Deification in the Bible

[enummaelish]

Hello FAIR Board. This post is designed as a response to Johnny from the thread on Psalm 89. As always, it would be nice to hear what others have to say. I

[dacook]

Well, I was just thinking of chiming in here with some good information on this topic from Chapter 17 of "The Disciple as Scholar..." (FARMS 2000 pg 471) entitled "Ye Are Gods: Psalm 82 and John 10 as Witnesses to the Divine Nature of Humankind", when I noticed who the author is. Since Dr. Peterson posts here often I'll just stand back and let him speak for himself on this topic if he wishes. It's an excellent chapter, with a lot of good information, including on the plurality of gods in the Old Testament. I would highly recommend it to our Catholic friends, especially.

Good summary, though, Enummaelish. I like your sig, too.

[Elihu]

Those scriptures are absolutely true.

There is only one God. We will be like God but not be a God, for there is only one God. Can you show me where it says man can become a God? Jesus said those worthy will be as the angels, but angels are clearly not Gods. Perhaps in a sense 'sons of God', but not Gods. What is your point? Can you show from the Scripture that God was a man before He became God? Can you show from the Scripture that God said we will become Gods? That we will have His Power?

Image and likeness is a similatude and not a state of equal being.

[1dc]

If the Bible teaches that humans become deified, in what way is LDS theology incongruent with Biblical theology?

IMO, Johnny seems to define only his interpretation as "biblical" and any which deviate from his seems to be considered non-bibilcal, even when supported by a different interpretation of scripture. While suggesting he believes in additional revelation, it seems that is only for teachings for which the answer is already established by tradition rather than the Bible itself. You may want to examine this premise first, before holding other candles out . . .

[LDS4EVER]

If the Bible teaches that humans become deified, in what way is LDS theology incongruent with Biblical theology?

IMO, Johnny seems to define only his interpretation as "biblical" and any which deviate from his seems to be considered non-bibilcal, even when supported by a different interpretation of scripture. While suggesting he believes in additional revelation, it seems that is only for teachings for which the answer is already established by tradition rather than the Bible itself. You may want to examine this premise first, before holding other candles out . . .

One must understand that Johnny doesn't give his interpretation of the bible but rather the Catholic interpretation of the bible. He's well indoctrinated.

[enummaelish]

IMO, Johnny seems to define only his interpretation as "biblical" and any which deviate from his seems to be considered non-bibilcal, even when supported by a different interpretation of scripture. While suggesting he believes in additional revelation, it seems that is only for teachings for which the answer is already established by tradition rather than the Bible itself. You may want to examine this premise first, before holding other candles out . . .

This is a very good point. In reality, Johnny

[Zakuska]

Contrary to popular Christian beleif (As I encounter on an other boards) the big bang theory does not support creation ex nihilo. In actuallity the big bang theory follows Mormon interpretation. God created everything from pre-existant chaotic matter. Known as the "Primal Atom".

http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/L/Lemaitre.html

It already existed.

[emaughan]

The new and improved theories also go against creation ex nihlo. Multidimensional membranes and string theory indicate that matter is far more complex then we imagined. This universe is a result in the motion of higher dimensions as two membranes collided.

To the ex nihiloist I would simply say don't panic yet - theories in science on the creation keep shifting - so just wait awhile and it will swing back your way.

[Zakuska]

Life, Don't talk to me about Life!

42

:thumb:

[BCSpace]

Life, Don't talk to me about Life!

42

:thumb:

"It committed suicide."

[Tanyan]

Hello FAIR Board. This post is designed as a response to Johnny from the thread on Psalm 89. As always, it would be nice to hear what others have to say. I

[johnny]

enummaelish  writes,

Johnny, your perspective on Biblical theology derives from later Jewish and Christian traditions directly influenced by Hellenization i.e. Greek philosophy mingled with scripture.

My perspective on Biblical theology derives from the teachings of the Catholic Church.

  Notice that the New Testament clearly presents the doctrine of apotheosis:

Notice the Catholic Doctrine clearly teaches:

http://www.vatican.va/archive/catechism/p122a3p1.htm#I

The Word became flesh to make us "partakers of the divine nature": [2 Pt 1:4] "For this is why the Word became man, and the Son of God became the Son of man: so that man, by entering into communion with the Word and thus receiving divine sonship, might become a son of God." [st. Irenaeus, Adv. haeres. 3, 19, 1: PG 7/1, 939] "For the Son of God became man so that we might become God." [st. Athanasius, De inc. 54, 3: PG 25, 192B] "The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods." [st. Thomas Aquinas, Opusc. 57, 1-4] (CCC460).

