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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Why did Jesus have to choose to die?
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Jesus believed our sins needed forgiving and could only be by His blood. That there was a penalty - AKA punishment - that only He could pay.
Was He wrong?
That's not what he believed.
You are wrong.
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Martin60
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# 368
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Posted
Riggghhht.
You can't imagine how disappointed I am Evensong. And it's not for being wrong. We're all wrong. You no less.
Any one else able to do the dialectical work necessary to overcome the 2000 year old thesis from Jesus' own mouth with a superior antithesis?
Can anyone answer the question why Jesus was compelled to choose to die, compelled to choose to lose His life blood for our forgiveness?
Or does that question not exist?
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Love wins
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
I'm sorry I've disappointed you Martin but I'm not sure why I have. I've merely disagreed with your interpretation that sacrifice = punishment.
Lots of people have answered your questions in the thread above. It seems you just don't find them satisfactory. Fair enough. I know about itches.
My New Testament professor John Dunnill is good value on biblical sacrifice. If you can trawl through a rather academic text you could do much worse than read his book on biblical understandings of sacrifice: Sacrifice and the Body: Biblical Anthropology and Christian Self-Understanding
I recall four main reasons for sacrifice in the bible from one of our lectures. I think John is big on sacrifice as communion.
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a theological scrapbook
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Jesus believed our sins needed forgiving and could only be by His blood. That there was a penalty - AKA punishment - that only He could pay.
Was He wrong?
That's not what he believed.
You are wrong.
Um, I think Jesus can speak for himself on this one. Let's break it down.
Jesus believed that the giving of his life was necessary. Check. (Luke 24:46; Mark 10:45)
Jesus believed that people's sins needed forgiving by his blood. Check. (Luke 12:10; Luke 24:47; and especially Matthew 26:28
Jesus believed that there is some form of penalty attached to sin. Check. (John 8:24)
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Can anyone answer the question why Jesus was compelled to choose to die, compelled to choose to lose His life blood for our forgiveness?
Or does that question not exist?
Your question rests on a huge presupposition, Martin. The presupposition that Jesus was somehow forced or coerced into choosing to die for sin.
If that is what you mean by Jesus having been compelled to choose to shed his blood for the forgiveness of sins then it's not a presupposition with which I agree so I am unable to answer your question as it is currently framed.
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EtymologicalEvangelical
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# 15091
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC....
Can anyone answer the question why Jesus was compelled to choose to die, compelled to choose to lose His life blood for our forgiveness?
Yes, I can answer the question.
God is both infinitely just and infinitely merciful.
And what if both these qualities find themselves on a collision course? This conflict is not due to any contradiction in God, but due to something offensive having come into being in His creation - as a result of the freedom that God has given to some of His creatures. Justice responds to this offence in a certain way, while mercy responds in the opposite way.
God is merciful and desires to show mercy. But He does not subvert His own moral law, which flows from His moral character. If He did, then there would be a contradiction within Him. So He suffers, in order to show mercy.
Yes, we may have different ways of understanding the mystery of this suffering, but it is undeniably a necessity, if mercy and forgiveness is to be a reality in the lives of sinners.
A God who can just throw away the moral law on a whim is a God who cannot be trusted. After all, if He can act on a whim in this way, then why not in some other way? He may just decide to damn every single one of us, just for the fun of it. I mean, why not? If God can act in a completely arbitrary and capricious way - as the advocates of "God can just forgive as a pure act of authority" seem to suggest - then we worship a dictator, not a loving, righteous, just, merciful and trustworthy Father.
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You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC....
Can anyone answer the question why Jesus was compelled to choose to die, compelled to choose to lose His life blood for our forgiveness?
Yes, I can answer the question.
You didn't answer the question, EE. Martin is asking why Jesus was compelled to choose to die for sin. He uses the word twice. His concern appears to be the element of compulsion, coercion, duress. Was Jesus under duress when he chose to die for sin? Or was he expressing the eternal purpose in the perfect unity of the eternal Trinity in when he chose the cross? Martin's presupposition appears to be the presence of compulsion, duress and coercion within the Trinity and therefore an element of compulsion in Jesus' choosing to die.
[ 21. January 2014, 13:07: Message edited by: daronmedway ]
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Martin60
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# 368
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Posted
daronmedway, the compulsion was in Jesus: 'Why then is it written that the Son of Man MUST suffer much and be rejected?' Mark 9:12 (NIV)
And you can bet that the Greek translation of His Aramaic words reflects that.
Not my will but THY will.
EE - yep. That's honest.
[ 21. January 2014, 13:10: Message edited by: Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard ]
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Love wins
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
daronmedway, the compulsion was in Jesus: 'Why then is it written that the Son of Man MUST suffer much and be rejected?' Mark 9:12 (NIV)
Um, Jesus' point appears to a rhetorical question based on the fact that the "MUST" was written in Scripture, and precisely not that the MUST was some kind of internal, personal, subjective compulsion.
