Sunday, October 21, 2018

Philo of Alexandria and the Logos


(Excerpted from “Godhead Theology” by Bishop Jerry Hayes)

Plato (fourth century B.C.) taught that God the first principle was, Himself, too holy to personally come into contact with a universe of matter, so He brought into existence, as His first creation, god the second principle, whom Plato called the logos (translated in our English Bibles as “word”). God the first principle delegated creation of the physical universe to the logos (god the second principle). Once the universe was created by the logos, according to Plato, both god the first principle and god the second principle (logos) brought into existence a third entity whom Plato called the world spirit. 
This concept of the godhead was current in the pagan world in which Christ's church found itself. Contemporaneous to Christ was one Philo of Alexandria, Egypt: a Platonic Jewish philosopher. This Philo saw the Jewish Messiah pre-shadowed in Plato’s logos concept of god the second principle. It must be pointed out that Philo was a non-Christian, who had a profound effect upon later generations of Christians, who would become apostate from Biblical-Christology. 
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The fact that Christianity was a new religion seemed to be impeding its progress; Christian apologists overcame this difficulty by showing that Christianity had common ground with Judaism and philosophy. In this task one cannot underestimate the influence of one Philo of Alexandria, Egypt. 
Philo, a contemporary of Christ and the apostles, was a Jewish philosopher of Alexandria who was a student of Plato and the Stoics. Greek philosophy had worked on the concept of God for several hundred years, and had transformed the ancient superstitions of half-animal and half-human gods to an homogenized form of ‘principles’ and ‘energies.’ It was theorized that there is only one God who is God in Himself (in this, it is suggested by Philo that the Greeks were influenced by Moses: i.e. the Shema, Deut 6:4), who could not touch or be touched by a created universe. This transcendent deity must, then, communicate through an intermediary that was called the logos. Philo … saw in the Greek logos the promised Hebrew Messiah. (The link between Plato's teachings and the Trinity as adopted by the Roman Catholic Church is so strong that Edward Gibbon, centuries later in his masterwork The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, referred to Plato as “the Athenian sage, who had thus marvelously anticipated one of the most surprising discoveries of the Christian revelation—the Trinity.”) 
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Philo was a Jew, not a Christian; but a disciple of his by the name of Justin (called by Christians, Justin Martyr) embraced the thought of Philo concerning the logos and the Christ. Justin and other Christian apologists began to promote this logos-christology, of Philo and the Greeks, in their Christian circles. (Justin was a Platonic philosopher before he became a Christian and continued to wear his philosopher’s cloak as he preached his version of the Gospel. He saw Christianity as being the fruition of all true philosophies.) The doctrine of logos-christology is basically this: 
God Himself is too holy and pure to become involved in the created world of matter: so a secondary entity was brought into being and called the logos, who created all things in behalf of God the first principle; this logos was called the second principle. This “second god” (as Justin called Him) came to earth and was born of the virgin Mary and died for the sins of the world. 

The Alexandrian school was Platonic; from this theology of Mind, Word, and Spirit came a disciple of Plato’s by the name of Philo. Philo was a Jew of Alexandria who was a world-class philosopher in his own right. He live from 20 BC to A.D. 54— which means he was a contemporary to Jesus. Philo’s faith in God came from his Jewish faith, but his concept of God came from the philosophical speculations of Alexandria. The influence of Platonism and the Stoics on Philo cannot be overstated. In the Mind – Word – Spirit system of Plato, Philo conceived of the ‘Mind’ as the Hebrew God Yahweh; in Plato’s ‘Word’ Philo finds an identity with the Jewish Messiah; He (at times) called the Logos a separate person from God; the mediator between God and man (Encyclopedia Americana, volume 21, page 766 the 767; International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. V, page 3021).
According to Emil Schurer (1844-1910 German theologian, best known for his study in Jewish customs in the time of Christ.),  Philo “agrees in the most essential points with the great teachers of the Greeks. Nay, Philo has so profoundly absorbed their doctrines and so peculiarly worked them up into a new whole, as himself to belong to the series of Greek philosophers. His system may, on the whole, be entitled an eclectic one: Platonic, Stoic, and Neo-Pythagorean doctrines being the most prominent. Just in proportion as now one now the other was embraced, has he been designated at one time Platonist, at another a Pythagorean. He might just as correctly be called a Stoic, for the influence of Stoicism was at least as strong upon him as that of Platonism or Neo-Pythagoreanism” (History of the Jewish People In the Time Of Christ, Schurer, Hendrickson Publishers, Vol III, page 364). 
Where Plato and the Stoics left off, Philo picked up. Plato took the crude, base gods of the heathen, stripped them of their trappings of superstitions, and dressed them up in much scientific rhetoric. Then enter Philo with his fantastic fantasy; he set forth his far-fetched (fetched from afar – Babylon) idea of Hebraizing Plato!?! Or, was he Hellenizing the Prophets? 

