The holy trinity

I am really puzzled by the holy trinity.

My understanding is that it consists of God the father, God the son and God the holy ghost.

That must mean that Jesus has always been around and that he didn't die at all. Which must mean he wasn't conceived of the virgin Mary and all that stuff.

And this view is supported by the 'God the father' bit. I mean he could not be a father without having a child.

Also, what is the holy ghost? Was there something called 'holy' and did it die unhappily only to wander through eternity as a ghost?

It is so confusing.

But obviously true

See the appropriate wikipedia entry.

In the future, you might not want to publicly confess ignorance about the central tenets of the religion you spend so much time condemning as stupid.

oh, you don't understand it either

Oh, well, if you say so.

Forgive me for not understanding but it is hardly obvious.

God is allegedly a trinity of father son and holy ghost.

But I thought Jesus was born 2009 years ago.

Was it the holy duality before that or was Jesus there all along?

And if he was it is not really fair to say he was born 2009 years ago.

But if he was there when and why did he come along and who was his mother?

It is so confusing.

Can anyone explain this?

My god Dawkins ... why don't you just read the bible ... you know they make english versions now...

Are you afraid you will burst into flames just for picking it up?!?!?!
Do us all a favor and study the material for yourself... reading it for one would be a start ... then how about reviewing the changes in church up to 1400th century .. like really .. as much as you bash christians up and down this web-site .. you actually are now asking to be informed about soemthing you should know by heart? **sigh**

Go to a college course for the History of Christianity , attend a sunday church meeting .. TALK TO A PREACHER FOR CRYING OUT LOUD! If you would drop you insensitive exostric approach to people ... you might get a bit farther ahead. and maybe even learn something.......

I personally think you will burst into flames thou just stepping into a church .. but thats IMPO

I have read the bible twice and it is a very confusing book.

Especially in this area.

Why don't you answer my questions?

Oh and BTW you don't have to step into a church to burst into flames. The church has a long history of taking the flames to the people.

Oh sorry, I thought this was a debating site

Please cite any place in the Bible that lists or describes any 'Trinity'. I am not aware of any. As far as I can tell, the 'Trinity' doctrine was the result of an interpretation of the late Roman era Christians. The secondary result of a long running battle between verious Christian factions in the 3rd and 4th century about the nature of God - Monophysites, Arians, and so forth.

You are correct that the term "Trinity" is not found in scripture. Nor is the term "Rapture".

However, people are to be baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. And Jesus described some events that people refer to as "The Rapture".

Keep asking questions Dawk. And read the Bible two more times.

Certainly not the word 'trinity' but the concept is there.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_trinity#Scriptural_texts_cited_as_implying_support

4:171:
This is a point where muslims and christians disagree in belief. Muslims do believe in Jesus, but they don't believe in the trinity. There are many verses in Quran about Jesus and his mother, Mary.
This is one of them!:
"O People of the Scripture! Do not exaggerate in your religion nor utter aught concerning Allah save the truth. The Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, was only a messenger of Allah, and His word which He conveyed unto Mary, and a spirit from Him. So believe in Allah and His messengers, and say not "Three" - Cease! (it is) better for you! - Allah is only One God. Far is it removed from His transcendent majesty that He should have a son. His is all that is in the heavens and all that is in the earth. And Allah is sufficient as Defender."(171)

Note:The version "People of the Scripture" in Quran refers to people believing in the Bible, or the Torah,; ie the christians and/or the Jews.

This verse notwithstanding, the three major monotheistic religions (christianity, judaism and islam) have infinitely MORE in common than any religion -- certainly MORE in agreement than disagreement.

And precisely because there is a wide area of doctrinal overlap, these religions should be allies rather than going at each other's throats -- or at the very least, it would be easier to accomodate inter-faith dialogue.

