Mormons, Judaism and the Trinity

“It is not a coincidence that the same council that condemned Jews also proclaimed the false doctrine of the Trinity, a there in one god that does not exist. Both Jews and Mormons reject the Trinity, and we both reject anti-semitism as a departure from true faith in God.” Mark Parades quoted in “Mormons, Jews Share Special Bond, Speaker Says” Saturday January 15 2011 in the Salt Lake Tribune.
Well that is nice, except for a couple things. I have opportunity to talk to many Mormons. Whenever I say they don’t believe in the Trinity, they claim they do. Of course when I ask them, “Is Christ God?” I get a firm no. This followed up with “but he became a god,” or sometimes, “he became God”. Now those are just ridiculous statements. To be God is to be eternal, that is without beginning and without end. If you are not God, forget becoming God or a god in any sense of the word that would make you like God our Father in Heaven. Second, Jews only believe in one god. So whereas they might reject the Trinity, they would also reject the notion that Jesus is a god, or became God.
Perhaps the bigger question, though, is why Mormons are talking out both sides of their mouths on the issue of the Trinity. On the one hand they want us to believe they are Christians like anyone else who believe in the Trinity, and expressly say they believe in the Trinity. Yet they know full well that by Trinity they believe something completely different than what Christians mean by Trinity. (Though Christians might do well to bone up on that doctrine and get it straight themselves before they begin to talk to Mormons.) What Mormons talk about is polytheism.
As for anti-semitism, I reject any racial prejudice as a departure from the true faith in God, not just anti-semitism. That isn’t to say that I believe everyone who has succumbed to racism in one form or another is thereby beyond the grasp of salvation. But racism of any stripe is sin, (like denying black people the right to be full fledged members of your church) against the will of God, and needs be forgiven. That said, the Council of Nicea was right in condemning Judaism as a false religion, as they rejected Jesus Christ, and therefore their own God. Christians believe Jesus Christ is the same God as the God of the Old Testament, or the Torah. To reject Christ is to reject God, of who there is only one. That does not mean that Jews should have been persecuted for their religion. But the Jews at that time might have helped themselves a bit, by not having persecuted the Christians and used whatever influence they had to get the Roman Empire to persecute them. One reading Eusebius, and many other even secular histories will note that up until the council of Nicea, those of the Jewish faith had gone out of their way at every opportunity to exterminate and persecute Christianity. Would that Christians were better at turning the other cheek and loving those who hated them. That people being persecuted in such a manner would backlash when given the opportunity is understandable, even if undesirable.
However, this article is just more propaganda trying to have Mormonism identify with Judaism. Ever wonder though why Jews don’t just go around building temples everywhere? Ever wonder why modern day Jews don’t recognize anyone as a prophet? And even the Temple that the Jews did have, reflects in no way the temples with which Mormons blight the landscape wherever they can. I have yet to see smoke billowing out of any of them. But a careful reading of John 4, and perhaps following the marginal notes to say, Leviticus 17 would give you a clue as to why Jews don’t go around building temples. Jews were to sacrifice at the Temple in Jerusalem and nowhere else. To offer sacrifice anywhere else, was to worship and whore after goat demons, a sin Lehi and Nephi would be guilty of had they ever really existed. And yet Jesus alerts the Samaritan woman to the fact that the time is coming when Temples will not be needed, but those who worship God will do so in Spirit and truth. That for the fact that the Sacrificial system will find completion and fulfillment in the sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross, where God died for the sins of the world. As for the prophet thing, none of the so-called prophets of the LDS church have done anything that would meet the requirements of designating a man as a prophet by Old Testament criteria.