09-02-2009, 12:16 PM
Many groups do not see a need to peel back the layers of tradition in order to discover what the original apostolic faith of the first century was. Rather, they are content to hold fast to the beliefs and practices that the church has bequeathed to them regardless of whether or not they were held to by the early Christians. That is not the sort of Christian I am. Instead, I am a restorationist—someone who wants to understand and align my practice of Christianity as closely as possible with the earliest Christians. Unfortunately, many times people who belong to restorationist groups, like us, oversimplify what early Christianity looked like. We imagine that everyone got along and agreed on doctrines, that there were no major schisms or controversies until much later. Some of us probably even believe that until the fourth century when the trinitarian controversy occurred, everything was serene and unified. But, this picture, no matter how much we might want for it to be true, is simply not accurate in light of the facts.
In actuality, many of the epistles of Paul deal specifically with controversial issues in the new churches. For example, in Corinth, there had been an issue where the saints had begun to split into factions: one for Paul, one for Apollos, one for Cephas, and one for Christ. Paul responded:
1 Corinthians 1.13-15
13 Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? 14 I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, 15 so that no one would say you were baptized in my name.
Further controversies concerned the role of women in the meeting, which was apparently an issue in the first century (1 Corinthians 14.34-36; 1 Timothy 2.11-15). Also, one of the most significant issues that caused division was whether or not Gentiles were required to keep the Law of Moses. In fact, the disagreement was so sharp and the outcome so serious that a council was held in Jerusalem with the pillars of the church in order to decide on the issue. The resultant letter (Acts 15.23-29) was then carried throughout the Mediterranean world by Paul and Silas to inform the churches that Gentiles were accepted without a need to become circumcised and keep the Law of Moses. Later on, another controversy arose over whether or not Jews needed to keep the Law of Moses. Sadly, that issue was not resolved as quickly, though the epistle to the Hebrews certainly does make it clear that because of Christ’s work even Jews are freed from the yoke of Torah.
My purpose in mentioning these early disagreements is simply to point out the fact that even back in the first century, in the early years of Christianity, there were plenty of controversies over all sorts of issues. Why was that the case? The answer is simple: any time someone changes their theological views on an issue and then teaches others, there is usually going to be someone who resists the change. Controversy is not necessarily bad even if it is uncomfortable, because through dialog and dispute often times we are able to learn where we need to change. So, when there is a significant change in doctrine there are almost always growing pains as people deliberate and transition occurs.
However, once we begin to talk about the doctrine of the Trinity, there is a major historical hole. The trinitarian myth generally goes like this: “Jesus claimed to be God in a trinitarian sense; he taught that he was God to his disciples who accepted it on the basis of his miracles and resurrection; it wasn’t until three hundred years later when the heretic Arius started spouting nonsense about Jesus being created that the church needed to formulate a creed to fight him off, though the church had believed in the Trinity all along.†Generally speaking, trinitarian defenders will tip their hats to a historical reconstruction similar to this. If the question is asked, “Who was the first trinitarian?†The answer is always “Jesus.†But if one asks, “Who was the second trinitarian,†suddenly we have a major thought experiment on our hands, because nowhere in Scripture does Jesus ever teach the Trinity. So, the trinitarian is left to fumble his or her way to the answer, “Well, the Scripture doesn’t say, but I’m sure the disciples believed in it.†But, isn’t that just assuming the answer from the outset? Furthermore, where is the controversy?
It is absolutely critical to realize that the first generation of Christians was strictly monotheistic. They were raised to believe in the Shema, the central creed of Judaism which teaches that Yahweh our God is one Yahweh (not two or three). From that day to today, one would be hard pressed to find a single Jew who would just go along with the idea that the Messiah is God. It’s just not part of their religion. But if Jesus really was teaching that he was God in a trinitarian sense to non-trinitarian, first-century Jews, then wouldn’t that be a massively significant change? Yet, as we saw just a moment ago, change generally breeds controversy. In fact, we could say that the bigger the change the more likely it is that there will be resistance.