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Philo saw himself as having a dual mission. To make the Jew Greek and the Greek Jew. Through the means of his ‘allegorical interpretation’ of the Pentateuch he was able to see, there, all the things taught by Greek philosophy which he conceived as enlightened. Philo was convinced that the Greeks had acquired their wisdom from Moses, and saw himself as the bridge between his co-religionists and the philosophies. 
In Philo’s doctrine of God he begins at the point of fundamental dualism: that God and matter are not in communion (here is revealed his Gnostic tendencies: The Gnostics taught Spirit world good—material universe bad; this included the flesh of man.  God is totally good and perfect —the created universe, with man at the center, is imperfect and not good, in the sense of being incorruptible. “An acting, therefore, of God upon the world and in the world, is, according to Philo, only possible through the intervention of intermediate causes, of interposing powers who [that] establish an intercourse between God and the world” (Schurer). Philo’s intervening causes are Plato’s ideas, the Stoic’s active causes, the Jewish angels, and the Greek’s daemons. All these add up to Philo’s logos. If, according to this, they appear to be individual hypostases, or personal beings, Philo makes other assertions that forbids us to take them as such. It is expressly stated that they exist only in the Divine thought (De mundi opificio, i. 4, Mang. (Richter, 1): As the ideal city, whose plan the artist sketches, exists only in his mind, pon auton tropon oude ho ek tōn ideon chismos allon an echoi topon ē ton theion logon ton tanta diakosmēsanta.—Ibid. i. 5, Mang.: Ei détis ethelēseis gumnotépois chrēsasthai tois onomasin, ouden anheperon eipoi ton noēton einai kismon, ē theou logon ēdē kosmopoiountos.). The truth of the matter is this: Philo conceived of them both as independent hypostases and as immanent (1. remaining within; indwelling; inherent. 2. Philosophy. (of a mental act) taking place within the mind of the subject and having no effect outside of it. Compare transeunt. 3. Theology. (of the Deity) indwelling the universe, time, etc. Compare transcendent (def 3). )  determinations of the divine existence. According to Eduard Zeller, Philo’s system required the necessity of this contradiction: “He combines both definitions without observing their contradiction, nay, he is unable to observe it, because otherwise the intermediary rôle assigned to the divine powers would be forfeited, even that double nature, the reason of which they are on the one hand to be identical with God, that a participation in the Deity may by their means be possible to the finite, and on the other hand different from Him, ... notwithstanding this participation, they remain apart from all contact with the world” (Philosophie der Griechen, iii. 2, p. 365). 
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As a help to arrive at an understanding of Philo’s doctrine of the Logos, we could do no better that Eduard Zeller ((1814-1908), German philosopher, was born at Kleinbottwar in Wurttemberg on the 22nd of January 1814, and educated at the university of Tubingen and under the influence of Hegel. In 1840 he was Privatdozent of theology at Tubingen, in 1847 professor of theology at Bern, in 1849 professor of theology at Marburg, migrating soon afterwards to the faculty of philosophy as the result of disputes with the Clerical party. He became professor of philosophy at Heidelberg in 1862, removed to Berlin in 1872, and retired in 1895. His great work is his Philosophie der Griechen (184452). This book he continued to amplify and improve in the light of further research; the last edition appeared in 1902. It has been translated into most of the European languages and became the recognized text-book of Greek philosophy. Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911).
“By the Logos, Philo understands the power of God or the active Divine intelligence in general; he designated it as the idea which comprises all other ideas, the power which comprises all itself, as the entirety of the supersensuous world or of the divine powers (Zeller iii. 2, p. 371).  Is the vicegerent and ambassador of God; neither created nor uncreated; the instrument by which God made the worlds. The logos is, thus, identified with the creative ‘word’ of God. Further, the logos, then, is the high priest of God to the world, and of the world to God. Making God known to the world, and the world known to God. “The definitions, which, according to the presuppositions of our thought, would require the personality of the logos, are crossed by Philo by such as make it impossible, and the peculiarity of his mode of conception consists in his not perceiving the contradiction involved in making the idea of the logos oscillate obscurely between personal and impersonal being. This peculiarity is equally misunderstood, when Philo’s logos is regarded absolutely as a person separate from God; and, when on the contrary, it is supposed that it only denotes God under a definite relation, according to the aspect of His activity. According to Philo’s opinion the logos is both, but for this very reason neither one nor the other exclusively; and he does not perceive, that it is impossible to combine these definitions into one notion” (Zeller iii. 2. p. 378) .
“But Philo cannot dispense with these definitions. With him the logos, like all the Divine powers, is only necessary because the supreme God Himself can enter into no direct contact with the finite; it must stand between the two and be the medium of their mutual relation; and how can it be this unless it were different from both, if it were only a certain Divine property? In this case we should have again that direct action of God upon finite things, which Philo declares is inadmissible. On the other hand the Logos must now, indeed, be, again, identical with each of the opposites which it was to reconcile, it must likewise be a property of God as a power operative in the world. Philo could not, without contradiction, succeed in combining the two” (Zeller iii. 2, p. 380) .  As remarkable as it may seem, however, this very thing is done in Modalism’s teaching of the Deity of Christ and His humanity—i.e. His dual nature. He is, indeed, identical with both elements He is reconciling, and yet a property of God operating in the world. 
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The Greek word prototokos is translated in two passages of the King James Version by “first-begotten” (Heb 1:6 Rev 1:5), but in all other places in the KJV by “firstborn.” Prototokos is used metaphorically of Christ to express at once His relation to man and the universe, and His difference from them, as both He and they are related to God. The laws and customs of all nations show that to be “firstborn” means, not only priority in time, but, more importantly, to certain superiority in privilege and authority. For example, Israel is said to be Yahweh’s firstborn among the nations (Ex 4:22; cf Jer 31:9). The Messianic King is God’s firstborn (Septuagint—prototokos), “the highest of the kings of the earth” (Ps 89:27). Philo applies the word to the logos as the archetypal and governing idea of creation. 
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Philo was, as it seems, the first to suggest that the Logos was the intermediate being between God and the world. The building blocks for his doctrine lay in both Jewish theology and Greek philosophy. Philo took from the Jewish theology the idea of the Spirit and Word of God; then from Greek philosophy he took chiefly the doctrine of the wisdom of God, utilizing for his purpose the Platonic doctrine of ideas and the world spirit, or soul. But it is the Stoic doctrine of the deity as the active reason of the world, which is the nearest to his. “We need only to strip off from this Stoic doctrine of the Logos, its pantheistic element by distinguishing the Logos from the Deity, and its materialistic element by distinguishing it from organized matter, to have the Philonean Logos complete” (Zeller iii. 2, 385).   
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The logos concept of Plato required one more step to infect Christianity; this needed step was found in the early Christian Apologists, of whom Justin Martyr is a prime example. Justin (A.D. 100-165) was a Platonic philosopher who continued to wear the philosopher’s habit, as a Christian preacher. He was not representative of the Christianity of his time. According to his own testimony, he was not associated with any Christians other than those who sought him out as a philosopher.
Justin Martyr and Companions: Justin Martyr Is Questioned About Christian Meetings "Where do you assemble?" Rusticus proceeded. “Wherever we want to and are able to," Justin replied. "Do you imagine that we all meet in the same place? Not so! The God of the Christians is not limited to a location. He is invisible, and he fills heaven and earth. Therefore, he is worshipped and glorified everywhere by the faithful." Rusticus sighed. This was no angry prefect. He was not the least bit interested in Justin's speech. "Just tell me where you personally assemble. In other words, in what place do you, Justin, gather your followers?" "I live above a man named Martin, at the Timiotinian Bath." Justin paused, then, knowing what the next question would be, he continued, "During the entire time I've lived here, because I'm now living in Rome for the second time, I don't know about any other meetings. I've simply taught the truth to anyone willing to come to me.”

