“The Son is equal to his Father”

[Soapy]

@Soapy

In Genesis 1:26-27 God says, " 'Let us make man in our image, in our likeness.' So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them."

Who or what does the 'us' refer to in this passage?

Groan….!!!! Sigh….!!! Not this again!!!????

It’s late in the evening here in the uk and I’m nearly ready for bed. Please excuse me if the thought of answering you with over-trodden reality doesn’t appeal to me right this moment.

I tell you what, though… let me put it in a nutshell:

• God uses his angels to carry out his desires - his biddings - his commands. That’s what God created angels to do. There are tier layers of such spirit creatures (Created Beings of Spirit alone, nothing physical). Angels are HIGHLY INTELLIGENT and IMMENSELY POWERFUL.
• Angels CAN, when authorised, MATERIALISE a physical body in the physical world and DEMATERIALISE it when they leave back to the spirit realm (it’s no really a ‘going to’ but it’s the only analogy our minds can fathom!) We often read in scriptures of angels appearing as ‘Men’ in pure white apparel. It’s not really ‘Male’ as angels have no gender, and their ‘body’ and ‘clothing’ is only a mirage so that humans can visualise them - an angel ‘in raw’ is a terrifying sight that would kill a human being from fright!!!
• Angels MUST DO what God commands them to do… There is no room for failure … BUT angels have wisdom and enough intelligence to know that they can ‘drift’ the direct command as long as the result is holy and ultimately true to God’s command. In the story of LOT, the angels were commanded to get LOT out of Sodom along with Lots relatives. Lot begged them to let him go into the mountains instead of the city God had commanded them to take Lot to. The angels ACCEPTED the change of plan but note that if succeeded by getting Lot and his family (minus the ‘unwedded-Son in laws’ who refrained from leaving!!) out of Sodom as God had commanded. However, Lot caused his own demise by going into the mountain where there were no people - leaving his daughters without ‘Husbands’… and they then did a wicked deed!! The angels were not reported to have done anything wrong - they fulfilled their task.
• Among the greatest of angels, in fact THE GREATEST of angels is the one given the human name, ‘Lucifer’, for our convenience - angels do not, by and large, carry NAMES to identify them. Bug for the sake of humanity we do so. We indenting ‘Gabriel’, and ‘Michael’ as we need to identify certain angels for good reasons. So, we say, ‘Lucifer’, as Gods greatest angel. Lucifer was says to be the most gloriously adorned (spiritually) of all angels, the most powerful, the most intelligent, the one closest to God, himself…. But yet ONLY AN ANGEL…..
• All things carried to create the world and all things in it were carried out by Angels under God’s command. The COMMAND, the order, the WORD to create, how, when, why, are GODS… Angels are NOT TO BE GLORIFIED and therefore no mention is made of their ACTS in this regard. BUT LUCIFER was God’s greatest angel and so when the decision to make a ruling ‘animal’ over all animals, God glorified himself saying He would make this creature to be IN HIS IMAGE… and God commissioned LUCIFER to create THE BODY (only) OF THIS CREATURE He called ‘MAN’ and the family name of ‘Mankind’, AFTER HIS IMAGE.
• Now you can see that THERE ARE TWO EVENTS happening:
  1. The CREATION OF THE BODY
  2. THE INSPIRITING OF THE BODY
• “Let us create man in OUR image” - It means only that man should be ‘HAVE INTELLIGENCE AND POWER TO RULE’ like LUCIFER and GOD.
• But note CAREFULLY… Lucifer created the body… BUT GOD MADE IT ALIVE!!!
• A BODY is just ‘DUST OF THE EARTH’ but it is not ALIVE until a spirit is put into it. Only GOD can put an independent self willed spirit in a body so as to animate - and so the Bible says that GOD CREATED MAN… After Lucifer sinned and became known as ‘The Satan’ and ‘The devil’, he persuaded other angels to rebel with him by telling them that God had lied to man and that he could rule better. Many of those DEMON angels ‘MADE BODIES FOR THEMSELVES’ and PUT THEIR OWN SPIRIT INTO THOSE BODIES and came into the earth to take human females and procreated with thdm to make offspring called ‘Nephilims’, gross humanoids. Angels can make human-like BODIES but could only put THEMSELF into those bodies in order to make them animated. When God destroyed them, those demons simply LOST THEIR BODY but God ‘locked their Spirits away in metaphorical chains in darkness’ so they could no longer affect the spirit nor physical world.
• Note also that God created A MAN ONLY in the first instance. Adam, the man, would be ANDROGYNOUS, having the ability to PROCREATE from himself. But God saw it would be bad for such a thing to be and so God TOOK OUT OF ADAM that which he deemed and fashioned them into ANOTHER HUMAN BEING which Adam called in Hebrew, ‘WO-MAN’, meaning, ‘Taken out of Man’!!. Many people falsely believe that God created both male and female AT THE SAME TIME. But read the Bible yourself and see what if says… do not just read THE SUMMARY VERSION of the creation of man!!!

