1.2.2.9
John 14:8-9
Well, what about the verse
"He that hath seen me hath seen the father."
Let us look at the context:
"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?"
John 14:8-9
Philip wanted to see God with his own eyes, but this is
impossible since no one can ever do ever do that. The Bible
says:
"No man hath seen God at any time,"
John 1:18
"No man hath seen God at any time,"
1 John 4:12
So Jesus simply told him that his own actions and miracles
should be a sufficient proof of the existence of God without God
having to physically come down and let himself be seen every
time someone is doubtful. This is equivalent to for example
- John 8:19: "Then said they unto him, Where is thy
Father? Jesus answered, Ye neither know me, nor my Father: if
ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also."
- John 12:44"Jesus cried and said, He that believeth on
me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent me."
- John 15:23"He that hateth me hateth my Father also."
- Matthew 10:40-41 "He that receiveth you receiveth me
(Jesus), and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me.
He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall
receive a prophet's reward; and he that receiveth a righteous
man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous
man's reward."
If we want to insist that when Philip saw Jesus (pbuh), he
had actually physically seen God "the Father" because
Jesus "is" the father and both are one "Trinity," and Jesus is
the "incarnation" of God, then this will force
us to conclude that John 1:18, 1 John 4:12, ..etc. are all lies.
Well, is Philip the only one who ever "saw the father"? Let
us read:
"Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is
of God, he hath seen the Father."
John 6:46
Who is this who "is of God" and had seen the Father you ask?
Let us once again ask the Bible:
"He that is of God heareth God's words: ye therefore hear
them not, because ye are not of God."
John 8:47.
And
"Beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is
good. He that doeth good is of God: but he that doeth evil hath
not seen God"
3 John 1:11.
Have all people who have done good also physically
seen God?
In "The New Catholic Encyclopedia" (Bearing the
Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur, indicating official
approval) we get a glimpse of how the concept of the Trinity
was not introduced into Christianity until close to four hundred
years after Jesus (pbuh):
".......It is difficult in the second half of the 20th
century to offer a clear, objective and straightforward account
of the revelation, doctrinal evolution, and theological
elaboration of the Mystery of the trinity. Trinitarian
discussion, Roman Catholic as well as other, present a somewhat
unsteady silhouette. Two things have happened. There is the
recognition on the part of exegetes and Biblical theologians,
including a constantly growing number of Roman Catholics, that
one should not speak of Trinitarianism in the New Testament
without serious qualification. There is also the closely
parallel recognition on the part of historians of dogma and
systematic theologians that when one does speak of an
unqualified Trinitarianism, one has moved from the period of
Christian origins to, say, the last quadrant of the 4th
century. It was only then that what might be called the
definitive Trinitarian dogma 'One God in three Persons' became
thoroughly assimilated into Christian life and thought ...
it was the product of 3 centuries of doctrinal development"
(emphasis added).
"The New Catholic Encyclopedia" Volume XIV, p. 295.
They admit it!. Jesus' twelve apostles lived and died
never having heard of any "Trinity" !
Did Jesus leave his closest and dearest followers so
completely and utterly baffled and lost that they never even
realized the "true" nature of God? Did he leave them in such
black darkness that neither they nor their children, nor yet
their children's children would ever come to recognize the
"true" nature of the One they are to worship? Do we really want
to allege that Jesus was so thoroughly incompetent in the
discharge of his duties that he left his followers in such utter
chaos that it would take them fully three centuries after his
departure to finally piece together the nature of the One whom
they are to worship? Why did Jesus never, even once, just say
"God, the Holy Ghost and I are three Persons in one Trinity.
Worship all of us as one"? If he had only chosen to make
just one such explicit statement to them he could have
relieved Christianity of centuries of bitter disputes, division,
and animosity.
Top Harpur writes in his book "For Christ's Sake":
"What is most embarrassing for the church is the
difficulty of proving any of these statements of dogma from the
new Testament documents. You simply cannot find the doctrine of
the Trinity set out anywhere in the Bible. St. Paul has the
highest view of Jesus' role and person, but nowhere does he call
him God. Nor does Jesus himself anywhere explicitly claim to be
the second person in the Trinity, wholly equal to his heavenly
Father. As a pious Jew, he would have been shocked and offended
by such an Idea....(this is) in itself bad enough. But there is
worse to come. This research has lead me to believe that the
great majority of regular churchgoers are, for all practical
purposes, tritheists. That is, they profess to believe in one
God, but in reality they worship three.."
The Encyclopaedia Britannica states under the heading
"Trinity":
"in Christian doctrine, the unity of Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit as three persons in one Godhead Neither the word Trinity
nor the explicit doctrine appears in the New Testament,� The
Council of Nicaea in 325 stated the crucial formula for that
doctrine in its confession that the Son is 'of the same
substance [homoousios] as the Father,' even though it said very
little about the Holy Spirit. Over the next half century,
Athanasius defended and refined the Nicene
formula, and, by the end of the 4th century, under the
leadership of Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory
of Nazianzus (the Cappadocian Fathers), the doctrine of the
Trinity took substantially the form it has maintained ever
since."
Once again, let us have a look at our table:
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