Today, all scholars of early Christian tradition recognize that the New Testament loudly proclaims the doctrine of deification. When you deny this fact, you deny Biblical theology:

I do not deny the doctrine of deification. What I deny is the Mormon teaching that a creature can become a creator like the Father.

This argument however does not derive from the Bible. The beginnings of the doctrine of creation ex nihilo serve as the underlying assumption in the Letter of Aristeas, a Hellenized Jewish text that dates sometime between the 3rd century BC to the 1st century A.D.

It derives from 2Macc 7:28)

http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/2maccabees/2maccabees7.htm

Sorry to disappoint, but even this Apocryphal verse does not teach the non-biblical doctrine of creation ex nihilo. It is quite clear to scholars who specialize in Second Temple Judaism that by paralleling the creation of the human race with the creation of heaven and earth, the author does not preach creation from nothing.

Sorry to disappoing you the Catholic Church does not derive it's teachings on bible only. Here is more on the teaching that God creates "out of nothing"

http://www.vatican.va/archive/catechism/p1s2c1p4.htm#IV

As you can see, the views endorsed by Hellenized Christianity are non-biblical, not consistent with the Bible, and I would submit irrational.

The Mormon view that a creature can be a creator like God is non-biblical, not consistent with the Bible, and I would submit irrational.

I find it irrational to assume that one would become like God and not continue his work and glory. If the Bible teaches that humans become deified, in what way is LDS theology incongruent with Biblical theology?

The Catholic Church clearly teaches that men will continue his work and glory. What the Catholic Church and the Bible does not teach is that we are the source of the work and glory.

LDS theology is inconsitent with Bible theology because it teaches that men can become a creator like the Father.

http://www.lds.org/library/display/0,4945,11-1-13-59,00.html

Men can partake of the divine nature but they do not become the origin and source of the divine nature.

[Del March]

Johnny,

isn't being a creator an inherent quality of being a god? So if we can become gods, doesn't that necessarily imply that we can also become creators? If not, how do you explain God's creating quality? Where does it come from, if it doesn't come from His being a god? Is He something more than a god? What is a god then, and why does God describe Himself as only a god if He is more than a god? Why use the same word to describe God and to describe what we can become, if those two things are in fact not the same thing?

Del

[urroner]

When is David Waltz going to come out with his book about deification?

HURRY UP DAVID!!!!!! I'm getting to be an old man, a really old man!!!!

[johnny]

Del March  writes,

isn't being a creator an inherent quality of being a god?

What do you mean by "being a creator"?

So if we can become gods, doesn't that necessarily imply that we can also become creators? 

The ultimate purpose of creation is that God "who is the creator of all things may at last become "all in all" (1 Cor 15:28)

If not, how do you explain God's creating quality? Where does it come from, if it doesn't come from His being a god? Is He something more than a god?

God's creating quality comes from the fact that he is God. God is the origin and source of creatioin. This quality comes from him being God. He is something more than a man, he is the creator of the creature called man.

What is a god then, and why does God describe Himself as only a god if He is more than a god? Why use the same word to describe God and to describe what we can become, if those two things are in fact not the same thing?

A "god" partakes of the divine nature". God is the divine nature and the origin of the divine nature. The same word is used because both have the divine nature but men can "partake" of this divine nature (2Pet 1:4) when they are born again. God is source of man's divine nature.

Don't be fooled by the word "god" ... Satan is called "god" of this world (2Cor 4:4).

[LDS4EVER]

The Mormon view that a creature can be a creator like God is non-biblical, not consistent with the Bible, and I would submit irrational.

You critizise our doctrine as being non-biblical and yet you say:

Sorry to disappoing you the Catholic Church does not derive it's teachings on bible only.

Yet another double standard.

[Rtifs]

The EO teaches deification. However, not in the same way as the Mormons. Remember that the Bible teaches us that we become adopted sons and daughters of God (don't remember the verse. It's in one of the epistles talking about baptism). Just as I can adopt a child and he/she will become mine, he will never be my biological child. The EO teaches that we will not share the divine essence (we will always be human, not His

[urroner]

Does it contradict the Bible or does it contradict your interpretaion of the Bible?

