Dave "the yellow"
Bartosiewicz (click here
for previous responses to his “arguments” against the LDS Church and/or in
favour of his flavor of Protestantism) recently wrote the following:
How I love this scripture: If you don't think Jesus is Our God in Flesh,
this may help. Revelation 21:3 And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying,
“Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and
they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. (source)
This only shows that Dave is incapable of
engaging in exegesis. To be fair, more intellectual honest Trinitarian
apologists don’t appeal to this verse to support Trinitarian Christology,
though let us deal with it here in this post.
Let us read Rev 21:1-4:
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the
first earth had passed away, and the sea was n more. And I saw the holy city,
the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride
adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,
"See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will
be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from
their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no
more, for the first things have passed away." (NRSV)
Some may be wondering how Dave gets
Trinitarian Christology form Rev 21:3 (or the pericope itself), but he tries to
make a link between the tabernacle in Rev 21 and language used of Jesus
elsewhere in the New Testament:
Jesus is the true tabernacle.
John 1:14 tells us that “the Word became flesh and dwelt [Gk. σκηνόω]
among us,” and the Greek translation of “tent of meeting” is σκηνὴ μαρτυρίου
(Ex. 33:7). In other words, when Jesus became the God-man he “tabernacled”
among us. (And of course Jesus spoke about “the temple of his body” [John 2:19,
21], and Paul taught that because we are united to the risen Messiah “we are
the temple of the living God” [2 Cor. 6:16].)
Jesus’ body is the curtain ripped in two that brings us to the holy
presence of God.
“Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places
by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through
the curtain, that is, through his flesh. . . .” (Heb. 10:19-20). (See also
Matthew 27:51: “the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to
bottom.”)
Jesus is the great high priest over the house of God.
“. . . and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us
draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts
sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.”
(Heb. 10:21-22)
Jesus is the full and final sacrifice.
“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John
1:29).
“. . . We have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus
Christ once for all. . . . Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice
for sins . . . By a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are
being sanctified.” (Heb. 10:10, 12, 14)
We can't help but see the verbal carpet
bombing Dave is known to engage in, as well as simply throwing out a bunch of passages
with no exegesis in the hope that the common Evangelical reading imputed to
them (via eisegesis) will hold up. Sadly, they don't. Take, for instance,
Hebrews chapter 10. Verses
10-14 refutes, not supports, the common Protestant interpretations of the
atonement, and vv.26-29
clearly refutes eternal security and its variants (e.g., Perseverance of the
Saints). While tabernacling language is used of Jesus in the prologue of John,
it is to engage in a common interpretive fallacy (illegitimate totality transfer)
to claim that, ipso facto, it is being used in the exact same way in Rev 21:3
(as well as question-begging).
Furthermore, with respect to John 1:14, if
Jesus is God in the Trinitarian understanding and Jesus is the tabernacle, then
one question--who dwelled in Jesus? In reality, Trinitarians are asking the
wrong question--it was the divine word of God who dwelled in the tabernacle,
Jesus. The transcended God, Jesus' Father (who, for John, is the only person
who is true God [John 17:5]), interacted and made himself present by means of
his logos, wisdom or divine agents.
The language of tabernacling is used of
God the Father in Revelation, which alone blows Dave out of the water. Note the
following from Rev 7:15:
For this reason they are before the throne of God, and worship him day
and night within his temple, and the one who is seated on the throne will
shelter (σκηνωσει, third person singular indicative future active of σκηνοω)
among them. (NRSV)
When one read the book of Revelation,
there is a numerical distinction between God/the figure who sits on the throne
(who is in view in Rev 21) and the Lamb/Jesus Christ; Dave’s “argument”
would require use to violate the law of
the Identity of
Indiscernibles:
And I behold, and lo, in the midst of the throne of the four beasts, and
in the idst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven
horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all
the earth . . . And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and
under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I
saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory and power, be unto him that sitteth
upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever. (5:6, 13)
And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the
face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb. (6:16)
And this I beheld, and lo, a great multitude, which no man could number,
of all nations, kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and
before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; and cried
with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne,
and unto the Lamb . . . For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall
feed the, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters, and God shall
wipe away all tears from their eyes. (Rev 7:9, 10, 17)
And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding
out of the throne of God and of the Lamb . . . And there shall be no more
curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants
shall serve him. (Rev 22:1, 3)
In reality, instead of being Trinitarian,
the Christology of the book of Revelation is subordinationist. Consider the
following:
The revelation of
Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take
place; he made it known by sending his angel to his servant John. (Rev 1:1 NRSV)
The
opening verse of the book of Revelation is a verse that is often overlooked in
discussions about the Trinity, but it deals this theory a deathblow. Why? In
this verse, not only is there a distinction between "God" (not simply
the person of the Father) and "Jesus” (something that is not tolerated in
Trinitarianism), but also God has to give Jesus a revelation (not simply
commission him to speak His words as his agent), notwithstanding His now being
glorified after his ascension (cf. Phil 2:5-11). Such does not fit well with
creedal Trinitarian formulations of Christology, but is part-and-parcel of Latter-day
Saint Christology whose “Jesus” is the true “Biblical
Jesus.”
