The Nature of God in the Tanakh (Old Testament)

 

First, it would be useful to consider what theologians have to say about the Trinity in the Tanakh (Old Testament).

"theologians today are in agreement that the Hebrew Bible does not contain a doctrine of the Trinity, even though it was customary in past dogmatic tracts .... to cite texts like Genesis 1:26 .... as proof of plurality in God."  The Encyclopedia of Religion, Vol. 15, ed. M. Eliade, c. 1987, Macmillan Pub. Co., New York

Let’s start with God’s answer to Moses about who He is.

Exodus 3: 14-15 ASV,

^“14 And God said unto Moses, I am that I am: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I am hath sent me unto you. ¹⁵ And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, Jehovah, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.”

The Hebrew word translated as “I AM” is אהיה (Ehyeh), which means “I am what I will be”.   The Hebrew word translated as “Jehovah” is   יהוה (Yehovah), which means something like “to be” or “Eternal One”.  So, God is known as the one who is, He is the eternal one. 

The Torah describes God as the father of His people.

^“22 And thou shalt say unto Pharaoh, Thus saith Jehovah, Israel is my son, my first-born:”  Exodus 4:22 ASV

Isaiah expands on this idea by explicitly stating that Jehovah is the Father.

^“16 For thou art our Father, though Abraham knoweth us not, and Israel doth not acknowledge us: thou, O Jehovah, art our Father; our Redeemer from everlasting is thy name.” Isaiah 63:16 ASV

^“8 But now, O Jehovah, thou art our Father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand.” Isaiah 64:8 ASV

And the Torah explicitly states that Jehovah, our Father, alone is God and there is none other besides Him.  The doctrine that there are two others beside Jehovah, our Father, directly contradicts the clear statements of Scripture.

^“35 Unto thee it was showed, that thou mightest know that Jehovah he is God; there is none else besides him.”  Deuteronomy 4:35 ASV

At the end of Moses’ life he made a famous declaration about who God is.  Deuteronomy 6:4.

 “⁴ Hear, O Israel: Jehovah our God is one Jehovah”

In Moses’ speech, he makes it very clear that there is one God.  The prophet Isaiah expressed it very beautifully in Isaiah 45:18-22 ASV.

“¹⁸ For thus saith Jehovah that created the heavens, the God that formed the earth and made it, that established it and created it not a waste, that formed it to be inhabited: I am Jehovah; and there is none else. ¹⁹ I have not spoken in secret, in a place of the land of darkness; I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain: I, Jehovah, speak righteousness, I declare things that are right.

²⁰ Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, ye that are escaped of the nations: they have no knowledge that carry the wood of their graven image, and pray unto a god that cannot save. ²¹ Declare ye, and bring it forth; yea, let them take counsel together: who hath showed this from ancient time? who hath declared it of old? have not I, Jehovah? and there is no God else besides me, a just God and a Saviour; there is none besides me. ²² Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else.”

There are many other examples of this.

1 Kings 8:60 ASV

^“60 that all the peoples of the earth may know that Jehovah, he is God; there is none else.”

Nehemiah 9:6 ASV

^“6 Thou art Jehovah, even thou alone; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all things that are thereon, the seas and all that is in them, and thou preservest them all; and the host of heaven worshippeth thee.”

Isaiah 43:10 ASV

^“10 Ye are my witnesses, saith Jehovah, and my servant whom I have chosen; that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.”

Isaiah 44:6 ASV

^“6 Thus saith Jehovah, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, Jehovah of hosts: I am the first, and I am the last; and besides me there is no God.”

Many people claim that because Jesus also referred to himself as the first and last he must be claiming to be God.  First and last does not necessarily mean first and last in existence.  It can also refer to total authority over something.  Jesus is called the first and last over those who are resurrected because he was resurrected and is given authority over resurrection (Revelation 1:17-18; 2:8).  Saying that Jesus must be God because he uses a similar phrase is a perfect example of giving priority to ambiguous statements over clear statements like the one above that clearly states there is no God except for Jehovah, our Father.

