Section: 2B1 - Pre-trinity ideas.
Number of quotes: 102
Age of Constantine the Great, The
Jacob Burckhardt
Book ID: 614 Page: 371
Section:
2B1,3C
The century was eager to find a new home for its thoughts and aspirations.
Quote ID: 9359
Time Periods:
4
Ancient Rome by Robert Payne
Robert Payne
Book ID: 16 Page: 15
Section:
2B1
The temple was approached by a high stairway reaching to a platform with colonnaded portico opening on three chambers, the larger chamber being occupied by a powerful god while the side chambers were occupied by his divine attendants. All over ancient Etruria we find traces of such temples. When they built the great temple to Jupiter on the Capitoline hill, the Romans imitated the Etruscans by building a high stairway, a portico, and three chambers - one for Jupiter, one for Juno, and one for Minerva.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 259
Time Periods:
0
Ancient Rome by Robert Payne
Robert Payne
Book ID: 16 Page: 33
Section:
2B1
The temple he built to the trio of gods on the Capitoline was to be his most lasting
memorial and the first major monument in Rome. (Tarquinius Superbus)
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 262
Time Periods:
0
Ancilla To the Pre-Socratic Philosophers: A complete translation of the Fragments in Diels
Kathleen Freeman
Book ID: 19 Page: 70
Section:
2B1
36. ION OF CHIOS was active between 452 and 421 B.C. He wrote tragedies, lyrics and other poems; also a philosophical work in prose called Triagmos (‘Triad’) or Triagmoi. I. The beginning of my work is: everything is Three and nothing more or less than these three. The virtue of each thing is a Triad: intelligence, strength, luck.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 365
Time Periods:
0
Arnobius, ANF Vol. 6, Fathers of the Third Century
Edited by Alexander Roberts
Book ID: 659 Page: 419
Section:
2B1
“We Christians are nothing else than worshippers of the Supreme King and Head, under our Master, Christ.”
PJ footnote reference: Arnobius, Against the Heathen, I.27.
Note: Arnobius is on the fence. He does not outright deny the existence of the gods, but says only that he worships the Supreme God, under Christ.
Quote ID: 9458
Time Periods:
34
Arnobius, ANF Vol. 6, Fathers of the Third Century
Edited by Alexander Roberts
Book ID: 659 Page: 424
Section:
2B1
Is that Christ of yours a god, then? some raving, wrathful, and excited man will say. A god, we will reply, and the god of the inner powers; {7} and—what may still further torture unbelievers with the most bitter pains—He was sent to us by the King Supreme for a purpose of the very highest moment.
PJ footnote reference: Arnobius, Against the Heathen, I.42.
Quote ID: 9461
Time Periods:
4
Arnobius, ANF Vol. 6, Fathers of the Third Century
Edited by Alexander Roberts
Book ID: 659 Page: 431
Section:
2B1
But, you will say, “He was cut off by death as men are.” Not Christ Himself; for it is impossible either that death should befall what is divine, or that that should waste away and disappear in death which is one in its substance, and not compounded, nor formed by bringing together any parts. “Who, then,” you ask, “was seen hanging on the cross? Who dead?” The human form, I reply, which He had put on, and which He bore about with Him.
PJ footnote reference: Arnobius, Against the Heathen, I.62.
Quote ID: 9462
Time Periods:
34
Arnobius, ANF Vol. 6, Fathers of the Third Century
Edited by Alexander Roberts
Book ID: 659 Page: 431
Section:
2B1
“What, then?” says my opponent. “Could not the Supreme Ruler have brought about those things which He had ordained to be done in the world without feigning Himself a man?”
PJ footnote reference: Arnobius, Against the Heathen, I.62
Quote ID: 9463
Time Periods:
4
Ausonius, LCL 115: Ausonius I, Books 1-17
Several
Book ID: 133 Page: 17
Section:
2B1,3C,3C1,3D
Book II The Daily Round or the Doings of a Whole Day
Paragraph III The Prayer Line 6-12
He only may behold thee and, face to face, hear thy bidding and sit at thy fatherly right-hand who is himself the Maker of all things, himself the Cause of all created things, himself the Word of God, the Word which is God, who was before the world which he was to make, begotten at that time when Time was not yet, who came into being before the Sun’s beams and the bright Morning-Star enlightened the sky.
Quote ID: 2929
Time Periods:
4
Caesars & Saints: The Rise of the Christian State, A.D. 180-313
Stewart Perowne
Book ID: 44 Page: 55
Section:
2B1
an Egyptian triad: Isis, Serapis, and Horus, their son.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 975
Time Periods:
047
Catechism Of The Catholic Church
Pope John Paul II
Book ID: 48 Page: 69
Section:
2B1,5A
The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 1098
Time Periods:
47
Celtic Sacred Landscapes
Nigel Pennick
Book ID: 51 Page: 162
Section:
2B1
(Caption) Image of the three-breasted saint Gwen Teirbron, with her three saintly children. Known in England as St Candida or St White, Gwen Teirbron is a Christian aspect of the bounteous threefold earth mother goddess. From the Church of St Venec, Brittany.
Pastor John Note: [There is a picture of this also marked on this page.]
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 1149
Time Periods:
0
Celtic Sacred Landscapes
Nigel Pennick
Book ID: 51 Page: 173
Section:
2B1
The cultus of St Brigid of Kildare is the epitome of this process, encapsulating every aspect of Celtic religion. Brigid was a threefold light-goddess, whose festival was Imbolc (I February).
The coming into being of St Brigid was a remarkable accommodation of polytheism in a monotheistic framework, permitting the continuation of women’s mysteries under the aegis of patriarchal monotheism.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 1152
Time Periods:
567
Christian Liturgy: Catholic and Evangelical
Frank C. Senn
Book ID: 54 Page: 30
Section:
2A4,2B1
The profound water symbolism of baptism appeals to something aboriginal in human nature. Eating and drinking in the eucharist employ our most primal appetites. The image of the God-human may be at least five thousand years old, and the symbol of the trinity may be even older.{2}
[footnote 2] See Carl-Gustav Jung, Psychology and Religion (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1938), 56ff.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 1209
Time Periods:
2
Christians as the Romans Saw Them, The
Robert L. Wilken
Book ID: 201 Page: 55
Section:
2B1
Then the praetor Helvidius Priscus, guided in the ritual by the pontifex Plautius Aelianus, purified the area by the sacrifice of pig, sheep and ox, and offered up the entrails upon a turf altar, praying to Jupiter, Juno and Minerva, as the deities that ruled the empire,.....
Quote ID: 4543
Time Periods:
01
Christians as the Romans Saw Them, The
Robert L. Wilken
Book ID: 201 Page: 106
Section:
2B1
When Origen read Celsus’s statement that Christians set up Jesus as equal to, or even greater than, the one high God, he said that Celsus had obviously got things wrong because we “do not hold that the son is mightier than the Father, but inferior” (c. Cels. 8.15)! For Origen, Jesus is clearly subordinate to God the Father.