[Tanyan]

When is David Waltz going to come out with his book about deification?

HURRY UP DAVID!!!!!! I'm getting to be an old man, a really old man!!!!

Oh hush up and get in line, I was in line FIRST !!! .

[Zakuska]

Johnny,

The ultimate purpose of creation is that God "who is the creator of all things may at last become "all in all" (1 Cor 15:28)

So if God becomes "ALL" in me and God becomes "ALL" in you and God becomes "ALL" in eveybody else. What does that make All of us... but fully God?

[Rtifs]

Zakuska, are you suggesting that individual identities will cease in the next life?

[enummaelish]

It derives from 2Macc 7:28)

I am actually quite a fan of both I and II Maccabees, which is why I took the time and effort to correct your view. Please see the original post.

[TOmNossor]

The EO teaches deification.  However, not in the same way as the Mormons.  Remember that the Bible teaches us that we become adopted sons and daughters of God (don't remember the verse.  It's in one of the epistles talking about baptism).  Just as I can adopt a child and he/she will become mine, he will never be my biological child.

I wanted to comment on two things on your post.

The first is that I predict that going forward the statement,

[johnny]

enummaelish writes,

I am actually quite a fan of both I and II Maccabees, which is why I took the time and effort to correct your view. Please see the original post.

Let me correct your view. Please see the following teachings of the Catholic Church:

Nothing exists that does not owe its existence to God the Creator. The world began when God's word drew it out of nothingness; all existent beings, all of nature, and all human history are rooted in this primordial event, the very genesis by which the world was constituted and time begun. [Cf. St. Augustine, De Genesi adv. Man 1, 2, 4: PL 34, 175] (CCC338).

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." [Gen 1:1] Holy Scripture begins with these solemn words. The profession of faith takes them up when it confesses that God the Father almighty is "Creator of heaven and earth" (Apostles' Creed), "of all that is, seen and unseen" (Nicene Creed). (CCC279).

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth": [Gen 1:1] three things are affirmed in these first words of Scripture: the eternal God gave a beginning to all that exists outside of himself; he alone is Creator (the verb "create" - Hebrew bara - always has God for its subject). The totality of what exists (expressed by the formula "the heavens and the earth") depends on the One who gives it being. (CCC290).

"In the beginning was the Word... and the Word was God... all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made." [Jn 1:1-3] The New Testament reveals that God created everything by the eternal Word, his beloved Son. In him "all things were created, in heaven and on earth... all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together." [Col 1:16-17] The Church's faith likewise confesses the creative action of the Holy Spirit, the "giver of life", "the Creator Spirit" (Veni, Creator Spiritus) , the "source of every good". [Cf. Nicene Creed: DS 150; Hymn Veni, Creator Spiritus; Byzantine Troparion of Pentecost Vespers, "O heavenly King, Consoler"] (CCC291).

God is unique; there are no other gods besides him. [Cf. Is 44:6.] He transcends the world and history. He made heaven and earth. (CCC212).

The Old Testament suggests and the New Covenant reveals the creative action of the Son and the Spirit, [Cf. Pss 33 6; 104:30; Gen 1:2-3] inseparably one with that of the Father. This creative co-operation is clearly affirmed in the Church's rule of faith: "There exists but one God... he is the Father, God, the Creator, the author, the giver of order. He made all things by himself, that is, by his Word and by his Wisdom", "by the Son and the Spirit" who, so to speak, are "his hands". [st. Irenaeus, Adv. haeres. 2, 30, 9; 4, 20, I: PG 7/1, 822, 1032] Creation is the common work of the Holy Trinity. (CCC292).

God is infinitely greater than all his works: "You have set your glory above the heavens." [Ps 8:1; cf. Sir 43:28] Indeed, God's "greatness is unsearchable". [Ps 145:3] But because he is the free and sovereign Creator, the first cause of all that exists, God is present to his creatures' inmost being: "In him we live and move and have our being." [Acts 17:28] In the words of St. Augustine, God is "higher than my highest and more inward than my innermost self". [st. Augustine, Conf: 3, 6, 11: PL 32, 688] (CCC300).

"The eternal Father created the whole universe and chose to raise up men to share in his own divine life,"[LG 2] to which he calls all men in his Son. (CCC759).

[TOmNossor]

Zakuska, are you suggesting that individual identities will cease in the next life?

I would suggest that just as Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost, and the Father are one and individuals also; so PERHAPS may we be one and individuals