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IX. There Is Only One True God: “The Trinity” Is a Misnomer
1. It was only after the truth of Jesus become flesh came to be that man realized this: It is not only the Father in heaven, but also the Son, and even the Spirit. This is the conventional notion man holds, that there is a God such as this in heaven: a Trinity that is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, all in one. All mankind has these notions: God is one God, but comprises three parts, what all those grievously entrenched in conventional notions deem to be the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Only those three parts made one is all of God.
Without the Holy Father, God would not be whole. Similarly, neither would God be whole without the Son or the Holy Spirit. In their notions, they believe that neither the Father alone nor the Son alone can be deemed God. Only the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit together can be deemed God Himself. Now, all religious believers, including each and every follower among you, hold this belief. Yet, as for whether this belief is correct, none can explain, for you are always in a fog of confusion about the matters of God Himself. Though these are notions, you do not know whether they are right or wrong, for you have become too grievously infected by religious notions. You have accepted too deeply these conventional notions of religion, and this poison has seeped too deep within you. Therefore, so too in this matter have you succumbed to this pernicious influence, for the Trinity simply does not exist. That is, the Trinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit simply does not exist. These are all conventional notions of man, and the fallacious beliefs of man. Throughout many centuries, man has believed in this Trinity, conjured up by notions in the mind of man, fabricated by man, and never before seen by man. Throughout these many years, there have been many spiritual greats who have explained the “true meaning” of the Trinity, but such explanations of the Trinity as three distinct consubstantial persons have been vague and unclear, and all are befuddled by the “construct” of God. No great man has ever been able to offer a thorough explanation; most explanations pass muster in terms of reasoning and on paper, but not a single man has a fully clear understanding of its meaning. This is because this great Trinity man holds in the heart simply does not exist.
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
2. Let Me tell you that, in truth, the Trinity does not exist anywhere in this universe. God has no Father and no Son, much less is there the concept of an instrument jointly used by the Father and the Son: the Holy Spirit. All of this is the greatest fallacy and simply does not exist in this world! Yet even such a fallacy has its origin and is not entirely without basis, for your minds are not so simple, and your thoughts are not without reason. Rather, they are quite appropriate and ingenious, so much so that they are impregnable even to any Satan. The pity is that these thoughts are all fallacies and simply do not exist! You have not seen the real truth at all; you are merely making conjectures and conceptions, then fabricating it all into a story to deceitfully gain others’ trust and to gain dominance over those most foolish of men without wit or reason, so that they believe in your great and renowned “expert teachings.” Is this truth? Is this the way of life that man should receive? It is all nonsense! Not a single word is appropriate! Throughout these many years, God has been split by you in this way, being split finer and finer with each generation, to the extent that one God has been openly split into three Gods. And now it is simply impossible for man to rejoin God as one, for you have split Him up too finely! If not for My prompt work before it was too late, it is hard to say how long you would have brazenly continued this way! To continue splitting God in this way, how can He still be your God? Would you still recognize God? Would you still return to Him? If I had arrived any later, it is likely that you would have sent the “Father and Son,” Jehovah and Jesus back to Israel and claimed that you yourselves are a part of God. Fortunately, it is now the last days. Finally, this day I have long awaited has come, and only after I carried out this stage of work by My own hand has your splitting of God Himself been halted. If not for this, you would have escalated, even placing all the Satans among you onto altars for worship. This is your artifice! Your means of splitting God! Will you continue to do so now? Let Me ask you: How many Gods are there? Which God will bring you salvation? Is it the first God, the second, or the third that you always pray to? Which of Them do you always believe in? Is it the Father? Or the Son? Or is it the Spirit? Tell Me who it is that you believe in. Though with every word you say you believe in God, what you actually believe is your own brain! You simply do not have God in your heart! And yet in your minds are a number of such “Trinities”! Do you not agree?