Isaiah 44:8 ASV

^“8 Fear ye not, neither be afraid: have I not declared unto thee of old, and showed it? and ye are my witnesses. Is there a God besides me? yea, there is no Rock; I know not any.”

Isaiah 45:5-6 ASV

“⁵ I am Jehovah, and there is none else; besides me there is no God. I will gird thee, though thou hast not known me; ⁶ that they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none besides me: I am Jehovah, and there is none else.”

It is difficult to imagine any way that God could possibly articulate better that He is one person with no other beside Him.  He is a single, indivisible person and not a duality, trinity, quadrility or anything else except one person with no equal beside Him.

Christian will, of course, agree that there is one God.  But they redefine the meaning of the word God to mean a plurality of persons.  However, the Old Testament is very consistent in insisting that there is only one who is God and no other beside Him.  Far from supporting the idea of the Trinity, it is a plain denial of even the possibility.  Never in any of these passages will you find a statement that this God is three-in-one.  You will only find statements that He is God alone and that there is no other beside Him.  He does not say that He is God and two others beside him.  He says that He is God alone and there are no others beside Him.

Jesus said that the greatest commandment begins with the declaration that God is One, not three in one:  

Mark 12:29-30, 

 “²⁹ Jesus answered, The first is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God, the Lord is one: ³⁰ and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength”. 

The most important commandment, according to Jesus, begins with the knowledge that God is ONE.

Jesus is quoting Deuteronomy 6:4-5.  Trinitarians will often claim that the word translated as “one”, which is “echad”, indicates a compound unity.  The primary verse they turn to in order to justify this is Genesis 2:24.  However, when we look at the verse in context, we can see their argument fall apart.

Genesis 2:21-24 ASV

²¹ And Jehovah God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; and he took one (echad) of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof: ²² and the rib, which Jehovah God had taken from the man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. ²³ And the man said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. ²⁴ Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one (echad) flesh.

When we look at verse 21 we see that “echad” is used there to indicate one single rib.  It is not a unity of multiple ribs.  Throughout the Tanakh “echad” is usually used to simply indicate “one” or “first”.  Using it to describe a unity is the exception, not the rule.  In reality “echad” acts very much like the English word “one”.  It in no way, shape or form implies a unity.  It can be used to describe a unity, but only if the context clearly indicates that.

Jesus’s conversation didn’t end there.  The scribe he was talking to clearly stated that he understood the word “echad” to mean that God consisted of one single person, the Father alone.

³² And the scribe said unto him, Of a truth, Teacher, thou hast well said that he is one; and there is none other but he: ³³ and to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbor as himself, is much more than all whole burnt-offerings and sacrifices. Mark 12:32-33 ASV

If “echad” really indicated that God was a unity of three persons, Jesus should have corrected the scribe.  Instead, he believed the scribe answered correctly and told the scribe he was on the path to the Kingdom of Heaven.

³⁴ And when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly, he said unto him, Thou art not far from the kingdom of God. And no man after that durst ask him any question. Mark 12:34 ASV

When Trinitarians say that “echad” in Deuteronomy 6:4 indicates that God is a unity of three persons, they are saying that Jesus was wrong.  They are absolutely refusing to believe Jesus.  They prefer to listen to the church leaders instead of Jesus. 

Trinitarians will point out that God teaches us a little at a time because we can’t handle everything at once.  They say that Jesus didn’t go around saying, “I am God”, because it would have been too dangerous (we will discuss the times the Jews tried to stone Jesus later to see if he was actually implying that he was God).  The problem with this argument is that the Old Testament specifically says that there is one God and no other besides Him.  Nowhere in Moses’, or any of the other prophets’ declarations about God, do we see them explaining that this one God is a plurality of persons. 

