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Source: (consider it) Thread: What should we do about 'our own' terrorists?
Martin60
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quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Otherwise we are left with a problem: if God is prepared to miraculously give someone a fully worked out Lutheran theology, why doesn't he do that to everyone else?

Because God does not see us as all alike; he knows that what is good for one person is not necessarily good for another.

Moo

What's God got to do with what good we get? Beyond His provision?

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Love wins

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Kaplan Corday
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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
you can't avoid admitting that Christianity involves dealing with the OT in the light of the NT; and you have admitted that actions such as crusading religious violence cannot be condoned from the NT.

No, he has said he doesn't believe religious violence is a correct interpretation of the NT, he hasn't made a blanket statement that it is obvious it cannot be condoned. Obviously it can be.
Obviously you can "condone" anything - rape, paedophilia, arson, you name it - if you choose to ignore the most elementary exegetical principles.

I told you I didn't believe that you would stop talking to me!

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Kaplan Corday
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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
- I have maintained, in keeping with the historical evidence, that a range of hermeneutical approaches existed in the early Church - some more allegorical in tone, others closer to the historical-grammatical approach and what gradually emerged was a kind of fusion/compromise if you will, between the two.

I think the heart of your problem lies in this pericope.

Yes, of course there were dodgy hermeneutical techniques, including allegory, used earlier in church history, and sometimes they are still used today.

It is highly misleading to imply, however, that a range of hermeneutics freely and equally competed in the exegetical market place.

A grammatical-historical approach was always overwhelmingly the norm, with stuff like allegory as aberrant accretions which were later identified, discredited and discarded - as we do today, for example with Augustine's fanciful dealings with the parables.

If a grammatical-historical approach had not been the central norm, then Christianity would not have survived, but would have crumbled into innumerable subjective versions dreamt up by innumerable individuals, with no meaningful communication betwen the versions possible.

The fact that the NT writers used allegory from time to time does not entitle us to do so when we feel like it.

The grammatical-historical approach has always been the norm, even when unacknowledged and unnamed, and it is not unjustifiable, albeit with 20/20 hindsight, to point out lapses from it - as long as we admit that we are probably being inconsistent too, in ways which future generations will no doubt point out.

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mousethief

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quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
A grammatical-historical approach was always overwhelmingly the norm, with stuff like allegory as aberrant accretions which were later identified, discredited and discarded - as we do today, for example with Augustine's fanciful dealings with the parables.

This is grossly overstated. The very evangelicalest Evangelicals do not think Christ literally meant the disciples were drinking his literal physical blood. It is an allegory for something, whatever that something is. People can overdo typology and try to find allegories in every jot and tittle, but that is an excess, and not a condemnation of the method as a whole. Christ himself finds allegories in the Old Testament, for instance Jonah's cetaceogastric sojourn he takes as an allegory of his own entombment.

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Lamb Chopped
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You know, Gamaliel, how about you just stop trying to tell me what my experience is.

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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

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mr cheesy
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quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
Obviously you can "condone" anything - rape, paedophilia, arson, you name it - if you choose to ignore the most elementary exegetical principles.

That's the bible for you.

Actually it is far easier to construct a hermeneutic which promotes religious and state violence - if it is as I've defined it* - than one which justifies paedophilia from the bible. Because the text doesn't tell people to go out and do horrible things to children, whereas it certainly does say to kill heretics and destroy enemies in the name of the Lord.

quote:
I told you I didn't believe that you would stop talking to me!
Yeah. Well you have at least stopped saying the same thing over and over again so there is something different to respond to.

*ie one which holds together, is capable of being examined etc

[ 27. July 2017, 06:52: Message edited by: mr cheesy ]

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arse

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Martin60
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quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
You know, Gamaliel, how about you just stop trying to tell me what my experience is.

He's telling US. With his hermeneutic of yours.

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Love wins

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mr cheesy
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Seems reasonable to me to think aloud about other people's experiences. I dare say that the majority of us think that Joseph Smith was deluded - are we not allowed to say so?

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arse

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Martin60
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quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
you can't avoid admitting that Christianity involves dealing with the OT in the light of the NT; and you have admitted that actions such as crusading religious violence cannot be condoned from the NT.