‘Let us’… If it were the case that scriptures many times mentioned God as ‘Us’ and ‘We’ and ‘Our’,then there may have been a case for a multiple as one (Why does ‘Us’ and ‘We’ mean THREE… whg not two, or four, or 100…?) but yet God is spoken of as ONE and expressed as ‘I’, ‘Me’, ‘Myself’, implying ‘one alone’!

 

[Dimi95]

Groan….!!!! Sigh….!!! Not this again!!!????

It’s late in the evening here in the uk and I’m nearly ready for bed. Please excuse me if the thought of answering you with over-trodden reality doesn’t appeal to me right this moment.

I tell you what, though… let me put it in a nutshell:

• God uses his angels to carry out his desires - his biddings - his commands. That’s what God created angels to do. There are tier layers of such spirit creatures (Created Beings of Spirit alone, nothing physical). Angels are HIGHLY INTELLIGENT and IMMENSELY POWERFUL.
• Angels CAN, when authorised, MATERIALISE a physical body in the physical world and DEMATERIALISE it when they leave back to the spirit realm (it’s no really a ‘going to’ but it’s the only analogy our minds can fathom!) We often read in scriptures of angels appearing as ‘Men’ in pure white apparel. It’s not really ‘Male’ as angels have no gender, and their ‘body’ and ‘clothing’ is only a mirage so that humans can visualise them - an angel ‘in raw’ is a terrifying sight that would kill a human being from fright!!!
• Angels MUST DO what God commands them to do… There is no room for failure … BUT angels have wisdom and enough intelligence to know that they can ‘drift’ the direct command as long as the result is holy and ultimately true to God’s command. In the story of LOT, the angels were commanded to get LOT out of Sodom along with Lots relatives. Lot begged them to let him go into the mountains instead of the city God had commanded them to take Lot to. The angels ACCEPTED the change of plan but note that if succeeded by getting Lot and his family (minus the ‘unwedded-Son in laws’ who refrained from leaving!!) out of Sodom as God had commanded. However, Lot caused his own demise by going into the mountain where there were no people - leaving his daughters without ‘Husbands’… and they then did a wicked deed!! The angels were not reported to have done anything wrong - they fulfilled their task.
• Among the greatest of angels, in fact THE GREATEST of angels is the one given the human name, ‘Lucifer’, for our convenience - angels do not, by and large, carry NAMES to identify them. Bug for the sake of humanity we do so. We indenting ‘Gabriel’, and ‘Michael’ as we need to identify certain angels for good reasons. So, we say, ‘Lucifer’, as Gods greatest angel. Lucifer was says to be the most gloriously adorned (spiritually) of all angels, the most powerful, the most intelligent, the one closest to God, himself…. But yet ONLY AN ANGEL…..
• All things carried to create the world and all things in it were carried out by Angels under God’s command. The COMMAND, the order, the WORD to create, how, when, why, are GODS… Angels are NOT TO BE GLORIFIED and therefore no mention is made of their ACTS in this regard. BUT LUCIFER was God’s greatest angel and so when the decision to make a ruling ‘animal’ over all animals, God glorified himself saying He would make this creature to be IN HIS IMAGE… and God commissioned LUCIFER to create THE BODY (only) OF THIS CREATURE He called ‘MAN’ and the family name of ‘Mankind’, AFTER HIS IMAGE.
• Now you can see that THERE ARE TWO EVENTS happening:
  1. The CREATION OF THE BODY
  2. THE INSPIRITING OF THE BODY
• “Let us create man in OUR image” - It means only that man should be ‘HAVE INTELLIGENCE AND POWER TO RULE’ like LUCIFER and GOD.
• But note CAREFULLY… Lucifer created the body… BUT GOD MADE IT ALIVE!!!
• A BODY is just ‘DUST OF THE EARTH’ but it is not ALIVE until a spirit is put into it. Only GOD can put an independent self willed spirit in a body so as to animate - and so the Bible says that GOD CREATED MAN… After Lucifer sinned and became known as ‘The Satan’ and ‘The devil’, he persuaded other angels to rebel with him by telling them that God had lied to man and that he could rule better. Many of those DEMON angels ‘MADE BODIES FOR THEMSELVES’ and PUT THEIR OWN SPIRIT INTO THOSE BODIES and came into the earth to take human females and procreated with thdm to make offspring called ‘Nephilims’, gross humanoids. Angels can make human-like BODIES but could only put THEMSELF into those bodies in order to make them animated. When God destroyed them, those demons simply LOST THEIR BODY but God ‘locked their Spirits away in metaphorical chains in darkness’ so they could no longer affect the spirit nor physical world.
• Note also that God created A MAN ONLY in the first instance. Adam, the man, would be ANDROGYNOUS, having the ability to PROCREATE from himself. But God saw it would be bad for such a thing to be and so God TOOK OUT OF ADAM that which he deemed and fashioned them into ANOTHER HUMAN BEING which Adam called in Hebrew, ‘WO-MAN’, meaning, ‘Taken out of Man’!!. Many people falsely believe that God created both male and female AT THE SAME TIME. But read the Bible yourself and see what if says… do not just read THE SUMMARY VERSION of the creation of man!!!