In other words, it was God who, through His messengers, created the situation where it would have been dangerous for Jesus to say, “I am God”.  Therefore, anyone who would reject Jesus for saying, “I am God”, would have been doing so because of what God said to Moses and the prophets.  Obedience to the Bible would lead them to reject the idea that God is three-in-one.  Why would God set up a situation where those who strictly adhered to the prophets’ teachings would find it difficult to accept Jesus as God?  Why wouldn’t God have mentioned somewhere that this one God was in three persons, which would have made it easy for those who obeyed the teachings of the prophets to accept Jesus as God?

Now we need to look at what the Old Testament says about God’s form. 

What did the Israelites see when God revealed Himself to them?  Exodus 24:9-12 ASV.

“⁹ Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel: ¹⁰ and they saw the God of Israel; and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of sapphire stone, and as it were the very heaven for clearness. ¹¹ And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand: and they beheld God, and did eat and drink.

¹² And Jehovah said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there: and I will give thee the tables of stone, and the law and the commandment, which I have written, that thou mayest teach them.”

Moses wanted to see God to understand Him better.  God said that Moses could not see his face and live, but God would reveal His back to Moses.  But, we don’t get a description of a form; we get a description of God’s character. 

Exodus 33:18-23 ASV

^“18 And he said, Show me, I pray thee, thy glory. ¹⁹ And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and will proclaim the name of Jehovah before thee; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. ²⁰ And he said, Thou canst not see my face; for man shall not see me and live. ²¹ And Jehovah said, Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon the rock: ²² and it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a cleft of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand until I have passed by: ²³ and I will take away my hand, and thou shalt see my back; but my face shall not be seen.^”

Exodus 34:1-7 ASV

^“1And Jehovah said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon the tables the words that were on the first tables, which thou brakest. ² And be ready by the morning, and come up in the morning unto mount Sinai, and present thyself there to me on the top of the mount. ³ And no man shall come up with thee; neither let any man be seen throughout all the mount; neither let the flocks nor herds feed before that mount. ⁴ And he hewed two tables of stone like unto the first; and Moses rose up early in the morning, and went up unto mount Sinai, as Jehovah had commanded him, and took in his hand two tables of stone. ⁵ And Jehovah descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of Jehovah. ⁶ And Jehovah passed by before him, and proclaimed, Jehovah, Jehovah, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness and truth; ⁷ keeping lovingkindness for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin; and that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation.^”

Moses commented on what people actually see when they encounter God in Deuteronomy 4:9-19, 35 ASV

⁹ Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes saw, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life; but make them known unto thy children and thy children’s children; ¹⁰  the day that thou stoodest before Jehovah thy God in Horeb, when Jehovah said unto me, Assemble me the people, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they live upon the earth, and that they may teach their children. ¹¹ And ye came near and stood under the mountain; and the mountain burned with fire unto the heart of heaven, with darkness, cloud, and thick darkness. ¹² And Jehovah spake unto you out of the midst of the fire: ye heard the voice of words, but ye saw no form; only ye heard a voice. ¹³ And he declared unto you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even the ten commandments; and he wrote them upon two tables of stone. ¹⁴ And Jehovah commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and ordinances, that ye might do them in the land whither ye go over to possess it.

¹⁵  Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves; for ye saw no manner of form on the day that Jehovah spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire; ¹⁶ lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, ¹⁷ the likeness of any beast that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flieth in the heavens, ¹⁸ the likeness of anything that creepeth on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth; ¹⁹ and lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun and the moon and the stars, even all the host of heaven, thou be drawn away and worship them, and serve them, which Jehovah thy God hath allotted unto all the peoples under the whole heaven.^”

……………………………………………….

³⁵ Unto thee it was showed, that thou mightest know that Jehovah he is God; there is none else besides him.

In this passage Moses completely denounced the possibility of the incarnation or that God is a trinity.

