The Pagan Origins of the Trinity

Chapter Two: ~1400–1200 BC—The Shema: One He, by Commandment

The timeline begins here because everything else is measured against this foundation. God established his identity in unambiguous, singular, personal terms—and commanded Israel to maintain it, and Israel fully understood what this meant:

Deuteronomy 6:2: “…Fear Yahweh your God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you…”

Deuteronomy 6:13: “You shall fear Yahweh your God; and you shall serve him, and shall swear by his name.”

Deuteronomy 6:17: “You shall diligently keep the commandments of Yahweh your God, and his testimonies, and his statutes, which he has commanded you.”

Deuteronomy 10:20: “You shall fear Yahweh your God. You shall serve him. You shall cling to him, and you shall swear by his name.”

Deuteronomy 11:1: “Therefore you shall love Yahweh your God, and keep his instructions, his statutes, his ordinances, and his commandments, always.”

Deuteronomy 13:4: “You shall walk after Yahweh your God, fear him, keep his commandments, and obey his voice. You shall serve him and cling to him.”

One He, every time. God commanded it, Jesus affirmed it. God did not leave the question “one what?” up to man’s imagination as today’s Trinitarians claim. He answered resoundingly within the commandment: “one He.”

Notice that every one of these commands requires a response from us.

Only one of these passages does not include a singular personal pronoun alongside the divine name. The exception is the one most famously quoted as the Shema:

Deuteronomy 6:4–5: “Hear, Israel: Yahweh is our God. Yahweh is one. You shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.”

In the one passage, Deuteronomy 6:4–5, where the name stands alone without a pronoun qualification, it is still surrounded by singular pronouns on both sides in verses 2 & 13. The context will not allow any other reading. Only when the Shema is quoted out of context could someone believe it was describing three Hes rather than ‘one He.’

God, not man, is the Lawgiver.

Mark 7:6–13: “[Jesus] answered them, ‘Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. They worship me in vain, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ For you set aside the commandment of God, and hold tightly to the tradition of men… Full well do you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your tradition… making void the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down. You do many things like this.”

The question is simple: Who gives commandments—God or His servants? This is the fork where the development of the Trinity shipwrecked God’s commandment.

The Shema is not a theological variable to be adjusted by later frameworks, nor an unexplained mystery left to theologians to figure out and redefine according to their desires. It is a commandment, and an absolute truth that is to be obeyed, not dismissed and not redefined. Imagine any other commandment being redefined by the very people misusing it. Do thieves redefine the law against theft to justify what they steal as acceptable? Do adulterers get to redefine adultery until their adultery fits within the parameters of the command? Absolutely not. Commandments do not work that way—and Trinitarians are no exception. They don’t get to redefine God when God has already defined Himself, and done so by commandment.

Jesus called it the greatest commandment—not the greatest starting point for negotiation. Yet that is precisely how it is treated when Trinitarian theology is brought to the text: not as the fixed, non-negotiable foundation that defines everything else, but as raw material to be reinterpreted in light of conclusions reached elsewhere. That is not exegesis. That is the conclusion driving the reading, rather than the commandment ruling supreme and bringing every other thought into subjection.

In Hebrew, the singular masculine pronoun isn’t just a translation choice; it’s embedded in the verb conjugations, possessive suffixes, and noun agreements throughout the passage. Every “his” in these verses is a masculine singular suffix (-o or -av) attached directly to the noun. For example, ‘his statutes’ in Hebrew—huqqot—with the masculine singular possessive suffix attached directly to it, making it huqqotav. That suffix -av means ‘his.’ It is fused onto the noun itself. You cannot separate ‘his’ from the noun it belongs to. God is grammatically singular and personal in every one of these verses. It’s grammatically inescapable. Any Hebrew reader knows exactly how these singular suffixes work—including today’s Jews, who read these passages in their own language and have never understood them to describe a multi-personal deity. Yet Trinitarian apologists attempt to explain to them what their own scriptures mean, contrary to what the grammar demands.

Jesus Upheld the First Commandment:

Luke 4:8: “Jesus answered him, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For it is written, “You shall worship the Lord your God, and you shall serve him only.”’”

Mark 12:28–34: “…‘Which commandment is the greatest of all?’ Jesus answered, ‘The greatest is: ‘Hear, Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one…This is the first commandment…’ The scribe said to him, ‘Truly, teacher, you have said well that he is one, and there is none other but he; and to love him… is more important than all…’ When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, ‘You are not far from God’s Kingdom.’”

Notice that the scribe equated Jesus quoting the Shema as Jesus saying God is ‘one He’ when he said, “you have said well that he is one,” even though Jesus did not use a singular personal pronoun. The New Testament scripture, out of the mouth of Jesus, confirms what we just established above—that Jews understand that the grammar demands the singular personal pronoun.

John 17:3: “And this is life in the age to come, that they know you, the only true God, and the one you have sent—Jesus Christ.” (REV)

1 Corinthians 8:5–6: “For though there are things that are called ‘gods’, whether in the heavens or on earth—as there are many ‘gods’ and many ‘lords’— yet to us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we for him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we live through him.”