[ 21. January 2014, 13:18: Message edited by: daronmedway ]
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Freddy
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# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
daronmedway, the compulsion was in Jesus: 'Why then is it written that the Son of Man MUST suffer much and be rejected?' Mark 9:12 (NIV)
Um, Jesus' point appears to a rhetorical question based on the fact that the "MUST" was written in Scripture, and precisely not that the MUST was some kind of internal, personal, subjective compulsion.
If Jesus is God then He is the one who wrote the Scripture in the first place. So it amounts to the same thing.
But I think that I can answer Martin's question in a different way.
Jesus was compelled to choose to die, compelled to choose to lose His life blood for our forgiveness because of what "forgiveness" actually is.
We think of God's forgiveness as a change of mind on His part, as if He relents from feelings of anger or takes back His intention to punish.
But God never changes. This is inconsistent with an omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent Being.
Forgiveness is actually change on our part. Jesus' whole mission was to redirect the human race, and therefore to save it from itself. He saved us from the consequences of our own actions by redirecting us away from "evil" and towards good.
The reason that this involved His death and resurrection is that the essence of the mission to change the human race is that its attachment to worldly and self-centered goals must die and be replaced by the prioritization of heavenly and spiritual goals.
This death is described repeatedly in numerous ways in the Gospels, and it is acted out in Jesus' life.
We tend to discount and misunderstand the symbolic value of the death and resurrection theme in the Gospels, but it is what salvation is all about.
Everyone needs to allow their worldly and self-centered desires to "die" in order to be saved - so that God can give them new life, a life of love towards others and towards Him.
God came into the world and underwent this process in a way that was both physical and spiritual in order to break the power of evil and make this new life possible for every person.
This is why Jesus understood and accepted that He was compelled to allow Himself to be killed in order to accomplish the spiritual revolution in human hearts that needed to take place.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
daronmedway, the compulsion was in Jesus: 'Why then is it written that the Son of Man MUST suffer much and be rejected?' Mark 9:12 (NIV)
Um, Jesus' point appears to a rhetorical question based on the fact that the "MUST" was written in Scripture, and precisely not that the MUST was some kind of internal, personal, subjective compulsion.
If Jesus is God then He is the one who wrote the Scripture in the first place. So it amounts to the same thing.
You might say that the three persons of the holy trinity caused the scriptures to be written by means of human agency, but that's not quite the same as saying Jesus wrote the bible. And it doesn't account for Martin's belief that Jesus was compelled to choose his own death, as if that death were entirely against his will.
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Freddy
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# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
You might say that the three persons of the holy trinity caused the scriptures to be written by means of human agency, but that's not quite the same as saying Jesus wrote the bible.
In the end it amounts to the same thing. But you are right in that Jesus never said "I wrote these Scriptures so I guess that I need to do what they say."
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
And it doesn't account for Martin's belief that Jesus was compelled to choose his own death, as if that death were entirely against his will.
Jesus clearly did not want to die. There is no indication that He was eager for it. Rather, He accepted it, willingly. Still the Gospel accounts indicate struggle and torment.
All of this is consistent with the "die so you can have life" metaphor that runs through the Gospels.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
I think it's more comex than that. Jesus didn't want to experience the agony of crucifixion. Who would? However, Jesus was aware that the whole trajectory of his life would end in his death and resurrection. In this sense I think it's possible to say that he did in fact want to save humanity by means of his death. quote:
Jesus answered them, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." 20 The Jews then said, "It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?" 21 But he was speaking about the temple of his body. John 2:19-20
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Martin60
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# 368
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Posted
God didn't write the Bible. We did.
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Love wins
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Martin60
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# 368
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Posted
Hmmm. We're getting there. Getting to the mystery which involves everything INCLUDING PSA. Everything except it is not faithful to the courage of Jesus, His submission to His fate, to the texts, to which there can be no yeah but but yeah and.
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Love wins
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
I don't believe Jesus submitted to his fate; I believe he orchestrated his death. I honestly believe that this is what the gospel of John presents.
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Martin60
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# 368
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Posted
I believe both.
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Freddy
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# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
I don't believe Jesus submitted to his fate; I believe he orchestrated his death. I honestly believe that this is what the gospel of John presents.
I agree.
All that is saying is that He was both human and divine. He had two natures - the human which could struggle and suffer, and the divine, which is above all. They were joined at His death.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
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LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
quote:
Freddy: All that is saying is that He was both human and divine. He had two natures - the human which could struggle and suffer, and the divine, which is above all. They were joined at His death.
At His death? I never heard this. (FWIW It's not what I believe.)
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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
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Freddy
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# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
quote:
Freddy: All that is saying is that He was both human and divine. He had two natures - the human which could struggle and suffer, and the divine, which is above all. They were joined at His death.
