Be the Bee # 63 | The Holy Trinity
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- Опубліковано 28 вер 2024
- How can God be both 3 and 1? Christians are monotheists, we believe in one God, but many people don't understand how the Holy Trinity fits in with that. The Holy Trinity is One God, three divine Persons who express one divine Nature.
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Music:
"Cloud Patterns," by Silent Partner, UA-cam Digital Library
"Magic Marker," by Silent Partner, UA-cam Digital Library
End Theme:
"Noahs Stark," by krackatoa
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Links:
Holy Trinity Icon Explained
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Plato's "Euthyphro"
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St Gregory of Nyssa, "There Are Not Three Gods"
goo.gl/NUzWab
"Precise Exposition of the Orthodox Faith," St John of Damascus
goo.gl/qXOzhT
Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom
goo.gl/zrO3fo
Shield of the Holy Trinity
goo.gl/pYNkgA
The Holy Trinity, Orthodox Wiki
goo.gl/2nKrwY
Photo credits:
Confused Man
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Parthenon
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Plato
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David, "The Death of Socrates"
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Zeus
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Apollo
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Rublev, Icon of the Holy Trinity
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Earth
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Tree
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Tea Kettle
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Top Hat
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Amphora
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Barbed Wire
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Holy Trinity Icon
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Divine Liturgy
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Holy Trinity Icon, Rublev Minature
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Holy Trinity Icon
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St John of Damascus Icon
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St John the Evangelist
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Holy Trinity Icon, Rublev
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So Everyone can understand the Holy Trinity.
God bless you brother ***** and your work on these videos
Greetings from a fellow catholic(who sees ORTHODOX as MY fellow brothers & sisters in CHRIST).
One of the best descriptions of the Trinity I've ever heard.
OUR IMAGE
Very beautiful, Steve !!!
I love these Be the Bee episodes! We use them to spark discussions at our OCF Chapter Meetings. However, I sometimes find the music distracting. I wish it were a little quieter!
Great video. Background music is fun.
The Trinity shows me how absolutely huge and complex my God is, and I like that!
Loved this episode!
Though I have reservations about showing the Hospitality of Abraham icon in order to try and explain the Holy Trinity. I've often seen it cause more confusion than answers as it's led some people to envision the Trinity as the three angels.
Evan L That is a good point. I actually did not know it was called the Abraham icon. But ya I did have a discussion between an Ethiopian friend who says that in their churches there is an icon of the trinity which is something similar to those shown here. My issue is more that showing the trinity as 3 distinct persons may be problematic, to someone like me at least. Since they are one in God head, and im not a theologian but if I'm not mistaken they are 1 in nature and therefore 1 person, one that has 3 hypostasis. Iv always kept the simple example that I learned in Sunday school. I am peter. Made up of mind body and spirit. My mind is still peter, it's just part of me which does certain tasks (it is my wisdom, and similarly it can be called the logos or word of Peter since it is where my words are created). Similarly the body and spirit, the body is just the body but it is considered still Peter and the spirit is my spirit. So looking at this simple picture of a human, the 3 distinct parts have their own duties, yet they are still 1 in their unity as PETER, and can never be separated or else there would be no peter. I hope that adds to this in some way and not just more confusing for those who read it lol
Peter Saad This is where the proper definitions of words are so important.
Since the clarifications offered by the Cappadocian Fathers in the 4th century (St Basil the Great, St Greogry the Theologian, St Gregory of Nyssa) the words "person" and "hypostasis" are usually interchangeable. "Person" and "nature" mean very different things, however.
The belief that God is only one person, rather than a Holy Trinity of Three Persons, is called Modalism or Sabellianism. The Orthodox Church identifies it as mistaken.
The mind, body, soul example can lead to confusion. For instance, the Persons of the Holy Trinity do not necessarily have different tasks. And mind, body, and soul are all qualitatively different from each other, whereas the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are not.
Perhaps a better example, to avoid this confusion, is that used by St Gregory of Nyssa: Peter, Paul, and John are all distinct human persons, but there is only one human nature that they all express. He also used the example of gold: we can have three distinct gold coins, yet still only one gold nature.
Yes your right about that Steve. I was worried about my wording when writing that especially when I got to the word "persons". Lol i had a feeling I was going to mis-word some of that, so thank you for the clarification and the great counter example you gave. I commend you on the example of the apostles, I think I might start using that one now lol. Good stuff bro
My reservation comes from the fact that we know we can not depict the Father and calling this icon the Trinity just makes it confusing. One of the angels is not the Father and the other angel is not the Holy Spirit. So my thought is why should we call it the Trinity as opposed to the hospitality of Abraham.
In my opinion only and in my experience, I never saw how this icon could have explained the Holy Trinity when the Trinity itself is the greatest Mystery.
Your thoughts?
I think so too Evan. The discussion I was having was with an Ethiopian Orthodox and Armenian Orthodox friends. As a copt, the Armenians and i never really saw such an icon. Our complaint was similar to urs Evan. The Holy Spirit is not a man, and moreover God the Father is not a man with a long white beard. It just seemed to fictionalized to depict the trinity as such. I was always taught that Christ is the image of God of course, and therefore when looking at his image we look at the trinity as a whole. But depicting the father and the Holy Spirit seems like hearsay, we don't know what God's physical traits can even possibly be, except what has been revealed to us through Christ
New to this channel. Great explanation!! 🙏
We are monotheists because we believe there is ulitmatly only one uncaused cause the Father alone who eternally causes the Son and Holy Spirit who share his nature who we glorify with the Father. This is the doctrine of the Father's Monarchy. And yes the unity between the Father his reason and Spirit is beyond what we can comprehend Some might consider that polytheism because we worship 3 hyposases together or because we believe God creates through his Logos and Spirit. One uncaused cause One Arche three Divine Persons. No contradictory math to make sense of. This is what seperates us from Judaism Islam and the polyarchic pagans.
