quote:

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The Bible needs to have structural and thematic integrity if God has inspired it. I believe he has. It cannot contain errors or he did not.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Yes, and the theological term for that is 'bollocks'.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:


SvitlanaV2. I'm not talking God the weak killer by Him being creator of entropic creation. But The Killer. The one who slaughters humanity directly and by His righteous agents by the billion from one end of 'inspired' scripture, as believed by Jesus, to the other.

That's before He resurrects them to do even worse.

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quote:

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Gamaliel: A requirement to understand Genesis, Job, Jonah and apocalyptic books like Daniel and Revelations in a literal way.

But trying to set my stall out on any of that is going to get me into arguments with both right and left

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quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:
This seems to be functionally how Fruchtenbaum's reasoning, so often invoked by Jamat on that thread, operates, and thinking about it, it seems to be the approach taken by the dispensationalist Scofield reference bible with its notes.

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One good thing about the Scofield ref. Bible: I saw an edition with a footnote on Genesis that "Eve was deceived, but Adam knew what he was doing". Nice change from women being blamed for the Fall!

 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
They will go on to tell you that this means women should not teach or preach precisely because they are more easily deceived, 1 T 2:14.
 

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Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :
 
But not in that Genesis footnote!
 

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Posted by hatless (# 3365) on :
 
SvitlanaV2 said

quote:

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But the question is what you actually do with these texts if you believe that what they have to say about God is utterly wrong. For the moderate churches the usual response is simply to ignore these passages. Most of the time, nothing else is required. You only have a problem if you insist on hanging out with Christians who won't leave these passages alone!

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quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:

SvitlanaV2. I'm not talking God the weak killer by Him being creator of entropic creation. But The Killer. The one who slaughters humanity directly and by His righteous agents by the billion from one end of 'inspired' scripture, as believed by Jesus, to the other.

That's before He resurrects them to do even worse.

---

Killer or 'Killer': if God is all-powerful, what difference does it make? Are you arguing that God can hide behind human destructiveness or natural disasters? Isn't he supposed to be mightier than all of these?

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quote:

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Of course, I realise that what you're really talking about here is the OT set-up whereby the ancient Israelites engage in apparently divinely sanctioned violent interactions with their neighbours.

I don't think there's an argument for God's involvement in this sort of thing that's going to be acceptable to those at the most liberal end of the religion.

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quote:

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But does it matter? Liberal and conservative Christians are different. There's interaction in the broad middle, and some movement from one end to the other, but the spectrum itself is never going to collapse. IMO the reasons for this are probably more psychological and sociological than they are theological.

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quote:

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But the question is what you actually do with these texts if you believe that what they have to say about God is utterly wrong. For the moderate churches the usual response is simply to ignore these passages. Most of the time, nothing else is required. You only have a problem if you insist on hanging out with Christians who won't leave these passages alone!

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

Martin 60: I’m not sure why you see justifications of inspiration from within the text as a cop out, nor why you are so determined to identify only with the Jesus of the gospels rather than say with the apocalyptic figure of Revelation 1-3 or with the prophetic figure, who must also be Jesus, from Isaiah 63 who comes from Edom with blood stained robes having just squashed all his enemies in the wine press of God’s wrath.

What decides your picture of Jesus seems to be your politics.

And what do you do with with the CS Lewis insight..the lord, liar or lunatic trifecta?

---

quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:


SvitlanaV2. I'm not talking God the weak killer by Him being creator of entropic creation. But The Killer. The one who slaughters humanity directly and by His righteous agents by the billion from one end of 'inspired' scripture, as believed by Jesus, to the other.

That's before He resurrects them to do even worse.

---

Killer or 'Killer': if God is all-powerful, what difference does it make? Are you arguing that God can hide behind human destructiveness or natural disasters? Isn't he supposed to be mightier than all of these?

Of course, I realise that what you're really talking about here is the OT set-up whereby the ancient Israelites engage in apparently divinely sanctioned violent interactions with their neighbours.

I don't think there's an argument for God's involvement in this sort of thing that's going to be acceptable to those at the most liberal end of the religion. But does it matter? Liberal and conservative Christians are different. There's interaction in the broad middle, and some movement from one end to the other, but the spectrum itself is never going to collapse. IMO the reasons for this are probably more psychological and sociological than they are theological.

But the question is what you actually do with these texts if you believe that what they have to say about God is utterly wrong. For the moderate churches the usual response is simply to ignore these passages. Most of the time, nothing else is required. You only have a problem if you insist on hanging out with Christians who won't leave these passages alone!

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
God is helpless in the plain sight of human destructiveness and natural disasters. There's not a thing He can do about it in this level of creation and He can't create by fiat, ex nihilo above it (unless we accept angels as real, which are prone to go to the bad). I cannot imagine how He transcends all that, but the Incarnation is the door to it.

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quote:

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Wow – flesh tearing irony alert – so non-most liberals accept that He did command infanticidal genocide? He suffered the little children eh?

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Unless we have a strong, generous, benevolent, radical orthodoxy Christianity has no chance whatsoever up against Islam, Russia, China, the US. The gates of Hell will continue to close.

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quote:

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'Christians who won't leave these passages alone' [...] are the only ones I know doing anything directly for the poor.

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Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:


Falling over myself to find justifications for going door to door killing young and old, from toothless grandparents to babies, I do not do. Might as well go looking for square triangles.

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Originally posted by wabale:
I believe it was fifty years ago that the Church of England removed some of the more bloodthirsty readings from the Book of Common Prayer Lectionary. Why did it take nearly 2000 years for the Church to find these passages unsuitable? And why then I wonder?

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Originally posted by wabale:
Agreed mousethief. Just been watching a documentary about the year of my birth, 1945, and reminding myself what an awful year it was! I believe the body count for the rest of the century after WWll is actually greater than that of the two world wars combined. However, other wars, gulags and final solutions have been documented from the beginning of human history, and the prehistoric evidence is equally depressing. While some of the warlike sentiments presented in the Psalms appear unchristian, I have have to ask myself what I would have done if I had been around at the time when someone shouted “The Canaanites / Philistines / whoever are coming!”

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Self justification by a text is meaningless. I identify appropriately with all Jesuses. Gospel, apocalyptic and prophetic, even from late exilic Deutero or post-exilic Trito (-) Isaiah if that could be demonstrated, rather than being obviously apocalyptic oracles. My picture of Jesus is the same as Isaiah's politics. Which transformed my politics

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Originally posted by hatless:
I think all scripture is inspired because the bad bits, the stupid bits, the offensive bits and the nutty bits wake up the fire in us all.

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Text is SYMBOLIC, representative of library. Metaphoric, semiotic, semiological. If you call 66 'books' a library. Which is ...

My picture of Jesus is the God who grants justice, defends the oppressed, takes up the cause of the fatherless; pleads the case of the widow - Isaiah's politics. Through us, His only hands in this pre-transcendent life.

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quote:

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Originally posted by wabale:
I believe it was fifty years ago that the Church of England removed some of the more bloodthirsty readings from the Book of Common Prayer Lectionary. Why did it take nearly 2000 years for the Church to find these passages unsuitable? And why then I wonder?

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quote:

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Originally posted by RuthW:

quote:

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Originally posted by hatless:
I think all scripture is inspired because the bad bits, the stupid bits, the offensive bits and the nutty bits wake up the fire in us all.

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Bullshit. These bits don't wake up the fire in us all. Lots of people are merely put off by these things and give up reading the Bible at all because of them. I'd bet the rent that more people are put off than fired up.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:


Infanticidal genocide God: I can't believe that you approve of it.

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quote:

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How is world Christianity formally going to declare the Bible to be full of error and yet retain hold of the believers who remain? Why would it, should it, do that?

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quote:

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Silence in the face of evil isn't an option unless you're Jesus before Herod. Especially evil done in the name of Christ against the poor, LGBT+, the other.

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Nothing can change charismatic evangelicals except aging out. Long may they continue to make a difference. A couple or three decades at least.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
My picture of Jesus is the God who grants justice, defends the oppressed, takes up the cause of the fatherless; pleads the case of the widow - Isaiah's politics. Through us, His only hands in this pre-transcendent life.

---

That is a rather left wing new age picture of him rather than a Biblical one.

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quote:

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What about the one who is returning to earth at some stage to judge the wicked and set up his kingdom. Does that Jesus not exist for you?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
Tangent alert:

Jamat, I’m sorry I wasn’t able to answer your question about Fruchtenbaum before that thread was closed. I feel that I owe you an answer, but I don't want to derail this thread. So I'll simply say I did read, more than once, the blog post to which you linked, and I did not find Fruchtenbaum's argument for why almah should be translated as “virgin” in Isaiah 7 convincing at all, largely for the reasons put forth by Eutychus. I found it a very superficial argument, especially given that his recourse to the Septuagint seemed to ignore those places that parthenos is used for women whom the text makes clear are not virgins. In essence, the argument seems to rest almost entirely on an a priori assumption that almah in Isaiah 7 must mean “virgin," so whenever it is used anywhere it means “virgin."

/Tangent

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quote:

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Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I owe most of my understanding of this topic to James Barr's book 'Fundamentalism'. The forced bonding between inspiration and innerancy creates a self-enclosing ideology.

It is interesting that Eutychus mentioned Scofield's reference bible, since it displays the disease best of all. 19th century Dispensationalism was, in its own mad way, a defence of biblical inspiration from the textual attacks on the consistency of scriptural texts. It was able to explain, or explain away, differences between the words of Jesus and the words of Paul re forgiveness, but only at the cost of placing the Sermon on the Mount (including the Lord's prayer) in an earlier dispensation. The net effect was that the defence of innerant texts did and still does great damage to much that is central to mainstream Christianity.

This isn't just an academic theory. It's something I experienced personally in the 70s and 80s and almost drove me away from Christianity altogether. Barr's book severed the knot of confusion which was strangling my faith.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:

quote:

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Originally posted by wabale:
While some of the warlike sentiments presented in the Psalms appear unchristian, I have have to ask myself what I would have done if I had been around at the time when someone shouted “The Canaanites / Philistines / whoever are coming!”

---

Try minding your own business in Jericho when someone shouts "The Israelites are coming." Then watch as they slaughter your wife and children before putting you to the sword.

And all because God told them to.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
So what (the OP subject) is it wabale?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Rowan Williams's short little book on Mark's Gospel is worth a read.....

I'm sure Mark was a brilliant editor too.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:


Why would I want world Christianity to formally declare the Bible to be full of error?

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quote:

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Your randomly read, wooden, six day cookbook interpretation of your 'library' (the size of an epic novel, I've got it in that form of course, The Book of God) Bible is flat with regard to a thousand years of cultural evolution, so you can see no move to the left, i.e. to the people, to humanity, to equality of outcome for all, away from privilege. As epitomized by God's left wing move, God's new age, in Jesus. The Jesus of apocalyptic prophecy doesn't exist, so how can He exist for me? He never will. Not just for me but for you or anyone and everyone else. Not in this pre-transcendent world. Or in the transcendent of course. Except figuratively.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
Eutychus: As all ancient texts are read and understood via translation, one must trust that it is a mirror rather than an interpretive device.

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quote:

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une langue est un filet jeté sur la réalité des choses, une autre langue est un autre filet et il est rare que les mailles coïncident.

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Since we have many translations of Biblical texts, I think it is fair to say that if words like the one we discussed, alma, is rendered consistently by a variety of translators, then translation is a reliable convergence of expert linguistic views and therefore trustworthy.

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quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:


Why would I want world Christianity to formally declare the Bible to be full of error?

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Because you believe that parts of the OT are in error by depicting God as a monstrous killer. Why would you want a decent religion to have anything to do with such horrible passages?

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quote:

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I'm different, of course. It may be a sign of my theological backwardness, but I suppose I want to feel that there's something instructive (or even 'inspirational') in every part of the Bible, including the parts where there's some divinely sanctioned awfulness. After all, the crucifixion is an example of the same awfulness! What honorable father would require his son to die to solve a problem when the father could make things okay without requiring such a disgusting solution?

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quote:

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I don't see a solution in Christianity to the problem of the Killer God, so I just have to accept that troubling mystery. Others will take a different view.

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quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Any Chosen People narrative is problematic, because such a nation is surely obliged to cultivate a single minded bellicosity if it's going to last for centuries in a violent world. Any God who disapproves of such an attitude among his Chosen might be accused of hypocrisy....

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quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
The Christian narrative is that Jesus succeeded where Israel had failed, and embodied Israel's faithfulness and chosen-ness. And we know where that faithfulness and chosen-ness ultimately led.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Nick Tamen:

quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Any Chosen People narrative is problematic, because such a nation is surely obliged to cultivate a single minded bellicosity if it's going to last for centuries in a violent world. Any God who disapproves of such an attitude among his Chosen might be accused of hypocrisy....

