How do these bible verses impact the trinity doctrine?

Question

Speaking about Jesus, Col 1:15 reads:

(KJV)- "Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature"

(NAS)- "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation"

(DBY)- "who is image of the invisible God, firstborn of all creation"

What does it mean to be the "firstborn of all creation"?

AND

John 3:16 says:

(KJV) "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

(NAS)- "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life."

(DBY)- For God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believes on him may not perish, but have life eternal.

What does it mean to be "begotten"?

Does it seem that Jesus as the "firstborn of all creation" ties in with the idea that Jesus being the "only begotten son" of God?

Answer 1

Jesus is rightfully called the only begotten son of God because he is the only one God created directly, alone without help. Continuing the verse you provided: ; 16 because by means of him all [other] things were created in the heavens and upon the earth..Jesus helped Jehovah in creating the angels,he is the master worker of God during creation (Prov 8:23). The chapter also describes the relationship of God and his Son.

Revelation 3:14 also refers to Jesus as the "faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation by God..."

Jesus was created as opposed to the trinity doctrine that he isnt...

Trinitarians argue that the verse above means that Jesus Christ is the Beginner, the Originator or Origin of God’s creation; and they can point to An American Translation and Moffatt’s translation, which read: “The origin of God’s creation.” Note that expression “God’s creation.” This, of course, does not mean creating God, for God is uncreated. Jesus said “God’s creation,” not, “creation by me,” as though he were talking about things created by him. He was talking about works created by someone else, namely, God’s creative works.

Answer 2

Think "Jewish".
Why did Esau want to kill Jacob in Genesis 27? Because Jacob stole the birthright that is suppose to go to the "firstborn".

The title "firstborn" is from the Greek "prototokos" which means both first out of the womb (which Jesus was from Mary) and preeminance (which Jesus is over all Creation).

Col 1:18
And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence.

Eph 1:21
[Jesus, Who is] far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.

You can confirm this with John 1 and Revelation. Jesus was not created, but was the Creator of ALL that is creation.

John 1:3
All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.

Re 4:11
“You are worthy, O Lord, To receive glory and honor and power; For You created all things, And by Your will they exist and were created.”

Answer 3

He is "born" of God, not "made," the "only begotten Son" of God (John 3:16). "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him" (John 1:18). The eternal Father is omnipresent, and therefore invisible, inaudible, inaccessible to the physical senses. The eternally existing Son is the "image" of the invisible Father, the One who declares, reveals, embodies His essence. Although He is always "in the bosom of the Father," yet He is eternally also "the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person" (Hebrews 1:3). He is the eternal, living Word, which was "in the beginning with God" (John 1:2), and which "was God" (John 1:1).



Thus the phrase, "firstborn of every creature" in our text, can be translated literally as "begotten before all creation." The eternal inter-relationship of the Persons of the Godhead is beyond human comprehension in its fullness, and the terms, "Son" and "begotten" are the best human language can do to describe it. Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, is the only begotten, eternally generated, Son of the Father, forever shining forth as the image of the otherwise invisible God. HMM

Answer 4

This is just my opinion and remember I am just one person and speak only for myself as one person and not a Sect..

If you are using the “Trinity” as meaning The Father, The Son and The Holy Ghost?

For me it means the same,

The Lord of all Creation/Creature is the Father,

Begat – beget – begot – begotten – begetting: all means one thing – to procreate as the father : Sire

Henceforth the Creator of all Creation, begat his Son, that who is Jesus Christ the Son of the Heavenly Father, Creator/Creation of all. Now all you need is the Holy Ghost and there you have all three.

Answer 5

God the Father, the Son & the Holy Spirit are all one & have always existed before Time was. They are All the Same Just Different. The analogy used in Scripture for the Church also holds here. Using the Human Body, we try to divide it into different parts such as the Hand, Foot etc., but they cannot exist & function without each other. The hand is for picking Ur nose, but it needs the arm & nose to to this! Begotten refers to the Human gift from God of Christ in Human form. John

Answer 6

Firstborn = Preeminent position, Paul makes it clear that Jesus WAS NOT CREATED. Here is a BETTER translation with more of the CONTEXT which EXPLAINS what he means:

Col 1:15 Christ is the exact likeness of God, who can’t be seen. He is first, and he is over all of creation. 16 All things were created by him. He created everything in heaven and on earth. He created everything that can be seen and everything that can’t be seen. He created kings, powers, rulers and authorities. Everything was created by him and for him. 17 Before anything was created, he was already there. He holds everything together.

Consider also what Paul writes in Titus 2:13 "That’s how we should live as we wait for the blessed hope God has given us. We are waiting for Jesus Christ to appear in all his glory. He is our great God and Savior."

Jesus WAS BORN.

Here is a discussion of John 1:1 from a New Testament Greek textbook:

We know that “the Word” is the subject because it has the definite article, and we translate it accordingly: “and the Word was God.” Two questions, both of theological import, should come to mind: (1) why was 'theos(God)' thrown forward? and (2) why does it lack the article? In brief, its emphatic position stresses its essence or quality: “What God was, the Word was” is how one translation brings out this force. Its lack of a definite article keeps us from identifying the person of the Word (Jesus Christ) with the person of “God” (the Father). That is to say, the word order tells us that Jesus Christ has all the divine attributes that the Father has; lack of the article tells us that Jesus Christ is not the Father. John’s wording here is beautifully compact! It is, in fact, one of the most elegantly terse theological statements one could ever find. As Martin Luther said, the lack of an article is against Sabellianism; the word order is against Arianism.