Let’s take it one step further. Let’s assume that the disciples had no trouble accepting this new formula for defining God and they went forth proclaiming the Trinity from town to town after Jesus ascended into heaven. As they arrived at synagogue after synagogue it is easy to observe that there was significant resistance and persecution, which is what we would expect if they were now teaching that God is three-in-one rather than just one. Even so we must ask the question, why were the early Christians persecuted? Was it because they taught that Jesus was God or was it for other reasons?
In Judea Peter and John were persecuted by the Sanhedrin for proclaiming the resurrection of a man they had executed as a false messiah (Acts 4.2; 5.28). Stephen was first accused of saying “that this Nazarene, Jesus, will destroy this place and alter the customs which Moses handed down to us†(Acts 6.14). Then he called the Sanhedrin to repentance (Acts 7.51-53) which enraged them to such a point that they gnashed their teeth, stopped their ears, and stoned him to death (Acts 7.54-58). Once Paul became a Christian he preached in Damascus that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God (Acts 9.20-22). He was so difficult to defeat in argument that the people decided to murder him, though he narrowly escaped when he was let down from the city wall in a basket (Acts 9.23-25). In Pisidian Antioch, Paul and Barnabas were persecuted by the Jewish leadership because they were jealous that many of the Gentile proselytes and Jews gravitated towards the Christian message (Acts 13.42-45). The early Christians in Syrian Antioch were harassed by Christian Judaizers because the Jewish Christians ate with the Gentile Christians, accepting them as full members of the people of God even though they were not circumcised and they did not keep the Law of Moses (Galatians 2.4, 11-16; Acts 15.1-2). In Philippi, Paul and Silas were seized and beaten after they had cast a demon out of a girl who was being used to make money by telling fortunes (Acts 16.16-19). The specific accusation brought against them was that they (being Jews) were throwing the city into confusion by “proclaiming customs which it is not lawful for us to accept or to observe, being Romans†(Acts 16.20-21). In Thessalonica, Paul and Silas preached that the Messiah had to suffer and rise again from the dead and that Jesus was in fact the Messiah (Acts 17.3). When a large number of God-fearing Gentiles and a number of the leading Jewish women joined Paul and Silas, the Jews became jealous and instigated a city-wide uproar. As a result they seized Jason (the one who was housing Paul and Silas) and dragged him before the city authorities saying, “These men who have upset the world have come here also… they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus†(Acts 17.6-7). In Ephesus, Paul’s traveling companions—Gaius and Aristarchus—were dragged by an angry mob into the theatre where they shouted out “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians†for hours since Paul had been teaching that idols were not real gods (Acts 19.26). Later on, in Jerusalem, Paul was nearly torn to pieces by a riot which broke out because they thought he had brought Trophimus, a Gentile from Ephesus, into the inner courts of the Temple (Acts 21.28-29). The formal accusation they brought against Paul was that they found him to be “a real pest and a fellow who stirs up dissension among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ring leader of the sect of the Nazarenes. And he even tried to desecrate the temple†(Acts 24.5-6). The Roman administrator, Porcius Festus summarized the accusation like this, “they [the accusing Jews] simply had some points of disagreement with him [Paul] about their own religion and about a dead man, Jesus, whom Paul asserted to be alive†(Acts 25.18-19).
There is no shortage of trouble the early Christians faced as they traipsed about the Mediterranean world proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and Christ, but isn’t it telling that they never even once faced the accusation that they were redefining God? Never did someone say, “I can’t accept Jesus as God because that would be idolatry.†Not once did a riot erupt over Paul proclaiming that Jesus of Nazareth was a divine being. Yet, every single Jew today would say exactly that if they were asked to recognize Jesus as the second member of the holy Trinity.
