A History of the Christian Church 2nd Ed. 1985 Williston Walker

"AD 200. . Noetus had been expelled from the Smyrnaean church for teaching that Christ was the Father, and that the Father himself was born, and suffered, and died."

Man's Religions John B. Noss 1968

"The controversy first became heated when Apollinarius, a bishop in Syria . . . asserted that Christ could not have been perfect man united with complete God, for then there would not have been one Son of God, but two sons, one by nature and one by adoption, the first with a divine, the second with a human will. Such a thing seemed inconceivable, religiously abhorrent."

"Nestorius . . . preached a sermon against calling the virgin Mary "the mother of God" declaring she did not bear a deity, she bore a man,"

Numbers 23:19 states that God is not a man. God was not born, and God certainly did not die, but when people deviate from what the Bible teaches you can come up with the bizarre complexities of trinitarian religious mysteries that contradict logic, common sense and God's Word.

New Bible Dictionary 1982

"The word trinity is not found in the Bible . . ."

". . . it did not find a place formally in the theology of the church till the 4th century."

". . . it is not a biblical doctrine in the sense that any formation of it can be found in the Bible, . . ."

"Scripture does not give us a formulated doctrine of the trinity, . . ."

The HarperCollins Encyclopedia of Catholicism 1995

". . . scholars generally agree that there is no doctrine of the trinity as such in either the Old Testament or the New Testament."

If the trinity is the cornerstone of Christianity then how did the church of the first three centuries get along so well without it? If the trinity is the cornerstone of Christianity then why is it not mentioned in the Bible?

The Encyclopedia Americana 1956

"Christianity derived from Judaism and Judaism was strictly Unitarian (believing in one God). The road which led from Jerusalem to Nicea was scarcely a straight one. Fourth century trinitarianism did not reflect accurately early Christian teaching regarding the nature of God; it was, on the contrary, a deviation from this teaching."

The trinity is a deviation from believing in one God; it is a deviation from what the early church taught and it is a deviation from the scripture.

The New Catholic Encyclopedia 1967

"The formulation 'one God in three persons' was not solidly established, certainly not fully assimilated into Christian life and its profession of faith, prior to the end of the 4th century."

Who is Jesus? Anthony Buzzard

"The Old Testament is a strictly monotheistic. God is a single personal being. The idea that a trinity is to be found there or even in any way shadowed forth, is an assumption that has long held sway in theology, but is utterly without foundation."

The New Encyclopedia Britannica 1976

"Neither the word trinity, nor the explicit doctrine as such, appears in the New Testament, nor did Jesus and his followers intend to contradict the Shema in the Old Testament: 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord' (Deut. 6:4). . . The doctrine developed gradually over several centuries and through many controversies. . . . By the end of the 4th century . . . the doctrine of the trinity took substantially the form it has maintained ever since."

The Shema consists of three sections of scripture Deuteronomy 6:4-9, 11:13-21, and Numbers 15:37-41. It is called the Shema after the Hebrew word hear, the first word in Deut. 6:4. The Shema was to be recited twice daily once upon arising and once when going to bed. So the Old Testament Jews would start and finish their day with 'Hear O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord.'

The Complete Word Study Old Testament 1994

"To the Jew, (Deut. 6:4-9) this is the most important text in the Old Testament. Jesus himself called the injunction in 6:5 'the first and great commandment' Matt.22:36-38. . . Moses is teaching not only the priority of belief in one God, but also a means to preserve that belief. As time went on, the proper understanding of the Shema with its spiritual implications was no longer grasped by the people. This absence of saving knowledge became a factor in their spiritual downfall." short red formal dresses

Whenever God's people forget that there is only one God and they follow after other gods this will result in their downfall. This can be seen time and time again in the Old Testament where God's people forsook the Lord and then evil came upon them. God does not send this evil, but He warns us to stay away from the evil of worshipping more than one God.

Dictionary of The Bible 1995 John L. Mckenzie

"The trinity of God is defined by the church as the belief that in God are three persons who subsist in one nature. The belief as so defined was reached only in the 4th and 5th centuries AD and hence is not explicitly and formally a biblical belief."