---

But there’s the problem. The idea that Israel consistently misunderstood what it meant to be a Chosen People is woven through the OT—the Prophets in particular, but also the Law. They were chosen not to cultivate a single-minded bellicosity so that they could last for centuries. They were chosen to be a light to world, blessing the world through faithfulness to the covenant and witnessing to the kind of society God intended.

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...unless God really did tell them to go forth and murder entire groups of people, and take their land...


(Don't know, either way. These days, I think the Bible is a record of one culture's struggles with and towards God. That gives me some breathing room. Growing up in church, I was taught that the various OT views of God were accurate, even when contradictory. Except when God told them they'd gotten it wrong. That's one reason, I speculate, for the prohibition on saying/writing a particular name of God--because, if God really is like *all* of that, do you really want to call on the Dude? Unless you absolutely have to?)

 

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Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :
 
mt--

quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
The Christian narrative is that Jesus succeeded where Israel had failed, and embodied Israel's faithfulness and chosen-ness. And we know where that faithfulness and chosen-ness ultimately led.

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Resurrection and ascension and sitting down at the right hand of the Father.

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
The Christian narrative is that Jesus succeeded where Israel had failed, and embodied Israel's faithfulness and chosen-ness. And we know where that faithfulness and chosen-ness ultimately led.

---

Resurrection and ascension and sitting down at the right hand of the Father.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:

On the Stott thing, I must admit I'm quite taken aback at seeing him categorised as occupying a 'halfway-house' position. To me, he seems firmly within the evangelical camp, but certainly not towards the more fundamentalist Bibliolatrous end, of course.

One wonders where you've been, wabale, if you're finding Stott somewhere in the middle. He was nowhere near the Higher Critical end of the spectrum, although he was clearly not a fundie either.

It all depends where we draw our lines, of course.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Golden Key:
mt--

quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
The Christian narrative is that Jesus succeeded where Israel had failed, and embodied Israel's faithfulness and chosen-ness. And we know where that faithfulness and chosen-ness ultimately led.

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Resurrection and ascension and sitting down at the right hand of the Father.

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Good post.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
You mean 'antidiluvian' I presume?

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You must be the polar opposite of those French people who believe the correct term for Antichrist is antéchrist because "he will appear before Christ"...

"Antidiluvian": one who does not believe in the Flood?

(antediluvian)
 

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Posted by wabale (# 18715) on :
 
Actually I'm more 'antidelivian', which will be a very useful word when people get fed up with Amazon.
 

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Posted by RdrEmCofE (# 17511) on :
 
All scripture is given by inspiration of God.

This is a sentence which depends for its meaning on knowing what its author meant by:

All Scripture: Did he mean merely The Septuagint? i.e. what the author accepted as 'scripture' at the time he actually wrote the sentence. Perhaps he could envisage a possible future where his own and other Christian writers works would be classified as 'scripture', perhaps not. Perhaps he classified as scripture Apocryphal books included in the Septuagint that are no longer regarded as 'scripture' by the readership of significant sections of The Worldwide Church, perhaps not.

Given: This word was not in the sentence originally composed in Greek by its author. (every WRITING [is] God-breathed,) In fact even the word 'scripture' is not found in the Greek sentence, though the context makes clear that 'scripture' is being referred to.

Inspiration: The word used in the original sentence was 'God-breathed', meaning much the same in effect as the breathing of 'life' into Adam meant to him. Scripture then is being referred to as something which God has provided to ANIMATE us, educate us, to convict us of the truth about ourselves, to train us in righteousness, equipping us for the good works that God has placed within our capacity to do.

It would appear then that 'inspiration' in this context has little connection with the idea that all scripture is an infallible, sacrosanct, backed by supernaturally inviolable divine authority, word for word transcript of God's verbal edicts to sinful mankind. As is sometimes assumed when verses such as "But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence." are quoted in support of the pernicious 'doctrine' of male headship without reference to the other sentences in scripture which would call this draconian edict into question, such as. "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.".

Scripture is 'inspired' both in its authorship, and its effects upon the attentive reader, (it can reveal the attentive readers heart's intent), but it is neither infallible or incapable of having been redacted.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
You mean 'antidiluvian' I presume?

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You must be the polar opposite of those French people who believe the correct term for Antichrist is antéchrist because "he will appear before Christ"...

"Antidiluvian": one who does not believe in the Flood?

(antediluvian)

---

Zut alors!


And nice one, wabale ...
 

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Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by wabale:

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
So what (the OP subject) is it wabale?

---

I’m not sure. I’m just finishing learning Mark’s Gospel, for performance purposes, and it’s having an enormous influence on what I think about inspiration. It took me two years - I’ve got one or two other things keeping me busy. I’m just starting to read R.T.France’s commentary, because he says Mark’s Gospel is a drama in 3 Acts, which I find particularly encouraging from a performance point of view. He writes that the author was either an extraordinarily inventive writer, or he was a brilliant editor of the sayings of Peter, and I’m inclined to believe the latter. Either way the Gospel has the ring of truth for me, and I’m feeling a bit euphoric. And if Mark’s Gospel is true, everything else must be. While generally speaking I have been making the long (57 years) and hazardous journey from Bibledolatry/Fundamentalism to higher criticism, I seem to have got stuck somewhere, mainly with the Stott line that the Bible was written by people and inspired by God, and both were fully involved. Don’t know if that’s what you meant, or if it helps.

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quote:

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but it is neither infallible or incapable of having been redacted.

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
Of course we can hear chiasmus. Say this out loud and you will hear it:

The LORD is a roaring lion
A beast of prey is our God.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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but it is neither infallible or incapable of having been redacted.

---

So to clarify you are saying:

'God is fallible in his pronouncements in the Bible and might tell lies about authorship but this does not reduce the truth value or credibility of his scripture.'

If this is your God I suggest you trade him in for a better model.

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quote:

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Bible is filled entirely with infallible pronouncements from God

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
Eutychus: an interesting concept of invective. Are you serious?

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quote:

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insulting, abusive, or highly critical language

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quote:

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Originally posted by Enoch:

quote:

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Originally posted by wabale:
I’m just finishing learning Mark’s Gospel, for performance purposes, and it’s having an enormous influence on what I think about inspiration. It took me two years - I’ve got one or two other things keeping me busy. I’m just starting to read R.T.France’s commentary, because he says Mark’s Gospel is a drama in 3 Acts, which I find particularly encouraging from a performance point of view. He writes that the author was either an extraordinarily inventive writer, or he was a brilliant editor of the sayings of Peter, and I’m inclined to believe the latter...

---

That's interesting. Where does he put the divisions? I've a suspicion it's a chiasmus built round Peter's confession in Mk 8:29. The whole feel of the gospel changes at that point, and I'm sure its intentional

If the tradition is true that Mark is Peter's gospel - it's a tradition which goes back to the earliest days, 100-120 AD - then it's particularly telling that Peter's confession should be so critical to the narrative and also, that Peter should then get so unequivocally reprimanded only four verses later...

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quote:

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Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
My wife, many years ago, taught in a highly Fundamentalist school for missionary children (it's a complicated story ...).

They didn't believe in reading fiction as it was "lies" - i.e. the events described hadn't happened.

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quote:

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in the Hebrew language there is no relationship between the words almah and virgin. On the contrary, it is usually a young woman who bears children. The word alma only conveys age/gender. Had Isaiah wished to speak about a virgin, he would have used the word betulah1 (בְּתוּלָה) not almah. The word betulah appears frequently in the Jewish Scriptures, and is the only word – in both biblical and modern Hebrew – that conveys sexual purity.

Moreover, as mentioned earlier, the masculine form of the noun עַלְמָה (alma) is עֶלֶם (elem), which means a “young man,” not a male virgin. This word appears twice in the Jewish Scriptures (I Samuel 17:56, 20:22). As expected, without exception, all Christian Bibles correctly translate עֶלֶם as a “young man,” “lad,” or “stripling,” never “virgin.” Why does theKing James Version of the Bible translate the masculine Hebrew noun לָעֶלֶם (la’elem) as “to the young man” in I Samuel 20:22, and yet the feminine form of the same Hebrew noun הָעַלְמָה as “a virgin” in Isaiah 7:14? The answer is Christian Bibles had no need to mistranslate I Samuel 20:22 because this verse was not misquoted in the New Testament.

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
My wife, many years ago, taught in a highly Fundamentalist school for missionary children (it's a complicated story ...).

They didn't believe in reading fiction as it was "lies" - i.e. the events described hadn't happened.

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Probably that miserable sort who think there really WAS a woman who looked for a coin all over the house, and one particular mustard tree Jesus was referring to. In short that every parable Jesus told referred to an actual event that happened to an actual person (or tree).

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quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen:

quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
My wife, many years ago, taught in a highly Fundamentalist school for missionary children (it's a complicated story ...).

They didn't believe in reading fiction as it was "lies" - i.e. the events described hadn't happened.

---

Probably that miserable sort who think there really WAS a woman who looked for a coin all over the house, and one particular mustard tree Jesus was referring to. In short that every parable Jesus told referred to an actual event that happened to an actual person (or tree).

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I heard a radio preacher claim just that once. The idea struck me as an absolutely bizarre idea at the time. Still does.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Thing is, Eutychus, I suspect most of us here, if we wanted to, could make Jamat's arguments for him more cogently than he can.

It's as if he thinks it's so a priori that he doesn't need to bother.

Either that or ...

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Originally posted by RdrEmCofE:
The fact remains that no one except Miriam herself or whoever impregnated her can be sure that Miriam was a virgin when she became pregnant with the Messiah.

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Eutychus:It’s certainly not interacting with the arguments set forth. To do that you'd have to explain, in your own words, just how you think that the position set forth constitutes God telling lies.

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quote:

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Euthchus: any other meaning would make Isaiah's prophecy sub-par and thus not up to infallibility standards.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
The arguments set forth as you put it are chock full of straw man assumptions about what an opposing view looks like. I simply cannot be bothered with humbug.

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quote:

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If anyone wants to pull apart a statement like:

“If you find it impossible to imagine a God who would studiously avoid producing a book filled with irrefutable edicts proscribing every aspect of human conduct, with the threat of eternal torture for non compliance..”

then be my guest.

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quote:

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The confusion in it bears no relation to my convictions.

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quote:

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If one questions or assumes flaws in scripture as a beginning position on the basis of so called inconsistency, textual assumption like redaction, historical anomaly or morality, then the word ‘lies’ is not too harsh a way to put it IF as is claimed by many here, an almighty, omniscient, just, omnipotent and loving being inspired them. To point this out is not invective.

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quote:

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If one questions or assumes flaws in scripture

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quote:

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as a beginning position on the basis of so called inconsistency, textual assumption like redaction,

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
I maintained and still do that the Septuagint translators were correct in rendering the word ‘virgin’ since that translation clearly shows the prophet’s intention that this was the qualification required for the mother of the Messiah.

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quote:

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Infallibility is a side issue. The question is that this is a genuine predictive prophecy.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
I maintained and still do that the Septuagint translators were correct in rendering the word ‘virgin’ . . . .

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Ah, but you see Eutychus, by questioning whether the word translated 'virgin' in Isaiah 7:14 actually means that, you are 'questioning the Bible' because the 'plain-meaning of the text' is 'virgin' according to Jamat - who sides with the 70 translators of the Septuagint at this point.

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quote:

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Eutychus: Arguing thus also requires you to believe that to be predictive, prophecy must be fully commutative, i.e. you could in effect replace the prophecy with its fulfilment in the text, or vice versa, and not see the difference. I have repeatedly challenged you on this and you haven't answered

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
Regarding alma..parthenos..virgin/maiden. I do grasp that translation is a ‘best equivalent’ process. The discussion on my part arose from the denial of the predictive nature of prophecy on the other thread.

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quote:

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Gamaliel:How is God inspiring scripture inconsistent with additions and redaction?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
My thought is surely you need better evidence than the fact that the text as redacted, fits better with your current theology or world view.

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quote:

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The difficulty with scripture is the God factor. If in fact there are 3 Isaiah’s and 2 Daniels, then the almighty has not told us this and signally failed to communicate with clarity.

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quote:

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he IS God, by knowing the end from the beginning.

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quote:

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Nick Tamen: what you have yet to answer, despite repeated requests, is how the predictive nature of Isaiah's prophecy is in any way diminished if the “best equivalent” to Isaiah's use of almah is “young unmarried woman” or “maiden” rather than “virgin.”

