Thanks. How do you see “selective awareness” working with omniscience?
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More on the deity of Christ
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Thanks. How do you see “selective awareness” working with omniscience?
- Aug 10, 2012
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I believe Psalm 103:12 "As far as the east is from the west, So far hath he removed our transgressions from us."
So we have a God who can forgive and forget sins yet he is omniscient. Its a variation of the old paradox, can an omnipotent God make a rock so big he can't lift it? Can God who knows all things forget? I wouldn't believe it if it were not written.
So God can choose not to know something as well as not to remember something. (Nothing is impossible with God.)
Did God choose not to know what was happening to - to use your terminology - the second person of himself?
Over and over studies are published showing that most people don’t read their Bibles regularly. In light of the fact, with what frequency then would we hazard a guess - greater or lesser - that they’re reading the early church fathers? (“LESSER” rings the bell and wins the Kewpie doll.)
From my X / Twitter “For you feed” today:
”The teaching of the early church fathers wasn’t perfect - they made mistakes. But God’s word never errs.
We don’t understand the Bible in light of the early fathers - we must test even the early fathers according to Scripture.”
(Gabriel Hughes)
The pastor is right.
Mistakes? What mistakes did the early church fathers make?
Take Tertullian for example. I can quote him until I’m blue in the face (and have) saying, “There was a time when the Son did not exist with the Father”. (Everyone who reads Tertullian knows he said it and knows he believed it.)
It typically doesn’t matter. People believe what they want to believe, and what trinitarians want to believe about Tertullian is that Tertullian believed what they believe.
“There was a time when the Son did not exist with the Father.” What kind of “God“ is that, Tertullian?
Tertullian is dead. What kind of “God” doesn’t eternally exist with the Father, KUWN?
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I highly encourage people to read the Bible, and also the early church fathers. It falls largely on deaf ears.
My particular area of interest is in the Ante-Nicene fathers - of which Tertullian is one. I’m keenly interested in them because their writings document the gradual shift which occurred in the early church - from Jewish monotheism in the 1st century to trinitarianism in the 4th century.
People sometimes hear snippets of the early church fathers and think they understand them. They don’t. They have to read their writings in full to gain a proper understanding of them.
If all you want me - a Jewish monotheist who believes Jesus is the Messiah, Son of the living God - to do is say / confess that “Jesus is divine” and / or ”Jesus is God” then consider it done.
I’ve quoted A.E. Harvey frequently of late. (Jesus and the Constraints of History.) I might as well be playing a kazoo and marching up and down sand dunes in the middle of the Sahara Desert. This trinitarian scholar - and he isn’t the only trinitarian scholar who does - hands it to us on a silver platter.
Who is reading him / them? The people who seldom read their Bibles? The people who even less seldom read the early church fathers?
P.S.
I‘m about to turn in for the night but wanted to add a quick word about the Nicene fathers. They too are of great interest to me, but in a slightly different way than are the Ante-Nicene fathers.
For decades I‘ve publicly called for the early church fathers / church history to be taught in every church (and privately in homes). Trinitarians, binitarians, and unitarians have typically declined to join with me in calling for it. I‘m extending a personal invitation to you. Will you join with me in calling for it to be done?
The early church fathers / church history are a boon to Jewish monotheists who follow the Messiah. It can work for you too, but few people have any interest in it.
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“Tertullian denied that a Father / Son relationship was eternal with the Trinity, seeing it rather as a new development emerging from God’s plan to make the world. Such temporal paternity and filiation distances Tertullian from the eventual Nicene consensus, which accepted instead the eternal generation theory of Origen. While Tertullian did propose some important terms that would gain traction among the Nicene fathers, he was also marked by a subordinationist tendency that had affinities with Arianism. … Historical theologians need to start admitting that Tertullian was a far cry from being fully Nicene. Rather, he offered a clever but still imperfect half-step toward what would become official orthodoxy.”
(Bryan M. Litfin, “Tertullian on the Trinity,” Abstract)
Tertullian would violate the current Board policy if he were to return to life, register here as a “Christian” member and state his position. He would have to register as “Other Faith” in order to do that.
Historical theologians do acknowledge that Tertullian was “a far cry from being fully Nicene”. I’ve elsewhere quoted the Lutheran scholar J.L. Neve (A History of Christian Thought) as an example.
We should still read Tertullian. He’s an important intermediary figure in the post-biblical transition period. He’s not a Jewish monotheist and he’s not a Nicene trinitarian. He’s a precursor of Arianism.
People would know this if they read Tertullian for themselves.
This isn’t controversial. It’s simple church history.
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Dr. Litfin is a trinitarian scholar. For those who are unfamiliar with him:
(Bryan M. Litfin, “Tertullian on the Trinity,” Abstract)
Tertullian would violate the current Board policy if he were to return to life, register here as a “Christian” member and state his position. He would have to register as “Other Faith” in order to do that.
Historical theologians do acknowledge that Tertullian was “a far cry from being fully Nicene”. I’ve elsewhere quoted the Lutheran scholar J.L. Neve (A History of Christian Thought) as an example.
We should still read Tertullian. He’s an important intermediary figure in the post-biblical transition period. He’s not a Jewish monotheist and he’s not a Nicene trinitarian. He’s a precursor of Arianism.
People would know this if they read Tertullian for themselves.
This isn’t controversial. It’s simple church history.
***
Dr. Litfin is a trinitarian scholar. For those who are unfamiliar with him:
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