At His death? I never heard this. (FWIW It's not what I believe.)
No, I wouldn't expect you to believe it. But this is what the New Church teaches.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Jesus believed our sins needed forgiving and could only be by His blood. That there was a penalty - AKA punishment - that only He could pay.
Was He wrong?
That's not what he believed.
You are wrong.
Um, I think Jesus can speak for himself on this one. Let's break it down.
Jesus believed that the giving of his life was necessary. Check. (Luke 24:46; Mark 10:45)
Jesus believed that people's sins needed forgiving by his blood. Check. (Luke 12:10; Luke 24:47; and especially Matthew 26:28
Jesus believed that there is some form of penalty attached to sin. Check. (John 8:24)
Nothing there about Jesus being punished by God.
(check)
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
I don't believe Jesus submitted to his fate; I believe he orchestrated his death. I honestly believe that this is what the gospel of John presents.
Yes it is what the gospel of John presents. But it's the gospel of John alone. Which is why the gospel almost didn't make the canon - too gnostic. Jesus was just God on earth, not true man.
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
Forgiveness is actually change on our part. Jesus' whole mission was to redirect the human race, and therefore to save it from itself. He saved us from the consequences of our own actions by redirecting us away from "evil" and towards good.
The reason that this involved His death and resurrection is that the essence of the mission to change the human race is that its attachment to worldly and self-centered goals must die and be replaced by the prioritization of heavenly and spiritual goals.
This death is described repeatedly in numerous ways in the Gospels, and it is acted out in Jesus' life.
We tend to discount and misunderstand the symbolic value of the death and resurrection theme in the Gospels, but it is what salvation is all about.
Everyone needs to allow their worldly and self-centered desires to "die" in order to be saved - so that God can give them new life, a life of love towards others and towards Him.
Yes.
[ 22. January 2014, 02:09: Message edited by: Evensong ]
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
I don't believe Jesus submitted to his fate; I believe he orchestrated his death. I honestly believe that this is what the gospel of John presents.
Yes it is what the gospel of John presents. But it's the gospel of John alone. Which is why the gospel almost didn't make the canon - too gnostic. Jesus was just God on earth, not true man.
I don't think that's right. The synoptic gospels also present it.
With regard to John's gospel being proto-gnostic, I totally disagree. The first chapter alone is enough to blow a hole the size of the moon in that argument.
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
I don't believe Jesus submitted to his fate; I believe he orchestrated his death. I honestly believe that this is what the gospel of John presents.
Yes it is what the gospel of John presents. But it's the gospel of John alone. Which is why the gospel almost didn't make the canon - too gnostic. Jesus was just God on earth, not true man.
I don't think that's right. The synoptic gospels also present it.
Those texts refer to the fact that his death was inevitable in the tradition of the prophets and he knew it. And/or it was also foretold.
quote:
Luke 13:34
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!
But orchestrating his own death is not part of the synoptics at all.
Acts is even clearer. It refers to you (the people) killing Jesus all the time.
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
With regard to John's gospel being proto-gnostic, I totally disagree. The first chapter alone is enough to blow a hole the size of the moon in that argument.
The first chapter refers to his divinity.
How do you see that as countering gnosticism? If anything it goes the other way - overemphasis on divinity to the detriment of his humanity.
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Freddy
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# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Those texts refer to the fact that his death was inevitable in the tradition of the prophets and he knew it... But orchestrating his own death is not part of the synoptics at all.
Maybe "orchestrating" is not the perfect term, but the synoptics definitely portray Him as more than just a willing participant.
To quote more of what was quoted before:
quote:
Matthew 16:21 From that time Jesus began to show to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised the third day.
22 Then Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, “Far be it from You, Lord; this shall not happen to You!”
23 But He turned and said to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are an offense to Me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.” Repeated in Mark 8:33
Jesus rebukes Peter for not being mindful of the things of God. Jesus, by contrast, is mindful and understands what is happening.
But more than just understanding it, He describes it as service, something that He is actively doing:
quote:
Matthew 20:28 “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
Mark 10:45 “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
After His resurrection He describes it as the process of entering into His glory, a process that He understood and participated in from the beginning.
quote:
Luke 24:26 Then He said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?” 27 And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.
These themes are much more clearly laid out in John but they are certainly present in the synoptics.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
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daronmedway
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# 3012
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Posted
Evensong, quote:
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. John 1:14
No Gnosticism here. And you a teacher of the Israel of God? ![[Disappointed]](graemlins/disappointed.gif)
As for the idea that Jesus wasn't orchestrating his death in the Synoptics? One might put it like this: Jesus committed suicide by Pharisee. The evidence is there in black and white, Evensong. The whole trajectory of his life led him to the cross. He walked into it. Literally.