---

quote:

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Gamaliel: But scripture isn't clear, Jamat. It says that of itself. The Petrine reference to the Pauline corpus being 'hard to understand' for instance.

Once again, you are placing your expectations of scripture onto scripture. 'Scripture has to behave in this, that or the other way otherwise the whole thing is cast into doubt and our faith and salvation jeopardised

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quote:

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Eutychus: I put my trust in God because I believe he is good

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Hey G, E. This is me, sitting at the top of the mountain. Not fiercely on the fence. When are you coming on up? I'm lonesome.

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quote:

---

During a Gish gallop, a debater confronts an opponent with a rapid series of many specious arguments, half-truths, and misrepresentations in a short space of time, which makes it impossible for the opponent to refute all of them within the format of a formal debate. In practice, each point raised by the "Gish galloper" takes considerably more time to refute or fact-check than it did to state in the first place.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

---

Nick Tamen: what you have yet to answer, despite repeated requests, is how the predictive nature of Isaiah's prophecy is in any way diminished if the “best equivalent” to Isaiah's use of almah is “young unmarried woman” or “maiden” rather than “virgin.”

---

To me, that was not the point. Going from context,those terms are equivalent.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Gamaliel: [...]

Once again, you are placing your expectations of scripture onto scripture.[...]

---

[...]
I do not understand what you mean by ‘placing scripture over scripture’.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Eutychus: I put my trust in God because I believe he is good

---

I agree of course. You assertion is not on the basis of scriptural integrity though is it? But on the basis that your theology and world view requires him to be good.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

---

but it is neither infallible or incapable of having been redacted.

---

So to clarify you are saying:

'God is fallible in his pronouncements in the Bible and might tell lies about authorship but this does not reduce the truth value or credibility of his scripture.'

If this is your God I suggest you trade him in for a better model.

---

quote:

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Finish the quote.
‘Paul wrote some things difficult to understand, which the unlearned and unstable, wrest to their destruction.’

IOW Peter is not suggesting a lack of clarity, only a lack of willingness to understand.

---

quote:

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Eutychus: No answer to the question

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quote:

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mistranslations of scripture

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quote:

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I’m not sure what you mean by scriptural integrity

---

quote:

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Gish Gallop

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I overlooked a key phrases of Jamat's ...

'That there is consistent if you look for it ...'

Yes, if you look for it within the framework of an interpretive grid that you have inherited from someone else - in this case Schofield and other mid-19th century figures.

A lot of what passes for 'consistency' among fundamentalists is anything but. It's all about squeezing things in to fit an unfeasibly neat framework imposed upon the text itself.

It's a red herring at best, a fool's errand at worst.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Eutychus: No answer to the question

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OK, it makes no difference.

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quote:

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quote:

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mistranslations of scripture

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Your opinion and that is fine.

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I mean that I think scripture works as a whole, that it’s a time -neutral salvation narrative than stands up to scrutiny, that there is consistency if you look for it, that it is God’s book.

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quote:

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quote:

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Gish Gallop

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As I recall, he never lost an argument..not a comparison I would make.

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quote:

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How would it be compromised or fraudulent if there were two or three authors?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Hey G, E. This is me, sitting at the top of the mountain. Not fiercely on the fence. When are you coming on up? I'm lonesome.

---

I'm put off coming straight on up by your unwavering conviction that you've reached the top. I prefer to take my own route as my own conscience allows and at my own speed.

---

I await your arrival with G (the confusion is in the messenger, not the message, surely?) and Nick and a sharp rock giving me proctalgia. I daren't move as it's a long way down.

As for the "time-neutral salvation narrative", that's the entire Bible read as randomly, flatly as you like; it's always the same metanarrative, every inerrant infallible part has as much weight and absolute truth as every other. All paths through it lead to the same place yesterday, today and forever.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Martin60, how do you know that we are heading towards the same spiky pinnacle as you?

We might be heading towards our own rocks ...

I must admit, I'm a bit like Eutychus in acknowledging a degree of irritation in the way you presume that we are following you to a place you've got to first ...

Perhaps that's pride on my part?

Yes, like you I'm heading out of a rather 2D and conservative approach to the scriptures - although I'd never have acknowledged or owned up to being a fundamentalist (although I was probably pretty close at times).

That doesn't necessarily mean that there's one final destination, the one you feel that you have reached.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
On the 'time-neutral salvation narrative' thing.

I don't like Jamat's somewhat clumsy terminology, but I think I can see what he's driving at and I don't have an issue in principle - although I'd certainly add caveats.

I'd be more inclined to say that the message of salvation found in scripture is 'time-transcendent' rather than 'time-neutral'.

I don't think it's possible for anything to be 'time-neutral.'

The scriptures were written at particular times and in particular places and for particular purposes.

There's nothing 'time-neutral' about them.

Just as there is nothing 'time-neutral' about the Incarnation.

But the point of both transcends time and raises us towards eternity.
 

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Posted by leo (# 1458) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:
[QUOTE] if there are single authors of Isaiah and Daniel, as claimed by the Jewish scholars.

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quote:

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Gamaliel: A lot of what passes for 'consistency' among fundamentalists is anything but. It's all about squeezing things in to fit an unfeasibly neat framework imposed upon the text itself.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by leo:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
[QUOTE] if there are single authors of Isaiah and Daniel, as claimed by the Jewish scholars.

---

Some Jewish scholars accept deutero and trito Isaiah

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
Eutychus: you have asserted that alma..Parthenos..maiden are equivalents but in summary denied that these interchangeable terms mean virgin.

---

quote:

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In doing this, you deny a strong argument from context and seem to question the LXX.

---

If the context were conclusive, the vast majority of translators would not opt for a term with a broader range of meaning. As to the LXX, it uses parthenos for Dinah after she has been raped. I learned that from the LXX (because I specifically went looking to see whether your implicit claim that the LXX parthenos was ever used only for girls who could have been virgins was true - it's not). I didn't put it there. Certainly no English translation of that verse in Genesis uses "virgin"

quote:

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I was asked the question what difference it makes to the validity of the Isaiah 7 prophecy. I think it makes no difference because I think if the translators used maiden in the English, this would imply virginity. I have answered the question.

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quote:

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Eutychus: The question is whether, if (as several of us have argued) the notion of virginity is not explicitly present in the Hebrew in Isaiah 7:14, this would call into question the validity of Isaiah's prophecy in your eyes, and if so, why. Can you answer that?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
You can deny being a fundamentalist until you are blue in the face, Jamat, but fundamentalism is as fundamentalism does and what is Dispensationalism if not a fundamentalist schema?

As for Daniel 9:24-27, it's an example of what - in the face of some controversy, I'm referring to as 'apocalyptic' literature over on another thread.

As is the nature of such literature, there will have been an immediate, contemporary application - and you'll be familiar with the way 'the abomination that causes desolation' is given an 'inter-testamental' application by many scholars.

Seems reasonable to me. It fits what we know occurred.

It's also quoted by Christ of course and given some kind of apparently future fulfilment or application. Destruction of the Temple?

Beyond that, I'm not prepared to speculate.

And I'm mightily suspicious of anyone who does.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:

Eutychus: you have asserted that alma..Parthenos..maiden are equivalents but in summary denied that these interchangeable terms mean virgin.

However, in doing this you are pedantically insisting on possible alternatives..(not necessarily virgin). In doing this, you deny a strong argument from context and seem to question the LXX. Yet you insist you have made your case.

I was asked the question what difference it makes to the validity of the Isaiah 7 prophecy. I think it makes no difference because I think if the translators used maiden in the English, this would imply virginity. I have answered the question.

---

quote:

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Gamaliel: it is one I understand only too well having seen Dispensationalism in practice in Brethren assemblies and in some forms among some Pentecostals here in the UK.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Nick Tamen:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:

Eutychus: you have asserted that alma..Parthenos..maiden are equivalents but in summary denied that these interchangeable terms mean virgin.

However, in doing this you are pedantically insisting on possible alternatives..(not necessarily virgin). In doing this, you deny a strong argument from context and seem to question the LXX. Yet you insist you have made your case.

I was asked the question what difference it makes to the validity of the Isaiah 7 prophecy. I think it makes no difference because I think if the translators used maiden in the English, this would imply virginity. I have answered the question.

---

Eutychus has made his case, and you seem to have just admitted so by saying that had the translators used “maiden” it would “imply virginity.” There would be no implication of virginity if the word “maiden” actually meant "virgin." But it doesn't. It means “young, unmarried woman.” Virginity may be culturally assumed for such young women—an association which may or may not be accurate in any specific case. Because of the cultural assumption, virginity may be implied by the word maiden, but it’s not what the word means. And that’s what Eutychus , I and others have been arguing.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:
I think it is explicitly present

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quote:

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and shown to be so in Luke 1

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quote:

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so it is, as you admit, in retrospect, a valid prophecy

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quote:

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Anyhow, the bone has no meat left on it.

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quote:

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Eutychus: What I will admit to beyond question is that the Gospel writer saw the nativity as a fulfilment of something Isaiah wrote. I'm unsure as to whether Isaiah actually foresaw this fulfilment of the prophecy and I'm sure he didn't predict a specifically virgin birth

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

---

Eutychus: What I will admit to beyond question is that the Gospel writer saw the nativity as a fulfilment of something Isaiah wrote. I'm unsure as to whether Isaiah actually foresaw this fulfilment of the prophecy and I'm sure he didn't predict a specifically virgin birth

---

Which is what is important. Prophecy is actually only clear in retrospect and I think you are probably correct. Isaiah did not clearly grasp what Is 7 or 53 for that matter, was about.

---

Absolutely

quote:

---

As Hebrews says, prophets struggled to understand what was signified by their revelation.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:
Isaiah did not clearly grasp what Is 7 or 53 for that matter, was about.

---

quote:

---

The fact that the Gospels report that the Messiah was born of a virgin and that the Gospel writers saw this as a fulfilment of Isaiah 7:14 does not grant us a licence to retrospectively add that additional detail of virginity in our translations of the original prophecy if, as it seems we now agree, it goes beyond what the original text actually says.

As I see it, to do so constitutes a failure to treat Scripture with the respect it deserves, all the more so if we believe it to be inspired.

---

Were the Christian Church to adopt such a responsibly theologically uninfluenced interpretation and translation of OT scripture with respect to NT material, it would probably also result in enhancing mutual respect and cooperation with Jewish scholarship and even helpfully narrow the gap between our respective theological differences.

Who knows?

[Shrugs shoulders, palms upward, in typically Yiddish gesture].
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
As I have never met you in real life, Jamat, I can only write as I find from what I read in your posts.

From what I read I detect a particularly fundamentalist approach to the interpretation of scripture. That doesn't mean that you are 'legalistic' in your personal habits or treatment of other people.

Besides, getting into a debate about what constitutes a 'true fundamentalist' is a bit like the 'No True Scotsman' fallacy ...

If I've been ad hominem, then I apologise.

I will try to reserve my comments and labelling to your approach to scripture, not to you as a person.



I'm sure there are people out there are way, way, way more 'fundamentalist' or literalist than you are. For instance, people who wouldn't accept or acknowledge, as you have done, that Isaiah or Daniel weren't fully aware of how future generations would interpret their prophecies.

To listen to some folk you'd think they had some kind of sneak-preview of the entire sweep of human history from that point onwards!

Anyhow, be all that as it may, I still maintain that you adhere to a particularly 'fundamentalist' (for want of a better word) form of scriptural interpretation that 'demands' that some of these 'apocalyptic' writings and prophecies 'have' to have some kind of direct or literal future fulfilment otherwise the whole thing is compromised.

I don't see it that way.

Besides, it's not as if any of us are going to be able to verify whether or not this is the case unless we happen to be around when events uncannily similar to those 'foretold' or described in apocalyptic terms take place.

You've only got to look at how many interpretations there are of 'the abomination that causes desolation' to realise that these things aren't necessarily clear-cut.

I will take up your challenge on how we might understand and apply the verses you cite in Daniel 9.

I will start a new Kerygmania thread on that topic and invite other Shipmates to share their views. If I get any 'takers' then it will soon become readily apparent that there are a range of viewpoints available and that the issue isn't at all clear-cut in any neat, join-the-dots, Meccano-set sense.

I would argue that prophetic and apocalyptic texts don't 'work' in that kind of neat and linear fashion. That's not the point of them.

But I've said my piece on that elsewhere.

In the meantime, craving everyone's indulgence, I'll start a new thread as well as continuing to contribute here if I may.
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Happy New Year all.