Amateur grammarians, as F.F. Bruce put it, make a big deal of the "missing article" on "God" in the predicate nominative construction in John 1:1. John used the construction to stress what Arianism denies. John's Gospel has over 40 instances where the divine nature of Jesus is intended to be understood. That is THE PRIMARY theme of his Gospel and those who deny it would strip the Gospel of most of its meaning.

Answer 7

Wow, your trying to ask a real question on Yahoo. That's a tough one.

The Bible says that Jesus existed (Was a part of God ) during the creation. Jesus is the part of God that exists inside our universe and experiences time the way we do.

Answer 8

Absorb this...The Greek word mo·no·ge·nes´ is defined by lexicographers as “single of its kind, only,” or “the only member of a kin or kind.” (Thayer’s Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, 1889, p. 417; Liddell and Scott’s Greek-English Lexicon, Oxford, 1968, p. 1144)

The term is used in describing the relation of both sons and daughters to their parents.

The Scriptures speak of “the only-begotten son” of a widow who lived in the city of Nain, of Jairus’ “only-begotten daughter,” and of a man’s “only-begotten” son whom Jesus cured of a demon. (Lu 7:11, 12; 8:41, 42; 9:38) The Greek Septuagint uses mo·no·ge·nes´ when speaking of Jephthah’s daughter, concerning whom it is written: “Now she was absolutely the only child. Besides her he had neither son nor daughter.”—Jg 11:34.

The apostle John repeatedly describes the Lord Jesus Christ as the only-begotten Son of God. (Joh 1:14; 3:16, 18; 1Jo 4:9) This is not in reference to his human birth or to him as just the man Jesus. “This one was in the beginning with God,” even “before the world was.” (Joh 1:1, 2; 17:5, 24) At that time while in his prehuman state of existence, he is described as the “only-begotten Son” whom his Father sent “into the world.”—1Jo 4:9.

How is Jesus the “only-begotten Son.” Jesus’ being called the “only-begotten Son” (Joh 1:14; 3:16, 18; 1Jo 4:9) does not mean that the other spirit creatures produced were not God’s sons, for they are called sons as well. (Ge 6:2, 4; Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:4-7) However, by virtue of his being the sole direct creation of his Father, the firstborn Son was unique, different from all others of God’s sons, all of whom were created or begotten by Jehovah through that firstborn Son. So “the Word” was Jehovah’s “only-begotten Son” in a particular sense, even as Isaac was Abraham’s “only-begotten son” in a particular sense (his father already having another son but not by his wife Sarah).—Heb 11:17; Ge 16:15.

Hope this has helped. Did you know Jesus was created before all other things were created and he was at God's right hand when all things were created? He did a wonderful task by allowing himself to come to earth to live in a womb, be born, to live in a less than perfect world all while knowing about the age of 13 or so that one day he would be killed to fulfill his Father's task for him? Wow, Jesus was the most awesome, yet perfect man to ever walk the earth.

Also, with regard to the trinity...trying to make sense of the trinity can simply be put like this:

A young boy is seen on a beach with a bucket and he continues to take his plastic shovel and with each spoonful, he takes water from the ocean and puts it into his bucket until a man wanders by his way. The man says, "Hey, why are you putting spoonfuls of the ocean into your bucket". The boy replies, "Because I'm trying to take the ocean from out there and put it into my bucket to move it all away from here". That's how weird and troubling it is to make sense of the trinity. Taking our Creator and trying to piece him down into his own Son that he created, then saying that the holy spirit is another form of God and Jesus...it's weird and it makes no sense.

There is Jehovah God, His only begotten son Jesus Christ, and there is God's Holy Spirit. If you pray for his holy spirit to be upon you in your daily life and to help you to endure, to be strong, and to resolve your enemies, these things are within God's will as he will answer these prayers. But...being the little boy with the bucket is not something God will entertain.

Answer 9

God is 3 persons, each one of them entirely separate and each one entirely God. God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. You get ice, water and steam - 3 manifestatons of the same thing and God is like that. God the Father is remote and seemingly hard and cold like ice, God the Son is the life giving water bubbling out like a spring and the Holy Spirit is the steam, the powerhouse of God. Get to know Him in all 3 persons. He is absolutely adorable.

Answer 10

firstborn 'porototokos' can mean several things

1) first one born as in Mary took her firborn and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid Him in a manger... this is the one use as you suggest... not the only use

2) head of ... the ruler of the syngogoue was called the same word for ruler in the gospels there was a case of a ruler of a synogague coming to Jesus, the word used for ruler was prototokos... he was the head of the synagugue not necessarily the first one born
Note that (prototokos). The following scriptures used prototpkos for ruler... Jairus, a ruler of the synagogue (cf. Mark 5.21-43;Lk.8.40-56) came

3) heir... in Hebrew the entire church is called the church of the firstborn (plural)
the whole church is heirs with Jesus... of course we all arent the first one born... but ina sense we are like the first born in Egypt who were redeemed

I believe the trinity is true
the word for firstborn has at least three meaning and in the Old testament the firstborn tern os applied to people not always first one born

Firstborn of creation can mean heir, first in rank and first one raised from the dead.. it is probably a combination of all three