Closely tied to the doctrine of the Trinity is the belief that Jesus is Yahweh. As Trinity gave Jesus divine nature and being equal to God, Yahweh is understood to be a title rather than a name that belongs to the Father, only, but a title belonging to the Son and the Holy Spirit. With this belief and the doctrine of Virgin birth where Mary, Jesus’ mother was conceived by the Holy Spirit, which in Christianity is believed to be a masculine spirit, this gave Jesus a foundation to be able to claim to be God. Trinity however expanded to the belief that Jesus is Yahweh – the creator of the world.
How Jesus, from being the second head of the Trinity and being distinct from God the Father started to morph into the Father and being Yahweh himself?
Without the doctrine of Trinity, Jesus cannot be God, without the virgin birth there is no miracle, without masculine Holy Spirit, there is no miraculous conception, without original sin, Jesus didn’t escape sin or was unique in nature – all this is connected and interdependent.
Through Greco-Roman philosophical debates and being rooted in pagan practices, Christianity started to mirror those pagan believes, however under the new Christian coat. However, as I was going through my deconstruction of those doctrines, I presented so far that all those doctrines have no Biblical basis and were not the believes of early Christianity prior to the Nicean creed, but rather, developed through the Roman Empire in the 4th century.
The idea that Jesus is Yahweh first started with Jesus being part of the Trinity and being separate from God the Father, however with time and many interpretations, the idea that Jesus is actually God the Father started to form. Today, most Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and part of the Trinity, yet He is also the creator of the world and was with God from the beginning.
Today, only Jesus is worshiped in the church under the understanding that Jesus is the Lord and the Father and God the Father disappeared into the background. What is interesting is that although Trinity has three people who are equal in nature yet distinct from each other, they are not equally worshiped. Jesus has morphed into the God the Father and therefore only Jesus is worshiped, God the Father is in the background and forgotten and the Holy Spirit is not worshiped, apart from the baptism. However, Mary – Jesus’ mother, has been exalted to the divine status and called “God” but the Pope Leo the XIV in one of his sermons. It all started to lose its foundation completely.
Before we discuss the believes of today, it is important to look at what the Hebrew Bible prophesied about the Messiah. In the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament it was very clear that God was One and there was no other. God never said that He was sharing His being with the Son or the Holy Spirit and He was always calling people to worship Him only.
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one!” Deuteronomy 6:4 “
I am the Lord, and there is no other;
There is no God besides Me.” Isaiah 45: 5
“To you it was shown, that you might know that the Lord Himself is God; there is none other besides Him.” Deuteronomy 4: 35
“Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel,
And his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts:
‘I am the First and I am the Last;
Besides Me there is no God.” Isaiah 44:6
Therefore, we can see that in the Hebrew Bible God presented Himself as one, as not sharing His essence with anyone, and that there is no other God sitting next to Him. If this was any different, then God would have presented Himself as having three forms of sharing His essence with other spirits.
Why would He present Himself as one and expect His people to figure it out later that He, in fact, is in three forms?
We also see that God introduced Himself as Yahweh:
“God spoke further to Moses and said to him, ‘I am Yahweh; and I appeared to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as God Almighty, but by My name, Yahweh, I did not make myself known to them'”. Exodus 6: 2-3
“I am Yahweh, that is My name;
And My glory I will not give to another,
Nor My praise to carved images.” Isaiah 42:8
Therefore, we can see that not only God highlighted He is one, that there is no other God beside Him, but also that His name is Yahweh and He will not give His glory to another.
What can we see in the Hebrew Bible about Jesus? How was God prophesying about the future coming of His son?
“Behold! My Servant whom I uphold,
My Elect One in whom My soul delights!