E, nice, your reply to me. I might 'know' I'm right, but it doesn't feel good, which perversely confirms I'm right! I'm cast high and dry up on the rocks. I wouldn't wish it on anybody. But yearn for fellow castaways! I yearn for simpler times too, 10 years ago, 6, encountering the emergent in evangelicalism. Happy Days! But the inertia of that tide had cast me 'up' here on this stark, de-inspired, unprophesied, brave new world

Jamat, delighted that you've lost the shackles of fundamentalism, that you're inspired to recognize that the age of the universe is over two million times greater than you forced it to be. Welcome!
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
And of course no inspiration of foretelling prophecy occurs in Daniel 9-11, just history propagandized in apocalyptic.
 

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Posted by Nick Tamen (# 15164) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
I cannot understand you guys to be honest. You agree with every rational assault on invincible ignorance but still believe that some ... Jungian thing could be going on.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Sorry chaps, but I can't, in my Aspyesque way, square the circle

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
. . . but you STILL say that's how the Naiad inspires it? Despite a deep understanding of hydrology, hydrodynamics and turbulence (which even God doesn't understand) explaining a stream in the woods.

---

quote:

---

Martin 60: I'm cast high and dry up on the rocks. I

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
This one. I think.

(which FWIW elicited this response from me).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Thing is, if we were going to be completely dead-pan 'rational' then we'd immediately dismiss the Gospel accounts per se because none of us have ever seen miracles happen nor someone rising from the dead ...

Ultimately, faith comes into it wherever we draw the line.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
the main charge being redaction for propaganda purposes, by inspired, Godly men, to turn contemporary history in to prophecy.

That emerges from the text.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Crossed in the post E. Nice one. There are enormous, incomparable cultural differences between the testaments. So much so that the charges against the Old cannot be made against the New, the main charge being redaction for propaganda purposes, by inspired, Godly men, to turn contemporary history in to prophecy.

That emerges from the text. The alternative is Jamat.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
the main charge being redaction for propaganda purposes, by inspired, Godly men, to turn contemporary history in to prophecy.

That emerges from the text.

---

How? Simply because you find the alternatives unthinkable? You haven't pointed to any other evidence.

---

quote:

---

Gamaliel: If redaction did took place, it took place long before the Dead Sea Scrolls were tucked away.

The Dead Sea Scrolls show a remarkable degree of continuity in these ancient texts but they don't prove that redaction and addition took place over time

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Yes, I did mean 'never took place' and no, I'm not agreeing with you.

Whatever else they tell us, and they are certainly highly significant of course, they don't prove that redaction or pseudographia didn't take place.

As far as I know, the Scrolls mostly date from between 300 or 480 BC and around 100 AD (or CE).

They don't date from 600 BC or 800 BC for instance.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Check your facts, Jamat.

If redaction did took place, it took place long before the Dead Sea Scrolls were tucked away.

The Dead Sea Scrolls show a remarkable degree of continuity in these ancient texts but they don't prove that redaction and addition took place over time.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
So while we're waiting for Martin's reply, Gamaliel, what's your take on the dating arguments.

Specifically, to what extent are they driven by assumptions one way or the other about predictive prophecy, and to what extent are they informed by purely textual, lingustic elements?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
The work all has to be done the other way, to prove that anything was prophetically foretold given how fast and loose everyone played for reasons of faith, including Jesus and the gospel writers and the editors before them of the texts they in turn played fast and loose with.

---

quote:

---

Gamaliel: ..and here I stand, I can do no other - the balance of possibility for me at the moment lies more towards later dates than early ones - and this accounts for the apparent predictive element.

Beyond that, I can't speculate.

It's not that I'm ignoring anything or parking it all on one side as being too difficult - which is what Jamat accuses me of doing. It's work in progress and at a time when I've got a lot of other things on my plate

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
J. Faith in God the Killer prevents faith in Jesus. Show me God the Killer in Him and I'm your man. Show me Him in God the Killer, the same.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Sin, whatever that is, is so serious it justifies the God of prophecy drowning babies?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Aye E. Superb analogy.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Sin, whatever that is, is so serious it justifies the God of prophecy drowning babies?

---

So at the risk of being offensive to the great killer God beam in your eye, why is it that the issue you have is not more wide spread in the church universal. Why has not the whole of humanity rejected Christ on that basis aeons ago?

Your clinging to Jesus as a life raft of faith does not answer the issue you say you have as after all, the cross is actually a terrible judgement on sin..which involved death? So you are inconsistent here.

Why is it though, that few have this problem that claim to be Christians. Is everyone else thick? morally inferior to you? ignorant or hardened to the the extent they do not realise that..hey, God is a killer? Not worthy of worship?

---

quote:

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Karl LB: Come on, explain

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
J. What K. said.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
E. Aye. You're right. It's the only thing of worth there is. Unless you have something else better to offer? It's the greatest punchline of any story though. You can't equal let alone better it. It's The Lathe of Heaven.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Sin, whatever that is, is so serious it justifies the God of prophecy drowning babies?

---

So at the risk of being offensive to the great killer God beam in your eye, why is it that the issue you have is not more wide spread in the church universal. Why has not the whole of humanity rejected Christ on that basis aeons ago?

---

quote:

---

Your clinging to Jesus as a life raft of faith does not answer the issue you say you have as after all, the cross is actually a terrible judgement on sin..which involved death? So you are inconsistent here.

---

quote:

---

Why is it though, that few have this problem that claim to be Christians. Is everyone else thick? morally inferior to you? ignorant or hardened to the the extent they do not realise that..hey, God is a killer? Not worthy of worship?

---

quote:

---

Martin 60: If you hadn't noticed, they very mainly have. In Christendom

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
The Pathways of Desire. I'll Kindle that for a dollar! A fiver actually.

---

quote:

---

27% About 30% true. 1,817 prophecies. Most fulfilled. What 51%? 80%? At least a thousand? Wow. None on this thread pass faithful scrutiny. You got any that do? You know, that would convince a reasonable person

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jamat:
You do not find prophecy in the writings of Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism either. The Bible is different and when you read it seriously and consistently you find truth in so many places it’s staggering.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
So while we're waiting for Martin's reply, Gamaliel, what's your take on the dating arguments.

Specifically, to what extent are they driven by assumptions one way or the other about predictive prophecy, and to what extent are they informed by purely textual, lingustic elements?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ricardus:
even a non-specialist should be able to distinguish between Anglo-Saxon and Chaucerian English, and between Chaucerian and Shakespearean English. So if Hebrew scholars claim to be able to date a text on the basis of the stage of development of the language, I don't see a reason to doubt that it's possible.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ricardus:
Also, there seems to be a bit of an assumption that if Daniel was actually written after all the stuff about the Kings of the North and the South took place, then it must be fraudulent.

But it's only fraudulent if the author claimed it was some ancient text he'd just dug up. If there was no pretence to that effect, then it's just some kind of historical fiction.

---

Yes again. I'm quite open to that from a literary perspective, and your example from Virgil is instructive.

But I'd like to be sure that this wasn't just a convenient way of avoiding predictive prophecy, not on literary or linguistic grounds, but on theological grounds.

One of the places I part company with Martin is that he often seems to be starting with: 1) "there can't be any predictive prophecy because that means God must be micro-managing history, be a Killer, etc." and going on 2) to read the text in that light, whereas ideally, I'd much prefer the other way round:

starting by 1) looking at the literary aspects of the text and 2) possibly concluding from that analysis "hmm, what looks like predictive prophecy at first glance might be a literary convention" (or a bad translation, see Isaiah 7:14...) and 3) drawing some conclusions about divine sovreignty and so forth from that. I'd like my theology to be more informed by the actual text than Martin's seems to be.

I don't know if this makes sense. I tried to say something like this before but nobody picked up on it
 

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Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on :
 
I suppose the problem for me is that there will always be something a bit a priori about deciding whether a text is more likely to be predictive prophecy than anything else.

That is, if one looks at the options and think predictive prophecy is a more (or less) likely explanation than fraud, literary convention, etc, then that presupposes not only that I know prevalent fraud or literary conventions were at the time, but also that I already have some idea of how likely predictive prophecy is.

But I can't have got that idea from the text, because it's what I'm using to evaluate the text.

(So if I say something like, hm, 2% of forgery, 3% chance of literary convention, therefore prophecy is the most probable option, that implies I'm approaching the text with an a priori view that prophecy has a greater than 3% chance of being present. My reasons for that view may be entirely rational, but they are still something I am bringing to the text rather than taking from the text.)
 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ricardus:
I suppose the problem for me is that there will always be something a bit a priori about deciding whether a text is more likely to be predictive prophecy than anything else.

---

Yeah, I get that. But I like to dream one could be objective about it, or at least a bit more so.

Caricaturing again, the "higher criticism" view seems to start by practically ruling out the involvement of God at all, thus saying "well we know predictive prophecy is impossible" and explaining away bits of, say, Daniel by pointing out they mimic contemporaneous, extra-biblical texts cast as prophecy that aren't.

At the other end of the scale, confronted by this, Joyce Baldwin in my IVP commentary on Daniel grudgingly admits the existence of other, similar texts and goes on to say something along the lines of "so of course the Biblical prophecies have to be extra-specially accurately predictive to prove they are inspired and not like all the other, fake ones they resemble"

I can't help thinking there must be a way between these two extremes if predicitive prophecy is not allowed to take on the role of shibboleth - which it seems to do for both Jamat and Martin.

I'd prefer to start with something like "this looks predictive; is it really? Is there any doubt either way? If so, let's make this a secondary, not a primary consideration in our theology".
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I've been pondering that self-same point, Eutychus but can't avoid the conclusion that it makes little difference to my faith and the way I work it out and apply it if:

- The apparently predictive elements in Daniel and Isaiah aren't.

- The apparently predictive elements in Daniel and Isaiah are certainly predictive in the way Jamat claims.

What possible difference does it make?

I still believe that Jesus is the Messiah. I still believe the historic Creeds.

And if there are future, 'unfulfilled' elements then they'll become apparent in the fullness of time.

I don't see why there's so much fuss made over the whole thing when there are a lot more pressing issues to be concerned about.

It's pretty inevitable that liberals are going to opt for late dates for some of this material and conservatives will argue for early dates. There's no such thing as objectivity here. The sooner we acknowledge that the better.

Then we can do as I do and try to steer between the Scylla of scepticism and Charybdis of inflexible certainty.

Come on. We know it makes sense ...
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
My apologies to you as host Louise and to yourself Jamat for sniping.

@Jamat, as you know, my provenance for 30 years is Armstrongism; Anglo-Israelism as the key to Holy Spirit inspired and preserved prophecy by the prophets, as stated and dated, starting with Moses. For 30 years I would have made your argument above in deeply researched encyclopaedic detail. I majored in the minors second to none. We could not differentiate between the old and the new covenants except by progressive case law. That which wasn't permitted, repealed, rationalized by our apostle, was forbidden.

Anglo-Israelism is a delusion. I wept for its loss on the toilet in '95. It took another 15 years at least for God the Killer to finally die. I was wrestling with postmodernism just 5 years ago.

What disturbs me most about myself as always is “So knowledge isn’t the be-all, end-all here; love is.” from this this morning.

I am found wanting in love. Again. And again. And... Let me count the ways!

@Ricardus. I like 'that post'. And the point about the evolution of English – which Eutychus despairs of in the Hebrew (and Greek?) - and the historical fiction of 'Daniel' as in Virgil. I don't know if you think me guilty of liberal prejudice. If you do, please say. I'd say 'not guilty', even though in what follows you'd all find me guilty as charged I'm sure.

@Eutychus. I'm sorry to make it difficult for you, but you're doing fine despite that, overcoming my severe limitations. You make sense.

I don't want to avoid, cannot avoid predictive prophecy on theological grounds over scientific grounds, to which literary and linguistic grounds are entirely subordinate. For decades I reified predictive prophecy using every literary and linguistic ground I could find, distorted science itself through that lens. It should be childishly simple to demonstrate from history, i.e. the scientific analysis of documents, if prophecy has been fulfilled, IF the documents can be scientifically traced back to Isaiah son of Amoz and the Daniel of the scriptural Daniels or another alone. They can't be. And there is nothing internal to the documents themselves that can possibly, falsifiably, literarily or linguistically prove that they are foretellingly prophetic. The text does not validate itself internally.

That is not liberal prejudice.

In no other field of enquiry would we abandon the principles of science, of forensics, of history in favour of a miraculous explanation that isn't warranted. And I am COMPLETELY open to the miraculous as I accept the Incarnation AND the independently warranted, reasonable posit of God as ground of being. AND more! I see Him in the texts. Despite them. I see Him in contrast to the gods and their requirement in contemporaneous, concurrent religious texts. Staggeringly so. Profoundly, beautifully, movingly, inspiringly and inspiredly so. Progressively through a glass darkly still. He changes not.

