Wednesday, October 12, 2005

Anti-trinitarian heresies pt 2

When you read "Oneness" literature, you will see that they usually cite a couple of sources to claim that the early church never said "I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit" during ceremonies. These sources are "The New Schaff-Herzog Religious Encyclopedia" and "The Hastings Bible Dictionary." What they don't tell you is that, far from claiming that Jesus was speaking a riddle in Matthew 28:19, they claim that Jesus never said what Matthew tells us he said. The Encycopedia in particular asserts that Matthew put those words in the Lord's mouth.

Also, the various "Oneness" groups like to claim that their teaching is a true revelation, known to the early church but lost through most of church history, only to be restored by Jesus to them, the true Bride of Christ, in the End Times. But all of their arguments are simply recycled heresies from ages past.

The argument that "Jesus Christ is the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit" came from a Fifth century Egyptian monophysite monk named Shenoute. He was actually a trinitarian. Still, it is too simplistic to build a revelation out of "Jesus Christ" being the literal name we are supposed to use when refering to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Otherwise, why did Paul and the other early church fathers continuously refer to the Father and the Spirit? Why did they not make a point to always say "Jesus Christ"?

And the first person to insist that proper baptisms should carry, exclusively, the pronouncement "I baptize you in the name of Jesus Christ" was the ancient gnostic heretic Marcion (see Cyprian, Letter 72,4). Marcion did not use Matthew 28:19 because he did not accept Matthew's gospel. Nor did he accept the Old Testament, because he believed Jehovah was a false god. In fact, his "bible" only contained a greatly-edited version of Luke's writings and Paul's epistles.

From the afore-mentioned trisagionseraph website (highlighted in my last post):

"... The 'Oneness' Pentecostal reading of Matthew 28:19 turns the Christian quest for salvation into a frantic race to solve a riddle ... and, tragically, virtually all of those who have loved the Lord down through the centuries have guessed 'wrong,' believing in all sincerity that Matthew 28:19 was supposed to be the Christian baptismal formula. The pagans could have swallowed that. The Sphinx posed a riddle to the inhabitants of Thebes, devouring those who could not solve it ... The Pagans were quite familiar with the idea of riddler-gods and trickster gods. Christians are not. Christians are more familiar with the father of the prodigal, running to meet his son: '... But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him.' (Luke 15:20)
"The 'Oneness' revised version should run, '... But when he was still a great way off, his father screeched to a halt and demanded, Solve my puzzle or you can't come home!'
"God's children know he is no trickster; we can rest secure in His plain and unadorned word, not scrambling to 'decode' it: 'The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple.' " (Psalm 19:7)