Is the Son eternal?
 

I'm puzzled as to how so many Oneness folk can say that the Son or the Sonship came into existance at bethlehem, and so they vhermently deny that the Son is eternal, yet in their next breath they'll say that the Son is Yahweh, although other Oneness folk dey this and claim that he's either just a manifestation of Yahweh or else he's a man in whom Yahweh indwells. What do the people in this room believe, do you hold to any of these three views or to another view?

For my part, as a God can' change being immutible; 'for I am God I change not' (Malachi 3:6), Yahweh God must therefore be both eternal and immutible, so if the Son is Yahweh God and I certainly do believe that, then he must be eternal and immutible. For that matter I apply every divine attribute to the Son, as I don't believe that the Son can exist as Yahweh and yet not possess every divine attributes.

God has dealt with and spoken to His people over the centuries via many vessels & manifestations.

He was manifest in the burning bush.
He was manifest in the cloud by day.
He was manifest in the fire by night.
He was manifest in the flesh by the begotten man Jesus Christ.

None of these manifestations are eternal yet all of them are manifestations of the eternal God.

God... the eternal, invisible God... was IN Christ... the begotten vessel who was born (had a beginning) and experienced death (Had an end)...

The vessel was not eternal but the eternal was in the vessel.

But is it as the Son that Jesus is divine or is it as the logos (memra, word, divine expression) that Jesus is divine. The Son was begotten and that, in itself, necessitates that there was a beginning. Let us not do what so many of the Nicene fathers and subsequent church fathers did: confuse Jesus' humanity with His being God. What I mean by this is their kind of argument where since Jesus is divine and being divine necessitates being eternal, then he must be eternally begotten since Jesus is divine.

I've explained this to you dozens and dozens of times and you either don't get it or just don't WANT to get it. You don't have to agree with me, but at least be honest about what we believe.

So let me ask you here a rhetorical question in order to address this issue...
Has George Bush ALWAYS been the President of the United States? The honest intelligent answer is no. Does that mean the PERSON George Bush did not exist until he became president? Of course not. That is a logical impossibility. The PERSON George Bush must exist in order to become the President

So to, in Oneness, Yahweh the God that created everything has always existed. HE became the Son at the incarnation when He united a Human nature to His own Person. Thus the Son is Yahweh HIMSELF (person) who has the Divine nature, hypostatically united with a Human nature. The Son then is not a mere man, someone other than God, in whom God was.

The Son is Yahweh Himself taking on a human form, adding a human nature. The Son therefore is not another person from God

You have a logical problem here....you claim in absolute terms God can't change by becoming the Son...therefore you MUST logically and honestly conclude God also could not become that Man, Christ Jesus. Yet you would not deny the Trinitarian doctrine that God was incarnate.

God HIMSELF did not change by becoming the Son. He remained the same. His person and Divine nature was unchanged. Additionally you are misusing this verse, which you know full well already because you have agreed with me before. This verse is about changing His word or promises. Read the context and you will see His not changing has to do with his Promises to Israel. God can not lie....that is what this is about. It has NOTHING whatsoever to do with taking on a different form, or nature.

Otherwise this was violated with all the theophanies

Digging thanks for yoru reply, but you've avoided my question which was specifically this - IS THE SON ETERNAL? I'd be grateful if you've tell me if you affirm that the Son is etenral and that as the Son he had no beginning, or do you claim that either God became the Son or that God indwelt a man who was created at Bethlehem or some other viewpoint.

My question is speecificaly focused upon the SON and not upon the Father. So if you should believe that Jesus is God the Father, then telling me that Jesus (by which you mean God the Father) is eternal, then that would really be an avoidance of my question.

Digging has quoted 2nd Corinthians 5:19, I'd like to reply to this specific verse if I might please.

Concerning 2nd Corinthians 5:19, the KJV translation is inaccurate here and the actual Greek text reads completely differently namely; “That God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sin against them” 2nd Corinthians 5:19, NIV. So this verse is simply stating, that the Father has reconciled us to himself, through Christ’s redemptive work upon the cross. So the Son is certainly the propitiation for our sins, and he is also our advocate to God the Father (1st John 2:1-2). But this verse does not make the Father the propitiation for sin, together with the Son. So Jesus Christ, who is the Son (2nd John 3), is alone the propitiation for sin (see also Galatians 2:20). Now because the Son and not the Father died for sins, the Son now intercedes to the Father, on our behalf (Hebrews 7:25).

I don't think that it is wise to base an entire doctrine upon one faulty KJV rendering, as some have done with 2nd Corinthians 5:19. Our doctrine should be based upon clear and obvious translations, please consider 2nd Corinthians 5:19 in the following other translations:

“That God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ,” NIV.
“Our message is that God was making friends of all men through Christ.” TEV.
“That is in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ.” RSV.
“All this is God's doing, for he has reconciled himself to us through Christ.” Phillips.
“To whit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them.” KJV.

So my point to digging for truth would be that we should never base any doctrine upon one verse, and certainly never upon one single verse, which is dubiously translated in a single version such as the King James Version. I certainly do concede that the Father does indeed indwell the Son, from passages such as Hebrews 1:3, John 14:9 and 10. But to argue that God’s indwelling of Christ logically implies that Christ is other than the one who indwells him, namely God is fallacious. So the argument that “God was in Christ,” makes Christ out to be non-deity, in whom deity then chooses to indwell is false. Possibly digging coukld address this accusation of mine.

If he or anyone else here in thsi forum should beleive this, and I don't know yet, which is why I'm asking this qquestion, then that would be an outright denial of Christ’s (the Son’s deity). However, it is an extremely popular argument, often used by some Oneness people, who would claim that the “Sonship” is the flesh of Jesus, and that the Father is the deity of Jesus. I would argue in response to this claim, that the Father does indeed indwell Jesus (Son), but I would not say that “God” indwells Jesus, because this claim consequently implies that because God cannot indwell himself, therefore the Son has to be someone or something other than God in whom God then chooses to reside.

You misunderstand the Trinitarian creeds, which state that Christ (Son) took on flesh, to my knowledge, no Trinitarian creed or scholar claims that he became flesh for if he did then he changed which is why we don't bevlei that. His deity always remained completely unchanged when he took on flesh, amd as god is not flesh, taking on a blody of flesh in the hypostatic union didn't affect his deity.

The son was not eternal.

The eternal was IN the Son. (To wit, God was IN Christ...)

I do not believe that Jesus was God the Father.

I believe that God the Father was IN Christ.

God was in the vessel.

The vessel was not God.

God indwelt a man who was begotten of a woman.

There was no attempt to avoid your question. I was answering what I saw your post to be asking whether than answer the subject line.

I hope this answers your questions as to where I stand.

But what do you mean by "the Son"? Do you mean some sort of divine entity that is someone other than the one God, the Father that the Nicene-Constantinopolitan says we believe in? Do you mean the man Christ Jesus? Do you mean the logos of John 1 (the memra or divine expression)?

Consider the following excerpt from the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed:

We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible;

And in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Only-begotten, Begotten of the Father before all ages, Light of Light, True God of True God, Begotten, not made, of one essence with the Father, by Whom all things were made:

Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and was made man