I love this channel thank you so much. Orthodoxy is the complete truth. read the nicene creed, what do we as christians believe. the creed spells it out in perfection. it has the finger print of God on it.
@Y2AM the son and the holy spirt is with no begining to, read Ethiopian orthodx churh to fully understand this
You're right, they are both eternal as well. However, the Son is eternally begotten of the Father. And the Holy Spirit eternally proceeds from the Father.
Help me understand the significance of “Be the Bee”, please! Thanks!
We get into it here:
Be the Bee #47 | Free as a Bee
ua-cam.com/video/KvHrnSKPOQo/v-deo.html
@@stevenchristoforou1667 Thank you, Steven! I watched that episode and really enjoyed it. I was raised in the Protestant tradition, have been a committed Christian for many years and began to see the inconsistencies and problems in church practices and theology. I became acquainted with an Orthodoxy priest and his family through their friendship with my daughter. I am exploring and studying Orthodoxy with the help of this priest. I appreciate your videos because they are concise and clear. I am no longer a “youth” but I am a beginner. And your work has helped me.
@@thestraightroad305 Glory to God! Connecting with a priest and parish is definitely the way to go.
God bless you and your family!
@@stevenchristoforou1667 Thank you, Steven. I appreciate and thank you for your prayers. There are a lot of western paradigms to see through and overcome. My husband turned away from following Jesus because of wrong theology and is just recently become more open to looking at God through different lenses. We had a good talk with Fr. Nicholas today and I ask you to pray for my dear husband. He is a good and kind man.
@@thestraightroad305 God bless you both!
Goodness and kindness is a beautiful start. That's the fruit of the Holy Spirit.
So could this be also described as: I am a father, I am a son and I am a husband. But I am still one Dustin?
This is a creative metaphor, but it can lead to a heresy called Modalism or Sabellianism which says that God is one person who appears in different modes (sort of like you're one person who acts in the word in the different modes of the relationships you listed).
St Gregory the Theologian uses gold as an image. Consider three identical gold coins. They're all equally gold: same color, same density, same weight, etc.
But they're not all the same coin: each coin is distinct (coin 1 is neither coin 2 nor coin 3, etc).
The Three Persons are all fully divine and share alike in all things. But the Father is not the Son nor the Holy Spirit, etc.
Once we see those distinctions, we can see that each of the Three Persons acts differently in salvation history. Jesus (the Son) was baptized; not the Father, nor the Holy Spirit. We heard the voice of the Father; not the Son's voice, nor the Spirit's voice. The Spirit descended in the form of a dove; not the Father, nor the Son.
So this gold image (while still imprecise) is a bit closer to the mark.
Does that make sense?
@@stevenchristoforou1667 maybe...let me take another crack at it. I don’t mean to bother you.
I have a mind (consciousness), body (flesh) and spirit, which are distinctly separate but at the same time those 3 are fully united in one. Am I at least in the ball park? If not, I apologize.
@@dustinfields2055 You're not a bother!
This is an interesting image, but it runs the same risk of your first image. You may be seeing the Three Persons of the Trinity as "parts" or "aspects" of a thing that are all united. But mind, body, and spirit are all different things.
It's ok to struggle with this, it's complicated (and no one fully understands it).
God contemplates Himself and the Son is that “image” or Idea of Himself. This is why the Son is also called the Word, Logos, Wisdom, and Image of God.
The Father knows Himself perfectly from all eternity, He eternally knows, and his knowledge of Himself is his Word... So in this sense the Son was begotten of the Father before all ages.
So even if nothing else existed but God, he would still have knowledge of himself; the Logos, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity.
But even uncreated wisdom may be said to be the first creation in the sense that a known thing is prior to the knowledge had of it, and even if nothing else existed but God, he would still have knowledge of himself as first cause, and therefore wisdom, in logical order, but not in order of time.
The Spirit, which is expressed as Breath or as theologians call it “Spiration.” So the Holy Spirit eternally proceeds through spiration as an act of love or will. This is at least one reason we refer to this third Person as the Spirit even though God in Three Persons is completely spirit.
What (in nature) Father, Son, and Spirit are is the same. I don’t mean that there are three identical beings, but one being who is three Persons. He is one nature, but there exists certain relationships within Himself, not between parts, but belonging to His whole. The internal process of knowing and willing by the substance of God.
Follow-up question: what does the Orthodox Church say about eclecticism? Is it truly forbidden? I'm drawn to the Church, but a few discussions with Orthodox are really making me think first. Is there anything wrong with praying Catholic or Anglican or even Muslim prayers that are not conflicting with Christianity, or modify them to fit them into the Orthodox faith? What about attending say, an Anglican Church? Is there any place at all for comparative religion and eclecticism in the Church? Are these permitted? Thank you.
I'll ask the question from a different direction: if the Orthodox Church really is the Church, why would you seek services or prayers elsewhere? If it's the fullness of the faith, what's missing that you'd seek from a different source?
