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On good authority
One of the common criticisms against Christianity from the atheist is that Christians do not think for themselves but take too much on external authority — that is, the authority of Scripture.
I would like to ask such a person how he knows that the earth revolves around the sun, how he knows there are millions of galaxies, how he knows that Uzbekistan really exists, or that he has kidneys, or that Constantine was ever Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, or that there was a Holy Roman Empire, or that pi equals 3.14159.
Speaking for myself, I know all these things on authority. “Each man’s experience is so limited that…of every hundred facts upon which to reason, ninety-nine depend on authority” (C.S.Lewis, The Weight of Glory).
The Christian has as his final integration point the word of God in the Bible. The atheist has as his final integration point his own mind. He lives four score and ten, inhabits a single zip code most of his life, and may not even know how to fill out his tax form without an expert, but pronounces in his heart, “I am the authority on whether there is a God.”
Let us not pretend that Christians base their beliefs on “authority” while non-Christians base theirs on “knowledge.” My apologies to you if you have been everywhere and seen everything, including Uzbekistan, and so are qualified to call your beliefs “knowledge.” But if not, then you might consider God’s answer to one man who briefly thought he knew better:
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? (Job 38:4)
back to top185 Comments to “On good authority”
Thank you Andree. Very eloquently put. I’ve been trying to make this point for almost a year now…
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I find that I can fairly easily be confident in things where the “authorities” (in the sense used here) pretty much agree. I’ve never heard anyone seriously question whether Uzbekistan exists or whether I have kidneys, or the identify of Constantine or the value of pi. (I do know of Christians who believe the sun goes around the earth because they think the Bible teaches it.)
It is more difficult to know what to think when authorities differ. Historians and economists are still not agreed on the cause of the Great Depression, or whether Roosevelt’s policies helped or hurt. You get a very different answer depending on which authority you listen to. Not all doctors agree on the best treatment for certain diseases. Literary critics do not agree on what constitutes a good book. Financial planners do not all agree on the best investments or types of insurance.
When it comes to religious beliefs, there are even more competing authorities. I can find those who tell me to believe the Bible as God’s Word and those who tell me that it is a product of humans trying to understand their world and God’s role in it. If I choose to trust the authority that tells me to believe the Bible, I can find many differing authorities on how to interpret it. Rather than dismissing the whole thing as too hard to figure out, I still struggle to understand what is true. And in the meantime I live my live based on the understanding I have.
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One of the problems of modern man is that he doesn’t recognize ANY authority. Of course this has always been a problem but not so unashamedly asserted as it is now. “Pretending” is the order of the day for most people.
And, it’s taken it’s toll on the church too in that we are reluctant to confess sin that is based on the authority of scripture. We run from integration (a neat way of describing integrity). It’s another way of describing the lawlessness that is prophecied to prevail in the last days. Praise God that he has given us an alternative to pretending.
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I agree with #2 in its entirety.
Further … I have never heard a good explanation for how Christians conclude that the Bible is the one true religious authority.
Not only are there competing authoritative ideas about how to interpret the Bible, as Pauline notes in #2, there are competing authorities altogether.
How do you know — know — that the book to turn to for the truth about God is the Bible, and not the Koran, the Book of Mormon, the Bagavahd Gita or any other writing that claims to be divinely revealed?
They all claim it. They all have significant numbers of people who believe the claim. So how do you know you are right and the devout Mormon or disciplined Buddhist is wrong?
(And by the way, saying those are wrong because they contradict the Bible is not a valid argument. It does not establish why the Bible is right, only that it’s different, which nobody doubts.)
“One light, many windows,” I say.
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Pauline,
I think it’s because people don’t believe in God’s authority or think it too limited that other authorities seem to take on more authority. This is not to suggest that many of the tensions you describe won’t still exist. And, God, being truly authoritative, does work through other authorities, however limited they are. In the meantime, as you say, one must make decisions and live life. The question for each person though is, when push comes to shove, what authority will be the “integrating” authority? The one against which all others will be placed for evaluation and understanding.
I think the question you raise about conflicting religious authorities is a good one and exactly why God’s Word takes teaching scriptural principles so seriously. cf. Jesus’ response to the teachers of the law in the Gospels and James 3. Yet, God’s Word never advocates throwing up our hands on knowledge or wisdom just because they are difficult to discover. And, scripture itself gives us principles to sorting out authorities (the end of James 3 would be an example though there are many more).
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SteveG,
Good luck on your “one light, many windows” approach when you come into conflict with someone who wants to kill you. It was not an academic question for the Christians who were being fed to the lions in the first and second centuries. They had no power to resist in human terms. You would have thought (as the Roman authorities did) that the church would have died very quickly under those circumstances. But instead it grew.
Christianity still has this element; a responsibility, even desire, to care for what is best for one’s enemies. Christ willingly went to the cross for his enemies (me among them), not so with other religions.
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Of the major religions, Christianity historically has relied not only on faith but has subjected that faith to reason. St. Paul, especially in Romans, makes a case for Christianity on both faith and reason. The great thinkers, inclusing the Cappadocians, Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, Niebuhr, C.S. Lewis et al make the case for Christianity on both faith and reasons.
One of the most cogent recent statement of this came from John-Paul II in Fides et Ratio that begins as follows:
Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves
Those who argue that Christians don’t think for themselves don’t really know what they are talking about.
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. . . and may not even know how to fill out his tax form without an expert, but pronounces in his heart, “I am the authority on whether there is a God.”
Absolutely perfect.
It’s pretty arrogant to say, as some around here do, “There is no god; if there were, I would understand it.”
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The harder I try to understand the concept of religion and God, the more elusive they become. A good authority should be able to be tested, proven correct and give the same results time and time again. As there are so many different denominations and different beliefs, there is either a problem with the authority, or with the people doing the testing. Hence, if there is a problem somewhere in this area, why should anyone be able to absolutly insist that they have the right results?
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Dick Friedrich at #6: Good luck on your “one light, many windows” approach when you come into conflict with someone who wants to kill you. It was not an academic question for the Christians who were being fed to the lions in the first and second centuries.
That has absolutely nothing to do with my point.
What you said at #5, however, does: I think the question you raise about conflicting religious authorities is a good one and exactly why God’s Word takes teaching scriptural principles so seriously.
“God’s Word” … says who? Why the one and not the other? The Muslim also follows “God’s Word” and “the will of God.” So does the Jew. Yet none agree.
How do you know you are right and they are wrong?
Or do you “just believe” with no good reason?
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Peter Leavitt at #7: Of the major religions, Christianity historically has relied not only on faith but has subjected that faith to reason. St. Paul, especially in Romans, makes a case for Christianity on both faith and reason. The great thinkers, inclusing the Cappadocians, Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, Niebuhr, C.S. Lewis et al make the case for Christianity on both faith and reasons.
But other faiths also have their intellectuals and their apologists, who argue why they are right and you are not with just as much conviction, academic rigor and passion as the scholars you cite.
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Steve G.
They cannot all be right, because they contradict. It’s fairly easy to prove most other religions wrong, as they contradict known truth and/or contradict themselves shamelessly.
Most apologists look at several lines of truth to show evidence for Christianity. Primary among these is the resurrection; there is good evidence for it, which validates “easier” truths of Scripture. As to Scripture itself, it makes truth of our world (why man is simultaneously so good and so bad, for instance); prophecies have been fulfilled; the various authors support one another; archaeology and other evidence supports Scripture.
But really, there is tons of material out there that makes all these cases (and more) in much more depth, if you’re interested. It really isn’t hard to find. Lee Strobel, C. S. Lewis, and many more have written extensively on such issues.
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They cannot all be right, because they contradict. It’s fairly easy to prove most other religions wrong, as they contradict known truth and/or contradict themselves shamelessly.
The same is true of Christianity. Many of the stories Christians believe contradict known truth, or known science, or other Bible passages.
I don’t believe all religions are “right.” It’s more accurate to say I don’t believe any of them are “right” if by that you mean they have the one truth about God. But I believe all of them can be useful to their practioners. I believe God is above all human religions. Each religion sees a small part of the whole, and each religion contains a lot of human ideas that are misguided at best.
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SteveG #2
“How do you know — know — that the book to turn to for the truth about God is the Bible, and not the Koran, the Book of Mormon, the Bagavahd Gita or any other writing that claims to be divinely revealed?”
Good question. Maybe more to the point, is there any proof that compels Christians to believe that the Bible is divinely inspired, but those other holy books are not?
For me there is one glaring ‘proof’ that sets the Bible apart. That is fulfilled prophecy.
The naysayers notwithstanding, the accusations leveled at fulfilled Bible prophecy have proven time and time again to be without merit.
I am not speaking about the prophecies that are vague, nor those of which it is said “they are yet to be fulfilled.”
What spoke to me when I was seeking were those prophecies that are clear, detailed & unable to have been fulfilled by the machinations of man.
This cannot be said of the other holy books.
This thread doesn’t seem like the forum to list all fulfilled Bible prophecies. But it is Christmas, and there are ample websites listing those which are directly related to the birth of the Savior.
Early in my Christian walk, being an avowed unbelieving evolutionist, fulfilled prophecy was evidence that spoke more to me than what I saw as blind-faith.
At first I was ashamed that I needed proofs, feeling that my faith was lacking. But then I read Isaiah 1:18
“Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”
I first thought that God only wanted to reason with us about His provision for my sins. But as I continued to study, pray & most of all, do my best to live my life according to biblical principles (sometimes to my ‘hurt’, financially, relationally, et al), it became abundantly clear that God is willing to reason with us in all areas of life, even if not in every detail.
I agree with Andree, there is much pride in those who aver that there is no God. But it is also true what Peter wrote for us:
1Peter 3:15 “…sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asks you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:”
I have seen meekness lacking in some of the Christians I have seen giving answers, even on WMB.
But non-Christians should keep in mind that meekness isn’t uncertainty. When a Christian defers to the Bible as his/her authority, it is often because he/she knows that God — Whom I believe surely does exist — knows more than they.
That isn’t a bad thing.
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Lee Strobel, C. S. Lewis, and many more have written extensively on such issues
Cheryl, I have read extensively of most authors you might name. I may not have read Strobel, but I have read Lewis, William Lane Craig, Norman Geisler, Josh McDowell, John Stott, R.C. Sproul, and many others.
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FP at #14:
Give me one example of what you consider to be an unambiguous fulfilled prophecy, one that does not depend on how the later event is interpreted.
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SteveG,
Can you waith until I get some of the stuff on my desk cleared off, later this afternoon? Not dodging you. Just end-of-week busy-ness.
My lunch time ran out at the end of my post, so I’ll get to it when I get home (out early today; yippee!).
I will be glad to comply with your request.
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Peter #7,
Your’s are encouraging comments when so many deny both faith and reason through their behavior if not their words. I’m not sure why so many are so willing to look for a “new” way first instead of at least starting from wisdom established by the ages let alone scriptural authority.
SteveG,
Dying for what you profess says a lot about the authority you submit to. How you die takes it a step further. For instance, the Christian martyrs of the first century don’t look anything like the “martyrs” that strap bombs onto themselves and their children in the Middle East today. I am definitely be drawn to the authority that motivates the first rather than the second. I think most people would be.
Of course every religion has its committed and serious advocates. That doesn’t make them equally valid any more than two drivers being committed and serious about going through an intersection at the same time separated by 90 degrees, one with the red light and one with a green light. Some things just aren’t subjective no matter how one wishes differently.
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The key to “knowing” that the Bible is truly the Word of God is in knowing the one it testifies of — the resurrected Christ. If you don’t know Christ, you’re just a camel trying to squeeze through the eye of a needle. If you want to know Christ, seek Him and you will find Him. If you don’t want to seek Him, it probably means what He has to offer (peace with God and eternal life) doesn’t matter to you. In which case, you won’t matter to Him — pretty fair, I would say.
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Really, what it comes down to for every human being is faith. By “faith” I mean the things that people believe to be true. That would include everyone, from Christian to atheist. None of us, including the most learned scholars of Christianity or atheism knows for sure because none of us are all-knowing. Now you’ve got many people who insist that they possess or have knowledge of absolute truth. They don’t. They’re just as fallible as the rest of us.
SteveG has it right. Every religion insists that it possesses the Truth, with a capital “T”. Every religion insists that it is right and everyone else has got it wrong. Every religion has it’s holy books, it’s holy (learned) men and women, and it’s system of theology/belief. As vociferously as Christians on here insist that they are right, other people of other faiths insist that they are right. In the end, it still comes down to faith.
“One light, many windows” is an excellent way of understanding it.
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In other words the law of non-contradiction has no bearing on the truth?
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Pauline, that post was absolutely perfect.
SteveG, you’re much better off avoiding Strobel. He organizes compendiums of atrociously awful interviews that will frustrate you to no end with their lack of logic and insight. Before you read any of his books, go to Amazon and read all of the one-star reviews — they’re absolutely correct.
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I am too old to benefit from it, but I hear the slow crunching sound of people gradually walking over the gravel to stumble their way to Random Agnosticism.
I am not the Johnny the Baptiser of this heresy.
Perhaps I am the Random the All Wet of my non-faith.
I think I am far enough away from Boston not to lose my head over this, especially if I stop posting on here by January 1. Don’t forget to put up a Christmas Twee for me.
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#2 Pauline, #7 Peter:
Thank you both for clear, encouraging comments on this. All of us, no matter what our beliefs, rely in some way on authority for knowledge. And, yes, Christians do use reason and think things out.
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Andree’s point is that at the practical level sensible and thoughtful folk accept the authority, however flawed, of their tax advisors, parents, preachers, doctors, dentists, teachers, coaches, bosses et al, and [in the Christian West] on fundamental moral questions, the Holy Bible. Though we often miss the marks of these authorities, we know ddep down that they are right.
Skeptics, like SteveG and Anlir, bless their misguided romantic souls, finding imperfection among the authorities, say “a pox on them”, and go their autonomous ways; and, as the Twentieth-Century proved in spades, when individuals rely on their own poor lights all hell breaks loose.