PJ: non-Trinitarian
Quote ID: 4562
Time Periods:
2
Christians as the Romans Saw Them, The
Robert L. Wilken
Book ID: 201 Page: 107
Section:
2B,2B1
“In the midst of such contention, strife, and disagreement on other matters,” wrote Maximus of Tyre, a second-century pagan intellectual, “you would see in all the earth one harmonious law and principle that there is one God, king and father of all, and many gods, sons of God, fellow rulers with God. The Greek says this, and the barbarian says it, the mainlander and the seafarer, the wise and the unwise” (Or. 11.5; ed. Holbein). When a person worshipped these lesser gods, it was assumed that he or she was also worshipping the one high god. Such worship did not detract from the honor shown the highest god, nor did it, in the view of the ancients, threaten the belief that God was one.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 4565
Time Periods:
2
Christians as the Romans Saw Them, The
Robert L. Wilken
Book ID: 201 Page: 119
Section:
2B1,2D3B
If you taught them, the Christians, that Jesus is not God’s Son, but that God is Father of all, and that we really ought to worship him alone, they would no longer be willing to listen to you unless you included Jesus as well, who is the author of their sedition. Indeed, when they call him Son of God, it is not because they are paying very great reverence to God, but because they are exalting Jesus greatly.” c. Cels. 8.14
PJ: Celsus was a 2nd century fellow. Dates unknown. Origen wrote his “refutation” in 248.
Quote ID: 4568
Time Periods:
23
Christians as the Romans Saw Them, The
Robert L. Wilken
Book ID: 201 Page: 148
Section:
2B,2B1,4A
If all that was known of Porphyry’s attack on Christianity were what we have discussed thus far, it would be hard to imagine why his work was so feared by Christians. This is* precisely the conclusion to which a recent writer on Porphyry’s Against the Christians has come. “That its burning should have been thought necessary as late as 448 is sufficient evidence of its power to move men’s minds. Yet when we look at the undoubtedly genuine fragments it is difficult to see why such a fear existed if they are indeed characteristic of the whole.”{11}
[Footnote 11] Meredith, 1136.
Porphyry was feared because he also wrote another book, the Philosophy from Oracles, and this work sets forth more fundamental criticism of Christianity. In it Porphyry provided a sympathetic account and a defense of the traditional religions of the Greco-Roman world, and he sought to make a place within this scheme for the new religion founded by Jesus of Nazereth.
....sophisticated thinkers such as Porphyry or Celsus believed that though there was one supreme God this did not prevent people from believing in other lesser gods. The term divine designated a category of being stretching from the one high God down through the Olympian gods, the visible gods (e.g., the stars), the daimones, and finally to heroes or deified men. The supreme God presided over a company of gods.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 4580
Time Periods:
23
Christians as the Romans Saw Them, The
Robert L. Wilken
Book ID: 201 Page: 149
Section:
2B,2B1
Each type of god required a different form of worship. To the one supreme God only spiritual worship of the mind and heart was thought appropriate, whereas to other gods it was proper to bring sacrifices.
“The first God is incorporeal, immovable, and invisible and is in need of nothing external to himself.” Hence, to this god “who is above all things, one sacrifices neither with incense, nor dedicates anything sensible to him....Neither is vocal language nor internal speech adapted to the highest god...but we should venerate him in profound silence with a pure soul, and with pure conceptions about him” (Abst. 2.37, 34.) To his “progeny,” however, “hymns, recited orally, are to be offered.” To other gods, like the stars, sacrifices of inanimate objects are fitting, whereas to lower gods, religious observances and other sacrifices should be offered. The daimones, for example, love the smell of burning flesh (Abst. 2.42).
...from Plutarch that illustrates this point, and it may be helpful to cite it again. He says that some heroes are borne upward, “from men into heroes and from heroes into daimones....But from the daimones a few souls still, in the long reach of time, because of supreme excellence, come, after being purified, to share completely in divine qualities” (De def. Or. 415c).
Quote ID: 4581
Time Periods:
12
Closing of the Western Mind, The
Charles Freeman
Book ID: 205 Page: 73
Section:
2B1
The influence of Plato on Philo was so pronounced that, despite his Jewish background, Philo rejected Old Testament portrayals of God which talk of his face, his hands and his emotional power. As an entity who was beyond all human attributes and even beyond human understanding, he could not be classified in such an anthropomorphic way.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 4808
Time Periods:
01
Closing of the Western Mind, The
Charles Freeman
Book ID: 205 Page: 76
Section:
2B1
These in their turn project outwards to a “world soul,” which exists as a composite of all animate beings in the world although appearing as an individual soul in each human being. Each of the three entities exists as “lower” than the one above, but “the One’ does not lose anything of its goodness during the procession of nous--any more, said Plotinus, than the brightness of a lamp is diminished when it gives out light. ”The One,“ the nous and the world share a single substance (ousia), but each maintains in distinct nature, its hypostasis, or personality. Plotinus went on to argue that the ”lower“ states would always be attracted back to the "higher."
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 4811
Time Periods:
3
Closing of the Western Mind, The
Charles Freeman
Book ID: 205 Page: 264
Section:
2B1
Even if, after 381, Christ and the Holy Spirit were fully incorporated into the Godhead, Christianity could provide a mass of figures who had some form of “divine” status in the afterlife as companions of God, such as the Virgin Mary, the saints and the martyrs. Then there were the angels and demons whose combined presence filled the Christian world with as many supernatural presences as there had been in earlier times. It needs to be remembered that Christians continued to believe in the existence of the pagan gods--as demons. None of this world have been alien to pagans. G. W. Bowersock describes a number of instances, from Syria and Mesopotamia in particular, of gods being worshipped in groups of three.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 4961
Time Periods:
0123
Continuity and Change in Roman Religion
J. H. W. G. Liebeschuetz
Book ID: 313 Page: 264
Section:
3C1,2B1
The divinity of Jesus had to be reconciled with monotheism, but this was not difficult to do convincingly. After all, philosophers had managed to reconcile the infinite variety of gods of traditional religion with a monotheist picture of the world. Certainly Lactantius {*} insists on the divinity of the Son. ‘He who worships the Father only does not worship him at all, since he does not worship the Son. But he who receives the Son and bears his name, he together with the Son worships the Father also, since the Son is the ambassador and messenger and priest of the Father.’{1}
. . . .
Nevertheless, the claim made for Jesus was basically a familiar one. Seen in this way, he could take his place naturally in the long line of moral philosophers whose memory was held in high honour by educated Greeks and Romans. In fact this ‘theology’ would have been more acceptable to a pagan than to a well-informed Christian. Moreover, Lactantius’ God consists of two persons not three. There is no mention of the Holy Ghost.
