Summations Only

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Of course the Trinity is a reality. Anyone wanting to start a new religion would probably never have as a central teaching something so objectively problematic as a doctrine of a three-one God.
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God is the Father. God is the Son. God is the Holy Spirit.

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The Gathas of Zoroaster are at least 3000 years old. Notice that there is very much a prominent Holy Spirit aspect of the one God, in the worlds oldest monotheistic religion. The term "father" is indeed used. (the idea of God incarnated in the womb of a female is not there though)

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In one Gathic verse he is said to have achieved creation by his thought (Y. 31.11), but elsewhere his instrument is said to have been his Holy or Bounteous Spirit, Spənta Mainyu (Y. 44.7; 31.3; 51.7). The relationship between Ahura Mazdā and the Holy Spirit is theologically as subtle and hard to define as that between Yahweh and the Holy Spirit in Judaism and Christianity; and it has been repeatedly argued that Christian doctrine owes a debt in this respect to Zoroastrianism. Spənta Mainyu appears as the active principle by which Ahura Mazdā accomplished the acts of creation. It is also through Spənta Mainyu that he comes to the world (Y. 43.6), and so can be immanent in the wise and just man (cf. Y. 33.6).

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The first of Ahura Mazdā’s creative acts was to emanate the six great Beings known from the tradition as the Aməa Spəntas, who likewise are aspects of his own being, and with Spənta Mainyu make up a mighty heptad. Each of the seven takes for his own one of the seven creations, man being that of the Holy Spirit, i.e. he belongs especially to Ahura Mazdā. This fundamental doctrine is alluded to in the Gāthās, and is set out systematically in the tradition (e.g. Bundahin 3.12; The Supplementary Texts to the āyest nē-āyest, ed. and tr. F. M. Kotwal, 1969, 11.5). The relationship of Ahura Mazdā to the six Aməa Spəntas is again a subtle one, and its closeness is expressed metaphorically by the prophet when he calls Ahura Mazdā the father of Aa and of Vohu Manah (Y. 31.8, 44.3, 45.4, 47.2), and speaks of Ārmaiti as his daughter (Y. 45.4); but it is conveyed even more vividly ...
AHURA MAZD — Encyclopaedia Iranica

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The Holy Spirit and the "father" aspect are indeed mentioned (though it must be admitted that the father aspect of Mazda isn't as strong of a parallel with Christianity as the Spenta Mainyu is with the Holy Spirit)The incarnated son isn't in Zoroastrianism (at least not in the Gathas which are easily said to be no later than the 10th century BCE)But, the 3rd century BCE Indian king Asouka wrote his edicts in Aramaic and Greek and sent missionaries all the way to Palestine and beyond. His vegetarian views are quite prominent among the early Jewish Christians like James (though admittedly he isn't held in high regard by Christians today) and even a large number of Greek-Roman Christians (who are held in high regard to say the least).The idea of an incarnation of God was understandable considering the well known (to historians) influences of the Persians and their close Vedic relatives ( I think the Indians should be seen as important influences of the Classical Greek world too).Krishna was known to the western world for sure, as numerous archaeological discoveries and texts show.Along with the Avatar issues is a better known and related issue.Kings were already calling themselves divine. The "king of kings" concept was already existing and it came from Persia and the term was inscribed on coins (in Aramaic!) before the time of Jesus. The Persians controlled Jerusalem until 37 BCE (the year of the birth of Herod in the Matthew 2 story whiich includes the Magi - Zoroastrian priests.

New Birth or Rebirth?: Jesus Talks with Krishna - Ravi Zacharias - Google BooksNew Birth or Rebirth?: Jesus Talks with Krishna
By Ravi ZachariasHere is a fundi admitting that there was an incarnation of God (in all his forms) before the time of Jesus, it seems.

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Subra:You have already acknowledged that you are an incarnation of god. And you mention the preexistence of every soul and the reincarnation of every life.
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What about the others - Shiva, Vishnu, and Brahma?

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Krishna: I am them I am Vishnu. I am Shiva. I am the heavenly father. I have spun this universe. I am the ruler. I am the supreme god.

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Subra: You are God incarnate and have come before?
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Jesus: I wonder, Krishna, if you are the divine one, are the sacrifices demanded in the Vedas offered to you.

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Krishna: Yes, of course. Various canons of our scripture have given specifics for sacrifices. But these sacrifices are only shadows. I told Arjuna that such sacrifices only led to more sorrow and rebirths. The true sacrifice is god himself. So I am both the one to whom the sacrifice was made and the sacrifice itself.

