Clear Challenges to the Trinity Doctrine Examined

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Clear Challenges to the Trinity Doctrine Examined

Post #1

Post by tigger2 »

CLEAR CHALLENGES FOR THE TRINITY DOCTRINE

"trinity ...1. [cap.] Theol. The union of three persons or hypostases (the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost) in one Godhead, so that all the three are one God as to substance, but three persons or hypostases as to individuality. 2. Any symbol of the Trinity in art. 3. Any union of three in one; a triad; as the Hindu trinity, or Trimurti." - Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam Co., 1961.
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Athanasian Creed:

"And in this Trinity none is afore, or after other, none is greater or less than others; but the whole three persons are co- eternal together; and co-equal. So that in all things as is aforesaid: the Unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity is to be worshipped.

"HE THEREFORE THAT WILL BE SAVED MUST THUS THINK OF THE TRINITY."
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"Trinity, the Most Holy

"The most sublime mystery of the Christian faith is this: 'God is absolutely one in nature and essence, and relatively three in Persons (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) who are really distinct from each other." - p. 584, The Catholic Encyclopedia, Thomas Nelson, Inc., Publishers, 1976.
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The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
"1. The Term 'Trinity':
"The term "Trinity" is not a Biblical term, and we are not using Biblical language when we define what is expressed by it as the doctrine that there is one only and true God, but in the unity of the Godhead there are three coeternal and coequal Persons, the same in substance but distinct in subsistence." - p. 3012, Vol. IV, Eerdmans, 1984.

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Clear Challenges from scripture itself:

(A) Please carefully and thoroughly search to find a vision, dream, or clear description in scripture wherein God is visibly shown as more than one person.

(This is really not that difficult. Either there is a vision, dream, description, etc. somewhere in scripture clearly visibly showing the one God as three persons or there isn't. Either way, it should not be difficult to ascertain and admit truthfully.)
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(B) Please show where in scripture God is ever described using the word "three."

(Either God is described somewhere in scripture using the word "three" or its clear equivalent (just as He is clearly and frequently described with the word “one� or its equivalent - “alone,� “only,� etc. ), or He is not. Either way it should not be difficult to ascertain and admit truthfully.)
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(C) Please find clear, direct, undisputed statements (equivalent to “Jesus is the Christ� or "YHWH is God" which are found repeatedly in clear, undisputed scriptures) which declare:

“YHWH is the Son,� or “YHWH is the Firstborn,� or, “YHWH is the Messiah (or ‘Christ’),� or any other equally clear, undisputed statement that “Jesus is YHWH� (the only God according to scripture).
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Since the Father is clearly, directly, and indisputably called "God, the Father," many, many times, and the Son and Holy Spirit are said by trinitarians to be equally the one God (in ‘three distinct persons’):

(D) Please give equally clear, undisputed scriptures where Jesus is called "God, the Son," (equal to those which declare "God, the Father" – Ro. 15:6; 1 Cor. 1:3; 1 Cor. 8:6; 2 Cor. 11:31; Gal. 1:1; Eph. 4:6; 1 Thess. 1:1; 2 Thess. 1:2; etc.)

and,
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(E) Please give equally clear, undisputed scriptures (such as "God, the Father") where the Holy Spirit is called "God, the Holy Spirit."
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(F) If Jesus and/or the first century Christians (considered a sect of Judaism at that time) truly believed that Jesus was God, how could they possibly be allowed to teach in the temple and synagogues as they were? (This not only would not have been allowed, but the Jews would have stoned them to death.)
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(G) If John truly believed a stunning new essential ‘knowledge’ of God that Jesus is equally God, why would he summarize and conclude his Gospel with, “But these [the Gospel of John] are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God…�

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(H) When the chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin were attempting to gather evidence to kill Jesus, why did they have to hire false witnesses? And why did these same priests and false witnesses never say that Jesus believed (or taught) that he was God? Instead the high priest finally said to Jesus: “Tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God.� - Matt. 26:59-63 NIV.

Obviously these officials had never heard anyone accuse Jesus or his followers of claiming that Jesus was God!

I believe any objective observer would admit that the answers to these simple scriptural challenges (A-H above) should be abundantly, clearly, indisputably available if the trinity (or ‘Jesus is God’) worshipers are correct.

To look for rare instances of unclear, disputed scriptures which have to be interpreted to fit a trinitarian concept (developed after the death of the last Apostle and the completion of Scripture) and convince yourself that they are "proofs" seems to me to be a tragic error.

God has always existed as God and, therefore, His people should have always known who He was and worshiped him in truth.

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Post #21

Post by dio9 »

The trinity was cooked up by Greek Church Fathers . I can see God as Father (as Jesus taught) and Jesus (who never declared himself to be God) but the third person should be the feminine nature of God expressed in creation as Father Mother and savior son. It is a mistake to think the HS is male. Are we to think God is all male? Who then is the source of female nature expressed historically as blessed virgin and Holy Mother. Eve was created in the image of God together with Adam. Trinity is Father Mother and Savior . I see each of these aspects together as God.

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Post #22

Post by tigger2 »

I see each of these aspects together as God.


Everyone is free to 'see' whatever they wish.

However it is obvious that no one is able to give the examples requested in Challenges A-E nor answer the questions in F-H. If the trinity were believed in by the writers of the NT, these should have been easily answered.

