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To: Alamo-Girl; betty boop; hosepipe; .30Carbine; Kitty Mittens; Kolokotronis; marron; Quix; T'wit
I assert that such reasoning should not be applied to God lest we anthropomorphize Him

Christ is the anthropomorphic form of God. We can anthropomorphize Christ because of His essential duality (icons of Christ are not idolatry, because they represent an image of a Man). His divine nature is never absent from His human nature, and the two are always in perfect harmony (or so the Church teaches, although sometimes this doesn't seem so).

Why did Christ "need" Spirit as His guide is an enigma which +Paul did not explain at all, as far as I am concerned, and it remains an enigma just as the Spirit descending on Him at the Baptism in the River Jordan.

Our Trinitarian understanding of God is challenged by those sections of the NT, imo.

13,269 posted on 04/22/2007 5:51:24 AM PDT by kosta50 (Eastern Orthodoxy is pure Christianity)
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To: kosta50; betty boop; hosepipe; .30Carbine; Kitty Mittens; Kolokotronis; marron; Quix; T'wit
Thank you so much for your reply and further explanation!

Christ is the anthropomorphic form of God. We can anthropomorphize Christ because of His essential duality (icons of Christ are not idolatry, because they represent an image of a Man). His divine nature is never absent from His human nature, and the two are always in perfect harmony (or so the Church teaches, although sometimes this doesn't seem so).

Why did Christ "need" Spirit as His guide is an enigma which +Paul did not explain at all, as far as I am concerned, and it remains an enigma just as the Spirit descending on Him at the Baptism in the River Jordan.

To the contrary, it is no more an enigma than Christ should require air to breathe or food and water or suffer pain on the Cross or bleed - being God also.

If one concentrates on the differences between Jesus Christ as a man and Jesus Christ as God, he is apt to see Jesus as two persons when He is One Person with two facets.

Our Trinitarian understanding of God is challenged by those sections of the NT, imo.

Truly, if one cannot see Jesus Christ as One he would no doubt have great difficulty comprehending God as One in three Persons (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) - much less the Spirit being One Person with seven facets (Rev 4).

Here’s one way to visualize it:

Who being the brightness of [his] glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; - Hebrews 1:3

In the above, Jesus is the brightness of the Father’s glory. That is worth considerable time in meditation contemplating how there is no delineation between the glory and the brightness of it while yet there is a difference.

Likewise, Jesus is the express image of the Father’s person. Again, worthy of meditation that there is no delineation between the image of the person and the person and yet there is a difference. Meditate not on a reflection of an image, like a mirror – but the image itself.

If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou [then], Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. – John 14:7-10

The same quality of no delineation and yet a difference applies to Jesus Christ as man and Jesus Christ as God.

Further, I assert that there is no delineation and yet a difference in the seven Spirits before God:

And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth. – Rev 5:6

When we accept this, we realize that we cannot apply man’s logic to God – including Jesus Christ as a man. Ditto for the Spirit.

If God in three Persons – or Jesus in two facets – or the Spirit in seven - were each an “Identity” according to Aristotle’s Law of Identity - the following would not be logical:

And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. – Luke 1:35

And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased. – Luke 3:22

And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, - Luke 4:1

For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God: for God giveth not the Spirit by measure [unto him]. – John 3:34

[Even] the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. – John 14:17

But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, [even] the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me: - John 15:26

Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you. - John 16:7

And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. – Acts 2:4

But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. – Romans 8:9

That is why I say we must resist anthropomorphizing God. A thing is true because He says it. It doesn’t have to be “logical.”

13,273 posted on 04/22/2007 8:49:44 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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