John’s note: * Lactantius c. 250 – c. 325
{1} Div. Inst. iv. 29.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 7617
Time Periods:
34
Councils: First Council of Nicaea (Online Source)
From Wikipedia
Book ID: 89 Page: 11
Section:
2B1
The council of Nicaea dealt primarily with the issue of the deity of Christ. Over a century earlier the use of the term “Trinity” (Τριάς in Greek; trinitas in Latin) could be found in the writings of Origen (185-254) and Tertullian (160-220), and a general notion of a “divine three”, in some sense, was expressed in the second century writings of Polycarp, Ignatius, and Justin Martyr. In Nicaea, questions regarding the Holy Spirit were left largely unaddressed until after the relationship between the Father and the Son was settled around the year 362.{73} So the doctrine in a more full-fledged form was not formulated until the Council of Constantinople in 360 AD.{74}
Quote ID: 2354
Time Periods:
23
Cults of the Roman Empire, The
Robert Turcan
Book ID: 209 Page: 153
Section:
2B1
Officially endowed with the same epithets (‘Best and Greatest’) as Jupiter Capitolinus, like him the Baal of Heliopolis was at the centre of a triad formed with Venus and Mercury.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 5169
Time Periods:
012
Daily Life in Ancient Rome
Jerome Carcopino
Book ID: 72 Page: 122
Section:
2B1
A “conservative” like Juvenal, who professedly execrates all foreign superstitions, might at first sight appear to be devoted in every fibre to the national religion; and reading the delightful opening of satire XII, one might well imagine that he still loved it profoundly. He paints with charming freshness the preparations for one of the sacrifices to the Triad of the Capitol: {83} . . . .
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 2006
Time Periods:
12
Documents of the Christian Church
Edited by Henry Bettenson & Chris Maunder
Book ID: 74 Page: 32
Section:
2B1,3C1
A “conservative” like Juvenal, who professedly execrates all foreign superstitions, might at first sight appear to be devoted in every fibre to the national religion; and reading the delightful opening of satire XII, one might well imagine that he still loved it profoundly. He paints with charming freshness the preparations for one of the sacrifices to the Triad of the Capitol: {83} . . . .
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 2059
Time Periods:
4
Druids, The
Peter Berresford Ellis
Book ID: 212 Page: 112
Section:
2B1
The name of Ireland herself, Eire, is the name of one of the triune goddesses; her sisters being Banba and Fotla. Each goddess asked the Milesians to remember her by naming Ireland after her. Banba and Fotla were often used as synonyms, particularly in poetry, for Ireland. But the Druid, Amairgen, promised the goddess Eire that the children of Gael would use her name as the principle name of the country.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 5224
Time Periods:
0
Druids, The
Peter Berresford Ellis
Book ID: 212 Page: 128
Section:
2B1
As in the Greek world, so among the Celts, who saw homo sapiens as body, soul and spirit; the world they inhabited as earth, sea and air; the divisions of nature as animal, vegetable and mineral; the cardinal colours as red, yellow and blue and so forth. Three was the number of all things. Most of their gods were three personalities in one. Combinations of the figure three occur often in Celtic tales such as nine (three times three) and thirty-three.
Ireland itself is represented in the female triune goddess - Eire, Banba and Fotla. There were three Celtic craft gods - Goibhniu, Luchta and Creidhne. The goddess of fertility, of smiths and of healing and poetry, even The Dagda himself were worshipped in triune form. The most famous war goddess was the Morrigan, sometimes Morrigu, ‘great queen’, and she also appears interchangeable as Macha, Badb, and Nemain. She embodies all that is perverse and horrible among the supernatural powers.
Mother symbols were also worshipped in triple form; in Gaul the title matres or matronae was used, because the dedications on the monuments survive only in Latin. Mother Earth was the symbol of fertility and figures with children, baskets of fruit and horns of plenty are found all over the Celtic world. From Vertault in Burgundy comes a triple mother goddess sculpture with a baby held by one while the other holds a towel.
Christianity later adopted this triune godship (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost) - not from Judaic culture, to which it is alien, but from the Greek interpretation aided by the concepts of early Christian Fathers. The Gaulish Celt, Hilary, bishop of Poitiers, (c.AD 315-c.367) is regarded as one of the first native Celts to become an outstanding philosophical force in the Christian movement. And his great work was De Trinitate, defining the concept of the Holy Trinity, which is now so integral to Christian belief.
Diogenes Laertius observed that the Druids taught in the form of Triads. This is confirmed by the literary traditions of both Ireland and Wales.
PJ: Three in one.
Quote ID: 5226
Time Periods:
07
Dynamic Monarchianism: The Earliest Christology?
Thomas E. Gaston
Book ID: 418 Page: 12
Section:
2B1
…it is debatable how many Christians in the second and third century were truly Trinitarian.
PJ: non-Trinitarian
Quote ID: 8585
Time Periods:
23
Dynamic Monarchianism: The Earliest Christology?
Thomas E. Gaston
Book ID: 418 Page: 16
Section:
2B1
…we have little reliable source material with which to reconstruct his life and teachings.
PJ: Paul of Samosota?
Quote ID: 8587
Time Periods:
23
Dynamic Monarchianism: The Earliest Christology?
Thomas E. Gaston
Book ID: 418 Page: 25
Section:
2B1
There are reasons for doubting the accusations made against him.{32} Firstly, had there been credible charges of significant immorality against Paul then his excommunication could have been accomplished much more swiftly.
PJ: Paul of Samosota?
Quote ID: 8588
Time Periods:
34
Earliest Christian Heretics – Readings from Their Opponents, The
Edited By Arland J. Hultgren and Steven A. Haggmark
Book ID: 213 Page: 17
Section:
2B1,2D3B
Then there is a certain Marcion of Pontus, who is still teaching his converts that there is another God greater than the Fashioner. By the help of the demons he has made many in every race of men to blaspheme and to deny God the Marker of the universe, professing that there is another who is greater and has done greater things than he.
. . . .
Whether they commit the shameful deeds about which stories are told – the upsetting of the lamp, promiscuous intercourse, and the meals of human flesh, we do not know; but we are sure that they are neither prosecuted nor killed by you, on account of their teachings anyway.
Quote ID: 5232
Time Periods:
12
Earliest Christian Heretics – Readings from Their Opponents, The
Edited By Arland J. Hultgren and Steven A. Haggmark
Book ID: 213 Page: 52
Section:
2B1,2D3B
Hippolytus gives essentially the same information about the Carpocratians as Irenaeus. He makes additional claims, however, on the Carpocration teaching concerning Christ, who came down upon Jesus from the superior God,
PJ: non-Trinitarian
Quote ID: 5237
Time Periods:
234
Earliest Christian Heretics – Readings from Their Opponents, The
Edited By Arland J. Hultgren and Steven A. Haggmark
Book ID: 213 Page: 56
Section:
2B1,2D3B
7.1. Irenaeus, Against Heresies 1.24.1-2. Lyons, ca. A.D. 190.
. . . .