I submit that due to the science, the theology follows. Not the other way around. No cart of theology can drive the horse of science. No matter how much I want existential, postmodern, neo-orthodox, liberal theology to be true (not Spongiform liberal theology, which is neither), all it would take is ONE fulfilled prophecy demonstrating 'redemptive' violence and I'd have to bow the knee and shake my head. But there isn't even a single Jewish messianic prophecy that isn't only – 20% numerically - vaguely fulfilled in Jesus. Most aren't at all. 'Yet'. Christians add more from seven Psalms, two of which Jesus used as He was dying. I haven't done a proper comparison of Jewish with Christian messianic claims, but they certainly overlap.

If because I accept the Incarnation-Resurrection I must accept the fulfilment of messianic longing and 'prophecy' does that mean I must accept God the Killer, PSA and a Wednesday universe? Only the last have I never believed. Whilst believing in Adam and Eve, the Flood and other mything the point as fact. Now NONE are warranted. Predictive prophecy IS possible. There isn't any. Certainly none predicated on God's 'sovereignly' violently micromanaging the future.

(@Gamaliel) This isn't scepticism. And it is objective.

And yes I want the Church to go forward on an unsensibly broad, inclusive front.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I wasn't accusing you of 'scepticism', Martin60. I actually find your accounts of your explorations quite moving - when I can follow the gist ...



What I'd say in response is to reiterate a point made earlier and somewhere or other ( ) by Eutychus I think, that prophecy needn't be 'commutative' ...

So I'd suggest that any of us who go round try to match every single detail and whip-stitch of an OT prophecy (whether we see it as predictive or otherwise) to its NT fulfilment or some kind of future fulfilment, are barking up the wrong tree.

Take Peter's Pentecost sermon in Acts 2:

'This is what was spoken by the prophet Joel ...'

http://biblehub.com/acts/2-16.htm

Well yes, and if we were to tick the boxes we'd find people prophesying, dreaming dreams, seeing visions ...

But where on the Day of Pentecost do we see, 'blood and fire and billows of smoke ...' the moon turning to blood and so on?

Ah, the Futurists say, that's not talking about the Day of Pentecost, that's a foretelling of a future event, 'before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord' (Acts 2:20 NIV).

So why mention it then? Why does Peter include it in his sermon?

Sure, he sees it as the inauguration of a new era, the start of the age which is to come - with concommitant signs, wonders and auguries.

Other than the general point about signs and wonders, there is nothing in Joel's prophecy that describes the events of Pentecost in detail. No specific mention of 'speaking in other languages as the Spirit gave them utterance,' for instance.

No, it's the general principle that Peter applies.

It seems to me that hard-line Futurists and ultra-conservative evangelicals like Jamat (I'm avoiding the fundamentalist tag as he doesn't like it) expect the scriptures to 'behave' in ways that they don't actually conform to ie. exact equivalences in 100% of cases 100% of the time.

I don't see that in the text.

So, to my mind, it's a complete red-herring to say '20% of prophecies accurately refer to this' or '47.92% of them do that ...'

It smacks of a mid-19th century obsession with numerology - literal 1,000 year millenia, 'seventy weeks of years' and 'times, time and half a time' and so on ...

As if the scriptures are some kind of Rubik's cube puzzle or pocket calculator.

This is why I keep banging on about genre and why I find the kind of eschatological speculations engaged in by Jamat's favourite authors to be such a waste of time.

They are missing the point. By a country mile. Or by 'times, time and half a time' or however many 'weeks' of years you want it to be.

They think that they are defending the integrity of the scriptures by doing so but in reality they are making the scriptures behave in a way that don't appear to have done at any time.

'This is that ...' this is like ...

'It is as if ...'

'It reminds me of ...'

'Surely it is a case of ...'

Etc ...

You don't have to be a dyed in the wool liberal to see that. Heck, I've read Watchman Nee and he makes the same observation about Acts 2 as I just did. That's where I got it from.

Ultimately, if Josiah's reign was prophesied 300 years in advance, then glory be ...

If it wasn't and we are dealing with a contemporary account of some kind then glory be also - it doesn't detract from the broad thrust and aim of the account unless we insist on scripture behaving in ways that it doesn't ever appear to have done - other than in the minds of mid-19th century Protestants reacting against Higher Criticism or going off on post-Darby flights of eschatological fancy.*


* Although I'd certainly accept that eschatological speculation pre-dates that and you find it the Fathers, in medieval writing and in the speculations of the 18th century Jesuit, Manuel Lacunza. But you get my point ...
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Ah go on G. Accuse away if yer want. But you don't. Which is damn nice of you. Whip-stitch! You really are the most agreeable of men even though I want to disagree!

: if Josiah's reign was prophesied 300 years in advance, then God is VERY other indeed. Reality, God is BEYOND Haldane's '...not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose. I'd add 'more pragmatic' to 'queerer'.

I used to regard Him as such for decades. It would take a scientifically demonstrable prophecy to make me go back to that from as I see Him in Christ now.
 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
I'm beginning to suspect that Ursula Le Guin is the key to your mind, Martin:

quote:

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How can you tell fact from legend, truth from truth?

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Originally posted by Martin60:
But there isn't even a single Jewish messianic prophecy that isn't only – 20% numerically - vaguely fulfilled in Jesus.

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Martin :60 I used to regard Him as such for decades. It would take a scientifically demonstrable prophecy to make me go back to that from as I see Him in Christ now.

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Gamaliel: starting at any fixed point you choose we could pretty much make the 70 weeks fit with any scheme we wish. There are a whole load of arbitrary assumptions and leaps in the example you cite. It is far from scientific and water-tight and any of us here could drive a steam-roller or coach and horses through it if we wished

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Originally posted by Jamat:
I just did that because Martin60 demanded detailed verifiable and definite example. It is such and a challenge to his complacent atheism.

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Originally posted by mousethief:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
I just did that because Martin60 demanded detailed verifiable and definite example. It is such and a challenge to his complacent atheism.

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Martin is an atheist? Where's your evidence? Do you just mean he doesn't share your understanding of Christianity? I guess that would make me an atheist too.

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I've read loads of stuff like this. It doesn't convince. My faith persists despite of efforts like this, not because of them.

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Gamaliel: What does Anderson say about, 'He shall be called a Nazarene?'

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Aye. It looks like Jesus. So it's God.

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Originally posted by Jamat:
His thesis if you read him, is that prophetic time differs from ordinary time. Prophetic time is only in play when Israel is functioning in the blessing of God.

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All this to say the 70th week of Daniel’s prophecy is not yet begun. When it begins, people may realise too late, what these scriptures mean. The bridegroom May have come. The door may be closed.

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If I'm 'left behind', I was not a true believer but do I still have hope? Yes, if God grants me the gift of repentance. The gospel is still operative

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From this, in the Rapture thread, we discovered a two-stage return of the Lord and various categories of believer other than those in the Church universal, including those saved after the rapture by 144,000 Jewish Evangelists, who only get to visit the New Jerusalem occasionally
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
You've said it yourself. For Anderson's scheme to work it has to make assumptions that are extrinsic to the text:

- That 'prophetic time operates differently to normal time'.

- That the temporal aspects only function properly when the Jews are enjoying the blessing of God.

Both those are assumptions. They are not explicit or even implicit in the text.

Sure,we all make interpretive and hermeneutical leaps, but those are some pretty long bounds to make.

All this specious speculation about 'prophetic time' only confirms my resolve to stick with 'liturgical time' and with 'redeeming the time' rather than wasting it on the futile construction of elaborate pre-millenialist and Dispensationalist schemas. Mercifully, from what I can gather, there are more subtle and nuanced forms emerging from these particular systems. Bring it on. It's not before time.
 

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Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

I can't help thinking there must be a way between these two extremes if predicitive prophecy is not allowed to take on the role of shibboleth - which it seems to do for both Jamat and Martin.

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Originally posted by Martin60:
I don't know if you think me guilty of liberal prejudice. If you do, please say.

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Not at all.

The 'liberal prejudice' comment was mostly for Jamat's benefit. I get the impression Jamat believes that anything implying a late date for Daniel, with little or no predictive content, constitutes a rejection of the Bible, and thence liberalism or atheism. What I'm trying to get across is that there are other options.
 

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Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 

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I could undertake a blow by blow dismantling of Anderson's speculative schema if I wanted to. I might well do later today, but it seems somewhat cruel and spiteful to do so, like kicking over someone's carefully constructed sandcastle on the beach. There's no point. The tide will come in and wash it away in due course.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
prophetic years of 360 days

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Eutychus:This basically allows you to arbitrarily start and stop all your prophetic counting when you feel like it, depending on how "functioning in the blessing of God" is defined

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Originally posted by Ricardus:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
prophetic years of 360 days

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Where does the idea that a prophetic year is 360 days come from?

According to Wikipedia, a Hebrew year can have 353, 354, 355, 383, 384 or 385 days according to various complex rules which are intended to give you an average year of 365 and a bit days.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Ricardus:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
prophetic years of 360 days

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Where does the idea that a prophetic year is 360 days come from?

According to Wikipedia, a Hebrew year can have 353, 354, 355, 383, 384 or 385 days according to various complex rules which are intended to give you an average year of 365 and a bit days.

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Gamaliel: incidentally, Jamat, how do you know I've not read Anderson or people associated with that school of thinking?

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Originally posted by Jamat:
Actually, it is anything but arbitrary the more you look at it. you'd have to read him for yourself of course

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Originally posted by Jamat:
What is salvation in Christ if not an escape from a scary alternative?

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Originally posted by Jamat:

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Martin :60 I used to regard Him as such for decades. It would take a scientifically demonstrable prophecy to make me go back to that from as I see Him in Christ now.

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Oh really? And preferably something peer reviewed and repeatable?

Here is Robert Anderson’s summation of Dan 9 24-27.

*The 70 weeks = 70 times 7 prophetic years of 360 days
* The weeks begin with the edict of Artaxerxes Longimanus’ 20th year noted in Nehemiah.
* Luke states that the Lord’s public ministry began in the 15 Th year of Tiberius Caesar..between August AD 28 and April AD 29
*the Passover of the crucifixion was therefore in AD 32 when Christ was betrayed on the night of the paschal supper, and put to death on the day of the Paschal feast.
* The period between Artaxerxes edict and the passion should be expected to be 483 years.
* The edict was issued in Jewish month of Nisan. Jews compute from 1st of the month so the 70 weeks begin 1st Nisan BC 445.
* In BC 445, the new moon by which the Passover was regulated was 13 March, 7hr,9 m am so 1st Nisan was March 14.
* An era of 69 weeks ore 483 prophetic years reckoned from 14 March 445 BC should accord with some event to satisfy the words, ‘unto Messiah the prince.’
* This could not be the nativity as this would be 33 years before Messiah’s death.
* Jesus final visit to Jerusalem was the crisis of his ministry. He accepted the acclamation of the crowd in contrast to previous admonition to disciples not to make him known. Luke 19:39,40. This was the point of irrevocable choice.
*Zechariah signalled that day “Rejoice greatly daughter of Zion” Zech 9:9. This was a day that satisfies the angel’s words in Daniel.. “unto Messiah the prince.”
* this date is ascertainable. Jesus went up to Jerusalem on 8Nisan, 6 days before Passover.
* in that year, 14 Nisan was on a Thursday so the 8 of Nisan was the preceding Friday. He spent the sabbath at Mary and Martha’s house and entered Jerusalem as recorded in the gospels on 10 Nisan.
* The Julian date of that 10 Nisan was Sunday, April 6 AD32.
* what then was the length of the period between the issuing of the decree to to rebuild Jerusalem and ‘Messiah the prince’?
Ie between 14 March BC 445 and 6 April AD 32?
* This interval contained exactly and to the very day, 173880 days or, 7 times 69 prophetic years of 360 days, in other words
The first 69 ‘weeks’ of Gabriel’s prophecy.

Seem forensic enough for you Martin60?

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Aye. It looks like Jesus. So it's God.

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I don't understand this answer.

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Originally posted by Jamat:
The Bible seems consistent in using 360 days for a year. In the ancient times it seems lunisolar years were the norm.

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When the book of Daniel speaks of a seven, it is accepted generally that this is 7 years. Daniel's 70 th week is divided in half and one half is referred to as a time,times and half a time. Twice this same length of time is described as 42 months and twice as 1260 days. 1260 days are 42 months of 30 days. Using the Julian year, 3 and one half years would be 1278 days. The bible then must measures a 'prophetic' year as 360 days.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Ricardus:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
prophetic years of 360 days

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Where does the idea that a prophetic year is 360 days come from?