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Interesting.I was going to hunt for specific scripture, but this co-author of the famous Kingdom of the Cults book has done a good job of interpreting it (partly anyway).

It is on topic.See the comments of jaywill and post #191.Edited by LamarkNewAge, : No reason given.

I admit that the Gospel that ended up being attributed to John did become the first Gospel to specifically consider Jesus to be God.But those verses actually don't describe that divinity issue.BTW, I am in a good mood. Since my last post about an hour ago, I went outside. A Hindu actually stopped me and expressed amazement at how I look like Ghandi. I just shaved my head.I have some amusing EVC stories that happened right as I was posting. There was a black guy from Nebraska that was describing my "ethnic features " once when I was posting. From my chin to top of head. I was outside in Omaha posting about the conservatism of the Catholic church (debating NoNukes) and this cool guy noticed me and his analysis was that I have "obvious Jewish features from the forehead to the top of the eye brows " then German features above the brows. Lol.He told me that he thinks Germans are the coolest people so I wasn't anything but happy I suppose.(as I got to know him, it turned out he was gay, which I was not, but he found me to be quite a cool brother )Anyway, I am in a good mood.Now if only I could look like Asoka. What did he look like?Anyway...

I need to pay more attention, but I get lost badly as to what (on earth! ) is the scriptural basis for all of this stuff about God not bringing suffering and "evil" business.Too much hot air balloon sermons are part of the problem, but perhaps I just lost myself as to what this is based on scripturally.

Faith and Phat claim it is the same thing as the Spirit of Christ in Romans 8:9I request as many sources from Paul's epistles as Faith & Phat can find to clarify the Pauline view.(Can you understand that Faith? I will be happy to clarify if the request makes no sense )

FIRST THING:I am not going to be able to fathom how you can accuse me of being full of nonsense simply because I am interested in understanding the Pauline view of the Holy Spirit.I remember when you used to argue with me when I said that the Council of Nicea should be seen as totally unimportant and irrelevant to the teachings of the 1st century founders of (what would become ) Christianity.You strongly insisted on the importance of the 4th century Trinity doctrine and seemed to be saying that salvation rode on whether individuals accepted or rejected Constantine's 325 AD church council . (Have you grown out of that my mindset in the last 18 months? )SECOND :Can we stick with the (genuine and disputed in terms of authentic Pauline authorship ) Epistles of Paul, since they are chronologically the most early. Nobody doubts Paul wrote 1 Thessalonians in the first 1/3 of the 50s in the first century. The rest of the epistles were all written before 62 AD. The authentic ones anyway. The technology of recent decades (computers ) have backed up the single author of the 7 authentic Pauline Epistles.Both fundamentalists and the "Jesus never existed" crowd should value the Pauline epistles as an area of extreme chronological importance.THIRDYou did quote from 1 Cor 12:3 .Do you want to interpret the verse?Is that the only Holy Spirit verse?We can get to Acts quotes of Paul, but the book probably was written after 90 ADFOURTHCan you please show us how the quotes are consistent with the Council of Nicea?

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Athanasius was a man of integrity serving God and the Church honestly and not from any "political" motives.

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The Pope somehow caused Constantine I to see him as the supreme decider over all of Christianity in the leadup to Nicaea.(However,after Nicaea, Constantine started to attempt to allow more Bishops to vote, though the situation was ESSENTIALLY one where Arius followers (on the one hand) and Roman Catholics (on the other) would overthrow and banish one respective bishop - from the other side - after another, and instating each's own side)Pope Militiades and Sylvester I made sure that Bishops that disagreed (however slightly) with Roman Catholicism were excluded. The See of Alexandria was a Roman Catholic puppet.Literally every last part of North Africa, except for (Roman Catholic stacked) Alexandria disagreed with Rome.I don't know where to begin. (I could try to selectively paste selective parts of roughly 2 dozen or so wikipedia links)I will avoid that and keep it short.Avoiding the intrigue of Alexandria itself, I will just cover a few things.(Constantine was involved in all of what I am to cover)The Melitians (in Egypt) had 29 bishops that were not allowed to vote at Nicaea. The Council of Nicaea did give the 29 bishops the right to be counted (in the future), but they were subject to severe restrictions from the will of the See Alexandria. Melitians were Arians.The Donatists were the majority in North Africa in the 4th century (or the plurality, outnumbering Roman Catholics).The historical clues from the Donatist controversy show us that the first ever Lateran Council (aka the 313 Council of Rome) saw the Roman Catholic Pope Miltiades appoint 20 Bishops (to take on the 70 from North Africa) overrule the majority. October 2-4 313 was the fraud that set the precedent for the Roman Catholic Empire.The 314 Council of Arles (which handled a North African matter in Europe) was full of stacked Bishops, and the 313 Lateran Council was upheld. Pope Sylvester just came to power after Pope Miltiades died.Constantine (ALL BY HIMSELF) himself decided the 317 appeal, and sided with (shock) the Pope of Rome against the North African people.Hundreds of Bishops, all over Africa were absent power of the vote.No wonder only 5 western Bishops (Egypt was "Eastern", but the rest of North Africa was Latin speak "West Roman") were allowed to vote at Nicaea.Even the (severely limited)Bishops that were allowed to vote in Nicaea actually preferred Arius' position, but were intimidated by Constantine.Here is a bit from BEFORE Nicaea.I will start with 1 of the 5 Western Bishops allowed to vote(notice that 70 representing all of Roman Mauritania, all of Roman Algeria, and parts of Roman Tunisia and Libya WERE EXCLUDED!)