C.S. Lewis, contra the romantic skeptics, points out that the religious authorities of most civilizations are in surprising agreement on most moral questions.
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So, once again, how do you become an athority on the “arcane”?
There is going to be a show tonight on CNN at 7 central time called, “What would Jesus do?”
Apparently, there will be theologians who discuss todays events and try to figure out, well, you know.
It just strikes me as funny that people would argue over the opinion of someone no one can prove ever existed on things that happened two thousand years after they supposedly died. Talk about living in the past. To have to deal seriously with mysticism and supernatrual spiritualism in this day and age is “irksome”.
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The reason why the New Testament has ‘authority’ is because its writers asserted the supremacy of moral values, as embodied by Jesus, over the temporal, pragmatic and hypocritical values of the priests.
Because the values Jesus embodied are timeless and universal, they are independent of ALL human divisions of race, creed, colour etc. The New Testament asserts that the living of a “Christ-like” life is all that matters, whether one knows it or not.
The doctrines built up around the personality of Jesus turn this message on its head: they localise and restrict Jesus to a time and a place, whereas his message is for all persons, everywhere, all of the time.
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SteveG #16
Thanks for waiting. In keeping with your wishes, I will avoid those prophecies that appear to be interpretations (actually a more in-depth look at the Bible makes it clear they do not rely on the interpretations of men).
Since it’s Christmas season, I will list a few of those prophecies concerning the coming of the Messiah.
1. Gen 49:10
Shiloh, another name for Messiah (no interp needed) will come through the line of Judah.
Fulfillment: Matt 1:2
In the genealogy of Jesus’ mother, Mary (His blood parent) He is from the line of Judah.
)Of course, I believe Jesus IS the Messiah)
2. Isaiah 11:1
Messiah will also be from the line of Jesse.
Fulfillment: Luke 3:23,32
We see that Joseph, Jesus’ step-dad, is from the line of Jesse. Yes, he isn’t ‘blood’, but in that society the adopted son became legal heir to the lineage of the adopting father.
3. 2 Samuel 7:12-16
Messiah will come from Jesse’s son, David.
Fulfillment: Matt 1:1
Jesus was a descendant of David’s, son of Jesse.
4. Micah 5:2
Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.
Fulfillment: Matt 2:4-8 ff
Jesus was born in Bethlehem, Ephratah.
5. Messiah’s ministry would be in Galilee
Fulfillment: Matt 4:12-16
Jesus’ministry was predominantly in Galilee.
6. Isaiah 53:7
Messiah would be silent before His accusers.
Fulfillment: Matt 27:12-19
The record of JEsus’trial emphasizes His silence.
7. Psalm 22:16 18
Messiah’s hands & feet would be pierced; His clothing would be gambled for; none of His bones would be broken (contrary to Roman practice).
Fulfillment:
John 20:25
Jesus’ was crucified (hands & feet pierced)
John 19:24
Soldiers gambled for His clothing
John 19:33-36
None of His bones were broken.
There are more.
Regardless that these particular prophecies are very direct, I suppose you might disagree. But that doesn’t change the clarity of the prophecies, nor does it change the fact that they were fulfilled.
I could point out to you the prophecies concerning both Cyrus & Josiah, being called by name hundreds of years before their births.
Even though I disagree with almost averything Anlir says, he is correct that it all comes down to faith anyway.
People can choose to believe facts, or they can choose not to believe facts. They can choose to believe myths, or they can choose not to believe.
Either way, I wish you a very merry & blessed Christmas.
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Make It Man at #21: In other words the law of non-contradiction has no bearing on the truth?
Perhaps an analogy will help.
The movie Star Wars Epidsode IV: A New Hope (or, the first one, for those of us old enough to remember 1977) is on HBO.
Four people who have never seen it tune in to five minute snippets at various times.
One says: “It is about two robots wandering around a desert.”
The second one says: “No, it takes place on a space ship and it’s about a captured Princess.”
The third says, “No, it’s about hooligans and criminals in a seedy town on an alien planet.”
The fourth says, “No, it’s about metaphysics and mysticism.”
None of these sound like they’re all from the same movie, but they are. They could be taken as contradictory, but for anyone who knows the whole, they are not.
You keep citing this “law of non-contradiction” with apparently not understanding that “one light many windows” allows for human misunderstandings. Some humans say Jesus was the divine Son of God, other say Jesus is one in a long line of prophets, and still others say Jesus is irrelevant to their beliefs. Those are contradictions because they are all the result of limited human understanding trying to understand something much, much bigger.
In other words, they can’t all be true… but rather than insisting that one is true and the others are not, I say none of them are true but the reality that inspires and draws people to seek communion with the Divine is very true.
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FP at #26: Thanks for posting the list. Sadly, I see it’s the same list of spurious fulfillments that we’ve all seen a hundred times.
See, in order for those to count as fulfilled prophecies, you have to already believe that Jesus is the messiah AND that all the details recorded in the gospels are accurate.
You have to discount the possibility that some of them might be invented details specifically intended to connect Jesus to older prophecies.
Also, as this list invariably does, you cite some lines from Psalms as examples. The Psalms were never meant as prophecies to begin with. They are prayers and songs written to express the emotions of the psalmist.
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FP,
You said: “In the genealogy of Jesus’ mother, Mary (His blood parent) He is from the line of Judah.”
Your statement is incorrect. Luke identifies Mary as a Levite. It is merely wishful thinking to claim that the genealogy provided by Luke is that of Mary. The genealogy is written specifically to demonstrate Jesus’ Davidic ancestry through his biological father, Heli.
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Poor SteveG, you have chosen to dismiss the truth just because you do not want to believe.
I stated in my reply that one must believe that Jesus is the Messiah. I guess you missed that.
“The same list” you’ve “seen a hundred times”, yes. The truth doesn’t change. You either honestly look at the facts or you don’t. Your dishonesty is now exposed. So, your use of the word “sadly” is well-chosen. You are very sad indeed.
Your answer is as I expected. Your choice of the word “spurious” betrays your unwillingness to even look at the facts.
The “lines from Psalms” as you say, songs/hymns written as expressions of the psalmist are prophetic, though probably not with that thought in mind when written…whether or not you believe it to be true.
If they don’t believe Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe even is someone should rise from the dead.
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VYNETTE,
“Luke identifies Mary as a Levite.”
I’m not posting this to open up this whole genealogy discussion again. I’m only wondering if you have seriously considered the possibility that Mary’s mother was a Levite – not her father, Heli.
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Many of the most frequently asked questions concerning Christianity (ie. “Who really wrote the Bible?” and “Was Noah’s flood a world-wide event or a local disaster?”) are addressed at http://www.answersingenesis.org
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Awsome article!
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STEVEG,
No matter how much evidence of fulfilled prophecy is presented, you will say that you know that it was written after the fact or you know that the details were fabricated or that you know how God intended to use the psalmist’s emotional introspection.
You are proving Andree Seu’s point:
“The Christian has as his final integration point the word of God in the Bible. The atheist has as his final integration point his own mind.”
A couple examples relating to the contradiction discussion is the fact that the Quran says that Jesus is not the Son of God and that he was not crucified. But the Bible says the exact opposite. Both can’t be true and both can’t be false.
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#27: The reason why the New Testament has ‘authority’ is because its writers asserted the supremacy of moral values, as embodied by Jesus, over the temporal, pragmatic and hypocritical values of the priests.
Not exactly. Remember, Christ and all his family and supporting cast were Jews. They were part of the Jewish religion. What actually split them up was the uprising of the Jews. The Romans marched on Jerusalem and killed hundreds of thousands of Jews and destroyed their temples. The Christians broke off from the Jews because they didn’t support the uprising.
It was under Constantine that the Christian religion became much more unified. This was because their numbers measured millions and Constantine needed them to keep his empire whole. This was the actual reason he made the Christian religion “legal”. He supported Church leaders getting together and decide actually what Jesus was, the Son of God, a divine being or a secondary God separate from the main one or both God and Son of God in one being. This was decided by church leaders more than three hundred years after the death of Jesus to unify the different factions.
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“No man can come to Me, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him” (John 6:44).
“Belief is not an intellectual act; belief is a moral act whereby I deliberately commit myself.
“There must be a surrender of the will, not a surrender to persuasive power; a deliberate launching forth on God and on what He says until I am no longer confident in what I have done, I am confident only in God.
“The hindrance is that I will not trust God, but only my mental understanding. As far as feelings go, I must stake all blindly. I must will to believe, and this can never be done without a violent effort on my part to disassociate myself from my old ways of looking at things, and by putting myself right over onto Him.
“Every man is made to reach out beyond his grasp. It is God who draws me, and my relationship to Him in the first place is a personal one, not an intellectual one. I am introduced into the relationship by the miracle of God and my own will to believe, then I begin to get an intelligent appreciation and understanding of the wonder of the transaction.” (Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest)
(…Lifting SteveG to our Father…)
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SBG,
You asked: “I’m not posting this to open up this whole genealogy discussion again. I’m only wondering if you have seriously considered the possibility that Mary’s mother was a Levite – not her father, Heli.”
Luke identifies Mary as a ’suggenes’ of Elizabeth. In this family context it means tribal affiliation. Your question is based on the premise that Luke’s genealogy is that of Mary viz. your remark “her father, Heli.”
Luke would not have gone to trouble of identifying Mary as a Levite if all he really wished to say was that she was of Davidic descent through Heli.
Ecclesiastics have always been on the horns of a dilemma. They proclaim the virgin birth, yet it is also scripturally necessary to show Jesus’ descent from David. The only way this could be done was to make the baseless claim that Luke’s genealogy is that of Mary. It is merely an assertion without evidence, made to serve the interests of doctrine.
Numbers 1:18 clearly states that tribal affiliation is traced exclusively through the father –
“They assembled the entire congregation together on the first day of the second month, and they declared their pedigrees after their families, by the house of their fathers…”
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SBG at #3: No matter how much evidence of fulfilled prophecy is presented, you will say that you know that it was written after the fact or you know that the details were fabricated or that you know how God intended to use the psalmist’s emotional introspection.
I didn’t say I know any of that. I said those are possibilities. And if the person arguing for fulfilled prophecy wants to make a stronger case, he should have a good argument about them.
Most of the time the response is not “I think the detail about Jesus’s legs not being broken is authentic history because … ” followed by a reason. It is more often, as FP does here, to criticize the skeptic for raising the issue.
A couple examples relating to the contradiction discussion is the fact that the Quran says that Jesus is not the Son of God and that he was not crucified. But the Bible says the exact opposite. Both can’t be true and both can’t be false.
True, but you’re still missing the point. From the “one light, many windows” (OLMW) view, it just doesn’t matter. Christians and Muslims have argued those points for centuries and will no doubt continue to. But the human impulse strive for the Divine isn’t contained in creedal statements or scriptures.
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FP at #32: Poor SteveG, you have chosen to dismiss the truth just because you do not want to believe.
I stated in my reply that one must believe that Jesus is the Messiah. I guess you missed that.
No, I got it. That was a major part of why your answer was so disappointing.
What you missed is that the original question was how can a Christian know his Bible is the true word of God when every other religion has their own holy books and their own ideas of what is the true word of God.
Your answer boils down to: If you want to believe it, you’ll believe it.
Well duh. That’s just the point. Everyone who claims a creed wants to believe what they believe, and so does believe what they believe. And that moves us absolutely no closer to making a case for why one is more likely than any other to be right.
I asked you for fulfilled prophecies that do not depend on how the later event is interpreted. (#16)
None of what you offered comes close to that. They all depend on one already believing that Jesus is the Messiah, as you do. They depend on how Jesus’s life is interpreted.
Your answer is as I expected. Your choice of the word “spurious” betrays your unwillingness to even look at the facts.
Oh spare me your condescension. You couldn’t provide even one single fulfilled prophecy that doesn’t depend on interpreting what it supposedly predicts in a way that makes it fit. It’s not me who is unwilling to look at facts.
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#34: Many of the most frequently asked questions concerning Christianity (ie. “Who really wrote the Bible?” and “Was Noah’s flood a world-wide event or a local disaster?”)
Surely you realize that you can’t take the word of the religious when it comes to the history of the Bible? They have a vested interest that is filled with mysticism and the arcane.
The first gospels were written decades after the death of Christ. It is pretty much agreed that the four gospels that make up the base of the Bible are probably the earliest from the hundreds to choose from. The texts weren’t written by the actual “authors” but handed down as verbal stories and finally written to page. Other Bible stories were adopted from many other religions. Two thousand years of calling it the word of God and some people believe in stories such as Noah’s Ark regardless of the lack of evidence and the damage it would cause the planet, not to mention the time it would take to heal. Considering the amount of magic it would take to cause and then heal this damage, it would certainly be easier to make the bad people “disappear”. If you can shimmer an entire universe into existence, why go to all the trouble of making a flood to murder a few million people? Doesn’t make any sense.
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RDean,
I fail to see how my comment #27 relates to your response which began “Not exactly. Remember, Christ and all his family and supporting cast were Jews…”
No matter the reason, no matter what scriptural distortions and manipulations took place in post-apostolic times, the central message of the New Testament remains the same today, as it did then, as it will always be.
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I must take you up on your statement: “The first gospels were written decades after the death of Christ.”
Claude Tresmontant, Father Jean Carmignac, Professor David Flusser, and many other eminent scholars have convincingly demonstrated that the gospels of the New Testament were written originally in Hebrew, or compiled from Hebrew notes well before the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD. Paul’s letters were also in circulation well before the destruction.
The fact that the NT is full of semitic syntax, vocabulary, idioms, and thought patterns argues against their being transmitted orally as such idioms etc would have disappeared completely if transmitted in a supposed Gentile Hellenist medium.