According to Wikipedia, a Hebrew year can have 353, 354, 355, 383, 384 or 385 days according to various complex rules which are intended to give you an average year of 365 and a bit days.

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Let me wiki that for you

[ 06. January 2018, 14:17: Message edited by: Martin60 ]
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Sigh, sorry Eutychus. So, as it's minimal, an exquisite oracular detail, with no rampaging puppet empires, it could be the same God as in Jesus. I'd bet it was. In the Jungian sense I know it was. How it will be, we haven't the faintest idea.
 

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Posted by RooK (# 1852) on :
 
Just to be explicit, Jamat, Gamaliel, et al - you may consider the Hostly imperatives on this thread to be functionally divine. Such that either they will be complied with, or reality will be altered that questions of compliance will become moot.

You will get no further warnings.

-RooK
Admin
 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
And it's CERTAINLY not '...simply a plot device by Matthew, putting the words of that prophecy in the mouths of the scribes to make the whole thing more exciting.'. That takes fast and loose beyond my comfort zone in to absurd Crossan-Spong territory.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Ricardus:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
The Bible seems consistent in using 360 days for a year. In the ancient times it seems lunisolar years were the norm.

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With respect, I wouldn't treat Sir Isaac Newton as an authority on this question.

A lunisolar calendar is one where you use the phases of the moon to determine when each month starts, and then add intercalary months to ensure the months don't drift too far from the seasons with which they're associated. By definition the year length will average 365 and a bit days, because that's the average you need to prevent the seasons from drifting.

One lunar cycle is about 29.5 days. If you use 30-day months then it takes less than three years before the first day of the month is the Full Moon instead of the New Moon.

On the modern Hebrew calendar, the months have either 29 or 30 days according to set rules. Presumably in origin you would have just looked at the sky and thought 'New moon = new month'.

Likewise, if you use a 360-day year with no intercalation, then it takes less than 40 years before your midsummer festivals are in midwinter.

If you have contrary evidence that the ancient Hebrew year was 360 days I would like to see it.

quote:

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When the book of Daniel speaks of a seven, it is accepted generally that this is 7 years. Daniel's 70 th week is divided in half and one half is referred to as a time,times and half a time. Twice this same length of time is described as 42 months and twice as 1260 days. 1260 days are 42 months of 30 days. Using the Julian year, 3 and one half years would be 1278 days. The bible then must measures a 'prophetic' year as 360 days.

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a. Accepting for the sake of argument that all of these periods refer to the same event: If I were to say in one place that a bridge took three and a half years to build, and in another place that it took 1260 days to build, then the natural conclusion would be that three and a half years was the approximate figure and 1260 days the exact figure. The natural reading would emphatically not be that I was using my own private definition of a year.

b. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the 1260 days comes from Revelation, not Daniel. Your scheme requires that a prophecy was given at the time of Belshazzar but the interpretive key that was required to understand it wasn't given until the time of John of Patmos, by which point 69 of the 70 weeks had already elapsed.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Sure, and I'm not looking where you are looking, at highly partial and selective Protestant fundamentalist websites.

That one has the RCs down as 'The Beast' for instance, in almost 17th century fashion.

I'll admit that I don't take Anderson or people like him terribly seriously.

There is good reason for that. Eutychus had already outlined a few.

I could add some more.

I'm sorry but I have no time whatsoever for pre-millenialist Dispensationalism in any way, shape or form, although I'll readily accept that some more recent exponents have moved things on a bit from the numpty stuff I first encountered as a young Christian.

I'd certainly prefer some form of conservative theology to the Spongiform version but find it very hard to take fellas like Anderson very seriously.

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Originally posted by Jamat:
I think when one googles the calendar issues, it is obvious that in the ancient world there were lots of adjustments for reasons we do not understand from this vantage point in time. The issue is not straightforward.

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You will be aware that the Bible has two places where the sun was said to have stopped, the long day of Joshua and Hezekiah's sundial.

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Critics both here and elsewhere accuse him of arbitrarily starting his time clock to suit his time line to make the prophecy fit.

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He assumes that the Bible does have integrity of form

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I think a second accusation is the more serious. Occam's razor is said to be violated. The schema is said to be made more complex to fit the details.

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Shipmates here cannot supply alternative 'simpler' explanations except to dismiss it on the basis of undermining the text by assuming, and that's all it is, that it is late dated or error ridden. This is the sceptical fall back position.

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I said that allowing for the possibility of the "clock of prophecy" stopping and starting on the basis of a factor with a degree of subjectivity (when "Israel is walking in the blessing of God") is incompatible with trying to measure a linear, chronological progression of time.

Again, you can reasonably apply one of these ideas, but you can't sensibly apply both. It's just too easy to "stop the clock" as the need arises to make the chronology f

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I'm not going to try and find out how to fix my car or washing machine by looking in the Bible; neither do I expect to be able to open it and discern a 1:25,000 scale map of all history. That doesn't mean I believe it's "error-ridden". That is a mischaracterisation

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Originally posted by Jamat:
You assume that he does this arbitraily for his convenience. (...) He does not stop the clock when the need arises to suit his theological presumptions though like any researcher he does work from assumptions which he is testing, but rather, in those OT periods when Israel falls from grace.(...)If these times can be ascertained, the years to measure are simply those in between them..no inconsistency.

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it is about assumptions that the Bible is flawed as to fact and history where it touches these things.

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I am currently convinced that it has integrity

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It is clear to me that most Bible trashing, is an excuse to be free from the moral strictures it imposes. I want to behave in a certain way contrary to Biblical injunctions? No problem! The Bible has got so many errors after all! This is often what one is up against in discussion about it. Morality is the elephant in the room.

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I can't see anybody arguing that here.

What is more, my experience of getting on for 50 years of belief ( ) is that a "conservative" or "fundamentalist" view of Scripture is absolutely no guarantee of moral integrity.

This can easily be seen from the seemingly endless stream of hypocritical evangelical leaders who condemn loudly from the pulpit the very sins they themselves are guilty of.

For much of my adult life I was led to believe that "sound" teachers and preachers embodied the upright theological morals and honesty they preached and could instinctively be relied on, in contrast to wicked liberals. My experience, which has cost me dearly in my own life, is that they cannot.

It would be nice if individuals' morality broke down so straightforwardly along the lines of the doctrine one professes to hold, but it doesn't. My criterion for assessing a theological argument these days sets a lot of store by the intellectual honesty with which the argument itself is made, over and above whether it comes to the "right" conclusions.
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
And it's CERTAINLY not '...simply a plot device by Matthew, putting the words of that prophecy in the mouths of the scribes to make the whole thing more exciting.'. That takes fast and loose beyond my comfort zone in to absurd Crossan-Spong territory.

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Thanks for the clarification.

I think I'm with you most of the way.

What you say here, though, confirms my suspicion that it's your comfort zone, rather than a particular school of textual criticism, that stops you applying the same logic to Matthew. I have every sympathy for that and can understand the reasons why (I think), but I still think that's a teeny bit inconsistent.

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Originally posted by Martin60:
How did the sermon go?

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OK. PM me if you want to brush up on your French

So things get more reliable, honest, and accurate the nearer we get to the meteor crater of Jesus and/or as culture progressed. I suppose that's a fresh way of saying "the Old is by the New explained".

Now where does that leave Revelation?

[ 07. January 2018, 15:42: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
It leaves it as a 'Revelation of Jesus Christ'.
 

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Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

The first is to claim of the OT does actually support his assertion that the Bible, when it treats of a prophetic year, uses a year of 360 days. It seems that right from Genesis, in detailing the days of the flood, this actually was the case

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I think a second accusation is the more serious. Occam's razor is said to be violated.

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Crossed in the post. Where do I claim the Rock in the pond is crystal clear?

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So I certainly don't expect any of His contemporaries to make any sense at all.

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Not when they go off on one, as we say round 'ere. And John of Patmos certainly went off on one. And it may WELL have been a fully immersive movie by the Holy Spirit for him and his audience. I'm not his audience.

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Surely either of those events (Caligula’s statue etc) could be seen to fulfil the prophecy equally well?

Anderson's schema makes Daniel either vague or obscurantist

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Aye, closer is good. So 30-40 year after He were resurrected, John of Patmos had his trip, not a problem.

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I can't avoid a wry smile at the difference between what you classify as "not a problem" and what Jamat classifies as "not a problem" .

So, the nearer-to-(or further-from)-the-incarnation half of your argument works in this case, but not the culture-has-progressed-so-we-know-better-still-40-years-on part?

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It's a work of genius whatever.

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Audience value: We're inheritors, beneficiaries of heirlooms that need careful handling. The LEAST said about them the better in some ways. Apart from as art, literature by our spiritual ancestors. What use they are beyond that, the arcana - including takes on atonement, weird stuff like the harrowing of hell - beyond the reporting, I've no idea.

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Originally posted by Jamat:
Hi Ricardus
In denying that the Prophetic year is 360 days, you are contradicting major expositors.

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If you are really interested and wish to investigate it further, I suggest you look at Anderson who Pentecost who also quotes others who have thought it through thoroughly but suffice it here that Leviticus 23 does not constitute a rebuttal and Genesis 7 and 8 are conclusive.

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quote:

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The flood began on the seventeenth day of the second month 7:11 and ended on the seventeenth day of the seventh month 8:4. This is exactly 5 months also said to be 150 days.

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quote:

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quote:

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Anderson's schema makes Daniel either vague or obscurantist

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This is simply nonsense. Once again, if interested, I suggest you investigate further. If you are not and in point scoring mode, then there is no point in further interactions.

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quote:

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, it says that the waters 'had abated' after 150 days and that the ark came to rest on Ararat on the seventeenth day of the seventh month. It doesn't say that those two events were simultaneous

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quote:

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G Dee: how do you draw the line?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Please don't tell me God is sovereign in history. The correct adjectival phrase would have to be "to blame". Human history is hideous. It's not helped that Boy #1 bought me Dunkirk for Christmas, but, really, you'd not want to be held responsible for human history, really you wouldn't.

As for Martin, bless him, I love his solos, when I can follow them, but he'd probably be considered a bit too weird to play sax for Gong...

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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G Dee: how do you draw the line?

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Thank you for your comment. I am not an academic. No original research or anything like that. I use the NASB for personal devotions. 66 books ...40 authors.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gee D:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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G Dee: how do you draw the line?

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Thank you for your comment. I am not an academic. No original research or anything like that. I use the NASB for personal devotions. 66 books ...40 authors.

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Nor am I an academic. But this does not address the real point I was making - you assert that all scripture is divinely inspired, so how do you define scripture?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gee D:
But what Bible? The Authorised Version or one of its more modern translations? The Douai? The Latin one I'd find on a lectern in St Peter's? That used by the Eastern Orthodox. That used by the Copts, or the one in you'd find in the ancient churches of Kerala and Sri Lanka, those talking of foundation by St Thomas?

This is not a question of translation, but the inclusion or exclusion of particular books.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Please don't tell me God is sovereign in history. The correct adjectival phrase would have to be "to blame". Human history is hideous.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gee D:
Jamat, I'd have thought the relevance was obvious. If you claim that all scripture is divinely inspired, you have to define what all scripture is. To say that it's the Bible does not take matters much further as there are different reckonings of what is in the Bible. The obvious example is the books excluded by Luther and the Anglican churches, but included as deuterocanonical by the Catholics, who constitute by far the largest Christian community. I understand that there are yet different lists in the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox traditions.

So how would you define scripture? Is it simply what you would call the Bible, and if so, which of the varying list of contents has your allegiance? Why is that so, and by what criteria do you include and exclude? ISTM that this is highly relevant to the thread. I'm not talking of which translation you use, which seems to be the limit of your understanding of the point. And why do you have only a superficial knowldedge of the apocrypha?

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quote:

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Gee Dee: Are you now able to give a proper definition of what you would call scripture, and what is constituted by it?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gee D:
Again, no. What is the Bible you refer to? Is there but 1 Bible?

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Yes, the authoritative version.
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
The 1 God dictated 1604-1611.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I was being somewhat tongue-in-cheek, Jamat but also trying to make a serious point.

I'm not accusing you of this, but I once heard the Rev Ian Paisley on the radio declaring, 'St Patrick was not a Roman Catholic! St Patrick was a Protestant!'

Thereby betraying a common approach found among certain brands of conservative Protestantism - that their particular 'take' is the only one there is and has been so from the outset.