I have put My Spirit upon Him;
He will bring forth justice to the Gentiles.” Isaiah 42:1
“I, the Lord, have called You in righteousness,
And will hold Your hand;
I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people,
As a light to the Gentiles,
To open blind eyes,
To bring out prisoners from the prison,
Those who sit in darkness from the prison house.” Isiah 42: 6-7
“And He shall stand and feed His flock
In the strength of the Lord,
In the majesty of the name of the Lord His God;
And they shall abide,
For now He shall be great
To the ends of the earth;
And this One shall be peace.” Micah 5:4
“Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord,
“That I will raise to David a Branch of righteousness;
A King shall reign and prosper,
And execute judgment and righteousness in the earth.
In His days Judah will be saved,
And Israel will dwell safely;
Now this is His name by which He will be called:
THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.” Jeremiah 23: 5-6
“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!
Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem!
Behold, your King is coming to you;
He is just and having salvation,
Lowly and riding on a donkey,
A colt, the foal of a donkey.” Zechariah 9:9
Therefore, in the Old Testament Jesus was prophesied to be the Servant, the Holy One, the Righteous One, the peaceful One, the King, the Messiah, the Anointed One, The Lord our Righteousness. All those characteristics indicate that Jesus, as the Anointed one and standing at the right hand of God, acting as an arm of God and a judge, is still the Son of God and separate from God the Father. Jesus is depending on God – “In the strength of the Lord, In the majesty of the name of the Lord His God;” and God delights in Him, calls Him great, however, God the Father still requires worship as the creator of the world and our Father. Yahweh is Jesus’ God and he will feed his flock in the strength of his God. This all indicates that Jesus is separate to God and not the same essence.
What Jesus said about Himself when he was on earth?
“The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.” Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.” John 4: 25-26
Jesus also said that he is: “I am the bread of life” (John 6:35),
“I am the light of the world” (John 8:12)
“I am the door of the sheep” (John 10:7)
“I am the good shepherd” (John 10:11)
“I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25)
“I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6)
“I am the true vine” (John 15:1) ”
“Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:28
“If you loved Me, you would rejoice because I said, ‘I am going to the Father,’ for My Father is greater than I.” John 14: 28
“Do you say of Him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’? John 10: 36
“Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and came from God; nor have I come of Myself, but He sent Me.” John 8: 42
In those verses we see Jesus calling Himself the Son of God, the true vine, a good shepherd, Messiah, the bread of life, the light of the world… He never called Himself equal to God or Yahweh. Would Yahweh sent Himself and then speak of Himself in third form?
One verse that many people mistake as Jesus being God in the flesh and God Himself sending Himself to the earth to dwell with people:
“The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.” John 14: 10-11
This however is the same concept as Holy Spirit dwelling in people. Does that make someone God automatically? Just as Jesus and the Father are one, Jesus was praying that we would become one with God, just as He was:
“I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours. And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them. Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are one.” John 17: 9-11
Being one with God doesn’t automatically make you God Himself. It means being a holy vessel for God, where God can dwell. It means being set apart from the world, it means seeking the will of God and being in harmony with God. The fact that Jesus became Yahweh and the creator of the world is just misinterpretation based on the book of Hebrews, which was possibly written by the Apostle Paul. This was just Paul’s interpretation, however looking at the Old Testament or the words of Jesus, we do not see anything other than what they both described.
How about the others who walked with Jesus, what did they say about Jesus?
“She said to Him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that You are the Christ, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.” John 11: 27
“Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Matthew 16:16
Therefore, here we also see a clear distinction from God the Father and Jesus being the Christ, the Anointed one, the Messiah and King. Nowhere in the Gospels or the words of Jesus we see him clamming to be Yahweh. This is just misinterpretation of the Apostle Paul.
How did this idea develop into a belief?
The idea that Jesus is Yahweh was not introduced in a single moment, but it developed gradually over the first few centuries of Christianity through scripture, worship, and theological debate. The first major change happened with the translation of the word “Lord” – which in Greek is “Kyrios”, which also is used as a title for Yahweh in Greek translation. This would naturally confuse people at which point scripture was talking about the Lord God and at which point about the Lord Jesus.
