Very frequently in the NT God is “the GOD,” that is
the one and only God of true belief as distinct from other
pagan gods which always threaten to deceive us.
Some today in desperation are reviving a completely
false understanding of plurality in YHVH, because
Genesis 19:24 reads that “YHVH rained brimstone from
YHVH in heaven.” But they did not notice that “Solomon
gathered the people to King Solomon” in 1 Kings 8:1.
Two Solomons? Obviously not. These are special
Hebrew idioms and easily explained as suchPeople who clutch at these anomalies forget that the
One God of Israel is described by singular personal
pronouns thousands upon thousands of times. You
learned in high school (we hope!) that a singular personal
pronoun refers to a single person. If you learn of someone
who is I, ME, THEE, THOU, HIM, MYSELF,
THYSELF, HIMSELF — can you concede the simple
fact that God is a single Person?
Unfortunately your church probably gathers under
the strange banner of a GOD who is “three in one.” This
teaching has been thought to be quite false to Jesus and
Scripture by thousands of competent scholars and by 5
American Presidents — and by Sir Isaac Newton who
spoke of the West’s strange cult of “three gods.” Newton
was deeply troubled by this non-biblical concept of God.
John Milton, the British poet, and John Locke the
philosopher were adamantly against the idea of a triune
God. Others died at the hands of a cruel church for
refusing to believe that the God of Scripture is triune.
Michael Servetus was murdered by John Calvin over this
issue.
Counting how many God is in the Bible is in no way
difficult. We are to rejoice and relax in the wonderfully
sound and health-giving truth that as Jesus said “The
LORD our GOD is one LORD” (the Greek of Mark
12:29, reflecting the LXX of Deut. 6:4). Jesus upbraided
Jews of his time for failing to believe Moses. If they
would not receive the words of Moses predicting the
Messiah, how would they believe in the Messiah who had
come? (John 5:46).
One Lord is not two Lords. Jesus declared his firm
confession of the One God of Israel (Mark 12:29), and
then as if to anticipate objections Jesus went on
immediately to discuss Psalm 110:1, where there are two
lords. It is hardly a matter of higher learning or advanced
mathematics to see that if “the LORD our God is one
LORD” (as Jesus had just said, in agreement with a
friendly unitarian Jew), then the second lord of Psalm
110:1 cannot also be GOD, making two Lord Gods! Then
note (and Strong’s Concordance alas hides this from you)
that the second lord, “my lord” (adoni) of Psalm 110:1 is
never the title of Deity, but always the title of a superior
who is not GOD. The capital letter in your Bible on the
second lord of Psalm 110:1 is false and misleading. It
should read “lord,” not “Lord”! A capitalized Lord
regularly translates the Hebrew ADONAI (the Lord God,
450 times) and the second lord of the psalm Jesus quoted
to silence all objectors is not Adonai! It is adoni, my lord.
ADONI occurs 195 times in the Hebrew Bible.
Jesus, our teacher and lord (John 13:13), said in
Mark 12:29, “The LORD our GOD is one LORD.” This
should settle all doubts once and for all, that Jesus never,
ever disturbed the central, core principle of all true
religion that God is one single LORD. Tell your Jewish
friends and your Muslim friends, and very gently even
your Christian friends who are likely to be puzzled if not
infuriated!
You might want to help them by pointing out that
even the famous reformer John Calvin said:
“Elohim as a proof text with the plural ending to
prove that God is plural appears to me to have little
solidity. I will not insist upon the word; but rather caution
readers to beware of violent glosses [comments] of this
kind. They think that they have testimony against the
Arians to prove the Deity of the Son and of the Spirit, but
in the meantime they involve themselves in the error of
Sabellius [Modalism or Oneness, represented by
‘Oneness Pentecostals’ today]…If we suppose three
persons to be here [Gen. 1.1] denoted, there will be no
distinction between them…For me it is sufficient that the
plural number expresses those powers which God
exercised in creating the world.”1
“The followers of Jesus could assume that Jesus, like
many other Jews of his day, would have regarded Deut.
6:4-5 and Lev. 19:18 as the ideal summation of the
Jewish law. Jesus was repeating a common Jewish
understanding of the law…The words ‘the Lord our God
is one Lord’ are the proper expression of Jesus’ piety.”2
Why, you might ask, then do not churchgoers pay
reverent attention to the command which Jesus calls the
most important of all commands? Because churches have
long since given up thinking of Jesus as their rabbi and
teacher — contrary to his own constant admonition that
we listen with rapt and concentrated attention to what he
taught! Not to listen to Jesus and obey him is the one fatal
error we humans cannot afford to make (John 3:36 —
believing Jesus leads to immortality and refusing to obey
him is a dangerous mistake!).
To persuade your friends, invite them to explain
Mark 12:29. Jesus agrees wholeheartedly with a Jewish
scholar, and we know that Jews were believers in God as
ONE single Divine Person, not a Trinity. Being exposed
to the words of Jesus in Mark 12:29 can produce the
necessary shock which enables believers to rethink! At
present, once one says “Jesus is GOD,” one is admitting
to belief in two who are GOD! This is not the
monotheism of the Bible.
The world of scholars today often treats the Bible as
an unreliable source! That is hard for many to grasp! But
the typical comment of scholars is that “we do not know
whether Jesus said a given saying reported in the NT. It
might be that the church made it up and put it back into
the mouth of Jesus to give the impression that Jesus said
it: but no one knows if Jesus really uttered these words!”
1 Calvin, Commentary on Genesis, trans., ed., John King.
2 Stephen Patterson, DD, The God of Jesus, p.
http://www.focusonthekingdom.org/1512.pdf
the one and only God of true belief as distinct from other
pagan gods which always threaten to deceive us.