There Will Be a Test

Deuteronomy 13:1–4: “If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you… saying, “Let’s go after other gods” (which you have not known), “and let’s serve them,” you shall not listen to the words of that prophet, or to that dreamer of dreams; for Yahweh your God is testing you, to know whether you love Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul. You shall walk after Yahweh your God, fear him, keep his commandments, and obey his voice. You shall serve him, and cling to him.”

When you hear a Trinitarian defender say that Unitarians “presuppose” a Unitarian view, now you know why. That is a subtle tactic to get you to doubt God’s word and trust in their interpretations instead. It isn’t a presupposition on our part; it is simple and honest obedience to the first commandment. We are commanded to serve “Him,” and not to serve “them.” And anyone who presents a case to the contrary is in blatant disobedience to the command and is aligning themselves with those spoken against in this very passage. Namely, the prophets or dreamers of dreams saying, “let’s serve them.”

The Object of Obedience

There was never any question of “one what” in the Scriptures. They were simple, direct, consistent, and absolute: ‘one He.’ That is, until the Trinitarians came along and questioned God’s command and His explanatory use of singular, personal pronouns. “Yeah, has God said…?”

But God never commands us to love Him as a substance, an essence, or a nature. Every command to love, fear, serve, cling to, and obey is directed at a personal He, not at an abstract divine nature shared by three persons. If the Trinitarian definition of God were correct, we would expect at least one command somewhere in Scripture directing us to respond to God as a triune being—to love the Trinity, to serve the three-personed God, to swear by their names. There is none. Not one.

What we find instead is the opposite: every commandment assumes a singular personal recipient. The Hebrew grammar demands it, the pronouns confirm it, and Jesus himself reaffirmed it in Mark 12 without adding a single qualification.

The commandments God has given us are His self-definition in action. God commands a response of obedience, not a response to question His authority or to redefine the requirements. That kind of response would be disobedience and disloyalty, not obedience and loyalty. In this case, the obedience He commands fits only one kind of God: a singular personal He. When Trinitarians respond in obedience to a them rather than a Him, as the commands require, they are responding to a different god than the ‘one He’ God of the Bible. And that other god—the one who replaced Him—is precisely what this book identifies and documents.

God defines biblical monotheism as ‘one He,’ never “one substance.”

Trinitarians define Trinitarian monotheism as one substance.

Trinitarian monotheism does not mean the same thing as what God says or means when God defines Himself as one God by using singular pronouns.

Summary—In this chapter, I have documented:

Commands we are given to obey a singular He/Him/His:

  • Fear him (Deuteronomy 6:13; 10:20)
  • Serve him (Deuteronomy 6:13; 10:20; 13:4)
  • Cling to him (Deuteronomy 10:20; 13:4)
  • Obey his voice (Deuteronomy 13:4)
  • Keep his statutes (Deuteronomy 6:2; 11:1)
  • Keep his commandments (Deuteronomy 6:2; 11:1; 13:4)
  • Keep his testimonies (Deuteronomy 6:17)
  • Keep his ordinances (Deuteronomy 11:1)
  • Keep his instructions (Deuteronomy 11:1)
  • Swear by his name (Deuteronomy 6:13; 10:20)
  • Walk after him (Deuteronomy 13:4)
  • Love him (Deuteronomy 6:5; 11:1)

Commands we are given to obey Yahweh/The LORD (singular):

  • Love Yahweh your God (Deuteronomy 6:5)

Commands we are given in the Bible to obey the Triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit collectively:

  • (none)

Those with ears to hear will hear God defining Himself within the commandment:

“…you shall love Yahweh your God, and keep his instructions, his statutes, his ordinances, and his commandments, always.” (Deuteronomy 11:1)

And we hear Jesus when he said: “If you love me, keep my commandments.” (John 14:15)

We also hear John when he wrote, “But God’s love has most certainly been perfected in whoever keeps his word. This is how we know that we are in him.” (1 John 2:5)

If God’s love is made perfect in keeping God’s word, why would anyone want to change it?

According to the Bible, there are only two choices regarding loyalty. You can serve Yahweh or the gods of the surrounding nations, but you can’t serve both. And if you serve Yahweh, you are serving a “Him”, not a them. If, therefore, you are serving a group of them, you are not serving Yahweh.

Joshua 24:14–15 “Now therefore fear Yahweh, and serve him in sincerity and in truth. Put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the River, in Egypt; and serve Yahweh. If it seems evil to you to serve Yahweh, choose today whom you will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell; but as for me and my house, we will serve Yahweh.”

Paul made exactly that distinction:

1 Corinthians 8:5–6 “For though there are things that are called “gods”, whether in the heavens or on earth—as there are many “gods” and many “lords”— yet to us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we for him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we live through him.”

As did Jesus:

John 17:3 “And this is life in the age to come, that they know you, the only true God, and the one you have sent—Jesus Christ.” (REV)

The sobering fact is, Jesus also said this:

Matthew 7:13–14 “Enter in by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter in by it. How narrow is the gate and the way is restricted that leads to life! There are few who find it.”

We turn now to the path that enabled the broad way of Christianity to choose a God of ‘them’ over a God of ‘Him,’ so that we may enter by the narrow gate and choose life.

Print This Post