The Origins of Christianity

Alpha & Omega Ministries

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00:02

We have in studio today, James R. White, who has been on the last two hours with Van Hale and is probably pretty tired at this point, drinking glasses of water trying to keep going on this.

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And I'd just like to, if I can, kind of change the mode and spirit a little bit of what we've been listening to and try and get into a discussion in certain areas.

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We are going to, I'm sure, get down to biblical references and so forth. And we'll let you call in and ask questions in a little while.

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I want to talk a little bit myself and James before we get into that too much. I just wanted to mention that James was kind enough to send me a copy or a letter before he came.

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And I'm going right into this, by the way, because today, because we have a special guest and James is not able to be here all that much, and because there is going to be a lot of interest in what he has to say and what we both are going to be discussing, that we will not have the religion in the news or focus on doctrine issues or portions of the program today.

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We're just going to go straight to the interview. James White, is it a

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Master in Arts, James? M .A. in THM, right. Okay, and the THM, that means Master of Theology.

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Master of Theology, right. And you are the head of Alpha and Omega Ministries, is that correct?

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Alpha and Omega Ministries in Phoenix, Arizona. What is Alpha and Omega Ministries? It's a Christian apologetics organization.

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We deal primarily in providing a defense of the faith in what we would call an interfaith context.

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I have dealt with atheism and things like that. But we primarily focus upon dealing with, for example, just to give you an idea, in less than three weeks,

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I'll be debating Father Mitchell Pacwa, a Jesuit scholar and priest on Long Island, on the subject of the papacy.

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I've done 22 moderated debates against the leading Roman Catholic apologists in the United States on the papacy, justification by faith, the

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Marian doctrines, issues like that. And a lot of our work is in that area.

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In fact, one of my books is called The Roman Catholic Controversy that deals with those issues in regards to the gospel with Roman Catholicism.

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We also deal with Jehovah's Witnesses, the Watchtower, Well and Track Society. And every six months, we are here in Salt Lake City.

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This is my 28th consecutive general conference. 14 years I've been coming up here. And Van's hair was much darker.

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He had much more of it back when we first met. And he would tell you that I had much more of it back when we first met, too.

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I had bushels of it back then, but the genetics caught up with me. So we've been coming up here for years now.

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We also track the Easter pageant of the LDS Church in Mesa, which starts next week. In fact, as soon as Josh and I get back, we'll be doing that Tuesday night through Saturday night of next week.

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Do you ever listen to the conference? Yes. In fact, we used to hear it more often than we do now because we used to drive up.

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So on the way back on Sunday, we would listen to the conference on the way back. Now, of course, with the

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Internet and things like that, you can get synopses of the talks and so on and so forth.

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It used to be you could hear it pretty well at the Westgate if you were passing out tracks over on that side. You can't hear it nearly as well on the

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Southgate anymore. Oh, I guess we'll have to see if they can't pipe it out to you. Well, that might be interesting, yeah.

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Do you some good. That would be great. We'd welcome your being here if we could only get you to hear it.

03:39

It says here you're a critical consultant with the NASB update. What does that mean? The New American Standard Bible was updated in 1995.

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If you've seen the updated edition, and I noticed that you used the NASB in your book,

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Biblical Mormonism, probably what you have there is, if that's the NASB, it's probably the 77.

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I have the 88 edition. That's the Schofield Study Version. If you look inside that at the copyright of the

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NASB itself, the last date will probably be 1977, I would assume.

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At least for the Lockman Foundation. Yes, that's correct, 1977. That was the last revision that was done before the 1995 update.

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What we did with the update is, and my work was primarily after most of the work was done. I'm involved in explaining the textual bases of the translation.

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One of my books, I don't know if you've seen it or not, is called The King James Only Controversy. Yes, I'm familiar with that.

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I became associated with the Lockman Foundation through doing a debate on the John Ankerberg Show, which you may be familiar with.

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Yes, I'm familiar with it. He wouldn't let me on his program. Well, I was on his program. I would imagine he would let you on, yes.

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We debated some King James Only advocates, and one of the individuals there was

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Dr. Don Wilkins, who represented the Lockman Foundation. So I began working with the Lockman Foundation along those lines.

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The main difference is we updated the text to the 26th edition of the Nestial and Greek text. There's no more these and thous in the

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NASB. You may remember in the Psalter, it used the and thou, and then when it would quote from the Psalms of the

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New Testament, it would also use the and thou. Those are no longer there. So there's been an updating, and it's not quite as wooden a translation in some places.

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I like wooden translations myself. The Al Gore type translations. One of the things

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I like about the NASB is that in spite of the translation it chooses, it will frequently put in the side notes a literal or alternative translation, and I almost always find that a preferable translation.

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I read an excellent defense of the

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King James Version. I'm just kind of curious what your response would be. I think it was Edward F.

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Hills. He pointed out that for the sake of our listeners, one of the major differences between the

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NASB and the King James is the use of fairly recently discovered texts of the

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Bible. Oh, I'm trying to think of them. Codas. Vaticanus. Sinaiticus.

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And Alexander Nicus. Right. And one of them, I think the Sinaiticus, was discovered in a wastebasket.

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Actually, that's not correct. Well, maybe that's what Hills said, and he said that it deserved to stay in the wastebasket.

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That's a common misapprehension about Sinaiticus. Actually, what he's referring to is

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Count von Tischendorf was looking for ancient manuscripts in Palestine. He went to the monastery at St.

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Catherine's Monastery, and he saw some monks burning papyri and vellum fragments in the oven.

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And he looked in one of the wastebaskets and found fragments of the Septuagint. And he became very agitated and excited, which is not a good thing to do amongst monks who live on a mountain, so they wouldn't show him anything after that.

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Years later, he was visiting again, and he gave a copy of the Septuagint that he had just printed to one of the monks.

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And he said, you know, I have this. And he took him to his cell, and he opened the closet area, and he took out of his cell, wrapped in red cloth, what today is known as Codex Sinaiticus.

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So it was not in a trash can. It was wrapped in red cloth, which for a monk meant this was one of his most precious possessions.

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And it is a manuscript of both the Old and New Testaments that dates to about around the time of the

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Council of Nicaea. It is not complete, though, of the Old and New Testaments? It is very, very complete.

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There are some pages missing from beginning to end, but it is a very, very complete text. And in reality, please realize, the

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NASB, NIV, and other modern translations are not based solely upon Codex Sinaiticus or Vaticanus or Alexandrinus.

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Oh, I know that. Let me just, before you go on, just let me point out, because I am curious your reaction to Hill's argument, which was that if this document was a good copy, it would have been used to the point that it would have deteriorated long since, and had been replaced by, as they did when they came to a copy that was, you know, when the good copy wears out, they would make a new copy.

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And so the fact that it was so ancient suggested to Hill that people did not regard it as a good copy or a good usable text, and therefore had not used it very much.

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And that would indicate that it was a poor copy of the text. What do you think about that? That argument actually goes back to Dean Burgon, but it is interesting.

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It is a two -edged argument. The arguments against Sinaiticus are that, and then the other argument they use is, well, but there are all these textual changes in it.

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You can't have it both ways. The problem with Sinaiticus is that it was used for centuries and centuries and centuries, and most of the scribal emendations took place about the 9th century, when someone attempted to update its readings to what was then the current text, what is known as the

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Byzantine text. It would be like taking your NASB and trying to scratch things out and make it read like the

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King James Version. You can imagine what that would end up looking like. Obviously, therefore, it was in use.

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And the simple fact of the matter is that the argument that you're presenting from Hill is assuming that the

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New Testament manuscripts were dealt with like the Old Testament Masoretic manuscripts were dealt with. The simple fact of the matter is that Christians never dealt with the manuscripts the way the

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Masoretic scribes did in the Jewish tradition. Isn't it true that, now when did the Masoretic text start?

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Well, that depends on how you date it. The Masoretes flourished around the 10th century.

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The Masoretic text itself, you can trace it earlier than that, but the

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Masoretes themselves flourished around that particular time in history. It's just that Christians treated the scriptures differently than Jews did.

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The Christians wanted everybody to read about Jesus, so they let anybody and their uncle make a copy. Back in 1993, when the

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Pope came to Denver for World Youth Day, I went up to Denver with some folks from our ministry. I did some debates up there at Denver Seminary on the papacy, and we also passed out tracts amongst the youth.

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In fact, at one point, there was about 125 ,000 youth and two of us. It was really good odds. But when the

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Pope came to town, the Vatican Library sent certain things for an exhibit. One of the things I got to see while the

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Pope was in town was a papyri manuscript. The papyri manuscripts go as much as 150 years prior to the time of Sinaiticus.

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That's where a lot of these arguments have fallen apart, and why most scholars don't accept them anymore. It's because they go back to a time when

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Sinaiticus was the earliest. We've now found new papyri manuscripts that go a century or more earlier, and guess who they agree with?

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They agree with Sinaiticus. So we've been able to demonstrate that text did exist even more primitively.

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What are some of the differences within the King James text, which is taken primarily from the Byzantine, isn't that correct?

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It's the Byzantine textual tradition, and primarily the Byzantine textual tradition is, I call it the expansion of piety.

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That is, whereas the most ancient text might say the Lord Jesus, the Byzantines could say the

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Lord Jesus Christ. Whereas an earlier text might say the Lord, the Byzantines could say the

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Lord Jesus. In other words, there's an expansion of piety that is evident. It's a fuller text in the sense of expanding titles and names of deity and things like that.

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I did say, and I think you'd find it very interesting, because it is being used as a textbook all across the

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United States, in my book, The King James Only Controversy, I did point out that I have with me, for example, the

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Textus Receptus, which is the Greek text that underlies the King James. I also have with me here in this particular edition, the modern edition of the

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Greek New Testament. This happens to be the UBS 3rd corrected. It's become the UBS 4th edition. Now, if you apply the same rules of interpretation of exegesis to the

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Textus Receptus that you apply to the United Bible Society or the Nessie -Aland text, you will not come up with any different beliefs.

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That's what I thought. There's really not that much difference between these texts. I think that this should be of interest to the

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Latter -day Saint audience that we have, and this is why I've gone on this long on this issue, because most of the time we don't really always, as members of the church, realize the great care over the centuries that has been taken in trying to provide us today with a really fine, excellent text.

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The translation varies to some degree from various reasons, but we do have a good text,

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I think, and it has always been interesting to me that the article of faith that says we believe in the

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Bible as far as it's translated correctly doesn't mention anything about being transcribed correctly. But most

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Mormons that I know of, and maybe you've had the same experience, in fact, I noted in your book, that you address the alleged contradiction in Acts 9 -7,

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Acts 22 -9, as I do, in letters to a Mormon elder, and you had said this is not a valid contradiction.