‘Let us’… If it were the case that scriptures many times mentioned God as ‘Us’ and ‘We’ and ‘Our’,then there may have been a case for a multiple as one (Why does ‘Us’ and ‘We’ mean THREE… whg not two, or four, or 100…?) but yet God is spoken of as ONE and expressed as ‘I’, ‘Me’, ‘Myself’, implying ‘one alone’!

Read the other answer.
Isaiah 40:14 says otherwise.

You need to learn Hebrew more.

 

[Dimi95]

In Deuteronomy 32 the language originally said that the nations were assigned by El according to the number of his sons and daughters, which fits perfectly with the statement that Israel is Yahweh's inheritance or portion. Yahweh was just another one of El's sons in the old polytheism of Israel.

Also in Genesis, when the human couple ate the fruit of knowledge, God said “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”
In Job 1, the sons of gods came to present themselves before the Lord.

I can not really understand how there are people who believe the Old Testament is faultless.

The word "elohim" literally means "gods." It is used with this denotation, with the meaning of pagan or false gods, almost 200 times.

Ddeuteronomy 28
"If you are not careful to observe all the words of this law which are written in this book, to fear this honored and awesome name, the LORD [YHWH] your God"

 

[Ajax]

A BODY is just ‘DUST OF THE EARTH’ but it is not ALIVE until a spirit is put into it. Only GOD can put an independent self willed spirit in a body so as to animate - and so the Bible says that GOD CREATED MAN

It depends on who wrote each book..for example it is accepted that there were at least three or even more authors for Genesis...

Also I'm sorry but you don't need a spirit to become alive, neither a soul. The scientific consensus holds that the mind is a complex machine that operates on the same physical laws as all other objects in the universe. According to this consensus, there is currently no scientific evidence whatsoever to support the existence of soul. There is no need for a soul, since all soul's theoretical functions are carried out by the brain. There is no need for an invisible, immaterial and odorless substance.

In many religious and philosophical traditions, the soul is the spiritual essence of a person, which includes one's identity, personality and memories. If that is the case everybody should be able to tell us from their soul memories, what they experienced during the first year in their life, or even better in their mother's womb . Nobody can, because the memories and feelings originate in the brain and at this early age, the brain has not developed enough. When after death our brain decomposes, we have no memories, no feelings, no consciousness and....no soul. Sorry!!

 

[Dimi95]

There is no need for a soul, since all soul's theoretical functions are carried out by the brain.

But not fully controlled.

 

[Ajax]

It is widely accepted that ancient Israelites were predominantly polytheistic during most or all of the monarchic period. Yahwistic monotheism appears to develop only in the neo-Babylonian period and does not become the dominant religious expression until the Persian period.

Research Portal

researchportal.murdoch.edu.au

 

[Ajax]

But not fully controlled.

100% controlled

 

[Dimi95]

It is widely accepted that ancient Israelites were predominantly polytheistic during most or all of the monarchic period. Yahwistic monotheism appears to develop only in the neo-Babylonian period and does not become the dominant religious expression until the Persian period.

Research Portal

researchportal.murdoch.edu.au

Irrelevant to the topic.

We discuss kontext , not History.

 

[Dimi95]

100% controlled

Nope

The soul has three parts : mind , emotion and will.

We do not control it fully.

Can We Control Our Thoughts? Why Do Thoughts Pop into My Head as I'm Trying to Fall Asleep?

www.scientificamerican.com

 

[ppp]

Irrelevant to the topic.

