Three God Trinity Monte - Step Right up To the Table, Folks!

[MineralMan]

Imma show you how the game works. See these three golden chalices? One's God, One's his Son, and the third is the Holy Ghost, ladies and gentlemen. Which one covers your salvation? You all are sinners and you know it. You there, Sir - you lust after your neighbor's daughter. And Ma'am - your gossip is false and harms others. Sinners, one and all! But, your forgiveness and salvation is under one of these three cups. Here, !'ll show you which one. See, there it is, glowing like the morning sunrise!

It's only $5 to play, folks! Put it on the table right over here, under the silver cross. Now, watch the cup that holds your salvation carefully, as I move the cups around. Keep your eyes on the prize, ladies and gentlemen! Don't watch my face! Watch the cups as I mix them up! When I stop, if you can point at the cup that holds forgiveness of your sinful nature, you get your $5 back, and I'll give you another $5 from my own pocket. It's the easiest thing in the world to find salvation, dontcha see?

You, sir, which cup holds your eternal soul? The one on the left? No, sir, it does not, as you can plainly see. You were not following the cups as I moved them. Do you care to try again? The stakes are high, but the prize is priceless. Thank you! And you, ma'am, will you try? You appear to be attentive and bright. Yes, just put your $5 there under the cross, and watch the cups carefully...

[WhiteTara]

1. The original trinity -- stolen by patriarchal agents

is Maiden, Mother, Crone. The stages of life for women. Again, Christianity stole myth, legend and truth from women and perverted it to their desires.

[MineralMan]

2. Indeed. Women are the givers of life.

Men are just accessories. They couldn't stand that, so they stole the roles...

[CrispyQ]

5. Love that term, patriarchal agents.

Man created God to control woman. They even co-opted the birth process & fashioned Eve from Adam's rib. I'd be ROFL except so many women have bought into this bullshit. 53% of white women voted for Trump & I'll bet a significant majority of them identify as Christian. It worked pretty good.

During Confirmation when I asked the pastor, "Where are all the women in religion?" he named all the women in the Bible. I said that didn't count. Where is woman in the holy trinity? Why is God always referred to a Father, He, & Son? If God has no gender, like you taught us, then why don't we have a special pronoun for God instead of using the masculine? He & the class got a good laugh at that & then he said it was just following the tradition of language & there was no hidden meaning to it. A few years later, about the time of Roe v. Wade, I concluded it was designed that way. The Big Three are all based on a male God, regardless of what they try to tell us.

On a side note, I have never heard of the Holy Spirit referred to in the feminine. ???

[WhiteTara]

9. "I have never heard of the Holy Spirit referred to in the feminine"

me either. When I asked pretty much your same question, I was told the Holy Spirit is gender neutral so that's how women fit in. I too had to explore more deeply. I am considered a raging feminist; simply because I believe that women are fully human.

[Tribalceltic]

13. Fully Agree

The outright theft of religion by Males bothers me to no end

(old white male here and disgusted by it)

[Voltaire2]

14. They both have three elements.

Other than that there does not appear to me to be much in the way of a direct connection.

[WhiteTara]

15. Excuse me?

Before the patriarchy, there was a matriarchy. Christianity is a conglomeration of many of the older (read Goddess) religions. The Mother was the exalted one; she is the life giver and has three phases in her life; that of the maiden who then becomes the mother who then becomes the wise crone.

In order to replace the original trinity, Christianity had to have three male figures, but could only come up with two, and instead of including father, mother and son; mother got cut out because they were extinguishing her place in the cosmos.

Perhaps a good book for you would be "When God Was A Woman" by Merlin Stone. It's a good primer.

[Voltaire2]

16. There were thousands of years between

matriarchal religions being dominant, if they ever were, and Christianity’s emergence. Even if one accepts the assertions of Stone’s thesis, the early Christians were basing their new religion on top of Judaism, not ancient matriarchal religions. Judaism at that time had at least 1000 years of patriarchal history.

The thesis of Stone’s book is not well supported by archeological evidence.

[Major Nikon]

18. Not only that there's no basis for the trinity in the canonical gospels

The only reference to it was a forgery added sometime after the 5th century which virtually all modern translations have removed.

The concept of the trinity was created out of the necessity to turn Jesus into a god after they realized all the messianic claims weren't going to stand up to scrutiny. The first Christians didn't even believe in it and some today still do not.