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
3. If the three stages of work are assessed in accordance with this concept of the Trinity, then there must be three Gods as the work carried out by each is not the same. If any among you says that the Trinity indeed exists, then explain what exactly is this one God in three persons. What is the Holy Father? What is the Son? What is the Holy Spirit? Is Jehovah the Holy Father? Is Jesus the Son? Then what of the Holy Spirit? Is not the Father a Spirit? Is not the substance of the Son also a Spirit? Was not the work of Jesus the work of the Holy Spirit? Was not the work of Jehovah at the time carried out by a Spirit the same as Jesus’? How many Spirits can God have? According to your explanation, the three persons of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are one; if so, there are three Spirits, but to have three Spirits means there are three Gods. This means that there is no one true God; how can this kind of God still have the inherent substance of God? If you accept that there is only one God, then how can He have a son and be a father? Are these not all simply your notions? There is only one God, only one person in this God, and only one Spirit of God, much as it is written down in the Bible that “There is only one Holy Spirit and only one God.” Regardless of whether the Father and the Son of which you speak exist, there is only one God after all, and the substance of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit you believe in is the substance of the Holy Spirit. In other words, God is a Spirit, but He is able to become flesh and live among men, as well as to be above all things. His Spirit is all-inclusive and omnipresent. He can simultaneously be in the flesh and throughout the universe. Since all people say that God is the only one true God, then there is a single God, divisible at will by none! God is only one Spirit, and only one person; and that is the Spirit of God. If it is as you say, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, then are They not three Gods? The Holy Spirit is one matter, the Son another, and the Father yet another. They are distinct persons of different substances, so how then can They each be part of a single God? The Holy Spirit is a Spirit; this is easy for man to understand. If so, then the Father is even more so a Spirit. He has never descended onto earth and has never become flesh; He is Jehovah God in the heart of man, and He is certainly a Spirit as well. Then what is the relationship between Him and the Holy Spirit? Is it the relationship between Father and Son? Or is it the relationship between the Holy Spirit and the Spirit of the Father? Is the substance of each Spirit the same? Or is the Holy Spirit an instrument of the Father? How can this be explained? And then what is the relationship between the Son and the Holy Spirit? Is it a relationship between two Spirits or the relationship between a man and a Spirit? These are all matters that can have no explanation! If They are all one Spirit, then there can be no talk of three persons, for They are possessed of a single Spirit. If They were distinct persons, then Their Spirits would vary in strength, and simply They could not be one single Spirit.
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
4. This may call to mind for most people the words of God from Genesis: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” Given that God says let “us” make man in “our” image, then “us” indicates two or more; since He stated “us,” then there is not just one God. In this way, man began to think in the abstract of distinct persons, and from these words arose the idea of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. What then is the Father like? What is the Son like? And what is the Holy Spirit like? Could it possibly be that the mankind of today was made in the image of one joined together from three? Then is the image of man like that of the Father, the Son, or the Holy Spirit? Which of the persons of God is man in the image of? This idea of man’s is simply incorrect and nonsensical! It can only split one God into several Gods. At the time that Moses wrote Genesis, it was after mankind was created following the creation of the world. In the very beginning, when the world began, Moses did not exist. And it was not until much later that Moses wrote the Bible, so how could he have possibly known what it was that God in heaven spoke? He had not an inkling of how God created the world. In the Old Testament of the Bible, there is no mention of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, only of the one true God, Jehovah, carrying out His work in Israel. He is called by different names as the age changes, but this cannot prove that each name refers to a different person. If this were so, then would there not be innumerable persons in God? What is written in the Old Testament is the work of Jehovah, a stage of work of God Himself for commencement in the Age of Law. It was the work of God, where as He spoke, it was, and as He commanded, it stood. At no time did Jehovah say that He was the Father come to carry out work, or did He ever prophesy the Son coming to redeem mankind. When it came to the time of Jesus, it was only said that God had become flesh to redeem all mankind, not that it was the Son who had come. Because the ages are not alike and the work that God Himself does also differs, He needs to carry out His work within different realms. In this way, the identity He represents also differs. … What man first saw was the Holy Spirit descending like a dove upon Jesus; it was not the Spirit exclusive to Jesus, but rather the Holy Spirit. Then can the Spirit of Jesus be separated from the Holy Spirit? If Jesus is Jesus, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit, then how could They be one? The work could not be carried out if so. The Spirit within Jesus, the Spirit in heaven, and the Spirit of Jehovah are all one. It can be called the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, the sevenfold intensified Spirit, and the all-inclusive Spirit. The Spirit of God alone can carry out much work. He is able to create the world and destroy it by flooding the earth; He can redeem all mankind, and moreover, conquer and destroy all mankind. This work is all carried out by God Himself and cannot have been done by any other of the persons of God in His stead. His Spirit can be called by the name of Jehovah and Jesus, as well as the Almighty. He is the Lord, and Christ. He can also become the Son of man. He is in the heavens and also on the earth; He is on high above the universes and among the multitude. He is the only Master of the heavens and earth! From the time of creation until now, this work has been carried out by the Spirit of God Himself. Be it the work in the heavens or in the flesh, all is carried out by His own Spirit. All creatures, whether in heaven or on earth, are in the palm of His almighty hand; all of this is the work of God Himself and can be done by no other in His stead. In the heavens, He is the Spirit but also God Himself; among men, He is flesh but remains God Himself. Though He may be called by hundreds of thousands of names, He is still Himself, and all the work[a] is the direct expression of His Spirit. The redemption of all mankind through His crucifixion was the direct work of His Spirit, and so too is the proclamation unto all nations and all lands during the last days. At all times, God can only be called the almighty and one true God, the all-inclusive God Himself. The distinct persons do not exist, much less this idea of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit! There is only one God in heaven and on earth!