We discuss kontext , not History.

The context is that when those stores were spun the Hebrews were worshipers of one of the gods in the Canaanite pantheon. So the 'us' refers to the gods of that pantheon.

 

[Ajax]

We discuss kontext , not History.

I was replying to this and agree with what you wrote

We discuss kontext , not History.

 

[Dimi95]

The context is that when those stores were spun the Hebrews were worshipers of one of the gods in the Canaanite pantheon. So the 'us' refers to the gods of that pantheon.

Elohim is the plural of ʾĔlōah and can be also singular.

Like in the verse i mentioned.
Also in Genesis 1:1
Also in Isaiah

When referring to Yahweh, elohim very often is accompanied by the article ha-, to mean, in combination, 'the God' and sometimes with a further identification Elohim ḥayyim, meaning 'the living God'

"The Israelites probably borrowed the Canaanite plural noun Elohim and made it singular in meaning in their cultic practices and theological reflections."
Source : Elohim | Ancient, Monotheistic, Supreme Being

 

[Nakosis]

I think the Bible indicates the son has the authority as his father does, but not equal.

That was my thought when I was a Christian.

Philippians 2:6 equates Jesus with God.
In my religious/Christian training worshiping Jesus was equal to worshiping God as they were one in the same. It was all about Jesus since in the worship of Jesus nothing about God was excluded.
Of course, how many thousands of versions of Christian belief exist.
Maybe that is a good thing since no one of them can gain enough power to take over the world.

The problem with Islam is they only got two versions. They need more.

 

[Trailblazer]

@Soapy

In Genesis 1:26-27 God says, " 'Let us make man in our image, in our likeness.' So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them."

Who or what does the 'us' refer to in this passage?

Who do you think us refers to?

 

[Soapy]

Read the other answer.
Isaiah 40:14 says otherwise.

You need to learn Hebrew more.

• “Whom did the LORD consult to enlighten him, and who taught him the right way? Who was it that taught him knowledge, or showed him the path of understanding?” (Isaiah 40:14)

Did you mean to post a verse that proves against you?

God did not ASK for enlightenment … GOD said, ‘LET US …’. That is a DIRECTIVE… not a REQUEST FOR ENLIGHTENMENT.

Were you just kneejerking a reply because you saw the truth in what I wrote to you?

‘The Satan’ (Lucifer) desired worship from man just as God was given worshipped by man. Why did ‘Satan’ do this if he had nothing to do with the creation of man - the body of the man as we know that God alone put the spirit into the man to make the BODY alive. A lifeless body is of no consequence in terms of glory… Satan was not to be glorified for creating the body…

Who created the bodies of all those other millions of millions of animals?
Who put the animating spirit in them?
Are they one act - or two?
Who gets the glory of the result of the two acts?

Glorifying an angel might well lead to WORSHIP of then hence God denies them such an act upon them. But Satan’s deception should underline exactly why he was, in particular, not to be worshipped despite his action in creation.

GOD, the Father, ALONE, is the creator! Not THREE, not TWO, but ONE ALONE.

‘Father’ means:

• ‘He who creates’
• ‘He who brings into being’
• ‘He who GIVES LIFE …’

Many sects of Christianity claim that Jesus was the creator … but jesus is never is called ‘Father’ (‘Eternal Father’ is a title for jesus AT THE END OF TIME… not linked at all to creation IN THE BEGINNING OF TIME)

 

[stvdv]

I have been trying to research from the Christian Bible the idea that:

• ‘A son is equal to his Father’

I can, nowhere, find such a schema from Judaism or Christianity

I found it in the Christianity and in Islam

 

[Soapy]

I found it in the Christianity and in Islam

Please tell us more…

 

[stvdv]

Please tell us more…

Christianity claims:
"All are children of the Father (God)"

Father is a child of God
Father's son is a child of God

q.e.d. "Father and son are equal"
(In the sense of "incarnations of the Divine")
(And the Divine POV is what is most important)

 

[Ajax]

Nope

The soul has three parts : mind , emotion and will.

We do not control it fully.

You're in a hurry...First you have to prove there is a soul, contrary to the consensus of scientists...unless you can describe in full detail what you did in the first year of your life.

 

[Soapy]

Christianity claims:
"All are children of the Father (God)"

Father is a child of God
Father's son is a child of God

q.e.d. "Father and son are equal"
(In the sense of "incarnations of the Divine")
(And the Divine POV is what is most important)

….. ????