The writings of these scholars have been dismissed or ignored by the majority of their peers for two simple reasons:
(1) it is considered rather simple-minded to believe in prophecy, to believe that Jesus actually predicted the destruction of the Temple, and yet these same scholars will credulously and confidently assert the “deity” of Jesus of Nazareth;
(2) many eminent past and present reputations are at stake.
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I think Andree has oversimplified the criticism.
There is no criticism directed towards being informed by external authorities. It’s people’s unbending hold to a singular, exclusive, external authority that receives criticism.
Additionally, people who understand atheists only in terms of Bible passages (e.g. Rom 1:28, Psalm 14:1 etc.), and think that atheists’ first-hand accounts of their own lives are irrelevant, because they don’t accord with those Bible passages, also draw this criticism.
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VYNETTE is incorrecct to say that Luke identifies Mary as a “Levite.”
Her “relative” Elizabeth was of the tribe of Aaron but that is not necessarily determinative for Mary. Legal, marital and/or biological family and tribal ties were not always synonymous or uniform.
Many other scriptures do, however, make it clear that Jesus was of the seed of David, who was in the line of Judah.
Mary’s tribal identity is debatable, but it is not correct to say that Luke specifically identifies her (Mary) as a “Levite.”
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I appreciated Dick Friedrich’s response (#5) to Pauline (#2),
DF wrote; “The question for each person though is, when push comes to shove, what authority will be the “integrating” authority?”
This is insightful. There are many competing authorities in life from which to choose and we may be fooling ourselves if we presume to be able to handle each one independently and objectively. We all, to one degree or another, have a worldview or mental map or set of presumptions we use to assess all the competing authorities in our lives. Because of our cognitive and pewrsonal limits as mortals, all honest thinkers must come to the question of trust.
It is healthy to admit that we all require a huge amout of faith in order to integrate our thinking and make sense out of life. That is as true of scientists, artists, and historians as it is for theologians. Historical data and material evidence are also subject to levels of trust for our sources and presumptions.
A biblical worldview respects the evidence of the material world but it does not limit all evidence needed to develop an integrated worldview strictly to the material world. Also, we fool ourselves to trust only our own observation (witness) of the world. We must open our minds to incorporate other witnesses and learn how to scrutinize them with moral, material, spiritual, and intelligent judgment.
Hopefully, we all share in Pauline’s stuggle to understand what is true. Part of that struggle ought, in my view, to include a healthy dose of humility regarding our presumptions and judgments. If we divorce ourselves too much from the witnesses of others, we trust too much in ourselves and this can lead us astray from that struggle for truth.
Christianity is rooted in a conviction that rises from such an honest look in the mirror (mentally speaking) that we realize that the “self” cannot fully be trusted.
There is something to Proverbs 3:5.
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.”
If there is a God, He is worth that level of trust. For people of faith, He is our “integrating” guide.
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Joel Mark,
“VYNETTE is incorrecct to say that Luke identifies Mary as a “Levite.”
I have already explained that “suggenes” denotes tribal kinship. In ancient Israel, tribal affiliation was traced through the paternal line. Mary would receive her tribal affiliation through her father as would Elizabeth, a daughter of Aaron.
The ’suggenes’ relationship of the two women was through their respective fathers.
There is clear evidence for Mary’s Levitical descent but absolutely none for her supposed Davidic descent.
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VYNETTE wrote, “I have already explained that ’suggenes’ denotes tribal kinship.”
And I have already explained that that is incorrect. The word merely denotes a kinship of some sort. It can be translated as “relative” and in Romans 9:3, Paul used it to refer to all of his entire race (his “countrymen” or his “brothers” in the sense that they were simply Jewish). That would include all the tribes.
“suggenes” is a much more versetile word than your are claiming it to be.
So the point is debatable on Mary’s tribal identity (and I don’t think you are right) but Luke clearly and categorically did not specifcy Mary as a Levite.
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FP here, and Victoria and others in other threads, have argued that fulfilled prophecy shows why the Bible is the one real spiritual authority.
Apart from their failure to show any examples of this fulfilled prophecy that don’t depend on already believing what the prophecies supposedly predict, there is another weakness: other religions also claim fulfilled prophecies.
Examples:
William Miller, working from Daniel 8:14, predicted that Jesus would return in 1844. Christians who followed Miller were disappointed, but the prophet Baha’u'llah, founder of the Baha’i faith, began his ministry in that year and adherents of Baha’i say that is a prophecy fulfilled. Christ did return in 1844, they say, but under a different name.
This is especially instructive because it suffers from precisely the same failing as the Messianic prophecies FP and others have cited. It is a fulfilled prophecy IF you believe that Baha’u'llah is Christ reborn. But if you don’t, then it isn’t.
Interestingly, Baha’u'llah’s claim is supported by other prophecies as well. The Toltecs (a native tribe in Mexico later conquered by the Aztecs) worshiped the one God taught by the prophet-king Quetzalcoatl. Their prophecies said that Quetzalcoatl would return in “the 13th era” … which began in 1844. The prophecies specified that he would return as he had left, from the East, across the sea. He would be bearded and wear long robes. He would bring a message of peace. Baha’u'llah fulfilled all these.
There’s still more. In around 1500 AD a prophet named Chilam Balam arose among the Mayan people. He predicted the coming of the European conquerors, and predicted natural disasters, down to the date. But perhaps more importantly, he foretold that a spirtual leader would arise in 1862 or 1863 and be imprisoned for his beliefs a few years later. This was fulfilled in Baha’u'llah’s forerunner, The Bab (sort of the John the Baptist of the Baha’i faith.)
So here we have the advent of a new spiritual leader predicted down to the specific year by three different religious traditions and fulfilled in recent history, not ancient.
I say these prophecies are even more impressive than those Christians argue predict the first coming of Christ.
FP, please tell me how your prophecies are correct and these are wrong?
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SteveG, you’re great at wielding a hammer to knock down the beliefs of religion. What is it exactly that you believe in? Or, are you a nihilist?
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Peter, I have explained what I believe several times, including in this very thread. I am somewhat unsure whether I should do it again because you’re clearly not paying attention, but since you asked directly, I will try once more. Perhaps I have not put it all in one place before.
I call myself a Deist-slash-liberal Christian. I do not have a creed per se, but I do believe:
- God exists and created the whole shebang.
- God is universal and not contained in any one human religion.
- All religions, with their practices and rituals and rules, are human creations. Therefore, none of them are “true” in their ability to contain a supposed one truth.
- However, most religions, excluding those created specifically to bring profit to their founders (e.g. Scientology and the Unification Church) are born of man’s innate need to connect with God. Therefore, all of them are “true” in their ability to facilitate that communion.
- God has revealed himself in the works of creation, and also in an innate moral sense that humans have. I do not believe in “special revelation” where because someone who lived 5,000 years ago had a dream and wrote about it, I’m supposed to take that as a revelation from God that is binding on me.
- I have a hope, though not a certainty, of continued existence after death. If there is an afterlife, then salvation, like God, is universal. No one’s salvation depends on choosing the right beliefs. And even great sin is nothing compared to God’s infinite grace.
- Spiritulity is individual. Some people commune with God through the rituals and practices of their religious tradition. Others do it through meditation, getting out into nature, through music or other things. God, being infinite and universal, is accessible through many paths.
- Some individuals through history have reflected God in powerful ways. Jesus was one. Baha’u'llah was probably another, and also the Buddha. Their lives are marked by selfless love and a gentle spirit, but also some quality that transcends understanding. The people who know these few individuals are affected profoundly, as the behavior of Jesus’s disciples after his death demonstrates.
I am a “liberal Christian” in that I grew up in a Christian tradition and it is the language I most naturally speak when I think about spiritual matters. But I do not insist that all must adhere to Christian ideas in order to be connected to God.
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SteveG,
Thank you for posting your well-written explanation of your belief system. I hope you will forgive me for saying I consider it compatible with medium agnosticism, and for waiving the membership fee, and I wish you a Merry Christmas.
I would wish Peter a Merry Christmas, but I fear it it would be like wishing the grinch a Merry Christmas.
What the heck. Merry Christmas, Peter.
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SteveG I call myself a Deist-slash-liberal Christian. I do not have a creed per se, but I do believe:
I am afraid that being a Deist-slash-liberal Christian would place you in the category of what C.s. Lewis once remarked would be Christianity and water. He allowed for plenty of latitude within the Christian faith, though the key elements would be a belief in the incarnate and resurrected Christ along with some form of the Trinity.
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Joel Mark,
“And I have already explained that that is incorrect. The word merely denotes a kinship of some sort. It can be translated as “relative” and in Romans 9:3, Paul used it to refer to all of his entire race (his “countrymen” or his “brothers” in the sense that they were simply Jewish). That would include all the tribes.”
Your statement fails to recognise that in the broad context of race, “suggenes” refers to those of the same race. But in the context of individual families, “suggenes” refers to those of the same tribe or clan.
As I said before, there is plenty of scriptural evidence for Mary’s Levitical ancestry and I have presented it. If you have scriptural evidence to the contrary, it is up to you to now present your case.
Trying to demolish what evidence we do have without presenting alternative evidence does not constitute proper argumentation.
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#43: I fail to see how my comment #27 relates to your response which began “Not exactly. Remember, Christ and all his family and supporting cast were Jews…”
What happened is that you started of with the phrase:
“The reason why the New Testament has ‘authority’”
And then continued with lofty phrases such as “supremacy of moral values”.
If the Jews hadn’t rebelled against Rome when they did, it would all be one religion. It was the events that happened at the time that divided up the religion into Christians and Jews.
#43: the central message of the New Testament remains the same today, as it did then, as it will always be.
The unfortunate problem with religion and the Bible is that is that the central message of Jesus, “Love your brother as yourself” as well as the idea of people helping each other just isn’t followed. Instead of following the good things laid out in the Bible, too many want to “punish” others for not following the “rules”. If you look at what Jesus really thought about the “rules”, you can see how meaningless they are. You see, it’s the message, NOT the rules that have the meaning. Jesus offered comfort to two people whose crimes were so bad that they were being crucified. It is no accident that one said yes and the other said no. This was written to prove a point. There may have been a hundred or none, but then you wouldn’t have a “lesson”.
That fact that the religious make laws against their own children based on “rules” and not love or understanding and with a total lack of compassion or empathy, proves that they completely miss the message.
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VYNETTE,
You are claiming that Jesus was born from an adulterous affair (Mary was betrothed to Joseph but she had a child by Heli) and that Mary would willingly tell Luke about the affair and that Luke would choose to record this in his gospel. If you think that’s reasonable – have a Merry Christmas.
Luke states that Mary was a relative or cousin of Elizabeth. Luke does not designate her specifically as a Levite. It is reasonable to me that Mary’s mother was a Levite and her father Heli was a descendant of David. This is another fulfillment of who the Messiah would be – a priest and king.
Zech 6:13
He will be a priest on His throne
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Much thanks to SteveG, who spells out almost exactly what I too believe. I couldn’t have said it better!
*****
One finds that people of all religious persuasions become very adept at explaining away contradictions, inconsistencies, and even flat out errors in their religious beliefs and their holy books. A Mormon will have an explanation for the writings of Joseph Smith, a Christians for the Bible, a Muslim for the Koran, A Scientologist for Elron Hubbard, etc.
If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard the explanation “Well, this actually means this” or “If you interpret it this particular way, then it explains x”, and so forth. It’s almost like people have to believe every last jot and tittle, or their entire Faith comes unglued.
Religion can be the refuge for human beings who want/need everything to be spelled out in “black and white” terms. Religion says “Here is X. Don’t question it or doubt it. Just accept it and believe it”. Doubters and questioners are eventually, one way or another, drummed out.
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STEVEG,
Post#40
“it just doesn’t matter.”
That’s the problem – it does matter. If the Bible is true, then it matters. If God sent His Son to die for your sins, then I think it would matter to Him how you respond to that. It only doesn’t matter if the Bible isn’t true – as you say yourself, salvation might be universal if there is even an afterlife and it doesn’t matter how we worship God.
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#33 SAVEDBYGRACE
This is exactly right.
Heli was Mary’s father. The genealogy in Luke Ch. 3 has nothing to do with Joseph. The phrase “as was supposed”(nomizo, which means to do by law) was intended to make that point. I think that this implies that Mary had no brothers, and that her father had either already died, or was near death enough to realize that he wouldn’t have any sons That means that by Law (the one centered around the daughters of Zelophehad detailed in Numbers Chs. 26,27,and 36) Joseph and his family inheritance would be given to Mary’s inheritance. That would explain why Joseph would be listed as continuance of Mary’s father’s house.
The genealogy listed in Matthew is Joseph’s lineage.
The Luke Ch 3 genealogy is that of Mary’s father
This means that Christ, and Mary had to have been half Judah (Mary’s father), and half Levite (Mary’s mother)
We know this because Elisabeth was of the daughters of Aaron (Levite)
This means that for Mary to be her cousin, as we think of the term, Mary’s mother had to be full blood Levite.
suggenes = sun (union, together, with) + genos (You don’t have to be a Greek scholar to know that genos means kin)
Symbolically, It is a merging of the King line and the Priest line.
I think that the symbolic meaning of this union should be taken into account,and is somewhat explained in the comparison of Christ/Melchisedek in the book of Hebrews.
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Suggenes -Greek Lexicon
Definition:
1. of the same kin, akin to, related by blood
2. in a wider sense, of the same nation, a fellow countryman
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SBG,
It is not I but Luke who claims “that Jesus was born from an adulterous affair (Mary was betrothed to Joseph but she had a child by Heli) and that Mary would willingly tell Luke about the affair and that Luke would choose to record this in his gospel.”
It may seem “reasonable” to you “that Mary’s mother was a Levite and her father Heli was a descendant of David…” but that is not what scripture says.
To demonstrate that Jesus was a descendant of David through the patrilineal line and therefore entitled to be called “messiah” was vital.
If Luke had indeed given a female genealogy as proof of Davidic descent, he would have been laughed to scorn and his claims for Jesus dismissed utterly. To indulge in moral qualms about the circumstances of Jesus’ birth were not an option for Luke.