No, he has said he doesn't believe religious violence is a correct interpretation of the NT, he hasn't made a blanket statement that it is obvious it cannot be condoned. Obviously it can be.
Obviously you can "condone" anything - rape, paedophilia, arson, you name it - if you choose to ignore the most elementary exegetical principles.

I told you I didn't believe that you would stop talking to me!

And like all conservatives - please prove me wrong, PLEASE! For God's sake!! - you can justify God the Killer with a shrug. God the Genocidal Maniac, the destroyer of worlds, the nuker of cities, the commander of race murder. With ah well, His ways aren't ours (the IRONY!), He is holy and righteous so it must be OK.

Just like 'they' do.

PS, I was conservative.

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Love wins

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Golden Key
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quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Unless somehow you think that God is going around telling different people different answers to the same question, there is no way to square that circle.

I don't think that God gives different answers to the same question. I think people are asking different questions, and he gives an appropriate answer to each.

This.

Also people will be heading towards the same point from different places. In sailing, there's something called "tacking", in which, due to various conditions, you have to sail in different directions than you want, and gradually work towards where you're going. So God might nudge someone in what seems like the wrong direction, the better to bring them Home.

What's Tolkien's line? "Not all who wander are lost."

And good grief, not everyone wants or needs a hermeneutic. There's more than one way to go about figuring out and living Christianity (or any other faith).
[Roll Eyes]

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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

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Golden Key
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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Seems reasonable to me to think aloud about other people's experiences. I dare say that the majority of us think that Joseph Smith was deluded - are we not allowed to say so?

ISTM that would be a matter of time, place, and manner.

--------------------
Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

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Gamaliel
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@Lamb Chopped. Fair do's. I have stopped.

I shouldn't have used your experience as an example. I should have made the same point by using a putative one.

On the point about not everyone not wanting or needing a hermeneutic, we can't not have one whether we want it or not.

@Kaplan, the only thing that seems consistent to me from my meagre reading of Patristics and church history is that there was an emphasis on working with what was taken to be the 'apostolic deposit' in the context of the community of faith.

I really don't see where you get this idea from that the historical-grammatical method was 'the norm' from the earliest times and nasty old Augustine and other more allegorical interpreters departed from it. Tertullian went in for some oddball feats of interpretation from what I can see, as did Origen.

The idea that there was a single over-arching system of interpretation from get-go is historically incorrect. Even the most cursory glance at these things shows that allegorical, historical-grammatical and literal approaches co-existed and coalesced to a certain extent, even in the approach taken by single individuals.

I am astonished that you even consider it to have been otherwise. What possible evidence do you have for these assertions?

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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mousethief

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quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
And good grief, not everyone wants or needs a hermeneutic. There's more than one way to go about figuring out and living Christianity (or any other faith).

Any time you interpret something, you are using a heremeneutic, which is "a method or theory of interpretation." You may not have it all worked out in your head, but you are using some method, even if it's only to compare it to what your nurse taught you about treating other people fairly.

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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...

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Golden Key
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mt--

Yes, I know [Smile] , and I probably should've stated it. I was tired of posters who seemed certain sure that everyone should have a systematic theology, bound in a pure gold cover with blended pure gold and silk thread, and written in iron gall ink with a quill from a Himalayan phoenix; with a study outline, delineated down unto a nano level; in 19 esoteric languages; with an autograph from St. Jerome, John Wesley, Hildegarde of Bingen, Aimee Semple McPherson, or Sylvia Boorstein, depending on preference; and with a handy sign for the reader's lawn, nailing the hermeneutical colors to the mast. (Cheap knock-offs and abridged versions available at K-mart. Infomercial on a station near you, in 4-6 weeks. Bitcoin accepted.)

And they really need to stop hassling Lamb Chopped about her spiritual journey and the source of her hermeneutics.

--------------------
Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

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mousethief

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I love Hildegaard of Bingen!

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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...

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Kaplan Corday
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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
The very evangelicalest Evangelicals do not think Christ literally meant the disciples were drinking his literal physical blood. It is an allegory for something, whatever that something is.

You are confusing metaphor and allegory, though the two do overlap.