It is preposterous to think that Jesus or his apostles redefined the concept of God from a unipersonal, monotheistic belief that “Yahweh alone is God†to some triune God of three persons when there is not one New Testament book, not one chapter, not one paragraph describing such a change. There is no explanation of how the clear statements of radical monotheism found in the Old Testament could be reinterpreted in light of this new understanding of divine plurality. We should find at least one church in either Palestine or the Diaspora that struggled to accept this new doctrine of God. To think that the early Church debated over accepting the Gentiles, keeping the Law, how to keep communion, the role of women in the Church, yet never once had any trouble at all accepting that God is now mysteriously three instead of one is absurd. Would not some group of Christians resist a change of this magnitude? Yet, what we have instead is a conspiracy of silence—zero evidence that the Trinity even existed in New Testament times.
Eventually a controversy about whether or not Jesus was God did break out, but it was in Egypt not in Judea, in the early fourth century not in the first century. This controversy was so severe that no less than twenty-five councils met specifically to address this issue between a.d. 318 and 381. Fifteen of them found in favor of Arius who taught that Jesus was a created being
[Theodosius]
Theodosius (a.d. 347 - 395)
and seven found in favor of Alexander and Athanasius who taught that Jesus was fully God with no beginning. (Three of them ended in stalemate). In fact, it was not until Theodosius (the emperor who took office in a.d. 379) made non-trinitarian beliefs illegal that the die was cast and orthodox Christianity cemented itself into a rigidly trinitarian shape. The church could just as easily have had a unitarian rather than a trinitarian creed, but politics, in the end, were the decisive factor. Had the non-trinitarians been more successful in courting the emperor’s favor everything would have been different.
So what are we to make of these facts? Controversies come about when new ideas emerge that conflict with people’s long-held and cherished beliefs. The Trinity was certainly a new idea which nearly all scholars agree was not taught at all in the Hebrew Bible (our Old Testament). Furthermore, the Trinity was foreign to the way first century Jews thought about God and the Messiah. Thus, if Jesus did come on the scene revealing this “truth†then where is the evidence of it? We have no passage from the New Testament explaining or even stating the Trinity. Furthermore, there is no controversy within the church where some Christians rejected it and needed to be persuaded otherwise. In addition, when the Christians traveled abroad as missionaries, supposedly teaching the Trinity among other things, they were met with repeated persecution for a variety of reasons, yet in not one case was there a conflict about whether or not Jesus was God. Last of all, we do find controversy over this issue, but it is not until much later. I think if we take these historical lines of argumentation together we have solid grounds to reject the myth that Jesus and/or the disciples believed and taught the doctrine of the Trinity.
Original Here
http://kingdomready.org/blog/2009/07/29/...ntroversy/
Jake
In actuality, many of the epistles of Paul deal specifically with controversial issues in the new churches. For example, in Corinth, there had been an issue where the saints had begun to split into factions: one for Paul, one for Apollos, one for Cephas, and one for Christ. Paul responded:
1 Corinthians 1.13-15
13 Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? 14 I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, 15 so that no one would say you were baptized in my name.
Further controversies concerned the role of women in the meeting, which was apparently an issue in the first century (1 Corinthians 14.34-36; 1 Timothy 2.11-15). Also, one of the most significant issues that caused division was whether or not Gentiles were required to keep the Law of Moses. In fact, the disagreement was so sharp and the outcome so serious that a council was held in Jerusalem with the pillars of the church in order to decide on the issue. The resultant letter (Acts 15.23-29) was then carried throughout the Mediterranean world by Paul and Silas to inform the churches that Gentiles were accepted without a need to become circumcised and keep the Law of Moses. Later on, another controversy arose over whether or not Jews needed to keep the Law of Moses. Sadly, that issue was not resolved as quickly, though the epistle to the Hebrews certainly does make it clear that because of Christ’s work even Jews are freed from the yoke of Torah.
My purpose in mentioning these early disagreements is simply to point out the fact that even back in the first century, in the early years of Christianity, there were plenty of controversies over all sorts of issues. Why was that the case? The answer is simple: any time someone changes their theological views on an issue and then teaches others, there is usually going to be someone who resists the change. Controversy is not necessarily bad even if it is uncomfortable, because through dialog and dispute often times we are able to learn where we need to change. So, when there is a significant change in doctrine there are almost always growing pains as people deliberate and transition occurs.
