Dan McClellan pushes thought

[huckelberry]

I do not have his book but have listened and watched a number of his presentations. I find most unsurprising but perhaps presenting increased focus. An example would be discussions about lack of trinitarian teaching in the New Testament. It should be well known that there was extended time before the various ideas of how Jesus was related to or revealed God in the first century developed or changed into the formulae of Trinity.

I experience some uncertainty about his claim that there is no full monotheism in the Bible. I start to see his point that the philosophical ideas of one God of a completely singular nature, eternal and source of everything else developed, or clarified after Biblical writing. It has often been said in Christian teaching that the entire Bible is pointing in that direction. Well to admit that is to admit growth in understanding in time.

Dan treated the late Isaiah passages about there being no other God as rhetorical not actually meaning other gods do not exist (despite the words laboring hard to say there are no other gods). Dan proposes that this is not literal but is speech like sports trash talk, bluster, and exaggeration.

I do not find that believable. Yet after thinking that I find myself thinking that there is something to his observation. God as for our team and against those other people is strong in the Bible. The Book of Jonah rejects that. I think all the prophets look deeper than that. But to accept that God is the God of all people has developed slowly. Perhaps it is well short of being realized even now when the idea of monotheism is assumed widely.

[drumdude]

I had the same earth shattering realization when I discovered the polytheist roots of Judaism and Christianity. In fact, Mormon apologists often use that to justify Joseph Smith’s conception of God as a restoration of original truths.

It’s a fascinating topic.

[huckelberry]

I had the same earth shattering realization when I discovered the polytheist roots of Judaism and Christianity. In fact, Mormon apologists often use that to justify Joseph Smith’s conception of God as a restoration of original truths.

It’s a fascinating topic.

I have seen apologists use these observations to defend Joseph's ideas. I find the connection vague at best. Old Testament theology evolving from Caananite religion is not a close fit but thinking divine as a shared power does link.