There is a difference between accepting "I am the door" as a metaphor, which everyone does, and treating the parable of the Good Samaritan as an allegory of the Christian life, which Augustine did, but which no-one with any respect for the most basic principles of exegesis does.

quote:
Christ himself finds allegories in the Old Testament, for instance Jonah's cetaceogastric sojourn he takes as an allegory of his own entombment.
The Second Person of the Godhead does not "find" or "take" allegories, but declares them.

Mirabile dictu, we do not possess the same right.

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Kaplan Corday
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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
The idea that there was a single over-arching system of interpretation from get-go is historically incorrect.

No, what is historically incorrect is to imply that there were a whole lot of competing interpretative schemes; that different ones were accepted as dominant or authoritative in different eras; and that at present the grammatical-historical method happens to have come out on top for no particular reason other than the vagaries of chronology.

The grammatical-historical method was always the default position, for the simple reason, as I keep pointing out, of the impossibility of meaningful communication without it.

Others, like allegory, were popular with certain writers and in certain epochs, and yes, were enmeshed with the grammatical-historical, but were always aberrations and always doomed.

[ 28. July 2017, 03:59: Message edited by: Kaplan Corday ]

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mousethief

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quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
quote:
Christ himself finds allegories in the Old Testament, for instance Jonah's cetaceogastric sojourn he takes as an allegory of his own entombment.
The Second Person of the Godhead does not "find" or "take" allegories, but declares them.

Mirabile dictu, we do not possess the same right.

[Roll Eyes] [Disappointed]

--------------------
This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...

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Kaplan Corday
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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Actually it is far easier to construct a hermeneutic which promotes religious and state violence - if it is as I've defined it* - than one which justifies paedophilia from the bible.

Actually, it is impossible to do either - -on the basis of your hermeneutic or anyone else's - while maintaining the slightest respect for the text

quote:
Because the text doesn't tell people to go out and do horrible things to children, whereas it certainly does say to kill heretics and destroy enemies in the name of the Lord.
The NT certainly doesn't, which from a Christian POV is all that matters in this context.
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Martin60
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No Name needed. God is Killer throughout. Tends to poison the waters.

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Love wins

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mr cheesy
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quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
Actually, it is impossible to do either - -on the basis of your hermeneutic or anyone else's - while maintaining the slightest respect for the text

And... we're back to you trotting out the same old lines. Don't you get bored of saying that?

quote:
The NT certainly doesn't, which from a Christian POV is all that matters in this context.
Well history says that it isn't and hasn't been for centuries.

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arse

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Gamaliel
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The NT doesn't stand alone. The Bible doesn't stand alone.

The only constant I can see in all of this is that the scriptures care received and understood in the context of community.

Even if we receive and understand it on the john, our understanding is further refined and developed as we interact with other people. That happens in churches, it also happens, I hope, here aboard Ship.

Yes, the historical-grammatical method has emerged as the dominant one right across the board. But that was part of a process. It did not exist from Day One. It BECAME normative because people gradually made it so as they riffed and experimented and tried things out.

Augustine wouldn't have been aware that there was some kind of Kaplan Corday approved Gold Standard approach out there that was apparently binding and normative.

No, he riffed on the scriptures using thought-patterns and frames of reference he was familiar with. In his case they happened to be very allegorical.

Also, there's strong historical evidence for all Kaplan's protestations to the contrary that particular areas and even particular Patriarchates put more emphasis on certain approaches more than others. So, Alexandria, for instance, tended to be seen as taking a somewhat more allegorical approach than Antioch did.

Not exclusively of course ...

So, what gradually emerged and what all of us have inherited today, irrespective of traditional or Tradition, is a broad consensus.

No-one takes Augustine's allegorising seriously today but people did in times past. There's no point in tut-tutting and criticising them for it.

Yes, we can certainly say they were wrong in that respect, in the same way that can say that Puritans during the Commonwealth period were wrong to apply particular verses or biblical prophecies in a literalist way to contemporary events.

What we can't do is imagine some kind of fixed Gold Standard of interpretation that somehow existed independently of them all and which was there anachronistically from the outset.