That said, I'll note that St Tychon, when he was Patriarch of Moscow, reviewed the Anglican Book of Common Prayer and concluded that (with a few modification) it could be used in Orthodox worship. This was when many Anglicans were considering converting to Orthodoxy, as a group, and there was discussion about what prayers they could bring with them. Unfortunately, World War One interrupted those plans.
So what you are saying is that they are three different person’s, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. But they all carry one nature, which is the nature of God, which is why it’s only one God. Or did I misunderstand?
That's a good summary.
Hi Steve! If there is a distinction between apophatic essence and cataphatic energies, is the Holy Trinity the essence or the energies of God? Thanks!
The Hermitage man can say anything he want. There is no prove for what he's saying. Do you believe in the Bible? You won't be able to find the word "trinity" anywhere in the bible. If you do have time please check this link below Thank you so much for your time. And i hope you can find the truth. And if you do have more questions. You can also check on the same website the places of worship close to you and can organise to see the minister of the Church of Christ and they will explain everything to you not from their opinion but from the Holy Bible. God bless you
incmedia.org/god-and-jesus-christ-who-are-they/
incmedia.org/the-truth-about-god-part-iii-is-the-trinity-true-or-false-2/
I'm curious: do you believe that God the Father is divine?
Do you believe that Jesus Christ is divine?
Do you believe that Jesus Christ (the Son of God) and God the Father are different purposes? Or is Jesus just talking to Himself when He prays to the Father?
There are three options here. You can believe that:
1. The Father is divine, yet the Son is not (in which case you can't identify as a Christian).
2. The Father is not divine, yet the Son is (in which case you can't identify as a Christian).
3. The Father and Son are both divine.
If you believe that the Father and Christ are both divine (as you must in order to be a Christian) then you already believe in the Holy Duality. Is that a term that's in the Scripture?
If we've established this, then we can begin to talk about the Holy Spirit and the mountain of Scriptural evidence.
Also, where in the Scripture does the Scripture say that it is complete and exhaustive? Even John the Evangelist ends His Gospel account by saying it doesn't include much of what Jesus did (John 20:30).
Finally, how did the Church function without a complete Scripture for so long? The books of the New Testament weren't written for decades after Christ's Resurrection, nor was the canon set until centuries later (it was first set forth in St Athanasios' Festal Letter of 367AD, yet not set until the Quinisext Council of .692AD).
Forgive me, I'm not sure exactly what you're asking.
"Apophatic" refers to affirmations, things we can positively say about theology (God is just, God is good, etc.). "Cataphatic" refers to negations, things we can negatively say about theology (God is not evil, etc).
Orthodox theological method is actually a blend of both. We can say certain things about God (that He is good), but those statements are inherently limited. In one sense, God is good. In another, He is not. He is so much more than good, so far beyond our understanding and comprehension that it would be a mistake to call Him "good." God is bigger than any word or idea.
Essence and energy is a different distinction. All things have an essence or nature; we are human beings, with a human nature. God has a divine nature. All natures are, fundamentally, deep and mysterious. Just as we can't quite wrap our mind around what it fully means to be human, even less can we understand what it means to be God.
Yet God, even though His nature is fundamentally unknowable, still acts in the world. We can know Him through His energies, His action in the world.
As for the Trinity, basically all we can say is that divinity exists as Trinity: uncreated God, Son begotten of the Father, Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father. When we try to say more, we find ourselves in the tension of apophatic and cataphatic theology, because our words and concepts aren't big enough to fully capture or express God.
Does that make sense?
3:30 you mention multiple persons. How can that be one? The trinity is so confusing
Indeed, it's confusing.
Yet this is the revelation God has given to us. At the very beginning of John's Gospel, for example, we read about Jesus the Word of God. This Word is God and was with God the Father at the beginning.
It's ok to be confused; this is describing something beyond our normal experience.
Steven Christoforou still seems confusing lol. That doesn’t necessarily mean “the word” is an entity though no?
Steven Christoforou and if God is all knowing, loving etc and wants to be glorified why wouldn’t he make it VERY clear so everyone could know and understand him so he can be glorified ?. I know you’ll probably have an answer but in the end it just doesn’t make sense. Also... lots of stories in bible don’t make sense. Like the book of Jonah. Also in the Old Testament how God instantly killed 187,000 Assyrian soldiers laying siege to Jerusalem. There is another side to the story written by the Assyrians that basically says the Jewish king ended up surrendering and therefore the Assyrian army stopped the siege and left. The second story makes a lot more sense. I just can’t believe everything that’s written in the Bible. It very much favors one group of people over everyone else and you know who those people are. I really like your channel. You seem like a very nice guy with a lot of positive energy. I wish you all the best. I love the beautiful Orthodox Church.
@@sagesarabia5053 I'm not sure what you mean by "entity."
And yes, totally confusing! We even see this in the Scripture. On the one hand, we read that God is invisible. Yet we also see the Word of God (who has the same name as God, and is God) walking around and presenting Himself to people.
Even in the Scripture, we see references to the Trinity.
I thought I saw a response. It might have been deleted by accident.
As for understanding: is something false just because we don't understand it?
Consider what God told Job:
"Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements?" (Job 38:4-5)
so is it comparable to this?
Johnny is a person, just one person, but he has multiple personalities, Steve Brandon and Kevin, Steve isn't Brandon or Kevin, neither are Kevin and Brandon, but all three are personalities of Johnny? do I get that right?
Not quite. The metaphor breaks down because those are all manifestations of the the same person.