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Caecilianus, or Caecilian, was archdeacon and then bishop of Carthage in 311 AD. His appointment as Bishop lead to the Donatist Controversy of the Late Roman Empire. He was also one of only five Western bishops at the First Council of Nicea.[1][2] [3][4][5]

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On the death of Mensurius, Caecilianus was nominated as his successor. The religious world of Carthage divided itself broadly into two sections, the moderate and rigoristic parties, or the supporters and opponents of the principles of Caecilianus. At the head of the latter was a devout and wealthy lady named Lucilla, who had been severely rebuked by the archdeacon for superstitious veneration for martyrs' relics.[6]

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The rigoristic party wished to fill the vacancy with one of their own followers. Caecilianus' party hastened matters, and the archdeacon was consecrated by Felix, Bishop of Aptunga. Whether this was in the presence of any Numidian bishops or not seems uncertain.

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Secundus, Primate of Numidia and Bishop of Tigisis, was presently invited to Carthage by the rigorist party. He came, attended by 70 bishops, and cited Caecilianus before them. Felix of Aptunga was denounced as a traditor and consequently it was claimed that any ordination performed by him was invalid.

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Secundus and the Numidian bishops answered by excommunicating him and his party, and ordaining as bishop the reader Majorinus, a member of Lucilla's household.

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Schism
The church of Northern Africa went into schism. The party of Caecilianus broke off from that of Majorinus, and the Christian world was scandalized by fulminations, excommunications, invectives, charges and countercharges. Both parties confidently anticipated the support of the state; but Constantine I, now emperor of this part of the Roman world, took the side of the Caecilianus. In his largesse to the Christians of the province, and in his edicts favourable to the church there, he expressly stipulated that the party of Majorinus should be excluded: their views were, in his opinion, the "madness" of men of "unsound mind." The rigoristic party appealed to the justice of the emperor, and courted full inquiry to be conducted in Gaul ” at a distance from the spot where passions and convictions were so strong and one-sided.

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Council in Rome
A Council in Rome met in 313 AD. presided over by Pope Miltiades who had as his assessors the bishops of Cologne, Arles and seventeen others. Caecilianus appeared with ten bishops; Donatus, Bishop of Casae Nigrae, in Numidia, headed the party of Majorinus. The personal charges against Caecilianus were examined and dismissed, and his party proclaimed the representatives of the orthodox Catholic church; Donatus himself was declared to have violated the laws of the church, and his followers were to be allowed to retain their dignity and office only on condition of reunion with Caecilianus' party. The bitterness of this decision was modified by Caecilianus' friendly proposal of compromise; but his advances were rejected, and the cry of injustice raised. It was wrong, the rigorists pleaded, that the opinion of twenty should overrule that of seventy; and they demanded first that imperial commissioners should investigate matters at Carthage itself, and that then a council should be summoned to examine their report, and decide upon its information.

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Council of Arles
Constantine met their wish. Jurists went to Carthage, collected documents, tabulated the statements of witnesses, and laid their report before the bishops assembled at the Council of Arles in 314 A.D. This council, presided over by Marinus, bishop of Arles, and composed of about 200 persons, was the most important ecclesiastical assembly the Christian world had yet seen; and its decisions have been of permanent value to the church.

