80 Years Ago

27 80 YEARS AGO (The following is an extract from the December issue of The Review of Religions. 1909) SOME SCRIPTURAL ARGUMENTS AGAINST THE GODHOOD OF CHRIST It is strange how, in spite of the over-whelming scriptural evidence against the God-hood of Christ, certain Christians still persist in holding that Christ is the very God or is identified with Him or is equal to Him. There is not a single passage in the whole of the Bible which directly sets forth the doctrine that Christ is God; innumerable texts may be adduced to prove the untenableness of this doctrine; the whole tenor of the New Testament disfavours it. The following few texts, some of which are considered by our Trinitarian friends to be their strong points to prove their case, are herewith adduced. Christ has said, I go to my Father and My Father is greater than (I John xx, 28). Christ asked his disciples, But whom say ye that I am? Simon Peter said unto him, Thou art Christ the son of the Living-God, and Jesus answered and said, Blessed art thou son of Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood have not revealed it unto thee but my Father which is in heaven.This is an emphatic declaration that Christ is not God but the Son of God. Indeed, Christ has said, I and my Father are one (John x, 30). But he has again said, And the glory which thou hast given me, I have given them, that they may be one, even as we are one (John xvil, 22). Surely Christ did not mean that they all shall be God. Then there is to be an end of Grist’s reign. When aR things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the son also himself be subjected unto him that put all things under him that God may be all in a]! (1 Cor. xv, 28). Then again the Jews who were seeking evil against him said, He himself made himself God. Christ immediately refuted the calumny and said, is it not written in you law, ye are Gods? If he called them God unto whom the word of God came, and the Scripture could not be broken; say ye of him whom the Father has sanctified and sent to the world, Thou blasphemest, because I said, I am the son of God (John x, 34-36). Christ’s protest against the asssertion that he is God, is thus significant Whosoever shaE confess that Jesus ‘is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him and he in God.(John iv, 15). The following text, in the opinion of eminent Christian divines, is not to be found in any Greek M.S.S. earlier than the 15th century, nor in any Latin M.S.S earlier than the 9th century. It runs thus, Christ being in the form of God thought it not robbery to equal with God. The expression in the form of God or figure or image of God proves that he was not the person of God. The same idea (continued on page 49)