The Holy Trinity isn't three manifestations of the same person; it's three persons in the same divine nature.
Steve, Brandon, and Kevin are all human. Three distinct persons who are all of the same human nature. The metaphor again breaks down here, though, because we are separated by selfishness, jealousy, anger, etc (sin) in a way that the Holy Trinity is not.
Any metaphor we use will have limitations, so we need to be precise and careful.
Does that make sense?
Yeah It does, thank you
I know about Trinity and i worship God..But there is a things confused me about Trinity.
1)Did Jesus in the bible ask us to worship him as God?? Even Jesus prayed to the God(The Father) and he said to the Children of Israel in the Mark 12:29 : "Jesus answered and said unto them, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God" , Jesus said "Our God" , that means he is included to worship God..
2)And i was confused why Jesus is called Son of God...Did suitable for God to have a Son?? If Jesus was the son of God , than who is Wife of God..There must be a wife to born a son...
3)And if Jesus was a God , why people in the bible called him as a Prophet?? Can a God become a Prophet? In Matthew 21:11:"And the people answered and said, This is Jesus the prophet of Nazareth of Galilee."
Luke 24:19: "He said to them, "What is it?" They answered him, "What happened to Jesus of Nazareth? He was a prophet, powerful in work and word before God and before all our nation."
4)And i am curious , why God need to died on the cross to remove our sins? He is omnipotent, he can only said to remove our sins.Just as he created the universe he just said "be" and be everything.
5)And if we read in the old testament , we find out that a lot of People such as Isaac , Jacob , David , Solomon and others are only Worship God as 1 , they didn't worship to god as Trinity(3 in 1)...
So I hope you can explain to me...
Those are very good questions, and I hope you've alreadyfound answers too... but there are anyway my tries to answer, by the grace of God.
1) We can answer this two different ways. At first, people did worship Jesus (at least, bow go him) and He did never denied it. The woman of Canaan worshipped Jesus (Matt. 15:25), the possessed man of Gedara worshipped him (Mark 5:6), all apostles worshipped him after His resurrection (Matt. 28:17), and so on. And like we know, this kind of bowing/worshipping is only for God in Judaism. All apostles denied people when they bowed to them, and so did also all angels. When Jesus did not deny this "worshipping", he either was God or he committed blasphemy.
But there is another respond. Jesus called himself "Son of Man"... more like 80 times in the gospels. This title comes from the book of Daniel, chapter 7 where the Son of Man is brought near before God, sits on the right hand of God (that means Son of Man is equal with God and God's co-ruler) AND all people, all nations should serve (in hebrew, it reads "worshipp") him, Son of Man.
And do you remember the discussion between the high priest and Jesus:
*_"Again the high priest asked Him, saying to Him, 'Are You the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?' Jesus said, 'I am. And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven,'" (Mark 14:61-62)._*
It was well-known in Judaism that the Christ and the Son of Man are the same person. They also understood the Son of Man is equal with God and should be worshipped as God. This is the blasphemy and idolatry of the highest level, if person is not who he claims to be.
And when it comes to Shema ("Hear O Israel" and so on), the word "one" is in hebrew (in this context) 'echad'. It doesn't describe monolithic unity. Rather, it is used when people are talking about something like a grape cluster... or in creation when it is said "they shall become ONE flesh" (Gen. 2:24). That imply that God is truly one in His divine essence but plural (three) in His persons.
But that doesn't mean Jesus (God the Son) would not worship God the Father. Jesus is Father's begotten Son... of course He praise and honor God and is perfectly obedient to God's will. Jesus is equal with His Father in the divine essence, but their roles as own persons are different... just like we serve presidents and civil forces although we are equal as humans.
2) There are many reasons why Jesus is called "Son of God".
We know that all kings of Israel were called sons of God... the more reason to call Jesus "the Son of God", because he is the King.
We also know angels are called sons of God... the more reason to call Jesus "the Son of God", because he is called also "the angel of God".
Israel is called son of God too... the more reason to call Jesus "the Son of God", because the new Israel is founded in him.
But we also know that Jesus is the Word of God, God's wisdom. In the book of Proverbs, the Wisdom is called the first-born of God (not directly but the text points in that direction). Furthermore, wise Agur asks: "Who has ascended into heaven, or descended? Who has gathered the wind in His fists? Who has bound the waters in a garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is His name, and what is *_His Son’s_* name, If you know?" (Prov. 30:4).
But Jesus is the son of God, Jesus incarnate by the Holy Spirit (who is God) and the virgin Mary. God is Jesus' father, and Mary is his mother. But God didn't have sex with Mary. Rather, Mary just gave to Jesus his physical essence (she dressed him into flesh) when Holy Spirit overshadowed her.
This all is about the biblical arguments. Now, we move to philosophical section.
It is said that God is love. The love is feeling but also the direction of will. The love is also invisible. But when a person loves someone, this feeling and will gives birth words and thoughts. Now, there is a dialog between the feeling and the word, the heart and the sense. And through words, the love makes itself visible. And the deeds of love proceeds from the will and through the thought. Still, there is no single moment when all these three (the will, the sense and the action) doesn't appear at the same time, together. They work together, completing and inspiring each other.
And so it is when we talk about Triune God... although this analog is very poor and rough and foggy. We can also say that it is like candles. One candle has a flame, and when we bring other candle near it, a new flame is born. But this flame is (in a sense) same fire by its essence with the first flame, and it already existed in the first fire. Therefore, the new flame is "son" of the first flame, but has already existed before it appeared... this is an analog by Justin the Martyr.
