What is the Trinity? To be short, it´s not from So NiNi. It is very much a man made belief. See, just the way a child will point out things to an adult, like they trying to say you are complicating things, a little one will struggle to explain the complex stories of adults. A child's mind is different, less corrupted... a quote befitting this, by Christ (Matthew 18,3): And he said:
“Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."
So let us then, like little children again start to understand things. Lets see now how the doctrine of the Trinity has become a household name, and something that everyones believes but cannot really explain how. Because just like praying in the name of Amen, this teaching is not from So NiNi. So then, as Christmas, a time when the Saviour is suppose to have been born, is drawing near. It is a time when we are reminded of all the pagan practises that has been adopted by churches and believers up through the ages. Because just as with most people today, they are involved in the worship of the sun and run after other gods like they run after their own volitions (sins). Let us therefore lay one of these man made traditions to rest for good this time.
The question is simple, how can one Almighty God (monotheism, the mark of being a Hebrew was the belief in One Old and Almighty One), how can He suddenly become three, the father, the son and the holy spirit? Don't listen to preachings on how these three entities is a mystery and all that. The Son and the Father being one, that surely is a mystery, and the joy of being a believer is living that mystery. But believing in three separate entities? Nah. How could the ancient Hebrews of Southern Africa, pride themselves with cries of war and love such as: Shema (Listen) Israel, the Lord our God, THE LORD IS ONE (Deuteronomy 6,4 ; 11-13-21, Numbers 15,37-41).
This sounds like One God, how come all the sudden He is three different entities/units? Yes the whole concept of the trinity is pagan and has no place in the worship and dependency of One Ultimate Creator. Lets go deeper...
Now people assume that the Father (Inkosi), Christ the Son (Nkosanna) and the Holy Spirit make out or form what is commonly known as the trinity. A belief summed up as a belief in one God existing (or co-living) in three distinct but somehow equal persons. Now even allot of sincere people believe this, because they have been told, the trinity does not appear in Scripture. The term trinity does not appear until centuries after the last books and letters was composed in the Bible. This was long after Christ and the apostles had already cemented their teachings. Teachings which Paul said would become corrupted. And indeed they have been.
If we consult the New Bible Dictionary (1996) under Trinity:
“The term trinity is not itself found in the Bible. It was first used by Tertullian at the close of the 2nd century, but received wide currency [common use in intellectual discussion] and formal elucidation [clarification] only in the 4th and 5th centuries.”
Almost all Christians will struggle trying to explain the ‘Doctrine of the Trinity’ to other believers (different faiths) and also laymen (non-believers). Lets try to make sense out of this... Now these three persons supposedly make one God i.e. God consists of three lords: God the Father, Jesus (the son) and the Holy Spirit/Ghost. They also refer to the three as the Godhead of God. Christ didn’t teach this and neither did other prophets. This teaching came after Christ and not before, and therefore is cannot be from Christ.
Just listen to these Scriptures:
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord:”
- Deuteronomy 6:4 KJV
“And Christ answered him, The first of all the commandments is,
Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord:”
- Mark 12:29
The trinity is good old fashioned blasphemy. A tell-tale sign of this being something not of the Father So NiNi, is that fact that people have been taught something they cannot in any good sense explain. Or they lean on their own misunderstanding and confusion saying, as humans we do not have the capacity to understand the Trinity concept. Haibo... !
If they are followers of Pauls’ teachings they would know (1. Corinthians 14,33):
“For SoNiNi is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.”
Have a closer look at Genesis 1,26:
“And SoNiNi said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.”
Now allot of Christians believe believe the highlighted words in the above verses (us, our) show the plurality of lords in their concept of the Trinity. They have obviously no understanding of the language. This is the Majestic language of God, another word that is frequently used is “We”. These words do not in any way signify a plurality of lords. God is always one Being.
The Christian Trinity
This is what is looks like, The Father, the Son (Christ) and the Holy Spirit are supposed to make one God. 3 beings / lords make one God. But listen, this is nothing new - The ‘Doctrine of the Trinity’ is not a new thing in religion. It has pagan roots and the concept has been around since ancient days. Below are listed more trinities, and here are many more as every civilisation had its own concepts trinity, in some form or another. So, just like things stem from Egypt or Babylon in some form or another, again different versions of trinities evolved from existing ones. The “Godhead” which is the triangle consists of three beings/lords which make one God. Let`s have a look at the most common ones.
The Ancient Egyptian Trinity
The Father (Osiris), the son (Horus) and Isis are supposed to make one. Again we see, 3 beings / lords make one God. 19th century minister and author Alexander Hislop stated, “The trinity got its start in Ancient Babylon with Nimrod—Tammuz—and Semiramis. Semiramis demanded worship for both her husband and her son as well as herself. She claimed that her son was both the father and the son. Yes, he was ‘god the father’ and ‘god the son’—The first divine incomprehensible trinity”. The same is true of other constructs like the Egyptian Isis—Horus—Set or Isis—Horus—Osiris. Whichever combination of Egyptian gods one packages together as three, there is one common element—one deity giving birth to another. In each myth, Horus is an offspring.