In Luke’s account, there are some very intimate details about the timing of Jesus’ conception. Details so private that only Mary herself could have provided them.
I am glad you mentioned the “fulfillment of who the Messiah would be – a priest and king.”
It was indeed perfectly fulfilled in Jesus – his mother from the priestly line and his father from the kingly line.
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Mr_Meaner,
See my comment #62
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Victoria,
You forgot to mention that “suggenes” in the context of individual family relationships means tribal kin.
Once again, I have provided scriptural evidence that Mary was a Levite. Not one person has provided any scriptural evidence that Mary was of Davidic descent. If you have such evidence, then now is the time to present it.
The constant repitition of mere baseless assertions will not make them ‘true.’
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“And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was of Heli, which was of Mat that, which was of Levi…”
You use this to say that Luke implies that Jesus was the son of Heli?
That isn’t even how it’s worded.
And why would Luke say this, when in 1:34-35,he says that Mary was a virgin, when she conceived.
Are you saying that Luke was calling Mary a liar, or are you calling Mary a liar?
I think that the law of inheritance better explains why Joseph is listed under Heli’s lineage.
I have to say, your’s is a bizarre interpretation of that text.
And that is saying something coming from me.
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Vynette – 64
I would suggest you stop trying to make up your OWN interpretations, CHECK the Greek Lexicon, its just not hard at all –
You have PROVEN NOTHING, Vynette, no Scriptural evidence, ZERO ……… except that you want so desperately to make the LORD Jesus less than He is, you would strip Him of His DEITY if you could, but you cannot, many have tried and FAILED, just as you have tried and failed – Mary was a Virgin when she conceived, and bore Jesus, you can’t change that fact either –
Many have been very patient with you, but you don’t listen nor do you understand the facts associated with the birth of God the Son – Mary makes it very clear that she is a VIRGIN – do you think she lied?
34 – Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?
35 – And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. Luke 1:30-35
But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. Mattthew 1:20
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“If Luke had indeed given a female genealogy as proof of Davidic descent, he would have been laughed to scorn and his claims for Jesus dismissed utterly.”
But he did use a female in the proof of Davidic descent in Ch.3 vs 27…Joanna
Further proof of the law of inheritance having come in to play.
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Mr_Meaner,
Luke 3:27 “Which was the son of Joanna, which was the SON of Rhesa…”
The ‘Joanna’ of Luke 3:27 is not a female. The word is derived from the Hebrew “Yowchanan”.
Besides, I rather think that a female could not be the ’son’ of anybody.
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Joanna is most definitely a female.
It is Ioanna, which is the fem. version of the masculine word Ioannes, or “John”
You do realize that the words “the son” in every verse but vs. 23, are not in the original text, don’t you?
That’s why those words are italicized in most versions.
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STEVEG,
Post#50
“predicted down to the specific year”
First, Miller should have known better than to even attempt to predict the return of Jesus since Jesus said no one knows the hour or the day. Also, the return as described by Jesus has nothing in common with Baha’u’llah.
Second, do you have any source besides Bahai literature for the prediction of Quetzalcoatl’s return being “exactly” 1844?
Third, how is 1862 or 1863 a “specific” year and how does that match the other two “prophecies” of 1844?
I would not agree that these are very “impressive”
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Vynette,
I’d like to see you address the points about Luke contradicting himself.
Was Jesus born of a virgin, or did Mary cheat on Joseph?
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Victoria,
You have not provided scriptural evidence that Mary was of Davidic descent.
So, in the absence of your scriptural evidence, I will assume that you have none.
Instead of addressing the subject under discussion, you jump from branch to branch and quote yet more verses in an attempt to justify the virgin birth doctrine.
“Many have been very patient with you…”
Your condescension is noted. I do not need or want your patience or your approval – truth is sufficient of itself and needs no justification.
By the way, There are no such terms as “God the Son” or “Holy Ghost” in scripture.
To address your quotations referencing the ‘Holy Spirit’ -
A consistent theme of the Old Testament is that the Spirit of God is the agent of EVERY human birth e.g.
“Before I (YHVH) formed thee in the belly, I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.” (Jer 1:5).
To use this theme in a ‘particular’ or ‘exclusive’ way ONLY where it refers to Jesus is to wrest the words of gospel writers who were just availing themselves of commonly understood terminology.
The two Greek words used to denote the Holy Spirit are ‘hagios’ and ‘pneuma’, words which closely approximate the Hebrew term ‘ruah ha-kodesh’ or ‘holy breath’.
The ‘ruah hakodesh’ was used to denote a divine power which could fill men, as for instance the prophets, and was so used in reference to Jesus.
The verses from Matthew and Luke which reference the “Holy Spirit” have nothing whatsoever to do with any ‘virgin birth.’
Luke records that John the Baptist was “filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s womb.” (Luke 1:15).
He also records that a few months before John was born, his mother Elizabeth was “filled with the Holy Spirit.” (Luke 1:41)
In Mary’s case, it is this divine power, the “Holy Spirit,” which will “overshadow” or protect her, e.g.
“He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.” (Psalm 91:4)
You also quoted Matthew 1:20 which includes “that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit”
If one discards pre-conceived opinions and applies a little logic and some grammatical rules, it will then be obvious that the “Holy Spirit” does not refer to the manner of Mary’s conception but to the child himself -”that which is conceived in her.”
Now Victoria, do you wish to address my comments regarding the “Holy Spirit” or do you wish to brush them aside and move on to some other topic?
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STEVEG,
Was Jesus born in Bethlehem?
Was Jesus born of a virgin?
Was Jesus from the tribe of Judah and a descendant of David?
Did Jesus heal the blind, deaf and sick?
Did Jesus ride into Jerusalem on a donkey?
Was Jesus betrayed by a friend?
Was the betrayal for 30 pieces of silver that paid for a potter’s field?
Was Jesus mocked and spit on?
Were Jesus’ hands and feet pierced?
Did the Roman soldiers break his legs?
Did the Roman soldiers draw lots for Jesus’ robe?
Did they give Jesus vinegar and gall on the cross?
Was Jesus crucified with criminals?
Was Jesus buried in a rich man’s grave?
…….
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These same arguments were made by Vynette over on the “Hitchens: Romney’s Mormonism fair game” thread, you can check them out.
Hitchens: Romney’s Mormonism fair game
This was my post on December 5. 2007, which was never answered – she left the thread – So here WE ARE AGAIN -
VICTORIA – 290
18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise: When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost. Mathew 1:18
19 Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a publick example, was minded to put her away privily.
20 But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. Mattthew 1:18-20
31 And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS.
32 He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David:
33 And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.
34 Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?
35 And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. Luke 1:31-35
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#72
Wow…
just….wow.
I am in awe
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When you link to “Hitchens: Romney’s Mormonism fair game” thread, NOTE who wrote the first post, and ignored the TOPIC!
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Vynette,
What about clarifying your position on what Luke said, concerning Mary?
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Vynette – 72
Here are more “Holy Ghost” Vynette – up to 50 so far -
26 Acts 1:2 Until the day in which he was taken up, after that he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the apostles whom he had chosen:
27 Acts 1:5 For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.
28 Acts 1:8 But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
29 Acts 1:16 Men and brethren, this scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took Jesus.
30 Acts 2:4 And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
31 Acts 2:33 Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear.
32 Acts 2:38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
33 Acts 4:8 Then Peter, filled with the Holy Ghost, said unto them, Ye rulers of the people, and elders of Israel,
34 Acts 4:31 And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the word of God with boldness.
35 Acts 5:3 But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost, and to keep back part of the price of the land?
36 Acts 5:32 And we are his witnesses of these things; and so is also the Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey him.
37 Acts 6:3 Wherefore, brethren, look ye out among you seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business.
38 Acts 6:5 And the saying pleased the whole multitude: and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost, and Philip, and Prochorus, and Nicanor, and Timon, and Parmenas, and Nicolas a proselyte of Antioch:
39 Acts 7:51 Ye stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye.
40 Acts 7:55 But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God,
41 Acts 8:15 Who, when they were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost:
42 Acts 8:17 Then laid they their hands on them, and they received the Holy Ghost.
43 Acts 8:18 And when Simon saw that through laying on of the apostles’ hands the Holy Ghost was given, he offered them money,
44 Acts 8:19 Saying, Give me also this power, that on whomsoever I lay hands, he may receive the Holy Ghost.
45 Acts 9:17 And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost.
46 Acts 9:31 Then had the churches rest throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.
47 Acts 10:38 How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him.
48 Acts 10:44 While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word.
49 Acts 10:45 And they of the circumcision which believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost.
50 Acts 10:47 Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we?
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51 Acts 11:15 And as I began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning.
52 Acts 11:16 Then remembered I the word of the Lord, how that he said, John indeed baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost.
53 Acts 11:24 For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith: and much people was added unto the Lord.
54 Acts 13:2 As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them.
55 Acts 13:4 So they, being sent forth by the Holy Ghost, departed unto Seleucia; and from thence they sailed to Cyprus.
56 Acts 13:9 Then Saul, (who also is called Paul,) filled with the Holy Ghost, set his eyes on him.
57 Acts 13:52 And the disciples were filled with joy, and with the Holy Ghost.
58 Acts 15:8 And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us;
59 Acts 15:28 For it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things;
60 Acts 16:6 Now when they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, and were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia,
61 Acts 19:2 He said unto them, Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.
62 Acts 19:6 And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Ghost came on them; and they spake with tongues, and prophesied.
63 Acts 20:23 Save that the Holy Ghost witnesseth in every city, saying that bonds and afflictions abide me.
64 Acts 20:28 Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.
65 Acts 21:11 And when he was come unto us, he took Paul’s girdle, and bound his own hands and feet, and said, Thus saith the Holy Ghost, So shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man that owneth this girdle, and shall deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.
66 Acts 28:25 And when they agreed not among themselves, they departed, after that Paul had spoken one word, Well spake the Holy Ghost by Esaias the prophet unto our fathers,
67 Romans 5:5 And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
68 Romans 9:1 I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost,
69 Romans 14:17 For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.
70 Romans 15:13 Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost.
71 Romans 15:16 That I should be the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God, that the offering up of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost.
72 1 Corinthians 2:13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
73 1 Corinthians 6:19 What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?
74 1 Corinthians 12:3 Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.
75 2 Corinthians 6:6 By pureness, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned,
76 2 Corinthians 13:14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen.
77 1 Thessalonians 1:5 For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance; as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sake.
78 1 Thessalonians 1:6 And ye became followers of us, and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost.
79 2 Timothy 1:14 That good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us.
80 Titus 3:5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;
81 Hebrews 2:4 God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will?
82 Hebrews 3:7 Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice,
83 Hebrews 6:4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,
84 Hebrews 9:8 The Holy Ghost this signifying, that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing:
85 Hebrews 10:15 Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us: for after that he had said before,
86 1 Peter 1:12 Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into.
87 2 Peter 1:21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.
88 1 John 5:7 For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.
89 Jude 1:20 But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost,
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Vynette – 72
The Scripture above should give you something to work on for awhile – Holy Ghost is all through the Bible, you just need to know where to look -
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STEVEG,
There are also prophecies in the OT about the destruction of these cities and how they would be destroyed: Tyre, Sidon, Memphis, Thebes, Babylon, Nineveh, Petra, Edom, Samaria.
Lastly, Daniel’s prophecies are so accurate that the skeptics have no other response than they must have been written after the fact. The discovery of the Dead Sea scrolls destroyed that theory.
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VYNETTE,
One note of evidence that Mary was of the line of David (Judah) is that Paul wrote regarding Jesus that as to His “human nature, [He] was a decendant of David.” (Romans 9:3). This clear reference to Jesus’ “human” decendancy implies that Mary (His human mother) was a decendant of David. See also Luke 1:32 for another connection of Jesus with the family line of David, which lends to identifying Mary with the same tribe. And note that Luke does not take pains to distinguish Mary as from another tribe at all. But the connection is often made clear throughout the New Testament that Jesus was of the royal family line of David.
VYNETTE, I have trouble with your dogmatism over something the text simply does not say. Luke does not “identify” Mary as a Levite.
As to “suggenes” in context, it is best translated in Luke 1 as “realtive.” It is a general kinship term and it does not necessarily determine tribal identity. One can easily be “kin” without being in the same specific tribe. Kinship connections can come through marriage and through intermarriages among tribes at various points in time.
As stated before, the “suggenes” affiliation between Elizabeth and Mary is not determinative for Mary’s tribal identity.
Not that it matters so much, but your unjustified dogmatism (without solid evidence in my view) evoked my interest in responding.
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The text is just too crystal clear in claiming a virgin birth for Jesus to argue the point. Let the Bible reader decide. You don’t have to believe the text if you wish, but honest readers cannot spin away the fact that the text does clearly make the claim.
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VYNETTE, your post at #62 seems to betray a reckless disregard for what Luke actually writes. Luke does not claim “that Jesus was born from an adulterous affair.”
Reread it.
Disbelieve it if you want, but don’t rewrite it!
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Mr_Meaner,
I don’t know why you persist in identifying as female the Greek word translated by the KJV as ‘Joanna.’
Brown, Driver and Briggs; Strongs, or any other lexical work will tell you that ‘Joanna’ is derived from ‘Yowchanan’ and is definitely male. There were eight men of this name in the Old Testament.
Translators have supplied the English words “which was the son of” in front of each male ancestor for a very good reason – to convey the correct meaning of the Greek grammatical case of the definite article (tou) preceding each name in the list. Your claim that ‘Joanna’ is female would actually break this chain of genitives on which the entire genealogy is constructed.
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Vynette 86
The Joanna’s in the Scripture below are ALL women, its so obvious –
Luke 3:27 Which was the son of Joanna, which was the son of Rhesa, which was the son of Zorobabel, which was the son of Salathiel, which was the son of Neri,
Luke 8:3 And Joanna the wife of Chuza Herod’s steward, and Susanna, and many others, which ministered unto him of their substance.