God has no wife... actually, He doesn't even have a sex. When we call God "God the Father" and Jesus "the Son of God", we describe the relations and roles between the persons of Trinity. Jesus has always been the Son, God the Father has always been the Father and God's Spirit has always been Holy Spirit. Before time, in eternity. The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit have always been.
3) In the Bible, "a prophet" is a person who proclaim God's words (in this meaning, a prophet is also an angel... that means "a messenger"), teach His commandments and probably show some miracles.
And that is exactly what Jesus did... and what he does right now. He taught people, proclaimed that God's Kingdom is near and did miracles. And like I said above, Jesus is "the angel of God", because he is the one through which the God becomes visible. Through Jesus we will learn to know God.
In fact, we could say that all prophets have been foreshadows of Christ, who is the real prophet as God's Word.
4) You said right that God is omnipotent. Hence, He could remove our sins, and that is what happened, in certain sense. But (and this is important "but") He couldn't have done it without contesting against our free will. Sin is more than breaking God's will. It is separation from God who is perfectly good, the perfect love. Therefore, everything we do here is sin (more or less) because our acts and thoughts are separated from perfect goodness.
And if this is our will, God allow it. The real and perfect love doesn't force anyone. And because we are sick because of sin, and our whole being is "corrupted", we are not able to want to repent and ask God to remove our sins.
Only way, how God could bring people back to Him and take apart the life of Holy Trinity, is the ultimate act of love. Just like our separation from God started from the ultimate act of selfishness and pride. And because the cause of sin is the curse and the death, God took the curse and the death upon himself. And through His death, He gives His own life to us, as a present.
And when it comes to "why God needed"... Eli, the high priest during Samuel the prophet, has said prophetically: "If one man sins against another, God will judge him. But if a man sins against the Lord, who will intercede for him?” (1 Sam 2:25). That means, only God who is also a human can be "mediator" between God and humans and bring the atonement and the salvation.
5) We also read in the Tanakh (old testament) that there are many people who met God in physical form. Adam and Eve saw Him in the garden, Abraham met Him, Jacob met Him and got the name Israel by Him, Moses and the elders of Israel met him, Isaiah the prophet saw God sitting on His throne etc. etc. At the same time, the Bible makes it very clear that no one has seen God and that God has no visible form.
This is explained in the gospel of John where he writes: "No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him," (John 1:18). Whenever people have seen God, they have seen the Son of God.
We also read in the Tanakh that terms "God", "the word of God" (also "the angel of Lord") and "the spirit of God" appear in many places around the Scriptures. The word of God came to prophets, the angel of Lord lead Israel out of Egypt, prophets and kings became fulfilled by God's spirit, God have mercy on people for His name, the world is created by God's word and His spirit... and so on and so on.
But there is nothing wrong when they worshipped God as one. There truly is just one God, Yahweh. Christians worship one God as well -- as one. Father is Yahweh, the Son is Yahweh and Holy Spirit is Yahweh. Christians just pray to God both generally and also each persons.
And if Trinity is so hard to understand for Christians who are monotheists (there are dozens of heresies and misconceptions about Trinity), how hard it would have been for Israelites? I bet that if God revealed himself as Triune God, it would have lead Israel to polytheism. Therefore
And now I'm just more confused. Is it one or is it three? I just don't get it.
If Jesus was God, why would he pray "Father"? But if he wasn't, why would he say "I am."?
So. Confusing.
Hi, this matter your referring was a huge " logical problem" in the year 300. In 325 was the first synodos... who answer this question...not by words ..because it is difficult...but by action... St Spyridon from Cyprus a Holy man...he was a peasant farmer and shepherd. He took a potsherd to illustrate how one single entity (a piece of pottery) could be composed of three unique entities (fire, water and clay); a metaphor for the Christian doctrine of the Trinity.
As soon as Spyridon finished speaking, the shard is said to have miraculously burst into flame, water dripped on the ground, and only dust remained in his hand (other accounts of this event say that it was a brick he held in his hand).
water,ice,and water vapour has the same chemical formula H2O
Katie Neves
Hi Katie,
This man can say anything he want. There is no prove for what he's saying. Do you believe in the Bible? You won't be able to find the word "trinity" anywhere in the bible. If you do have time please check this link below Thank you so much for your time. And i hope you can find the truth. And if you do have more questions. You can also check on the same website the places of worship close to you and can organise to see the minister of the Church of Christ and they will explain everything to you not from their opinion but from the Holy Bible. God bless you
incmedia.org/god-and-jesus-christ-who-are-they/
incmedia.org/the-truth-about-god-part-iii-is-the-trinity-true-or-false-2/
I'm curious: do you believe that God the Father is divine?
Do you believe that Jesus Christ is divine?
Do you believe that Jesus Christ (the Son of God) and God the Father are different purposes? Or is Jesus just talking to Himself when He prays to the Father?
There are three options here. You can believe that:
1. The Father is divine, yet the Son is not (in which case you can't identify as a Christian).
2. The Father is not divine, yet the Son is (in which case you can't identify as a Christian).
3. The Father and Son are both divine.
If you believe that the Father and Christ are both divine (as you must in order to be a Christian) then you already believe in the Holy Duality. Is that a term that's in the Scripture?
If we've established this, then we can begin to talk about the Holy Spirit and the mountain of Scriptural evidence.