Justin Martyr (AD 100-165) and Philo
Space will not allow an exhaustive examination of the logos theology, however a few comments on the subject are necessary at this point. As stated, logos-christology sees the logos (Word) as a separate person (individual) from God the Father, and has come into Christianity from pagan thought, in point of fact: from Plato by way of Philo (first century Jewish Platonic philosopher) and the early Christian (so-called) Apologists (so-called) such as Justin Martyr. 
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 Justin saw Christianity as the fruition of Platonism, and preached Christ (Messiah) according to the understanding of Philo. Justin called Jesus the “second god.” Through Justin Martyr, and others of his time and philosophy, logos-christology came to the fore in post- apostolic thought. 
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Justin was profoundly influenced by Plato and Philo and their understanding of God. Christian historian G.P. Fisher tells us of the Godhead theology of Justin Martyr: “Yet we have presented prominently another conception, Platonic and Alexandrian Jewish, of God as a transcendent, ineffable One, too exalted to be the subject of finite predicates, the ordinary representations of Him being merely relative to our finite apprehension. It is only through an intermediate being that He is revealed. It is through the Logos or Word, that God is manifested.... Justin’s particular idea of the Logos is not consonant (in agreement or harmony…) with that of John (the Apostle), but corresponds to that of Plato and Philo. …” (Underlining mine.) “The Logos, impersonal in God from the beginning, becomes personal prior to the creation. Justin does not fully succeeded in taking Christ out of the category of creatures. He is begotten, or assumes a person, form of being, by an act of God’s will. He was generated from the Father ‘by His power and will.’ The Logos is another ‘in number,’ but not in ‘mind’ (or ‘will’). There is a personal distinction, but this is not eternal, and it springs from an act of God’s will, anterior to the creation of the world. To the Son, is assigned the second place in relation to the eternal God.... Justin speaks of the Spirit in conjunction with the Father, and Christ in such terms as to naturally imply that the Spirit is regarded as distinct from both, although subordinate to them.” 
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The Apologists had found fertile soil in the heathen that had been converted to Christianity. Most religions of the ancient world had a trinity of some sort. This, along with the logos concept of Plato and Philo, made the message of the Apologists almost irresistible to the people that had a Greek, instead of a Hebrew, culture. 
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Now that we have a little understanding of Philo’s contribution to our discussion, we will proceed to discover how he made an impact upon a segment of the Christian faith. Bible scholars John McClintock and James Strong explain: “Towards the end of the 1st century, and during the 2[n]d, many learned men came over both from Judaism and paganism to Christianity. These brought with them into the Christian schools of theology their Platonic ideas and phraseology” 
Out of this nest (Alexandria) of worldly philosophy grew a Christian church (of a sort). From this swamp of paganism arose the citadel to the “Logos Christology” of Plato and Philo. From this fortress marched forth the warriors of darkness proclaiming light—illuminating none—but blinding and binding all. The Trinitarians of all ages since can look to one Alexandrian bishop and proclaim, “O Captain, My captain;” this bishop is Clement of Alexandria. Not to be confused with the saint from Rome. 
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When John wrote that all things were made by the Word, it was not the logos of Plato, nor of Plato’s student, Philo, that he had in mind. It is clear that John is writing to combat this false christology, for he opens his gospel with words that strike a fatal blow to this heresy. Plato, Philo, and one Cerinthus taught that the logos had a beginning as the first creation of God the first principle; but, John’s first salvo is “In the beginning was the Word (logos).” To John the logos did not have a beginning, the logos was eternal—had always been. Secondly, John was a Jew who knew and confessed the Shema. To him God was a radical one. When he wrote that the “logos was God,” one may be confident that he did not mean “a god” or “another god” or “also god.” To John there was but one God: namely, the Father. The logos was that God. 
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The true disciple of Christ will permit the Bible to interpret itself. Whereas John, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, writes that all things were created by the Word, the Psalmist explains that it was by “the breath of his mouth.” The difference in the logos-christology of Justin (originating from Plato and Philo and showing up in the pluralism of the Arians and later Trinitarians), and the Hebraic-Christology of the bible, is this: In logos-christology the logos (Word) is the second person of the Godhead, while in Hebraic-Christology (which is held by Modalistic Monarchians) the logos (Word) is the speaking of God, i.e. “the breath of his mouth.” Truly, this is the narrative of Genesis where Yahweh created by saying; “Let there be!”
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The above comments on Philo of Alexandria, Egypt are excerpts taken from the author’s book entitled “Godhead Theology.” “Godhead Theology” may be ordered from Amazon, or anywhere great books are sold.