Hermeneutics developed as people engaged, discussed, canonised and debated the scriptures. It's not In The Beginning Were Hermeneutics ...

It's the other way round.

The Word came first, then the Church and the word (small w) through the Church - although we might prefer the formulary 'The Church through the word and the word through the Church' in classic both/and not either/or style.

Yes, the NT was there, but the issue then was how to interpret it, and that's where the long process of developing appropriate hermeneutical approaches started. The approach couldn't possibly have been fixed from the outset as the process had only begun.

It was bound to meander and develop. That's how these things work. The process was an iterative one. It wasn't like a chess game with predetermined and agreed rules. The rules developed as the process evolved.

It is a nonsense to claim otherwise. Completely and utterly unhistorical.

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Martin60
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@G. What dominates here is historical-critical interpretation. Historical-grammatical method as the dominant method is always subservient to 'distinctives'. I.e. some untransferable bias. As we see with the one true hermeneutic or any denominational one.

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Love wins

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Martin60
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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
Actually, it is impossible to do either - -on the basis of your hermeneutic or anyone else's - while maintaining the slightest respect for the text

And... we're back to you trotting out the same old lines. Don't you get bored of saying that?

quote:
The NT certainly doesn't, which from a Christian POV is all that matters in this context.
Well history says that it isn't and hasn't been for centuries.

Ever.

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Love wins

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Jamat
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quote:
Gamaliel: Yes, the NT was there, but the issue then was how to interpret it, and that's where the long process of developing appropriate hermeneutical approaches started. The approach couldn't possibly have been fixed from the outset as the process had only begun
The tedium of the repetition of this particular piece of nonsense..sigh.
You say it yourself. The text WAS always there. The text that was always there ALWAYS definitively demonstrated that Christ's message was inherently, authoritatively non political and non violent. It is utterly STUPID to assert otherwise. If you insist on debating this then go figure!
You CANNOT, with any intellectual honesty assert the contrary WHATEVER so called 'hermeneutics' you choose to employ, invent or imagine.
To use your own words, just read the text itself for meaning. Just to help you here is a quote.
"My kingdom is not of this world" said The Lord to Pilate. What could he possibly have meant I wonder?

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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)

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Gamaliel
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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
quote:
Gamaliel: Yes, the NT was there, but the issue then was how to interpret it, and that's where the long process of developing appropriate hermeneutical approaches started. The approach couldn't possibly have been fixed from the outset as the process had only begun
The tedium of the repetition of this particular piece of nonsense..sigh.
You say it yourself. The text WAS always there. The text that was always there ALWAYS definitively demonstrated that Christ's message was inherently, authoritatively non political and non violent. It is utterly STUPID to assert otherwise. If you insist on debating this then go figure!
You CANNOT, with any intellectual honesty assert the contrary WHATEVER so called 'hermeneutics' you choose to employ, invent or imagine.
To use your own words, just read the text itself for meaning. Just to help you here is a quote.
"My kingdom is not of this world" said The Lord to Pilate. What could he possibly have meant I wonder?

Someone else who is apparently unable to read for comprehension.

'My Kingdom is not of this world, otherwise my servants would fight.'

Yes. Agreed.

'Here are two swords.' 'It is enough.'

Hang on, what does that mean? Let's try to get a handle on it. How do we do that? By debating and discussing it - in community.

'Rulers do not bear the sword for nothing.'

Again, what does that mean? Let's discuss it, let's debate it in order to arrive at a consensus.

Charlemagne: 'I'm a ruler. I am ordained by God to occupy that position, therefore I am entitled to wield the sword against malefactors and that includes those recalcitrant Saxons over there who refuse to convert and in so doing pose a fifth-column existential threat to my authority and the peace of my dominions ...'

Gamaliel / Kaplan Corday / Almost everyone else in one way or another: 'Hang on a minute, Charlie, look at this text and that text and the other text and consider the context. Is that exactly what the NT is saying? We don't think so ...'

Charlemagne: 'Well, now I come to think of it, you are absolutely right. I will change my mind and stop acting like an 8th/9th century potentate and act instead like a post-Reformation / post-Enlightenment less autocratic ruler because you have given me chapter and verse to convince me that this is how I ought to act ...'