Also, where in the Scripture does the Scripture say that it is complete and exhaustive? Even John the Evangelist ends His Gospel account by saying it doesn't include much of what Jesus did (John 20:30).
Finally, how did the Church function without a complete Scripture for so long? The books of the New Testament weren't written for decades after Christ's Resurrection, nor was the canon set until centuries later (it was first set forth in St Athanasios' Festal Letter of 367AD, yet not set until the Quinisext Council of .692AD).
Hi Steve,
In my believe, God is the only Father in Heaven. Jesus Christ is not God. He is the son of God. Jesus have never said he is God in the Holy Scriptures. Have you fully watched the link I've attacheded? There is more than that as I'm only a member of the Church I don't have the authority to fully explain everything to you. But I invite you to come to my Church the Church of Christ. You can come there anytime and ask to see the minister. You can ask anything you want and they will be able to answer all your questions not from their opinions but from the Holy Scriptures. Then hopefully you can understand why I'm not believe anything you say in your Trinity's Videos
One question: isn't God the Father also a "Mother" to us, in the sense that everything a mother does, God the Father also does?
Sure, you can say that (in a sense). It's the trouble with language: we can't be so tied to it that it obscures the truth rather than reveals it. We call God our Father, and rightly so, though of course He doesn't create us in the way a father makes children. Yet, even though we wouldn't call God "mother," God does care for us with a motherly care, bringing us into existence, etc.
God is bigger than any word we can use to describe Him. We should take care to use words responsibly, consistent with the teaching of the Church.
That's why it's important to continue to call God our Father. It's a reminder that, in Christ (who is the Son of the Father), we all are adopted into God. And further, it's a reminder that the Church is our Mother, the womb in which we are shaped into who we truly are (in baptism, chrysmation, and communion).
There are definitely scriptures that explicitly refer to God as a mother. At the end of the day the way we call God Father, Mother, Friend etc is simply using language to try and explain how we may relate to God.
I don't know if I explained this well enough, but hopefully it makes sense.
@@therese4089 "...scriptures that explicitly refer to God as a mother..."
Could you show me what you have in mind?
Sure, we do our best to use language to relate to God. But Jesus specifically refers to God as Father. There's a reason for that.
@@stevenchristoforou1667 Deuteronomy 32:18 "the God who gave you birth"
Hosea 11:3-4 God takes on a motherly role
Isaiah 49: 15 God compares himself to a nursing mother
Psalm 131: 2 again likened to a nursing mother
Isaiah 66:13 "as one whom a mother comforts so I will comfort you"
Matthew 23:37 described as a mother hen
Hosea 13:8 described as a mother bear
Deauteronomy 32:11-12 described as a mother eagle
Keep in mind I'm not saying God is female. He is neither male nor female. He is spirit (John 4:24)
Plus men and women were created in his image etc.
The original word used was Elohim meaning they, translations do vary but at the end of the day God has qualities that were at the time strongly associated with women, and qualities strongly associated with men. It's just helpful to have the other side of the equation also.
@@therese4089 Indeed, God is neither male nor female. God is infinite, and beyond these limited categories.
You bring up good examples, but they're all images. Like a mother, like a mother hen, etc.
The one thing we know is that Jesus calls God "Father" and teaches us to do the same. It's literally in the one prayer Jesus gave us: "Our Father, who art in heaven..."
One way Christians have understood this is because we refer to the Church as our Mother.
AMEN☦️❤️✝️
Trinity is not biblical Jesus is the son of god not god
@@theguyver4934 If you don't believe the Trinity is Biblical, then I suggest you're not accurately understanding the Scripture.
Yes, Jesus is the Son of God. That means He is divine. He is the divine Word that John describes at the start of His Gospel account.
@@stevenchristoforou1667 - Go ask a biblical unitarian about that
@@theguyver4934 I'd rather get advice from people who understand the Bible: the unbroken tradition that goes back to Christ opening the Scripture on the Road to Emaus.
Hi Steve, At 0:44 seconds you included Muslims (ergo Islam) among your list of Christians. Islam is not considered part of the Christian Faith by most scholars (as far as I am aware), but its own separate unique world Religion. They do not up believe in the Trinity or Jesus Christ as the risen Savior of man. Was that on purpose or a slip of the tongue?
I think you misunderstand what I said.
Here's a transcript: "Christians, like Jews and Muslims and others, are monotheists." In other words, we all confess belief in one god (as opposed to many). None of us are polytheists.
Does that make sense?
After listening again I understood. Also I have been listening through many of the Be the Bee episodes. Please forgive my misunderstanding. A dear friend of mine is from the Orthodox tradition and has piqued my interest so I have been learning. I am a Christian from a different tradition than Orthodoxy but I admire and treasure the knowledge and Truth I have heard from you. May our Lord Jesus Christ continue to bless the good work you and the Orthodox part of the body of Christ is doing.
Not a problem! Please know that you can ask any question at any time.
Thank you for your prayers, may God bless you!
You are a very respectable man, and you have made clear to me what the Trinity is, but I still think it is not monotheism
Thank you for your kind words.
Christians don't confess what some people call "a unitary montheism," which we see in contemproary Judaism and Islam. But this "unitary monotheism" isn''t what we actually see in the Scripture (and, in fact, was widely acknowledge in pre-Christian Judaism).
blogs.ancientfaith.com/wholecounsel/2019/02/28/biblical-monotheism/
@Saad Bin Masud What?
