine Union (in Christian terms) does not mean two become one by the annihilation of one of the ones.

It can only be that the All holds the many in Itself ...
"I know a man in Christ: above fourteen years ago (whether in the body, I know not, or out of the body, I know not: God knoweth), such a one caught up to the third heaven. And I know such a man (whether in the body, or out of the body, I know not: God knoweth): That he was caught up into paradise and heard secret words which it is not granted to man to utter."
2 Corinthians 12:2-4

Thomas

[path_of_one]

Originally Posted by 17th Angel

So how there is violence and hate growing stronger... day by day, that is god losing? Or his power drawing away... Fading? Because you say god is love... But if there is no love, then is there no god?

I do not think that violence or hate grows stronger. If you look at human history, it's always been there in copious quantities.

I don't think God can lose. No Christian thinks He can, of course, because He is omnipotent. However, as a liberal Christian I push this farther, because I don't believe in a literal Satan. It is our own evils and our own self-centered perceptions that allow us to wallow in our hate and misery. God wants us to change- but not because He is losing or needs our help in any way. He wants us to let go of our self-centeredness and embrace Christ so that we can attain our highest potential and have joy and peace.

I do not think that God's power is fading in any way. Indeed, I experience so much of God everywhere and in everything that it is sometimes overwhelming.

From “The Deer’s Cry” (St. Patrick’s prayer):
I arise today,
Through the strength of Heaven:
Light of Sun, radiance of Moon, splendor of Fire,
Speed of Lightening, swiftness of Wind, depth of Sea,
Stability of Earth, firmness of Rock.
I arise today, through God’s strength to pilot me:
God’s might to uphold me, God’s wisdom to guide me,
God’s eye to look before me, God’s ear to hear me,
God’s word to speak for me, God’s hand to guard me,
God’s way to lie before me, God’s shield to protect me
From the snare of evil, and from the temptation of vice
Against every power and every person
That may oppose God’s path for me.
Christ be with me, Christ be before me,
Christ behind me, Christ within me,
Christ below me, Christ above me,
Christ on my right hand, Christ on my left.
Christ in my sleeping, Christ in my waking,
Christ in the hearts of all who think of me,
Christ in the mouths of all who speak of me,
Christ in each eye that looks to me,
Christ in all I meet.
Amen

There will always be love. It has nothing to do with humanity to me. Nature itself is replete with love. If the world were utterly destroyed, love would continue in God Itself, just as Love (aka God), existed long before humanity without any help from us.

I just don't give humanity that much power. What we do ultimately fades to dust, the Universe heals itself of anything we throw at it, and God remains.

We choose what we wish to see in the world. You may see God's Love fading. I see it as a constant. And I see God's Love growing in people all the time, even through their pain and suffering. And I am empowered by the Spirit to extend this love of Christ to others, in my ability to listen to them, to meet their needs, and to ease their suffering.

Christ is everywhere. God is everywhere. In us. In others. In the Earth-Mother Herself. It isn't hard to find- you just have to be open to seeing it.

[mee]

Originally Posted by Thomas

Hi Dondi –

Well I for one think that's a very workable idea.

The Catholic West generally has tended to focus on Christology in Theology, some might say at the expense of the Holy Spirit – this was the driving force behind Vatican II – to focus on the Spirit in the life of the Church:

"Amen, amen, I say to you, he that believeth in me, the works that I do, he also shall do: and greater than these shall he do."
John 14:12

Only 'by the Power of the Holy Spirit' as we say, can such works be done.

Thomas

yes the goodnews
of the kingdom is now preached in all nations and islands of the sea. when the active force of God is behind a work great things are accomplished. matthew 24;14 and matthew 28;19-20
Go therefore and make disciples of people of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all the things I have commanded YOU. And, look! I am with YOU all the days until the conclusion of the system of things.".............. yes teaching others what Jesus taught is the way to go . great things are going on, and the active force of God is behind it all.
And this good news of the kingdom will be preached in all the inhabited earth for a witness to all the nations; and then the end will come matthew 24;14

[17th Angel]

Originally Posted by path_of_one

I do not think that violence or hate grows stronger. If you look at human history, it's always been there in copious quantities.

I don't think God can lose.

I don't believe in a literal Satan.

It is our own evils and our own self-centered perceptions that allow us to wallow in our hate and misery.

There will always be love. It has nothing to do with humanity to me.

Interesting post there thanks. So anything bad is human, but good is not human it comes from a higher being? Satan = our bad intentions and actions... So wouldn't that mean god = our good intentions and actions, meaning there was no god? It was just how you acted, meaning you are either god or Satan? So you choose your own destiny? Not a god. But, if you believe in god, doesn't it say he made Satan? So to believe in a literal god, do you not have to believe in a literal Satan? Just trying to get this straight in my head....... *shruggs*