In the 2nd and 3rd century, early Christian thinkers like Martyr and Origen tried to explain how Jesus could be divine while still affirming one God. They described Jesus as “the Word” – Logos and distinct from the Father. The major dispute broke out in the 4th century between Arius, who claimed that Jesus was created and not equal to God and Athanasius of Alexandria, who argued that Jesus is fully God, not created. Those disputes between two different views continued, until the Council of Nicea, who’s aim was to end all differences and disputes in Christianity.
The Council of Nicea rejected the idea that he was a created being and declared Jesus “of the same substance” (homoousios) as the Father. This is where the core belief that Jesus fully shares the identity of Yahweh became official doctrine. This again, similarly to the doctrine of Trinity and the doctrine of the original sin – started with an argument and was shaped by more convincing arguments and majority of votes. However, it is important to mention that this idea was not shared and agreed by everyone.
Another important factor is translation of John 1:1 – “and the Word was God”, which strongly suggests that Jesus is God that created the world. However, we have to compare this with the creation in the book of Genesis:
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.” Genesis 1:1
Therefore, God was with the Spirit of God – the Holy Spirit, at the beginning. Two beings. Then God said to the Holy Spirit, the feminine Spirit, who Jesus called “His true mother”:
“Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in His own image; in the image of God, He created him; male and female He created them.” Genesis 1:26 – 27
Therefore, God with the Spirit of God were together and God said: “Let Us make man in Our image”. Very clearly God created man in His own image but there is also a female, therefore this tells us that female was created in the image of the Holy Spirit.
“Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply;” Genesis 1: 28
This tells us that since we were created in God’s and the Holy Spirit likeness, God also would be fruitful and would multiply as we are created in the image of God. Therefore, each soul was first born through the Holy Spirit before coming to earth into the body. God being our Father and the Holy Spirit our Mother, just as Jesus said in the Gospel of the Beloved Companion:
“And Yeshua therefore answered them ‘Do not murmur amongst yourselves. No one can enter the Kingdom unless they are born of the spirit. You speak well when you say that my mother gave me birth but, only from the truth I tell you, it was my true mother who gave me life” (Gospel of the Beloved Companion 18:3)
“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” Genesis 2:24
This would suggest that Adam had a father and a mother that he was about to leave to join with his wife Eve. God was conversing with His wife, the Holy Spirit, our Mother. We also see the truth about the Mother in the book of Proverbs that speaks about Wisdom.
“My son, hear the instruction of your father,
And do not forsake the law of your mother;
For they will be a graceful ornament on your head,
And chains about your neck.” Proverbs 1: 8-9
Therefore, Jesus was a result of that union, the union of God and the Holy Spirit, our Mother. Jesus is the Son of God, however He did not create the Universe.
Yahweh is the one true God who created the world as it states in the book of Genesis, however Jesus was the result of “Let Us make man in Our image”. That is why Jesus called Himself one with God and said: “He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?”. Which essentially means Jesus and the Father are very alike. And the spirit of Jesus – the Anointed one, is the “Word” that dwelled with the flesh.
He was at the beginning in the body of Adam and reincarnated through many different lives to finish His journey in the body of Jesus. In the book of Isaiah chapter 53 we see: “of the travail of his soul he shall see to the full“, therefore the Servant or the Messiah will not fulfil all those expectations in one life. This will be a soul’s journey throughout many lives to finally arrive as perfected Messiah.
I am not taking away from the divinity of Jesus, however I am separating Jesus and God the Father as two separate beings and having two very different roles. The merging of Jesus into Yahweh is very dangerous, because it takes us away from the worship of the One true God. You just have to ask yourself those questions: if the words of God in the Old Testament do not present Jesus as Yahweh, if Jesus did not present Himself as such, if early Christianity did not worship Jesus as God the Father – why after a theological argument, this doctrine rose to power? Do I want to believe the words of God in the Old Testament or the words of a theologian who won the argument? Do you shape your understanding based on the existing belief and you try to fit in or do you understand those texts differently? Once you question and leave pre-conditioned beliefs, then the text becomes clearer.
By Dagmara Z.