I've previously introduced the fact that the Eastern Churches were the last to officially adopt the Book of Revelation as canonical scripture, an observation you dismissed as 'irrelevant' or at least you questioned its relevancy.

Now you appear to be suggesting that the fact that it's irrelevant that other brands of Christianity differ from Protestants in which texts they consider canonical.

Your answer, 'the authoritative version' begs a number of questions of course, as you'll undoubtedly by aware.

Deemed authoritative by whom?

Who decides?

If the Ethiopians, for instance, hold that the Book of Enoch is authoritative, what criteria do we have to disagree with them?

How do we know that the Book of Enoch isn't authoritative?

Unless by some kind of collegial, conciliar and consensual agreement that is shared in common by all but the Ethiopians (and whoever else may include the Book of Enoch in the canon).

What grounds are there for not including it? Jude quotes it. Why should it not be included?

Ok, of course I'm not arguing a case for its inclusion. But my reasons for not including it may or may not tally with yours. How do we know which of us is right?

As I understand it, the issue of which scriptures were officially canonised was more an issue of deciding which were profitable to be read in church - the Christians of the time weren't saying that the other writings were somehow beyond the pale ...

Of course, over time, some texts such as The Shepherd of Hermas (which appear to have been treated almost on a par with the canonical scriptures) fell out of regular use.

So what we have in the 'authoritative' scriptures, as you put it, are those texts which both 'stood the test of time' as it were and which were universally (or almost universally) regarded as being authoritative.

That doesn't deny inspiration, nor does it take away the Godward aspects - it's a 'synergistic' thing.

The scriptures are both the words of men and the word of God. Inspiration isn't dictation. But then, you know all that ...

I'm not suggesting that we all have to adopt The Book of Enoch or whatever texts there might be among the Syriacs, the Copts, Armenians and so forth that aren't found in RC, Eastern Orthodox or Protestant Bibles.

All I'm saying, along with Eutychus, is that the question of canonicity has never been as cut-and-dried as some have made out.
 

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Posted by Gee D (# 13815) on :
 
Jamat, to put it mildly, your post's more than a bit flippant. Which of the numerous versions is what you would call the authoritative one? Any of those I mentioned? Any other?
 

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Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Gee D:
Jamat, to put it mildly, your post's more than a bit flippant. Which of the numerous versions is what you would call the authoritative one? Any of those I mentioned? Any other?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:
I think the quick'n dirty answer to this issue is that the felt need for a nailed-down canon is inversely proportional to the presence of a priesthood and the expectation of the congregation that Scripture is to be mediated to them through a priest rather than placed into their own hands.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:
That reminds me that, again as a non-conformist protestant, I have a Bible on order from an inmate, containing (not least because of my input) the Deuterocanonicals, about which we had a discussion on this very subject. So don't paint us all with the same brush please.

More generally, I think that since the Reformation and the printing press (not to mention the internet) the Pandora's box of access to the text has been opened and is not likely to slam shut again any time soon. Any church that doesn't factor this in is going to have problems. I'll have to ask the 25-year-old Russian Russian Orthodox churchwarden newly elected to our ecumenical bureau, who appears to have a rather reformist approach to Orthodoxy, what she thinks about it.

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I think your 'quick and dirty' answer was just that, quick and dirty ...

As you'll know, of course, there was more to the Reformation to 'have printing press will read Bible.'

The RC authorities didn't react badly to the invention of the printing press. They simply used it to produce missals and prayer books.

The issue wasn't the printing press per se, of course, but the ability to circulate polemical tracts and arguments - as Luther and the other Reformers did. A bit like social media and the internet having an impact on the consumption of news - fake or otherwise.

As far as the 'deuterocanonicals' go - well the RCs regard them as such, the Orthodox, as far as I am aware, don't make that kind of distinction.

As for the individual Orthodoxen's approach to scripture - Mousethief and your somewhat reformist Russian Orthodox friend will be able to shed light on that but my impression seems to be - with English-speaking Orthodox in the UK at least - their approach to scripture doesn't differ that drastically from what you might find among High Church Anglicans, say.

That might only because most of them used to be High Church Anglicans ...

That said, I've met Romanian monks and so on who seem to use the scriptures in not that dissimilar a way to the way Anglicans might.

I suspect it all depends on who you speak to.

Non-conformist Protestants don't all use the scriptures in the same way either.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
And then there's all the stuff about the 1611 Authorised Version being translated in such a way as to conform to King James I's proclivities.

'Bishops' rather than 'elders' for instance ...



'No Bishops, no King ...'

Which is doubly ironic when some of the most non-conformist of non-conformist sects insist on the King James Only ...



But that's another issue.

However we cut it, we all of us defer to some kind of tradition or 'priesthood' whether it's a paper-priest or a real live one - whether it's a school of interpretation - Schofield, Anderson etc - or whether it's a Big T Tradition.
 

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Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
And then there's all the stuff about the 1611 Authorised Version being translated in such a way as to conform to King James I's proclivities.

'Bishops' rather than 'elders' for instance ...

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Bishop = overseer, not elder. Elder translates presvyter = priest.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Ok, yes, I was being too 'quick and dirty' too ...


 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
Submerged by work, listening to this, imagining it's this thread set to music...
 

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Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Ok, yes, I was being too 'quick and dirty' too.

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quote:

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Gee Dee: to put it mildly, your post's more than a bit flippant

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Gee Dee: to put it mildly, your post's more than a bit flippant

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Not at all. The canon to me is a settled issue. It does not include the additions Jerome made and I will not be commenting further on it.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Gee Dee: to put it mildly, your post's more than a bit flippant

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Not at all. The canon to me is a settled issue. It does not include the additions Jerome made and I will not be commenting further on it.

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Gamaliel:
Why can't we examine and discuss that issue as well as any other issues?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Gamaliel:
Why can't we examine and discuss that issue as well as any other issues?

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Obviously, you may.

Source

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
According to this, St Jerome was persuaded to include the Apocrypha / Deuterocanonical books against his better judgement and that be rejecting them later on the Protestants were simply following his original intention.

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quote:

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As I understand it, the issue of which scriptures were officially canonised was more an issue of deciding which were profitable to be read in church - the Christians of the time weren't saying that the other writings were somehow beyond the pale ...

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quote:

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Coming back to the Apocrypha, I've always been told that the Jews don't accept them into their canon - but as far as I know there were plenty of copies and fragments at Qumran as well as what Protestant would consider OT canonical texts.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Gee Dee: to put it mildly, your post's more than a bit flippant

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Not at all. The canon to me is a settled issue. It does not include the additions Jerome made and I will not be commenting further on it.

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quote:

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My question was much wider than that

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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My question was much wider than that

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Gee Dee: Do you actually doubt what is scripture? If yes, I do not believe you.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
I think the issue of canonicity is not coterminous with regarding writings as helpful or even interesting, unless all you ever read is canonical scripture.

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quote:

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I think the drive for canonicity revolved more around use in the liturgy, did it not?

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quote:

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Plus of course that Judaism today is pretty much derivative from one strand of Judaism, and Qumran was not in that strand.

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Yes. This.
 

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Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :
 
This point is often missed;there is a fashion at the moment for looking to Judaism to understand Christianity, and whilst there's much to commend this (leaving aside the rather odd trend amongst some Evangelicals now to keep not only the Jewish festivals but also Kosher), the idea does seem to be that you could have dropped anyone from Jesus' culture straight into Golders Green and he'd feel immediately at home. This may not be entirely accurate. /tangent
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Sure, perhaps it's material for another thread, but I'd be interested in more on how modern Judaism has developed and the various strands that have fed into it.

Meanwhile, I don't know what the current scholarly consensus is, but I have heard that the received wisdom on the Qumram caves, that it had to do with the Essenes, has recently been challenged and revised.

Of course, that's how these things work, hypotheses are put forward and then challenged and redressed.

On the canonicity issue, I've also heard it postulated that the Jews didn't formalise their canon until well on into the 'Christian era' ... and some have suggested that their reasons for doing so may have been something to do with the emergence of the Church and a reaction to the sect of the Nazarenes ...

Whatever the case, yes, these things do seem to have been fuelled by a desire to agree on what was helpful and useful both for public liturgical use and for private reading - for those few people able to read and, presumably, fewer who actually had access to documents.
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
40 Years On: Ah, yes Alan Bennett, before your time though. Not enough to know better though. We needed the intervening 1900+ years. The arc is long and we are remarkably slow learners.

Joyce: Must start before I'm too old. Like Proust...

Ever increasing circles: Aye, even stuff in the first circle around Jesus, Christ the cynosure, Gamaliel's perspective giver and focus from a two thousand year later postmodern perspective, is alien. I wouldn't ditch a ripple, no matter how far it reached and was modulated by the sea bed of culture.

Revelation Wood: The sovereignty of God is ABOVE history. There isn't a trace of God for Karl to have to blame in history. Of divine intervention even at the level of inspiration. Except in the second and third circles beyond history. Where Jesus lives. I brush NOTHING aside. I wish I could brush it in, unlike Jerome. But it can't be done. Not with barely intellectual honesty. I'm touchy about claims. Jesus is the be all and end all, the transcendent hope. He will be in a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, ... years. Ten or so for me. With my eyes I see history. With my heart I feel Jesus. Their ever increasing circles overlap with fascinating interference. Here. On this thread. With some finding second, third order, circle inspiration in apocalyptic, prophecy.

I'd like to take your course. In French of course!

Too weird for Gong! Well I'll be didgiri-done!

G: I still feel sorry for Andre Previn. God through the Incarnation is in the off-key cacophony, including of history and 'prophecy'. Like Sibelius in The Nice's Keith Emerson's version of The Karelia Suite from Five Bridges, bursting through the white noise from 06:13 at 07:45.

Sovereignty: Like eschatology is transcendent. As in your sermon I'm painfully translating. Not of this world. It has NOTHING to do with history, not a single detail. The quantum of solace is in our mental interference between God above Godless history.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Sorry Martin, you've lost me again ...


 

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Posted by Honest Ron Bacardi (# 38) on :
 
mousethief wrote:

quote:

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Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
I think the issue of canonicity is not coterminous with regarding writings as helpful or even interesting, unless all you ever read is canonical scripture.

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quote:

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I think the drive for canonicity revolved more around use in the liturgy, did it not?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Sorry Martin, you've lost me again ...

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quote:

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Originally posted by RdrEmCofE:
[QUOTE][b]
The John of authorship could be one of many possible John's and for textual analysis reasons probably not the John who authored a Gospel and 3 epistles. One thing seems certain though the John who wrote it was Jewish. Probably Palestinian, one John the Prophet, with Galilee his original home, having then migrated to Asia Minor. Writers of apocalypses generally lived outside Judea and this type of literature was usually read where the Law was less observed.

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quote:

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Gee D:I would not say that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, for a start. A better definition is that scripture was composed by people especially inspired by God and that their writings are generally accepted as containing teaching to instruct and guide

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Gee D:I would not say that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, for a start. A better definition is that scripture was composed by people especially inspired by God and that their writings are generally accepted as containing teaching to instruct and guide

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What seems to be the difference to you. Why change from 2tim3:16? This establishes scriptural authority and function pretty tightly.

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quote:

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A good false dichotomy. Were the Torah writers and editors especially inspired to attribute millions of deaths to God the Killer? I see that they WERE especially inspired despite that, transcendently despite where they were in social evolution. Even in dreadfully wonderful stories like Abraham under the Terebinth Trees at Mamre, with God acceding to his every request for mercy to the five cities He was about to nuke. As they evolved, God got better. He completely spared Nineveh. Funny that.

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quote:

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Do you have any firm evidence for the presumption that the author was not John the apostle, who also wrote the 4th gospel?

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quote:

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Originally posted by RdrEmCofE:

quote:

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Do you have any firm evidence for the presumption that the author was not John the apostle, who also wrote the 4th gospel?

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Does it really matter? John was a common name, even in Asia Minor, and the seven churches there, that his apocalypse was addressed to, would have known which John had been exiled to Patmos recently, surely. We don't know who wrote The Epistle to the Hebrews, but does that mean it is not 'inspired'?

If we can't be sure the apostle John, the favorite disciple, wrote Revelation, why insist that it was that particular John?

As I said, textual analysis suggests otherwise.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:
Jamat once again it is not up to RdrEmCoE to make their case here: the burden of proof is on you to show it was John the apostle and not on everyone else to show it wasn't.

But that's not the important question.

The important question, which I've already asked too and which I don't think you've answered, is why does the authorship matter (cf Hebrews, which I also cited)?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
It matters because who said it is critical in determining its authority.

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quote:

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Some sort of 2nd century John ain’t the same as the one who walked 3 years with the master.