According to Irenaeus, the highest God for Saturninus is “unknown to all” and can be known only by revelation through Christ to believers – persons who have “the spark of life in them.”
Quote ID: 5238
Time Periods:
234
Earliest Christian Heretics – Readings from Their Opponents, The
Edited By Arland J. Hultgren and Steven A. Haggmark
Book ID: 213 Page: 136
Section:
2B1,2D3B
Dynamic Monarchianism holds the view that Jesus was a mere man, who was indeed born of Mary and the Holy Spirit, but to whom a great power (dynamis) was given at his baptism.
Quote ID: 5245
Time Periods:
234
Early Arianism: A View of Salvation
Robert C. Gregg and Dennis E. Groh
Book ID: 76 Page: 68
Section:
2B1
Irenaeus:
There is none other called God by the scriptures except the Father of all, and the Son, and those who possess the adoption. {104}
[Footnote 104] Iranaeus Adv. Haer. 4, Preface. See Ps. 82:6 and John 10:34ff., and Hans von Campenhausen, The Formation of the Christian Bible (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1972), p. 56 and n. 199.
Quote ID: 2097
Time Periods:
2
Early Christian Church, The
J.G. Davies
Book ID: 214 Page: 124
Section:
2B1
. . .while his Discourse with Heraclides shows him opposing a bishop’s doubtful opinions regarding the trinitarian question.
Pastor John’s note: ? in reference to “his”
Quote ID: 5287
Time Periods:
3
Early Christian Church, The
J.G. Davies
Book ID: 214 Page: 137
Section:
2B1
About the year 190 a Byzantine leather-worker named Theodotus came to Rome, teaching that Jesus was a mere man adopted as God’s son at his baptism when the divine power descended upon him.
Quote ID: 5295
Time Periods:
2
Early Christian Church, The
J.G. Davies
Book ID: 214 Page: 140
Section:
2B1
Tertullian’s trinitarian doctrine eventually became the norm for the western Church,
. . . .
Quote ID: 5297
Time Periods:
23
Early Christian Church, The
J.G. Davies
Book ID: 214 Page: 142
Section:
2B1,3C1
(Origen) So he declared that the Son is transcended by the Father in as great a degree as he himself transcends the best of all other beings. He could even call the Word a creature, in applying to him the Wisdom text of Prov. Viii.22: ‘God created me in the beginning of his ways.’
Quote ID: 5298
Time Periods:
4
Early Christian Church, The
J.G. Davies
Book ID: 214 Page: 176
Section:
2B1,3C1
Donatism was indeed a running sore in the side of the African Church, but it was confined to one area. Arianism set the whole of the empire afire, disrupting the Church’s life at all levels.
Quote ID: 5323
Time Periods:
234
Early Christian Doctrines
J. N. D. Kelly
Book ID: 428 Page: 91
Section:
2B1,2D3B
The Holy Spirit Clement regarded{4} as inspiring God’s prophets in all ages, as much the Old Testament writers as himself. But of the problem of the relation of the Three to each other he seems to have been oblivious.
Quote ID: 8702
Time Periods:
2
Early Christian Doctrines
J. N. D. Kelly
Book ID: 428 Page: 95
Section:
2B1
The Apologists were the first to try to frame an intellectually satisfying explanation of the relation of Christ to God the Father. They were all, as we have seen, ardent monotheists, determined at all costs not to compromise this fundamental truth. The solution they proposed, reduced to essentials, was that, as pre-existent, Christ was the Father’s thought or mind.
Quote ID: 8703
Time Periods:
2
Early Greek Philosophy, LCL 526: Early Greek Philosophy III
Translated by Andre Laks and Glenn W. Most
Book ID: 429 Page: 77
Section:
2B1
R2 (Metaphysics
Xenophanes, the first of those [scil. Together with Parmenides and Melissus] to have taught the One […].
Quote ID: 8705
Time Periods:
0
Early Greek Philosophy, LCL 526: Early Greek Philosophy III
Translated by Andre Laks and Glenn W. Most
Book ID: 429 Page: 77
Section:
2B1
For Xenophanes said of this one and whole that it is god. He demonstrated that he is one on the basis of the fact that he is the strongest of all; for, he says, if there were more than one, ruling would necessarily belong to all of them in a similar way....
Quote ID: 8706
Time Periods:
0
Early Greek Philosophy, LCL 526: Early Greek Philosophy III
Translated by Andre Laks and Glenn W. Most
Book ID: 429 Page: 103
Section:
2B1
[…]Xenophanes affirmed dogmatically, against the conceptions of all other humans, that the whole is one, that god is [scil. consubstantially] mixed with the nature of all things….
Quote ID: 8707
Time Periods:
0
Early Greek Philosophy, LCL 526: Early Greek Philosophy III
Translated by Andre Laks and Glenn W. Most
Book ID: 429 Page: 105
Section:
2B1
R22 (A35) Ps.-Galen, Philosophical History
[…]Xenophanes was in aporia about all things, and held as his only dogmatic view that all things are one and that this is god, who is limited, rational, and changeless […].
*John’s Note: aporia = an irresolvable internal contradiction or logical disjunction *
Quote ID: 8708
Time Periods:
0
Geoffrey of Monmouth: The History of the Kings of Brittain
Geoffrey of Monmouth
Book ID: 234 Page: 65
Section:
2B1
By the common consent of all, Brutus took with him the Augur Gero and twelve of the older men and set out for the temple, carrying everything necessary for a sacrifice. When they reached the place, they wrapped fillets round their brows and, according to the age-old rite, they set up three sacrificial hearths to the three gods: to Jupiter, that is, to Mercury and to Diana.
Quote ID: 5842
Time Periods:
0
Gods and the One God
Robert M. Grant
Book ID: 426 Page: 75
Section:
2B1
Against polytheism stood those who, usually followed philosophers, developed ideas about the unity of God or, as it is sometimes called, the divine monarchy. This idea was supported more often not by rejecting other gods in favor of one but by insisting upon the virtual identity of one god with others.
Quote ID: 8676
Time Periods:
0
Gods and the One God
Robert M. Grant
Book ID: 426 Page: 135
Section:
2B1
…in the early centuries the Christian doctrines about God—Father, Son, and Spirit—were remarkably flexible and that at least the emphases changed from one generation to another.
Quote ID: 8678
Time Periods:
123
Gods and the One God
Robert M. Grant
Book ID: 426 Page: 158
Section:
2B1,4A
This is to say that in beginning to develop the doctrine of the Trinity Christians made use of the methods already worked out among Platonists and Pythagoreans for explaining their own philosophical theology, in harmonious accord with pagan polytheism.
Quote ID: 8683
Time Periods:
34
Greatness that was Babylon, The
H.W.F Saggs
Book ID: 227 Page: 149
Section:
2B1
They then marched on the residence of the divine chief executive, Enlil, and compelled him to call two other senior gods for negotiation.