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And yet, of all the passages, in speaking with over 1 ,500

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LDS missionaries over the past 14 years, that is the single most repeated alleged contradiction that I have encountered.

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That's unfortunate. Well, I'm not holding you accountable for that, but I'm also saying most LDS people whom I know believe that translated correctly means transmitted correctly.

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Yes, I know. And one of the reasons that I spent so much time in the first chapter of my book on the text was to try and get

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Latter -day Saints acquainted with the fact that a great deal of effort has been made to give us a good text.

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Where we run into trouble is with the translation. I find Hebrew to be especially challenging.

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So do I. I'll be teaching it this fall for Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary, and it's a very difficult thing to present to people.

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Well, I've never taught it. I'm just self -taught in it. I do use an interlinear

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Bible, Greek, Hebrew, English, by J .P. Green. Are you familiar with that one? Yes, and probably that will then use the

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TR, the Texas Receptive. Yes, I'm sure it does. In fact, I have the same thing that you have there, and it does definitely use the

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Texas Receptive. Yeah, it's quite good. He's not King James only, but he's Byzantine only, basically.

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Is he only Byzantine only? Primarily, yes. Well, I don't know whether Sinaiticus would have a difference on this, but while you were talking with Van Hale, I was looking up a few things, and one of the things that I thought was interesting in the

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NASB, it says on Isaiah 29 .16

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that you were talking about, it says that the error was in, you owe your perversion, it says in the original

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Hebrew, as far as I get the translation from here, that you have, as I read it in this version, it's you have counted the creator equal to the clay.

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No, you've accounted him as not equal to, not equal, equals not in there.

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In fact, the Hebrew symbol or letter that would make it be as equal to is notably absent from this text.

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I don't know if you have that. Do you notice that, any difference? No, I don't believe there's anything. There's nothing indicated in the text where there's a variation.

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There's nothing in there that actually would justify the NASB's translation of as equal to. Well, actually, if you look at the

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NIV and all the others, there's a whole host of translations of it, but the literal translation would be, have counted it as the clay.

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Right, right. And so the question then becomes, well, if you translate it as clay, what do you mean? Exactly. I mean, is it equal, is it like, what is it talking about?

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My point is that I just kind of feel like, you know, as members of the church, we certainly acknowledge that God is our creator and we are as the clay to the potter in that respect.

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Absolutely, with respect to our bodies, certainly we're created by God and are strictly the clay.

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But as to whether or not that denies equality with God, I would say it's not clear.

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And we may be stretching the analogy a bit much. I mean, it just seemed to me that you were stretching the analogy a bit far.

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Well, and we went over it, but I believe that the fundamental point of that passage,

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Psalm 50 and numerous others I didn't even get to, is that Isaiah, or God actually, could remonstrate with these people and could rebuke them because it was a fundamental article of their belief concerning God that they were thinking of God as if he was like man, and he is not.

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Now, you say that he is not. Right. And I understand that that's kind of a fundamental precept in your mind that you have.

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And I would say Christianity, Orthodox Christianity, has had that opinion since approximately 150...

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No, let's see. No, no, no. Justin Martyr said it first in Dialogue with Trifle a Jew. That was about 159

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A .D. Prior to that, it appears nowhere in any writing that I'm familiar with except possibly some of the versions of Ignatius, which are so numerous that nobody can tell what was the original thing he said.

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I would not agree with that statement. Well, I'm familiar with three different versions. I'm familiar with 15 letters that are supposed to be by him, seven of which are clearly not written by him, three of which appear in the

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Syriac and are believed to be accurate because they're also in the Syriac as well. But you compare the

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Syriac and you compare the Long and the Greek versions, and they're just vastly different with respect to their description of God.

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I wouldn't agree with that either, but I would go with the Greek edition of the seven genuine epistles of Ignatius, not using the pseudo -Ignatian epistles at all.

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And what they present concerning God is... Which versions, Long or Short Greek? Well, there's only one.

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The Greek, if you're referring to the Longer Version, that's primarily based on Latin, not on Greek. Yeah, I think you're right.

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It's a much older version. I mean, it was older and therefore more likely suspect to having been fiddled with by people who were trying to make...

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Are you familiar with the history of the second century? Yes, I teach church history. Yeah, good. But what about Roman history?

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Well, not Roman history outside of its relevance to the interaction between the

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Roman leaders and the Christian church. Right, so you're familiar with the fact that there was a long peace following the death of Trajan from 117

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AD to approximately, well, 163...

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No, probably 161, that's when... There was only local persecution during that time. Right, and there was criticism, extensive criticism.

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On three principal points, the most important of which was atheism. Denied the existence of the

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Roman gods. Right, well, not just the Roman gods, do you know... Well, any gods, but the one true god.

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Right, right, in other words, what was the problem was that the Christians were worshipping a god that just did not fit in with the

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Roman idea of what gods should be, or the ideas or views of the Greek philosophers, which were accepted generally by the pagan culture at the time.

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In fact, those were the opinions of the intellectual elite at the time.

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And they taught a god that basically was completely different from man.

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And in fact, I submit to you that that is the source of your view on that. Actually, the

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Greeks had gods who were plurality of gods. They believed that these gods had physical bodies.

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And you're talking about the pagans. Yes, exactly. Oh, no, no, I'm not talking about the pagans. I'm talking about the prevailing

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Hellenistic view. I'm not talking about the Greeks. Yes, I'm talking about the prevailing Hellenistic view of the Greeks at the time of Christ.

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It was the intellectuals, I mean, yes, the majority of the masses that had no really strong influence on thought, frankly.

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At that time, they did not. Most were pagans, but their ideas of what

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God was like were very much criticized by the... There were all sorts of different views at the time.

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I would not say, however, you say there's nothing before that. That's why I presented in Is the

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Mormon My Brother and in Letters to a Mormon Elder the testimony of the scriptures in regards to the nature of God.

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And I recognize that in your book you assert and basically make it a mantra a number of times,

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Hellenistic Christians, Hellenistic Christians. I do not believe for a second that what divides us is due to Greek philosophy.

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My new book that's coming out shortly, I think, will demonstrate. Unfortunately, I wish it was out now.

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I wish this was out right now. That's my book, The Forgotten Truth. Well, I appreciate the chapters you gave me.

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By the way, I must say that your exegesis of John 1 was superb.

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Which we need to discuss concerning your book. I think we need to discuss it concerning what the truth is.

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You made some direct assertions in biblical Mormonism that John 1 teaches that Jesus is created.

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I think we need to look at the text and see if that's the case, as well as in Colossians 1.

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We'll get to that. Do you want to focus on this? One special thing that we do need to get into is defining the doctrine of the

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Trinity correctly. Absolutely. I'm very anxious to get to that, and I will do that. I'm leaning into that.

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Are you familiar with the idea of strict monotheism? Monotheism, for example, is not a word that appears in the

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Bible, is it? No, it's not. No inspired writer used monotheism to describe the

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Jewish... Or polytheism, or henotheism, or panentheism, or anything like that.

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No, they said, Shema Yisrael, Yahweh Eloheinu, Yahweh Echad. Israel, Yahweh our

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Elohim, Yahweh is one. Right. Exactly. They believed in one

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God. Yahweh Elohim. Yahweh Elohim. Right. Yeah.

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See, because if you were listening... I was listening. Okay, so you know exactly what

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I'm talking about. Yeah, we don't need to go over the old stuff. We're going to get to that. What I meant was when

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I presented the distinction between Elohim and Yahweh, and the identification of Jesus as Yahweh, which you do present plainly,

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I was told that that's not exactly the view, so I just want to make sure we're going on the same road.

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I can't speak for every Mormon in the... I understand that. I'm not asking you to. I just want to make sure we get yours. I think my view on this is the prevailing view amongst

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Mormons. I would agree that it is. I would agree that it is. It's just that some will argue that it's a 20th century identification and not a 19th century identification, because Joseph Smith did identify the

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Father as Jehovah, which he did. But I would say that today, the 1916 statement of the doctrinal exposition of the first presidency on the relationship of the

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Father and the Son should be the doctrinal norm by which we go in describing quote -unquote Mormonism. I don't believe

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Joseph Smith identified the Father as Jehovah. There were some statements he made early on, though, very, very early on before,

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I would say, before his understanding of God became more complete that can be confusing to you, but I think there's very little that is in that area.

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Now, my point, though, is this. Are you familiar with the writings, say, of Pythagoras?

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So you know that Pythagoras started a group called the Pythagoreans, and he observed in the mathematics by which he calculated the orbits of planets and stars and so forth that there was this perfect order in the heavens, which convinced all the

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Greek philosophers after him that there was absolutely one being who was God. And, you know, that's right, isn't it?

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Well, I think that would be a very simplistic view of what would be presented by someone like Philo, someone who would be presented by any of the great

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Greek philosophers. Philo never disagreed with Pythagoras as far as the number of gods. You've got

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Plato's view, you've got Neoplatonism, the view of the Logos. I mean, there's all sorts of issues that go in here.

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There's a lot of interesting issues, yes. You can't just simply... Now, interestingly enough, someone like Justin, who was more of a philosopher than he was a theologian by far, he wore the polyam his entire life, saw in these

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Greek teachers elements of God's truth. Look, they found God's truth by just simple reference to looking at the world around them.

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No, he and Clement of Alexandria both claimed that the Greek philosophers had stolen a number of their views from the

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Hebrew prophets who, as he pointed out, wrote before the Greek philosophers. But they also felt that just by the observation like Pythagoras did of mathematics, the world around them, so on and so forth, they could see this perfection.

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But the issue is... It's interesting to me that Pythagoras, in around 600 B .C., was living right around the time

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Isaiah prophesied that the time of the Gentiles would come in, that basically the

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Messiah would be rejected and the gospel would be taken over by the

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Gentiles. You'll find me to agree primarily with Tertullian when he said, what does Jerusalem have to do with Athens?

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Personally, that's much more my perspective. You and James Sheel are in the same band on that.

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I find there to be a number of interesting doctrines taught by the ancient Greeks that correlate so closely with LDS beliefs in certain ways that I cannot help but believe that they did, in fact, take some of their ideas from the

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Jews, the ancient Jews. But that's not the point that I'm trying to get to. The point is that as philosophy progressed, by the time of Christ, the

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Platonists were teaching, basically, that God is matter, God is mind, and everything else, matter, that is matter, is created and is distinct from that which is mind.

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This is dualism, as I'm sure you're familiar with. I noticed your use of it. I wouldn't agree with this. There were some groups who identified the mind as the only good thing and the matter as evil, but that wasn't the general vein of it.

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Dualism is basically the belief in a distinction between mind and matter.