Luke 24:10 It was Mary Magdalene and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, and other women that were with them, which told these things unto the apostles.
I went to Strongs, they are “women” - are you actually researching this material?
Johanan is a male name used in the Old Testament.
I advise you to research these two names more carefully – - Johanan and Joanna without confusing gender -
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______________________________________
Here is the link to the “Strong’s Concordance with Hebrew and Greek Lexicon” – You can research this for yourselves, its not that difficult –
______________________________________
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Vynette,
Vynette – 72
Have you researched all 89 passages of Scripture that state the name “Holy Ghost” posts 78, 79, and 80?
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Victoria,
Well, I looked and I’m really impressed that you have come up with so many inappropriate translations of the Greek word “pneuma.”
It’s primary meaning is “breath”. The English word “ghost” carries with it the connotation of disembodied souls floating about – an idea which is totally foreign to both Old and New Testaments.
The English term “Holy Spirit” is synonomous with the Greek “hagios pneuma” and the Hebrew “ruach hakodesh” and carry with them no ghostly connotations at all.
Perhaps the prime example of the true meaning of “pneuma” is one you quoted yourself –
” ‘Peace to you! As the Father has sent me, I also send you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit [pneuma]‘ ” (John 20:21-22).
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Victoria, you are cofusing the female name ‘Ioanna’ (Luke 8:3, 24:10) with its masculine equivalent ‘Ioannas’
The name given in Luke 3:27 is the masculine ‘Ioannas’
Strongs Numbering system -
Number: 2490
Name: Ioannas (ee-o-an-nas’)
Comment: A form of Ioannes (2491); Joannas, an Israelite
Number: 2491
Name: Ioannes (ee-o-an’-nace)
Comment: Of Hebrew origin (Yowchanan); Joannes (i.e. Jochanan), the name of four Israelites
It would be unkind of me to respond in kind to your suggestion that I do my research.
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Make it Man and Mr_Meaner,
It is Sunday evening here in Australia and some family members are due to arrive from overseas. I will respond to all your questions as time permits.
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Vynette,
I’ve seen messages from you here and there. You definitely seem to be on a “different page” than most people here.
This is just a curious question. (There is no agenda positive or negative.) What do you believe?
(As you probably know, I call myself a Radical Agnostic.)
By the way, though I have always lived in the United States, some of my relatives have chosen to live in Australia at various times. My uncle and aunt (both quite elderly) are living there now, I believe.
I wish you a merry Australian Christmas. Is it filled with sunshine at your end of the world?
(When you get time from relatives and instructing the loyalists at wmb. I will be here until the end of the year, and then I will gone from wmb, so while I don’t want to rush you, that is the time frame.)
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Joel Mark,
Thanks for your honesty and humility in addressing various concerns and issues above, many of which are only red herrings as far as the topic of authority is concerned. We can see by the passions that have come out that it’s difficult for people to sign up to AN authority in their lives. Even as Christians we fall back into rebelliousness that is symtomatic of our fallen condition. Praise God that he has sent his son to set captives free (me among them) from their slavery to defining authority as they wish.
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by vynette 12.23.07 at 1:01 am
Mr_Meaner,
According to my Strong’s that greek word is entry #2489-Ioanna, which is the fem. version of 2490.
Is it possible that you are misreading your reference work?
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Mr_Meaner,
Well, can’t sleep so checked in here to see your message.
If you take another look at my #91 comment, you will see that I did not quote the Strong’s number for female ‘Ioanna’ which is indeed 2489.
I quoted the numbers for masculine ‘Ioannas’(2490)
and masculine ‘Ioannes’ (2491)
I was responding to a comment by Victoria that all the Lukan references to ‘Joanna’ were women.
As you can see by checking the Greek, this is incorrect. The name given in Luke 3:27 is the masculine ‘Ioannas’
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I’m at a loss.
No matter how many times I check the Greek dictionary, It still says 2489 next to the entry Joanna.
Now you are making me wonder whose Strong’s is wrong.
If you don’t mind my asking, what year was your version published?
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Random Name,
A Merry Christmas to you too. The weather here is fairly hot, very humid, and overcast. Unusually, we’ve hardly seen the sun for the past week or so. But even as I type, I’m looking out the window and see some clear patches in the just-breaking dawn sky.
Now, to your question. I strive to be a follower of Jesus, but whether I have succeeded or not will one day be decided by a higher authority. How does one become a follower of Jesus though? First, some background –
The hope of Israel, as expressed in the Old Testament, was the establishment on earth of the Kingdom of God under the kingship of an anointed one – a ‘messiah’.
After the Exodus, YHVH was seen as a ‘deliverer’ who had saved his people through his human agent, Moses.
Throughout subsequent centuries and manifold troubles, an idea arose that YHVH would one day send another ‘deliverer’ – one like Moses. The Hebrew prophets, each building and enlarging upon the expectations of his predecessors, finally developed a complete picture of this ‘deliverer’, this ‘messiah’. His scope, however, would not be limited to that of Moses. The saving work of this deliverer would reach out to embrace the entire world. Through the messiah, God’s Kingdom of justice and peace would be established, not just in Israel, but over the whole world, “on earth as it is in heaven.”
The Hebrew prophets also realised that if God’s promises to King David were to be fulfilled, then the messiah must be a descendant of David – of David’s flesh and blood. (The infancy narratives in Matthew and Luke were written to prove this very point, not to record a virgin conception or a virgin birth.)
The New Testament portrays Jesus of Nazareth as this longed-for messiah, as a perfectly normal human who was chosen by YHVH as an instrument of intervention into wordly affairs.
Many Christians are ignorant of Hebrew messianic expectations and the ‘messianic’ mindset of Jesus’ contemporaries. This ignorance has facilitated the building up of doctrinal absurdities such as the Miraculous Incarnation and the Trinity, which centre around the personality cult of ‘Jesus Christ,’ thereby defeating the entire purpose of Jesus’ life and death.
The “gospel” being preached was stated by Paul to be -
“Having therefore obtained the help that is from God, I stand (before Herod Agrippa) unto this day testifying both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses did say should come; how that the Christ must suffer, and how that he first by the resurrection of the dead should proclaim light both to the people and to the Gentiles.” (Acts 26:22-23)
The interpretive principle of the New Testament is the way in which it reconciles the ‘physical’ nature of Israelite messianic expectations with a totally unexpected ’spiritual’ fulfilment. Its two major themes are John’s gospel of love and the Pauline principle of inner and spiritual identification with Jesus, with a self-imposed ‘crucifixion’ and ‘resurrection.’
Regardless of the varying perspectives of its authors, much of the New Testament was written for the purpose of convincing Israelites that the Kingdom of God on earth would not become a reality through obedience to the “letter” of the law but rather by adherence to its “spirit.”
Dead belief and ritual practice was nothing:The Kingdom of God on earth would become a reality by walking in the footsteps of Jesus.
One becomes a follower of Jesus by emulating his character in action; by holding to the same set of values; by challenging any religious or political authority if it violates those values…then…others may see your good works and perhaps emulate you as you emulate Jesus…and so on.
That’s it!
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Mr_Meaner,
Relax, we are saying the same thing – ‘Ioanna’ IS 2489.
The point is that the feminine ‘Ioanna’ is NOT the name given in Luke 3:27. The name given there is the masculine ‘Ioannas,’ which is Strong’s Number 2490.
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Ah, so you aren’t basing that on a Strong’s.
What reference work translates that word Ioannes?
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“This ignorance has facilitated the building up of doctrinal absurdities such as the Miraculous Incarnation and the Trinity, which centre around the personality cult of ‘Jesus Christ,’ thereby defeating the entire purpose of Jesus’ life and death.”
Why would a belief in the virgin birth defeat the purpose of Jesus’ life, death, and (I’ll add)resurrection.
As far as the trinity, that is a subject on which not many people will agree. I can’t see how having an opinion on this, whether true or not would effect one’s understanding of the purpose of Jesus’ life.
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Mr_Meaner,
How are we at such cross-purposes? I am using Strong’s.
Strong’s Number 2489 is ‘Ioanna’.
Strong’s Number for the name ‘Ioannas’ is 2490.
Strong’s Number for the same name ‘Ioannas’ but different form ‘Ioannes’ is 2491.
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Mr_Meaner,
I really have to go now so I’ll get back to you on your # 101
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Below is a link to the following post -” personality cult of “JESUS” ?
“It matters not one scrap whether you believe in Jesus, or God, or anything else.”
This was written on “A golden hope, no compass needed”
Vynette wrote this December 8, 2007 – post 104 –
___________________
Anlir, you asked: “So people who live(d) where there are/were no Christians, no Bibles, no radio, TV or internet, no churches, and no inkling of Jesus or the Christian religion are going to hell? How did God provide them with “all the information” to make an informed decision?”
That these types of very legitimate questions need to be raised at all is an indictment of all Christian churches becuase they are all united in pursuing the personality cult of “Jesus Christ,” thereby concealing the prime message of the NT for nearly two thousand years.
The issues for which Jesus of Nazareth was crucified are universal and living. They were made explicit by a collision of wills which took place at a certain time (30 AD) and in a certain place (Jerusalem).
Jesus was a man who died for a principle. He was crucified by self-righteous ignorance and arrogance. The principle is the essential thing. Time, place and personalities are only incidental.
For the purposes of demonstration, let us consider that the New Testament is nothing more than an attempt to write a dramatic tragedy.
The account which is most like that of a drama is found in the Gospel of John. He portrays Jesus as God’s Word of Life, and Love, made flesh. He subordinates all incidental material.
Within the limits imposed by factual accuracy, it is in Jerusalem that he brings all the main characters onto the stage at the time essential for dramatic impact and development.
In the particular events and in the climax which John presents, the dramatist (as we are presently considering him), sees the outworking of universal principles – truth versus the lie, objective attitudes versus subjective attitudes,
personal integrity versus institutional formalism, and so on.
Instead of localising Jesus to the stage of the Jerusalem of 30AD, he places him on the stage of eternity as a symbol of ‘Everyman’ by identifying him with issues of principle.
Because these values are universal and living, they are independent of ALL human divisions.
It matters not one scrap whether you believe in Jesus, or God, or anything else. “Faith” in Jesus is identification with the principles for which he lived and died.
What matters is the LIVING of a “Christ-like” life whether you recognise it as such or not.
Politeness forbids me from drawing an analogy between the centuries of theological encrustation concealing the simplicity and beauty of this New Testament message, and Hercules’ cleaning of the…er…matter from the Augean stables…but I know how he must have felt when faced with the job. Nice symbolism in that Labour.
Please note – I am not casting aspersions on any individual, only on the collective “wisdom” of Christendom.
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Sorry wrong link give in above post 104
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Mr_Meaner, Vynette,
I think the confusion comes from differences between different Greek manuscripts. The Textus Receptus, on which the King James Version was based (and which Strong used to create his concordance), has the name Joanna. Hort/Westcott (and I forget the name of the group of manuscripts associated with their work) show it as Joanan (as least that’s how I would transliterate the Greek), which the modern translations generally use.
Many people use Strong’s numbering system for the Greek and Hebrew words, whether or not they use the Textus Receptus. So “using Strong’s” can mean looking up where Joanna (2489) is used, and that would include Luke 3:27 as per the KJV. Or it can mean finding the Greek word in a Greek interlinear Bible, then looking it up in Strong’s to find its meaning and where else it was used. And then it depends which Greek text you use, since they are not identical. (The differences are small, but this happens to be one of them.)
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Vynette,
Let me just ask you straight out.
Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the messiah?
also,
Do you recognize the OT as “God’s word”?
If so, I have further questions.
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Pauline,
(and I forget the name of the group of manuscripts associated with their work)
It isn’t Young’s Concordance, is it?
That would explain a lot, if so.
There is an old saying that comes to mind
Strong’s for the strong. And Young’s for the young.
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“textus receptus”
Not an easy thing to find online.
I find plenty of opinions on it.
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Mr_Meaner,
No, I forget what manuscripts Young’s is based on, but I was referring the Greek texts themselves, not an particular reference work. I was always taught that the more recent translations were better largely because they were based on better manuscripts, not just because they use modern English. But I found out from this blog, mostly from DR I think, that some people think the Textus Receptus is better in terms of accuracy, something about the Alexandrians having changed things to fit their own ideas – though when I read up a bit on the subject I wasn’t convinced.
My husband prefers the NASB, so we got an NASB concordance. I find it difficult to look up most verses in a concordance unless you have the version that matches it – and I’ve used so many versions that my memory of any given verse tends to be a synthesis of a few different versions. Since I have access to my husband’s study tools, I generally use the interlinear if I want to know what a word means, and his Greek lexicons, rather than Strong’s. (Or I just do an online search, which lets me look things up in any one of dozens of versions, including the various Greek texts, as I did today.)
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Hey!
I found it!
http://www.christianhospitality.org/TRStephanus.pdf
It’s a 3.3 MB file.
I clearly see an “a” at the end of the word in question in 3:27.
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The fundamental issue here is whether one believes in the virgin, miraculous birth, incarnation,and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Vynette, frankly is a bit vague on this issue, though she is obviously a devout Christian.
It is true that Jesus was on an important level a Jewish teacher and rabbi who came to fulfill the Jewish law as well as to extend within reason this law to the Gentiles. Yet, he was, also, the Logos, or Word made flesh who incarnated the truth of the cosmos, however “foolish,” as Paul remarked the cultural despisers of religion often regard this.
I understand that this is regarded by many moderns as occultish nonsense, though it is according to faithful Christians the truth.
At any rate it is wonderful that Andree can inspire such an interesting discussion of Christian authority on this fine Christian blogsite.
Have a good Christmas all.