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
5. Man believes that Jehovah is the Father of Jesus, but this was actually not acknowledged by Jesus, who said: “We were never distinguished as Father and Son; I and the Father in heaven are one. The Father is in Me and I am in the Father; when man sees the Son, they are seeing the heavenly Father.” When all has been said, be it the Father or the Son, They are one Spirit, not divided into separate persons. Once man attempts to explain, matters are complicated with the idea of distinct persons, as well as the relationship between Father, Son, and Spirit. When man speaks of separate persons, does this not materialize God? Man even ranks the persons as first, second, and third; these are all but the conceptions of man, not worthy of reference, and utterly unrealistic!
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
6. Still some may say: The Father is the Father; the Son is the Son; the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit, and in the end, They will be made one. Then how should you make Them one? How can the Father and the Holy Spirit be made one? If They were inherently two, then no matter how They are joined together, would They not remain two parts? When you say making Them one, isn’t that simply joining two separate parts to make one whole? But were They not two parts before being made whole? Each Spirit has a distinct substance, and two Spirits cannot be made into a single one. The Spirit is not a material object and is unlike anything else in the material world. As men see it, the Father is one Spirit, the Son another, and the Holy Spirit yet another, then the three Spirits mix like three glasses of water into one whole. Is not that then the three made one? This is an erroneous explanation! Is this not splitting up God? How can the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit all be made one? Are They not three parts each of different natures? There are still those who say, did not God expressly state that Jesus was His beloved Son? “Jesus is the beloved Son of God, in whom He is well pleased” was certainly spoken by God Himself. That was God bearing witness to Himself, but merely from a different perspective, that of the Spirit in heaven bearing witness to His own incarnation. Jesus is His incarnation, not His Son in heaven. Do you understand? Do not the words of Jesus, “The Father is in Me and I am in the Father,” indicate that They are one Spirit? And is it not because of the incarnation that They were separated between heaven and earth? In reality, They are still one; no matter what, it is simply God bearing witness to Himself.
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
7. This concept of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is most absurd! This segments God and splits Him into three persons, each with a status and Spirit; how then can He still be one Spirit and one God? Tell Me, were the heavens and earth, and all things within it created by the Father, the Son, or the Holy Spirit? Some say that They created it all together. Then who redeemed mankind? Was it the Holy Spirit, the Son, or the Father? Some say it was the Son who redeemed mankind. Then who is the Son in substance? Is He not the incarnation of the Spirit of God? The incarnation calls God in heaven by the name of Father from the perspective of a created man. Are you not aware that Jesus was born from the conception through the Holy Spirit? Within Him is the Holy Spirit; whatever you say, He is still one with God in heaven, for He is the incarnation of the Spirit of God. This idea of the Son simply is untrue. It is one Spirit who carries out all of the work; only God Himself, that is, the Spirit of God carries out His work. Who is the Spirit of God? Is it not the Holy Spirit? Is it not the Holy Spirit who works in Jesus? If the work had not been carried out by the Holy Spirit (that is, the Spirit of God), then could His work represent God Himself? When Jesus called God in heaven by the name of Father as He prayed, this was done only from the perspective of a created man, only because the Spirit of God had clothed Himself as an ordinary and normal man and had the exterior cover of a created being. Even if within Him was the Spirit of God, His exterior appearance was still that of an ordinary man; in other words, He had become the “Son of man” of which all men, including Jesus Himself, spoke. Given that He is called the Son of man, He is a person (whether man or woman, in any case one with the exterior shell of a human being) born into a normal family of ordinary people. Therefore, Jesus calling God in heaven by the name of Father was the same as how you at first called Him Father; He did so from the perspective of a man of creation. Do you still remember the Lord’s Prayer that Jesus taught you to memorize? “Our Father in heaven….” He asked all man to call God in heaven by the name of Father. And since He too called Him Father, He did so from the perspective of one who stands on an equal footing with you all. Since you called God in heaven by the name of Father, this shows that Jesus saw Himself to be on equal footing with you, and as a man on earth chosen by God (that is, the Son of God). If you call God “Father,” is this not because you are a created being? However great the authority of Jesus on earth, prior to the crucifixion, He was merely a Son of man, governed by the Holy Spirit (that is, God), and one of the earth’s created beings, for He had yet to complete His work. Therefore, His calling God in heaven Father was solely His humility and obedience. His addressing God (that is, the Spirit in heaven) in such a manner, however, does not prove that He is the Son of the Spirit of God in heaven. Rather, it is simply that His perspective is different, not that He is a different person. The existence of distinct persons is a fallacy! Prior to His crucifixion, Jesus was a Son of man bound by the limitations of the flesh, and He did not fully possess the authority of the Spirit. That is why He could only seek the will of God the Father from the perspective of a created being. It is as He thrice prayed in Gethsemane: “Not as I will, but as you will.” Before He was laid on the cross, He was but the King of the Jews; He was Christ, the Son of man, and not a body of glory. That is why, from the standpoint of a created being, He called God Father. Now, you cannot say that all who call God Father are the Son. If this were so, then would you not have all become the Son once Jesus taught you the Lord’s Prayer? If you are still not convinced, then tell Me, who is the one that you call Father? If you are referring to Jesus, then who is the Father of Jesus to you? After Jesus went away, this idea of the Father and the Son was no longer. This idea was only appropriate for the years when Jesus became flesh; under all other circumstances, the relationship is one between the Lord of creation and a created being when you call God Father. There is no time at which this idea of the Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit can stand; it is a fallacy rarely seen through the ages and does not exist!