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Gnostic dualism included the specific identification. Gnostic dualism definitely did that. And it's proto -Gnostic dualism that Paul is dealing with,

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I believe, in Colossians, which is where I presented that in the chapters. Yes, and we can get into that.

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But my point is that it's my position, and you'll need to read my book for this, that these views became the founding assumptions of the apologists, which they brought in to early

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Christianity and changed in very many subtle ways that became very important distinctions.

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The way that they looked at the Scriptures, the way that classical theism to this day interprets

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Scripture. So when we go through this, I want to try and identify, if I can, the areas where I think that your interpretation is coming from Greek philosophy as opposed or a

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Greek assumption that I can easily trace and do in my book to extensive statements by the

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Greek philosophers and so forth of the time and earlier that agree with it, whereas there's nothing in the

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Bible that says anything about that. And to me, that leads to a clear assumption, a clear conclusion that what you're assuming when you think about the

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Scriptures from a Greek perspective is not accurate. I mean, the Greek Scriptures were not given to Greeks.

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The Greek Scriptures were given to Hebrews. You've got to think like a Hebrew. In fact, that's the very point

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I make, and it's more my brother, is that I rebut Dr. Robinson's assertion that the differences between us do come from Greek philosophy.

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I'm pointing out the difference isn't Greek philosophy, it's the shema. It is the Old Testament presentation of the supremacy of Yahweh, the nature of Yahweh, and the relationship of Yahweh to the creation.

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And so... Let's get to that, because I think that's an important place to start. We're talking about... Let's talk about the

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Trinity. Let's do that. You've given me in the letter you sent a very excellent three foundations to the

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Trinity. Exactly. And I think we ought to go over those because I will tell you something amazing that you will find, and that is that Mormonism actually does not disagree with you on any of those foundations.

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Actually, Mormonism fundamentally disagrees with me on the first. Let's go over it. But before I do that, I just have to point out, and I hope we have the time to do this, is that I hope in your new book...

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I've listed here about eight places where your work very clearly, and I mention this in the letter...

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Do we need to go to a break right now? I think we're having to go to a break, but my engineer is indicating we need to go to a break.

30:45

Well, the engineer is always in control. He has all power. So we're going to have to do that, and let's get back to what you were going to say as soon as we do that.

30:53

Hello, this is Richard Hopkins. We're returning with Religion Today, and in studio we have

30:59

James White and his son who, by the way, is here with him. A young man, looks like a fine young fellow.

31:05

What's his name? Joshua. Joshua? Nice to have you, Joshua. This is actually his third general conference to come up here. Oh, how nice.

31:11

Joshua, you should listen to them sometime. Okay. I have my son in studio, too.

31:17

He's the engineer, by the way, who was telling us we have to go. All right. You know, this is really the toughest thing for me to get across to evangelical or orthodox

31:29

Christians that Mormons do in fact believe in one God, and I'm hoping that when you read my book you'll understand just how exactly true that is and how much we really do believe in one

31:41

God. The reason, the thing that gets you guys mistaken is the exact same thing that got the

31:47

Aryans off and going crazy, is that the New Testament talks about more than one God. So how do you figure, you know,

31:53

Old Testament, one God, whatever. It talks about more than one individual whose title is

32:01

God. That's where Mr. Hopkins, with all due respect, you do not understand the doctrine of the

32:06

Trinity as taught by the Nicene Creed. As you cite it, it is. And let me give you an example.

32:11

On page 69, you say, he is not three gods in one essence, a trinity. We don't believe he's three gods in one essence.

32:18

On page 79, the New Testament is always clear in treating the Father, Son, Holy Ghost as separate persons. How could

32:23

Christ also be God the Father in the Nicene sense? The Nicene Creed and Trinitarians deny, vehemently, that the

32:30

Father is the Son. They would never say that. In fact, they anathematized anyone who would say that.

32:36

So everything on 79 is incorrect. Page 81. If the Father and the Son are the same in the way the

32:42

Nicene Creed describes, why did one raise the other from the dead? That's not what the Nicene Creed says at all. All through here.

32:48

Page 87. The analysis only shows how erroneous Nicene doctrine is. The Greek word charakter refers to an exact reproduction, not the original.

32:54

We're not saying that he's the Father. Page 90, 93, 94, 95. And realize, you said this in the context of calling it a heresy and calling others cultists who believe it.

33:04

That is not what the doctrine of the Trinity states. You cited the Athenation Creed that says we do not confound the person.

33:11

And you did indicate, at one point anyways, you were struggling with it anyways. You reject the idea that you can differentiate between being and person.

33:20

You say it's incomprehensible, it's incongruent. And yet, as you sit there right now, you're doing it. Oh, how am

33:25

I doing that? I'm interested. There's a microphone right in front of you, right? Yeah, right. Would you ever get as close to me and talking to me as you are to that microphone?

33:33

No. And I wouldn't to you. We Americans don't like to get that close to each other because that's far too close for us.

33:40

Are you worried about offending the microphone? No. I'm worried about offending my audience. Okay, but if you...

33:46

If you... Okay, exactly. Let's say, though, you came in and we all had dinner beforehand and we stopped at Fazoli's Italian restaurant and we had garlic bread.

33:57

All of us did. And we had to rush in here and didn't have a chance to do anything about it. You wouldn't be worried about offending that microphone, would you?

34:03

No. Why? Because the microphone has being. It exists. But it is not personal.

34:11

It is not a person. It cannot be offended. The doctrine of the

34:17

Trinity says there is one being of God, infinite and eternal, not limited by time or space, that the

34:24

Bible identifies by the word Jehovah. But it is shared by three co -equal and co -eternal persons, the

34:31

Father, the Son, and the Spirit. Being does not mean person. The Father loves the Son and sent the

34:37

Son. The Son and the Father send the Spirit. They are not one person, as you say throughout your book.

34:43

Three persons. But, see, you and I are human beings. My being is limited to...

34:48

I believe the time is approximately 18 minutes before 8 on... What is today?

34:54

April... Is today the 6th? April 6, 1998 in Salt Lake City, Utah. I am not at a different time in a different place.

35:01

Star Trek aside, I can't do that. My being is limited and finite because I'm a creature.

35:07

And my being is shared by one person, James. Your being is shared by one person, Richard. Joshua's being is shared by one person,

35:14

Joshua. Only my being, since it's limited, can only be shared by one person. God's being, which is unlimited, is shared biblically by three persons, the

35:23

Father, the Son, and the Spirit. So, this is demonstrated biblically for us by the fact that the word

35:30

Jehovah, as you would agree, is used of the Son. I don't know that you would agree that it's used of the

35:35

Father, but it is in Isaiah 53 -6 and Matthew 22. It really makes no difference.

35:41

Okay. It makes no difference which member of the Godhead is speaking for that singular authority which we believe rules the universe and which you refer to, and which is referred to, as you pointed out, with a rather qualitative word, theos, that reflects divine nature, and for us would be the singular authority that comes from the

36:06

Father, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 8 -6. But the one being, that we believe is described by the name

36:13

Jehovah, is shared... Just a moment. But I'm just trying to point out to you that all of these objections that you presented in your book are relevant only to a small group of people called

36:27

Oneness Pentecostals, if you've ever run into them, the Jesus -only movement. All right. I'd like to get off of that point because I don't think that you understand the perspective from which

36:35

I'm coming to in the book. Let's try and get to that so you understand why I do not agree that you can simply...

36:44

See, what's your problem is this. You've got three people clearly described separately every single time in the

36:50

New Testament that they're referred to. They speak as I, thou... Which is exactly what Isaiah taught.

36:55

Yeah, exactly. And yet you want to impose on them... But that's not what they taught. Please, James.

37:01

Wait, let me finish now. I'll let you talk. Okay. You want... Well, not you.

37:06

Classical theism. And classical theism wants to do this because the apologists did it. And the apologists did it because the

37:13

Greeks did it from the time of Pythagoras. They want to take... I completely disagree. Fine, I know you disagree.

37:20

But at any rate, you want to take these three separate individuals and instead of seeing them as a singular authority, seeing the three of them as a singular position that flows from the

37:34

Father and is exercised by the Son and the Holy Ghost, you want to make them one being.

37:40

Now, that's where all we disagree on. We agree with all the other three things. Yes, there is only one God. Yes, there are three divine persons.

37:46

Yes, they are co -equal and eternal. But we disagree on whether or not there is a being here that is a singular being.

37:56

Now, what we say instead is there is another explanation for these three foundations.

38:02

And you haven't got it. It appears in the Bible. It appears throughout the

38:08

Old Testament the referral to Jehovah frequently as the angel of God. The fact that angels are agents of God.

38:16

The fact that Christ submitted his will to God. To the Father. And what that indicates, if you put those together, is you're not talking about a single being.

38:25

What we're talking about is a single authority. The authority of the Father that is exercised by those who sit on his throne with him.

38:35

Revelations 3 .21. So, that is my point on this.

38:41

That we disagree. It is not as big a disagreement as you may think. It comes out as a huge disagreement.

38:47

It is a fundamental disagreement. Because you're also saying that that quote -unquote authority, that there are other gods, that God is once a man, lived on another planet, the king followed a funeral discourse.

38:56

I quote Paul. To us, there is but one God. The Father.

39:04

That's not all he says. He defines that one God as the Father and the Son. But the point is, he says there is one

39:11

God then he names two different people. What's the point? The point is that the one God is the Father from whom are all things.

39:20

Meaning, including clearly what he's talking about, divinity and the idea of the singular authority.

39:27

He never uses the term exousia of God. He never says God is an exousia. Well, where did you get exousia?

39:34

You're saying authority. I'm just taking it back into Paul's language. No. He does not use that word.

39:41

He uses the word God. So he doesn't use the term authority? No, because the authority he's talking about is divine.

39:48

It's much higher than what you would use to describe an earthly authority. And so when he speaks of God, you're saying he's only speaking of an authority.

39:56

He's not speaking of Yahweh of the Old Testament. No, he's speaking of the Father whose authority as God is exercised by the

40:04

Son in the Old Testament and in the New Testament to a certain extent. You're familiar with the kenosis, right?

40:10

Of course. We'll get to that a little bit later. The point is that the authority is what's being dealt with here.

40:20

That's what is singular. The authority is God, and he does not identify God as exousia or authority.

40:27

God is the being of God. That is what we do believe. There is only one true God. The idea that you're seeing here is that there is only one being of God shared by three persons.

40:38

Where is that in the Bible? There is only one being of God. No, no.

40:45

Before me there is no God formed, there should be none after me. Is there any other God besides me? There is no rock I know not of.

40:53

When John was getting the Revelation that he recorded in Revelation, the book of Revelation, he was being spoken to in the first person by God, supposedly.

