John 3:35 The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand.
Is it possible that Father created and perhaps does a few things in the first chapters of Genesis and then steps back and takes a purely passive role.
If Father gives everything in the hand of the Son I would expect Jesus would be very busy in the OT.
In other words do 90% (just a rough guess) of the God references really mean Son/Jesus?
So for example did Moses recieve the tablets from Father or Son?
But now it seems Jesus has a minimal role in the Bible (no downplaying salvation...)
Whole OT is Father. NT is very small compared to the OT; especially if you take into account the first books of the NT are just the same story reworded a bit by the various authors.
What if it is a mutual role, rather than passive?
After all, the idea of giving when it comes to God, even to (Himself)/(Son) is that of "lavished generosity" in which God out of the infinite treasury of his wealth - gives abundantly.
In other words, the Father giving all things into the hands of his Son might be expressible in that he gives all things to his son, because all things are infinitely his to infinitely give.
Not sure if that helps at all, but just a thought that maybe it is not so much a "complete transfer" but a mutual and continual flow.
White Wings thats the conclusion I've been coming to lately that it is Jesus is the majority of the times we see God in any form in the OT.
I and the Father are one
No one has seen the Father except the Son
No man can see my face and live
I see Yah-Weh as the I am, the existing, the source
I see Yah-Shua as the active extension, the visible image of the invisible, he is the word made flesh
Our 3 dimensionality cannot handle the fullness of all that God is, we can't even perceive really a 4 dimensional object let alone 11+ dimensional. So God gets funnelled down (for lack of a better word) into a form that we can perceive and relate to.
Not any less than the Father, still the fullness of deity
Quote from: Lefein on March 24, 2011, 07:25:30 PMWhat if it is a mutual role, rather than passive?
Coul;d be; it's just not how I understand "all in His hands."
I see it a bit like this. Long ago Father and Son had a little chat and agreed to created earth.
Father said: Okay, I'll give you a little help creating but then I give everything in your hands (read you are on your own)
Maybe Father gives a bit of help once in a while but the vast percentage is Jesus doing something.
But if God=Father in the OT then He basicly takes all things out of the Son's hands again.
If it's mutal I would expect 50/50. But the OT reads like 0/100(Father)
I suppose it might have to do with how the Father and Son deal with each other in their relationship. The Old Testament prophets probably didn't make the full connection between Father and Son until Christ showed his disciples the concept - such as the Emmaus road discussion.
Hmmn. The world is created and maintained through The Son, and by The Son. It would seem that The Son is in many ways the Creation-dealing expression of God, or; God as he deals with Creation. Even so far as to enter Creation as one Created - becoming The Word made flesh. The Eternal Creator expressing himself as one Created in Creation. A rather magnificent union of Creator and Creation and the Created.
Hmmn...
On the 0/100 Father thing, I'll have to think about that a little bit.
Quote from: redhotmagma on March 24, 2011, 07:52:01 PMI see Yah-Shua as the active extension, the visible image of the invisible, he is the word made flesh
I'll focus on this bit and ignore the Trinity hints :P
An extension sounds like a tool. That's to minimal for me.
I compare it to an earthly king.
Quite often when a king/ruler gets to old to rule the whole country, the king gave all things in the hands of his son (prince).
The father was still the supreme ruler of the country but spend most of his day doing nothing.
His son basicly ruled the country. He took care of (almost) all daily affairs.
That's how I see it.
But in the OT the king is claimed to have stepped back but he constantly is on the forground and his son is quiet all the time.
All things in his hand?
In the NT Jesus was the central character.
In the OT He was simply not there.
For me that can mean 2 things:
a] All things are given in His hands only 2000 years ago (I think that's not correct)
b] There is big misunderstanding who the OT God really is.
:2c:
"b]" is probably the truth of the matter.
Small thought, atleast my current thought; what if all of God (Father/Son/Spirit/what have you) were represented throughout, albeit "hidden" (for lack of a better word) in much the same way that we don't quite get to see the little surprises throughout the story.
I am thinking that...atleast for my own current milestone - that the OT God isn't "The Father", or "just the Father", or "The Father only". But in the face of b] some more for me to think about at any rate.
I did a quick count. In the OT using the KJV (YLT)
I think it's accurate enough for this discussion.
- 2361 verses that write "God" (God)
- 5589 verses read "Lord" (Yaweh)
- 518 verses read "Lord God" (Yaweh God"
Yeshua means "Salvation" or "Yah who is salavtion"
Assuming the Son has one name that's Yashua then Yaweh would always mean Father.
That would leave 2361 verses that possibly about Jesus and 6107 verses are about Father.
I'm fully aware that this seems to largely debunk my posts above; but guess what.... sometimes I'm honest and post what I found :icon_jokercolor:
well I have been a trinitarian my whole life, although I don't really care anymore (at least to the point of getting worked up about it), all I know is Jesus is my God, The Father is my God (not totally convinced on who/what the HS is, but I'm never told to worship Him/it, so that brings my focus back to Father and Son.)
