Passges 01 : Divinity of Jesus

'And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began.' -- Yeshua/Jesus, Gospel of St. John (17:5)

Doubtlessly, one of the most exquisite passages in the New Testament. Here Yeshua is re-iterating and establishing His eternal relationship to the Father - He is confirming that He, Yeshua, is the I Am (God), for He has existed in eternity before all time. Critics often object that Yeshua/Jesus never claimed to be God. This is not true. The above verse is but one of many where Jesus clearly states that He is God - that He, and the Father, are One.  In John (8:48), Jesus once again affirms, 'Before Abraham was, I Am.' - testifying to the fact that He had always existed and that He, Jesus, is the same Person as YHWH (I Am), r simply, God.

The above passage from St. John (17:5) foreshadows the death of St. Steven, where, whilst being stoned to death, St. Steven has a vision of Jesus seated at the right hand of God the Father in Heaven.

Likewise, Jesus' words in John (17:4) are re-affirmed in the first chapter of the Gospel of St. John (1: 14): The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.' And shortly thereafter in John (1: 17-18), St. John affirms: 'For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.'

And John (1: 29-30) in the words of John the Baptist: ''Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is the one I meant when I said, ‘A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’;.'

Through these passages, John the Beloved, John the Baptist, and Jesus Himself affirm His existence prior to the formation of time -- That He, Yeshua, had always existed with, as One with, God the Father [YHWH].

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Explaining the Trinity : A Philosopher's View

Last week was the feast of the Most Holy Trinity. With that in mind, I've been reflecting on a way to explain the Trinity in a manner that gets around the accusations of polytheism.This is how I explain the Trinity as a Roman Catholic Christian (from a logic of paradox). 

Let’s take a man named John. John is essentially one person. However, there are three aspects to John’s identity (to his ‘person): he is a father, a son, and a husband. These three aspects are like three different ‘persons’ or selves to the single man, John. These three aspects are both distinct and intimately related: as a father, John is compassionate, loving, and giving. As a son, he is caring and respectful. As a husband, he is a lover and sensual. With this analogy in mind, let us think about God as a Trinity. God is a Father, as He is revealed within Judaism and Islam: He is just, caring, and wise. But He has also incarnated Himself, as Yahweh or the ‘I Am’, into time and space in the event of the incarnation in order to save us from ourselves – this is God as a ‘Son’: compassionate, merciful, and loving. But why the word ‘Son’ to describe Jesus? If we take that word literally, it would seem like we are saying that Jesus is a distinct ‘God’ from Yahweh. The Catholic Church has many fantastic answers to this. But here is mine. Since God is everywhere all at once, but he also entered time and space through the Incarnation event, ‘Jesus’ is the Spirit of God which flowed ‘from eternity into time’, into our world – hence why Jesus is called the ‘begotten’ Son of God. Think of ‘’begotten Son’ as ‘the spirit of God which flows from God into time and space – One God who simultaneously occupied eternity and temporality (through the physical body of Jesus). This is not a biological sonship; but rather, ‘a flowing’ or ‘emerging’, where God, while still existing in eternity, also ‘flows’ into temporal time and space through the incarnation event. The moment that the Most Holy Virgin Mary said, ‘Yes’ to God, Yahweh, while remaining in eternity, also ‘flowed’ from eternity into Her womb – it is this ‘flowing’ of God into the world which we call the Divine Person of Jesus. Jesus is a ‘Son of God’ in the sense that Jesus is the Spirit of God that flows from Himself into time, while still existing in eternity – hence the paradox. God as ‘Son’ is therefore more a metaphor for how God flowed ‘from Himself’ into time and space while still remaining in eternity. What about the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit is the gaze of love that emerges between God as a Father and God as a Son – in other words, the Holy Spirit is the Love of God that emerges from His compassion, mercy, infinite love, and justice. Like John, God is one; but there are different ‘aspects’ to this Oneness of God – what we therefore call the Trinity. In the New Testament, Jesus affirms: “Before Abraham was, I Am”. This denotes that He (Jesus) is the same single Person as Yahweh in the Old Testament – they are not two distinct ‘gods’, but One, single God. ‘Jesus’ is that Part (Aspect) of God’s Personhood that Has come to save us, Who left eternity to enter temporal space, and to sacrifice Himself, His own beating Heart, for us all (while still existing in eternity at the same tine). In the crucifixion of Jesus, we see The I Am sacrificing Himself, His own beating Heart, for us on the cross – a bleeding, literal beating Heart that we receive each time during the Eucharist (Holy Communion) in the Catholic Faith. While I am not a theologian, and perhaps should stick to Philosophy, this is my simple understanding of God as a Trinity.

I hope this helps you,