Holy Qura, chapter35
11. Allah created you from dust, then from a small drop; then He made you pairs. No female conceives, or delivers, except with His knowledge. No living thing advances in years, or its life is shortened, except it be in a Record. That is surely easy for Allah.
12. The two seas are not the same. One is fresh, sweet, good to drink, while the other is salty and bitter. Yet from each you eat tender meat, and extract jewelry which you wear. And you see the ships plowing through them, so that you may seek of His bounty, so that you may give thanks.
13. He merges the night into the day, and He merges the day into the night; and He regulates the sun and the moon, each running for a stated term. Such is Allah, your Lord; His is the sovereignty. As for those you call upon besides Him, they do not possess a speck.
14. If you pray to them, they cannot hear your prayer. And even if they heard, they would not answer you. And on the Day of Resurrection, they will reject your partnership. None informs you like an Expert.
15. O people! It is you who are the poor, in need of Allah; while Allah is the Rich, the Praiseworthy.
16. If He wills, He can do away with you, and produce a new creation.
17. And that would not be difficult for Allah.
18. No burdened soul can carry the burden of another. Even if one weighted down calls for help with its burden, nothing can be lifted from it, even if they were related. You are to warn those who fear their Lord inwardly, and perform the prayer. He who purifies himself purifies himself for his own good. To Allah is the ultimate return.
19. Not equal are the blind and the seeing.
20. Nor are the darkness and the light.
21. Nor are the shade and the torrid heat.
Greetings from a fellow catholic(who sees ORTHODOX as MY fellow brothers & sisters in CHRIST).
this is the best explanation of trinity i've ever heard. i'm protestant and sometimes im still confused about trinity. because every protestant churches explain the holy Trinity in many different ways :(
Wow, that's incredible feedback! Glory to God!
And you're right. Unfortunately, I think that's a danger as we've slipped broken off from each other into our own groups, with our own preferred teachers and interpretations.
I just stumbled onto your channel. Your video really helped me understand this very icon that I venerate every day. I understand the Trinity but found this icon confusing at times. One of the most helpful things in this video is the photo depicting the relationship between the 3, which helps me not focus on the icon as what appears to be 3 separate angels. The discussion in the comments also very helpful. Thanks to all the commenters and to you for answering everyone!
Glory to God!
Thank you for the video. Do each of the Persons of the Holy Trinity have a will or are the three Person united in one will? Do the Church Fathers address this question? Thanks!
Great question. St John of Damascus puts it like this:
"One substance, one godhead, one virtue, one will, one
operation, one principality, one power, one domination, one
kingdom; known in three perfect Persons and adored with
one adoration..."
@@stevenchristoforou1667 Great quote!
I'm confused. Will I see 3 persons when I get to heaven or 1? 1 God 3 in 1? Ita hard.
This confused me to no end.
Sorry it's confusing!
It's definitely complicated. And it's more than any of us can understand.
As we read in Scripture, the Father is invisible, but we see Him in the Son. So it's not about "seeing" all three of the Holy Trinity.
Human man is mind, body and spirit. Creator God almighty is Father, Son, Holy Spirit. The number three is repeated throughout creation, as God's signature on His creation.
It is astounding to me that people try and put God in a box to study Him. How rude! You wouldn't try to perform empirical science on your partner on your first date would you? People do this to Him and as a result many call the Αγία Τριάδα stupid. The trinity is brilliant in that it shows that even God must answer to someone in a sense. He is selfless. He rules the Universe with Himself just as we must live with others.
This is one of those videos that's going to keep me awake for a month.
How so?
@@stevenchristoforou1667 I been wrestling with the concept of the Orthodox view point of "Is Jesus God". I swear I thought I heard a priest talking and say something along the lines of "We worship God, Jesus isn't God that's why we don't have any Iconography of God"
What I gather from scripture, Jesus prays to his father, he is his only begotten son, he sits at the right hand of God in his kingdom, he tells us to worship the Father.
So, in MY mind I had come to terms with, okay, Jesus is the son, that means he poses half the ingredients of God. Just like, I poses half my father's DNA, but we are obviously different enities. Now, if this "family" happens to be " royalty" , then obviously he's privy to everything. He is also godly, obviously, but not God. I worship God, through Jesus, the one who was sent to show me the way to eternal life, in heaven.
Is this just waaayyyyyyyyy off??
Am I over thinking ??
This video kinda helped until that inner triangle 🙃 help!
@@alexpapa7524 Jesus isn't the Son in a biological sense: He doesn't have half of what the Father has.
Jesus, as the perfect Son, has everything the Father as. The only difference is that He's the Son, begotten of the Father.
The Son in particular took on flesh and became human. The Father did not and remains invisible.
The Church in union with Christ, is also God. So there are really four in one, not three. Many people have been killed over this trinity doctrine, tis why I say no doctrine should ever be over obedience to Christ. Obedience to Christ removes any OCD (e.g. controlling) traits we may have and allows top God (the Father) to deal with it.
Psa. 82:0 A Psalm of Asaph.
Psa. 82:1 God standeth in the congregation of God;
He judgeth among the gods.
2 How long will ye judge unjustly,
And respect the persons of the wicked? [Selah
3 Judge the poor and fatherless:
Do justice to the afflicted and destitute.
4 Rescue the poor and needy:
Deliver them out of the hand of the wicked.
5 They know not, neither do they understand;
They walk to and fro in darkness:
All the foundations of the earth are shaken.
6 I said, Ye are gods,
And all of you sons of the Most High.
7 Nevertheless ye shall die like men,
And fall like one of the princes.