3. a loud voice: As in 19:5
the voice is not identified. It explains the significance of the vision.
God’s dwelling: See Ezek 37:27, “My dwelling place shall be with them; and I will be
their God, and they shall be my people”; see Zech 8:8. “Dwelling,” skēnē (see Rev 13:6; 15:5) may recall
the shekinah: the presence of God
among his people.
his peoples: Plural, laoi (Sinaiticus, A);
the singular laos is well attested.
The plural is the more difficult reading; the singular would represent
copyists’ assimilation to familiar lxx
texts, notably, Ezek 37:27: “My dwelling place shall be with them; and I will
be their God, and they shall be my people.” “One important and doubtless
deliberate change has been made in terms of these prophecies [Lev 26:11–12; Jer
38:4; Ezek 37:27; Zech 8:8]; our writer has substituted “peoples” for
“people“—the many peoples of redeemed humanity for the single elect nation, the
world for Israel” (Swete, 278). [as their
God]: Read in A. (Harrington, W. J. (2008). Revelation. (D. J. Harrington,
Ed.) (Vol. 16, pp. 207–208). Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press.)
Indeed, it will be God the Father who will
dwell personally with the people of God, not through the agency of the Son.
Another scholarly commentator on Revelation noted the following about Rev 21:3
Proximity to God implies relationship with God. John makes that
relationship explicit with the clarifying words with which he finishes the
verse. Appealing to numerous Old Testament witnesses (Lev 26:11-12; Ps 95:7;
Ezek 37:27; Jer 31:1, 33; Zech 2:11), the throne voice declares that God will
be their God and they will be God’s peoples. This is covenant language.
Interestingly, where the Old Testament covenant citations emphasized a single
people, no doubt Israel, the throne voice turns the singular laos (people) into the plural laoi (peoples). The subtle shift in grammar
signals a powerful shift in theology. What was particular has become universal
. . . As Zech 2:11 implies ad John’s own vision confirms at 21:24 (cf. 5:9; 7:9
. . .) the nations—all peoples—will be available for participation in this
eschatological covenant relationship. God will be God to all. (Brian K. Blount,
Revelation: A Commentary [New Testament Library: Louiseville, Ky.:
Westminster/John Knox Press, 2009], 380)
As
we have seen, the divine person in view in Rev 21:3 is God the Father, who will
personally dwell with the people of God in the eschaton, and that the “tabernacle”
spoken about is the heavenly Jerusalem. Furthermore, the book of Revelation
itself presents a Christology that does not allow for a numerical
identification of the divine person who dwells on the throne (God the Father)
and the “Lamb” (Jesus Christ). Furthermore, texts such as Rev 1:1 contradicts
Trinitarian Christology.
This
is also part of Pauline eschatology; in 1 Cor 15:28 (cf. vv22-27), we read the
following:
And when all things shall be subdued unto
him, then shall the Son himself be subject unto him that put all things under
him, that God may be all in all.
There
is a reason why more informed Trinitarian apologists never cite this passage in
favour of Trinitarian Christology—it is not to be found at all. However, Dave,
who prides himself on his powers of eisegesis, can read a man-made dogma into
any passage, as his comments prove. The apostle Paul wrote the following which
fits Dave perfectly:
And for this cause God shall sent them strong delusion, that they should
believe a lie. (2 Thess 2:11)
In reality, it is Latter-day Saints, not
Trinitarians, who have the true, biblical Jesus; I have discussed Christology
many times on this blog, including:
Such articles show that it is “Mormonism,”
not Evangelical
Protestantism, that is true “Biblical Christianity.”