The world would be an immensely better place if reasonable muslims weren't so infatuated with goat-herder logic as espoused by nasrallah and his ilk. Same thing for christians and jews.

to numinus

I quite agree. the topic was the Holy Trinity, so I just posted some thing I knew about it. I thought it would be interesting for some to know there is direct reference to it in Quran. Nevertheless there are many other verses that are common with what is written in bible, and we believe that the whole religion is the same, except that a more complete version of it has been revealed to prophet Muhammad. You might as well have a look at my last post in The monstrous Christian / Islamic God:

HTML:

http://houseofpolitics.com/forum/showpost.php?p=87496&postcount=68

Re: to numinus

Im not a bit surprised that the quran has something to say about the holy trinity. After all, the nicene creed pre-dates islam by more than two centuries.

I have no problem with you believing the quran to be 'more' complete. After all, completeness is not the issue of the world community with your religion. It is the interpretation of the quran by goat-herders-turned-demagogues that leaves much to be desired.

I should look at your post because....?

Any particular reason?

Re: to numinus

I never agree with what some like taliban do in the name of islam, but first we should have a look at the state of the world we're living in. Where zionists justify their bomb raids on palestineans with verses of torah that promises them the land, and where christians leave their foot out of politics and justify their silence against cruelty in the world by the "turn your face over" reasoning (here I mean the true christians, never mind some like Bush which also claim to be so; adding them would just make a greater mess!);
... just what else do you expect?
Does all these stop you to try to find what the true religion is?
And may I ask "who" or "what cause" you think has made this demagogue impression of muslims throughout the world. I sure am upset with my side not being so successful in showing the right face and put blame on ourselves, but don't you think there is also some propoganda at work?
You have all this news about terrorist bombs with the "Muslim" word beside it, only as a guess!; After all these claims of the international Nuclear Agency about Iran's nuclear activities being peaceful, repeated over and over, USA's government still tries to convince the world that Iran is going for Nuclear weapons; And you probably know now who had trained Bin-Ladan as a terrorist and has tried to make him a symbol of muslim; and also heard some about the attacks of 11th september being self-designed by the US government too!

These are only few examples of the great mess we're in!
But it's good to know that there is a truth and there are people that know the truth and live on it! we just got to look for it;
After all I think it is the religion that saves the world, so I believe we should try harder to find the truth about it.

Oh, yes, I should have said why! There I have referred to the verses of Quran that talks about this unity of religions. It was in answer to investo7 that had claimed Allah is not God of Jesus.

Re: to numinus

So is violence against either non-muslims or previous muslims ever justified because they are non-muslims or previous muslims?

Is violence against them ever more justifiable than it would be against other muslims because they are non-muslims or previous muslims? Is there a situation where, all other things being the same, violence against the non-muslims or the previous muslims would be ok but it would not be ok in the same situation against muslims?

When it comes to being violent is there a different standard applied to muslims versus non-muslims or previous muslims?

And just what does justify violence according to muslim laws?

Re: to numinus

Ok. Let's.

Its called sovereignty -- or more precisely, the right of a sovereign people to defend themselves. No one is talking about a promised anything.

No. I am not silent about the fact that israel has the sovereign right to defend herself from war-mongering goat-herders.

And if, by any chance, you find yourself somehow aiding goat-herders guilty of perpetrating crimes against a sovereign nation, then you can only blame yourself for what happens to you when the $hit hits the fan.

I believe my country sent some soldiers to help hunt down the taliban in afghanistan. So, I believe we are not complacent christians as you think we are.

I expect a lot from nations who are members of the international community. For starters, we DO NOT threaten another sovereign nation with annihilation -- as your president did.

Whatever the 'true' religion is, it certainly isn't the one talking about rewarding a man with 100 virgins in heaven.

Or is it the other way around? Is the arab man supposed to be the punishment of these 100 virgins in hell?

Hmmm? Makes perfect sense.

Of course there are lots of propaganda!

Iran has neither the guts nor the capability to annihilate israel. Your president is actually selling propaganda, rather than stating an objective truth. So is nasrallah.

When your president promised to annihilate israel and then goes on to enrich uranium and test propulsion systems -- well -- you do the math.

I think we all know that bin laden orchestrated 9-11. He admitted it himself, didn't he?

Certainly.

When your immam asks you to annihilate an entire nation, he isn't saying it as a religious imperative, is he?

