Sabbath 30/4/34/120

Dear Friends,

In dealing with the position of the Sons of God the Binitarians/Trinitarians/Ditheists were faced with a serious problem in the OT in that the sons of God were all understood as the Heavenly Assembly or the Council of the Elohim.  The structure of the subordinate Yahovah of Israel had to be hidden being allocated Israel as one of the sons of God because it was not acceptable to the post-170 CE Binitarian structure of Roman Christianity based on the system of Ishtar and the structure of the God Attis and also that of Adonis and Osiris, Mithra and Baal and in the Middle East. From 170 CE the Church theologians began to introduce the distinction between Christ as a son of God and the Heavenly Host as sons of God. They introduced the concept that the sons of God were angels and distinct from Christ who was the son of God that was uncreated. This Binitarian thesis derived from the worship of the god Attis was adopted in Christianity and developed in Binitarianism to a point where Christ was elevated above the Host and made a part of God distinct from the Host and then it was commenced to assert that Christ created the Host from a misreading of Paul in the NT.

This heresy developed until the Council of Nicaea and was adopted for two years and then thrown out along with the Athanasians until they regained power in 381 CE. The Trinity was then advanced and the canons of Nicaea were reconstructed from the Council of Constantinople of 381 and then formalised at Chalcedon in 451.  Let us be clear of one thing. This heresy was never part of the doctrines of the Churches of God until Herbert Armstrong inserted Ditheism in the Radio COG and the WCG in the twentieth century. The offshoots developed Binitarianism afterwards to try to make sense out of Armstrong’s doctrines and develop the groundswell for Trinitarianism to be developed.

The History of the Doctrines as developed from 170 CE are developed in the paper Binitarian and Trinitarian Misrepresentation of the Early Theology of the Godhead (No. 127b).

The forgery of Deuteronomy 32:8 in the MT had to be explained as it was discovered by the scholars who noted the divergence in the MT and the LXX and then found that the text of the Pentateuch available in Judea at the time if Christ shows the LXX was correct and they had to deal with it.           

That text shows that the sons of God of the elohim of the Heavenly Host had been allocated the nations and that Yahovah had been allocated Israel as his inheritance. The nation of Judah at the time of Christ understood that the Yahovah of Israel was the son of God and that was why they killed Christ when he declared himself as the son of God. This relationship was understood at the time of Christ and the subordinate elohim of Israel was declared in Psalm 45:6-7 as being anointed by His Elohim or God with the oil of gladness above his partners. We know this was Christ from Hebrews 1:8-9 and subsequent verses in the text.  The following text shows how the Trinitarians reacted to this text and how they tried to develop the text as referring to the Father which is impossible and strikes at the very structure of Spiritual Israel as the body of Christ. It is correct that the Elyon is the Father and God Most High who allocated the nations. There is only ONE God Most High. Otherwise in language and logic He could not be the Most High God and Elyon would have no meaning in language.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      
NET©   When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided up humankind, 2 he set the boundaries of the peoples, according to the number of the heavenly assembly. 3

Note the view of The Yahovah being the Elyon here is incorrect and Christ’s own comments reflect that in John 10:34-36. The text in Zechariah 2:8-9 and also in 12:8 shows that there are two Yahovahs involved. One is sent by the other who is Yahovah of Hosts who cannot be Jesus Christ. It is the subordinate Yahovah that is sent to save Israel and Jerusalem as we know from the entire NT text.

These points and the position were always understood by the Churches of God until Armstrong introduced the Ditheist heresy.  You then get all sorts of crazy arguments introduced by people trained in his ministry.

This bizarre notion introduced from Attis had then to be applied by some of the ex-WCG ministry and some of it is truly bizarre. One such argument developed by a rather obscure local elder of that church, Frank Nelte, follows along the lines of the Binitarians of Attis where Christ is portrayed not only as we have seen as being the object of the First Commandment but also as the creator of the Angelic Host based on the notion of Armstrong that the Father was not mentioned in the OT, which is a complete fabrication.

In answer to a UCG writing on Satan Frank Nelte continued this absurd argument declaring Christ as the Morning Star and thus because Satan was referred to as the Lucifer and son of the Morning Christ was therefore the creator of Satan.

