Anti-trinitarian heresies, again

Okay, I'm finally returning to this topic.

At the turn of the 20th century, when various small fragments of pentecostals began to project the theory that there was a secret code-name for "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit," it opened the door for other errors. This "Oneness" theology, ironically, splintered into many, many sub-teachings.

One such group, fresh from the denial of a trinitarian mode of baptism, claimed a Unitarian interpretation of John 1:1 for their own. Of course, most of them were not aware they were following Unitarian dogma. They felt their "revelation" was unique to them, a long-lost apostolic truth that God was, through them, restoring in the "End Time."

John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

They latched onto the Greek word "logos," translated "Word," and taught that it really meant something more like "thought." (It's important to note that almost no one who believes this can actually read the slightest bit of Koine Greek.)

Therefore, the passage would read "In the beginning was the thought..." The Son, then, did not preexist. He was a thought, an idea. The Father always knew, always predestined, that the Son would one day exist, but the day would not come until He was literally born in a manger.

This lead them down a difficult path. There are many scriptures that show or point to the preexistence of the Son, so each of these scriptures had to be tended to with verbal slight-of-hand. For instance:

Col 1:16 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities-- all things have been created through Him and for Him.

This passage, as well as the rest of John 1, was dealt with thusly: The Father created all things with the power that he would one day invest in the Son, after creating the Son. So it's something of a riddle. The Son created nothing, but the Father always had the Son in mind.

This would be like saying, if you had a son and you were baking him a birthday cake, thinking, with each step in the process, of your son, how much you love him, how much you want him to enjoy this cake, that, when the cake was done, your son was the one who had actually baked it.

The teaching that "Logos" really means "thought" originated with a 16th century Italian heretic named Faustus Socinius. He is credited with being a father of Unitarianism. He felt that Jesus was not divine, so John 1:1 cannot mean what it seems to mean. A priori reasoning, to be sure, but he gained many followers.

He rejected original sin, predestination, and the canonicity of the writings of Paul. It was assumed that Jesus never meant for us to believe He was divine -- that Paul twisted His teachings and corrupted them beyond recognition. Now, oneness Pentecostals believe nothing of the sort. THEY think their teaching on John 1:1 was given straight from God to them. It is a case of, among other things, "those who are ignorant of history are doomed to repeat it." They accept Socinius' teaching that Logos = thought, while trying to swing back over to Christianity when it comes to the divinity of Jesus and predestination.

Finally, the wholesale separation from the doctrine of the trinity became complete with the rejection of the teaching "God in three persons." As oneness theologians teach it, as I learned it, the doctrine of the trinity is this:

There are three gods: Father, son, and holy spirit. They are all people. Well, two are, I guess. Two people and a bird. The Father looks like a wizened old man -- perhaps like Father Time or Gandalf. The son of course is Jesus. The holy spirit is a dove. There are three thrones in heaven: one for Jesus, one for Gandalf, and one for the bird.

Of course this is ridiculous, but that is the danger of it -- when you grow up in a closed community that not only teaches that something is wrong, but misrepresents the "wrong" teaching, then it is hard to see your way out. They quote passages like "God is a spirit" and "no man has seen God at any time" to prove a point that no real trinitarian would quarrel with -- that God the Father is not a man. So those held in bondage to the heresy are led to believe that trinitarians believe the Father is a man. They create straw man arguments that no trinitarian scholar would put forth, and then they destroy the straw men, leaving their followers to believe they have just destroyed the doctrine of the trinity.

In the first place "God in three persons" is not the same as saying "God in three people." "Persons" and "people" do not share an etymology. Our English "person" comes from the Latin "persona," which shares an etymology with the Greek "prosopon." "Prosopon" is used of the Father in Rev. 6:16 and Matt. 18:10, where it is translated "face," and Acts 3:19-20 and Heb. 9:24 where it is translated "presence." (It is also translated as "face" from the Septuagint, in Exodus 33:20).

Of course, those of you who have studied Church history are well aware of the trouble that has come from translating words into different languages, and of the early trinitarian controversies that came about in large part because of the poverty of the Latin language as compared to Greek. The Church fathers had to defeat the teaching that the Godhead contains three "essences" or was of three different "substances" or "beings," or that each was separate. Distinct -- yes. Separate -- no.

The English word "person" has gradually become more and more synonymous with "human" or "formed being," which the devil has seized upon to confuse an unlearned yet proud group of people who live for "new revelation," always searching for more and more traditional Church teachings that they can tear down under the name of "restoring lost revelation in these Last Days." As with a complicated math problem, once you err in the first stage of an equation, you will err further at each later stage. In this way, it becomes harder and harder to see your way out.