re: The First Council of Nicaea came to an end 1,700 years ago this week...

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There is nothing written there that indicates that it's necessary to draw the conclusion that Christ wants his followers to be to him what he is to the father is every single imaginable way

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Except Jesus says he wants his followers to be one with him just as he is one with the father. It’s clear to me because I can interpret the plain meaning without having to add to it to support a dogma.

Jesus never says he is the Father or made up of the same substance as the father, but I bet you believe that too because it’s part of the dogma drilled into you by fallible men.

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You admit Jesus is divine.

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I don’t think I said that, but as Jesus is believed to be the incarnate version of the Lord, the same Lord who led Moses across the Red Sea and who knocked down the walls of Jericho, the scriptures do make the case that he is divine. It’s just that there isn’t a word in the scriptures that equate him to God the Father. You must realize that simply being divine does not make one God the Father. There are many divine beings in scripture. The Lord has like 70 brothers who all inherited a people group to rule over from their father. See Deuteronomy 32:8-9. This is a very important concept to Christianity (at least the original earliest versions) as the Lord was said to be taking over the authority of all his brothers’ inherited people groups so he would rule the entire earth (see psalm 82). Saint Paul wrote there are many gods and many lords but for us there is one God the Father and one Lord. The father and the (most special) son, all divine but not the same divinity.

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Again, you have to insert "exactly" or "every" in there to come up with the idea that he wants his followers relationship with him to be like his relationship with the father in every way

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No it’s you who inserted. Imagine if I said “I hope my boy grows up to be just like me.” And then you tell someone else “he doesn’t mean literally just like him, but like him in only some ways.” Doesn’t that sound ridiculous? That’s your argument.

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How in the world do you expect mortals relationship with the divine to be exactly like a divine beings relationship with the divine?

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Most experts explain this as being one in purpose and mind - shared goals.

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the truth about God (as stated in scripture, by the way)

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He should have made it unambiguous if he inspired it. Perfect deity perfect scripture don’t you think? You and I wouldn’t be able to have this disagreement if everything was clear and unambiguous an open to interpretation.

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divine (equal)

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Yeah I don’t know why you equate divine with being equal. The angels and cherubim and satan and demons and archons and seraphim etc are all divine but not equal to god the Father, wouldn’t you say?

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The reason you have some passages that seem to indicate oneness/equality with the Father and some that indicate inferiority with the father is because Christ was human

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I think you think that because you are misinformed and misinterpreting the text. No offense. I don’t think there is a contradiction though. Christ was inferior to his father, but he was one in purpose.

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When he says he is inferior to God. I believe that too.

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Do you????

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You sure you aren't a JW (or never were?) You argue like one.

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Positive.

You do realize they didn’t invent the co-equal trinity idea until about 400++ years after Jesus’ death. If it was clear in scriptures they wouldn’t have had to invent that framework to explain a bunch of contradictory ideas about Jesus and God.

Old news, man creates religion.

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Self castration?

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We call them transgenders now and pretend they’re normal

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We call them transgenders now

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No.

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Do you read and write koine Greek?

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I wish

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The consensus among most scholars is that the anarthrous Theos in “the Word was God” underscores the divine nature of the Word, not a lesser or separate deity.

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The author had just used “ton Theon” (the God, talking about a very specific god because the definite article was used). But then he says the Logos is “Theos” without a definite article. If he wanted to say the logos was ton Theon he could’ve, but he didn’t. The way it is written it should be understood that the logos was with the God, and the logos was divine (but NOT that the logos was the God). Get it?

Everyone is hung up on Jesus being co-equal with God the Father, but I find the Holy Spirit even more mysterious and interesting to ponder.

For further information on Jesus’ divinity, I would recommend Dr. Brant Pitre’s latest release, ‘Jesus and the Divine Christology’.

At the end of the day, it’s a mystery that is difficult for us to comprehend. One God: Three “Persons”. I love it!

You don’t read or write koine Greek but the majority of scholars who do don’t agree with your translation or view on it.

I easily determined your comment is false by reading John 1:1 in koine Greek. The absence of the definite article before Theos in the phrase “and the Word was God” in John 1 is significant in Greek grammar, particularly in a predicate nominative construction such as this. A predicate noun that precedes the verb and lacks the definite article often emphasizes the quality, nature, or essence of the subject (the Logos, "the Word") rather than its identity. This is why most translations render it as "and the Word was God" emphasizing that the Word shares the divine nature or essence of God. This has to do with the accepted rules of koine Greek grammar and not belief systems.