[Voltaire2]

20. Indeed. I was leaving that out to simplify things.

But the earliest Christians had no three faced god, it was just Yahweh re-mixed.

[qazplm135]

27. Christianity morphed

and much like Islam took bits and pieces from multiple religions that came before it.
At one point it became so unwieldy that they needed a Council to decide which bits stayed and which bits go.

So it lost reincarnation for example.

I'm not sure the idea that it said, hey let's blatantly still from the matriarchy for the Father, Son, Holy Ghost has much merit.
By the time that idea came into being, the concept of a matriarchy was far in the past, and there was no one left following it that they cared about so why would they feel a need to adapt it?

[DemoTex]

3. "The Gospel Singer" by Harry Crews

Gothic religious hucksterism at its best.

[MineralMan]

4. Elmer Gantry, too.

There have been so many, and there still are many more.

Some even convince themselves they are right.

[Pendrench]

6. Hi MineralMan - Thank you for starting this discussion.

As a believer, I do believe in God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit/Ghost.

I see the Father as the creator of all; the Son as God's physical manifestation on Earth, and the Spirit as God's remaining presence after Jesus died and returned to Heaven.

That being said...so what?

What good does it do if I say I believe this? Does this belief alone "save my soul" and earn myself a golden ticket into Heaven?

What good does it do if I say I believe in the Trinity but neglect the poor, the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, the imprisoned, the sick, and hate others that do not hold my same beliefs?

If I say that I believe in God (whether it's the Trinity, Yahweh, Allah, or Zeus) but do not care and show love/respect for my fellow humans (without exception), then I think that such belief is without merit and simply becomes another way of creating divisions.

Anyway, these are just my thoughts/opinions.

Thank you again - wishing you well and peace

Tim

[MineralMan]

7. Insofar as religion causes people to do as you suggest,

it is a benefit to society. Sadly, many religious groups do the exact opposite, encouraging bigotry and animosity toward some people. The problem for non-believers is in know which groups are which, frankly.

Personally, I believe that the problems begin when religious believers and groups think they're belief is superior to the beliefs of others and behave based on that in relating to others.

When that occurs, and it does occur on a frequent, regular basis, then I question the usefulness of religion to society. One needn't look far to see examples of religion being harmful to society.

As I say frequently here, I don't care what people believe regarding religion. It is their actions that concern me. If they behave well towards others, I have no argument with them. If not, however, I do have an argument to make with them. Unfortunately, I find many reasons to argue. Would it were not so.

[Pendrench]

8. Hi MineralMan -Thank you for taking the time to reply to my post.

I can only say that I agree with this 100%.

Again, wishing you well and peace

Tim

[AZ8theist]

10. You got it wrong, Mineral..

Three card Monte costs $20 bucks a try, not 5.....

[MineralMan]

11. Depends on where you are and who the grifter is, really.

[AZ8theist]

12. LOL!! for sure...

[NeoGreen]

17. Are you ready to try again?...

...
https://m.

[Major Nikon]

19. "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

Allegedly Jesus said this on the cross, which means He was asking why He had forsaken Himself.

[Bretton Garcia]

21. Three very different things, people,.in the Trinity.

Father, Son, Ghost. It's sort of like 1) War; 2) Peace; 3) Metaphors.

It's amazing you could convince anyone it was one unified, consistent entity.

A little like oil and water. Or three-way schizophrenia. A 3-way multiple personality disorder.

What's the name of that three-headed dog in hell?

[MineralMan]

32. Cerberus is the three-headed dog.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerberus

[edhopper]

22. I once asked for a explanation for the trinity

which i am still not clear about.

I was shown this:

[img][/img]

It did not clear anything up for me.

[MineralMan]

23. Yes, that drawing is used all the time.

It's not an explanation, really. Thing are or are not equivalent. It's really all gobbledygook. That's because the entire concept makes no logical sense in the first place, so neither does the explanation.

[edhopper]

24. The whole idea of God coming to earth as Jesus

makes no sense.

Why would an omniscient being need to have part of him, or a biological surrogate, or whatever Jesus is suppose to be, "experience" human life? Saying he was sent to die for our sins also doesn't make sense, since an omniscient being can feel all things at all times.
And if Jesus was part of God, why does he still exist in heaven? Why would you need to pray to a part of an omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient being?

As for the Holy Ghost...makes no sense at all.