Re: to numinus

I don't believe sovereignty brings you right to do anything and I don't believe it is defence.
But why didn't the jews choose some other country that had place enough or were their friends so they didn't have to bomb villages in the first place in order to have a home? The land is Holy for them.
And I would call what they've done and are doing, attacking rather than defending. what kind of defending is killing thousands about half civillians with women and children by radioactive & phosphoric bombs in answer to a few rockets that can only dig a small hole in the ground, which them too were in answer to some other attack, either to their lives or to their rights.

It's not a polite language your's, but I should answer;
First if I or my country happens to be aiding hizbollah or Hamas in anyways, It doesn't feel guilty. However it doesn't help them by military means.
You call what isreal is doing defence, so do I call what hizbollah or Hamas is. And as far as muslims are taught they are brothers, harm to one is harm to other. By trying to help them we help our family, So we are not afraid of what happens to us.

I didn't mean all christians; But as in the case of US I think the government's intention had always been different from all the nice sounding words the soldiers are taught as the reason fer their sacrifices. If it really was a moral or religious believe that caused it then you're right!

He did not threaten! He said it should be wiped off the map! And by that he meant the word "Israel". That means israel doesn't have a right as a established government to exist .There should only be a country named Palestine, which belongs to all palestinians who were forced out of their homes.

That's for the starters. Just like a mother that promises her kid a candy if he be good. In order for the child's soul to remain pure until he is a wise adult and can realise good from bad, understand why, and do good for the sake of it. if we don't encourage or threaten a child to & against good and bad deeds at all, wouldn't he end up in a mess before he can stand on his own understanding?
In Islam the final goal is not living in gardens with virgins or etc, it's the God's satisfaction:
4:72 Allah promiseth to the believers, men and women, Gardens underneath which rivers flow, wherein they will abide - blessed dwellings in Gardens of Eden. And - greater (far)! - acceptance from Allah. That is the supreme triumph.

Well if you believe he is not capable why do you see his word that "should be wiped of map" or "will be annihiliated" as a threaten?
But just remember Iranians were never afraid, and they fighted empty hands against American supported Shah and Saddam. And remember Nasrollah broke the undefeatable vision of the Zionist Army in the 33 days war. He was actually the winner.

He promised it will be annihilated. He didn't promise he would do it!
He said isreael is a "rotten, dried tree" that will be annihiliated by "one storm."
You know Imam khomeini had told Gorbachof in a letter that The Union Republics of Russia would collapse unless it became a muslim country? and so it did collapse! Was Imam khomeini the cause of it then?

Using this nuclear bomb you're so much afraid of Iran having it and your government justifies all the sanctions,etc by the made-up presumption that Iran is going for it, is against our religious beliefs, because a nuclear war is an unfair war and affects far more than the target; actually the whole world. And It kills not just military but a generation; so using it would be a great sin! But nobody tries to stop Israel which not only has nuclear weapons, but is also using them.

So what if he did? "Osama Bin Laden was a CIA fabrication and he never stopped working for the US secret service."
Another interseting fact that "Both he and the Taliban in Afghanistan that protects him are products of the 10-year-long, U.S.-backed war against the ex-USSR occupation of Afghanistan. After Russian troops invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the U.S. trained bin Laden and thousands of other Arab men.
Back then, President Ronald Reagan liked to call bin Laden and his cohorts "freedom fighters.""

HTML:

http://socialistworker.org/2001/377A/377A_02_BinLaden.shtml

I thought you at least should have heard the idea of CIA having a hand at this. If not have a look at the book "The Big Lie" by "Thierry Meyssan" or the film "zero" made by "Giulietto Chiesa".

And here are some links:

HTML:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_The_Big_Lie

HTML:

http://www.russiatoday.com/Top_News/2008-09-11/Who_was_involved_in_911_Documentary_reveals_shocking_facts.html

HTML:

http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/NWO/CIA_Created_Osama.htm

HTML:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4582.htm

HTML:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlWSv0NZBRw&feature=related

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Imam's word is a "religious imperative" for us, If he actually asks us to do something. But remember our Imam never asked anybody to "annihiliate a nation". He never asks us to kill civillians and women and babies. He asks us to help palestineans get back their home and their control over their country.