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goperryrevs
Shipmtae
# 13504
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
If God can act in a completely arbitrary and capricious way - as the advocates of "God can just forgive as a pure act of authority" seem to suggest - then we worship a dictator, not a loving, righteous, just, merciful and trustworthy Father.
EE, you've said this a few times, but I just don't see how it makes sense.
Firstly, it seems to conflate forgiveness and reconciliation. The two are not the same.
Secondly, I can just forgive as a pure act of authority, but I fail to see how that makes me a dictator, or unloving / unjust / unmerciful / untrustworthy. In fact, specifically, I would say, being able to 'just forgive' is an innate part of being merciful.
Thirdly, you seem to be conflating "able to just forgive" with "choosing to forgive completely randomly". These aren't the same thing.
A God who requires some ritual, sacrifice or precondition (for example "the shedding of blood") is not just, loving or merciful (I'll grant you the trustworthy bit). That God is not just, because the precondition itself is arbitrary (why "shedding of blood"? Why not "spilling of milk" or "passing of urine"). That God is not loving or merciful, because (s)he allows such triviality to get in the way of relationship and forgiveness.
A God who requires "the punishment of sin" before they can forgive isn't loving or merciful. Is this how a good, loving, merciful parent would act, or a cold, unfeeling one? Does every wrong thing one's child do have to be punished, or is discipline only necessary sometimes? Surely a big part of parenting is deciding when to "just forgive" when your child is sorry, and when it is necessary to punish / discipline them?
And, anyway, it's not the God of Christianity, who consistently and faithfully offers forgiveness to all, as a pure act of authority, because (as the saying goes), "to err is human; to forgive is divine". Jesus asked his disciples to forgive without condition, because that is the way of his Father. Christianity has consistently affirmed that the penitent sinner will be forgiven. "The vilest offender who truly believes" and all that. Christianity consistently states that the problem lies in getting people to ask for the forgiveness in the first place. Once asked for, it is always freely given.
Now, to say all this, does not (as you have asserted earlier) mean that God has no moral law, or does not care about sin, or even hate sin, or that sin doesn't have consequences. Forgiveness does not say "what you did was okay". It says "despite the evil you did, I will let you off the hook; I will bless you; I won't punish you". It's not God abolishing God's own moral law or character or anything like that.
I know that there has already been a lot of back and forth on this already, but I think these are important points (in fact, for me, they are central to the gospel as I understand it), and I don't feel you've satisfactorily answered any of them.
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A.Pilgrim
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# 15044
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by goperryrevs:
A God who requires some ritual, sacrifice or precondition (for example "the shedding of blood") is not just, loving or merciful (I'll grant you the trustworthy bit). That God is not just, because the precondition itself is arbitrary (why "shedding of blood"? Why not "spilling of milk" or "passing of urine"). That God is not loving or merciful, because (s)he allows such triviality to get in the way of relationship and forgiveness.
The text of Hebrews 9:11-10:14 seems to contradict this. To pick out some key verses: Heb 9:22 ‘Under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins’. If we now refer to what Jesus said in Matt 5:17 ‘Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them’ (ESV) it then follows that Jesus, by offering himself as a sacrifice, fulfilled the Law’s requirement for the shedding of blood for the forgiveness of sins: ‘[Jesus] has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself’ (Heb. 9:26, ESV)
The thing is, God makes the rules. It goes with him being creator of the universe. We can argue till we’re blue in the face about why he made the rules he did, and whether they are arbitrary or not, and we’ll get nowhere. Why did God make the rule that ‘without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins’? I haven’t the faintest idea. I don’t think we’ve been told. But God is infinitely clever, and smart, and wise, so he must have had his reasons. And trying to argue that God can’t do things the way he does because we don’t do them that way is futile. God doesn’t have to restrict his actions to conform to what his creation does. He’s the sovereign creator. Seems to me we have a simple choice. Accept what God has revealed about what he does and what he requires and what he offers, or engage in an ultimately futile self-delusion that God really ought to do what we think he should.
Angus
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
PSA is unavoidable in the library of texts, from Isaiah to Paul and beyond and in between.
As I AM now fully paid up to progressive revelation that doesn't mean that it is so in the slightest.
In fact it can't be, no matter how scholastic EE tries to be. It's a metaphor, a cultural limitation. And it worked. It still does. We certainly need to go beyond it, transcend it, deconstruct it the lot. But it's THERE. It was there for the Son of Man Himself.
To attempt to loop back our evolved understanding to Jesus Himself is utterly invalid. There is no evidence for it. The trajectory only moves forward and not to get to where Jesus was, but where He IS.
Jesus believed in PSA.
How could He NOT?
To say He was wrong and that I and billions of others are for seeing it plainly is a false dichotomy. And certainly isn't postmodern.
This is.
Jesus also believed in Satan the Devil. That doesn't make him so. So what? What else did Jesus believe from the Jewish scriptures that can't possibly be true?