41:06

All the way along. All of a sudden in chapter 19, he bows down to worship this being who he believes to be

41:13

God because he is speaking in the first person as God. The angel turns out to be an angel and says, wait,

41:20

I'm not God. I'm your fellow servant. You worship God. You worship

41:26

God alone. Exactly. He goes on then, speaking again just as if he were

41:32

God in the first person. My point is that Jehovah has done that throughout the Old Testament and anybody like Jehovah, the

41:39

Father, and the Holy Ghost would do that because they represent a singular authority. I'm not talking about an earthly authority for which you would use the

41:47

Greek word. I'm talking about the ultimate authority. Deity. God. That's the only authority.

41:52

Where is theos ever defined in any lexical form that I'm aware of as ultimate authority?

41:58

All the lexicons... Well, you know, if Unibly had made a lexicon for us, it would be there.

42:05

Well, that said a whole lot more than you may have wanted to intend to say. No, no, no. My point is this. All the lexicons that I'm familiar with,

42:12

I use Thayer and Bauer both. Both of those lexicons are written by me, although Bauer is pretty far off the classical theist edge in some respects.

42:24

And frankly, I like his lexicon best, but they're both classical theists.

42:30

And so you will not find their definition... So you're saying they're unfair? I'm just saying that their definition of the terms is frequently and quite obviously, at least to me anyway, shaded by their view of the word they're trying to express a definition of.

42:47

You said on page 94, if the Father and the Son were a singularity, as taught in Nicene doctrine, there could be no separation of authority between them, with one subject from the other, as Paul unequivocally taught.

42:58

Right, and my point is exactly that. What you say there is one being, that's a singularity. You're talking

43:04

Pythagoras here. No, I'm talking Yahweh. No, because Yahweh was identified with Yahweh Elohim.

43:11

Elohim is plural. The Jews always knew there was a plurality involved there. Or at least they should have.

43:16

They should have paid attention to it. And if you don't believe me, read Justin Martyr. I mean, Justin Martyr extensively points out that the three were taught from the very beginning of time.

43:27

And he identifies Jesus and the Father as Jehovah. But where does Nicene doctrine, Mr. Hopkins, teach that the

43:33

Father and the Son are a singularity, so that there is no subjection of the Son to the Father? The Nicene doctrine never, ever teaches that.

43:42

James, look, you want to have your cake and eat it too with the Nicene doctrine, and that's what the classical theists have done since the time of Irenaeus and Athagoras when they first came out with this idea.

43:53

And the fact of the matter is that you cannot just say, hey look, there are three persons here, but there are really only one person.

44:00

I didn't say that, but that's exactly right. Nicaea has never said that. Okay, what did they say? The one being?

44:06

What's the difference? Again, I hope you can grasp this before your book goes to print because any

44:14

Trinitarian is going to say what you're saying is like my saying that Mormons worship Joseph Smith.

44:20

That is the level of error of your criticism, honestly. I understand that you want that to be the case.

44:27

Wait a minute, James, let me go over this because if it's different from this, you need to explain a lot. So let's get it clear what the problem is here.

44:35

The problem is you have three separate persons. Now, let me ask you this. Do these persons have a separate center of consciousness?

44:44

Do each of the three have a separate center of consciousness? Using the quotation from Dr. Moore, yes. Well, I don't know about Moore.

44:50

I think that's what you quote in your book. Well, my point is this. Do they have a separate center of consciousness? Each says I and you.

44:57

The father loves the son. The son loves the father. Do they share the same knowledge? Yes, actually they do.

45:05

Well, the Bible doesn't say that. I know what you're referring to. We're talking about Jesus Christ in the Incarnation. Let me just get to this.

45:11

The Kenosis, remember? I appreciate you being honest about saying that because otherwise you're denying

45:17

Arrhenius who said clearly the mind and the... I'm not concerned about that.

45:24

I'm concerned about biblical teaching and I'm not concerned about the early fathers. I know that you want to say that's all my beliefs are, but they are not.

45:31

Well, let's get it clear then. You need to get this clear because this statement, when you say that Nicaea teaches that three persons are one person, you are wrong.

45:44

Okay, now let me just tell you that I am not wrong in my view of what you are saying.

45:53

Now, let's go to, if you can change the view of what we are saying here so that in fact...

46:01

Alright, let's get to this now. You say that the Father and the Son and the

46:06

Holy Ghost share the same knowledge, is that correct? Do they have the same will? The will?

46:12

There's one will of God, yes. Okay, so how come it says, how come Christ says, not my will but thine be done...

46:21

Because he became incarnate as a man. And as a man he had a human will. So the human will...

46:27

In other words, I'm avoiding the air of monothelitism. Wait a minute. So the will of Christ was only manifest in his human nature, is that correct?

46:36

In that sense, yes. So when he became resurrected... In the quote you gave, not my will but thine be done.

46:43

Okay, so in other words, only for 33 years he had a will separate from the

46:48

Father's. In that sense, yes. As human will, yes. Okay, so... In the passage you cited. As human will, what's the difference?

46:55

Obviously in Philippians chapter 2, when Jesus becomes incarnate, he does so voluntarily.

47:02

It was his will, his desire to enter into human flesh. It says he made himself of no repute.

47:09

It's reflexive. He did this himself. It was not done to him. This was his eternal purpose to do so.

47:15

Of course, but it was a purpose of God and it was the fact that he was willing to do this that God knew, foreknew when he exalted him.

47:23

As it says in Philippians 2 .9. What do you mean, he foreknew that he was willing to do this?

47:28

He foreknew that he was willing to shed his position in what we would call the

47:37

Godhead, what you call the Trinity. It wasn't his position. It was his position of glory with the

47:42

Father which he had before the world began. Right, that's what I'm talking about. He existed in the Morphe 2 .3.

47:48

But the point is, your constant accusation against the

47:53

Nicene Doctrine, the Trinity, is that that passage differentiates between the Father and the Son. And we all believe that.

48:00

James, this is my point. The problem is this. I deny that you are sincere in believing in their separation.

48:11

When you turn around and say they are the same person. We do not say they are the same person.

48:17

Wait a minute. You see, the problem is this. Persona is a word taken from the

48:22

Latin that was decided upon to mean a certain thing. Latin came later.

48:29

Yes, I know that. It was used to translate which is it? Hypostasis?

48:35

That's the whole issue. There was a tremendous disagreement between the Greek -speaking and the Latin -speaking fathers because they were miscommunicating.

48:42

But the Nicene faith is that there is one Ugia of God shared by three persons.

48:49

The Father, the Son, and the Spirit. These are not human persons with a physical body. They are persons who love, who act, and who have interaction with one another.

48:59

Wait a minute. They don't have a physical body? No, they do not. Then you deny the physical resurrection of Christ. I do not at all.

49:05

Jesus, Jesus, in eternity past, they are not limited to physical bodies.

49:12

At the incarnation of the Son, at the incarnation of the Son, He took on human flesh and continues to have that glorified body to this day.

49:22

But it was not something that He had in eternity and is not definitional of the persons of the

49:28

Trinity. Wait a minute. Mormons do not believe He had a physical body for eternity.

49:35

I realize that. He went through a mortal probation to obtain His physical body. He started out as an intelligence and became a spirit child.

49:45

Then He received a physical body. Then the physical body was resurrected, so it's permanent. The difference,

49:51

Mr. Hopkins, is that when I write in Is the Mormon My Brother, I cite from the general authorities of the

49:56

LDS Church, and I believe accurately define what Mormonism teaches from a Mormon perspective.

50:03

I'm simply trying to communicate to you that the assertions that you're making in Biblical Mormonism about Nicene Orthodoxy are aimed at oneness

50:12

Pentecostalism, not at the Nicene faith. Let me go to the point. What is your idea of what a person is?

50:19

The Nicene faith is talking about the persons of the Godhead. They are talking about the

50:25

Father and the Son and the Spirit, each who is co -equal and co -eternal but who is not to be confused with the other that are differentiated in Scripture.

50:35

They have communication with one another. They love one another. You're absolutely right.

50:41

That's all in the Bible. Exactly. To accuse Nicene Orthodoxy of not believing that, because there is only one

50:50

God, Yahweh, who has eternally been God, Psalm 90, verse 2.

50:55

He has eternally been God. We agree on that, too. He's never a man. No, I don't.

51:01

Your words, eternally been God, are not the way we understand eternally been

51:07

God. He has been God in any eternity, any creation, any universe you wish to postulate.

51:13

He's always been God. That would be really interesting if you could find that. I know that you think

51:19

Paul says that. I believe it in Psalm 90, verse 2. Psalm 90, verse 2, is even less specific.

51:25

It uses Olam for eternity. Olam is indistinct as to time period.

51:31

Not at all. Then you disagree with one of the lexicons. No, it's Gesenius, of course.

51:37

It depends on its usage and its context, sir. Yes, it does. Do you teach the subject?

51:43

Would it matter if I studied the subject? Do you think I don't know it because I don't teach it? If you're saying that you can correct

51:49

Gesenius, then I would have to ask you on what basis you're making that. I'm not correcting Gesenius. I'm using

51:55

Gesenius. And you are saying that he does not indicate that it is contextually defined? I can get it out. We have to go to a break here.

52:01

When we're out, I'll be happy to get Gesenius out and we'll see what he says on the subject. Hello, folks.

52:07

Richard Hopkins returning now with James White. We appreciate you being here.

52:15

We're talking about Gesenius, but I'm not sure that that's really the issue here.

52:22

What we're trying to do is communicate on a point that is quite important to James and I think it's quite important to this dialogue and maybe what we need to do is focus on that issue just a bit more.

52:36

Just as Mormons do not like to be misunderstood as to what they are actually teaching,

52:42

James is objecting to my conclusions based upon what

52:48

I regard to be a failure of the Trinity doctrine to explain what we're talking about with respect to the three persons in one being.

53:03

May I quote you? You like to be quoted, don't you? I learn as much as anybody else does and things that I say one point in time,

53:13

I may not quite word them the same way the next point in time. And I don't have any problem with that because I have no problem with that and if you want to say that this is not representative of where you are right now, please tell me.

53:23

Because I have no way of knowing outside of you telling me that. I have to go with what's there. You said on page 70, the

53:29

Trinity and I'm sorry, let me back up. That question racked and split the early church during the 3rd and 4th centuries

53:35

A .D. The answer that became historical Christian orthodoxy was the seminal step into an apostasy that has influenced

53:41

Christian churches of the present era. The Trinity, an incomprehensible conglomeration of the three into one substance, essence or nature co -substantial, co -equal and co -eternal remains one of the most telling legacies of that apostasy in Christianity today.