Pastor John’s notes: Trinity
Quote ID: 5749
Time Periods:
0
Greatness that was Babylon, The
H.W.F Saggs
Book ID: 227 Page: 283
Section:
2B1
The third of the great gods at the head of the pantheon was known under various designations, the two commonest being Enki, ‘Lord of the Ki’ (Ki meaning either ‘earth or subterranean region) and ‘Ea’ (god of) the house domain of water.
Pastor John’s notes: Enki or Ea
Quote ID: 5753
Time Periods:
0
Greatness that was Babylon, The
H.W.F Saggs
Book ID: 227 Page: 284
Section:
2B1
Deities representing the sun, moon and Venus formed a second group; they were known in Sumerian and Akkadian respectively as Utu or Shamash, Nanna or Sin (a from of Sumerian Su-en), and Inanna (Innin) or Ishtar.
Pastor John’s notes: 2nd Trinity
Quote ID: 5754
Time Periods:
0
Greatness that was Babylon, The
H.W.F Saggs
Book ID: 227 Page: 356/357
Section:
2B1
Atrahasis begins with a mythic account of the universe before the creation of man. The three great gods had divided the universe between them, Anu taking the heaven, Enki the ocean and Enlil the earth.
Pastor John’s notes: Trinity, Like Zeus, Hades & Poseidon
Quote ID: 5755
Time Periods:
0
Greek Folk Religion
Martin P. Nilsson
Book ID: 101 Page: 47
Section:
2B1
To each of these two pairs a here was added, and so we get two triads: Demeter, Kore, and Triptolemos; and “the God,” “the Goddess,” and Eubouleus.
Quote ID: 2549
Time Periods:
0
Historical Atlas of the Celtic World, The
Dr. Ian Barnes
Book ID: 232 Page: 152
Section:
2B1
The triskelli, triskele, or triskelion is a design comprising three interlocking spirals, or three bent human legs, bent at the knee and joined at the crotch. It symbolizes the pantheon of Celtic gods: Daghad, Ogme, and Lugh.....
Quote ID: 5822
Time Periods:
0
Historical Atlas of the Celtic World, The
Dr. Ian Barnes
Book ID: 232 Page: 153
Section:
2B1
However, the Celtic version was firmly based on the cycle of life, which became displaced by a Christian meaning after pagan times, representing the Holy Trinity.
Pastor John’s note: Read Pg. 355
Quote ID: 5823
Time Periods:
0
Historical Atlas of the Celtic World, The
Dr. Ian Barnes
Book ID: 232 Page: 153
Section:
2B1
The flag of the Isle of Man features the armored triskelli, three bent legs interlocked at the crotch circulating in a spiral motion. It is an ancient motif, symbolizing the three Celtic gods, the cycle of life, and the key elements of life.
Quote ID: 5824
Time Periods:
0
History of Dogma
Adolph Harnack, translated by Neil Buchanan
Book ID: 432 Page: 198
Section:
2B1
The Adoptian Christology, that is, the Christology which is most in keeping with the self-witness of Jesus (the Son as the chosen servant of God)....
Quote ID: 8749
Time Periods:
1
History of Dogma
Adolph Harnack, translated by Neil Buchanan
Book ID: 432 Page: 328
Section:
2B1
Paul was the first who limited the idea of pre-existence by referring it solely to the spiritual part of Jesus Christ, but at the same time gave life to it by making the pre-existing Christ (the spirit) a being who, even during his pre-existence, stands independently side by side with God.
Quote ID: 8760
Time Periods:
1
Influence of Greek Ideas on Christianity, The
Edwin Hatch
Book ID: 321 Page: 181
Section:
2B1
...the dualism of the Platonists, by laying stress upon the distinction between the creative energy of God and the form in the mind of God which His energy embodied in the material universe, was tending to introduce a third factor into the conception of creation. It became common to speak, not of two principles, but of three--God, Matter, and the Form, or Pattern. {2} Hence came a new fusion of conceptions.
....
{2} The three -Greek- are expressed by varying but identical terms: God, Matter, and the Form -(greek word)-, or the By Whom, From What, In view of What -(Greek)-, in the Placita of Aetius, 1. 3. 21, ap. Plut. de placit. phil. 1. 3, Stob. Ecl. 1. 10. (Diels, p. 288), and in Timaeus Locrus, de an. mundi 2 (Mullach F P G 2. 38): God, Matter, and the Pattern -(Greek)-, Hippol. Philosoph. 1. 19, Herm. Irris. Gent. Phil. 11: the Active -(Greek)-, Matter, and the Pattern, Alexand. Aphrod. ap. Simplic. in phys. f. 6 (Diels, p. 485), where Simplicius contrasts this with Plato’s own strict dualism.
Quote ID: 7747
Time Periods:
0
Influence of Greek Ideas on Christianity, The
Edwin Hatch
Book ID: 321 Page: 332
Section:
2B1
It is a conceivable view that once, and once only, did God speak to men, and that the revelation of Himself in the Gospels is a unique fact in the history of the universe. It is also a conceivable view that God is continually speaking to men, and that now, no less than in the early ages of Christianity, there is a divine Voice that whispers in men’s souls, and divine interpretation of the meaning of the Gospel history. The difficulty is in the assumption which is sometimes made, that the interpretation of the divine Voice was developed gradually through three centuries, and that it was then suddenly arrested. The difficulty has sometimes been evaded by the further assumption that there was no development of the truth, and that the Nicene theology was part of the original revelation---a theology divinely communicated to the apostles by Jesus Christ himself. The point of most importance in the line of study which we have been following together, is the demonstration which it affords that this latter assumption is wholly untenable. We have been able to see, not only that the several elements of what is distinctive in the Nicene theology were gradually formed, but also that the whole temper and frame of mind which led to the formation of those elements were extraneous to the first form of Christianity, and were added to it by the operation of causes which can be traced.
Quote ID: 7751
Time Periods:
4
Irenaeus, ANF Vol. 1, The Apostolic Fathers
Edited by Philip Schaff
Book ID: 671 Page: 351/352
Section:
2B1,3C1
Cerinthus, again, a man who was educated in the wisdom of the Egyptians, taught that the world was not made by the primary God, but by a certain Power far separated from him, and at a distance from that Principality who is supreme over the universe. . . .
PJ footnote: Irenaeus, Against Heresies, I.xxvi.1.