Did He believe in God the Killer?
How could He NOT?
That's both a rhetorical AND an open question.
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Love wins
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Jolly Jape
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# 3296
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Posted
quote:
originally posted by Evensong
Yes it is what the gospel of John presents. But it's the gospel of John alone. Which is why the gospel almost didn't make the canon - too gnostic. Jesus was just God on earth, not true man.
Really? Is that how you see John's Gospel? I find it, bar none, the most powerful declaration of His humanity as well as His divinity. Every time I open the pages I read of a very real man, with a very real personality. The synoptics tell, by and large, what Jesus did and taught. John portrays what He was like to know, to hang around with.
Furthermore, if we had only the synoptics, we might get the impression that Jesus acted, taught and healed out of his status as Son of God. In John we see that, far from operating from His divinity, He was in exactly the same position of any of us. He could only do what the Father told Him.
And, of course, far from being proto-gnostic, the fourth Gospel was written to refute, not commend, gnosticism
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
Posts: 3011 | From: A village of gardens | Registered: Sep 2002
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Jolly Jape
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# 3296
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Posted
Angus, I think that reading PSA into Hebrews is to misunderstand the nature and purpose of the OT sacrificial system to which the epistle refers. The point was that sacrifice was the means by which covenants were ratified. Sins were forgiven because that is what God had, in His blood ratified covenant, promised to do, not because the sacrificial victim was "punished" in the sinners' place. When Peter was saying that, without the shedding of blood there could be no forgiveness, he was reiterating the Old Testament teaching that forgiveness was solely dependant on the grace of God in keeping His promises.
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
Posts: 3011 | From: A village of gardens | Registered: Sep 2002
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Jolly Jape
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# 3296
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Posted
Martin, what evidence do you have that Jesus believed in a schema that wouldn't be invented until a thousand years after the Incarnation.
Was the Old Testament bloody and messy and violent? Of course it was, like the Bronze age in which it was written. But that shouldn't blind us to the fact that one of the main themes of the Old Testament, from at least the time of the near-sacrifice of Isaac onwards, was of God trying to wean His people away from the Pagan notion of blood-appeasement, towards reliance only on the character and promises, the chesed of God.
It's inconceivable to me that any good Rabbi, such as He was, would not have had an understanding of this.
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
Posts: 3011 | From: A village of gardens | Registered: Sep 2002
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goperryrevs
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# 13504
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by A.Pilgrim:
quote:
Originally posted by goperryrevs:
A God who requires some ritual, sacrifice or precondition (for example "the shedding of blood") is not just, loving or merciful (I'll grant you the trustworthy bit). That God is not just, because the precondition itself is arbitrary (why "shedding of blood"? Why not "spilling of milk" or "passing of urine"). That God is not loving or merciful, because (s)he allows such triviality to get in the way of relationship and forgiveness.
The text of Hebrews 9:11-10:14 seems to contradict this.
...
Accept what God has revealed about what he does and what he requires and what he offers, or engage in an ultimately futile self-delusion that God really ought to do what we think he should.
Angus
Thanks Angus - yeah, I'm aware of those verses in Hebrews. I guess it simply boils down to interpretation. I can't square the 'obvious' reading of those verses (that shedding of blood is necessary for forgiveness) with the fact that there are plenty of examples of forgiveness throughout scripture (and especially from Jesus) where there was no shedding of blood. So I have to interpret Hebrews in the light of that more clear witness.
Blood wasn't shed when Jesus forgave the paraplegic man, or the woman caught in adultery, or when he told his disciples to forgive "70x7 times". Jesus seemed able to forgive at will, with no preconditions (even repentance!). Jesus' point to the Pharisees when he heals the paraplegic man is that he has authority to do what he wants - forgive, or heal - no conditions.
So, for me, that makes those verses in Hebrews fall into the hard to interpret category, though Jolly Jape has done a fine job of interpreting them above.
I have sympathy with the idea that it's easy to project our ideals onto God. We all fall into the trap of making God in our own image. The difficulty is discerning when we are doing that. The two stances you outline above are two ends of a scale, rather than two alternatives. We all wrestle with scripture, tradition, our own experience and understanding; somewhere between those two extremes. I also want to accept what God has revealed and follow it, but sometimes it is very hard to figure out exactly what it is he has revealed.
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"Keep your eye on the donut, not on the hole." - David Lynch
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
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# 76
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Posted
Angus - what if we "Accept what God has revealed about what he does and what he requires and what he offers" and conclude he's a complete bastard?
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Callan
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# 525
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Posted
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
quote:
Was the Old Testament bloody and messy and violent? Of course it was, like the Bronze age in which it was written. But that shouldn't blind us to the fact that one of the main themes of the Old Testament, from at least the time of the near-sacrifice of Isaac onwards, was of God trying to wean His people away from the Pagan notion of blood-appeasement, towards reliance only on the character and promises, the chesed of God.