53:55

Mormons reject this concept as an early heresy and insist that references to God's oneness were not meant to be interpreted in a mechanically literal sense, but in a more figurative sense is consistent with all the relevant passages in the

54:05

Bible with common sense. And you specifically said on page 71 in the heyday of Greek philosophy, man's intellect generated the ultimate idol, which

54:12

I guess you're referring to the Trinity. A completely inscrutable paradox, the false concept of God known as the Trinity transcends both substance and comprehension.

54:20

I am simply my main point and it's one point is very clear and that is the passages that I read from 69, 79, 81, 87, 90, 93, 94, 95 in your book are erroneous in the understanding of what the

54:37

Nicene Creed states. The Nicene Creed refers to the Father and it refers to the

54:44

Son not as the Father but as the Son. It nowhere says that the

54:50

Father is the Son, and so to say that the Nicene Creed says that three persons are one person is too misrepresented.

54:59

Now, when I write on Mormonism, and I invite you, you may not have seen the book before, as Van liked to point out, no one ever will, but actually it's doing rather well and as I've given you a copy of Is the

55:11

Mormon My Brother? and Letters to a Mormon Elder, I would invite you to hold me to the same standard of accuracy in representing

55:21

Mormonism that I am asking you to hold yourself to and that is to recognize that we do not say that the

55:28

Father is the Son. We recognize that the Son became incarnate. It was not the

55:33

Father who became incarnate. It was not the Spirit who became incarnate. It was the Son who became incarnate. That the

55:39

Son takes a different function and role in our redemption than the Father does and that the

55:45

Spirit does. All this is good, James, and I'm well aware of the position of and the doctrine of co -substantiality that became or that was discussed, shall we say, at Nicaea because in fact it did not have its origin at Nicaea as you pointed out.

56:06

That's quite true. You're talking about the homologation clause. Right. All of that doctrine had its origin from about 160 to 180

56:16

A .D. in the apologists. If you follow the writings of the early Christian fathers you'll find that that's when that developed.

56:22

Let me point out an error, please. Are you aware of the fact that there were three different groups at Nicaea? Yes, I'm well aware of it.

56:29

I wrote an article for the CRI Journal recently Actually, the third group, the ones that were the middle of the road, the

56:36

Homoousians Homoousias They were actually Homoousians according to the records that I've studied on.

56:43

They're a subgroup, but they resisted initially the use of the term Homoousias of the same substance of the

56:50

Father. Do you know why they resisted it? If you want to tell me,

56:56

I'll listen. This is where the term really has interest.

57:01

You address this in your book. The reason many of the Eastern bishops did not want to use the term

57:07

Homoousias is because it had been condemned at a synod in the middle of the 3rd century because the

57:15

Sibelians, the modalists, those who did say that the Father and the Son were one person were using the term.

57:22

They were concerned that by using it they were going to be giving comfort to those who were denying that the

57:29

Father and the Son are separate persons. I'm quite aware of it. There was a big hullabaloo between Dionysus of Alexandria and Dionysius of Rome over this problem.

57:41

That, to me, is beside the point. The point is this. We agree with you that the three are separate persons.

57:50

But we do not agree with you on and this is the only element of our disagreement is we believe in one

57:56

God, the same as you do. We believe there are three separate persons, the same as you do. What we do not believe is that there is some mystical way that these three persons are a singular being is the way to explain those two facts.

58:08

There are two foundations that you mention in here. One of them is that there is only one

58:14

God. We agree with that. But we view that as an authority situation. Right, and that's where we totally disagree.

58:19

The words don't mean the same thing. To say we agree is to say that the

58:25

Republicans and the Democrats can agree on a bill when they come up with language that means one thing to a

58:31

Democrat and another thing to a Republican. Fine. The point is this. I agree with you. We don't agree on how do you explain these two facts.

58:38

How do you explain the fact that the Bible teaches there is one God and how do you explain that the New Testament teaches there is one

58:44

God and also identifies three individuals. How do you explain that?

58:50

That's the issue. That took the church hundreds of years to deal with and to deal with some of the heresies.

58:57

Actually it took 20 years for them to come up with the explanation that was adopted in Isaiah. But be that as it may, between about 160 and 180

59:07

AD is when they came up with the co -substantiality explanation of it. I'm going to read my book and check the authorities at that time.

59:14

I'm not going to go over that. You can find Trinitarian passages in Ignatius, but that's okay.

59:21

There are some versions of Ignatius that have very Greek metaphysical types of...

59:28

No, but in the oldest, the ones that scholars agree, go back to Ignatius himself, he is very, very plain in proclaiming the deity of Christ, the full deity of Christ, there are

59:37

Trinitarian passages in him in that sense. We're getting some frustrated people who want to get out on the air.

59:43

Those people staying outside the door with the guns? You didn't see them during the break, did you? I'm going to get to that at quarter after the hour, so you've got two more minutes and then

59:55

I'll be taking calls. Alright. I'm reading from you.

01:00:02

The problem is, of course, this is your explanation that you sent to me about the Trinity.

01:00:09

You recognize immediately that you say that we're not going to be able to explain God fully because we don't understand, we're on a different plane, we're completely different from God and God is completely unique.

01:00:20

Are you reading from one of my chapters in my letter to you? Well, this is one of your chapters that you sent.

01:00:26

It says, the problem is, of course, God is completely unique. He is God and there is no other. He is totally unlike anything else.

01:00:34

That's what holiness means, in fact. Well, I don't agree with you on that, but be that as it may,

01:00:44

He's totally unlike anything else. I'm sorry, I find that to be completely unbiblical. How can you say that in the face of Genesis 1, 26 and 27?

01:00:53

Because similarities do not make equality. What do you mean, similarities? The same thing

01:00:59

I mentioned to Mark. Let me finish this. Let me finish this.

01:01:05

In Genesis 5, 3, Moses, the same writer, says that Adam had a son in his image and likeness,

01:01:12

Seth. Same exact words. Okay, now you are telling me that God is something completely different from man and yet He made man in His image and likeness, just like Seth was in the image and likeness of Adam.

01:01:27

How do you get to that? Because God creates, He does not beget.

01:01:33

What is create and beget? What are you talking about? What difference is this? That's in the

01:01:39

Old Testament. Well, for example, God created Adam.

01:01:44

Adam begat Seth. It says in Luke 3, 38 that Adam is the son of God.

01:01:52

But it does not say begat. Alright. I'm not sure.

01:01:58

You're assuming that creation means to create out of nothing. Is that correct? Well, certainly.

01:02:05

In passages, again, I don't know how much you heard of my discussion with Van, but there are numerous passages

01:02:10

I alluded to there that talk about the fact that He spread abroad the heavens by His understanding.

01:02:16

By His wisdom, He created that which did not exist. Right, and a scientist creates by his wisdom things that didn't previously exist.

01:02:24

No, I do not believe that. Well, that's what your opinion is of the word, but are you aware of the origin of the doctrine of creation out of nothing?

01:02:34

I am aware of what you probably think it is. Well, I know that Justin Martyr did not teach it. And before Justin Martyr, the first time it was taught was by Baselites, who was a

01:02:44

Gnostic heretic. And then it was taken up by Tatian, who became a Gnostic heretic. And then it was adopted by the apologists.

01:02:51

So you tell me where the origin was, if it wasn't from other sources in the Bible. It's called the Old Testament when the

01:02:58

Bible describes the creative work of God. And that is another thing that separates God from man, is that as we were pointing out in that passage, and in many other passages,

01:03:07

God creates the spirits of men. Joseph Smith said that he could not do that.

01:03:13

Zechariah 12 .1 says Jehovah creates the spirits of men. Mormonism says He is one of the spirits of men. That is just one of the many places where God's creative action is inconsistent with any type of idea, where He actually is a part of matter, or is simply organizing matter.

01:03:29

It simply makes no sense at all. Well, your assumption that it makes no sense is based entirely on Greek philosophy.

01:03:35

No, it's based entirely on the presentation of who Yahweh is. No, it in fact doesn't. You have to approach that with a certain set of assumptions, and the assumptions that you have when you approach those passages are taken from the

01:03:46

Greek philosophy. And your assumptions come from Joseph Smith? No, they come from Hebrew thinking. I don't believe that Joseph Smith knew

01:03:53

Hebrew thinking. Well, we agree, we disagree. Let's go to the first caller here, which is line 3. Hello, Jean, you're on the air.

01:04:01

I've forgotten your name. The other fellow is James White. Yes, I'm Richard Hopkins.

01:04:06

Please don't forget my name. I wrote a nice book called Biblical Mormonism you might be interested in, and another one is coming out called

01:04:13

How Greek Philosophy Corrupted the Christian Concept of God. The Book of Mormon goes along pretty well with the

01:04:19

Bible on how certain groups get into apostasy and what they're doing.

01:04:26

Both of them prophesy about that. What I'm calling about is I agree with you that he didn't create things out of nothing, and Hugh's will tell you that the creation stories in the

01:04:37

Bible which aren't the same in the first and second chapter... By the way, the guy you like, Tertullian James, he agreed with me on this.

01:04:44

He didn't believe that God made... So he believed that matter was eternal? No, I... Are we talking about now as I'm trying to talk to the guest?

01:04:55

We're talking about Tertullian. Go ahead, Jean. Anyway, now

01:05:03

I've lost my train of thought because you came in, but I almost stopped. You've been discussing whether matter always exists, is what

01:05:16

I'm hearing. My understanding is we have an eternal God and every 7 ,000 years he puts the earth into a new birth called a new heaven and a new earth.

01:05:29

It's reorganizing what's already there. And it's supposed to go back like in the time of Adam without having an

01:05:35

Atlantic and a Pacific Ocean anymore. Well actually, Jean, that doctrine is very close to ancient

01:05:41

Stoicism. The Stoics believed that there was a continual cycle ending...

01:05:50

I'm talking about Biblical prophecy. I'm not talking about any Stoicism. I know that, but then perhaps you might not have it on quite right.

01:06:00

But you're not letting me talk to the guest at all. I'm trying to talk about his book. Okay, what do you have to say about that,

01:06:06

James? Who, me? No, I thought you wanted to talk to the guest. Yeah, that matter exists, but God reforms it and puts it in a new birth every 7 ,000 years, and that's

01:06:19

Biblical. That isn't something out of Stoicism. Well, it's closer to Stoicism than it is to the

01:06:26

Bible, Jean. I'm sorry to say that, but that's... The Bible tells you in Revelations chapter 21, he's making a new heaven and a new earth, and that's repeating

01:06:35

Isaiah. Oh yes, he is making a new heavens and a new earth, and then she'll pass away. That's true.

01:06:40

Right, and the way he does it is the mountains are flowing down, and the valleys are filling in, and there's no more water.