Some today in desperation are reviving a completely
false understanding of plurality in YHVH, because
Genesis 19:24 reads that “YHVH rained brimstone from
YHVH in heaven.” But they did not notice that “Solomon
gathered the people to King Solomon” in 1 Kings 8:1.
Two Solomons? Obviously not. These are special
Hebrew idioms and easily explained as suchPeople who clutch at these anomalies forget that the
One God of Israel is described by singular personal
pronouns thousands upon thousands of times. You
learned in high school (we hope!) that a singular personal
pronoun refers to a single person. If you learn of someone
who is I, ME, THEE, THOU, HIM, MYSELF,
THYSELF, HIMSELF — can you concede the simple
fact that God is a single Person?
Unfortunately your church probably gathers under
the strange banner of a GOD who is “three in one.” This
teaching has been thought to be quite false to Jesus and
Scripture by thousands of competent scholars and by 5
American Presidents — and by Sir Isaac Newton who
spoke of the West’s strange cult of “three gods.” Newton
was deeply troubled by this non-biblical concept of God.
John Milton, the British poet, and John Locke the
philosopher were adamantly against the idea of a triune
God. Others died at the hands of a cruel church for
refusing to believe that the God of Scripture is triune.
Michael Servetus was murdered by John Calvin over this
issue.
Counting how many God is in the Bible is in no way
difficult. We are to rejoice and relax in the wonderfully
sound and health-giving truth that as Jesus said “The
LORD our GOD is one LORD” (the Greek of Mark
12:29, reflecting the LXX of Deut. 6:4). Jesus upbraided
Jews of his time for failing to believe Moses. If they
would not receive the words of Moses predicting the
Messiah, how would they believe in the Messiah who had
come? (John 5:46).
One Lord is not two Lords. Jesus declared his firm
confession of the One God of Israel (Mark 12:29), and
then as if to anticipate objections Jesus went on
immediately to discuss Psalm 110:1, where there are two
lords. It is hardly a matter of higher learning or advanced
mathematics to see that if “the LORD our God is one
LORD” (as Jesus had just said, in agreement with a
friendly unitarian Jew), then the second lord of Psalm
110:1 cannot also be GOD, making two Lord Gods! Then
note (and Strong’s Concordance alas hides this from you)
that the second lord, “my lord” (adoni) of Psalm 110:1 is
never the title of Deity, but always the title of a superior
who is not GOD. The capital letter in your Bible on the
second lord of Psalm 110:1 is false and misleading. It
should read “lord,” not “Lord”! A capitalized Lord
regularly translates the Hebrew ADONAI (the Lord God,
450 times) and the second lord of the psalm Jesus quoted
to silence all objectors is not Adonai! It is adoni, my lord.
ADONI occurs 195 times in the Hebrew Bible.
Jesus, our teacher and lord (John 13:13), said in
Mark 12:29, “The LORD our GOD is one LORD.” This
should settle all doubts once and for all, that Jesus never,
ever disturbed the central, core principle of all true
religion that God is one single LORD. Tell your Jewish
friends and your Muslim friends, and very gently even
your Christian friends who are likely to be puzzled if not
infuriated!
You might want to help them by pointing out that
even the famous reformer John Calvin said:
“Elohim as a proof text with the plural ending to
prove that God is plural appears to me to have little
solidity. I will not insist upon the word; but rather caution
readers to beware of violent glosses [comments] of this
kind. They think that they have testimony against the
Arians to prove the Deity of the Son and of the Spirit, but
in the meantime they involve themselves in the error of
Sabellius [Modalism or Oneness, represented by
‘Oneness Pentecostals’ today]…If we suppose three
persons to be here [Gen. 1.1] denoted, there will be no
distinction between them…For me it is sufficient that the
plural number expresses those powers which God
exercised in creating the world.”1
“The followers of Jesus could assume that Jesus, like
many other Jews of his day, would have regarded Deut.
6:4-5 and Lev. 19:18 as the ideal summation of the
Jewish law. Jesus was repeating a common Jewish
understanding of the law…The words ‘the Lord our God
is one Lord’ are the proper expression of Jesus’ piety.”2
Why, you might ask, then do not churchgoers pay
reverent attention to the command which Jesus calls the
most important of all commands? Because churches have
long since given up thinking of Jesus as their rabbi and
teacher — contrary to his own constant admonition that
we listen with rapt and concentrated attention to what he
taught! Not to listen to Jesus and obey him is the one fatal
error we humans cannot afford to make (John 3:36 —
believing Jesus leads to immortality and refusing to obey
him is a dangerous mistake!).
To persuade your friends, invite them to explain
Mark 12:29. Jesus agrees wholeheartedly with a Jewish
scholar, and we know that Jews were believers in God as
ONE single Divine Person, not a Trinity. Being exposed
to the words of Jesus in Mark 12:29 can produce the
necessary shock which enables believers to rethink! At
present, once one says “Jesus is GOD,” one is admitting
to belief in two who are GOD! This is not the
monotheism of the Bible.
The world of scholars today often treats the Bible as
an unreliable source! That is hard for many to grasp! But
the typical comment of scholars is that “we do not know
whether Jesus said a given saying reported in the NT. It
might be that the church made it up and put it back into
the mouth of Jesus to give the impression that Jesus said
it: but no one knows if Jesus really uttered these words!”
1 Calvin, Commentary on Genesis, trans., ed., John King.
2 Stephen Patterson, DD, The God of Jesus, p.
http://www.focusonthekingdom.org/1512.pdf