1. Man-made doctrines confuse the meaning of monotheism

1. Man-made doctrines confuse the meaning of monotheism

 

People in the world have a desire to believe in God. They seek God in their own language. In English, they call him God, in China, Heavenly Emperor, in Islam, Allah, and in Jews, El. These names are common nouns. They think that the God they believe in is real. Even within Christianity, it is ambiguous whether the God each believe in is real or not.

In the past, during the Exodus, when the Israelites reached Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments from God, Moses did not come down for 40 days, so the people made a golden calf and worshiped it as God.

In this way, each person thinks of God as his own. Even the subjective expression of saying that one must meet God personally is an embodiment of God in oneself.

However, among the many names, there is only one God. All others are fake. That One revealed His name to a man named Moses. In Exodus 3:14, "And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you." In Hebrew, "I AM" is "Haya (Ehyeh) Asher Haya (Ehyeh)."

However, for some unknown reason, the Hebrews called the one and only God Adonai. After the fall of Israel, by order of Pharaoh Ptolemy II Philadelphus of Egypt, six men from each of the twelve tribes of Israel were selected and translated into Greek in Alexandria for 72 days. This is called the Septuagint. They wrote the name of the one and only God, whom they called Adonai, as YHWH and called it Kurius in Greek. In Latin, it is called Dominus. It is said that the diaspora living in Alexandria later added the vowels a and ai of adonai to YHWH, changing it to YHaWHai and calling it Yahweh. Later, during the translation process, the YHWH part was written in English as Jehovah (Jehovah: Jehovah in Korean). Today, the American New International Version translates Kyrios as The LORD, and both the Old and New Testaments use this translation, so that the expressions Adonai and Yahweh have disappeared. The King James Version translated in England also follows this. The Greek Kyrios is a translation of the Hebrew Adonai.

In the Bibles of other countries, unlike the English Bible, it is mixed as ‘Jehovah, Lord.’ Most countries’ translated Bibles translate the English Bible as ‘Jehovah’ and ‘The LORD,’ so this follows suit. Some countries translated the Old Testament as ‘Jehovah,’ and some translated it as ‘The LORD.’

People have changed the name of the one and only God to Haya Asher Haya, Adonai, Yahweh, Jehovah, The LORD, and the Lord, etc. to fit their language. Names are proper nouns, so they should not be changed. If people change even the name of the one and only God at will, how can we know if the God they believe in is the one and only God? Believers firmly believe that there is one God, but it may not be the case.

However, regarding the confused name of the one God, we can apply the words of Jesus. In John 8:58, “Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.” The Greek word for “I am” is “ego eimi.” The Hebrew word for this part is Haya Asher Haya (I am that I am). This means that the resurrected Jesus is the one God. The one who was born to die on the cross was not God, but the one who was born into the world as the Son of God. However, the resurrected Jesus is God.

In John 14:9-10, “Jesus said to him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.』

The fundamental core of the idea of ​​the Trinity is not God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, but God the Father, the resurrected Jesus Christ, and the saints in Christ become one through the Holy Spirit. Jesus in the Father, the resurrected Jesus, and Jesus in the saints are one. Therefore, the only God is the resurrected Jesus. Therefore, we pray in the name of Jesus, heal the sick, cast out demons, and baptize in the name of Jesus. Jesus is the only God, the word “I am who I am.” Therefore, the only God is God through the resurrected Jesus, and the saints become saints of faith through the resurrected Jesus. In the New Testament, this is commonly referred to as “in Christ.” Let’s put aside the name of the only God, which is called by various names, and seek only God through the resurrected Jesus.