Quote ID: 9626
Time Periods:
2
Journal of Early Christian Studies Volume 19 / Number 2 / Summer 2011
The Johns Hopkins University Press
Book ID: 120 Page: 197/198
Section:
3C,2B1
A Christian tradition of applying this name uniquely to God stretched back to the second-century apologists, {2} and the use of this term as a privileged designation for the Father continued among early
. . . .
fourth-century Eusebian {3} theologians.{4} The prominence of “Unbegotten” among Eusebians first sparked opposition by Athanasius of Alexandria, who rejected it as useless for designating the Father.{5}
Quote ID: 2772
Time Periods:
24
Journal of Early Christian Studies Volume 19 / Number 2 / Summer 2011
The Johns Hopkins University Press
Book ID: 120 Page: 199
Section:
2B1
Basil relegated a term that had been one of the primary designations, if not the primary designation, for God in previous centuries and especially among his contemporaries, to secondary status.{9}
Quote ID: 2773
Time Periods:
4
Justin Martyr, ANF Vol. 1, The Apostolic Fathers
Edited by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson
Book ID: 674 Page: 167
Section:
2B1
For they proclaim our madness to consist in this, that we give to a crucified man a place second to the unchangeable and eternal God, the Creator of all….
PJ footnote: Justin Martyr, The First Apology of Justin, XIII.
Quote ID: 9659
Time Periods:
2
Justin Martyr, ANF Vol. 1, The Apostolic Fathers
Edited by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson
Book ID: 674 Page: 280
Section:
2B1
We must also mention what the ancient and exceedingly remote Sibyl. . . .
“There is one only unbegotten God,
Omnipotent, invisible, most high,
All –seeing, but Himself seen by no flesh.”
Then elsewhere thus: -
“But we have strayed from the Immortal’s ways,
And worship with a dull and senseless mind
Idols, the workmanship of our own hands,
And images and figures of dead men.”
PJ footnote: Justin Martyr, Address to the Greeks, XVI.
Quote ID: 9690
Time Periods:
0
L. Annaeus Cornutus: Greek Theology, Fragments, and Testimonia
Translated by George Boys-Stone
Book ID: 486 Page: 55
Section:
2B1
(2) Just as we are governed by a soul, so the cosmos has a soul that holds it together, and this is called ‘Zeus’―who lives [zōsa] preeminently and in everything and is the cause of life [zēn] in those things that live. Because of this, Zeus is said to reign over the universe—just as our soul and nature might be said to reign over us.
Quote ID: 9089
Time Periods:
1
L. Annaeus Cornutus: Greek Theology, Fragments, and Testimonia
Translated by George Boys-Stone
Book ID: 486 Page: 137
Section:
2B1
But as to those [traditions], and the service of the gods, and what is appropriately done to their honor, you will thus grasp both your ancestral customs and also a perfect [philosophical] account when the young are led only to piety and not to superstition and are taught to sacrifice and pray and worship and swear in due form, as circumstances demand, and in proportionate manner{237}.
*John’s note: Cornutus was certainly a polytheist, but throughout his Greek Theology, he touches on making each god an allegory symbolic of differing aspects of the physical world.*
{237.} A similar thought is found in Epictetus, Ench. 31.4-5: “Whoever takes care to pursue and avoid what he ought is at the same time cultivating piety, but it is also appropriate to pour libations and to sacrifice and offer first fruits, in each case following ancestral tradition.” See also Cicero, Nat. d. 2.71-72.
Quote ID: 9090
Time Periods:
1
Lactantius, ANF Vol. 7, Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries
Edited by Philip Schaff
Book ID: 675 Page: 52
Section:
2B1
Since God was possessed of the greatest foresight for planning, and of the greatest skill for carrying out in action, before He commenced this business of the world, . . . in order that goodness might spring as a stream from Him, and might flow forth afar, He produced a Spirit like to Himself, who might be endowed with the perfections of God the Father.
PJ footnote: Lactantius, The Divine Institutes, II.ix.
Quote ID: 9699
Time Periods:
34
Livy, History of Rome, LCL 114: Livy I, Books 1-2
B. O. Foster, Trans.
Book ID: 356 Page: 71
Section:
2B1
…and so appointed a flamen for Jupiter, as his perpetual priest, and provided him with a conspicuous dress and the royal curule chair. To him he added two other flamens, one for Mars, the other for Quirinus.
Quote ID: 8144
Time Periods:
01
Minor Latin Poets, LCL 484: Minor Latin Poets II
Minor Latin Poets
Book ID: 153 Page: 565
Section:
2B1
Chapter IV
Pastor John’s Note: Early 300‘s Tiberianus lived
Almighty Being, to whom heaven’s age, ancient of years, showeth reverence, . . .
. . . .
. . . yet even in name unknown thou hast thy hallowed joy, when mightiest earth shuddereth and wandering constellations stay their rapid courses. Thou art alone, yet in thyself many, thou art first and likewise last, and midway in time withal, outliving the world. For without end for thyself, thou bringest the gliding seasons to an end.
. . . .
Thou art the whole kindred of the gods, thou art the cause and energy of things, thou art all nature, one god beyond reckoning, thou art full of the whole of sex, for thee cometh to birth upon a day here a god, here a world - this home of men and gods - lucent, starred with the majestic bloom of youth.
Quote ID: 3266
Time Periods:
4
Mithras: Roman Cult of Mithras: The God and His Mysteries, The
Manfred Clauss
Book ID: 389 Page: 148
Section:
2B1,3D1
Mithras is Sol, and at the same time Sol is Mithras’ companion. Paradoxical relationships of this kind are to be found between many deities in antiquity. People in the ancient world did not feel bound by fixed credos and confessions which had to be consistent to the last detail: in the area of religion, a truly blessed anarchy held sway. For that reason, we should not attempt to marshal the relationship between Mithras and Sol and their various exchanges into what we, with our knowledge and epistemological assumptions, would consider a strictly logical system. Perhaps we should not even assume that such a thing ever existed in antiquity. {159}
Quote ID: 8351
Time Periods:
234
Monumental Christianity, Or the Art and Symbolism of the Primitive Church
John P. Lundy
Book ID: 155 Page: 50/51
Section:
2B1,3B
Whatever modern critics and historians may say of Tertullian’s statement that the Emperor Tiberous desired to have Jesus Christ admitted among the gods of the Roman empire, but was refused by the Senate,{2} certain it is that Tertullian charges the Romans to consult their archives, where no doubt the record might be found of Pilate’s official dispatch concerning Christ and His crucifixion, to which even Tacitus seems so pointedly to refer in that passage so often cited, but which will here bear repetition; “Auctor nominis cjus Christus, Tiberio imperante, per procuratorem Pontium Pilatum, supplicio affectus erat.” “Christ, the author of the Christian name, was put to death as a criminal by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea, in the reign of Tiberius.” (Ann. Book XV . c. 44.) Then, too, there is the story of Alexander Severus, that he had a statue or portrait of Christ among his household gods, told by AElius Lampridius, with the additional statement that he wished to erect a temple in honour of Christ, and that the Emperor Hadrian had the same intention, directing buildings to be raised in every city, without images in them: but was prevented from executing his design by the oracles and the priests, who said that if this should be done, all would become Christians, and the heathen temples would be deserted.