One of the great truths of the Old Testament is that God has no physical form.  Moses’s argument against worshipping idols wasn’t simply that an idol is not actually God.  Rather, Moses argued that an idol couldn’t even look like God because God wasn’t visible.  If it is possible to see something, then it isn’t God.  It is the act of worshipping something with a visible form that is idolatry.  And God, through Moses, made the Jews the eternal witnesses of this truth (verse 9).  Would someone who only had the Old Testament, like the Jews of Jesus’ time, accept the idea of someone being God in the flesh?  Why would anyone who had studied Moses’s teachings ever believe that this person we can see and touch is God?  By Moses’s logic, Jesus can’t be God because it is possible to make an idol of him.

This makes it clear that, when the people encountered God, they saw no physical form.  The Bible speaks about God’s body metaphorically, but He does not have a body like us.  One of the concepts surrounding the incarnation is that God had to take on the form of a man so that we could understand God more. 

However, Moses heavily emphasized the fact that the Israelites saw no physical form.  For Moses, it was vital for the people to understand that God has no physical form.  The reason he gave was to make sure they would never create a statue of Him.  How does this relate to the doctrine of the incarnation?  How does this reflect on the Christian practice of creating statues of Jesus and saying that he is God?

This commentary from Moses provides some of the underlying reasoning for the Second Commandment.  It is simply not possible to make an image of a God that can’t be seen.  Therefoe, any idol we make is an image of a false god.

The Catholic Church understood that the docrine of the Incarnation contradicted what the Old Testament said about God, so they reasoned that the Second Commandment was no longer valid.

In the Catechism we read:

2129 The divine injunction included the prohibition of every representation of God by the hand of man. Deuteronomy explains: “Since you saw no form on the day that the LORD spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire, beware lest you act corruptly by making a graven image for yourselves, in the form of any figure.…”  It is the absolutely transcendent God who revealed himself to Israel. “He is the all,” but at the same time “he is greater than all his works.”  He is “the author of beauty.” 

2130 Nevertheless, already in the Old Testament, God ordained or permitted the making of images that pointed symbolically toward salvation by the incarnate Word: so it was with the bronze serpent, the ark of the covenant, and the cherubim. 

2131 Basing itself on the mystery of the incarnate Word, the seventh ecumenical council at Nicaea (787) justified against the iconoclasts the veneration of icons— of Christ, but also of the Mother of God, the angels, and all the saints. By becoming incarnate, the Son of God introduced a new “economy” of images.

2132 The Christian veneration of images is not contrary to the first commandment which proscribes idols. Indeed , “the honor rendered to an image passes to its prototype ,” and “whoever venerates an image venerates the person portrayed in it.”  The honor paid to sacred images is a “respectful veneration,” not the adoration due to God alone: Religious worship is not directed to images in themselves, considered as mere things, but under their distinctive aspect as images leading us on to God incarnate. The movement toward the image does not terminate in it as image, but tends toward that whose image it is.[1]

I must point out that the Ark of the Covenant and cheribum were never worshipped.  Also, Hezekiah destroyed the bronze serpent when the people began to venerate it (2 Kings 18:4).  Hezekiah permitted only the worship of God, not the bronze serpent. 

Now, I do need to be honest and mention Ezekiel’s vision of the throne of God.  Ezekiel does initially use the word “man” when describing appearance of the figure on the throne.  However, when he goes into more detail, he describes the figure as having the appearance of fire.  This lines up with Moses’ description of God speaking out of the fire.  Because of this, I believe that he was not saying that God actually looked like a man, but was just trying to find words to describe the indescribable.  You can judge for yourself. 

Ezekiel 1:26-28 ASV

“²⁶ And above the firmament that was over their heads was the likeness of a throne, as the appearance of a sapphire stone; and upon the likeness of the throne was a likeness as the appearance of a man upon it above. ²⁷ And I saw as it were glowing metal, as the appearance of fire within it round about, from the appearance of his loins and upward; and from the appearance of his loins and downward I saw as it were the appearance of fire, and there was brightness round about him. ²⁸ As the appearance of the bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain, so was the appearance of the brightness round about. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of Jehovah. And when I saw it, I fell upon my face, and I heard a voice of one that spake.”