Do you really think it works like that?

No. Simplifying things drastically, what happened in the early centuries of Christianity was this:

Christian A: Hey, look, we've got these verse here in this part of the scriptures, how do we approach them? How do we understand them?'

Christian B: 'I think we should understand them allegorically ...'

Christian C: 'No, let's take them literally ...'

Christian D: 'But we can't do it completely one way or the other - take this section, it's obviously allegorical and figurative - this other section seems to make more sense if understood literally and this one here seems to require elements of both ...'

Christian A: 'Ok, so let's discuss and debate these passages as and when we come up against issues where they may be pertinent and may be applied.'

And on it went ... the rest is history. The rest is how we are where we are.

What didn't happen was this:

Christian A: 'Hey guys, the lastest copie sof the Gospels and Epistles have arrived!'

Christians B, C and D: 'Yayyy!'

Christian A: 'And here's a ready-made set of instructions and hermeneutic which we can apply in order to understand them. It's called the historical-grammatical method ...'

Christians B, C and D: 'Wowser! Let's get on and apply it!'

Christian B: 'Hmmmm ... looking at it now, that makes sense, but I still think this passage should be understood allegorically ...'

Christian C: 'Allegorically my foot! It's obvious they should be understood literally ...'

Christian D: 'No, no, steady on! We have the historical-grammatical method already. Let's stick to that and all will be well ...'

I mean, c'mon ...

Which scenario is likely to fit more closely to the actual turn of events?

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Gamaliel
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# 812

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Ok.

Let's look at what I am not saying:

- I am not saying that state-sponsored religiously motivated violence is right or justifiable by any many of means.

- I am not saying that God the Holy Spirit isn't involved in the the way we interpret and understand scripture.

What I am saying is:

- Whilst I believe that scripture is inspired by God, it doesn't arrive with an in-built and intrinsic hermeneutical system embedded within it.

- Any hermeneutical system, an historical-grammatical one, historical-critical one, an allegorical one, a literal one, an Anything Else one, develops and evolves over time by an iterative process of engagement with the text, with the faith community involved and with external influences and circumstances.

I really don't see what is so 'nonsensical' about that.

It simply isn't the case that there was a single, over-arching, universally agreed hermeneutic from the Year Dot.

No, what happened is that what developed into the historical-grammatical method we all know and love came about through debate, discussion and in reaction to extremes on either side - whether extreme allegorisation on the one hand, or extreme literalism on the other. Origen wasn't the only one to have taken things so literally that he attempted to cut his own balls off ... the Church had to issue an edict about that - which implies that others were taking certain verses in an overly literal sense and doing damage to themselves ...

Which is one among many examples of what I'm saying about these things being determined and agreed in community.

No man is an island entire of itself.

That's all I am saying.

I can't for the life of me see what is so controversial or so whacky about it.

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Martin60
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# 368

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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
quote:
Gamaliel: Yes, the NT was there, but the issue then was how to interpret it, and that's where the long process of developing appropriate hermeneutical approaches started. The approach couldn't possibly have been fixed from the outset as the process had only begun
The tedium of the repetition of this particular piece of nonsense..sigh.
You say it yourself. The text WAS always there. The text that was always there ALWAYS definitively demonstrated that Christ's message was inherently, authoritatively non political and non violent. It is utterly STUPID to assert otherwise. If you insist on debating this then go figure!
You CANNOT, with any intellectual honesty assert the contrary WHATEVER so called 'hermeneutics' you choose to employ, invent or imagine.
To use your own words, just read the text itself for meaning. Just to help you here is a quote.
"My kingdom is not of this world" said The Lord to Pilate. What could he possibly have meant I wonder?

I wonder.

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Love wins

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mr cheesy
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# 3330

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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
The tedium of the repetition of this particular piece of nonsense..sigh.
You say it yourself. The text WAS always there. The text that was always there ALWAYS definitively demonstrated that Christ's message was inherently, authoritatively non political and non violent. It is utterly STUPID to assert otherwise. If you insist on debating this then go figure!
You CANNOT, with any intellectual honesty assert the contrary WHATEVER so called 'hermeneutics' you choose to employ, invent or imagine.
To use your own words, just read the text itself for meaning. Just to help you here is a quote.
"My kingdom is not of this world" said The Lord to Pilate. What could he possibly have meant I wonder?

