Mark,
That evil spirit in 1Samuel 16 is "of" the Lord just as much as the holy spirit.

From the same translation, okay?

13. And Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. And a spirit of the Lord passed over David from that day forth, and Samuel arose and went to Ramah.

Is "a" holy spirit different from "the" holy spirit (3rd person of the trinity)? No. It's God's will or action, Mark - not Him.

14. And the spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord frightened him.

So the 3rd person of the Trinity departed from Saul, or is it more like the will of God, or what God blessed Saul with that departed from Saul and was replaced by a curse?

15. And Saul's servants said to him, "Behold now, an evil spirit of God is frightening you.

An evil spirit "OF" God. Not "from", but "OF". There goes your argument.

16. Let our lord say (your servants are before you), 'Let them seek a man who knows how to play on the harp'; and it will be, that when the evil spirit of God is upon you, he will play with his hand, and it will be good for you."

Again, evil spirit "OF" God. Strike 2.

23. And it would be, that when the spirit of God was upon Saul, that David would take the harp, and would play with his hand, and Saul would be relieved, and it would be good for him, the spirit of evil would depart from him.

Strike 3. Evil spirit "of" God 3 times in these verses.

Once again, this argument of yours fails. The spirit of God is no more the 3rd person of a co-equal Trinity than the evil spirit of God is a 4th part of a quaternity. These spirits are the will of God or some action on His part. Neither are Him.

This thread is about the Trinity. It doesn't matter to me whether the first christians believed in Jesus' divinity - whether coequal or subordinate to God (which is what it actually looked like). Both views are wrong.

As to the Torah, there's no comparison. No Jew worships the Torah as if placing it in front of God. However, this is not the case with Jesus - as you and other christians equate Jesus to God or worship God through Jesus - as though placing Jesus in front of God, which is idolatry in every sense of the meaning. You think Jesus is God, right? So you pray to Jesus. Why not pray at his feet and worship his image?

Look, if Joe Schmoe in Rome worshipped Caesar as God in human form, I know you would agree that's idolatry. So what's the difference between you and Joe Schmoe? The same thing is happening with you in your devotion to Jesus the human being, who the NT describes as the "image" of God, not God Himself - the "first creation" of God, not the Creator - and as Acts 7:55 shows he was actually "seen" sitting next to God. That which exists outside of God is not God.

As to your "schechah" argument, you believe Jesus is divine and as far as I know, you would clearly worship his image - which is blatant idolatry. If Jesus commanded you to worship and pray to him as God, you would. Or would you say, "nope J-man, that's image worship. Against the commandments. No can do. Bye-bye." No, you'd worship his image because he commanded you to do so. You'd trust him, even though it goes against the 10 commandments.

Based on what you've now learned, can you say truthfully and confidently - based on facts alone - that Jews before Jesus prayed to, worshipped, or knew of a 3 in 1, coequal, 3 person God made up of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? I don't think you can.

Yet the Jews here are disingenuously accused of blindly sticking to man-made traditions rather than following God's clear Torah commandment to reject gods our fathers never taught us? Look at Deut. 4:9, 6:7, 6:20-25, and 11:19. God set up this system. Are we to ignore this commandment and reject our fathers teachings? Do you think God would be pleased if we told our fathers we weren't interested in what they know and that we should just figure things out on our own - and not care a wit whether they knew of a 3 in 1 god or not?

Please advise. I want a real answer to this. Something practical, biblical, you name it. Reject our fathers teaching or not?


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"He who saves one life... it is as if he saves an entire universe. He who destroys a life... it is as if he destroys an entire universe"

TALMUD - Sanhedrin 4:5

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