8 Arise, O God, judge the earth;
For thou shalt inherit all the nations.
Sean Rhoades Be careful with that. We will never be uncreated. The Trinity is not a Quartet. We can say that we are invited, in a sense, into the life of the Trinity, but only insofar as we are united with Christ (the Father is Christ's Father, singular, and our Father, collectively, in Christ). We become sons by grace, not by nature.
We are invited into life everlasting. But that life had a beginning; not so with God. We may be united with God, but we are qualitatively/essentially different from Him.
***** It may be the case that our souls are also uncreated, but not as Christ is, but begotten of the Father through Christ. Moreover, If we take Scripture seriously, we must have existed at the end of creation Day Six, as God ceased from creation then. Yes God is working now, but he is no longer creating, but resting from it.
How would you reconcile praying to the trinity to praying to the father in heaven as Jesus taught in the gospels? Is there any example of praying to the trinity in the bible?
Help me understand your question.
Do you believe that Christ is the divine Son of God the Father? Do you see a problem with praying to Christ?
If you don't, then is the issue with the Holy Spirit? Do you believe that the Holy Spirit is the divine Third Person of the Trinity?
@@stevenchristoforou1667 I do believe but I also believe that we must copy or imitate and obey what we are taught in scripture verbatim. Jesus taught to pray to the Father, he didn't teach to pray to himself or the Spirit mentioning the 3 names at the same time. Jesus also taught that too many repetitions won't cause God to hear us more. Paul taught that we should pray to God in the name of his son Jesus. There are a couple of examples where some pray short sentences to Jesus such as steven when he was stoned and when the apostles pray for Judas' replacement. I don't find any prayer to the Spirit but overall we are commanded to pray to the father in the name of the son.
@@nitochi3 This is why Jesus taught His disciples how to interpret the Scripture. This "verbatim" approach falls flat.
For example, when you see the word "Spirit" in the New Testament, it generally refers to the Holy Spirit. We lose this when we interpret without the mind of the Church, as Christ taught us.
Saint Paul prayed in the name of the Trinity. Just one example:
"The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen." (2 Corinthians 13:14)
You're making a mistake the Church addressed in the 4th century, when people doubted the divinity of the Holy Spirit.
@@stevenchristoforou1667 I'm not doubting the diety of the Holy ghost. He's God. I don't think what paul wrote to close his letter was a prayer, was a final salute. Prayer is talking to God, thanking him, laying our burdens and needs, praising him. Jesus said "pray to your father in heaven" nothing to interpret there.
@@nitochi3 If the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all equally divine, then it seems odd to pray only to one of them. Right?
You're reading into Jesus' word. "Pray to the Father" is not the same as "don't pray to the Son or Spirit."
It's also odd to see Paul's words as merely a "salute" rather than a prayer. As if he wasn't actually invoking the Trinity, and simply saying "I wish you well" in a really convoluted way.
You'll never find the word "persons" referring to God anywhere in the Bible. John 1:1,14; 10:30; 14:7-9; Isaiah 9:6; 1 Corinthians 8:6; Deuteronomy 6:5 and 1 John 5:7 all teach us that Jesus is the manifestation of the Father, that they are one and the same Person revealed in different ways. The same is true of the Holy Spirit, the "Spirit of your Father" and the Spirit of Christ. Isaiah 43:10,11 and Luke 2:11 also show that the God of the Old Testament and Jesus are the same Person.
Lack of the word "person" isn't an argument. Theological language about the "persons" of the Holy Trinity developed as a way for Christians to explain what we were seeing in Scripture and received from Christ Himself.
What you're teaching is something called "Modalism" or "Sabellianism," it was first taught in the 3rd century and rejected by the Church soon after.
A simple reading of the Scripture should be enough to demonstrate this. Jesus Christ (ie the Son of God) clearly prays to God the Father at various points. If Father and Son are just manifestations of the same person, what were they doing talking to each other?
As for the Old Testament, again that's wrong. Of course we find God/Yahweh in the Old Testament; this is God the Father. But we also see repeated references to the Word of God; that's the Son. As well as to the Presence of God; that's the Holy Spirit.
So yes, Jesus is in the Old Testament. But He's not God the Father.
Steve, in John 14:28, why does Jesus say that "My Father is greater than I"? I don't understand the meaning of the verse
That's a great question.
We can look at this a variety of ways. On the one hand, this can show us some of Christ's humility before the Father.
In a deeper sense, this can be Christ recognizing His relationship to the Father: He, the Son, is begotten of the Father (not vice versa). We say that the Son is the perfect image of the Father (not vice versa).
Does that make sense?
@@stevenchristoforou1667 I think so. I think about it as Christ is equally God and equally human. I don't think humans can ever understand the mysteries of the Trinity. Thanks
Christ talked in many cases either as 'Son of God' or 'Son of Man'. The verse you referred belongs in the second category.
Not exactly. "Son of Man" is also a phrase with messianic, and even divine, connection.
For example:
blogs.ancientfaith.com/wholecounsel/2018/05/30/the-son-of-man/
@@stevenchristoforou1667 Correct. What I meant is that Jesus Christ expressed as for Himself either as God or man, depending on circumstances.
And where is the feminine in all of this? As an honest and logical person does it seem correct that there is no feminine in the holy trinity? Please explain.
Divinity is infinite, beyond anything we could say or even imagine.
I'm not sure what you're trying to ask, or what you're assuming, with the question.
Help me understand?