Was it non-political though? It certainly didn't seem like either his opponents or the earliest disciples thought that it was a non-political movement.

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arse

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Gamaliel
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# 812

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Indeed, and on one live, Christ was arrested, tried and executed for political reasons - or perceived political reasons ... He was seen as a threat.

'Politics' isn't necessarily party-political politics. Politics is messy because it concerns issues around power, the preservation or challengin of vested interests and lots more besides.

Where there are people there are politics.

You can't avoid them.

There's politics within local voluntary groups and organisations just as there is within town and borough or state or national councils/governing bodies.

As sure as eggs are eggs there'll be politics going on in whatever local church congregation we attend or are involved with.

We can't avoid them.

Just as we can't avoid having a hermeneutic.

Just as we can't avoid or elide the community aspect I've been banging on about.

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Gamaliel
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# 812

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Anyway ...

Apologies to Lamb Chopped for using her experience as an example. I shouldn't have done that.

Apologies too for expecting Jamat and Kaplan to actually follow my drift and understanding what I'm trying to say.

They clearly can't or won't.

Therefore I will withdraw from this thread.

I'm wasting my time.

More fool me for not appreciating that the historical-grammatical method is magically embedded within the text itself and not something that evolved over time in the process of an iterative engagement with the text and with other believers.

How can I have been so naive?

I will withdraw from this thread until such time as my head-ache disappears ...

[brick wall]

And until Jamat and Kaplan actually read what I write and not what they think I've written.

I might be gone for some time ...

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Jamat
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# 11621

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quote:
Someone else who is apparently unable to read for comprehension
Nonsense. Your verbal diarrhoea is impossible not to comprehend, utterly tedious shite that it is.
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Kaplan Corday
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# 16119

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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
More fool me for not appreciating that the historical-grammatical method is magically embedded within the text itself and not something that evolved over time in the process of an iterative engagement with the text and with other believers.

I have not said this, and you know that I have not said this.

What I have pointed out is the very obvious fact that a grammatical-historical approach was and is the dominant and unavoidable (not unique or unalloyed) approach, because otherwise the faith would have disappeared in confusion shortly after 100AD.

quote:
I will withdraw from this thread until such time as my head-ache disappears
Wise choice.

And when you ave calmed down, try to take a step back and think instead of automatically generating standardisd Pavlovian responses.

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Gamaliel
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# 812

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None of which is true. All of which is patently incorrect on all sorts of levels.

The reason the Christian faith did not dissipate in confusion around 100 AD isn't because a particular hermeneutical method was the norm from the outset but because there was a degree of unanimity - but by no means uniformity - which gradually coalesced and was the means by which the generally agreed hermeneutical forms emerged.

You are putting the egg before the chicken. The chicken - the community - came first. The hermeneutic developed from that.

If you are saying that then I have no issue. But you don't appear to be.

As for Jamat, he doesn't even understand the point I am trying to make so I can see I am wasting my time with him. Kaplan less so.

The only place I want to see Jamat is in the Hell where he belongs receiving the pummellings he brings upon himself and so richly deserves. That's the Hell here aboard Ship, of course, before his overly literal hermeneutic makes him think I'm referring to the Other Place.

I'm out of this thread. It's not worth it. How can you debate with fellas who either don't understand or who refuse to understand what one is trying to say and try to take the moral high ground of their own ignorance?

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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mousethief

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# 953

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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
quote:
Someone else who is apparently unable to read for comprehension
Nonsense. Your verbal diarrhoea is impossible not to comprehend, utterly tedious shite that it is.
Your nasty response is impossible not to comprehend, clone of any random Romanlion post that it is.

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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...

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Gamaliel
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# 812

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I will admit to typing at length and often tediously.

I have to watch that tendency.

It is innate but it is in part an attempt in this instance to explain myself to people who lack the wit, inclination or conceptual tools to follow my drift. Jamat, I'm looking at you.

I'm more disappointed with Kaplan. He's smarter and should know better.

He's asked me to think. I would like to see him doing the same.