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Decision confirmed at Milan
The temper displayed by the victors was not calculated to soothe the conquered; and an appeal was at once made from the council to the emperor himself. Constantine was irritated; but, after some delay, ordered the discussion of the question before himself personally. This occurred at Milan in 316 AD. The emperor confirmed the previous decisions of Rome and Arles, and followed up his judgment by laws and edicts confiscating the goods of the party of Majorinus, depriving them of their churches, and threatening to punish their rebellion with death.

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Caecilianus - Wikipedia

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Lateran Council
During Miltiades' tenure as pontif, a schism over the election of Bishop Caecilianus split the Church of Carthage. The opposing parties were those of Caecilianus, who were supported by Rome, and of Donatus, mainly clergymen from North Africa who demanded that schismatics, and heretics, be re-baptised and re-ordained before taking office,[13] the central issue dividing Donatists and Catholics.[14] The supporters of Donatus appealed to Constantine and requested that judges from Gaul be assigned to adjudicate.[15] Constantine agreed and commissioned Miltiades together with three Gallic bishops to resolve the dispute, the first time an emperor had interfered in church affairs.[11] Miltiades, unwilling to jeopardise his relationship with the Emperor, but also unwilling to preside over a council with an uncertain outcome,[15] changed the proceedings into a regular church synod and appointed an additional 15 Italian bishops.[11]

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The Lateran Council was held for three days from 2-4 October 313.

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The Donatists again appealed to the Emperor, who responded by convening the Council of Arles in 314 but it too ruled against the Donatists.[17] By the time the council was convened, Miltiades had died and had been succeeded by Sylvester I.[11]

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Pope Miltiades - Wikipedia

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100 excluded Bishops in Nicaea.70 west Roman.The 70 Bishops of Numidia & Tigisis, (then in East Rome over in Egypt) plus the 29 Melitians in Egypt, were just the tip of the iceberg.(now what I did not get to)Athanasius is the most obvious case of a papal puppet there could ever be. Now Athanasius did fall out of favor with Constantine once the Emperor noticed the North African Bishop had views that were representative of literally NOBODY but the Roman Catholic Pope (and his puppet Bishops).

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There is nothing to support his arguments in the pasta.

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Did I not have a "paste" of Robert Price saying that there is one piece of "powerful evidence" for Jesus being an actual person?(Be advised that your honesty, or lack of, is being tested)EDITING TO SAY This answer belongs in the actual thread you are ignoring the evidence.Edited by LamarkNewAge, : No reason given.

Where did this powerful "God", called the "Holy Spirit", come from?How did this "Holy Spirit" issue, to SOME, suddenly loom so large after around 100 A.D. (or perhaps a bit earlier)?I struggle, from the available documents (including the New Testament), to understand this one.Now, in the 21st century, this "Holy Spirit" is taken to be something divine by hundreds of millions (if not billions) of people.(Call it the "divine something" or "divine Something" or "Divine Something")But, endless sermons aside, where (in the Christian documents) is the actual source material for this "Holy Spirit"?Faith seemed to give up her scriptural demonstration pretty darn fast (especially when it came to Paul's letters). She has better things to do than worry about any real (early) Christian documents. Perhaps that is because preachers assured her that their sermons were "inspired" by the "Spirit" (himself?) itself, so that is all she needs, aside from a few token passages in the King James Bible itself?Hell, I'm not a Christian, but I feel like - simply - invoking the Holy Council of Nicaea and just leaving it at that. (Just a "keep it simple, stupid" kinda solution).

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Do you consider yourself part of any religion at all, or do you simply like copying and pasting old documents to make a particular case or another?

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I see there was no response to my actual question.Since you changed the subject, I suppose I will respond to this "old documents" thingy you asked.I suppose I will comment on the only thing I read today.Today, I was reading the (beginning part) book of Julius Caesar's Gallic War history (an old school paperback book, the types that were really small in dimensions). It took place around 58 B.C. He was in conflict with GAUL (France), and he pointed out that the Gallic people call themselves "Celts" in their own language. It seems the Celtic people invaded the British Isles around 500 B.C. but their base was France. It was before the Germanic Franks invaded ("France") centuries later. The German and Belgae people were mentioned in Julius Caesar's war history. It was an example of North Europeans being mentioned by an Empire that ruled all the way to Persia.The Romans controlled Palestine during this period (58 B.C.E.) and that would be the case for many hundreds of years (however, a few decades later, the Persians held Palestine for a few years until 37 B.C.E., and it was the Romans that helped to install Herod the Great after they drove out the Persians).Back to the Gallic War.We see some of the beginnings of the first Roman interactions of people( assuming the "Galatians" involved Gallic people and it was not simply a 100% non-Gallic group Paul talked to in "Galatia") who would interact with Paul during his missionary journeys.(Gaul and Galatia were not the same thing mid you, but the name Galatia came from the Gauls. "Galatia" was Anatolian geography)The interesting thing is that Christianity and Judaism seemed very relevant to the Galatian people Paul was talking to.(I did not paste anything so I can't comment on that part)From France to Rome to Palestine to Persia and beyond, we see interactions.Do you have any theory on the Holy Spirit? Do Paul's Epistles help to inform us?Candle2 seems to have some questions about this whole Holy Spirit theology.