However, once we begin to talk about the doctrine of the Trinity, there is a major historical hole. The trinitarian myth generally goes like this: “Jesus claimed to be God in a trinitarian sense; he taught that he was God to his disciples who accepted it on the basis of his miracles and resurrection; it wasn’t until three hundred years later when the heretic Arius started spouting nonsense about Jesus being created that the church needed to formulate a creed to fight him off, though the church had believed in the Trinity all along.†Generally speaking, trinitarian defenders will tip their hats to a historical reconstruction similar to this. If the question is asked, “Who was the first trinitarian?†The answer is always “Jesus.†But if one asks, “Who was the second trinitarian,†suddenly we have a major thought experiment on our hands, because nowhere in Scripture does Jesus ever teach the Trinity. So, the trinitarian is left to fumble his or her way to the answer, “Well, the Scripture doesn’t say, but I’m sure the disciples believed in it.†But, isn’t that just assuming the answer from the outset? Furthermore, where is the controversy?
It is absolutely critical to realize that the first generation of Christians was strictly monotheistic. They were raised to believe in the Shema, the central creed of Judaism which teaches that Yahweh our God is one Yahweh (not two or three). From that day to today, one would be hard pressed to find a single Jew who would just go along with the idea that the Messiah is God. It’s just not part of their religion. But if Jesus really was teaching that he was God in a trinitarian sense to non-trinitarian, first-century Jews, then wouldn’t that be a massively significant change? Yet, as we saw just a moment ago, change generally breeds controversy. In fact, we could say that the bigger the change the more likely it is that there will be resistance.
Let’s take it one step further. Let’s assume that the disciples had no trouble accepting this new formula for defining God and they went forth proclaiming the Trinity from town to town after Jesus ascended into heaven. As they arrived at synagogue after synagogue it is easy to observe that there was significant resistance and persecution, which is what we would expect if they were now teaching that God is three-in-one rather than just one. Even so we must ask the question, why were the early Christians persecuted? Was it because they taught that Jesus was God or was it for other reasons?
In Judea Peter and John were persecuted by the Sanhedrin for proclaiming the resurrection of a man they had executed as a false messiah (Acts 4.2; 5.28). Stephen was first accused of saying “that this Nazarene, Jesus, will destroy this place and alter the customs which Moses handed down to us†(Acts 6.14). Then he called the Sanhedrin to repentance (Acts 7.51-53) which enraged them to such a point that they gnashed their teeth, stopped their ears, and stoned him to death (Acts 7.54-58). Once Paul became a Christian he preached in Damascus that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God (Acts 9.20-22). He was so difficult to defeat in argument that the people decided to murder him, though he narrowly escaped when he was let down from the city wall in a basket (Acts 9.23-25). In Pisidian Antioch, Paul and Barnabas were persecuted by the Jewish leadership because they were jealous that many of the Gentile proselytes and Jews gravitated towards the Christian message (Acts 13.42-45). The early Christians in Syrian Antioch were harassed by Christian Judaizers because the Jewish Christians ate with the Gentile Christians, accepting them as full members of the people of God even though they were not circumcised and they did not keep the Law of Moses (Galatians 2.4, 11-16; Acts 15.1-2). In Philippi, Paul and Silas were seized and beaten after they had cast a demon out of a girl who was being used to make money by telling fortunes (Acts 16.16-19). The specific accusation brought against them was that they (being Jews) were throwing the city into confusion by “proclaiming customs which it is not lawful for us to accept or to observe, being Romans†(Acts 16.20-21). In Thessalonica, Paul and Silas preached that the Messiah had to suffer and rise again from the dead and that Jesus was in fact the Messiah (Acts 17.3). When a large number of God-fearing Gentiles and a number of the leading Jewish women joined Paul and Silas, the Jews became jealous and instigated a city-wide uproar. As a result they seized Jason (the one who was housing Paul and Silas) and dragged him before the city authorities saying, “These men who have upset the world have come here also… they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus†(Acts 17.6-7). In Ephesus, Paul’s traveling companions—Gaius and Aristarchus—were dragged by an angry mob into the theatre where they shouted out “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians†for hours since Paul had been teaching that idols were not real gods (Acts 19.26). Later on, in Jerusalem, Paul was nearly torn to pieces by a riot which broke out because they thought he had brought Trophimus, a Gentile from Ephesus, into the inner courts of the Temple (Acts 21.28-29). The formal accusation they brought against Paul was that they found him to be “a real pest and a fellow who stirs up dissension among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ring leader of the sect of the Nazarenes. And he even tried to desecrate the temple†(Acts 24.5-6). The Roman administrator, Porcius Festus summarized the accusation like this, “they [the accusing Jews] simply had some points of disagreement with him [Paul] about their own religion and about a dead man, Jesus, whom Paul asserted to be alive†(Acts 25.18-19).