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
8. In the first stage of work carried out by Jehovah, He neither became flesh nor appeared to man. So man never saw His appearance. No matter how great and how tall He was, He was still the Spirit, God Himself who first created man. That is, He was the Spirit of God. When He spoke to man from among the clouds, He was merely a Spirit. None witnessed His appearance; only in the Age of Grace when the Spirit of God came into the flesh and was incarnated in Judea did man see for the first time the image of the incarnation as a Jew. The feeling of Jehovah could not be sensed. However, He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, that is, conceived by the Spirit of Jehovah Himself, and Jesus was still born as the embodiment of the Spirit of God.
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
9. When He came to carry out the first stage of work, He could only be called Jehovah, shepherd of the Israelites. In the second stage, the incarnate God could only be called Lord, and Christ. But at that time, the Spirit in heaven stated only that He was the beloved Son of God, and made no mention of His being the only Son of God. This simply did not happen. How could God have an only child? Then would God not have become man? Because He was the incarnation, He was called the beloved Son of God, and, from this, came the relationship between Father and Son. It was simply because of the separation between heaven and earth. Jesus prayed from the perspective of the flesh. Since He had put on a flesh of such normal humanity, it is from the perspective of the flesh that He said: My outer shell is that of a created being. Since I put on a flesh to come to this earth, I am now a long, long way from heaven. For this reason, He could only pray to God the Father from the perspective of the flesh. This was His duty, and that which the incarnate Spirit of God should be furnished with. It cannot be said that He is not God simply because He prays to the Father from the perspective of the flesh. Though He is called the beloved Son of God, He is still God Himself, for He is but the incarnation of the Spirit, and His substance is still the Spirit.
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
10. God is the One who rules over all things, and who administers all things. He created all that there is, He administers all that there is, and He also rules over all that there is and provides to all that there is. This is the status of God, and the identity of God. For all things and all that there is, God’s true identity is the Creator, and the Ruler of all things. Such is the identity possessed by God, and He is unique among all things. … for there is only one among all things who is possessed of this identity, power, authority, and the ability to rule over all things: our unique God Himself. He lives and moves among all things; He can rise to the highest place, above all things; He can humble Himself by becoming a man, becoming one among those who are of flesh and blood, coming face-to-face with people and sharing weal and woe with them; at the same time, He commands all that there is, and decides the fate of all that there is, and what direction it moves in; moreover, He guides the fate of all mankind, and the direction of mankind. A God such as this should be worshiped, obeyed, and known by all living beings. And so, regardless of which group and type among mankind you belong to, believing in God, following God, revering God, accepting God’s rule, and accepting God’s arrangements for your fate is the only choice, and the necessary choice, for any person, for any living being. In God’s uniqueness, people see that His authority, His righteous disposition, His substance, and the means by which He provides to all things are all unique; His uniqueness determines the true identity of God Himself, and it determines His status.
from “God Himself, the Unique X” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
11. There are many contradictions in the explanations of man. Indeed, these are all the notions of man; without further scrutiny, you would all believe they are correct. Do you not know that this idea of God as a Trinity is but the notion of man? No knowledge of man is full and thorough. There are always impurities, and man has too many ideas; this demonstrates that a created being simply cannot explain the work of God. There is too much in the mind of man, all coming from logic and thought, that conflicts with the truth. Can your logic thoroughly dissect the work of God? Can you gain an insight into all the work of Jehovah? Is it you as a man who can see through it all, or is it God Himself who is able to see from everlasting to everlasting? Is it you who can see from everlasting long ago to the everlasting to come, or is it God who can do so? What do you say? How are you worthy to explain God? On what basis is your explanation? Are you God? The heavens and earth, and all things in it were created by God Himself. It was not you who did this, so why are you giving incorrect explanations? Now, do you continue to believe in the Trinity? Do you not think it is too burdensome this way? It would be best for you to believe in one God, not in three. It is best to be light, for “the burden of the Lord is light.”
from “Does the Trinity Exist?” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
Footnotes:
a. The original text omits “the work.”
from The Word Appears in the Flesh
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