Okay, I gave you 6 things I would like to cover, but we’ll start one at a time, beginning with the last.
I spent a decade of my life as a Mormon, now before you dismiss this in whole cloth, I’m getting to a point here. They love to use James 1:5 as a starting point when they are proselytizing, but I had grown up in another faith and knew this verse well and had used it many times when trying to discern scriptural matters.
But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask from God, who gives to all freely and with no reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, doubting nothing. For the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, being driven by wind and being tossed; for do not let that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-souled man, not dependable in all his ways. But let the lowly brother rejoice in his lifting up;
(James 1:5-9 LITV(see footnote))
I was a fully, devout, believer in Almighty God, I read the scriptures daily in prayerful study to understand the meaning of what I was reading. I am not skilled in the original languages of the Bible, so I relied on aids; namely Strongs Lexicon of Biblical Languages. This helped to understand the original context of the words used, how they were used, and what those words may have meant.
Flash to my conversion to the LDS faith, they described the feeling you get when you are filled with the Holy Spirit as “a burning in your bosom”. This could also be described as the gut feeling when you know something is true. In fact, your goal as you read the Book of Mormon is to get this feeling so you know it is true. Okay, this isn’t the BoM we’re talking about, it’s the Bible, you might say. I’m getting there.
Before you go all Not a True Christian on me, remember the No True Scotsman fallacy.
When you pray for wisdom and meet the conditions set forth in the first chapter of James, you should have your eyes opened to the revealed truths in the scriptures. Before you go “not a true Christian on me, remember the no true Scotsman fallacy. God could have shown me his truth at any time here. Then I began to read the writings of Paul. I came across the only scripture in the Bible to FULLY support the Trinity in 2 Corinthians 13, hold your arguments until the end. (It should be noted, I was no longer a Mormon at this point.)
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
(2 Corinthians 13:14 LITV)
This is the only text in the ENTIRE Bible to mention them at once. This got me to thinking, which came first, Paul or the Gospels. Turns out, that Paul’s writings predate the Gospels by a few years:
- Second Corinthians – 57 CE
- Luke – 63 CE
- Mark – 66 CE
- Matthew – 67 CE
- John – c. 85 CE
By the time the Gospels were written, Paul’s preaching had already shaped and molded Christian thought and influenced beliefs. Now, why is this important? Well, here we go with that.
And coming up Jesus talked with them, saying, All authority in Heaven and on earth was given to Me. Then having gone, disciple all nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
(Matthew 28:18-19 LITV)
I know, I know, you are going to ask about Matthew 28:18-19. This is the where the Dan Brown claim comes in, which is based on the following:
“The baptismal formula was changed from the name of Jesus Christ to the words Father, Son, and Holy Spirit by the Catholic Church in the second century.”
The Catholic Encyclopedia II (Page 263)
“Everywhere in the oldest sources it states that baptism took place in the name of Jesus Christ.”- “The baptismal formula was changed from the name of Jesus Christ to the words Father, Son, & Holy Ghost by the Catholic Church in the second century.”
Britannica Encyclopedia 11th Edition, Vol 3 (Page 82, and Pages 365-366)
“The early church always baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus until development of the Trinity doctrine in the 2nd century.”
Canney Encyclopedia of Religion (Page 53)
This makes the original text to read:
And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in my name.”
Hypothetical true rendering of Matthew 28:18&19
And there you go, God’s word, passed down for thousands of years, contains the root of it being fully true and accurate. This was only the first spark that lead me to see that the Bible is not a true representation of God’s word, so where did the conflagration go from there? If you want me to cover the other five points, that will be uncovered.
What was actually posted in the discussion:
Okay, here’s the short take: Prayerful study of the scriptures, James 1:5-9 as my lamp post. Discovered a passage in Second Corinthians dealing the Trinity, got me to thinking about that whole idea and its appearance in S/Paul’s writings, his writings being the first to appear, historically. Jump to Matthew 28:18-19 (The Great Commission), research on Trinity and the rite of Baptism leads to several startling conclusions about that verse being altered by scribes to fit the Trinitarian idea (Nope, not Dan Brown hogwash, citations in Encyclopedias). Then BOOM we’re off looking at what else was corrupted over the centuries. This led to other startling discoveries about pre-Abrahamic myths and how they were adapted to be included in the books of “Moses,” ergo the foundational texts are shoddy copypasta.
Back to James 1:5 and the Radish Burp. I was always taught that this verse would help me to understand this whole of God’s word. I would be guided by the unseen hand and voice of the Holy Ghost/Spirit when I needed it to understand what I was reading. I would KNOW the Bible was true, with that help. I didn’t get a blessed thing. And the more I dug, extra-Theologica, the more I saw the Bible is nothing better than Aesop’s Fables or Grimm’s Fairy Tales. It had merit, but like those other two collections of stories, fictional in the whole cloth. If the Bible wasn’t true, then my whole faith was a lie and I was deceived by others and myself.
BUUUURP…my conviction passed out of me. Sure, the Bible is a good record of one group of Middle Eastern tribes’ oral history, moral codes, and hopes for the future, a cool cat doing all sorts of things for others and preaching love for others and his god (no matter how much of that stuff is mere fabrication mixed with a sliver of the real deal). But as far a the Word of YHWH, nope, can’t see that.
For the innocent reader, if you would like to join some good discussions about religion, come check out Let’s Talk Religion, the official Discord server of The Atheist Round Table. You can see this discussion here.
FOOTNOTE
LITV Green’s Literal Translation, is a translation of the Bible by Jay P. Green, Sr., first published in 1985. The LITV takes a literal, formal equivalence approach to translation. The Masoretic Text is used as the Hebrew basis for the Old Testament, and the Textus Receptus is used as the Greek basis for the New Testament.
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