There is no shortage of trouble the early Christians faced as they traipsed about the Mediterranean world proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and Christ, but isn’t it telling that they never even once faced the accusation that they were redefining God? Never did someone say, “I can’t accept Jesus as God because that would be idolatry.†Not once did a riot erupt over Paul proclaiming that Jesus of Nazareth was a divine being. Yet, every single Jew today would say exactly that if they were asked to recognize Jesus as the second member of the holy Trinity.
It is preposterous to think that Jesus or his apostles redefined the concept of God from a unipersonal, monotheistic belief that “Yahweh alone is God†to some triune God of three persons when there is not one New Testament book, not one chapter, not one paragraph describing such a change. There is no explanation of how the clear statements of radical monotheism found in the Old Testament could be reinterpreted in light of this new understanding of divine plurality. We should find at least one church in either Palestine or the Diaspora that struggled to accept this new doctrine of God. To think that the early Church debated over accepting the Gentiles, keeping the Law, how to keep communion, the role of women in the Church, yet never once had any trouble at all accepting that God is now mysteriously three instead of one is absurd. Would not some group of Christians resist a change of this magnitude? Yet, what we have instead is a conspiracy of silence—zero evidence that the Trinity even existed in New Testament times.
Eventually a controversy about whether or not Jesus was God did break out, but it was in Egypt not in Judea, in the early fourth century not in the first century. This controversy was so severe that no less than twenty-five councils met specifically to address this issue between a.d. 318 and 381. Fifteen of them found in favor of Arius who taught that Jesus was a created being
[Theodosius]
Theodosius (a.d. 347 - 395)
and seven found in favor of Alexander and Athanasius who taught that Jesus was fully God with no beginning. (Three of them ended in stalemate). In fact, it was not until Theodosius (the emperor who took office in a.d. 379) made non-trinitarian beliefs illegal that the die was cast and orthodox Christianity cemented itself into a rigidly trinitarian shape. The church could just as easily have had a unitarian rather than a trinitarian creed, but politics, in the end, were the decisive factor. Had the non-trinitarians been more successful in courting the emperor’s favor everything would have been different.
So what are we to make of these facts? Controversies come about when new ideas emerge that conflict with people’s long-held and cherished beliefs. The Trinity was certainly a new idea which nearly all scholars agree was not taught at all in the Hebrew Bible (our Old Testament). Furthermore, the Trinity was foreign to the way first century Jews thought about God and the Messiah. Thus, if Jesus did come on the scene revealing this “truth†then where is the evidence of it? We have no passage from the New Testament explaining or even stating the Trinity. Furthermore, there is no controversy within the church where some Christians rejected it and needed to be persuaded otherwise. In addition, when the Christians traveled abroad as missionaries, supposedly teaching the Trinity among other things, they were met with repeated persecution for a variety of reasons, yet in not one case was there a conflict about whether or not Jesus was God. Last of all, we do find controversy over this issue, but it is not until much later. I think if we take these historical lines of argumentation together we have solid grounds to reject the myth that Jesus and/or the disciples believed and taught the doctrine of the Trinity.
Original Here
http://kingdomready.org/blog/2009/07/29/...ntroversy/
Jake