Apostolically Speaking,
☩☩ Jerry L Hayes

Excerpted from the author's book entitled "Godhead Theology." Published by Seven Millennium Publications. Order your personal copy today: https://www.amazon.com/Godhead-Theology-Modalism-Original-Orthodoxy/dp/1516983521/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_1?keywords=Godhead+theology%2C+Hayes&qid=1554054212&s=books&sr=1-1-fkmrnull


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Read other essays from the Bishop on the subject of the Godhead:

"The Dual Nature Of Jesus Of Nazareth"

"The Worlds, Made By The Son"

"Hebrews 13:8 vs 1 Corinthians 15:28"

"Glory With The Father"

"Philippians 2:6-8, Answering Trinitarian Objections"

"How Is God One?"

"Hebrew Monotheism"


"The Apostolic Creed"

"Jesus Is Father God"

"Homoousia And The Creed Of Nicaea"

"The Triquetra And Modalism"

"Modalism, Simultaneous Or Sequential?"

"Micah 5:2-4, An Exegesis"


"Elohim, the Plural form For God"

"Can the Deity of Jesus Be called The Son Of God?"

"Mathematical Equation For The Godhead"

"Hebrew Monotheism, Second Edition"

"Jesus, On God's Right Hand"

"The Name of the Deity" (The Tetragrammaton)

"Christology of the Apostolic Church Fathers"

"Christian Modalism challenged by the Greeks"

"The Apologists and the Logos Christology"

"Logos Christology"

"The Seven Spirits of God"

"Historical Numerical Superiority of the Monarchians"

"How Is God One?" Second Edition

"Creed of Nicæa (Creed of the 318) Affirmed"

"Another Comforter (Answering Objections to Modalism)"

"Echad vs Yachid (Answering Objections to Modalism)"

"The Godhead Teaching of Ignatius of Antioch"

"Hebrews 1:8, (Answering Objections to Modalism)"

"Godhead Theology of the Tabernacle of Moses"

"Proper Biblical Understanding of the Word 'Person'"

"Defense of Isaiah 9:6, Answering Objections to Modalism"
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Thursday, October 18, 2018

The Economy of Man: Body, Soul and Spirit

  The Economy of Man: 
Body, Soul and Spirit

In Genesis1:26-27 Moses pulls back the curtain and permits the readers of holy Scripture to get a glimpse of the creation of mankind. He is made higher than the animals of earth and a little lower than the angels of heaven. Yet, in this mid-state man has been fashioned in the image of his Creator. Just what that means has been debated certainly from the time Moses wrote the words. 
While God is God and man is man, there is much, even most, about Him we cannot know until our glorification. Then we shall know Him even as we are known by Him (1 Cor. 13:12). In Yahweh’s mercy and grace, He has permitted us to be aware of a small portion of His nature through His self revelation in His Son and His Holy Spirit. We know, for instance, that God is a trinity of … somethings: Terullian said, “persons”; Augustine said: “three somewhats”; Anselm, “three I know not what”; Barth, “three ways of being” or “three modes”; Professor Stuart and Sabellius (before them all) said “distinctions.” It was John Calvin that articulated it clearly: “A threefold distinction in the Godhead.” 
Just as the signature of all great painters is found in the technique of their brush strokes, even so has the Creator God left His signature in all things He has made. Anyone with a cursory awareness of their surroundings must give witness to the three-ness found in all of God’s creation. Creation is made up of time, space, and matter (substance, mass).  The building blocks of all matter are atoms. Atoms have three principle parts: protons, neutrons, and electrons. All living things in God’s universe are made up of one or more cells. As atoms, cells also have three principle parts: membrane, a nucleus, and cytoplasm. In time there is present, past, and future; space possesses length, width, and height, as does matter. In that creation is made up of time, space,  and  matter, and further, in that time, space, and matter all have three parts, it is an undeniable conclusion that the Creator has left His brush strokes upon the canvas of His universe; because, we know from holy Scripture that the economy of the Godhead is divided into three parts. These three parts of God’s economy we know as the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Since this truth is undeniable, and since we know that man is made in the likeness of God, then we would expect the economy of man to also manifest three attributes. So then, just as God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit so is man: body, soul and spirit.

 The Debate:
The elements of the human person have been much in debate. By this I mean there is great discussion among Christian thinkers as to whether or not the human being is bipartite, such as only body and soul, or three parts - such as body, soul and spirit. Those who would argue for a binary human would say that there is no difference between the soul and the spirit of man. But for others the distinction between soul and spirit, although difficult to ascertain, is clearly presented in holy Scripture.  
We can concur with Charles Hodge (and others) that man is a dualism of body and soul (sōma and psychê) as to his particular human-ness; but must contend, against Hodge, that there is an additional  element in man we term “spirit.” The “spirit” we would say, is the god-spark, or divine life force, the God consciousness in man. This god-spark does not belong to man, per se, but to God, and returns to God upon the death of the body (Ecc 12:7).  Human beings have a spirit, but we are not spirits. However, in Scripture, only believers are said to be spiritually alive (1 Cor. 2:11; Heb. 4:12; James 2:26), while unbelievers are spiritually dead (Eph. 2:1-5; Col. 2:13). In Paul’s writing, the spiritual is pivotal to the life of the believer (1 Cor. 2;14; 3:1; Eph. 1:3; 5:19; Col. 1:9; 3:16). The spirit is the element in humanity that gives us the ability to have an intimate relationship with God. The spirit, then,  refers to that immaterial part of humanity that “connects” with God, who Himself is spirit (John 4:23.
So, then, the bipartite man (sōma and psychê) infused by the “spirit” (pneuma), the “breath of God,” or god-spark, produced a three-ness in man. The Bible, then, presents the human person as having three elements: sōma (body), psychê (soul/mind) and pneuma (spirit, or breath of God, i.e. the god-spark). We call this the trichotomy of man. What we mean to say here is that the human being is a trifold creature made up of three separate and distinct elements: namely, body, soul and spirit. The following two passages from the Word of God should establish this point beyond further debate: 
1 Thessalonians 5:23 ... the very God of peace sanctify you wholly: and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.  