01:06:48

There's nothing in there that says that he's doing it every 7 ,000 years. Yes, it does. It tells you exactly when he does it.

01:06:54

After the thousand year millennium. Exactly. After 7 ,000 years.

01:06:59

Yes, but my point is that he doesn't do the same thing over and over every 7 ,000 years. Well, he does do it the same thing over and over and over.

01:07:06

He does it. It's written. Okay. It's his word. Let's hear what the guest has to say.

01:07:12

Yes, let's do that. Go ahead, what do you think? Well, I obviously disagree. I'm afraid that a very unusual thing has just happened.

01:07:21

A caller has caused the two of us to agree with one another during this period of time. I don't know what to say.

01:07:29

Well, I don't agree with him on everything, but I agree with him that the matter is shaped by God.

01:07:36

In fact, the creation is all through it. We have a flood. That's his creation there.

01:07:43

And it goes on and on and keeps altering and volcanic eruption and earthquake and everything. It's never stopping.

01:07:49

It's a continual cycle. Well, I don't see... God does the natural phenomenon.

01:07:56

I will respond to that. The Bible says that there is a goal to history. There is a goal to what

01:08:01

God is doing in Christ Jesus, and it does not give us any indication whatsoever that this is a cyclical type thing.

01:08:07

In fact, the cross is identified as being the center point of history, the center point of time, and I see nothing in the

01:08:15

Bible that would even begin to suggest to me that once he's finished this, he's just going to start a whole cycle all over again.

01:08:23

There's nothing in the Bible at all. The word is from the mouth of God.

01:08:29

Christ is the deliverer of the word. God is the creator, and Christ is fifth, and they're both called out in Omega.

01:08:36

And he's in the creation with the Father, and that's why it says God saying, let us make man.

01:08:43

Okay, Gene, thanks very much for your comments. We'll go now to Rich in Holiday.

01:08:49

Hello. Rich, you're on the air. Yes, I've got a question. Either of...

01:08:56

Wait. Gene, are you on? Rich, hello. Hello.

01:09:04

Hello. Oh, I'm sorry. We momentarily cut you off. Can you hold on one second? Sure. Okay, go ahead.

01:09:10

Are either of you familiar with an author, Max I. DeMont, Jews, God, and History?

01:09:17

I'm not. How about you? Okay. We're not. Sorry. Oh, shoot. In that particular book, it's not necessarily a religious book, but it's more or less of a history, and he is, in his particular circles, recognizes a very eminent scholar.

01:09:42

But he is Jewish, and his proclamation is that the

01:09:50

Israelites, prophets, drew as much from the philosophy of the Greeks as the

01:09:55

Greeks did from the Jewish people. I don't know how you demonstrate that historically, sir.

01:10:00

I mean, the Jews were very much opposed to getting anything from the Greeks.

01:10:05

The Greeks were Gentiles. Hellens. That was translated, the word Hellens, which means derived from Hellenism.

01:10:14

Let me just finish here. Were the Gentiles, and they had, the Greeks and others had made a lot of efforts to Hellenize the

01:10:23

Jews, and that all stopped pretty much with Antiochus Epiphanes, who in 169

01:10:28

AD triggered the Maccabees.

01:10:35

After the Maccabean revolt, the political groups that dominated Israel and Palestine pretty much let the

01:10:43

Jews believe what they wanted to believe, and they did not have any Hellenistic views. For example, they were not believers in the metaphysical universe, and this is very, very important, because most of the interpretation of scriptures that is done by classical theists today assumes the existence of a metaphysical universe with a being that exists outside of time and space.

01:11:04

That was a Greek notion. It's not in the Bible. Okay. Now, this question

01:11:09

I think I would direct to Mr. White. Would you basically, and boy, I tell you, you boys are on some real refined doctrine here, and I want to stay just a little bit more general, or you'll throw me out of the ballpark.

01:11:22

Good deal. Mr. White, are you of the opinion that this

01:11:30

God that you're talking about, 3 in 1, 1 or 3 or whatever, is he incomprehensible to man's finite mind?

01:11:40

I believe that the God that I worship and that I love and that I serve and that Christians have worshipped and loved and served down through the centuries transcends my comprehension but not my understanding.

01:11:52

Let me define my use of those terms. I can understand what the doctrine of the Trinity is. I can understand how being differs from person.

01:12:00

I can understand what the Bible teaches about it. But I am a finite creature. I am a creation made by God.

01:12:07

And as such, I cannot encompass with my mind a being who is infinite and eternal.

01:12:13

So I think that what you have in Isaiah 55 when God says, my ways are above your ways, and my thoughts above your thoughts, is that my finite mind is incapable of really grasping.

01:12:25

I can't even grasp the fact that he is eternal. I cannot think of eternity in its fullness. Let alone more advanced revelations that God has made concerning his being.

01:12:36

So historically, when the church has used the term incomprehensibility, what they are protecting is the uniqueness of God in the sense of not limiting him to the creation.

01:12:47

And they are not saying that we cannot even begin to understand or define the truth that God has revealed about himself.

01:12:53

Richard, may I just jump in here for a second? I do think it's very interesting that we make a distinction, or that classical theists make a distinction between things that are created and things that create.

01:13:06

This is a Greek distinction. It existed long before Christ. It was taught by the Greek philosophers.

01:13:12

And no, there's no biblical basis for it. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. There you have the beginning distinction between he who creates and that which is created.

01:13:22

That distinction exists. The fundamental distinction in Romans 1 is between the creator and his creation.

01:13:28

There is a very distinct difference between man as a created being by God and God himself.

01:13:34

But it does not extend to the inferiority of man and the fact that man is not, or the idea that man is not like God.

01:13:42

But your God is created. Yes, and what's wrong with that? So, that's the whole idea.

01:13:49

No, see... He becomes parallel with man, then. Exactly. My point is this.

01:13:56

Exactly, he is the same. He is the genus. Man and God are the same species. Well, listen,

01:14:02

I know you've got more cars, but I've got... and there's another question that I would like to pop on the communicast, because it would blow things wide open, but we'll maybe save it for next time.

01:14:13

But Mr. White, I heard an advertisement on this radio station a couple of days ago, and apparently you are with the...

01:14:22

affiliated with the Southern Baptist Conference? No. Oh, you're not the one.

01:14:27

No, he's not. Where are you from? I'm from Phoenix. Do you have an address that I could send some correspondence to?

01:14:34

Sure. Electronic or the old snail mail? The old mail. Ah, the old way, huh? I have trouble getting the old way.

01:14:42

But, no, I can give you an address there. Alpha Omega Ministries. And it's a post office box 37106.

01:14:54

137? No, no. 37106. Okay. Phoenix, Arizona.

01:15:04

85069. If you need that later, we'll give it to you off the line. Okay, great.

01:15:11

We need to get to the next caller. Thanks very much for your contribution. Okay, I just wanted to mention before we go, quickly, that there is, in Mormon doctrine, there is no reason to think that the caterpillar cannot become like the butterfly.

01:15:29

Sure, the caterpillar is created, but eventually it can become the butterfly. And the point is that there's nothing, except in Greek theology, that discourages that attitude.

01:15:39

There's nothing in the Bible that discourages that. The Bible discourages it tremendously. We'll have to have that discussion later.

01:15:46

Let me read you a Biblical passage. No, I can't do that right now. We've got too many people waiting. Let me go to Scott in Salt Lake City.

01:15:55

Scott, you're on the air. Yes, hello. I'd like to ask a question of James White. I have several recordings of yours when the

01:16:04

CLI broadcast used to come up here. It isn't up here anymore? It hasn't been for about three years, since early 1995.

01:16:12

It's not broadcast anymore. That must have been a while back, because I've only been on with Hank since 1995.

01:16:19

I think it was the first time I came on on the James Only thing. I got a lot of your information on that that I recorded, and I also recorded your debate with one of the

01:16:27

Catholic... Oh, James Aiken? Yes, and I have those. It's among my prized collections to be able to listen to that material over and over again.

01:16:36

But my question tonight, you about gave me a heart attack when you talked about the

01:16:42

Lachman Foundation, and your work with the Lachman Foundation. I didn't know that their work was ongoing, such as the work of the

01:16:47

Revised Standard, and the new Revised Standard is an ongoing board. I thought the Lachman Foundation, at least insofar as it's work in translating the

01:16:54

Bible, had quit. In 1771, when the New American Standard came out. So what I need to know is...

01:16:59

No, they're a well -kept secret. What I need to know, you said you were working with them, or helping them, on something new, where you jettisoned the

01:17:07

Val and Vi completely. Is the work out yet? Oh yes, it's been out since 1995.

01:17:13

And what's it called? It's called the New American Standard Bible. Basically, it's New American Standard Bible update, but what's going to happen is this edition will then supplant the 1977 edition, and as the copyrights of the 77 expire, then everybody will go to the new edition.

01:17:32

Can I ask you about a number of formula things in it, just for a minute, and then I'll get off the air? You said it wasn't quite as wooden.

01:17:40

And I would like something that was not as relaxed as the NIV, but something that was a little bit stiffer, and I would suppose that that was maintained.

01:17:49

I'm laughing with Mr. Hopkins, because I felt like asking him sort of off air, does Lockman have to pay for this time?

01:17:57

A little unpaid advertising to send to Phil or something like that. I'm really excited about it. I mean,

01:18:02

I can actually go to a bookstore and get this? You know what, I would really love to have you have this discussion, perhaps after we're off the air.

01:18:11

Do you have access to the internet? Well... The reason I ask is that we make this translation available through our webpage.

01:18:19

It's on the internet. We make the translation available as far as being able to purchase the

01:18:25

Bible. So, I'd be glad to correspond with you if you've got that address, or if you'd like to contact the webpage at www .aomin

01:18:35

.org www .aomin .org www .aomin .org Then I could sort of tell you some of the differences, and why there are differences, and why

01:18:42

I think it'll fit exactly what you're looking for. Well, I don't think it will. For example, it is in the word abide, which is used a lot in the

01:18:48

New American Standard in John 15, and in 1 John 2, 3, and 4, and in 2 John. Do you still retain the term abide as often as you use it, or does it turn into remain, as some of the other modern versions do?

01:18:59

Remain seems a little more comfortable. I just like it better as a word. I realize the translations are equally valid, but...

01:19:05

Actually, I'm looking at 15 .6. If anyone does not abide... Oh, so you retain... It says abide, basically, just very briefly, because I know

01:19:13

Mr. Hopkins wants to move on... The Greek word meno, isn't it? Exactly. I know he wants to move on to the

01:19:18

Mormon subject, but very briefly, the reason it's a little bit smoother is that every other verse doesn't start with the word and.

