>First off, we have a clear testimony in the NT, that heresy of the
>Apostolic gospel was a problem even during the time of the apostles
>themselves.  Many of Paul's epistles deal specifically with heretical
>teaching.  The first 18 verse of John's gospel clearly speak against
an
>already existing heresy, namely gnosticism and its anti-Trinitarian
>teachings.

Gnosticism yes. "anti-trinitstianism" no way. There was no need to
defend something that didn't even exist (trinity) within the "church".
The only "trinity" the apostles and so-called "earchy church
fathers"
knew of was:

 that the Father, Son and holy spirit were in union. They recognized
the Father and God of Jesus (YHWH), they recognized the Son of God and
they recognized holy spirit as  God's force. Jesus was God only in the
sense of being a "mighty one" and because he spoke as if God (no
different than Moses in that respect- see Ex. 4:15; 7:1). This "agency"
where for all intensive puposes the messender *is* the sender.

Trinitarians simply refuse to comprehend that the Hebrew and Greek
terms for "God" are not limited the way English may be. The Biblical
usage of the word "God" cannot be defined by English and it's
semantics.

The holy spirit is "God" only in the sense it is God's power- his force
that accomplishes his will. It's not a person. Because of the early
"christians" need to explain and/or understand Christianity in
philosophic terms they allowed Greek philosophy to distort the Bible's
clear message. The trinity you believe in TODAY of three in one triune
all three being co-equal, co-equal,, etc..is merely a borrowing and
refashioning from Plato.

PLATO, it is thought, lived from 428 to 347 before Christ. While he did
not teach the Trinity in its present form, his philosophies paved the
way for it. Later, philosophical movements that included triadic
beliefs sprang up, and these were influenced by Plato's ideas of God
and nature.

The French Nouveau Dictionnaire Universel (New Universal Dictionary)
says of Plato's influence: "The Platonic trinity, itself merely a
rearrangement of older trinities dating back to earlier peoples,
appears to be the rational philosophic trinity of attributes that gave
birth to the three hypostases or divine persons taught by the Christian
churches. . . . This Greek philosopher's conception of the divine
trinity . . . can be found in all the ancient [pagan] religions."

The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge shows the
influence of this Greek philosophy: "The doctrines of the Logos and
the Trinity received their shape from Greek Fathers, who . . . were
much influenced, directly or indirectly, by the Platonic philosophy . .
.. That errors and corruptions crept into the Church from this source
can not be denied."

The Church of the First Three Centuries says: "The doctrine of the
Trinity was of gradual and comparatively late formation; . . . it had
its origin in a source entirely foreign from that of the Jewish and
Christian Scriptures; . . . it grew up, and was ingrafted on
Christianity, through the hands of the Platonizing Fathers."

By the end of the third century C.E., "Christianity" and the new
Platonic philosophies became inseparably united. As Adolf Harnack
states in Outlines of the History of Dogma, church doctrine became
"firmly rooted in the soil of Hellenism [pagan Greek thought].
Thereby it became a mystery to the great majority of Christians."

The church claimed that its new doctrines were based on the Bible. But
Harnack says: "In reality it legitimized in its midst the Hellenic
speculation, the superstitious views and customs of pagan
mystery-worship."

In the book A Statement of Reasons, Andrews Norton says of the Trinity:
"We can trace the history of this doctrine, and discover its source,
not in the Christian revelation, but in the Platonic philosophy . . .
The Trinity is not a doctrine of Christ and his Apostles, but a fiction
of the school of the later Platonists."

Thus, in the fourth century C.E., the apostasy foretold by Jesus and
the apostles came into full bloom. Development of the Trinity was just
one evidence of this. The apostate churches also began embracing other
pagan ideas, such as hellfire, immortality of the soul, and idolatry.
Spiritually speaking, Christendom had entered its foretold dark ages,
dominated by a growing "man of lawlessness" clergy class.-2
Thessalonians 2:3, 7.

 Besides according to some of  the so-called "early church fathers
JESUS WAS CREATED. Why haven't any of you acknowledge this point? It is
a giant elephant in the room that you are trying to ignore.

>The first is obvious. It is the failure to hold to the historic
>teachings of the Church.

