by Rives, Did Calvin Murder Servetus?

Why do Servetus’ arguments on the trinity doctrine appear so normal now? Because it comports better with Scripture trinity doctrine. Also, we have a respect for Scripture that rules out oral interpretations and traditions which our forefathers relied upon but which have no appearance in Scripture.

This strictness of following the written word, not tradition, was something not used at the time the trinity doctrine was imposed by Roman law in 534-38 A.D. (It was not the church Tertullian which first officially taught this doctrine. Tertullian’s views were not adopted officially by the early church.) At that juncture of 534-38 A.D, even the Roman government’s proponents of the trinity doctrine acknowledged that it violated the Scripture verses on the Shema that Moses delivered in Deuteronomy. Yet, they made no apologies for the contradiction. Let’s review this with some care. It proves the trinity doctrine was promulgated originally in utter disrespect for the principle of consistency between God’s word to Moses and Christian doctrine. No wonder the trinity doctrine was first imposed by the government. not the church.

As explained in the Cambridge History of Judaism, the trinity doctrine had its first official imprimatur in what was a non-Church document—the Justinian Codex of 534 A.D. Under the interpretation section of the Justinian Codex known as the Novella, issued in 538 A.D., it recognized a total incongruity between the Shema of Deuteronomy and the Trinity Doctrine. The “Shema Yisrael, sometimes considered the most important prayer in Judaism (“Hear, O Israel, the Lord is one), was banned, as a denial of the Trinity.510

Thus, the Roman-state law known as the Justinian Novella of 538 A.D. was being applied to outlaw any Jewish person from quoting “God is one” (the Shema prayer) even though Jesus said in Mark 12:29 this prayer to God was the first of all the commandments….”511 Rather, the Roman governors—the first to impose the trinity doctrine—did not care that the trinity doctrine contradicted (“God is one”)—because they knew they could use force to resolve the contradiction.

Hence, the Roman government banned the Shema by enforcement of the Justinian Novella’s prescription on Jews, claiming the Shema was a disguised attack on Christian doctrine. As a result, police would watch the synagogue service to prevent the recitation of the Shema (i.e., “God is one” from Deuteronomy). Jewish historians relate that records from the Byzantine period (viz., Justinian) reveal that “guards were sent to the synagogue to prevent recitation of the Shema because its proclamation of God’s unity was thought to impugn, if only implicitly, the Christian notion of the Trinity.”512

Thus, Roman-government trinitarians of 538 A.D. always acknowledged their doctrine contradicted the Law God gave Moses. This is why they could not tolerate a prayer that recited Moses’ words on the Oneness of God. Despite this, they refused to revise their trinity formula to be expressed more in line with inspired Scripture. This was simply all that Servetus was trying to correct and advance to evangelistic ends. By our coming around to follow Scripture more carefully, we too have dispensed with trinitarian verbiage and whether we know it or not, we are following Servetus’ opinions.