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Peter, maybe you missed this on the “Hitchens Romney’s Mormonism fair game” thread – Post 236 by Vynette -
Vynette posted:
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Marvin Olasky appears on the FRONT PAGE OF DRUDGE (maybe some of you didn’t know) as a contributor with other writers/authors (his name is just above Bill O’Reilly) – If you link his name you will find some interesting pieces he has written this year –
The link below will take you to “Atheists vs. Grace” an interesting read.
The list of Columns
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/marvinolasky/archive.shtml“>Columns by Marvin Olasky
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Mr_Meaner,
Back for a few minutes.
I am well aware that Stephen’s Textus Receptus of 1550 and Scrivener’s Textus Receptus of 1894 have the variant reading of ‘Ioanna’
The Westcott/Hort of 1881, Tischendorf’s 8th Edition, and the Byzantine/Majority Text of 2000 all have the reading ‘Ioannas.’
The variant ‘Ioanna’ cannot be correct because the Greek grammatical construct requires that the name be masculine. As I explained in a previous post, all names in the chain are dependent upon the “son” of Luke 3:23.
This fact is universally recognised by scholars which is why almost all English translations insert the words “son of” in front of every name in the list.
Pauline, thanks for your comment. I’m sure you didn’t mean to imply that I was confused about my sources but, just for the record, I can assure you that I am not.
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Victoria: Peter, maybe you missed this on the “Hitchens Romney’s Mormonism fair game” thread – Post 236 by Vynette -Vynette posted:
“Strange as it may seem to you, I don’t care one jot or tittle about my own salvation.”
Thank you. If this is true, we quite probably have a snake in the grass, though I hope this is not true. Perhaps Vynette could explain her remark regarding her salvation.
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Below are excerpts from Vynette’s post 402 – posted on December 11- 2007 – “Reason and the Season” thread –
“I beg to differ Victoria – it is the doctrines of orthodox Christinity that are ‘pure nonsense’ and ‘foolishness.’ “
“The genie is out of the bottle now and nothing the churches do or say will force it back in.”
“It may appear to folk in the USA that orthodoxy can withstand these ravages but I can assure you that the slide into atheism and agnosticism is nearing irreversible limits in those countries which once were the bastions of orthodoxy. The only places in the world where orthodox Christianity is surviving and growing, in some cases, are precisely those where ordinary folk still have limited access to information e.g. certain countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America.”
“And even this happy situation will not last forever.”
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LINK:
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Vynette,
Sorry, didn’t mean to imply a thing about you being confused. The confusion I referred to ws that you and Mr_Meaner were both looking at Strong’s but finding a different answer, and I was trying to explain why that was so. It’s not that either of you were confused, you just weren’t using the same Greek text (that is, an English translation based on that text).
Musing suggested in a different thread that I look at some of your comments regarding a different view of Christianity from what is generally considered “orthodox” today. I have to admit I have generally not tried to follow the arguments back and forth between you and others such as Victoria or Joel Mark. I’m curious, based on the conversation with Musing, to learn more about different points of view, but I have to admit I would prefer to read a book on the subject than comments on a blog. If you have any suggestions of books that explain your view of what it means to be a follower of Christ, I would be interested.
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VYNETTE,
“This ignorance has facilitated the building up of doctrinal absurdities such as the Miraculous Incarnation”
So now orthodox Christians are ignorant? I understand this kind of language from QWERTY and ERASMUS but not from you.
The virgin birth is clearly written by Luke
Luke 1:34,35:
“Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I KNOW NOT A MAN? And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.”
This is simple – Heli cannot be Jesus’ father since Mary did not know a man. I know you have to hold strongly onto your belief against the virgin birth because it would undermine your entire belief system that Jesus was not divine. And the only evidence you have is a misinterpretation of Luke 3:23 which you seem to think is unambiguous. So how do you explain the above verses? Do you believe Mary had her affair with Heli after the angel appeared to her even though the angel told her nothing is impossible with God and she told the angel let it be as you have said?
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If Musing suggests that Vynette has another than orthodox view of Christianity, then we have clear evidence that she is talking through her hat.
Putting it all together, it becomes clear Vynette is playing a deceptive game her, particularly in that she is distinctly hazy in her understanding of the Greek.
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Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Matthew 7:15
Let us remember that NOT ALL ‘false prophets’ come in sheep’s clothing, some are OUTWARDLY ravening wolves. There are many who are arrogant in their beliefs, to change the very words of the Gospel so that they might pontificate the FALSE GOSPEL -
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SBG,
“So now orthodox Christians are ignorant? I understand this kind of language from QWERTY and ERASMUS but not from you.”
Is the word “ignorant” an insult to folk in the USA? (I assume this is where you live). I use in the sense of “lack of knowledge” about a particular subject. I suppose it is just one of the perils of cross-culture communication.
I did not mean it as an insult at all so if you perceived it as such, I apologise.
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Vynette –
If we are to take your ‘word for it’ then one could call you ‘ignorant’ regarding Scripture, Greek, Hebrew, and most of what you post – however, no one has ‘up to this time’ –
It’s obvious you have traveled very little if at all, and have no idea what other countries consider ‘good manners’ but I can guarantee you that NO ONE calls ANYONE ‘IGNORANT’ in the US or anywhere I have traveled – It’s not only INSULTING, it makes the person who utters such a remark as unlearned, crude, but most commonly ‘common’ without a proper upbringing – Name calling isn’t a sport which we receive with a smile in the US, nor have I EVER found other countries anxious to welcome ANYONE who participates in such sport –
You can drop the presumed idea of “cross-culture communication” it doesn’t fly for an excuse -
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re: Vynette’s post #98, in which she wrote, “The New Testament portrays Jesus of Nazareth as this longed-for messiah, as a perfectly normal human who was chosen by YHVH as an instrument of intervention into wordly affairs.”
The reason (which superceded their jealousy at His popularity) why the Scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees were driven to homicidal rage against Jesus was the fact that He continually claimed to be God (Matt 27:43; Mark 14:62; Luke 22:70;John 4:26; John 8:24, 28, 58; John 10:36 and 13:19).
The New Testament does not portray Jesus as a mere human used by YHVH, but as the one and only divine Savior (like but essentially UNalike Moses), perfect (not a normal human), sinless, and therefore the only worthy Sacrifice for man’s sin.
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Well, Victoria.
It’s time for me to get kicked off this blog. I know that will make you feel good and you will bray your victory at having driven me off this blog but what I am going to do will make me feel even better. I am usually very critical of persons who indulge in personal attacks but..it’s time for a little Christmas cheer.
It’s a mystery to me why your behaviour is never questioned. Is everybody here frightened of you or what? If nobody else is willing to call you out, then I will.
You, Victoria, have called me a blasphemer, a liar, a heretic, a ravening wolf etc etc. But when I use one word ‘ignorant’ in the dictionary sense, you unleash a further diatribe and call me unlearned, crude, common, not well brought up…
In the past you have questioned my motives, blackened my name, cast me in the role of villain, doubted my honesty, incited others to fear and hate me, and insulted me in every conceivable manner. Now according to you I’m an international pariah as well…?
You, Victoria, are the most sickeningly self-righteous, hysterically self-indulgent, piously posturing, and thoroughly obnoxious little hypocrite it has ever been my displeasure to encounter.
What a wonderful example of Christian love you are with your highminded and arrogant condescension, your acid-like disposition, your hatred masquerading as concerned piety, your dripping vitriol, and your poison ‘pen.’
You, Victoria, are a joke!
Now, that diatribe was immensely satisfying and I can assure you I will sleep well tonight.
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Dear all,
I expect to be thrown off this blog now for my deliberately insulting personal attack on Victoria.
She will bray on and on about how she drove me off but no matter…it’s been worth it.
So, I’ll bid you all farewell…Thanks for the intellectually stimulating conversations.
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Nah..
That won’t get you thrown out. I’ve said much worse to other people.
Everyone needs an arch enemy.
Batman has his Joker, Superman had Lex Luthor, Wile E. Coyote had the Roadrunner. In fact, I feel lost not having a human arch enemy.
It keeps you on your toes.
heh,heh
Lets all just calm down, Its Christmas eve, d@%$#t!
Say after me…
Mmmelllloow….Mmmeellloow
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The Scripture which we have today was not, a conspiracy which the Apostles, deemed necessary to write – Nor were those who translated the documents so long ago in any way conspiring to delude the world as to the LORD’S virgin birth, ministry, death on the cross, and the triumphant Resurrection from the grave – However, the CONSPIRACY takes shape when those down through the ages, and more importantly in the past 200 years up to TODAY, weave what they consider to be a very cleaver way in which to attack the Bible, either by supposed knowledge or twisting passages of Scripture to meet their ‘agenda’ or ‘cult’ –
Those who wish to weave some sort of conspiracy as to the accuracy and reliability of Scripture, accusing Christ’s disciples who were chosen by Him for the preaching of the Gospel into a jigsaw puzzle, . . . . . . and also those disciples who sat under the Apostles to learn ‘first hand’ about the Savior, OR the accusations are hurled at the translators who worked with the original manuscripts –
Those individuals who believe THEY ALONE are capable of reassembling, due to error or negligence, or down right untruthfulness are nothing more than antichrist – The LORD warned us there would be those who would come with ‘false gospel’ and they have been with us forever -
Hebrew and Greek are ancient languages as are Aramaic and Latin – many pretend to have knowledge of these languages, be they in the ‘old form’ or the ‘new’ then becoming the so called ‘teacher’ of any and all who will listen, as though they are now ‘equipped’ with superior knowledge to translate the Scriptures, . . . .
The CONSPIRACY against GOD’S Word has not worked, those who are steadfast in their belief of the LORD Jesus Christ, and His DEITY are unmoved, those who would try to ‘delude’ the saints are the very ones who have fallen under their own delusion –
Today we celebrate the night before our Saviors birth, born of the virgin Mary over 2,000 years ago, not coming to this earth in earthly splendor, but coming in the splendor of GOD the FATHER with angels announcing HIS birth to shepherd’s -
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Peter Leavitt at #54:I am afraid that being a Deist-slash-liberal Christian would place you in the category of what C.s. Lewis once remarked would be Christianity and water. He allowed for plenty of latitude within the Christian faith, though the key elements would be a belief in the incarnate and resurrected Christ along with some form of the Trinity.
Fortunately, I don’t need C.S. Lewis’s approval.
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SBG at #70: First, Miller should have known better than to even attempt to predict the return of Jesus since Jesus said no one knows the hour or the day. Also, the return as described by Jesus has nothing in common with Baha’u’llah.
Second, do you have any source besides Bahai literature for the prediction of Quetzalcoatl’s return being “exactly” 1844?
The Toltecs believed that Quetzalcoatl would return in the 13th era on their calendar, which began in 1844 by our calendars.
Let me be clear in stating that I am not claiming these are prophecies pointing to Baha’u'llah. I do not believe they are. My point is that the prophecies Christians point to as predicting Christ are based on the same kind of later re-interpretation and dependent on already believing the predicted event.
Third, how is 1862 or 1863 a “specific” year and how does that match the other two “prophecies” of 1844?
Re-read what I said. The prophecy pertaining to the 1860s coincides with a person called “The Bab,” who was Baha’u'llah’s herald, and who was imprisoned for his beliefs, as the prophecy implied.
I would not agree that these are very “impressive”
I agree, they are not. But they are more impressive than reading a line in the psalms and a similar description in a gospel and calling it a fulfilled prophecy. And that was my point.
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I woke up this morning to find Santa had been and felt a little more mellow, as Mr_Meaner said.
While I still have the opportunity to post something here, I wish to invite anyone who is interested in following up on any topics raised here to engage with me on my own blog. I am more than willing to respond to any unanswered questions.
Pauline, I know of only one book that accurately reflects my views. But that book was a limited publication written by an Australian historian (who later became my mentor) in the early 1950’s.
This book is called “The Race is Run” by E.P. Wixted. I set up my own blog and called it “The Race is Run” in memory of my mentor. Much of the material I present there is based upon his research efforts spanning a period of more than forty years and on my own further research.
I don’t know of any copies still in existence except for the one I have, and it is in a very sorry state.
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Mr_Meaner,
You asked me: “Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the messiah?”
My answer is Yes.
“Do you recognize the OT as “God’s word”?”
My answer is that while I ascribe to the view that all scripture of the Protestant canon is “inspired” by God in the original languages, I don’t hold to the view that it is “inerrant.” To do so is to repeat the mistake made by the priests of Jerusalem who inadvertently crucified their messiah through a belief that the Old Testament was inerrant.
I also keep in mind that the Bible was made for man, not man for the Bible, and was written to explain as best it can our relationship to, and duties towards, the Creator.
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Another question
Do you believe in a second coming of Christ to Earth?
These questions are related, and related to the subject at hand, believe it or not.
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STEVEG,
You repeated the “prophecies” without answering my question about any source other than Bahai. And Miller’s “prophecy” was a joke.
I’m interested in how you deal with the prophecies in Daniel.
Merry Christmas to Everyone!
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Since some claim to believe Jesus was a messiah (of some kind) but do not acknowledge His divinity (re: post #98), I would consider it as important a question to ask, “Do you believe Jesus is God?”
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Mr_Meaner,
You asked me if I believed in the ’second coming?’
Most definitely.
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WINSOMETOCHRIST
Jesus is not God – he is a creature just like the rest of us. It is not important what I personally believe, the real question is what does scripture say about the matter.
I of course argue that Jesus never claimed to be God, the apostles never preached that he was God, and the writers of the New Testament never claimed that he was God.
To claim that Jesus is God is to misunderstand Hebrew modes of thinking and expression.
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Jesus is God the Son –
<But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom.
Hebrews 1:8
GOD calls His SON GOD, and His SON calls His FATHER GOD!
Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?
John 14:9
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And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.
1 Timothy 3:16
Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our Saviour, and Lord Jesus Christ, which is our hope; 1 Timothy 1:1
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Thank you, Victoria.
Again, Jesus claimed His divinity often, which led to his crucifixion (Matt 27:43; Mark 14:62; Luke 22:70;John 4:26; John 8:24, 28, 58; John 10:36 and 13:19). The religious leaders in Jerusalem at the time crucified Jesus mainly because He threatened their power, prestige and authority; their excuse for crucifying Him was because they claimed He was committing blasphemy.