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quote:

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Regarding your other question, the burden of proof is on the claimant not on the questioner of the claim.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
Rdr.Cof E, glibly wrote that the Author of Revelation was in all probability not John the apostle. Does he have evidence? No, none to cite. He chooses to raise the question and the question devalues the scripture. Someone who reads that scholarly sounding twaddle might just believe it.

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quote:

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Eutychus:So Hebrews, Job, Ruth... in fact everything between Joshua and II Chronicles and some more... are not authoritative because their authorship is unknown?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
No, they are accepted as part of the OT canon by the Jewish Rabbis etc.

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quote:

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They are part of the Septuagint are they not? Not sure how the ancient Jews sorted their canon.

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quote:

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It is not about authorship with them rather it is about what the likes of Paul would have accepted as scripture and those books, most of them are endorsed by NT writers by quotation or reference.

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quote:

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I accept the Bible as received.

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quote:

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The link I posted makes a fair case for his authorship. I merely asked if there was evidence of a contrary view. obviously not.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Do you have any response to my 4th and last paras here?

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quote:

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As soon as you examine why you have conservative, traditional beliefs you find that there is no rational basis for them. No intellectually honest basis.

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quote:

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Maybe I’ll die and that’s it. I’ll admit that as a purely scientific possibility. But I really doubt it. Heaven beats in my chest and runs through my veins, I can already hear the music, I can almost feel the warm embrace of my Lord, the peeling laughter of His final triumph, when He has made me to be in His image. From this peak I can see the far more glorious peak in the distance. I don’t like the valley I must cross to get there, and I may loose sight of that peak as I descend into the valley’s darkened depths, but I have the Psalmist’s comfort and my Lord’s reassurance.

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quote:

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You explicitly want to believe that an historical Abraham from the C19th BCE existed

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quote:

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You exclude the Torah from unknown authorship?

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quote:

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I do too. An Abraham who was prepared to murder his son under God's command? A God who stopped by to bargain for the lives of thousands of people?

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quote:

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Despite conservatives apparently having a point. They must have surely? They build such vast traditional structures on them. But whenever I investigate what they actually say, there's NOTHING there. They have no point that survives scrutiny. As you find?

And so it goes with inspiration, scripture, prophecy, sovereignty, eschatology.

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quote:

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Nothing can scare the be Jesus out of me!

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
God luck for tomorrow.

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quote:

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How does that diminish Christ?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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How does that diminish Christ?

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By redefining him and rewriting history..which is a luxury everyone would like but cannot afford.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
The scriptures aren't history in the modern sense.

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quote:

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Martin60: as there is no foretelling prophecy to any significant degree, with any intensity of signal above noise, there is no inspiration, no Tradition, no sovereignty. There is nothing that stands up to critical analysis which necessarily includes extreme post-modernism.

How does that diminish Christ?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

quote:

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Martin60: as there is no foretelling prophecy to any significant degree, with any intensity of signal above noise, there is no inspiration, no Tradition, no sovereignty. There is nothing that stands up to critical analysis which necessarily includes extreme post-modernism.

How does that diminish Christ?

---

Maybe, by making him a fictional character equivalent to a pseudo-scholarly epithet or maybe the protagonist of a piece of historical fiction.
Is there a real resurrection in there? Nope didn’t think so, so you have a cosmic Christ like Teillard de Chardin. That is rewriting the Christ of the gospels.
And..
The gospels are history. If they are not we may as well be making it up as we go along like you seem to be doing.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
Superb Eutychus.

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I'll take that as a "yes" to my question...

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin60:
No community has actively driven me out, I have withdrawn, although I remain involved where I can and will be able to do more soon. I MISS services. I love the Eucharist.

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Where does the Church fit in for you, Martin? Does it remain a safe mother within which you can think heretical thoughts, or have you gone beyond her into isolation? How does it mesh with your thought trajectory?

[ 15. January 2018, 10:29: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Your analysis of my position (deist beyond Christ, theist in Him) is as good as it gets.

Church. Hmmmm. If I had the money I'd move to Waterloo and attend and utterly immerse myself in Steve Chalke's literal Oasis. Also I've never been disappointed by a Cathedral service, including Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral (RC). Was blown away by a most Marian service at St. Pancras once.

Went to choral evensong a couple of months ago in a high church nearby. Too many wordy hymns. "...differs from the cathedral style in being 'Classic FM' rather than 'Radio 3'". Yeahhhh. Need time to fellowship, get to know people and there isn't any. Time. There will be soon, but...

Every Friday night except the first of the month and even some of them if needed I go to the charevo Anglican church I mainly attended since changing cities in 2009 (twice on Sunday for the first year and probably more - on the basis of always go to your local), having become a confirmed Anglican in 2005, to volunteer with the homeless. It's oxygen. Gets me out of myself like nothing else. With more opportunity coming we'll go Sundays. Despite everything Despite being the dangerously near operative word. I do NOT want to be isolated. Therein, in every way, is death. I'm enough of a loner (surprising? Intro-extro. Or extro-intro? A solitary plant spotter anyway.) as it is.

For a couple or three years I attended the church I could spit on with a following wind, a nice little MOTR Anglican village one. That was least problematic. The city church regarded us as liberals. We moved back to the city 2 years ago. Tried a more local church plant of the main city church. Too mother and child oriented for me and my wife. One big Sunday school.

I've been to other non-conformist services for special occasions. Never say never again, but... And the Deobandi Mosque. THAT was awesome.

I regard the Church (ALL of her over time and space) as my mother, yes. I can't have a real relationship with her (except in the Friday night interactions), a real conversation apart from here and with my wife. I am the beneficiary of her 2000 year continuity, of her Tradition to say the least. I couldn't exist without her.

I'm not entitled to any expectations along the subversive trajectory, except here and more remotely. At least here there is two-way analytical, reflective communication.

As do I, pick the bones out of that!
 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
Yeah, well just imagine living with those sorts of dilemmas and having a flock in your charge. My problem is seeing where everyone else around me will be theologically in a generation's time (at least, that's what's happened over the last 20 years or so) and struggling to bridge the gap whilst having nobody IRL to bounce ideas off - you just get blank looks (apart from Mrs Eutychus, thankfully).

Aside from that, though, inasmuch as your theology owes a debt to the Church and you recognise the need for meeting together, it seems important to me that your (one's) theology is capable of incorporating some form of local church (gathering together).

If your theology - especially, here, of inspiration of Scripture - takes you on an arc out of church altogether, I think it's rather like sawing off the branch you're sitting on, isn't it? The Church is what's got Scripture this far. You have to be missing something (generic you here).

To put it another way, in order not to drift into pure relativism or illuminism, and in order to be eschatolocially meaningful, reinterpretation needs to be taken on board by a community in some form of continuity with the historic Church. I think.
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Stone me E.! You have no up-line? No peer group? It's normal for the clergy to be more liberal than their flock, but not alone surely?

Fellowship outside bad coffee after services would be nice. We had a great small group in the village. Kept my wife going far more than services. No such thing in the city church any more. Not allowed. I wasn't allowed to go to the local one in 2009. Had to drive miles. And I did. Nowt ter do wi' me that. Charevo control freakery.

My theology can't take me out of the Church. I got it IN the Church. Rob Bell, Brian McLaren, Steve Chalke are in the Church. Just not in Leicester.

They will NEVER allow public discussion of the reinterpretation of eschatology, prophecy, sovereignty. Any more than Big-T can heterosexist patriarchy. Whilst allowing BENNY FFFFFFFF.....lamin' HINN! to have a say. He came to Leicester on a 'word' and we were all encouraged to go. I'd rather set fire to myself. Mark Stibbe was bad enough before his sordid fall. Andrew White was just eccentric.

So no, I won't pay for any of that.

And if I were so enlightened, how come I know that I am appallingly limited in love?
 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
I didn't say you were illuminated, as we say here. But there has to be a way for bleeding-edge theology to bring the Church along with it, otherwise it's a dead end. And it has to recognise its roots.
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
All it takes is another millennium or ten along the trajectory. Whether the Church has any part in that, I can't see.
 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
Yeah but you have to take people with you. Joshua made sure everyone got across the Jordan, didn't he?
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Until Pope Joshua I then!
 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
Well seriously (dragging us off-topic here a bit) I think that's what Francis is trying to do, isn't he? Drag the RC Church kicking and screaming into the 21st century with a leaf taken out of the evo piety book?

I nicked my insights about the inspiration of interpretation from conversations with our local RC archbishop (although he nicked them from Paul Ricoeur, a good protestant).
 

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Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
The last shall be first: Ricouer! Wonderful stuff. Sorry, I've gone through the thread, but could you point out your aye, aye, aye alliteration; Insights about the Inspiration of Interpretation? Or reiterate them? I know they're there, but I'm old and dim. And the first shall be last: Francis, well said. Happy to regard him as my Pope. Which for a former Whore AND Her (Reform) Daughters man is saying a lot. Could you elaborate on evo piety? Anti-materialist, inclusive traditionalism?
 

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Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on :
 

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Originally posted by Martin60:

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Originally posted by Jamat:

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Gee D:I would not say that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, for a start. A better definition is that scripture was composed by people especially inspired by God and that their writings are generally accepted as containing teaching to instruct and guide

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What seems to be the difference to you. Why change from 2tim3:16? This establishes scriptural authority and function pretty tightly.

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A good false dichotomy. Were the Torah writers and editors especially inspired to attribute millions of deaths to God the Killer? I see that they WERE especially inspired despite that, transcendently despite where they were in social evolution. Even in dreadfully wonderful stories like Abraham under the Terebinth Trees at Mamre, with God acceding to his every request for mercy to the five cities He was about to nuke. As they evolved, God got better. He completely spared Nineveh. Funny that.

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Originally posted by Gee D:
Jamat, I assume that when you said inescapable God not believed in you were not suggesting that Eutychus, Martin60 and others were non-belivers.

How would you interpret the saying "You are Peter and on ts rock I shall build my church". In the way that the majority of Christians since then have interpreted it, that is to give primacy to Peter and then the church at Rome which Peter established?

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Originally posted by Gee D:
How would you interpret the saying "You are Peter and on ts rock I shall build my church". In the way that the majority of Christians since then have interpreted it, that is to give primacy to Peter and then the church at Rome which Peter established?

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Originally posted by Gee D:
Jamat, I assume that when you said inescapable God not believed in you were not suggesting that Eutychus, Martin60 and others were non-belivers.

How would you interpret the saying "You are Peter and on ts rock I shall build my church". In the way that the majority of Christians since then have interpreted it, that is to give primacy to Peter and then the church at Rome which Peter established?

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Originally posted by Jamat:
What I meant was that If God is an issue, then he is inescapable. The wrestle for enlightenment continues..everyone comes at it from viewpoints which occasionally may intersect.

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Originally posted by Jamat:

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Originally posted by Gee D:
Jamat, I assume that when you said inescapable God not believed in you were not suggesting that Eutychus, Martin60 and others were non-belivers.

How would you interpret the saying "You are Peter and on ts rock I shall build my church". In the way that the majority of Christians since then have interpreted it, that is to give primacy to Peter and then the church at Rome which Peter established?

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What I meant was that If God is an issue, then he is inescapable. The wrestle for enlightenment continues..everyone comes at it from viewpoints which occasionally may intersect.

The Matt 16:14-18 is interesting. ISTM that the revelation given to Peter is the rock on which the church stands but that Peter himself was given ‘keys’ to unlock that revelation. We seein Acts how his words bring immediate change to the crowds in Acts 2 and later how he spearheaded the first offering of the gospel to the gentiles in the Cornelius story. It was on his testimony that the rest of apostles accepted this. It is if he used the ‘keys’ and after that, the door stayed open.

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Originally posted by Steve Langton:
AIUI there is a strong tradition for Peter as bishop of Rome though probably not the first. One list gives a predecessor in the post as one 'Linus', possibly derived from the Celtic name 'Llyn' . . . .

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Originally posted by Martin60:
A self serving tradition. And not a word about it in the Bible. Most odd.

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Originally posted by Jamat:
This is simply nonsense. Once again, if interested, I suggest you investigate further. If you are not and in point scoring mode, then there is no point in further interactions.

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Originally posted by Ricardus:

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Originally posted by Jamat:
This is simply nonsense. Once again, if interested, I suggest you investigate further. If you are not and in point scoring mode, then there is no point in further interactions.

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OK, I haven't forgotten this and have finally composed a response which is on the Kerygmania thread.

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
So the Pope and Eastern Orthodox patriarchs are 'self-appointed' and Protestant leaders/pastors and Bible commentators somehow aren't ...

How does that work?

But then I did think this will heading off on a tangent ...

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