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To me, the Holy Spirit is a belief. It cannot be a fact, nor can any amount of early writings document, prove, or disprove it.

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I am interested in the "old testament" (not what you think, keep on reading) of popular religious concepts. Where did these things start? I remember hearing about the Irish people having held something of a pre-Patrick "Trinity" concept in their "Celtic Religion of Druidism". Naturally, it sounds like pagan Irish borrowing from Christian theology.

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Do you have a belief at all, or are you just one who likes researching old documents? See...to me, old documents can prove interesting yet not entirely conclusive. Personally, I thought you had a good case going when you engaged the mythicists. All evidence I read shows me that Richard Carrier is trying to make a name for himself and for some odd reason has a motive to make Jesus vanish. Bart Ehrman responds to and defends himself from Richard Carrier here. Fuller Reply to Richard Carrier Admittedly, I have no solid evidence against Carriers claims and my judgment against his integrity is my own personal opinion.

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I think Carrier has a desire to tear down bad ideas that seem to be held by too many academics. He wants some - currently majority supported - things to be seen as outdated, already.He wants to show that the ground isn't as solid, on many things, as some like to make out.He wants more attention to be paid to the broader world of mythology, and comparative religions, as much of it is unknown to most.He, more importantly, blames academics for the incomplete picture the (interested) public gets.I AM GLAD HE HAS A MARKET FOR THIS TYPE OF TARGETED RESEARCH.

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I am convinced that many of these mythicists have an axe to grind, however.

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Even our very own Theodoric, himself aligned with the mythicists, shows his feelings towards Christians many times. He is no doubt delighted to attempt to make Jesus go away.

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I prefer not to assign motives.The fact that there is a marketplace is a great thing.I also am glad that the followers don't get too turned off by evidence (like Galatians 4:4) that severely weakens the most popular feature of their favorite researcher's work.

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It will never happen, however. Even if only a myth, the legend will continue as long as humanity lives. And though some Christians are in fact hateful and uninformed, there are many more good ones. Times will also come upon us where the belief will strengthen. Mark my words.

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Christian publishing houses, presses, colleges, etc. put out a massive amount of scholarly works each and every year.Secular presses, colleges, publishers put out lots of works that fall into a category that can, perhaps, be roughly described as "biblical and ancient studies".I doubt we would have such a market for such works if not for the large population of Christians.Just be happy we all have what we have.I have no ax to grind against anybody.

What is the gender?What about the "Logos"?What is the relation, if any?

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I will agree with the idea that pauls Epistles helped form the bedrock of Christianity, particularly later Protestant Dogma. They are well written and in some parts seem inspired by more than a simple authors imagination, but of course we have no objective proof.

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There did seem to be a collection, of some of Paul's letters, quoted (as scripture? probably) in what early non-Biblical Christian writings we have today.Just because the earliest 100 A.D. writings are European writings loaded with quotations of Paul's Letters, alongside the Old Testament "Scripture", might not mean it is representative of early Christianity.The Gospels might generally follow "Pauline Christianity", or perhaps a European mutant version of Paul's Christianity. The Christianity of Irenaeus (180-200) was a multi-fold mutation of the mutation.European Mutant Christianity Chronology:(Semitic individual, but Greek Letters) First (sort of)mutant: Paul(intermediate stage mutants): Greek Matthew, Gospel of Mark.Second level mutants: Colossians, II Thessalonians, Gospel of John,Super mutant: Irenaeus (and the earlier strain of Pastoral Epistles plus Ignatius, Barnabas, Didache)Current descendants of Super Mutant stage: Roman Catholics, Coptic Church, Eastern Orthodox, "Protestant", etc.However:Paul is difficult to classify. He was actually a Jew, and he did write 7 of the letters attributed to him (in Greek). The fact that he wrote in Greek made him an easy person for European Mutants to access (and claim ownership of). Scholars have this "Pauline School" thingy going. (something written "...in the tradition of his school"). European "Christian" fraudsters.