Hebrews 4:12 For the Word of God is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, ...   
As is seen, the apostle Paul when writing to the Christians at Thessalonica made a sharp distinction between the three elements of man. Here, in this passage he speaks of the Christians being preserved in their spirits, souls and bodies. Furthermore, when the writer of Hebrews speaks on the subject of the discerning power of the Word of God, he has no problem in admitting (even if many cannot) that the Word of God can indeed find the dividing line between the soul and the spirit of man. From these two texts it should be clear to the disciple that man is indeed a three part being. So that we may conclude that the trichotomy of the human-being is proven by holy Scripture. 
By beginning with the premise that God exists in three modes without His substance being altered or changed (and this being demonstrated throughout creation), it becomes, then, a matter of course to move to the conclusion that man’s three elements of body, and soul and spirit are a mirrored image of his creator.  
Having established that man exists in three separate and distinct parts which we call body, soul and spirit, it remains for these parts to be identified and in some way defined. With this in mind the following definitions are offered:
  1. Body: The Greek word is "sōma," the physical element of a person. The body (sōma) is the material part of a human being that gathers information from its surrounding world through the five senses: sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. Information enters these five "gates" and is transmited to the  "psychê" or mind, also termed "soul." 
  2. Soul: The Greek term is "psychê," the immaterial inner self, the mind; consisting of will, emotions, and intellect; i.e. the self consciousness. It is that element of the human being that was fashioned in the likeness and image of God in the act of creation and lives on after the body is dead. The soul assimilates information through the five soulish senses of  imagination, conscience,  memory, reason and affections. The soul who only acquires information through the five sense "gates" of the body (sōma) and only assimilates said information by the five soulish senses is said to be carnal, or fleshly.  
  3. Spirit: The Greek word is "pneuma," (many times translated as "breath" or "wind") the god-spark, or God nature that resides in all men; i.e. the God consciousness. This element of man governed his entire being pre-fall. The five sense faculties of the spirit are faith, hope, reverence, prayer and worship. The writer of Proverbs calls the spirit of man the "candle of the LORD" (KJV); Job identifies the spirit of man as the "breath of the Almighty" that gives man understanding. Man lost this divine light and understanding in the fall. This "breath of the Almighty" lies dormant in un-regenerated man, but is awakened to new life in one who has received the re-generating of the Holy Spirit. The person who is governed by the awakened spirit is said to be spiritual.

Sorting out the confusion:
There is some confusion over the difference between the terms “soul” and “spirit” because they are sometimes used interchangeably by the sacred writers. In the OT the Hebrew is nephesh (soul), and ruach (spirit). In the NT the Greek is psychê (soul, or mind), and pneuma (spirit). The confusion exists because “soul” is used by sacred writers to denote the inner man (consisting of the will, emotions, and intellect), and also to reference the complete human, material and immaterial combined. In like manner the term translated as “spirit” (that primarily means “life force,” is ruach in the Hebrew, found some 378 times in the OT, and literally meaning “breath,” “wind,” etc.; the corresponding Greek term is pneuma, occurring 379 times in the NT) is sometimes used interchangeably with the term translated as “soul” by sacred writers. “Spirit” can be used, by way of the figure of speech known as the synecdoche (part for the whole, or vice versa) for a person himself. John wrote: "Beloved, believe not every spirit, but prove the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1; emphasis added). Note that the term “spirits” in this text has reference to the inner man of the “false prophets.”  In this manner “spirit” may reference the element of man (2 Cor. 4:16) that is fashioned in God’s image (Gen. 1:26-27), and thus be a synonym of “soul.” This is also true of Zechariah 12:1 “… saith the LORD, …  formeth the spirit of man within him.” This has lead some to suppose that there is no difference between the soul and spirit of man.  This is a mistake in our opinion, because of the weight of 1 Thessalonians 5:3 and Hebrews 4:12 (introduced above) that demonstrate a marked difference between the soul and the spirit.
“Soul” may signify merely an individual person: e.g. the prophet Ezekiel declared that the “soul” (i.e., the person) who sins will surely die (Ezek. 18:20), or, as Peter would write centuries later, “eight souls” were saved by water in the days of Noah (1 Pet. 3:20). See also Exodus 1:5. Conversely, “soul” can have to do with that aspect of man that is characterized by the intellectual and emotional dimension (Gen. 27:25; Job 30:16). It is the eternal component of man that is fashioned in the very image of God (Gen. 1:26), and that can exist apart from the physical body (Mt. 10:28; Rev. 6:9). The term “soul,” as with the word “spirit” may take on different senses, depending upon its contextual setting. Since “soul” and “spirit” are used interchangeably by scared writers, one must consider the context of the Hebrew and Greek words to determine the proper understanding.