The New World Translation used by Jehovah’s Witnesses insert an indefinite article ("and the Word was a god"), arguing that the lack of the definite article suggests an indefinite or qualitative sense. This interpretation is not widely accepted among mainstream biblical scholars, regardless of their belief system. Not all biblical scholars are Christian (Many are agnostic or atheist). Koine Greek does not have an indefinite article, and so it is the Jehovah’s Witnesses who have added a word not in the original Greek to fit their beliefs.

In any case, all of this seems a bit pointless for one to argue if they don’t believe in any of it and are arguing from a point of Internet atheism and “ha, re-LIE-gion”, which seems to be the case for you because you make statements such as:

“The angels and cherubim and satan and demons and archons and seraphim etc are all divine but not equal to god the Father, wouldn’t you say?”

Your posts contain very crude and blatant misunderstandings of basic concepts like this one, presumably because you don’t actually care about these things and you only seek to learn enough to argue (but not enough to really know what you’re talking about). For example, in this case you are conflating divine with spiritual or supernatural. You are giving bad faith arguments from a position of extreme ignorance regarding the language and concepts that are central to the topic.

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I easily determined your comment is false by reading John 1:1 in koine Greek.

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Wow, awesome.

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The absence of the definite article before Theos in the phrase “and the Word was God” in John 1 is significant in Greek grammar, particularly in a predicate nominative construction such as this. A predicate noun that precedes the verb and lacks the definite article often emphasizes the quality, nature, or essence of the subject (the Logos, "the Word") rather than its identity.

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Excellent. You’ve corroborated my point.

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This is why most translations render it as "and the Word was God" emphasizing that the Word shares the divine nature or essence of God.

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And it’s precisely why it’s an intentional mistranslation. It would most accurately be that the Logos is divine - a deity in the qualitative sense.

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The New World Translation used by Jehovah’s Witnesses insert an indefinite article ("and the Word was a god"), arguing that the lack of the definite article suggests an indefinite or qualitative sense

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Which is what I have said and what you have said. I’m glad we agree.

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Koine Greek does not have an indefinite article, and so it is the Jehovah’s Witnesses who have added a word not in the original Greek to fit their beliefs.

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“A god” is still more accurate than “God” in this sense. They could have used “divine” or “deity-qualitatively” which could make it better but the way the JW’s translated this verse is accurate grammatically and practically already and superior to the mainstream translations.

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For example, in this case you are conflating divine with spiritual or supernatural.

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Why argue that angels are not divine? Is Jesus divine? I think you would say yes. Is Jesus an angel of God? The scriptures say he is. I think you are splitting hairs with your comments of divine vs supernatural. The beings in heaven are all divine. “God” (the father) does not exhaust the category of “divine”. Simply look up the English word in a dictionary.

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You are giving bad faith arguments from a position of extreme ignorance regarding the language and concepts that are central to the topic.

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I think you have your head squarely up your arse on this one. You corroborated my argument but are calling me wrong. I had already made the comment about the Logos being divine-qualitatively in John 1:1c. I think maybe your own beliefs are biasing your interpretation in your head. Maybe it’s because you think “divine-qualitatively” only applies to “the one true God” or something. It doesn’t. Maybe you should read psalm 89.

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You think trinitarian arguments corroborate your point

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What point is that? You might need to remind me.

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you do not understand the basic concepts and language that are fundamental to the dispute.

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You described yourself perfectly.

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Additional evidence of your nonexistent understanding of the topic is your absurd conflation of spiritual and divine and asserting that it is hair splitting to object to such absurdity regarding the concept of divinity

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Ok Mr. koine Greek, you should seriously look up the word “divine” in Oxford and Webster’s dictionaries and you’ll learn something new.

You must know of all the unique words used for what would just be “Elohim” in Hebrew. Words such as demons, archons, theos, angels, etc.

The English word “divine” belongs to a category of heavenly spirit beings and does not only point to the one true God. John 1:1c is evidence as the writer could have said the Logos was the God but he did not, he said the Logos was (a god/divine).

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Couple of other points for you: 1) the Greek word for angel simply means "messenger." The word refers to a function or role and not an ontological category.

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Dude I’m not stupid. Lol

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Neither trinitarians, arians, nor jews considered demons to be divine

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The English word “divine” didn’t exist yet 1600-2000 years ago. The Jews would have called them all “Elohim” which obviously is translated into English as “God” or “god” or “gods” depending on the syntax and grammar.

Go look at the English definition.