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This OP is to counter the belief by those who deny the Trinity that God's declaration to Israel that he is the one God and there is no other, means that neither Jesus or the Holy Spirit are God.
To do this we must discover from the Scriptures themselves why he said that to them. Was he establishing that there is no Trinity as is suggested? Or was there another reason he repeatedly told the Israelites this beginning with the Exodus from Egypt?
The answer is right before our eyes if we are reading through the Bible chronologically, or if we have become familiar with the whole of Scripture. And even then, it may not register, and there may be many things we forget or have not yet been applied to the actual context. This last is often a product of our automatic thinking as we read, (or not thinking about it) as though the Israelites had the same information that we have. But they did not. They had none of what is written in our Bible at the time of the Exodus or before that time, and neither did their fathers---Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and descendants.
One of the first rules of Bible interpretation can easily be cast aside. And that is taking into account the people and culture of those we are reading about. What they were doing and the times they lived in. We have it to read, but they did not. They knew nothing of the creation story, and even with Abraham, God did reveal himself as the one true God, and Abraham believed, but his knowledge was limited to that time and that place. There were, no doubt oral historic facts that involved God, passed from Noah, but there were four hundred years between Noah and Abraham. Every culture had many gods. It was as we see in Romans 1.
In Joshua 24 we are told explicitly that even the people of Abraham (and no doubt Abraham himself) were serving many gods. 1-3 Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem and summoned the leaders, the heads , the judges, and the people, "Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, "Long ago, your fathers lived beyond the Euphrates, Terah, the Father of Abraham and of Nahor; and they served other gods." 14 "Now therefore fear the LORD and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the god's that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD."
Between these verses is a summary of the work that God did in Egypt to bring his people out and in the wilderness.
What do we see God doing in Egypt? We see him putting all other "gods", who are not gods, to shame. He is exposing them for what they are. Deaf, dumb, unable to move, unable to act in any way, as just lifeless lumps of wood, and who never do and cannot enter into creation in a personal way or control and direct anything. He reveals himself as the one who is sovereign over all that is, it does what he tells it to do. He reveals himself as God who enters into history, who enters into nature, and relationships with those things in nature, and most of all, men. He is the God who acts and speaks and hears and governs.
The Hebrews in Egypt did not know this. They had no experience with it. The Egyptians certainly did not know this.
So this is why God said that he is One and there is no god besides him. To separate them from worshiping and trusting in lumps of wood. Why they were to have no other gods. He proved what he claimed about himself and he never stopped doing so. We learn this from reading about it. They learned it from living it.
God revealing himself as One is not about his manner of being, whether or not he is triune. It is about there being no other gods but him. It is not until the NT and the coming of Christ, that his tiunity is more clearly revealed by what Christ does. And then, when we see that we see that it was there all along in the OT too, especially in the Messianic writings.
To do this we must discover from the Scriptures themselves why he said that to them. Was he establishing that there is no Trinity as is suggested? Or was there another reason he repeatedly told the Israelites this beginning with the Exodus from Egypt?
The answer is right before our eyes if we are reading through the Bible chronologically, or if we have become familiar with the whole of Scripture. And even then, it may not register, and there may be many things we forget or have not yet been applied to the actual context. This last is often a product of our automatic thinking as we read, (or not thinking about it) as though the Israelites had the same information that we have. But they did not. They had none of what is written in our Bible at the time of the Exodus or before that time, and neither did their fathers---Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and descendants.
One of the first rules of Bible interpretation can easily be cast aside. And that is taking into account the people and culture of those we are reading about. What they were doing and the times they lived in. We have it to read, but they did not. They knew nothing of the creation story, and even with Abraham, God did reveal himself as the one true God, and Abraham believed, but his knowledge was limited to that time and that place. There were, no doubt oral historic facts that involved God, passed from Noah, but there were four hundred years between Noah and Abraham. Every culture had many gods. It was as we see in Romans 1.
In Joshua 24 we are told explicitly that even the people of Abraham (and no doubt Abraham himself) were serving many gods. 1-3 Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem and summoned the leaders, the heads , the judges, and the people, "Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, "Long ago, your fathers lived beyond the Euphrates, Terah, the Father of Abraham and of Nahor; and they served other gods." 14 "Now therefore fear the LORD and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the god's that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD."
Between these verses is a summary of the work that God did in Egypt to bring his people out and in the wilderness.
What do we see God doing in Egypt? We see him putting all other "gods", who are not gods, to shame. He is exposing them for what they are. Deaf, dumb, unable to move, unable to act in any way, as just lifeless lumps of wood, and who never do and cannot enter into creation in a personal way or control and direct anything. He reveals himself as the one who is sovereign over all that is, it does what he tells it to do. He reveals himself as God who enters into history, who enters into nature, and relationships with those things in nature, and most of all, men. He is the God who acts and speaks and hears and governs.
The Hebrews in Egypt did not know this. They had no experience with it. The Egyptians certainly did not know this.
So this is why God said that he is One and there is no god besides him. To separate them from worshiping and trusting in lumps of wood. Why they were to have no other gods. He proved what he claimed about himself and he never stopped doing so. We learn this from reading about it. They learned it from living it.
God revealing himself as One is not about his manner of being, whether or not he is triune. It is about there being no other gods but him. It is not until the NT and the coming of Christ, that his tiunity is more clearly revealed by what Christ does. And then, when we see that we see that it was there all along in the OT too, especially in the Messianic writings.