I need a bit of shore-leave I think and that'll be in everyone's best interests.

I've got various dead-lines looming and all sorts of council and other community issues to wrestle with. Online cut and thrust here and elsewhere can be a welcome distraction but I think I'm reaching an impasse. That last comment is directed at me and isn't a criticism or value judgement of any one else.

Anyhow ... Enjoy the rest of this discussion. Try to keep open minds.

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Jamat
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# 11621

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quote:
Gamaliel: It simply isn't the case that there was a single, over-arching, universally agreed hermeneutic from the Year Dot
Who do you think is saying there was?
I perfectly comprehend and agree with that.
But there is in my view, no possible way that one can find textual justification for Christian motivated violence whatever hermeneutic anyone chose to use. IOW, you have to go away from any text based hermeneutic to justify it. The justification would have to be irrelevant to hermeneutics which by definition must be attempts to interpret texts. My view is that Charlemagne's behaviour was not based in any such consideration. You may differ. I think he was merely a medieval military leader acting from self interest.

Gamaliel,
I do apologise for the angry comment above. You are a good chap.

Mousethief, please post personal comments on the hell thread you created for the purpose. Could a purg host please mediate on Mousthief's post above?

--------------------
Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)

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mr cheesy
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# 3330

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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:

But there is in my view, no possible way that one can find textual justification for Christian motivated violence whatever hermeneutic anyone chose to use. IOW, you have to go away from any text based hermeneutic to justify it. The justification would have to be irrelevant to hermeneutics which by definition must be attempts to interpret texts. My view is that Charlemagne's behaviour was not based in any such consideration. You may differ. I think he was merely a medieval military leader acting from self interest.

OK so defend that position. Show me the evidence that these leaders were not seeing within the biblical text justification (or even were not looking for it) for their actions.

Otherwise you're just talk.

--------------------
arse

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Jamat
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# 11621

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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:

But there is in my view, no possible way that one can find textual justification for Christian motivated violence whatever hermeneutic anyone chose to use. IOW, you have to go away from any text based hermeneutic to justify it. The justification would have to be irrelevant to hermeneutics which by definition must be attempts to interpret texts. My view is that Charlemagne's behaviour was not based in any such consideration. You may differ. I think he was merely a medieval military leader acting from self interest.

OK so defend that position. Show me the evidence that these leaders were not seeing within the biblical text justification (or even were not looking for it) for their actions.

Otherwise you're just talk.

That is a patently ridiculous demand. You prove the contrary.
You cannot of course. My reason not a proof but is simply what the text says..
'My kingdom is not of this world.'
Any justification must fly in the face of the Lord's or his apostles' stated words from which I could quote widely, and therefore cannot be based on them unless language can mean the opposite of what it says..which it can't.

--------------------
Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)

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mr cheesy
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# 3330

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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
That is a patently ridiculous demand. You prove the contrary.

Wait - you want me to prove that the crusaders had a hermeneutic which justified violence from their reading of the bible?

That actually seems quite easy to do, see this book and this paper and so on.

Rather than being impossible, there is an impressive body of scholarship which showed that it existed.

quote:
You cannot of course. My reason not a proof but is simply what the text says..
'My kingdom is not of this world.'

Right, but that wasn't the question. Just because you can think it doesn't mean that those who disagree have somehow not got their ideas from the bible.

quote:
Any justification must fly in the face of the Lord's or his apostles' stated words from which I could quote widely, and therefore cannot be based on them unless language can mean the opposite of what it says..which it can't.
Or it could just be that they read it differently to you. Now there's a novel idea.

[ 29. July 2017, 09:16: Message edited by: mr cheesy ]

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arse

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Gamaliel
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# 812

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I will bow out for a while. It's in everyone's best interests. I will pause to acknowledge Jamat's very gracious apology. It is more than I deserve for insulting his intelligence.

FWIW I believe Charlemagne was acting out of self-interest too. But he was also a man of his time and acting in accordance with that. Sadly, at that time that involved wielding state-sponsored violence for religio-political ends. That's how it was, that's how they thought.

It's no accident that the missionary monks used to curry favour with rulers and that the monastery at Lindisfarne, for instance, was in sight of the royal Northumbrian seat at Bamburgh. What other means did they have at their disposal?