01:19:25

In other words, we didn't translate every while consecutive and every chi if there was no grammatical reason to do so.

01:19:33

It still retains the truly and Matthew, Mark, Luke, and truly, truly, and John? I believe it still says truly.

01:19:41

We certainly didn't go to verily, anyway. No, no, but you were doing truly, truly, which was excellent, because it was copying, you know, the

01:19:47

ASB had copied the RSB there, and I thought it was an excellent excellent choice. Thank you,

01:19:54

Scott. I appreciate your contribution. It is truly, truly. It is truly, truly.

01:19:59

Okay, good deal. Thanks for calling. We'll get to the next caller here now. Who do we have?

01:20:06

It's John in Midvale. John, you're on the air. Gentlemen, I don't mean to sound heretical, but do you believe that there was a

01:20:14

God before there was a written language? Do you believe there was a God before there was a written language?

01:20:20

A written language? Well, I mean, Christ is called the Word, that sort of...

01:20:26

Oh, but no, no, no, that word stood for Logos and Wisdom, if you believe the Greek. The word

01:20:31

Logos means about 20 different things. Logos, okay.

01:20:37

Well, it's the Erasmian principle. Yeah, right. I was just, you know...

01:20:43

I'm not sure what you're asking. Well, we see a great deal of... and I don't mind them.

01:20:48

I mean, the Jesuits gave us... their debates over words gave us the Lutheran councils, the mini -camps of the various Protestants can argue today.

01:20:58

And, you know, if you go back to some of the studies of the Old Testament, you know, we see that it was the priests of Israel and the priests of Judea in the final redaction that gives us that appears in the

01:21:09

Old Testament. John, what's your point? It seems that we spend a great deal of time worrying about how the words mean.

01:21:18

That's how we communicate. Oh, not necessarily. Not necessarily. You know, we're talking about...

01:21:26

God could communicate in a little bit better way without necessarily words. Exactly. Man tries to attempt his communication of what he understands

01:21:33

God to be through words. You don't believe that God is communicated? Excuse me?

01:21:39

You don't believe God is communicated by language? When the prophets say, Thus saith Yahweh, that's not

01:21:45

Yahweh speaking? Thus saith the man who was communicated to by God.

01:21:51

And I don't think God said exactly those words to him. I don't know. Even though Jesus certainly believed that?

01:21:58

Well, certainly Jesus is one of the Trinity. But Jesus had an extremely high view of Scripture.

01:22:05

Let me ask you this about... He wrote a lot of it, didn't he? Well, obviously. But it's amazing how many people today...

01:22:14

But it's amazing, honestly, how many people today there are who call themselves Christian scholars who want to approach the text, the

01:22:20

Old Testament, without ever allowing that concept to have any say whatsoever into what it means. Now, I'm not saying you're doing that.

01:22:27

I'm just simply saying that's something... I am very much a believer that physics is the limit of physics.

01:22:36

You mentioned Pythagoras. Pythagoras' school there doesn't believe that one or two are numbers.

01:22:45

Three is really the first number because one is unity. It isn't a number. And two is just distinction. And it's with three that we get, well, in terms of their mathematics, the first number.

01:22:55

You sound like you have some familiarity with Pythagorean theory. John, we've got to get on to the next thing.

01:23:00

Just real quickly. This idea that God exists outside Alpha Omega certainly doesn't allow it.

01:23:09

And certainly you haven't. Would you admit that it was the will of God that created space and time?

01:23:16

No, I don't agree that God created space or time. I believe he created the quantum structure of space and time, probably.

01:23:26

I mean, that would be a good shot. Not space and time. I mean, I think space and time are just natural.

01:23:32

Well, we're getting bumped off here for a thing here. We'll be right back on the air shortly. Sorry. Thank you,

01:23:37

John. Okay, we're back on. Richard Hopkins here. Let's see. We're going to Richard in West Valley.

01:23:46

Richard, you're on the air. Yeah. You know, Mr. James White, you know, you and I, we both know people whose cranium is crammed full of knowledge but without an ounce of enlightenment to go with it.

01:24:08

Do you know how the Trinity works? I have a feeling

01:24:13

I'm about to find out. Okay, no. I'm talking to Mr. Hopkins. I'm not talking to you,

01:24:19

James White. I thought you were addressing... Okay, you can be rude to me. That's okay, but I didn't want you to be rude to my guest.

01:24:27

That's basically what I want to get to. Okay, what do you want to get to? See, you have a lot of knowledge but you don't have the enlightenment where the three persons come in.

01:24:39

So what I explain is you know, if you're created in God's image, there is three...

01:24:47

Do you know that there's three James sitting there? There is three of James sitting there.

01:24:53

There's the physical James. Maybe he likes sports. I don't know what

01:24:58

James physically likes. Maybe he likes playing with the kids. That's the physical

01:25:04

James. The mental James likes the study, the study of biblical history, the biblical...

01:25:17

He probably studies different writings and books. Then there's the spiritual James. The spiritual

01:25:24

James that studies the Bible, that prays. He communes with God.

01:25:29

So if you're created in the image of God, then there is three of me, there is three of you, and that's why

01:25:38

I don't see why you don't understand there is three persons in one substance. There is three of me, and that's why

01:25:47

Joseph Smith, I can show you a type where Joseph Smith attacked that and said God would be a monster or a giant.

01:25:56

One in three, three in one. Richard, let me just cut you off here a little bit. I'm afraid

01:26:01

James and I are going to have to agree on this one. Isn't this a heresy from back in the early 2nd century?

01:26:08

He's talking about three Jameses, all in one being. That reminds me of one of the

01:26:15

Modest or Sibelian... Okay. Are you saying that these three

01:26:21

Jameses are three separate individuals? Okay, but wait a minute.

01:26:27

If they're not three separate individuals then you're not talking about the Trinity. The Trinity believes that the three are absolutely separate.

01:26:34

Arrhenius, against heresy, spent his entire book four trying to make this point over Marcion. No, you won't believe me.

01:26:43

When you say completely separate, if you're talking about the fact that the Father is not the Son, that is quite true.

01:26:49

If you're saying that the Father and the Son do not share one being as God, you're missing Irenaeus and Christians at that point.

01:26:56

This is simply an analogy that he's using. Any analogy is going to break down and it's not an analogy, to be perfectly honest with you, that I would use.

01:27:03

Any analogy is going to break down for one simple reason and that is we are describing the unique God and since he is unique in how he exists, just as Jesus Christ was unique as the

01:27:13

Incarnate One, any analogy trying to describe how he exists is going to break down at some point along the line.

01:27:19

See, basically what I'm saying is if you're talking in terms of every person and every finite person then you could say three dimensions.

01:27:29

But if you're talking about a God, then you have three persons in one substance, as the late

01:27:37

Dr. Walter Martin said, three persons in one substance. And even

01:27:42

Catholicism agrees with three persons in one substance. So therefore, if you understand the

01:27:49

Trinity, then you have to conclude that there is three Richard Hopkins dimensions in three dimensions in one substance, if you agree in the image of God.

01:28:00

I don't agree that the analogy is going to work when applied to a finite creature because the relationship that the

01:28:08

Father, the Son, and the Spirit have is one of sharing an infinite being, not one third of God's being.

01:28:16

They're not one third God, they are completely... That's true, that's true. But I'm basically saying the thing that's important is that if you believe you're created in the image of God, then you've got to then it will only make sense that there is three of James as there is three of God.

01:28:37

That's assuming that we're created in the imagination. Another term...

01:28:42

Now, wait a minute, Richard, just before you go on, if there are three Jameses, I've got all three of them here in the studio, and I don't think that there's another one back in Arizona.

01:28:57

Whereas when Christ was on the earth, and he was baptized, there was one up in heaven speaking, and one down on the earth being baptized, and the

01:29:08

Holy Ghost descending between the two as if like a dove would descend.

01:29:15

So there's three separate people you could see. I can't see three separate James Whites here.

01:29:21

There's only one. But it doesn't matter. If James White is created in the image of God, you have to...

01:29:31

No, I don't mean you have to. You know that the angels cannot move around as God can.

01:29:39

God can be in more than one place. The angels cannot. Neither can

01:29:44

James nor I. But if I'm in the... I can move around pretty good.

01:29:50

Do you know what the term imagination means? Image making. That's what's in the word imagination.

01:29:57

Therefore, if I'm made in God's image, then there has to be three of me.

01:30:05

I'm not God. Well, there actually are three of you. I'm finite, and God is infinite.

01:30:11

Well, one part of me is not finite. Richard, that is, I think, the key. I can't follow the analogy in applying it to people.

01:30:20

But I can follow the analogy in recognizing, and the important part is...

01:30:27

I agree with. I understand, but I'm just trying to point out to you that... See, there's nothing that you can say that I would challenge.

01:30:36

If you're in the image of God, then there has to be, to me, three dimensions.

01:30:45

You are like the angels. You cannot be in any more places than one, basically.

01:30:51

Richard, what I'm trying to point out, and just briefly respond to that, is that the final thing that you said is what causes the problem with the analogy, and that is the concept of an infinite being versus a finite being.

01:31:04

I don't believe... This would be one area, again, where I don't think Mormonism would have an infinite being.

01:31:10

Oh, incorrect. This is one of the areas that classical theism completely misunderstands

01:31:16

Mormon doctrine on. As this gentleman was saying, and thank you,

01:31:21

Richard, for your contribution, we have essentially three natures.

01:31:28

Just as Christ had, as you recognized, at least two of the natures that he had while he was here upon the earth, a human nature and a spirit nature.

01:31:37

Divine nature. Yes, which you call the divine nature, and we believe everybody has a spirit nature like that divine nature that Christ had.

01:31:45

In other words, they were spirits before they came here. They are different only in degree.

01:31:53

Like the butterfly is different from the caterpillar. So both are created. Well, not exactly.

01:31:59

This is a point that I wanted to get across to you. They're not exactly created any more than a human body is created.

01:32:05

You've got the third element in a human being which is the intelligence that inhabits the spirit, or is the spirit.

01:32:13

I don't know. There's nothing in the scriptures that clearly indicate to us how this is created or begotten.

01:32:21

But the point is that that spirit has always existed. It is eternal, and it is intelligent, otherwise not the use of the word intelligence would be a misnomer.

01:32:34

But the point is, it is intelligent, and it has learned, and it has existed throughout all eternity, and we do not know how long we have been in the spirit.

01:32:43

We could have been in the spirit form for another infinite period of time. Who knows? I mean, an infinite period of time can be divided into an infinite number of infinite periods of time.

01:32:54

So when you're talking infinity, you know, it's a very different thing. But the point is, man is infinite, not finite, in his fundamental basis.