Apostolically Speaking
☩☩ JLH


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Friday, September 28, 2018

Answering Jason Weatherly’s Rebuttal to My Affirmative on Infant Water Baptism



Greetings friends in the mighty name of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Recently I wrote a blog article on “The Bishop’s Epistle” en-titled, Children of Christians are Holy Seed (A Study In Infant WaterBaptism) https://bishopjerrylhayes.blogspot.com/2018/09/children-of-christians-are-holy-seed.html. Something  of a long title, but necessary to inform the reader of the article’s content. My friend and former debating opponent, Jason Weatherly, wrote a rebuttal on his blog “The Weatherly Report.” https://theweatherlyreport.blogspot.com/search?q=infant+water+baptism (Jason is a minister and teacher in the United Pentecostal Church International and is a veteran debater.)
Apart from our disagreements on this subject, I am seriously concerned about how he represented my affirmative arguments. I will say, up front, that his article misrepresented my teaching in several key places and spun half truths into misinformation in a number of other places. What follows is an answer to Brother Weatherly’s rebuttal. It is my earnest wish that you, dear reader, will prayerfully consider both of our thoughts and arguments on this most ancient Christian doctrine of paedo-baptism.
I have numbered Brother Weatherly’s paragraphs 1 through 25 for easy referencing.
In ❡3 my friend mentions a concern over my “shocking confession," where I wrote: “I am no longer sure of the need of each succeeding generation of Christians being required to have the exact new birth experiences as did the first.” Of course I understand his “shock” given the position Acts 2:38 has held for 100 years in the Oneness Pentecostal ranks. But I would ask the reader to focus on my intent and not on Weatherly’s “shock:” Overlooked by our people (OP), but acknowledged by over 80% of all claiming Christianity as their faith, is the different genre that children of believers fall into. By that we mean that when the Gospel of Christ is first presented to a people, the people to which it comes are alien sinners who have experiential sins and a lifestyle that is opposed to godliness. To this sort (which includes the whole of the earth that are not Christian) the command goes forth to repent and believe ( Mark 16:16 and Luke 24:47) before water baptism is administered. However, children of believers are not of that sort. The apostolic church did not see them as alien sinners but as holy to the Lord (1 Corinthians 7:14 cf Ezra 9:2; Isaiah 6:13). So, then, the requirements for baptism are not the same for Children of believers as for the alien sinner that comes to faith in Christ.
We have shown that while the NT gives detailed instructions of how first generation disciples were made, it is silent on how 2nd and succeeding generations of disciples were made. In his ❡4-6 Brother Weatherly challenged that by stating: “the New Testament DOES  instruct us how second and succeeding generations ARE TO BE MADE Christians! Acts 2:38-39, Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. FOR (gar -because) the promise is to you (first generation), and to your children (second generation), and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.”
Permit me to untwist Brother Weatherly’s wresting of Scripture: The “promise” that is to all generations is the “promise of the Father” spoken of in Acts 1:4 “And, being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me.” I.e. the gift of the Holy Ghost. The 120 in the upper room were not repenting, they were believing !  They received the “promise of the Father” that all generations are promised. But, those who asked Peter and the rest of the apostles ‘Men and brethren, What shall we do?” had the blood of their Creator on their hands (v23). And to these murderers, Peter said “ R E P E N T “ !   In effect Peter was saying: What the 120 believed for and received, and you see and hear and desire, you must do more than believe, you must R E P E N T .
Because Acts 2:38 commands the sinner to repent before baptism it is the most quoted text in condemning the baptism of infants. (See Weatherly’s ❡13-16.) It is argued that infants cannot repent, so, then, they are not candidates for baptism. This passage with its command to “repent” was shown to be out of bounds for the baptism of the children of believers on at least two grounds: 
  1. Acts 2:38 are instructions given to alien sinners and includes the required repentance that is demanded of all who turn from Satan and his devices to Christ. Children of Christians are not alien sinners. According to Paul they are holy at birth (1 Corinthians 7:14). And 
  2. The command in Acts 2:38 to repent is crowd specific: The command to repent was given to those who had called for the crucifixion of Jesus. For further treatment on this point please see my first article.
Universal? Weatherly’s ❡7-8 challenged my use of the word “universal” for the practice of Infant Water Baptism. Perhaps I can clear-up the pool that my friend mudded. My use of “universal” intended to state that the practice of IWB was universally wide spread. The way Weatherly spun my use of the word was to insinuate that I was saying that every Christian in the world believed the doctrine and practiced it. 
Brother Weatherly’s debating style is to misrepresent his opponent’s position with such tactics of which his “universal” argument is a classic example. (My friend’s modus operandi is to debate from the foggy mist of deception.)
Brother Weatherly is the master of half truths. Nowhere is this better illustrated than in his ❡9-10 where he challenged my position that IWB was not brought into question until the 16th century. Of course my point was that the doctrinal soundness of the practice was not questioned until then.  My readers understood that. Not being able to let that stand (for that fact is a very powerful argument in favor of the correctness of the practice) my friend seized upon Tertullian of Carthage (A.D. 155 - 240), whom I had already introduced. 
To read these particular paragraphs (❡9-10) one would think that Tertullian challenged paedo-baptism on biblical grounds. Nothing could be further from the truth. The baptism of small children did not set well with the lawyer from Carthage, that much is true, but he did not oppose IWB on any biblical or historical grounds. Tertullian’s objection to paedo-baptism was on the grounds of what seemed to him to be impracticality. His suggestion was to delay water baptism for everyone (except the sickly) until after marriage. This to Tertullian seemed the most practical action since the temptations of the flesh were such that young people are pronged to indulge in fornication. (No doubt he was judging all humanity from his own youth.) His lack of confidence in men and women to live holy, and his conviction that water baptism remitted sin, and that one could only be water baptized but once in a lifetime, prompted him to advise delaying baptism until the danger of lust had abated. For if one sinned after baptism, reasoned Tertullian,  there would be no remission that could be had (Tertullian, On Baptism Chapter, XVIII). However, even he stated that in cases of illness or near death that baptism was not to be delayed and that even laymen could baptized if no priest or bishop were present (Tertullian, On Baptism, Chapter XVII). Moreover, it is pointed out that Tertullian’s opinion was not influential in changing the universal practice of Christians to baptism their new borns. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, who called Tertullian his teacher and master, who read Tertullian daily, took a whole different view on the baptism of infants.  
One, Fidus, had written to the council of sixty-six bishops asking whether it would not be better to wait until a child was eight days old to be baptized, after the ancient custom of circumcision, instead of the first or second day after birth.  Cyprian answered back to Fidus that he and the other bishops elected for the earlier time, but did not forbid waiting until the eighth day (The Epistles of Cyprian, Epistle LVIII.2-6).
“For which reason we think that no one is to be hindered from obtaining grace by that law which was already ordained, in that spiritual circumcision ought not be hindered by carnal circumcision,  but that absolutely every man is to be admitted to the grace of Christ, since Peter also in the Acts of the Apostles speaks and says, “The Lord hath said to me that I should call no man common or unclean." But if anything could hinder men from obtaining grace, their more hideous sins might rather hinder those who are mature and grown up and older. But again, if even to the greatest sinners, and to those who had sinned much against God, when they subsequently believed, remission of sins is granted– and nobody is hindered from baptism and from grace –how much rather ought we to shrink from hindering an infant, who, being lately born, has not sinned, except in that, being born after the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of the ancient death at its earliest birth, who approaches the more easily on this very account to the reception of the forgiveness of sins– that to him are remitted, not his own sins, but the sins of another.”  —Cyprian (The Epistles of Cyprian, Epistle LVIII.5)
The above statement is from the student of Tertullian !
You, dear reader, will have to determine between Weatherly and Hayes, as to who misrepresents history.
Hello friends, my name is Jerry Hayes, I am a full time biblical researcher. I  rely on freewill love offerings (from those of you who benefit from my work) and book sales  for my support. Would you please consider leaving a small donation at the link provided here? Thank you for your support.