However, he was the son of God and he did not reject Satan’s statement in the trial in the desert where Satan asserted and tested him as the son of God. Christ did not assert that he had created Satan there where if he had created him he would have said, “I am your God” which we know from Psalm 45 he was not and also we know from Psalm 110 that the One True God told him to sit at his right hand until he made his enemies his footstool. Christ said to Satan that we are to worship the Lord your God and Him only shall you serve. Armstrong’s Ditheism has led to more theological error by his followers than ever before seen in the Churches of God.  (See Frank Nelte:  "A Response to the UCG Statement on the Name Lucifer.")

To defend Armstrong’s Ditheism, Frank Nelte tries to separate Christ from the sons of God, as did the Binitarians of Attis at Rome from 170 to 325 to defend the falsehood.

His conclusion is because Satan is referred to as "son of the morning" or "son of the dawn" in Isaiah14:12) and Christ is referred to as "the morning star" in Revelation 22:16. Therefore Frank's conclusion is that Jesus Christ created Satan because of reference to Satan as being a "son of the morning." The fact that there were multiple Morning Stars at the laying down of the Earth when Eloah created it is lost on him or he does not compute the logic (cf. Job 38:4-7).  There is no assertion in the Bible that Christ created the sons of God. He is referred to as the son of God and not the father and no one, not even a Trinitarian Bible Scholar, would make such an assertion, although many Trinitarians in the US “religion business” would say seemingly anything.

Basically Frank is also stating that the word "Lucifer" is a created word within the Latin Vulgate and the UCG writer does not understand its meaning as it is used in reference to Satan. So Frank makes an attempt to define the possible meaning of the word "Lucifer" in Hebrew and how the word may apply in the Hebrew to Satan in Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28. He then compares “Lucifer” to the Greek word "Phosphoros" in 2Peter 1:19 as it applies to Christ.  He states: 

"THIS APPLICATION OF THE NAME “LUCIFER” TO JESUS CHRIST IN 2PETER 1:19 IS BLATANTLY LEFT OUT OF THE PICTURE IN THE UCG STATEMENT!"

“The UCG comments that the Greek “phosphoros” and the Latin “lucifer” were both applied to the planet Venus are basically okay, but they are misapplied! The intent for the inclusion of those statements about Venus is to provide some justification for applying the name “lucifer” to Satan, but without saying so directly. It is a matter of trying to justify the name “lucifer” for Satan through the back door!”

Then in Frank Nelte's conclusion he becomes logically incoherent with his Armstrong Ditheism.  He states:

“However, IF the expression “son of the morning” is indeed a correct reflection of the intended meaning, THEN the expression “SON of the morning” simply tells us that this “heylel” was PRODUCED or CREATED by another individual who is here referred to as “the Morning”. It is Jesus Christ who is in Revelation 2:28 referred to as “the Morning Star” and in Revelation 22:16 as “the Bright and Morning Star”. So the expression “SON of the Morning” in Isaiah 14:12 simply means that Satan WAS CREATED BY JESUS CHRIST. When God Himself was speaking in Isaiah 14:12, God most assuredly was not thinking of the planet Venus!”

The incoherent reasoning of these Armstrong adherents is truly bizarre. We know that Satan was among the sons of God that came before the throne of God and was stated as such in Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:4-7. Satan was an anointed covering cherub and was himself a Morning Star and the Morning Star of this planet and is still the Morning Star of this planet and these people don’t seem to get it. He is referred to as the god of this earth (theoi for elohim; 2Cor. 4:4) and that was never disputed by any of the Churches of God.

The fact is that they are arguing from false premises and both Binitarians and Ditheists are using a false premise. One is that there were two true Gods from the beginning and the one that became the Father agreed to let the other come down and became his son. They claim incorrectly that he was never referred to as such in the OT. The Binitarians assert that one came from the other as an emanation of the divine being and became his son at conception. In this false premise both follow the same doctrine and that is the worship of the god Attis and is pagan heresy.

Do not be deceived by either. That is why they are dead and no longer part of the Body of Christ going into the First Resurrection.

Wade Cox
Coordinator General