Related to God’s form is whether or not He is a man.  There are three texts that are important here.  The first is

Numbers 23:19 ESV.

19 God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind.  Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?

The second is 1 Samuel 15:29 ESV.

29 And also the Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for he is not a man, that he should have regret.

The third is Hosea 11:9.

9 I will not execute the fierceness of mine anger, I will not return to destroy Ephraim: for I am God, and not man; the Holy One in the midst of thee: and I will not enter into the city.

The Old Testament clearly states that God is not a man or a son of man.  However, this doesn’t necessarily preclude the possibility of God changing into a man.  Is that something that a reader of the Old Testament would consider?  We read in

Malachi 3:6 ASV

6 “For I, Jehovah, change not; therefore ye, O sons of Jacob, are not consumed.”

Here we have a statement that says God does not change.  This would seem to indicate that He would not change to become a man.  But, how do we take into account things like God’s visit to Abraham in Genesis 18?

This is a difficult passage which has caused a lot of discussion and controversy.  Since we are discussing God in the Old Testament right now, I will present one interpretation, which is quite different from the way Christians interpret it. 

This interpretation is based on the fact that the subject of this chapter is hospitality and there are not direct statements of who or what God is.  Therefore, it should be interpreted in the light of clear statements about God, such as the ones above that say God has no physical form.  The passage that makes a clear statement about God (Deuteronomy 4) should determine how we interpret the passage that makes no such statements (Genesis 18). 

According to one Jewish interpretation, God was comforting Abraham in verse 1 as Abraham recovered from his circumcision.  He then looked up and saw three men.  He stopped conversing with God and ran to meet the three men.  According to the Jewish Talmud, these three were Michael, Gabriel and Raphael (an angel named in the Apocrypha).  This means that the conversation should be interpreted something like this.

Genesis 18:1-23 ASV

1 And Jehovah appeared unto him by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day;

God visits with Abraham before the three angels arrive.

² and he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood over against him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself to the earth, ³ and said, My lord, if now I have found favor in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant: ⁴ let now a little water be fetched, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree: ⁵ and I will fetch a morsel of bread, and strengthen ye your heart; after that ye shall pass on: forasmuch as ye are come to your servant. And they said, So do, as thou hast said. ⁶ And Abraham hastened into the tent unto Sarah, and said, Make ready quickly three measures of fine meal, knead it, and make cakes. ⁷ And Abraham ran unto the herd, and fetched a calf tender and good, and gave it unto the servant; and he hasted to dress it. ⁸ And he took butter, and milk, and the calf which he had dressed, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree, and they did eat.

Abraham has prepared enough food for quite a few people. This would make sense if others from Abraham’s camp joined in welcoming the visitors.  One question worth considering is, did the angels themselves eat the food, or was it only the people in general who ate?  There are other texts that indicate Angels refuse earthly food (Judges 6:18-21; Judges 13:15-16).  Perhaps these angels also refused to eat and that detail was left.  This happened in other Biblical passages.  For example, Luke indicates Mary and Joseph returned to Nazareth when Mary’s 40 day purification was finished after Jesus’s birth (Luke 2:22-39) while Matthew indicates they remained in Bethlehem until the wise men arrived, then fled to Egypt, then returned to Nazareth.

⁹ And they said unto him, Where is Sarah thy wife? And he said, Behold, in the tent. ¹⁰ And he said, I will certainly return unto thee when the season cometh round; and, lo, Sarah thy wife shall have a son. And Sarah heard in the tent door, which was behind him. ¹¹ Now Abraham and Sarah were old, and well stricken in age; it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women. ¹² And Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also? ¹³ And Jehovah said unto Abraham, Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a child, who am old? ¹⁴ Is anything too hard for Jehovah? At the set time I will return unto thee, when the season cometh round, and Sarah shall have a son. ¹⁵ Then Sarah denied, saying, I laughed not; for she was afraid. And he said, Nay; but thou didst laugh.