The irony is that what you believe is part of the foretold apostasy.
See 1 Tim 4:1; 2 Thess, 2:3; Acts 20:30; 2 Pet. 2:1,3. The "church" you
refer to is the Roman Catholic Church. You have history badly garbled.

>Arius and his followers were not ignorant of Scriptures yet erred by
>drawing wrong inferences from the teachings of the generation of the
>Son.  They were unable to accept the idea of a pre-existent Son who
was >not also created, contrary to passages that indicated the equality
of the >Father and the Son.

In reality Arius was objecting to the pagan pollution that infiltrated
pure Christianity- he argued against the unBiblical doctrine of the
trinity not against the Bible. I'm not a fan of Arius by any means and
I don't recognize him as important in the least to this issue.
Trinitarians use Arius to build their strawmen.

**Additionally the early "church fathers" believe Jesus was a created
angel! (elephant again). Even if Ignatius had said that the Son was
equal to the Father in eternity, power, position, and wisdom, it would
still not be a Trinity, for nowhere did he say that the holy spirit was
equal to God in those ways. But Ignatius did not say that the Son was
equal to God the Father in such ways or in any other. Instead, he
showed that the Son is in subjection to the One who is superior,
Almighty God.

Ignatius calls Almighty God "the only true God, the unbegotten and
unapproachable, the Lord of all, the Father and Begetter of the
only-begotten Son," showing the distinction between God and His Son.
He speaks of "God the Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ." And he
declares: "There is one God, the Almighty, who has manifested Himself
by Jesus Christ His Son."

Ignatius shows that the Son was not eternal as a person but was
created, for he has the Son saying: "The Lord [Almighty God] created
Me, the beginning of His ways." Similarly, Ignatius said: "There is
one God of the universe, the Father of Christ, 'of whom are all
things;' and one Lord Jesus Christ, our Lord, 'by whom are all
things.'"He also writes:

"The Holy Spirit does not speak His own things, but those of Christ,
.. . . even as the Lord also announced to us the things that He received
from the Father. For, says He [the Son], 'the word which ye hear is
not Mine, but the Father's, who sent Me.'"

"There is one God who manifested himself through Jesus Christ his
Son, who is his Word which proceeded from silence and in every respect
pleased him [God] who sent him. . . . Jesus Christ was subject to the
Father."

True, Ignatius calls the Son "God the Word." But using the word
"God" for the Son does not necessarily mean equality with Almighty
God. The Bible also calls the Son "God" at Isaiah 9:6. John 1:18
calls the Son "the only-begotten god." Being vested with power and
authority from YHWH God, the Father, the Son could properly be termed a
"mighty one," which is what "god" basically means.-Matthew
28:18; 1 Corinthians 8:6; Hebrews 1:2.

>This ties in nicely with the second reason for heresy, the
>unwillingness to accept and live with tension in Christian theology.

There was no tension concerning the identity of the Son in the 1st
Century because they understood Koine Greek. They knew that Jesus being
called "God" was in a limited sense- it was qualitative. Jesus was the
Son of God. No real Christian thought he was "the only true God" that
Jesus himself prayed to. (John 17:3; Rev. 3:2,12). As regards the
identity of the Son the tension begand when the church felt the need to
express it's views in philosophy. The nonsensical concept of the
trinity caused tension becuase it was attempting to put a square peg
through a round hole.

The rest of your post has nothing to do with the Bible or the 1st
Century so I don't see a reason to respond to the opinions of men.

The bottom line is this. The Jews never believed in the "trinity as you
define it". Had this been a new revelation for them Paul would have
spent time explaining it clearly to the disciples just as he did
concerning Law, circumcision, Abraham's true children, the new
covenant, etc...There is not a single paragraph in any of his- or any
other writer's- letters explaing this mysterious trinity. You may pull
scriptures that at first blush seem to support your view but context
and an understanding of Biblical language and usage reveals the true
interpretation.

Why didn't Paul feel the need to explain the alleged tri-unity of YHWH?
Because he never would have accepted such heresy. You will draw guffaws
if you think it was already assumed by these Christians in the 1st
Century that YHWH was a triune bring. They still believed in the Shema
(Deut. 6:4-6) "Hear oh Israel, Jehovah your God is one.."

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