[MineralMan]

25. Well, for me, the entire idea of supernatural entities makes no sense.

Explaining anything beyond that is a waste of time, it seems to me. It's interesting to see how religious people attempt to explain what does not exist, but that's all.

What they come up with is gobbledygook like that drawing. Then, someone will stand up in front of a group and try to explain that drawing, further scrambling logic.

The simple explanation is that God, and all the rest, is just a figment of the human imagination. That covers the entire mess.

[edhopper]

26. Shortest theology class

in history.

[Major Nikon]

30. It makes sense if you look at the need to deify Jesus

Christianity started out as just a Judism sect, but when the gentiles took over they needed to differentiate themselves from a religion that rejected gentiles.

From a biblical perspective it makes no sense. There's far more that suggests Jesus was not a god and nothing that defines him as one. Not even all Christians believe it.

[qazplm135]

28. I'm guessing it plays with a couple of pretty ancient concepts

1. Gods visiting Earth in lesser forms. Zeus as a stag, or what have you.
2. God being "in all of us." This isn't even just a Christian concept. Thus the idea being we are each a piece of God, Jesus was just a whole slice or something like that.
3. Gods copulating with humans. We see that in mythology all of the time. I suppose this time, it's the Holy Ghost that has the penis? I don't know. But in seriousness, I'm guessing we are supposed to view the third part of the trinity as "the power" of God to make anything happen.

summing it all up...God is the "being" sitting in heaven, Jesus is God in human form (like Zeus), and the holy spirit is basically the power of God.

It would be at home in any Marvel comic or whatnot. Obviously, none of it is real, but I think there are ties to past religions that make it a recognizable path on the lineage of mythological supreme beings.

[edhopper]

29. Except

supposedly Jesus still exists separate from God in Heaven and was not absorbed back into the Hive Mind.

It's more like when Marvel tries to explain some wacky science that was used to create their characters in the 40s and 60s.
You just have to roll with it.

[Bretton Garcia]

31. Yeah, it's pretty illogical.

Here's one kind of trinitarianism that goes against the other, and that really seems just as logically indefensible: 1) God is immortal. And 2) Jesus IS part of him, and the hive. 3) But Jesus dies.

So 4) part of an immortal being dies.

The concept of a trinity was apparently made up late, to try to elevate the status of Jesus and the New Testament, and Christianity, to the same or higher status than the Old Testament, Judaism, and God. But? It could only be done through crazy, snakelike and dishonest sophistries, apologetics, lies.

Many Christians know none of it holds up logically That's where faith comes in: just give up on logic, and go with it, blindly.

[qazplm135]

33. it's got some unique bits

but the concept of an entity splitting parts of itself off from itself, even permanently, isn't completely novel in mythology/story-telling.

[Bretton Garcia]

34. Likely the Trinity WAS borrowed from earlier myths

I'm.seriously looking into the possibility it was bases in part on Cerebrus; the three-headed dog that guarded over Hades and the dead. The dead being a very major concern in religion, Christianity.

[qazplm135]

36. I don't know I mean maybe who knows what they were thinking

but the number three as a holy number (or simply as a prime number that humans really really like....see e.g. the rule of three in a good argument or story) has been around forever.

I think it could be as simple as that, or there could be other, multiple influences. Christianity is such a hodge podge and it's one of the last major religions so it had a ton of stuff to "sample" from.

[Bretton Garcia]

37. True enough. Just before Jesus, was Caesar's Triumvirate

Which didn't work out too well, by the way.

[The Genealogist]

35. "God is like a shamrock...small, green and split three ways"

This according to Eric Idle's character Brian in "Nuns on the Run," in describing the Trinity.

His partner in crime had tried to explain the trinity to him, as Brian didn't know how it worked. His partner used the analogy of a shamrock, with its three leaves on one stem, to illustrate that the Trinity is one with three aspects.

[Bretton Garcia]

38. But some Catholics say Jesus IS God.

That kind of Trinitarianism would seem to require Jesus to know everything that God did. Though the Bible doesn't quite support that: in the end, Jesus has to ask God why God has abandoned him.

The only conclusion is that. .. Jesus wasn't quite God.

[NeoGreen]

39. 3 is a magic number...

... https://m.

[Bretton Garcia]

40. Three witches loved " the power of three"

In the TV series " Charmed," with Rose McGowen

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_of_Three_(Charmed)