The rabbis interpret Genesis 21:12, “in all that Sarah hath said unto thee, hearken unto her voice” to mean that she was a prophetess.  So, she heard what God said to Abraham.

¹⁶ And the men rose up from thence, and looked toward Sodom: and Abraham went with them to bring them on the way. ¹⁷ And Jehovah said, Shall I hide from Abraham that which I do; ¹⁸ seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him? ¹⁹ For I have known him, to the end that he may command his children and his household after him, that they may keep the way of Jehovah, to do righteousness and justice; to the end that Jehovah may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him. ²⁰ And Jehovah said, Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grievous; ²¹ I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come unto me; and if not, I will know.

²² And the men turned from thence, and went toward Sodom: but Abraham stood yet before Jehovah.

Notice, it says the men went to Sodom while God remained with Abraham.  It doesn’t say only two of the men went to Sodom.

²³ And Abraham drew near, and said, Wilt thou consume the righteous with the wicked?

The Talmud states that Michael’s task was to inform Sarah of Isaac’s birth, so he returned to heaven and did not accompany Gabriel and Raphael to Sodom.  This is why only two angels appear in Sodom.

There is some difficulty in harmonizing Genesis 18, which seems to many people to indicate that God appeared to Abraham in physical form, and Deuteronomy 4, which emphatically states that God has no physical form.  I am not entirely convinced that the above interpretation of Genesis 18 is the correct one.  But, I am sure that the method used at arriving at that interpretation is better than used by most Christians. 

Another interpretation, that I feel is a little bit stronger is this.  The Bible sometimes describes an angel doing something, but states that it is Jehovah doing it.  One prime example is Judges 6:11-21.  The story makes it very clear that Gideon is talking to an angel, but several times it describes the angel’s speech as if Jehovah is speaking.

¹¹ And the angel of Jehovah came, and sat under the oak which was in Ophrah, that pertained unto Joash the Abiezrite: and his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the winepress, to hide it from the Midianites. ¹² And the angel of Jehovah appeared unto him, and said unto him, Jehovah is with thee, thou mighty man of valor. ¹³ And Gideon said unto him, Oh, my lord, if Jehovah is with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where are all his wondrous works which our fathers told us of, saying, Did not Jehovah bring us up from Egypt? but now Jehovah hath cast us off, and delivered us into the hand of Midian. ¹⁴ And Jehovah looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might, and save Israel from the hand of Midian: have not I sent thee? ¹⁵ And he said unto him, Oh, Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? behold, my family is the poorest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house. ¹⁶ And Jehovah said unto him, Surely I will be with thee, and thou shalt smite the Midianites as one man. ¹⁷ And he said unto him, If now I have found favor in thy sight, then show me a sign that it is thou that talkest with me. ¹⁸ Depart not hence, I pray thee, until I come unto thee, and bring forth my present, and lay it before thee. And he said, I will tarry until thou come again.

¹⁹ And Gideon went in, and made ready a kid, and unleavened cakes of an ephah of meal: the flesh he put in a basket, and he put the broth in a pot, and brought it out unto him under the oak, and presented it. ²⁰ And the angel of God said unto him, Take the flesh and the unleavened cakes, and lay them upon this rock, and pour out the broth. And he did so. ²¹ Then the angel of Jehovah put forth the end of the staff that was in his hand, and touched the flesh and the unleavened cakes; and there went up fire out of the rock, and consumed the flesh and the unleavened cakes; and the angel of Jehovah departed out of his sight.   Judges 6:11-21 ASV

The story of Abraham’s visitors suggests this possibility because it describes Jehovah as saying that He will go down to Sodom, but the next chapter clearly states that it was angels that went to Sodom.  So, if only two of the men left Abraham and one of them stayed talking with Abraham, it really could have been only an angel that was talking with Abraham even though the story describes Abraham talking with Jehovah.