01:33:03

Have you ever read Dr. Beckwith's criticism of that very issue? My book, the fourth section, is completely devoted to criticizing, not criticizing, but rebuking, or rebutting, is the word,

01:33:15

Dr. Beckwith's thing. In fact, Dr. Beckwith's article was probably the inspiration in many ways for my book.

01:33:22

Thus declares Yahweh, who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him.

01:33:27

You said man's spirit is eternal. No, no, no. I said his intelligence is.

01:33:33

The spirit is formed. The spirit is formed by Yahweh. No, we would not say by Yahweh.

01:33:40

By God the Father. Zechariah 12 .1. I understand what it's saying. Now, wait a minute. I'm not sure that it's

01:33:46

Yahweh. Is it translated from Yahweh? Do you have that? It is Yahweh. Well, let me look.

01:33:53

Zechariah 12 .1. You said, for example, at the beginning of your talk with Van Hale, that God, that Yahweh spoke in the garden.

01:34:04

Yahweh was the one who said, let us make man. But that's not correct. It was Elohim that said.

01:34:09

That, of course, assumes that Yahweh and Elohim are separate and distinct gods. The Bible very clearly says they're not. No, of course not.

01:34:15

They're not separate gods. They're separate persons. That's not according to the Bible. Yahweh is one person.

01:34:22

Deuteronomy 4 .35. To show that you might know that Yahweh, He is Elohim. There is none else beside Him. Mil Badu is singular.

01:34:29

He represents Elohim and is speaking just the way that messenger spoke to John in the first person.

01:34:36

Yahweh says there is no Yahweh. He is Elohim. If you say,

01:34:42

James, He is Richard. Right. Where did the angel ever say, I am God, in Revelation?

01:34:48

He didn't. That isn't the point. To you it was shown that you might know that Yahweh, He is

01:34:53

Elohim. There is none else beside Him. Singular. Where is it?

01:34:59

That's Deuteronomy 4 .35. 4 .35. And I've looked up Zechariah 12 .1 for you if you'd like to see it.

01:35:06

No, just a minute. Let me get this. Deuteronomy 12 .35, right?

01:35:12

4 .35. Oh, 4. That's what I thought it was. There's no other besides Him.

01:35:25

Read the rest of it. It says, To you it was shown that you might know that the Lord, He is

01:35:30

God. I thought you were looking at your inner linear. No, I'm not, but I know the Lord is translated as Yahweh.

01:35:37

And God is Elohim. And what else does it say? There is no other beside Him.

01:35:43

Him is singular. So you've got Yahweh, He is Elohim. There is none else beside Him.

01:35:50

And yet in Mormon theology, Elohim begat Yahweh as His firstborn spirit child.

01:35:55

And this would be understood as follows. That you might know that the Lord, He is

01:36:02

God. In the same sense that He is representing God. He is the angel of God.

01:36:08

He is God to you. Period. I didn't see that in my Hebrew text. No, but that is what the meaning is.

01:36:14

That is how you should understand it. That is where your Mormon presuppositions are determining your exegesis. Exactly.

01:36:21

You do exegesis as well. We all bring a certain amount of exegesis to the scriptures because we interpret them.

01:36:30

We exegete them using our fundamental suppositions. But if you are going to ask the question,

01:36:36

Are Jehovah and Elohim separate and distinct gods? 535 times. It is Yahweh, Elohim, one term.

01:36:42

Psalm 100, verse 3. Jehovah, He is Elohim. Jehovah, He is Elohim. And Jehovah says, I know of no other

01:36:49

Elohim besides me. That is not inconsistent with LDS theology. If you wish to say so.

01:36:55

Okay, we have somebody else we need to do this. I wish I could go into this more extensively. My new book does, and you should look at that.

01:37:02

There is Zechariah 12. It is Yahweh Creates Spirits. We have a few more people we have to get on here.

01:37:10

Let's go to, who is next on there? Just put them on.

01:37:16

Go on. John? First of all, a couple, about half an hour ago, you were discussing the difference between creation and beginning.

01:37:29

Yes, we were. And how man was created in the image of God and that is different from being begat in the image of Adam.

01:37:41

And I would like to take issue with that when you look at in the Gospel of John, first chapter, 14th verse, we read that the word referring to Jesus Christ was made flesh and He is the only begotten of the

01:37:57

Father. So if He is the only begotten of the Father, then there isn't a difference in interpretation of when we look and it says that in other places

01:38:09

Christ will say, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father. We look the same, we essentially act as one

01:38:18

God. And so if you look at the difference here, there is no difference between self being begotten in the image of Adam and mankind being created in the image of God.

01:38:29

It's all the same. Actually, if you're basing that upon John 1, 14 and the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld

01:38:35

His glory, the Greek term is monogamous. And if you will look up the term monogamous in any decent lexical source at all, you'll see that monogamous refers to uniqueness.

01:38:48

Actually, I was referring to the 14th verse where He is referred to as the only begotten of the Father. Exactly, the

01:38:53

Greek term is monogamous. Which James thinks means unique, one of a kind.

01:38:59

Yeah, monogamous comes from two words in Greek which mean first, let's see, first...

01:39:05

So the only child, right? It can be used to mean only child. It comes from monos and it does not come from genao, the verb to beget.

01:39:17

It comes from genes, which means race or kind. So it means unique one, that's why it's translated that way at John 1, 18 in modern translations, the unique God.

01:39:26

Wait a minute, is that the same as in 1 John 4 verse 9 then? 1

01:39:31

John 4 9? Yeah, I believe it is. James, there's a problem that what he's talking about relates to and that is exactly your argument based on Deuteronomy 4, 35 is exactly why

01:39:46

I have a problem with the idea of the Trinity being a separate Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

01:39:53

Why? Well, because right here you're saying they're not separate. No, I'm saying the Jehovah and Elohim, those terms are used of the only true

01:39:59

God in the Old Testament. Well, are they separate? Are they separate beings? Father, Son, and Holy Ghost in the

01:40:07

Old Testament. Of course they were. Okay, then you have the same problem with the scripture that we do. Not at all. Oh yes, because you have to explain why there's only one

01:40:16

God, Jehovah Elohim. You believe the Elohim's Father and Jehovah's Son. No, then we explain the scripture in exactly the same way.

01:40:23

It's just that we do not assume the additional idea that these three separate persons are one being.

01:40:31

That we do not assume. No, you're inserting a doctrinal exposition from 1916 into interpreting Deuteronomy Chapter 4.

01:40:37

No, I'm certainly not. I'm trying to explain to you how we see this as, no, you have the same problem as we do with this.

01:40:43

Not at all. No, you believe that there's one God. We believe there's one God. Yahweh Elohim. Well, fine.

01:40:49

We believe that would constitute the one Godhead, we would call it. And my point is... One being of God, Yahweh Elohim.

01:40:54

No, okay, there's only one, right? Right. Alright. We believe that's one authority. You believe that's one being.

01:41:00

Exactly. Alright, there's the difference. We're getting there. Good. Okay. I am saying to you that one being is not going to be three separate persons.

01:41:07

Why not? Let us make man in our own image. Because it's impossible. Let us make man in our own image. Where does it say it's impossible?

01:41:12

In fact, that passage right there says there is none else beside him, not there's none else beside that authority. No, no, no.

01:41:18

You're reading him as authority. No, I'm not. I'm reading him as the Father. The source of the authority.

01:41:24

Yahweh Elohim. That's Yahweh speaking. Exactly. And you've got two separate persons there.

01:41:30

We don't have any problem with the fact that the Son is identified as Yahweh, the Father is identified as Yahweh, and the

01:41:35

Spirit is identified as Yahweh. It's the Mormon idea of introducing this distinction between Yahweh and Elohim that I was saying

01:41:41

I was disagreeing with when you said it's not... It wasn't Jehovah that said that in Genesis 1.

01:41:47

Then let me clarify. There are, and this is correct. Generally speaking, Jehovah refers to, as even

01:41:54

Justin Martyr indicated, it was Christ that dealt throughout the Old Testament with the people of Israel.

01:42:01

The problem is, and that is what we identify Yahweh, but the words for God, Yahweh and Elohim, that are used in the

01:42:08

Bible are frequently used interchangeably as you've just suggested. But that does not mean that the three separate persons are one being.

01:42:16

The fact that one divine name is used for all three, and that is the only divine name there is, does, and I point out to you

01:42:22

Isaiah 53 .6, it is Yahweh that laid our sins upon the Messiah. Well, I've got to get into that more at a later time, but...

01:42:32

Well, there's another general conference in six months. We'll do it then. We've got to do that, but we've only got three minutes and we've got a few people to go here.

01:42:38

Let's go to... Who do we have? Carrie? Hi, Carrie. Hi. I have a question for James, and I'm asking very...

01:42:47

I just want to know, James, what is your relationship to Jesus the

01:42:53

Christ? He is my Lord and my Savior and my Creator. Your Creator. He is my Creator.

01:42:59

Okay. Mine too, by the way, James. Oh, that was your spirit brother. Me too. No, he is my elder brother.

01:43:04

He is my Creator. He absolutely is. He formed your spirit? As far as forming my spirit, I don't have an opinion.

01:43:10

I thought Elohim begat your spirit with one of his heavenly wives. Well, that's one person's interpretation of it.

01:43:16

I'm not... That's a General Authority's interpretation. Yes, that's one General Authority's interpretation of it. Okay, you're still on. I'm sorry.

01:43:21

Okay, that's my interpretation also. I... Well, okay. Now, when the

01:43:28

Lord is being baptized by John, whom is he speaking to or who's speaking to the

01:43:35

Lord? The Father. The Father. And who would that be? Yahweh? Elohim? Jesus?

01:43:41

Who? The Father is the Father, the Son is the Son, the Spirit is the Spirit. Each one is described as, with the one term,

01:43:47

Yahweh, which is, again, why we believe in the doctrine of the Trinity, Yahweh referring to the being of God, each shared fully by three persons, the

01:43:53

Father, the Son, and the Spirit. Thank you, Gene. I'm sorry we don't have more time. We're trying to get Doug in here.

01:43:58

Doug in Georgia? Georgia. Georgia. Doug from Georgia. Hello, James. Hello.

01:44:04

I don't know if you know who I am or not. No, I don't. I don't know if anybody's brought this up or not. How about, what do you make of the Mosser -Owen article?

01:44:11

Paul Mosser, Paul Owen speech of a year ago has been printed out and circulated around. I told them it was a bad idea at the time and I still think it is.

01:44:19

Do you agree with that conclusion? Okay, we've got one minute left. Thank you, Doug. I wish we had more time, but we want to get one more caller in.

01:44:28

Let's see. That was fast. We're not going to be able to get much in. Okay, I'm sorry.