Anti-Trinitarianism

Thanks for responding, I will address your rebuttals below.You say, "Even many Arians believe in God, Jesus and the Holy spirit. Just demonstrating there are three beings is far from demonstrating a triune God of the nicene creed." What Arians believe is irrelevant to the subject at hand, we are arguing from the scriptures, not from creeds and the beliefs of certain sects of Christians. You say, "Secondly the section of 1 John that is quote is a later addition. It is found in a handful of late manuscripts and in many of those manuscripts it is not found in the text itself but as a marginal note, demonstrating this was some note that eventually got incorporated into the text and hence not original." Your claims are false and unsubstantiated. While it is true that most Greek manuscripts do not contain 1 John 5:7, it should be noted that less than 500 of the more than 5,000 Greek manuscripts even contain 1 John 5, and of these, only 12 are from before the 11th century. In other words, the vast majority of manuscripts which contain 1 John 5 would be considered "late." Old Latin manuscripts which are dated earlier than the majority of Greek manuscripts containing 1 John 5 include: Codex Toletanus (10th century), Codex Complutensis (10th century), Codex Cavensis (9th century), Codex Ulmensis (9th century), Codex Theodulphianus (8th or 9th century), Sangallense MSS 63 and 907 (8th or 9th century), Codex Legionensis (7th century), Frisingensia Fragmenta (7th century), and Codex Speculum (5th century), all of which contain verse 7 as read in the KJV. (http://www.kjvtoday.com...). The fact that 1 John 5:7 is not found in most Greek manuscripts does not negate its authenticity as this verse is clearly supported by a plethora of early Christian writers and unto the Protestant Reformation. These include (from late to early): * Erasmus, Commentary on 1 John 5:7 (Paraphrase on The First Epistle of John, 1520 A.D.) "For the Spirit too is truth just as the Father and the Son are. The truth of all three is one, just as the nature of all three is one. For there are three in heaven who furnish testimony to Christ: the Father, the Word, and the Spirit. (http://books.google.com...) [p. 198] * Lombard, Second Distinction (Libri Quattuor Sententiarum, 1150 A.D.) "That the Father and the Son, says he, not by confusion of persons, but by Unity of Nature, St. John hath taught us in his Canonical Epistle, saying, 'There are three which bare record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one.'" (http://rarebooks.dts.edu...) [p. 14] *Jerome, Prologue to the Canonical Epistles (Codex Fuldensis, 546 A.D.)"Just as these are properly understood and so translated faithfully by interpreters into Latin without leaving ambiguity for the readers nor [allowing] the variety of genres to conflict, especially in that text where we read the unity of the trinity is placed in the first letter of John, where much error has occurred at the hands of unfaithful translators contrary to the truth of faith, who have kept just the three words water, blood and spirit in this edition omitting mention of Father, Word and Spirit in which especially the catholic faith is strengthened and the unity of substance of Father, Son and Holy Spirit is attested." (http://kentbrandenburg.blogspot.com...) * North African Bishops, Council of Carthage (484 A.D.) "And so that we may teach the Holy Spirit to be of one divinity with the Father and the Son still more clearly than the light, here is proof from the testimony of John the evangelist. For he says: There are three who bear witness in heaven, the Father, the Word and the Holy Spirit, and these three are one.' Surely he does not say 'three separated by a difference in quality' or 'divided by grades which differentiate, so that there is a great distance between them?' No, he says that the 'three are one.'" (http://en.wikipedia.org...) * Priscillian, (Liber Apolegeticus, 385 A.D.) "As John says 'and there are three which give testimony on earth, the water, the flesh, the blood, and these three are in one, and there are three which give testimony in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Spirit, and these three are one. . .'" (http://www.oocities.org...) * Cyprian, On the Unity of the Church (Treatise 1, 250 A.D.) "The Lord says, 'I and the Father are one;' and again it is written of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, 'And these three are one.'" (http://www.newadvent.org...) * Regardless of what the above quoted men believed, it is clear that this verse was authentic and to be found in many then extant manuscripts. Your accusation of the spuriousness of 1 John 5:7 is demonstrably false. There is more evidence as to the authenticity of this verse, but for sake of time I have limited myself to what I have given (http://brandplucked.webs.com...) . You say, "This again goes to show that this section is about witnesses being one and in agreement not on in essence!" Verse 8 says that the Spirit, water, and blood "agree in one" but you cannot extrapolate this back to verse 7 which says they "are one." Of course they would be in agreement, God cannot contradict Himself, but verse 7 was written for the purpose of expounding the fact that the witness of the Spirit (verse 6) is "truth" (consider John 14:6) because this witness comes with the authority of the "three that bear record in heaven." Of necessity these three must be one because the Holy Spirit is one in the same with God (1 Corinthians 3:16 and 6:19, where God's Spirit is equated with the Holy Spirit), and the Word is one in the same with God (John 1:1), so therefore we have the triadic formula: Holy Spirit=God=the Word. To say that there are three which bear record in heaven, but to then deny the unity of these three, demands a heretical proposition that there be three Gods, and we know from many passages that God is one (Ephesians 4:6, et al). . You say, upon quoting 1 Corinthians 3:5-9, "Would you now become an 'apostolic Binitarian' believing Paul and Apollos to be the two persons of the Pauline 'binity' because that is what you must be believe in order to be consistent. Or will you take the text in context and understand that Paul and Apollos are one in agreement and purpose as the text clearly states and as 1 John 5 is trying to demonstrate? I do agree that 1 John 5 is quite clear and hence my rejection of your interpretation and rejection of 1 John 5:7 is quite coherent!" Your rejection of my "interpretation" of 1 John 5:7 is really quite incoherent. Paul and Apollos are one in the Spirit, not one in essence. You cannot compare 1 John 5:7 to this passage because in the former, the three which are one are listed (Father, Word, and Holy Ghost), whereas in the latter, the ones the plant and water are given to not only mean Paul and Appalos but also ANY person which waters and plants, so you cannot say these are a "binity." Notice Jesus says, of the people are His, "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; that they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me." The oneness of Apollos and Paul is in relation to the Spirit in them of which the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost consists. We cannot say that we become part of the Trinity because Revelation 21:3 says that in the end, we shall be His people and He shall be our God, so of necessity we must conclude that the oneness of the believers and the oneness of God are two different things. And in fact, from the context of these passages we can clearly understand that the oneness of the Trinity is unique and separate from the oneness of the believers. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are eternal whereas man had a beginning (Genesis 1). Man is the vessel through which the one triune God works. Notice Paul says in that same letter, "Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all" (1 Corinthians 12:4-6). This expounds the oneness of the body of Christ, we are one IN THE SPIRIT. We may have different gifts, administrations, and operations (i.e. planting and watering), but the same Spirit of God dwells in al the believers. The unity of the body of Christ (the Church) is a major theme is Paul's epistles. Consider Ephesians 4:3-6, "Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. "There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; One Lord, one faith, one baptism, One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all." Nothing about 1 John 5:7 or 1 Corinthians 3:5-9 speaks of agreement. Agreement is no doubt contextually present, but the subject of the oneness in both cases is a derivative of the nature of the Spirit. There is one Spirit (God) working in the united body of Christ. Your delineation of Matthew 28:18 is erroneous; you unsuprisingly relinquish yet another trinitarian proof-text to obscurity. Verse 18 is authentic and the disciples did follow this command, but more on this in the next round as I am out of space.