This bronze age meme has got to stop. The Bronze Age Collapse happened around 1177BC, the earliest Biblical books date from around the 700s BC and the Book of Daniel was written around 164BC. Some scholars think that one or two canticles are genuinely archaic. I will concede that the militarised empires of the iron age and antiquity were every bit as uncharming as their bronze age predecessors.
I'm also not sure that the distinction between sacrifice and chesed is one that would have been terribly intelligible to a first century Jew. To his or her mind the ethical wisdom of the prophets and the chesed of God and the round of sacrifices in the Temple were all tied up into one seamless whole. There might, in time, have been a question as to whether or not it was appropriate for Christians to attend worship at the Temple (Luke seems to think that it was fine) but the Romans pre-empted any future controversy by burning it to the ground. Then, of course, Christians realised that Jesus' death and resurrection made the whole thing redundant anyway.
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How easy it would be to live in England, if only one did not love her. - G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 9757 | From: Citizen of the World | Registered: Jun 2001
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Freddy
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# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
quote:
originally posted by Evensong
Yes it is what the gospel of John presents. But it's the gospel of John alone. Which is why the gospel almost didn't make the canon - too gnostic. Jesus was just God on earth, not true man.
Really? Is that how you see John's Gospel? I find it, bar none, the most powerful declaration of His humanity as well as His divinity.
Thank you JJ.
It amazes me how often John is singled out on the ship as being the only source for certain concepts and throwing them into doubt. John did make the canon.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by daronmedway:
Evensong, quote:
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. John 1:14
No Gnosticism here. And you a teacher of the Israel of God?
Oh you mean the half verse in the highest Christology in the New Testament? Your reference could have bit somewhat specific what?
Regardless: enfleshment is indeed against gnosticism but it's only the literal understanding. The bigger line is the fact that creation is bad and being human is a Bad Thing.
Whereas Chalcedon affirms Jesus is truly human as well as truly divine.
The gospel of John is different from the synoptics in that Jesus is much more the heavenly figure that walks the earth barely touching the ground at all: God merely pretending to be human.
The agony in the garden is deleted for example - too human.
No agony or cry of dereliction from the cross for example - too human.
He does get upset about Lazarus, yet still - it's a much more bland an in control picture.
And you a teacher of the Israel of God?
As for Jesus' self-understanding of his death in the gospel of John: he speaks of what Freddy was talking about before his crucifixion in chapter 12.
Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also.
No punishment nonsense in that.
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a theological scrapbook
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
quote:
originally posted by Evensong
Yes it is what the gospel of John presents. But it's the gospel of John alone. Which is why the gospel almost didn't make the canon - too gnostic. Jesus was just God on earth, not true man.
Really? Is that how you see John's Gospel? I find it, bar none, the most powerful declaration of His humanity as well as His divinity. Every time I open the pages I read of a very real man, with a very real personality. The synoptics tell, by and large, what Jesus did and taught. John portrays what He was like to know, to hang around with.
Furthermore, if we had only the synoptics, we might get the impression that Jesus acted, taught and healed out of his status as Son of God. In John we see that, far from operating from His divinity, He was in exactly the same position of any of us. He could only do what the Father told Him.
I'm afraid I don't see that at all.....I've explained why a bit in the post above to daronmedway.
quote:
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
And, of course, far from being proto-gnostic, the fourth Gospel was written to refute, not commend, gnosticism
Really? I was taught it barely got into the canon because it skated on thin ice too much. (Too docetic - being the more insidious form of gnosticism).
[ 23. January 2014, 11:39: Message edited by: Evensong ]
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a theological scrapbook
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Jolly Jape
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# 3296
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Posted
I'm not sure I get your point, Gildas. We can argue about the precise dating of the Bronze age/Iron age transition, but we are really only talking about a shorthand way of referring to differences, not only in technology, but in worldview. By "Bronze-age" thinking, I was referring to the pagan belief in angry gods which required propitiation by blood-sacrifices, often human. I don't think it unreasonable to see this sort of thinking at work during the period between the conquest and the creation of the Kingdom, when the ANE was on the Bronze/Iron Age transitional cusp. Of course, I can be argued that the accounts were later, and thus there was a certain amount of theological hindsight being read back into the accounts, but I'm not sure that this alters the point I am making.
As for the extent which the average, theologically literate Jew of the 1st century, understood these things, I still think that it is unlikely that the temple sacrifices were understood in terms of substitutionary atonement, rather than an appeal to the Covenant.
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
Posts: 3011 | From: A village of gardens | Registered: Sep 2002
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Those texts refer to the fact that his death was inevitable in the tradition of the prophets and he knew it... But orchestrating his own death is not part of the synoptics at all.