We now come to ❡11 of my friend’s rebuttal. There are some statements from this paragraph that I will reference in passing
  1. Jesus’ words to Nicodemus in John 3:1-8 are referencing the Jewish nation, as the Grk grammar bears out. The nation of Israel was born again on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:38) and is addressed by Paul in Romans chapter 11. 
  2. I am not saying that every soul must not be born again, for truly they must. This new birth takes place on both infants and adults in the living waters of Christian baptism.
  3. Paul lets us know from 1 Corinthians 7:14 that children of Christians are holy. In the Old Covenant the children of covenanted Hebrews were holy seed.  The teaching of traducianism (which I hold the Bible to teach—a lesson for another day) is that each person’s soul comes from the spiritual DNA of the parent or parents. The teaching that our children are born Christians (in the sense that they are holy from conception and conceived and born into covenant prerogatives) is rooted in this belief. Whether or not Brother Weatherly (or any other Christian) believes his/her children are different from the children of the unregenerated really depends on how seriously he believes in the New Birth. Is there a nature change in our souls upon being born again or not. If we answer in the affirmative, then the children born to us, that come from our regenerated souls/spirits, are indeed different from the children of the unregenerated !  Different in as far as they are “holy” as opposed to “unholy.” And, yet, in need of baptism to remove the stain of Adam.
Again, some particulars must be pointed out concerning my friends ❡17.
  1. Water baptism is Christian circumcision according to Paul — regardless of what Brother Weatherly says: “In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ: 12 Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.”  —Colossians 2:11-12. ~ Just as surely as the foreskin of the male member was cut away from the OT covenanted Hebrew, so too are the “sins of the flesh” cut away from the NT covenanted one in baptism.
  2. Weatherly’s suggestion of baptizing males only is a red herring argument. Suggested for the purpose of throwing the reader off the trail of truth. It is hardly worth mentioning (because it is a well know truth), but I will: Judaism was/is a male religion; it is like Islam in that sense. With the coming of the Messiah all people: Jew and Gentile, male and female are but one person (Galatians 3:28).
  3. “Through the faith of the operation of God,…” My friend is arguing that one cannot have faith for another; and since infants cannot have faith for themselves they are not valid candidates for baptism. Sounds good on the surface. Then we read that Job not only had faith for his children, but repented on their behalf (Job 1:5). What is more, “If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. …” My point is: if Job can have faith for his children and even repent on their behalf, and if the NT believer can intercede in behalf of a sinning brother or sister and the sinning Christian receive “life” because of the third party’s prayer, then it is a small thing that the sponsoring parent can believe in behalf of a child being baptized. Think on this: Those , like my friend, that do not believe in or practice IWB profess to believe that the faith of the parent “covers” their children until they are of the age of accountability. How is that IMPUTED faith any different from the IMPUTED faith of a sponsoring parent for their infant being baptized?! Oh, wait! There is a difference: Faith alone does not remit sin, only baptism does. So, then, the faith of the parent who is attempting to cover a child until age of accountability does nothing to remove the guilt of adamic sin. However, the faith of a sponsoring parent for a child in paedo-baptism produces said baptism, which does, indeed, remit the sin of Adam.