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WINSOMETOCHRIST,
Matt 24:3 – the term “son of God” is synonomous with the term “messiah” and has nothing whatever to do with “deity”
Mark 14:62 – Jesus is asked if he is the Messiah and he tells them yes. Again, nothing to do with “deity.”
Luke 22:70 – again, the term “son of God” is synonomous with the term “messiah” and has nothing whatever to do with “deity”
John 4:26 – Jesus is just affirming that he is the “messiah”
John 8:24 – again, Jesus affirms he is the “messiah’
John 8:28 – ditto
John 8:58 – “Before Abraham was, I am” (I the one). Jesus was claiming to be the expected one, the anointed King, the Son of God (synonomous terms). The Messiah came first in the creative intention of God, before the time of Abraham. Abraham was able to look forward and see the his “day,” the day of the realisation of God’s plan for mankind, the day of the advent of the Messiah, the day when God would create man anew.
John 10:36 -
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John 10:36 – the term “son of God” is synonomous with the term “messiah” and has nothing whatever to do with “deity”
John 13:19 – again, Jesus affirms he is the “messiah’
The terms “son of god” and “messiah” are synonomous. They do not imply deity – in fact the “messiah” had to be of the seed of David according to the flesh. Nowhere in the Old Testament will you find any hint that the “messiah” was to be “divine.”
To the Hebrews, such an idea would represent the worst form of idolatry.
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Vynette,
When I looked at the issue of Jesus’ divinity several years ago, and asked someone why it was required by Christian theology, the answer was related to the atonement. The theologian Anselm said that “only human beings can rightfully repay the debt which was incurred through their willful disobedience to God, although only God can make the infinite satisfaction necessary to repay it; therefore God must send the God-man, Jesus Christ, to satisfy both these conditions.” (Columbia Enclyclopedia).
What is your view (if any) of the atonement?
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Vynette,
I meant to add in my comment #144 above that I looked around (briefly) on your web page, and didn’t see anything regarding the atonement. If you can direct me to where you address it (if you do), I will read that, rather than you having to repeat yourself here.
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Reading the passage below, we must realize that Christ was in the FORM of God, but took upon himself the FORM of a servant, being in the likeness of men.
6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
7 But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:
8 And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Philippians 2:6-8
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Reading the passage below, we must realize that Christ was in the FORM of God, but took upon himself the FORM of a servant, being in the likeness of men.
6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
7 But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:
8 And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Philippians 2:6-8
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Pauline,
you asked for my view on the ‘atonement.’ Except for posts on current affairs and certain Roman Catholic themes, I have been proceeding in a semi-structured way on my own blog. To this point, I have been analysing the major universal doctrines and haven’t yet dealt with doctrines particularly emphasised by the various denominations – such as the ‘atonement.’
The various atonement theologies need an exhaustive analysis, which I will provide in future on my own blog.
Just briefly though –
The story of the Garden of Eden presents us with the failings of mankind portrayed in an allegory. ‘Adam’ simply means ‘man’ and is derived from the Hebrew ‘ ha adamah’ which means ‘the ground’ or ‘the earth.’ ‘Eve’ simply means ‘living one’ or ’source of life.’
Paul emphasises that although made from the same ‘earth,’ there is a vast gulf separating the ‘first Adam,’ who embodied all the faults of ‘earthiness,’ and between the ‘last Adam,’ Jesus, who embodied all the virtues required by God.
Because blood symbolised ‘life,’ and we have new ‘life’ in Jesus, Paul depicts Jesus as corporately ‘atoning’ once only for the sins of Adam and Eve – humanity in general – and purging them with redeeming blood. As well as humanity in general, this once only atonement referred to the failures of corporate entities such as the Law of Moses and the Priesthood. We might say that the slate was wiped clean at the time of the crucifixion.
The Old Testament consistently warns that there is no vicarious atonement for individual sin. By the time of Jesus, however, the ritual observance of the ‘letter’ of the Mosaic Law had increasingly been seen as providing a comfortable excuse to avoid carrying out the ’spirit’ of the Law.
Jesus himself warned that every individual is responsible for his own sin. Henceforth, in the New Creation of Life brought into existence by him, there would be no more ‘cover’ for sin that the Mosaic Law had been seen to provide.
According to both Old and New Testaments, the only way it has ever been possible for an individual to ‘atone’ for personal sin is through prayer and repentance, followed by good works. This concept is befitting of the God of justice, wisdom, and impartiality.
What does not reflect the wisdom, justice and impartiality of God, however, is the claim that only a divinity can atone for the sins of humanity. This idea leaves the concept of atonement utterly devoid of meaning. Only a normal man fashioned after the first Adam, subject to all the weaknesses and temptations of the first Adam, can atone for the sins of Adam.
Well, Pauline, that was supposed to be brief, but, as you can see…
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Who is the Savior in the Old Testament? Who is the LORD in the Old Testament, Isaiah 43:11 If you give this careful thought you will see the DEITY -
I, even I, am the LORD: and BESIDE ME THERE IS NO SAVIOUR.
Isaiah 43:11
For unto you is born this day in the city of David a SAVIOUR which is CHRIST THE LORD.
Luke 2:11
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What does BESIDE ME mean in Isaiah 43:11
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If one doesn’t care about there salvation these passages wouldn’t mean anything to them –
31 Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him.
32 Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?
33 The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.John 10
NOTE:
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Amen!
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Only a perfect sacrifice could ever satisfy the holy righteousness of God. No creation, no man whatsoever, has ever been or could ever be perfect. Therefore, Jesus –if he were a created being as you say– could never have satisfied God as atonement for mankind’s sin.
Briefly, what God requires, God provides.
God requires a perfect sacrifice for man’s sin.
God provided a perfect sacrifice for man’s sin.
He gave of Himself. He loves us. As Jesus, He died for us. He Himself paid our debt.
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AMEN
God bless you,
Have a wonderful CHRISTMAS -
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Thank you! And Grace and Peace and Joy to you and yours!
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Well, WINSOMETOCHRIST,
You said: “No creation, no man whatsoever, has ever been or could ever be perfect…”
The entire witness of Scripture is at odds with your view.
The Old Testament states that man can be ‘perfect’:
“Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee” (Ezek. 28:15)
“And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil?” (Job 1:18)
“Thou shalt be perfect with the LORD thy God.” (Deut. 18:13)
The New Testament state that man can be ‘perfect’:
“But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.” (James 1:4)
Jesus himself confirms that man can be ‘perfect’ :
“Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.” (Matt. 5:48)
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#156
Vynette,
From your study of Hebrew, what is your understanding of the meaning of the word “perfect” that is used in those verses?
I have not studied Hebrew, so I have to rely on Bible study tools. One of these says that the word translated into English as “perfect” means “integrity of mind” or “innocence,” and could also described as “simplicity of mind, which is opposed to mischief and ill design.”
That is not the same as what we generally mean in English by the word perfect, by which we mean the total absence of any kind of fault.
Similarly, I have always been told that the word translated “perfect” in the New Testament means “mature” or “complete” rather than sinless. I have studied NT Greek, but not to the point that I can depend on my own knowledge of it, so I am again relying on study tools.
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VICTORIA,
Vynette has claimed that the first chapter of 1 John was not written to believers and yet John uses inclusive plural “we”.
Also you should continue to chapter 2
“My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.”
John encourages us not to sin but he obviously knows that we cannot be without sin. Jesus is the atonement for our personal sins not just corporate humanity. Vynette’s belief here has a hint of Catholicism. Vynette will then quote 1 John 3 but it is a misinterpretation of the entire letter. In chapter 3, John again exhorts us not to sin but the Greek means not to keep on sinning. John wants us to practice righteousness and not to practice sin. When you practice the piano, do you make mistakes? Yes, but you get better over time. Will you ever be a perfect piano player? No, but you will make fewer mistakes.
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VYNETTE – “The Old Testament consistently warns that there is no vicarious atonement for individual sin.”
Leviticus 4 is in direct conflict with this statement. It lists four ways that a blood sacrifice makes atonement for sins. This is not the annual “day of atonement”. A blood sacrifice is made for sins committed by the priest, the community, a leader or a member of the community. The sacrifices atone for individuals’ sins except in the case of the community. Chapters 5 and 6 continue with sacrifices to atone for individuals’ sins.
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Pauline,
I suggest that the real task is not one of identifying the possibly broad range of meanings attached to a particular word, but rather of identifying the existence of a pattern of meaning – the same word, the same particular meaning, the same or similar context, consistent application across a broad range ot texts.
However, Jesus has simplified this task greatly by including all these elements in a single verse – same word, same meaning, same context, applied consistently twice:
Jesus confirms that the level of ‘perfection’ required of man is the SAME level of ‘perfection’ as that ascribed to God.
“Be ye therefore perfect (teleios), even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect (telios).” (Matt. 5:48)
Because God is obviously without sin, and because the level of perfection required of man is precisely the same as that of God, it automatically implies ’sinlessness’ for the ‘teleios’ man.
In the Old Testament, the same Hebrew word ‘tamiym’ is used to describe man’s ‘perfection’ and God’s ‘perfection’ -
“Thou wast perfect (tamiym) in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.” (Ezek. 28:15)
“As for God his way is perfect (tamiym)…” (Psalm 18:30)
(Note another connection of ideas in these verses – God’s ‘way’ is perfect: man’s ‘way’ was perfect. The same Hebrew word ‘derek’ is used in both cases.)
In Deut. 18:13, man is commanded to be ‘perfect.’
“Thou shalt be perfect (tamiym) with the LORD thy God.”
The Septuagint translates the Hebrew ‘tamiym’ in this verse into the Greek word ‘teleios.’ Jesus drew on Deut. 18:13 for his exhortation in Matthew 5:8 – “Be ye therefore perfect (teleios)…”.
As we can see from the above, the proposition that man was always CAPABLE of the same level of ‘perfection’ as God is consistently applied in both Testaments. The concept of man being created ‘perfect,’ falling into sin, and then being recreated ‘perfect’ by following Jesus, is one of the major themes of Paul. The logical extension of all this is that man has always been CAPABLE of the same level of ’sinlessness’ as God.
Why would God say “let us make man in our own image” if it were not possible?
…………………..
The definition of the Greek word ‘teleios’ is -
brought to its end, finished, wanting nothing necessary to completeness, perfect, that which is perfect, consummate human integrity and virtue of men, full grown, adult, of full age, mature.
The definition of the Hebrew word ‘tamam’ on which its verbal derivative ‘tamiym’ is based is -
entire (literally, figuratively or morally); also (as noun) integrity, truth — without blemish, complete, full, perfect, sincerely (-ity), sound, without spot, undefiled, upright(-ly), whole.
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VYNETTE – “The logical extension of all this is that man has always been CAPABLE of the same level of ’sinlessness’ as God.”
It is because man is INCAPABLE of sinlessness that a perfect sacrifice had to be made on our behalf. Any man referred to as perfect in the OT is due to his faith in God – not because he was sinless. Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness. Noah was “perfect” because he had faith in God and yet he got drunk after the flood.
Gal 2:21
“…if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”
This is the same mistake that Mormons make. They quote the verse about Jesus telling us to be perfect and they say he wouldn’t command us to do something that we can’t do.
Righteousness can only come from God through faith – not by our own works.
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SAVEDBYGRACE – 161
What a post, I love it. Thank you. Yes, we still make mistakes. As Believers, Born Again, one day, we will never make another mistake, we won’t ever sin – Heaven is going to be a wonderful place, I can’t wait –
God bless you, and Merry CHRISTMAS. It’s just now 10:24 here on the Coast, I love this part of CHRISTMAS night, its my favorite night of the year – I feel such peace -
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SBG,
I did not go into detail in my post #148 so I’ll add a bit here.
If you read Leviticus 4 again, you will see that these sacrifices were for sins committed in “ignorance.” (Interesting word – ignorance)
That this is the true situation is confirmed for us in Hebrews 9:7 –
“…but into the second, only the high priest enters once a year, not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the sins of the people committed in ignorance.”
That Jesus did not see himself as vicariously ‘atoning’ for another individual’s intentional sin is amply demonstrated in John 15:22.
“If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloak for their sin.”
He had removed the ‘cover’ for sin that the Mosaic Law had been seen to provide. (Note that the doctrine of Original Sin has replaced the ‘cover’ for sin that Jesus came to take away)
Because Jesus also said that scripture could not be broken, his statement, of course, accurately reflects the Old Testament’s many warnings, e.g.
“And it came to pass on the morrow, that Moses said unto the people, Ye have sinned a great sin: and now I will go up unto YHVH; peradventure I shall make atonement for your sin. And Moses returned unto YHVH, and said, Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold. Yet now, if thou wilt forgive their sin, and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written. And YHVH said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book.” (Exodus 32:30-33) Moses’ request was denied on the basis that he could not suffer vicariously for intentional sin.
“But everyone will die for his own sin…” (Jeremiah 31:30).
“No man can by any means redeem his brother, or give to God a ransom for him” (Psalms 49:7).
“The person who sins will die…” (Ezekiel 18:20).
“…everyone shall be put to death for his own sin.” (Deuteronomy 24:16, II Kings 14:6).
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SBG,
The “faith” of Abraham and Noah was always accompanied by works. Abraham had faith that God would keep his promises and demonstrated that faith by the attempted sacrificial offering of Isaac. He was then declared righteous. Noah built the Ark.
I hardly think Noah’s unintentional ‘drunkenness’ constitutes ’sin.’ We must remember that Jesus was accused of being a ‘winebibber’ and there is no doubt that he did drink wine.
But, regardless, we are still exhorted by God and by Jesus to be ‘perfect.’
Re your quote from Galatians: Of course righteousness cannot be gained through the Mosaic Law – that is stated over and over. But at the time of Abraham and Noah, these men were not under the Mosaic Law because it was not yet in existence.