Quote ID: 3299
Time Periods:
123
Monumental Christianity, Or the Art and Symbolism of the Primitive Church
John P. Lundy
Book ID: 155 Page: 88/89
Section:
2B1
And so we have what seems to shadow forth the Christian Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; and, as the Latin Church represents the mystery, the Virgin Mary is included, as the necessary female principle in every idolatrous and pantheistic system of religion.
Those of us who have all our lives been accustomed to regard the Hindus as polytheists, and their religion as polytheism, will surely be surprised to hear what Major Moor says of the matter, viz.: “Strictly speaking, the religion of the Hindus is monotheism . They worship God in unity, and express their conception if the Divine Being and his attributes in the most awful and sublime terms. God, thus adored, is called BRAHM; the One Eternal Mind; the self-existing, incomprehensible Spirit.”
Pastor John’s notes: Hindu
Quote ID: 3306
Time Periods:
0
Monumental Christianity, Or the Art and Symbolism of the Primitive Church
John P. Lundy
Book ID: 155 Page: 89
Section:
2B1
Colebrooke says, that “The real doctrine of the whole Indian scripture is the unity of the Deity, in whom the universe is comprehended; and the seeming polytheism which it exhibits, offers the elements, and the stars, and planets, as gods. The three principle manifestations of the divinity, with other personified attributes and energies, and most of the other gods of the Hindu mythology, are indeed mentioned, or at least indicated, in the Vedas.”
Quote ID: 3307
Time Periods:
0
Monumental Christianity, Or the Art and Symbolism of the Primitive Church
John P. Lundy
Book ID: 155 Page: 97
Section:
2B1
The other figures, given above, are the Pagan expressions of the same fundamental idea. An Egyptian priest stands before an image of Isis or the great mother, nature, represented by a cow, and is making an offering of some tre-foil plant. Over the cow is the sacred Uraeus, or a symbol of the Egyptian Triad, consisting of the winged globe and the serpent; and representing the three powers of creation, preservation, and reproduction.
Quote ID: 3308
Time Periods:
123
Nag Hammadi Library, The
James M. Robinson
Book ID: 253 Page: 105
Section:
2B1
The Apocryphon of John: He said to me, “John, John, 10 why do you doubt, or why are you afraid? You are not unfamiliar with this image, are you? - that is, do not be timid! - I am the one who is with you (pl.) always. I am the Father, I am the Mother, I am the Son. 15
Pastor John’s note: What?
Quote ID: 6390
Time Periods:
2
Nag Hammadi Library, The
James M. Robinson
Book ID: 253 Page: 209
Section:
2B1
The Gospel of the Egyptians: Three powers came forth from him; they are the Father, the Mother, (and) the Son, 10 from the living silence, what came forth from the incorruptible Father. These came forth from the silence of the unknown Father.
Quote ID: 6391
Time Periods:
2
Nag Hammadi Library, The
James M. Robinson
Book ID: 253 Page: 514
Section:
2B1
Trimorphic Protennoia (XIII, I): Now the Voice that originated from my Thought exists as three permanences: the Father, the Mother, the Son.
Quote ID: 6393
Time Periods:
2
Origen: Contra Celsum
Henry Chadwick
Book ID: 164 Page: 378
Section:
2B1
Not one of us holds this view. But if the words ‘in the image of God’ apply to both together, God must be composite and, as it were, must consist of soul and body Himself, so that the superior part has its image in the soul, and the inferior and corporeal part in the body. And none of us says that.
Not one of us says that God participates in shape or colour. Nor does He partake of movement; because it is His nature to be established and firm,
Moreover, God does not even participate in being. For He is participated in, rather than participates; and He is participated in by those who possess the Spirit of God. Our Saviour also does not participate in righteousness; but being righteous, he is participated in by the righteous.
Quote ID: 3452
Time Periods:
3
Origen: Contra Celsum
Henry Chadwick
Book ID: 164 Page: 383
Section:
2B1
Nevertheless, Celsus says that we reply as follows, and affirms that he makes a probable conjecture at our answer in these words: Since God is great and hard to perceive, he thrust his own Spirit into a body like ours, and sent him down here, that we might be able to hear and learn from him. But in our opinion the God and Father of the universe is not the only being who is great; for He gave a share of Himself and His greatness to the only-begotten and firstborn of all creation, that being himself an image of the invisible God he might preserve the image of the Father also in respect of His greatness. For it was impossible that, so to speak, a rightly proportioned and beautiful image of the invisible God should not also show the image of His greatness.
Quote ID: 3453
Time Periods:
3
Paganism and Christianity 100-425 C.E. a Sourcebook
Ramsay MacMullen and Eugene N. Lane
Book ID: 170 Page: 60
Section:
2B1
After these introductory thoughts, you should deliver a hymn to the god himself: “Sminthian Apollo, how should we address thee? As the sun that is the dispenser of light and source of the brilliance of heaven? Or as Mind, as the theologians say, penetrating through the aether to this world of ours? As the creator of the universe, or as the Second Power?
Quote ID: 3680
Time Periods:
23
Paganism in the Roman Empire
Ramsay MacMullen
Book ID: 171 Page: 1
Section:
2B1
would need room for temples to the Capitoline Triad (Jupiter, Juno and Minerva), plus Mercury, Isis and Sarapis, Apollo, Liber Pater, Hercules, …
Quote ID: 3692
Time Periods:
0
Paganism in the Roman Empire
Ramsay MacMullen
Book ID: 171 Page: 81
Section:
2B1,2E5
PICTURE. As appears in the restored drawing by L. North, the faded painting in the Bel temple shows a Syrian triad of deities to the left, dressed in Roman military costumes and with gold disks (the later Christian aureoles) behind their heads. Below are the patron Fortunes of Palmyra and Dura. To the right, sacrifice is offered by the Palmyrene troop commander Terentius, holding some holy scroll, and by the priest Themes Mocimi, who in A.D. 239 shows up in a duty roster assigned to the troop’s chapel (ad signa, cf. Corp. pap. 331 = PDura 89, and below, chap. 2.4 n.70). Courtesy Yale University Art Gallery, Dura-Europos Collection.
Quote ID: 3729
Time Periods:
3
Paganism in the Roman Empire
Ramsay MacMullen
Book ID: 171 Page: 87
Section:
2B1
God is one, but his force, vis or duvamis, is many, expressed through the various familiar divine personalities.
Pastor John’s notes: Trinity precursor
Quote ID: 3738
Time Periods:
0
Persian Empire, The
J. M. Cook
Book ID: 262 Page: 147
Section:
2B1
There is nothing that Darius did or was but he attributes it to Ahuramazda’s favour;
Darius casually mentions the ‘other gods that are’ as also assisting because he was not hostile.{1} But he allows them no role. He does not name them, nor do any of his successors in their inscriptions until Artaxerxes II recognizes Anahita and Mithra along with Ahuramazda.