Maybe "orchestrating" is not the perfect term, but the synoptics definitely portray Him as more than just a willing participant.
Oh yes. He certainly knows what's going to happen and goes along with it but that's quite different to orchestrating it for the sake of it.
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a theological scrapbook
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
Maybe "orchestrating" is not the perfect term, but the synoptics definitely portray Him as more than just a willing participant.
Oh yes. He certainly knows what's going to happen and goes along with it but that's quite different to orchestrating it for the sake of it.
I think that you are making too much of the difference between John and the synoptics. The differences are certainly there - Jesus is much more on board and suffers less in John - but Jesus is still subject to the Father's plan:
quote:
John 18:10 Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant, and cut off his right ear. The servant’s name was Malchus.
11 So Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into the sheath. Shall I not drink the cup which My Father has given Me?”
But again, are you saying that John's view is invalid because it just barely made it into the canon?
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Martin60
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# 368
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Posted
JJ - He knew this: Isaiah 53:4-6, 10, 11—"Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all ... It was the will of the LORD to bruise him; he has put him to grief; when he makes himself an offering for sin ... By his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous; and he shall bear their iniquities.". As we all do. One has to deliberately choose to be blind to exclude punishment from this narrative.
Regardless of Anselm's "The honour taken away must be repaid, or punishment must follow" a thousand years later. Which is irrelevant as is most that follows in Calvin and beyond.
What would Jesus, the transcendent late ancient Jew have humanly FELT and thought? Even with the Consciousness of God bursting out in Him more than any other and only human rabbi.
A Consciousness that is inevitably having its cumulative effect through our two thousand year culture, back on track from Athanasius.
Scot McKnight: "What I want to say is not that this theory is wrong... I want to say is that the atonement is so much more than this. And, if it is so much more than this, then it follows that using “penal substitution” as our guiding term is inadequate and misleads others. At the least, it does not provide enough information to explain what one really believes occurs in the Atonement".
Which is THE sublime mystery.
[ 23. January 2014, 20:35: Message edited by: Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard ]
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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A.Pilgrim
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# 15044
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
Angus, I think that reading PSA into Hebrews is to misunderstand the nature and purpose of the OT sacrificial system to which the epistle refers. The point was that sacrifice was the means by which covenants were ratified. Sins were forgiven because that is what God had, in His blood ratified covenant, promised to do, not because the sacrificial victim was "punished" in the sinners' place. When Peter was saying that, without the shedding of blood there could be no forgiveness, he was reiterating the Old Testament teaching that forgiveness was solely dependant on the grace of God in keeping His promises.
JJ, I wasn’t intending to read anything penal into Hebrews, nor anything substitutionary but just the need for sacrificial atonement as a requirement for forgiveness. Do you still think even that element is invalid?
I’m aware that the sacrifice of an animal was done in OT times to ratify a covenant at its initiation, but I don’t recall any case of continued sacrifice to ensure that the covenant endured. Sure, one could argue that the OT sacrificial system was continued by the people of Israel out of obedience to the covenant Law, but I would have thought that there was a clear connection between blood sacrifice and forgiveness of sins in the Laws on sin offerings and guilt offerings in Lev.4:2 – 6:7. After the instructions for sacrifice, there is a repeated refrain of ‘And the priest shall make atonement for him for the sin that he has committed, and he shall be forgiven.’ Is it too much to read Heb.9:22 as referring back to that? I wouldn’t have thought so.
And then there’s Heb 7:27 where the author compares the Aaronic priesthood with the priesthood of Jesus, and says: ‘He [Jesus] has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for their own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself.’ (ESV) Sin offerings produce forgiveness for those on whose behalf they are offered: by the priests under the OT sacrificial system; by Jesus as his self-offering for the sins of the world. (John 1:29)
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quote:
Originally posted by goperryrevs:
I can't square the 'obvious' reading of those verses (that shedding of blood is necessary for forgiveness) with the fact that there are plenty of examples of forgiveness throughout scripture (and especially from Jesus) where there was no shedding of blood. So I have to interpret Hebrews in the light of that more clear witness.
Blood wasn't shed when Jesus forgave the paraplegic man, or the woman caught in adultery, or when he told his disciples to forgive "70x7 times". Jesus seemed able to forgive at will, with no preconditions (even repentance!). Jesus' point to the Pharisees when he heals the paraplegic man is that he has authority to do what he wants - forgive, or heal - no conditions.
Yes, I can appreciate the tension (or, as some would describe it, contradiction) between the gospel accounts and the passage in Hebrews. I would like to present a form of understanding that reconciles the two, at least in my mind.