On the textual thing, I've got nothing further to add on that. I'll let mr cheesy address that one from now on.

I'll see you all around on another thread at some point. I'm done on this one.

It's ironic that I've been asked to 'think' when I'm one of the most over-thinky people I know and then some but that's the Ship for you ...

Anyhow, that's more than enough from me. Bye for now.

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Jamat
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# 11621

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quote:
Mr Cheesy: Right, but that wasn't the question. Just because you can think it doesn't mean that those who disagree have somehow not got their ideas from the Bible.
Well, to me, it IS the question. You are free to have your view of course. The sources you quote? A book which may say..who knows.. and an article citing only the OT which is irrelevant, we've had that discussion already. We are dealing with Christianity,not Biblical Judaism.
If you claim the medieval war chiefs got their justifications from the NT, it is up to you to prove it. You can believe it but I doubt that it is based on anything more than your desire to do so.

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mr cheesy
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# 3330

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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:

Well, to me, it IS the question. You are free to have your view of course. The sources you quote? A book which may say..who knows.. and an article citing only the OT which is irrelevant, we've had that discussion already. We are dealing with Christianity,not Biblical Judaism.

There is a body of scholarship which you are disagreeing with. And to which you're offering nothing but vague opinions.

quote:
If you claim the medieval war chiefs got their justifications from the NT, it is up to you to prove it. You can believe it but I doubt that it is based on anything more than your desire to do so.
Nope, it really isn't. First they said that their actions were justified by their religion and second there is a whole scholarship of study looking at how they justified and developed their hermeneutic from the bible.

So it is down to you to show how these scholars are wrong and how the crusaders actually didn't read the bible and how they were not actually interested in the New Testament and how they knew so little about Christian theology that they'd got the basic ideas of it completely wrong.

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arse

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Jamat
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# 11621

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quote:
There is a body of scholarship which you are disagreeing with. And to which you're offering nothing but vague opinions
So you say..but you cite two sources which prove nothing. This mere bluster.

quote:
they said that their actions were justified by their religion and second there is a whole scholarship of study looking at how they justified and developed their hermeneutic from the bible.
Their religion might well have been cited but I would see that as a mere excuse for their actions. That any violent atrocity they did was justifiable via the NT is ridiculous.
Using religion to justify anything is NOT necessarily using a hermeneutic.

--------------------
Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)

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leo
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# 1458

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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
My reason not a proof but is simply what the text says..'My kingdom is not of this world.'.

No text is ever simple. The greek has the sense of ἐκ = 'from' this world - empowered by God, not humans.

--------------------
My Jewish-positive lectionary blog is at http://recognisingjewishrootsinthelectionary.wordpress.com/
My reviews at http://layreadersbookreviews.wordpress.com

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Dafyd
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# 5549

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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Your nasty response is impossible not to comprehend, clone of any random Romanlion post that it is.

The last time I looked Romanlion was an atheist.

--------------------
we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams

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Kaplan Corday
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# 16119

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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
there is a whole scholarship of study looking at how they justified and developed their hermeneutic from the bible.

Would you care to suggest some representative examples?
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mdijon
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# 8520

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quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
The last time I looked Romanlion was an atheist.

And you just couldn't look away I suppose?

--------------------
mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon

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mr cheesy
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# 3330

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quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
Would you care to suggest some representative examples?

I already gave accessible examples, it is now down to you to refute them, simply rubbishing or denying their existence isn't credible.

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arse

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Dafyd
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# 5549

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quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
There is a difference between accepting "I am the door" as a metaphor, which everyone does, and treating the parable of the Good Samaritan as an allegory of the Christian life, which Augustine did, but which no-one with any respect for the most basic principles of exegesis does.

Augustine wrote an exposition of the principles of exegesis: On Christian Doctrine. It's still considered an important contribution to hermeneutics.
If the Fathers were looking for a Biblical basis for allegory they could have found it in Paul. Paul cheerfully tells us that Abraham's two sons are an allegory for the two covenants. He does not tell us that he has the authority to declare an allegory and we don't, or tell us not to try this at home.

--------------------
we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams

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