Beloved, I have never in my years of debating witnessed as shameful of an act as is demonstrated in my friends ❡18. I am almost speechless. I said “Almost.” In this place Weatherly attacks the doctrine of Original Sin. Of course this teaching is anchored in Psalm 51:5 which reads: “ Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me” (KJV). The NIV breaks it down; “Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.” 
Now Brother Weatherly and those of his ilk cannot let this text stand as believed by most every group of Christians around the world. So, what does he do? He finds some commentator who has suggested that King David, who represents the Messiah, was born from an adulterous affair. (Did the Jews not tell the same tale on Mary and Jesus?) Weatherly suggests that that is the Psalmist’s reference to being shaped in iniquity and conceived in sin. 
One eternal day, hopefully, Brother Weatherly, you will met Jessie, whose character you have not shunned from assassinating in order to maintain a false doctrine. I am not surprised; I have witnessed it before. Nitzevet, also, you have insulted by denigrating her family. Militating against your evil suggestion are David’s words praising his mother as a servant of Yahweh (Psalm 86:16).
Our readers may wonder why brother Weatherly has gone off the reservation with his suggestion that Psalm 51:5 does not reference original sin. The reason IMHO is this: If this text stands as most Christians for 2000 years have read it and understood it Infant Water Baptism is not only allowed but REQUIRED for the salvation of children that are sickly or may die in infancy. 
Here I will offer my ABC’s for Infant Water Baptism:
  1. The doctrine of Traducianism;
  2. The Doctrine of Original Sin;
  3. The Doctrine of Paedo-Baptism
“B” is predicated on “A”, “C” is predicated on “B”. Or, we could work the problem from the other direction: If “A” is true, then “B” is true, if “B” is true that “C” is true.
Lastly, I will deal with Brother Weatherly’s ❡20-24.
I spent considerable word currency in establishing the probable events of IWB in the New Testament, although no passage actually describes an actual event. Great effort was expended to show that no NT passage militates against the practice of IWB, and that IWB is, in fact, actually taught by strong and necessary inference. It is clearly taught that Christian water baptism is the fulfillment of Old Testament circumcision (Colossians 2:11-12). It is clearly taught that the Children of believers, like the children of the covenanted Hebrews, were holy seed ( 1 Corinthians 7;14 cf Ezra 9:2; Isaiah 6:13). Children of the Old Covenant were circumcised at 8 days old. Also, at that time their names were assigned. It is at water baptism that  the name of Jesus, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth are named, is assigned to each believer. Both circumcision and baptism are seals of their respective covenants. There is, then, a strong inference that children of believers were baptized as infants.
The inference is more that just strong, it becomes a necessary inference when the testimony of the saintly Polycarp is considered. Polycarp was burned at the stake for being a Christian in A.D. 155. As the flames were licking at his body he was asked to deny Christ. His testimony was: “For eight-six years I have been His servant, and He has done me no wrong. How can I blaspheme my king that saved me” (The Martyrdom of Polycarp, chapter 9)  The bishop of Smyrna testified to being a Christian all eight-six years of his life (he was 86 years old). Christian are made by being baptized into Christ (Romans 6:4-5). Therefore, Polycarp was baptized in A.D. 69 as an infant. A.D. 69 was during the lifetime of the apostles. The apostles and their surrogates routinely baptized whole households (Acts 16:31-34; 18:8; 1 Corinthians 1:16) . To contend that these “households” did not include infants and small children is mischievous, if not an outright dishonest position. By reaching to A.D. 155 and bringing the testimony of Bishop Polycarp to bear on our topic, IWB is more than simply inferred by the household baptisms, it is necessarily inferred. In this writers mind it is proven beyond any reasonable doubt.

My friend, and those of his strip, doubt that there were small children and/or infants in ANY of those household baptisms of the NT. Now, they have expressed their doubt, but their's is not “reasonable doubt.”
One who is serious about paedo-baptism cannot ignore Timothy. Timothy was second (maybe third) generation Christian. We are introduced to him in Acts 16:1. We are not told how old he was at the time but he must have been very young, for 10 years later when Paul gives him encouragement by saying. “Let no man despise your youth”(1 Timothy 4;12) he was still young enough that grown men would think of him as unfit for great responsibility. At a time when few men lived to be fifty years of age and 30 was past prime (life expectancy of a Roman adult was 27) we can think of Timothy of being no older that 18-22. This would mean that Timothy could have been as young as eight when Paul took him as his apprentice. He had not been circumcised though he was from a Jewish family and his father was not a Christian. Because he was well versed in the Old Testament scripture at such a young age (the Septuagint, no doubt) is a necessary inference that Timothy was a Christian from infancy. The fact that he had not been circumcised may testify to circumcision having been replaced with Christian baptism.

Concerning Brother Weatherly’s comments on households, he had this to say: “A ‘household’ in 1st century times could have comprised of a Matriarch/Patriarch and adult servants.” This could be the case, but not likely in that a “household” consisted of the nuclear family, extended family members, servants and their children. Brother Weatherly is asking us to believe the unlikely is the likely. (He doubts if small children were included in the NT “households”, but his doubt is not “reasonable doubt.”) 
With the case of the Philippian Jailer (Acts 16:31-34) Paul’s declaration to him was that his believing would assure the salvation of his whole house. I dare say that Paul did not know at the time if the man had any children at home or not, but he knew what folks like my friend does not seem to know: I.e. the faith of the head of the family embraces the whole  household. Therefore, Joshua could say with certainty: “As for me and my house, we will serve the LORD” (Joshua 24:15).  The Jailer obviously did have children at home: v33 states that the Jailer and “all his” were baptized. Verse 34 mentions the rejoicing of the Jailer and the fact that he believed in God with all his house. Brother Weatherly’s question “Does this mean that even the infants in his house rejoiced…?”  This is his slight of hand with words. Anyone with one eye and walking around sense can see that. Let me make it clear: v34, “And when he (the Jailer) had brought them into his (the Jailer’s) house, he (the Jailer) set meat before them, and (the Jailer) rejoiced, …”

My Brother tries the same kind of spin tactics with Acts 18:8 and 1 Corinthians 1:16. That dog just won’t  hunt. The testimony of Bishop Polycarp destroys Brother Weatherly’s objections to IWB. The Bishop of Smyrna proves that the Apostolic church was baptizing infants in A.D. 69.
I will close by stating, in response to Jason Weatherly’s remark that our belief in original sin and Infant Water Baptism was a “strange” doctrine,   that most Christian denominations accept the doctrines of original sin and infant baptism. Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Assyrian Church of the East, Anglicans, Lutherans, Methodists, Church of the Nazarene, Reformed Church in America, Episcopalians, United Church of Christ, Presbyterians, Continental Reformed, Apostolic Orthodox Church International, True Jesus Church (which is a Oneness Pentecostal denomination with 1.5 million members, officially) and others. Together, these constitute over 80 percent of all those who call themselves Christians. So, the “strange” teaching is that which is not the norm. We who believe in the Original Sin and Infant Water Baptism are the norm. Amen.

Apostolically Speaking
☩☩ JLH

 Read the Bishop's first affirmative on Infant Water baptism at: https://bishopjerrylhayes.blogspot.com/2018/09/children-of-christians-are-holy-seed.html.


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