The Ancient Persian Trinity
The father (Ahura Mazda), the son (Mithra) and Anahita are supposed to make one. 3 beings / lords make one God. You can even find a trinity in Greek mythology, which involves Apollo being part if it. Apollo is, of course, the son of Zeus. Whether one looks at Hindu, Egyptian, Babylonian, Persian or Greek gods, there is one common thread in all of them and that is that one deity proceeds from another. The Hebrews differ from this line of faith, as the Ancient One, Mdala, Qamata So NiNi, was always there.
The Hindu Trinity
The father (Brahma), the son (Vishnu) and Shiva are supposed to make one. 3 beings / lords make one God. They called it trimurti (Three forms), the so-called triple deity in the supreme divinity of Hinduism... And Again follows the creations tales, how to maintain and then destruction, personified in this triad, Brahma the creator, Vishnu the preserver and Shiva the destroyer. Now neither Shiva nor the Holy Spirit seems to be apart from one another in this theory...
If we have a look at some researchers, one can easily see that this expose has been done by many other people, all with different agendas of course, nevertheless the trinity has been exposed. Time and time again.
Marie Sinclair, Countess of Caithness, in her 1876 book Old Truths in a New Light, states (Sinclair, 1876:382):
"It is generally, although erroneously, supposed that the doctrine of the Trinity is of Christian origin. Nearly every nation of antiquity possessed a similar doctrine. [The early Catholic theologian] St. Jerome testifies unequivocally, 'All the ancient nations believed in the Trinity'"
Notice how the following quotes document belief in a divine trinity in many regions and religions of the ancient world.
Sumeria
"The universe was divided into three regions each of which became the domain of a god. Anu's share was the sky. The earth was given to Enlil. Ea became the ruler of the waters. Together they constituted the triad of the Great Gods"
(The Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology, 1994, pp. 54-55)
Babylonia
"The ancient Babylonians recognised the doctrine of a trinity, or three persons in one god—as appears from a composite god with three heads forming part of their mythology, and the use of the equilateral triangle, also, as an emblem of such trinity in unity"
(T. D. Rock, The Mystical Woman and the Cities of the Nations, 1867:22-23)
India
"The Puranas, one of the Hindoo Bibles of more than 3,000 years ago, contain the following passage: 'O ye three Lords! know that I recognise only one God. Inform me, therefore, which of you is the true divinity, that I may address to him alone my adorations.' The three gods, Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva [or Shiva], becoming manifest to him, replied, 'Learn, O devotee, that there is no real distinction between us. What to you appears such is only the semblance. The single being appears under three forms by the acts of creation, preservation, and destruction, but he is one.'
"Hence the triangle was adopted by all the ancient nations as a symbol of the Deity . . . Three was considered among all the pagan nations as the chief of the mystical numbers, because, as Aristotle remarks, it contains within itself a beginning, a middle, and an end. Hence we find it designating some of the attributes of almost all the pagan gods"
-(Sinclair, 1876:382-383)
Greece
"In the Fourth Century B.C. Aristotle wrote: 'All things are three, and thrice is all: and let us use this number in the worship of the gods; for, as the Pythagoreans say, everything and all things are bounded by threes, for the end, the middle and the beginning have this number in everything, and these compose the number of the Trinity'"
- (Arthur Weigall, Paganism in Our Christianity, 1928, pp. 197-198).
Egypt
"The Hymn to Amun decreed that 'No god came into being before him (Amun)' and that 'All gods are three: Amun, Re and Ptah, and there is no second to them. Hidden is his name as Amon, he is Re in face, and his body is Ptah.' . . . This is a statement of trinity, the three chief gods of Egypt subsumed into one of them, Amon. Clearly, the concept of organic unity within plurality got an extraordinary boost with this formulation. Theologically, in a crude form it came strikingly close to the later Christian form of plural Trinitarian monotheism"
- (Simson Najovits, Egypt, Trunk of the Tree, Vol. 2, 2004, pp. 83-84).
And many others.... had their own divine trinities. In Greece they were Zeus, Poseidon and Adonis. The Phoenicians worshipped Ulomus, Ulosuros and Eliun. Rome worshipped Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto. In Germanic nations they were called Wodan, Thor and Fricco. Regarding the Celts, one source states:
"The ancient heathen deities of the pagan Irish[,] Criosan, Biosena, and Seeva, or Sheeva, are doubtless the Creeshna [Krishna], Veeshnu [Vishnu], [or the all-inclusive] Brahma, and Seeva [Shiva], of the Hindoos"
- (Thomas Maurice, The History of Hindostan, Vol. 2, 1798:171).
...The origin of the conception is entirely pagan
Egyptologist Arthur Weigall (1880-1934), summed up the influence of ancient beliefs on the adoption of the Trinity doctrine by the Catholic Church in the following excerpt (Weigall, 1928:197):
"It must not be forgotten that Jesus Christ never mentioned such a phenomenon [the Trinity], and nowhere in the New Testament does the word 'Trinity' appear. The idea was only adopted by the Church three hundred years after the death of our Lord; and the origin of the conception is entirely pagan . . .