Quote ID: 6646
Time Periods:
0
Philosopher and the Druids (A Journey Among The Ancient Celts), The
Philip Freeman
Book ID: 263 Page: 154
Section:
2B1
Mother goddesses in fact usually appear on Gaulish inscriptions in groups of three, often holding wheat or flowers to represent their fertility function.
Quote ID: 6672
Time Periods:
01
Pompeii: The Day A City Died
Robert Etienne
Book ID: 179 Page: 116
Section:
2B1
The Most Important Cult: the Triad of Hercules, Bacchus, and Venus, Protectors of the Vine
These three divinities were often allowed a place in the lararium, the shrine at which the head of the household would daily worship his ancestors, or lares, surrounded by the member of his family and his slaves.
Quote ID: 3937
Time Periods:
01
Quirinus: The Capitoline Triad
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quirinus
Book ID: 707 Page: ?
Section:
2B1
His early importance led to Quirinus’ inclusion in the Archaic Triad (the first Capitoline Triad), along with Mars (then an agriculture god) and Jupiter.
*John’s note: Accessed 3-14-2025*
Quote ID: 9885
Time Periods:
047
Rome Triumphant: How The Empire Celebrated Its Victories
Robert Payne
Book ID: 192 Page: 34
Section:
2B1
With the booty amounting to forty talents of silver, he built the temple to Jupiter Capitolinus which had been vowed by his father.
....
In time the temple was to be faced with marble and roofed with gold plate, and men would speak of the aureum Capitolium fulgens - the golden and shining Capitol - but now there was only a small squat temple in the Etruscan style with a wooden entablature, with three rows of columns in front and four columns on each side. Inside there were three cellae. The middle cella contained the terracotta statue of Jupiter; that on the right contained the statue of Minerva, and that on the left the statue of Juno. All of them seem to have been Etruscan gods.
Quote ID: 4430
Time Periods:
0
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
Yuval Noah Harari
Book ID: 691 Page: 213
Section:
2B1
Harari rejects the usual Western view of polytheism "as ignorant and childish idolatry. This is an unjust stereo type.... Polytheism does not necessarily dispute the existence of a single power or law governing the entire universe. In fact, most polytheist and even animist religions recognized such a supreme power that stands behind all the different gods, demons and holy rocks. In Classical Greek polytheism, Zeus, Hera, Apollo, and their colleagues were subject to an omnipotent ans all-encompassing power – Fate (Mpira, Ananke)."
Harari then shows the same sort of belief in the Nordic, West African, and Hindu religions.
Quote ID: 9795
Time Periods:
0147
Search for the Christian Doctrine of God, The
R.P.C. Hanson
Book ID: 268 Page: 749
Section:
2B1,3C1
Athanasius begins his argument for the divinity of the Holy Spirit from the point which was peculiarly his own, the existence of God as Trinity. The word ‘Trinity” Greek had long been in use (first by Theophilus of Antioch in the second half of the second century) and had been used to cover a multitude of conceptions.
Quote ID: 6780
Time Periods:
4
Soul is Naturally Christian, The
Herman Bavinck
Book ID: 489 Page: 1
Section:
2B1
Christianity does not first begin in the days of the apostles but was germinally present from the beginning in [divine] revelation. It is as old as the world and therefore receives testimony from all the true and the good that is found in the religions and philosophical systems of paganism, in fact even from every human soul. “The soul is naturally Christian.”
Quote ID: 9093
Time Periods:
047
Theophilus, ANF Vol. 2, Fathers of the Second Century
Ante Nicene Fathers
Book ID: 22 Page: 109
Section:
2B1
[PJ: ? – c. 184]
Chap. XXXVI – PROPHECIES OF THE SIBYL. - Book II
There is only one uncreated God, Who reigns alone, all-powerful, very great, From whom is nothing hid. He sees all things, Himself unseen by any mortal eye….Worship Him, then, the self-existent God, The unbegotten Ruler of the world, Who only was from everlasting time, And shall to everlasting still abide. Of evil counsels ye shall reap the fruit, Because ye have not honoured the true God, Nor offered to Him sacred hecatombs. To those who dwell in Hades ye make gifts, And unto demons offer sacrifice….There is one God who sends the winds and rains The earthquakes, and the lightnings, and the plagues, The famines, and the snow-storms, and the ice, And all the woes that visit our sad race. Nor these alone, but all things else He gives, Rolling omnipotent in heaven and earth, And self-existent from eternity….But there is only One, the All-Supreme, Who made the heavens, with all their starry host, The sun and moon; likewise the fruitful earth, With all the waves of ocean, and the hills, The fountains, and the ever flowing streams; He also made the countless multitude Of ocean creatures, and He keeps alive All creeping things, both of the earth and sea; And all the tuneful choir of birds He made….O man exalted vainly – say why thus Hast thou so utterly destroyed thyself? Have ye no shame worshipping beasts for gods?....O fools! ye worship serpents, dogs, and cats, Birds, and the creeping things of earth and sea, Images made with hands, statues of stone, And heaps of rubbish by the wayside placed. All these, and many more vain things, you serve, Worshipping things disgraceful even to name: These are the gods who lead vain men astray, From whose mouth streams of deadly poison flow. But unto Him in whom alone is life, Life, and undying everlasting light; Who pours into man’s cup of life a joy Sweeter than sweetest honey to his taste, -- Unto Him bow the head, to Him alone, And walk in ways of everlasting peace….Ye will not come unto a sober mind, And know your God and King, who looks on all: Therefore, upon you burning fire shall come, And ever ye shall daily burn in flames, Ashamed for ever of your useless gods. But those who worship the eternal God, They shall inherit everlasting life, Inhabiting the blooming realms of bliss, And feasting on sweet food from starry heaven.
Quote ID: 407
Time Periods:
0
Victory Of The Cross, The
Desmond O’Grady
Book ID: 278 Page: 149
Section:
2B1
Although Neoplatonism [PJ: 3rd c. AD] was hostile to Christianity, it was to give Christian theology the vocabulary it needed, especially for its Trinitarian doctrine.
Quote ID: 6991
Time Periods:
3
Was Virgil Catholic? : An old book teaches some new literary lessons.
David. G. Bonagura, Jr.
Book ID: 490 Page: 1
Section:
2B1
Theodor Haecker (1879–1945) was the first to apply Tertullian’s epithet, “a soul naturally Christian,” to Virgil.
Quote ID: 9094
Time Periods:
047
Way to Nicaea, Formation of Christian Theology, The, Vol. 1.
John Behr
Book ID: 431 Page: 152
Section:
2B1
Callistus comments, “For that which is seen, which is man, that is the Son, but the spirit contained within the Son is the Father” (Ref. 9.12.18)….
Quote ID: 8720
Time Periods:
3
World of the Celts, The
Simon James
Book ID: 280 Page: 89
Section:
2B1
Many dieties were venerated in triads, or were three aspects of one god, sometimes depicted as three-faced. Epona
Quote ID: 7030
Time Periods:
047
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