Even during the period of the Law, God through his prophets was still exhorting humans to become ‘perfect’ by prayer and repentance followed by good works.
You say: “This is the same mistake that Mormons make. They quote the verse about Jesus telling us to be perfect and they say he wouldn’t command us to do something that we can’t do.”
How is it possible for a follower of Jesus to ‘justify’ disregarding the words of Christianity’s founder in favour of an ideology called “justification by faith?”
To me, a hopeful follower of Jesus, the words of Jesus are sacrosanct and paramount. If the words of Jesus are perceived to conflict with another part of scripture, then the words of Jesus must take precedence. Of course, any conflict is only perceived, not real.
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Vynette, do the posts below look familiar to you?
Here is the link to this sight:
http://exchristian.net/letters/2006/10/i-love-you-guys.html
==================================
“Very good question. The reasons for my postings here I thought would have become obvious by now.”
“What would be the best, perhaps only way to loosen the churches stranglehold on the ‘faithful’?”
“The strategy I’ve been pursuing on my own blog is to divorce Jesus and the New Testament from those who claim to be acting in his name. Throw up a mental roadblocks and hurdles. Introduce doubt into the minds of ordinary Christian folk.”
Posted October 30, 2006 by someone named Vynette – Exchristian.net
==================================
“I don’t know how to make a link here so you’ll have to visit my blog, The Race is Run. I’ll post it there shortly. It’s a fairly large .pdf file so I don’t know if I can even upload it successfully.”
posted: November 02, 2006 – posted by someone named Vynette – Exchristian.net
“This book is called “The Race is Run” by E.P. Wixted. I set up my own blog and called it “The Race is Run”
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VYNETTE,
You quoted a bunch of verses about sin leading to death. Pauls says in Romans 6:23 – “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” His vicarious atonement is a gift to us who have faith in Him so that we won’t die spiritually. We earn death by our sin but we can’t earn life by our works.
VYNETTE – “How is it possible for a follower of Jesus to ‘justify’ disregarding the words of Christianity’s founder in favour of an ideology called “justification by faith?””
Did I ever say we should disregard the words of Jesus? Of course not. He tells me to be perfect and the only way to be perfect is to obtain righteousness from God through faith in Jesus – not by works. So by telling me to be perfect, he is exhorting me to trust in Him for perfection because I can’t do it on my own. If I have a saving faith then it will be accompanied by works (James 2) but God’s word is clear that it is by grace through faith that we are saved – not by works. It is the blood of Christ that justifies us before God and saves us from his wrath. If it were by works, then it would be earned and not a gift. The “ideology” of justification by grace through faith whereby we are washed clean from our sins with the blood of Jesus – is clearly taught by Paul.
Romans 3:24
…JUSTIFIED FREELY BY HIS GRACE through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
Romans 3:28
…a man is JUSTIFIED BY FAITH apart from observing the law.
Romans 4:25
He(Jesus) was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.
Romans 5:9
Since we have now been JUSTIFIED BY HIS BLOOD, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him!
Romans 5:18
…the result of one act of righteousness (submitting to death on the cross) was justification that brings life for all men.
Romans 10:10
For it is with your heart that YOU BELIEVE AND ARE JUSTIFIED, and it is with your mouth that YOU CONFESS AND ARE SAVED.
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VYNETTE – “That Jesus did not see himself as vicariously ‘atoning’ for another individual’s intentional sin is amply demonstrated in John 15:22.“If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloak for their sin.””
Jesus was referring to people who rejected him because they have no excuse, pretext, reason (cloak) for not recognizing who he was. He is saying that if he had not come, they would not be guilty of the sin of hating him. So you’re right – his blood would not be an atonement for those who reject him.
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Excellent work, Victoria. I praise God He has given you discernment and wisdom to discover and see Vynette’s true form, and the courage to share this information with us.
I am also thanking our Father for Pauline’s, Victoria’s, and SAVEDBYGRACE’s contributions to this thread. It appears a wolf in sheep’s clothing has been exposed!
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SBG at #135: You repeated the “prophecies” without answering my question about any source other than Bahai. And Miller’s “prophecy” was a joke.
I’m interested in how you deal with the prophecies in Daniel.
The idea that Quetzalcoatl would return was part of the Toltec, and later Aztec, religion. The Baha’i did not invent it, if that’s what you’re suggesting, but they did seize on it as one of several “prophecies” that they believed pointed to their prophet.
To be clear, the old stories did not say that the god-king would return in exactly 1844. It was to be in the 13th era of the Toltec calendar, which based on most scholars’ calculations, ran from 1844 to 1896.
My point here is only that it is easy to look back on a prophecy and interpret it as referring to a particular event AFTER that event has happened (and in these cases, only if you believe certain things about what the event was.) The prophecies of Nostradamus and Edgar Cayce and others can also be made to seem accurate, if you’re willing to accept specific interpretations of vague references.
My apoloigies, but my Christmas activities made it hard for me to keep up with thread. Whiich prophecy in Daniel are you referring to?
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More thoughts on #54, the reference to Lewis’s “Christianity and water.”
Lewis was very good at narrowly defining arguments to make sure his view of Christiainity always came out on top. In the chapter of Mere Christianity where he dismisses a view similar to mine as “Christianity and water,” he asserts that only two religious ideas accurately deal with the problem of evil. One is Christianity and the other is dualism, a system in which there are two equal powers, one good and one evil, always in conflict.
He does a pretty good job of dismantiling dualism, mostly through the argument that if good and evil are equals, then there is no objective “good.”
But what he doesn’t admit, either because he is unaware (unlikely) or because he knew he could not so easily dismiss it, is that there are in fact other religious ideas that deal with evil just fine.
Eastern religions that believe we reincarnate as many times as needed until we’ve expunged our own evil and paid our karmic debt deal with it just fine. It is a very different view than Christianity’s, but it does not ignore evil.
And neither does “Christianity and water,” even though he sniffs at it. In my view, evil exists, because intelligent creatures with free will often make choices that harm others, directly or indirectly.
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WINSOMETO CHRIST
“It appears a wolf in sheep’s clothing has been exposed!”
I have never worn ’sheep’s clothing’. I have never put on a false front.
Here, and on every other blog I may have posted to, I have always made it perfectly plain that I intend to rescue ordinary Christian folk from the clutches of an orthodoxy which speaks lies in the name of Jesus.
My strategy has always been to introduce New Testament truths into the minds of Christians to do battle against the lies they have been told. And to demonstrate that orthodox doctrines are not based on the New Testament – to separate the two.
I fully intend to destroy the false doctrines of orthodox Christianity. I fully intend to liberate people from their slavery to the fears imposed by these doctrines.
My blog address has always been available for any who cared to look. I issued a challenge to the churches in May, 2006, that I would not rest until I had achieved my objective. Till the crack of doom if necessary.
You may describe me as a ‘wolf’ in relation to my intent for orthodox doctrines, but you may not describe me as a ‘wolf’ in relation to the ’sheep.’
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Oh, SBG: I agree William Miller’s interpretation of the prophecy was misguided at best. But that’s just the problem: The text he was working from could be interpreted just as he did. The fact that Christ did not return in that year only goes to show that Bible “prophecies” don’t really have predictive value. They’re only right in hindsight.
I found your original post about the prophecies in Daniel (#82), but you don’t specify which ones you mean. If you could be more specific, I’ll do some research.
I will say that I think you’re mistaken to say the Dead Sea Scrolls disproved a late dating. The scrolls date back to about the mid second century BC (about 150 BC and forward.) The latest dating that scholars contend for Daniel was shortly after Antiochus IV Epiphanes desecrated the altar in 167 BC.
If that dating theory is correct, then Daniel would have been a new writing, but in final form, 15 or so years before the oldest DSS documents — which might account for the large number of copies of Daniel found among the scrolls.
Lastly, in #59, you said:
STEVEG,
Post#40
“it just doesn’t matter.”
That’s the problem – it does matter. If the Bible is true, then it matters. If God sent His Son to die for your sins, then I think it would matter to Him how you respond to that. It only doesn’t matter if the Bible isn’t true
Well that’s just my point. I don’t believe the Bible is “true” in the sense you’re talking about. From my perspective, God doesn’t care that one religion contradicts another religion, because religions are man-made systems and none are God-made.
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Winsometochrist – 171
Thank you for your kind words, … a wolf doesn’t always appear as a wolf, in fact some come in as semi-wolves, or they take on disguises which CONTRADICT one another. When it is the latter, you know you have a ‘wolf’ – CWD, (contradictive wolf disguised) –
A ‘contradictive wolf’ plays with Scripture, plays one verse against another, in such a way as to distract the reader - If the reader waits long enough, they will see a pattern, which gives the CWD (contradictive wolf disguised) away – As we come closer to the LORDS coming, I believe we will see more of the CWD … we must watch closely as the sheep must be watched and cared for –
I thank you for your care for the sheep, and the Scripture and posts you have made. SAVEDBYGRACE’s posts have been wonderful. Pauline has made some interesting questions which have gone unanswered, ….. I wonder why? Peter made a comment which hasn’t been acknowledged, and we ALL know why -
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Vynette – 174
YOU POST………“I fully intend to destroy the false doctrines of orthodox Christianity. I fully intend to liberate people from their slavery to the fears imposed by these doctrines.”
You haven’t liberated anyone from Christianity, your ’self flattery’ is boring – Slavery isn’t serving God, or believing in Jesus Christ as the Sacrifice for sin, or the virgin birth of Christ, Resurrection from the grave, DEITY of Christ…. what IS SLAVERY is: to believe that you CAN someone change peoples minds by playing Scripture against Scripture – you certainly give it a good try, but you don’t win, in the end you fizzle without even a ‘bubble’ -
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STEVEG,
If Daniel was a new writing around 165 BC and was around for only 15 yrs – why would there be so many copies in such a short time?(they didn’t have xerox machines) And if this was written in 165 BC and copies of this book suddenly showed up in 150 BC stating that Daniel wrote them, don’t you think the people at that time would get suspicious and start asking questions about where this book came from? Somewhere along the line you have to be claiming a conspiracy theory. Also, scholars have studied the linguistics and style of the book and shown that it is more similar to writing found from around the 5th century BC – it is not similar in writing style to the Dead Sea scrolls.
This is not a dodge but it would be impossible to outline the visions of Daniel and their interpretations in chapters 7-12 because there are so many historical details – that’s why skeptics have to push for a late date. I have a New American Commentary by Steve Miller that I used in seminary that does a much more thorough job than I could do on any blog. If you are serious about researching this, I would suggest that you get a commentary on only the book of Daniel. Of course you could just go to infidel.org to find the “truth”.
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Well, I’m not making any claims at all about the author/date of Daniel. I’m just saying that the Qumran documents don’t pre-date it even at the latest dates proposed.
I have not studied Daniel in some detail in many years, so I’ll have to refresh my memory. I do recall there is one prophetic sequence that was uncannily accurate in tracing the doings of a leader (Darius? I can’t remember) — accurate, that is, up to a certain point and then suddenly diverging wildly from real events.
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SBG at #73:
STEVEG,
Was Jesus born in Bethlehem?
Maybe. But he was known to come from Nazareth and the two birth narratives in the Gospels tell very different stories of how he came to be born in Bethlehem. So was he born in Bethlehem, or did a tradition develop retroactively?
See, the emergence of traditions are not “lies” as commonly understood. But since Jesus was widely believed to be the Messiah, and since the ancient prophecies held that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem, people might have begun to believe that even though he was a Nazarene, he was born in Bethlehem. Matthew and Luke then heard stories of how that happened, and wrote them down.
Was Jesus born of a virgin?
I don’t think so.
Was Jesus from the tribe of Judah and a descendant of David?
Again, maybe.
Did Jesus heal the blind, deaf and sick?
He may have been charismatic enough to have broken the spell of some psychosomatic afflictions, but I doubt he healed any real physical ailments.
Did Jesus ride into Jerusalem on a donkey?
Was Jesus betrayed by a friend?
Was the betrayal for 30 pieces of silver that paid for a potter’s field?
Was Jesus mocked and spit on?
Were Jesus’ hands and feet pierced?
Did the Roman soldiers break his legs?
Did the Roman soldiers draw lots for Jesus’ robe?
Did they give Jesus vinegar and gall on the cross?
Was Jesus crucified with criminals?
All these fall into the “who knows?” bucket. They could be memories of real history, they could be details that gradually became part of the tradition over time as people interpreted the life of Jesus in the light of the scriptures that they believed pertained to the Messiah.
Since he was crucified, it’s likely his hands and feet were pierced. And since he was mocked by some throughout his public ministry, he probably was while on the cross. But the soldiers gambling for his clothes and other small details? Maybe, maybe not.
We see this very same dynamic in effect even today. Most people now know that the story of George Washington chopping down his dad’s cherry tree and then refusing to lie about it is apocryphal. One wonders if it was even meant to be taken literally, or just as a metaphorical illustration of Washington’s honesty. But many people in the past have believed it. And people writing an account of Washington’s life could easily include it as fact.
Was Jesus buried in a rich man’s grave?
Probably not. It would be very unusual for a poor Jew executed as a criminal to be shown such favor. But it is possible.
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SteveG
So you don’t believe the Bible – what’s new about that?
You have been arguing about the Scripture for a long time, if you don’t believe it, then go on your way -
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Victoria, I find the discussion interesting, educational and fun.
Sorry, but I’ll go on my way when I’m good and ready. And not a moment before.
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Steveg,
There is no doubt in my mind that you will argue away, until you are ready to ‘give up’-
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SteveG – 179
Have you EVER studied the WHOLE book of Daniel?
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#184: I have, but it’s been at least 12 years ago. What I do remember is that it is all kinds of wrong about the history of the time of Nebuchadnezzar and very accurate about the history of the early second century BC (which is presented as prophecy in the book), which is why it’s believed to have been written later rather than earlier.
But I do not recall a lot of detail.
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