Have you read ELM's "What is God". He talks about the elohim being like the whitehouse, with The Father as the head, and the Son as the viceroy?
He claims Jesus was the first creation of the Father who then created all other things. But even ELM says they are the same in magnitude, just that Father is 1st, Son is 2nd, same in essence.
The point I'm making is that trinity or no trinity (per ELM at least, I don't really have any other reference for conception of the Nature of the Godhead) The Father and the Son are one, just not in rank, or role.
You said extension is too much like a tool. I don't mean it in that way, more of the visible and active(doing) version, of the invisible and being.
If you stand in front of a mirror, there are two WhiteWings. One is the the generator of the image your physical body, the other is the reflection of your glory. you could say your reflection is part of the spirit world, and your actual body is in the physical world.
Mirror that, so that the actual generator is the spirit side being the Father, which generates the image into the physical (all of the sightings of God in the OT). Obviously you can't take this illustration too far, because its very basic. But just as you actually standing in front of the mirror in 3D, projects a 2D image, so as the Father undefinable in human terms because of His vastness 11+D, projects into the physical a 3D image.
I'm not saying the Son is only an image of Father (thus the limitation of the illustration) but for the sake of the Father staying invisible, the Son manifests in that form. I believe Jesus is the only God anyone (including possibly the heavenly host) has seen.
Another way I visualize it is this: our world is a baloon fully inflated. God is me standing there holding the balloon (He's got the whole wide world in his hands) If I want to interact with the people in the ballon, I'd poke my finger into the balloon (without popping it). The people inside would see my finger covered in balloon but they would not see the rest of me including my arms legs, body etc. you wouldn't say my finger was not fully me, it just wasn't all of me. In this case the finger represents when we have someone coming into contact with God, which I believe to be the Son in all cases, they can't fully grasp the enormity, thus the need for Him to manifest in a lower dimensional form.
Now whether you want to go back to the T3 word and say that me standing there is just the Son, or is Father, Son and Spirit (my hand being one division for instance), or whatever other configuration you have in your mind (not that we're really allowed to talk about it anyway :happygrin:) Thats not my point, and I think it could fit either way, you could be standing next to me holding the balloon world, and I could call you the Father.
Either way I don't think its ever the Father pushing His finger into the balloon.
Kinda hard to not bring the ol "trinity" topic into this . . .but I wonder if much of our surmizing isn't really that of a separatist . . .we struggle to fathom God and Jesus being one and the same . . .just manifesting different natures or characters of the Godhead at diverse times.
Quote from: WhiteWings on March 24, 2011, 09:13:16 PM
Quote from: Lefein on March 24, 2011, 07:25:30 PMWhat if it is a mutual role, rather than passive?
Coul;d be; it's just not how I understand "all in His hands."
I see it a bit like this. Long ago Father and Son had a little chat and agreed to created earth.
Father said: Okay, I'll give you a little help creating but then I give everything in your hands (read you are on your own)
Maybe Father gives a bit of help once in a while but the vast percentage is Jesus doing something.
But if God=Father in the OT then He basicly takes all things out of the Son's hands again.
If it's mutal I would expect 50/50. But the OT reads like 0/100(Father)
I disagree with you but yet agree :icon_jokercolor: on your earlier assesment said that old Testament is mostly about the Son.
The reason I belive this is that Jesus said I came to
reveal my Father.
From my viewpoint I see PreJesus/OT God revealing 2 people during his earthly ministry. One is His Father and 2 is the promised messiah, God in the flesh, the seed of Abraham, who we know as Jesus.
Before Jesus came to Earth to reveal his Father, did anyone know that there even was a Father?
So Perhaps when the Jews speak of one God, The God of Abrham, Issac and Jacob, they are refering to the Son of God, but in their minds they thought of Him as God, but did not know that God had a dad, until Jesus came and said that he was a Son and the he came to reveal his Father.
So rather than being a revealtion that God had a Son, it was perhaps The revelation that God had a Father.
QuoteSo rather than being a revealtion that God had a Son, it was perhaps The revelation that God had a Father.
Or the ancient Jews knew it very well but the knowledge has been lost.
If sure you are aware today's Jews never write God but always something like G-d.
Gods name may not be spoken for unholy matters. Even wen His name was written down in the scrolls the priests always substituted His name for something else when reading to the public. There are views that the OT has become corrupted in that area. Many of the Lord/LORD/God/GOD things were not inspired. They are man made out of respect to not speak His name.
A wrong decision IMO because if God agrees with those alterations He surely would have inspired them that way.
OTOH 1st century Jews expected someone. They had many names for that person. Teacher, king, prophet, etc
But son was not one of those names.
In the 'has God a solid form' you will read that the Jews were very much aware that there was God and someone/something else.
I think they knew at least as much about it as we do. But they never knew that someone also has the title Son.
Quote from: wwI think they knew at least as much about it as we do. But they never knew that someone also has the title Son.
Why should they? The history of man and God is one of increasing revelation over the ages.
We build on their foundation and go further.
I am sure there are things that we don't know also, that are being saved for another age.
But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.1 Cor 2:9