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Post #23

Post by Wootah »

tigger2 wrote:
I see each of these aspects together as God.


Everyone is free to 'see' whatever they wish.

However it is obvious that no one is able to give the examples requested in Challenges A-E nor answer the questions in F-H. If the trinity were believed in by the writers of the NT, these should have been easily answered.
I've repeatedly tried to engage you on your challenges so that seems unfair to make your conclusion. Why would i bother with your list if you won't explore challenge A?
Proverbs 18:17 The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him.

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Post #24

Post by Wootah »

Challenge A
Previously you said that if there were clear images of 3 beings in the Bible you would be a Trinitarian and not a Polytheist.

Are you saying there is evidence in the Bible for Trinitarianism to compliment those images? If not then why do you feel you would not be a Polytheist?
Proverbs 18:17 The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him.

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Post #25

Post by tigger2 »

[Replying to Wootah]

My answer to Wootah in another discussion:
I certainly didn't say "that there is no clear example of three beings ever being together in the Bible." Three beings together being referred to as God. is clearly what I asked for.

If I found all 8 challenges clearly pointing to a 3 person God (or even 6 of the 8), I believe I would have to believe in a trinity.

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum ... (post 2)

Since God is clearly and repeatedly called 'one' and if there were also proper examples of His being three in my eight challenges, I would be forced to believe that He is a three-in-one God. Since no one can give clear, scriptural answers to them, I Do not believe in the trinity.

I find it telling that Trinitarians won't do the same. That is, even though they can't provide any clear evidence for a trinity in these very basic challenges, they still won't give up the trinity doctrine.

God is the Father alone. God is YHWH (Jehovah/Yahweh) alone.

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Post #26

Post by Wootah »

[Replying to post 25 by tigger2]

Yes but you are now bringing your preconceived ideas to the question because you say there is no scriptual support for the concept. So you wouldn't be a trinitarian and even if you would, could you concede that many others might see polytheism in the Bible with the images you request?

If you could conceive that problem (of your request creating more polytheists) have you not an answer to challenge A?
Proverbs 18:17 The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him.

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Post #27

Post by Overcomer »

I have only just come to this thread and have not read through your eight points, tigger2. But before I do so, I have a question: How do you define the Trinity?

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Post #28

Post by tigger2 »

For Overcomer:

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum ... p?t=34270

For my understanding of the trinity doctrine see the first several paragraphs of the OP above.

Please respond to my answer to your clear misstatements found in my above link (end of post 8 and all of post 9).

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Post #29

Post by Overcomer »

tigger2 wrote:
For Overcomer:

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum ... p?t=34270

For my understanding of the trinity doctrine see the first several paragraphs of the OP above.

Please respond to my answer to your clear misstatements found in my above link (end of post 8 and all of post 9).
My apologies for not responding to your posts in that other thread long ago. This is my second day back posting on the forum after more than a month-long vacation from it. I obviously have some catching up to do.

Re: your definition of the Trinity -- You offered other people's definitions of the Trinity. I am interested in how YOU define and understand it, not definitions from a dictionary or encylopedia. So I ask again, when you hear the word "Trinity" as people relate it to the Bible, how do you understand it?

tigger2 wrote:
So, let's examine, one by one, what should be found in scripture (if the trinity were true) as listed above.
As soon as I read that, I thought, “Oh, no! He’s going to give us a list of fallacious arguments from silence.�

And you did.

Attempting to refute the doctrine of the Trinity based on things that are NOT in the Bible is a bogus approach to the subject. We can only work with what we DO have in the text. If you want to refute the hundreds of verses that speak to the reality of the Trinity, that's fine. Here they are:

http://irr.org/biblical-basis-of-doctrine-of-trinity

That's the problem with arguments from silence. They typically ignore evidence for that which they're arguing against.

I'm sorry, but I'm not going to spend time refuting fallacious propositions. It's a waste of time and I don't have time to waste.

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Post #30

Post by tigger2 »

For Overcomer:

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum ... p?t=34270

For my understanding of the trinity doctrine see the first several paragraphs of the OP above. Since I don't believe in any form of the trinity doctrine as promoted by various Trinitarians, I have to use the definitions quoted by most Trinitarians.

As for your assertion that the Challenges in the OP are "a list of fallacious arguments from silence" - you are making up your own rule to avoid the obvious facts. It is specifically noted that if the trinity were true, we should expect to find certain obvious things. The Challenge is to find some of these 'obvious' things. I could have missed some of these things (I don't think so), so you should search for them to prove me wrong. (For example I did not examine every vision, dream, etc.
which shows the figure of God.)

This is no more 'fallacious arguments from silence" than challenging Christians to find proof of his Messiahship in scripture by finding things that should obviously be there (if he is truly Christ). 1. Does he ever admit that he is the Christ? 2. Do his disciples ever admit that he is the Christ? Does scripture by Non-Gospel writers ever admit that he is the Christ? Do we ever find that he sits or stands on the right hand of God? Does scripture ever describe things Jesus has done that were never done by others? Is he ever described as the King and savior of men? Did he fulfill any OT scriptures concerning the Messiah? Etc. Aren't these things we would expect to be in scripture if he were truly the Christ?

Which of the challenges in the OP are not to be expected in scripture if the trinity doctrine were true?

Please respond to my answer to your clear misstatements found in my above link (end of post 8 and all of post 9).

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