The question is should this story, which does not make any direct statements about the nature of God, alter our interpretation of Deuteronomy 4, which emphasizes God having no physical form?  Or, should the clear statements about the nature of God tell us how to interpret Genesis 18, which is essentially a story about hospitality?  Which is the better exegesis?

Judaism has always taught that God is one person.  God knew that the Jews would encounter many new ideas about God, including the idea that there were two others besides Jehovah, our Father, who is God, and one of these has a form and became a man and was a man walking around who eventually died.  God knew that one-day people would claim that we must worship this man Jesus in addition to Jehovah, our Father.  What does the Bible say about anyone who would bring new ideas about who God is that were different than those taught by Moses?

Trinitarians may say that they are still worshipping the God of Abraham, even if it is a different concept of God, and, therefore, they are not worshipping another God.  One problem in our society is identity theft.    If someone claims to be someone else, the people that have known them can still be certain that it is not that person.  How?  They have known the real person and can identify them.  Similarly, Moses and the Children of Israel encountered the real God at Mount Sinai.  Moses reminded the people of the basic qualities of the real God so they could always identify the real God.  The entire Jewish nation witnessed the True God and they and their descendants were commissioned by God as eternal witnesses of who God is (Deuteronomy 4:9).  If someone came along and said they also worship the true God, the Jews can compare the basic qualities this other group are using to describe God and identify if they are describing the same true God.  Moses described God as Jehovah, our Father, who is ONE with no others besides Him.   He is not a man or a son of man (born a man) and has no form that we can see.  Incidentally, Muslims also describe God as ONE without partners, who has no body and is not a man nor was ever born a man.  They use the Arabic word, Allah, which is simply the Arabic word for “God”.  It’s a different language from Hebrew, so there are different words, but the fundamental description is consistent. Different languages will naturally have different words.  We need to look at the description to see if it is consistent.

What was the advice that God gave the Jews for dealing with anyone who said we shouldn’t just worship one person, with no others beside Him, who has no form and is not a man or a son of man (born a man)?  God knew that many people would come along with many concepts of God including those who say that, in addition to the Father, we should worship two others and one of them has a form and is this man and son of man.  Did God tell them to examine the evidence and see if these people are presenting the Jews with a fuller understanding of God?

⁶ If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, that is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; ⁷ of the gods of the peoples that are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth; ⁸ thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: ⁹ but thou shalt surely kill him; thy hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. ¹⁰ And thou shalt stone him to death with stones, because he hath sought to draw thee away from Jehovah thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. ¹¹ And all Israel shall hear, and fear, and shall do no more any such wickedness as this is in the midst of thee.

¹² If thou shalt hear tell concerning one of thy cities, which Jehovah thy God giveth thee to dwell there, saying, ¹³ Certain base fellows are gone out from the midst of thee, and have drawn away the inhabitants of their city, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which ye have not known; ¹⁴ then shalt thou inquire, and make search, and ask diligently; and, behold, if it be truth, and the thing certain, that such abomination is wrought in the midst of thee, ¹⁵ thou shalt surely smite the inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword, destroying it utterly, and all that is therein and the cattle thereof, with the edge of the sword. ¹⁶ And thou shalt gather all the spoil of it into the midst of the street thereof, and shalt burn with fire the city, and all the spoil thereof every whit, unto Jehovah thy God: and it shall be a heap for ever; it shall not be built again. ¹⁷ And there shall cleave nought of the devoted thing to thy hand; that Jehovah may turn from the fierceness of his anger, and show thee mercy, and have compassion upon thee, and multiply thee, as he hath sworn unto thy fathers; ¹⁸ when thou shalt hearken to the voice of Jehovah thy God, to keep all his commandments which I command thee this day, to do that which is right in the eyes of Jehovah thy God. Deuteronomy 13:6-18 ASV

 

 

---

[1] U.S. Catholic Church (2012-11-28). Catechism of the Catholic Church: Second Edition (Kindle Locations 19703-19729). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.