"The ancient Egyptians, whose influence on early religious thought was profound, usually arranged their gods or goddesses in trinities: there was the trinity of Osiris, Isis, and Horus, the trinity of Amen, Mut, and Khonsu, the trinity of Khnum, Satis, and Anukis, and so forth . . .
"The early Christians, however, did not at first think of applying the idea to their own faith. They paid their devotions to God the Father and to Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and they recognized the mysterious and undefined existence of the Holy Spirit; but there was no thought of these three being an actual Trinity, co-equal and united in One . . .
"The application of this old pagan conception of a Trinity to Christian theology was made possible by the recognition of the Holy Spirit as the required third 'Person,' co-equal with the other 'Persons' . . .
"The idea of the Spirit being co-equal with God was not generally recognised until the second half of the Fourth Century A.D. . . . In the year 381 the Council of Constantinople added to the earlier Nicene Creed a description of the Holy Spirit as 'the Lord, and giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, who with the Father and Son together is worshipped and glorified.' .
"Thus, the Athanasian creed, which is a later composition but reflects the general conceptions of Athanasius [the 4th-century Trinitarian whose view eventually became official doctrine] and his school, formulated the conception of a co-equal Trinity wherein the Holy Spirit was the third 'Person'; and so it was made a dogma of the faith, and belief in the Three in One and One in Three became a paramount doctrine of Christianity, though not without terrible riots and bloodshed . . .
"Today a Christian thinker . . . has no wish to be precise about it, more especially since the definition is obviously pagan in origin and was not adopted by the Church until nearly three hundred years after Christ"
James Bonwick (1817-1906) summarised the story in Egyptian Belief and Modern Thought (Bonwick, 1878, 396):
"It is an undoubted fact that more or less all over the world the deities are in triads. This rule applies to eastern and western hemispheres, to north and south.
"Further, it is observed that, in some mystical way, the triad of three persons is one. The first is as the second or third, the second as first or third, the third as first or second; in fact, they are each other, one and the same individual being. The definition of Athanasius, who lived in Egypt, applies to the trinities of all heathen religions."
Pagan Roots of the Trinity Doctrine
So we can safely say that The Trinity doctrine is not unique to, nor original with, Christianity. It has deep Pagan roots, dating far back back and has been prominent in many Eastern religions ever since. Now this evidence points to the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Church Councils (Western and Eastern churches) being the ones who brought the Trinity doctrine into Christianity. This occurred before there was a final split between the two over authority. Even those who voted the idea into Roman Catholic dogma declared it was a mystery that had to be accepted by faith.... Now theologians pretty much agree (Catholic Encyclopedia) and freely admit that there is no Old Testament indication of a triune God, and very little in the New Testament that can be construed that way. These very same theologians also admit that it was a product of tradition that evolved over four centuries. The evolution of the trinity doctrine within Christianity began with The Apostle’s Creed, progressed to the Nicene Creed, and finally culminated in the Athanasian Creed.
The Apostle’s Creed which was not written by the Apostles at all, but by the RCC (Roman Catholic Church). While this simple statement of faith had nothing to say about a Trinity, or even hint that Christ was God, it laid the groundwork for further expansion, and was modified several times over the years.
The Nicene Creed was the next step. At the insistence of the Roman emperor, Constantine, and for the purpose of establishing unity between Christianity and Pagan beliefs, Christ was declared to be coequal, coeternal, and consubstantial with God. This established, Constantine made Christianity the state religion of the Roman Empire. Before Constantine’s rule the Christians suffered much persecution at the hands of Rome.
The Athanasian Creed developed even further the Trinitarian concepts of the theologian Athanasius. The time of its original writing is not known, nor is its author. Although the historians will say that it was probably composed in the fifth century, though some claim it may have been as late as the ninth century. Even the Catholic Encyclopaedia is vague about its origin. However, this blog questions all datings as history is very much a construed thing...
The Christian Church’s roots were originally from Judaism (from the Hebrews of Southern Africa), which was, and still is a monotheistic (One-God) religion. There is no belief in a polytheistic (Plural) God in the Old Testament. On the contrary, OT scriptures declare the singleness of God. Just have a look at them...
Isa. 43:10 Ye are my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.
Isa. 45:18 For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else.
The Nicene and Athenian creeds are in direct denial of these scriptures as well as many others. First, they had to declare that Christ was God, and that he was eternal....which also contradicts scripture.
Num. 23:19 God is not a man that he should lie, neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?
Christ was a man; and he referred to himself as the Son of Man many times.
Psa. 2:7 I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.
Christ was begotten, (born) at a point in time, according to the Hebrew prophecies. The Athanasian Creed also states that Christ was God incarnated. This contradicts scripture also, Christ came in the flesh and God does not change, and He is One.
Mal. 3:6 For I am the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.