A description of what Jesus did in offering himself as a sacrifice for sin appears in Heb.9:23-28. He entered not into ‘holy places made with hands’ but ‘into heaven itself’ – not into an earthly, time-bound place (the holy of holies in the temple) – but into a heavenly extra-temporal place (of which the ‘holy place made with hands’ is a copy). (See also Heb.9:11-12). So, unlike the Aaronic sacrifices, which were in the time-constrained sequence of sin/sacrifice/forgiveness, and had to be repeated within time for every occasion of sin requiring forgiveness, the effect of the Melchizedekian sacrifice offered by Jesus in heaven isn’t constrained by time, but is effective retrospectively before the crucifixion and prospectively after it throughout all time. So when Jesus is reported as forgiving people in the gospels, it is in anticipation of the sacrificial offering which he will make in the future, but the effects of which apply throughout all time.
Sure, it’s an intellectual construct which can be criticised for not being explicit in the Bible, but which does allow the Biblical evidence to be formed into a coherent picture.
quote:
We all wrestle with scripture, tradition, our own experience and understanding; somewhere between those two extremes. I also want to accept what God has revealed and follow it, but sometimes it is very hard to figure out exactly what it is he has revealed.
Oh yes indeed. You and me both. ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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Karl:LB I’ll try to come back with a response another time, but I’ve already spent more time on this than I should have done.
Angus
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Jamat
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# 11621
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Posted
Martin PC:
Can anyone answer the question why Jesus was compelled to choose to die, compelled to choose to lose His life blood for our forgiveness?
Or does that question not exist?
Hi Martin,
Maybe no one can give someone committed to post modernism the answer he wants. This would accord nicely with the nature of post modernism as it is a thought system of uncertainty by definition.
By asking the question you are maybe betraying that you are not really a post modernist but seeking certainty rather than its opposite.
You have rejected all answers suggested as unsatisfactory. From a PM POV there has to be something wrong with the question.
However, having begun an atonement thread, why don't you revisit the Christus Victor thread in Limbo. pretty well all the bases are covered in that behemoth thread.
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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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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
JJ - He knew this: Isaiah 53:4-6, 10, 11—"Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all ... It was the will of the LORD to bruise him; he has put him to grief; when he makes himself an offering for sin ... By his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous; and he shall bear their iniquities.". As we all do.
One has to deliberately choose to be blind to exclude punishment from this narrative.
I don't think that one has to be deliberately blind to exclude punishment from this narrative.
I think that it is just a failure of the imagination to grasp alternate readings.
Nor does it help that we are reading English translations that skew the meaning of many of the words.
The alternate reading that I believe is the correct one has nothing to do with punishment. Instead it has to do with the Messiah taking on our battle, taking on our faults and weaknesses and overcoming them. It was the will of God that He should fight this fight, and by His efforts, His struggles, and the wounds that He was willing to endure, He defeated the power of evil, He healed us, He made us righteous.
The larger paradigm is that the life of the spiritual man is possible only with the "death", as it were, of the natural man. This is about the priority of spiritual goals over worldly and physical ones. Jesus acted out this metaphor to the ultimate degree.
That is what Isaiah 53 is really about, in my view.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
However, having begun an atonement thread, why don't you revisit the Christus Victor thread in Limbo. pretty well all the bases are covered in that behemoth thread.
What a fabulous and brilliant discussion that was. ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
Maybe "orchestrating" is not the perfect term, but the synoptics definitely portray Him as more than just a willing participant.
Oh yes. He certainly knows what's going to happen and goes along with it but that's quite different to orchestrating it for the sake of it.
I think that you are making too much of the difference between John and the synoptics. The differences are certainly there - Jesus is much more on board and suffers less in John - but Jesus is still subject to the Father's plan:
quote:
John 18:10 Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant, and cut off his right ear. The servant’s name was Malchus.
11 So Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into the sheath. Shall I not drink the cup which My Father has given Me?”
But again, are you saying that John's view is invalid because it just barely made it into the canon?
No. John's gospel is as valid as the others. But it is different in how Jesus is presented.
I was merely responding to daronmedways post here.
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a theological scrapbook
Posts: 9481 | From: Australia | Registered: Apr 2009
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
I was merely responding to daronmedways post here.
Thanks. Now I see.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Thanks Jamat
The problem isn't with my postmodernism, any more than it is with my inability to see alternative meanings of Isaiah 53 - Freddy - from our end of the telescope of progressive revelation, which I don't have, it's the failure to deal with the thoughts and feelings of the people who wrote the texts and the One who lived them. That is a failure to be postmodern.
I'll plough through Limbo:
Penal Substitutionary Atonement
Rob Bell and Universalism
At-one-ment. ONLY one?
Christus Victor
Easter Message : Christ did not die for sin
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
The problem isn't with my postmodernism, any more than it is with my inability to see alternative meanings of Isaiah 53 - Freddy - from our end of the telescope of progressive revelation, which I don't have, it's the failure to deal with the thoughts and feelings of the people who wrote the texts and the One who lived them. That is a failure to be postmodern.
I don't believe that our goal is to affirm the thoughts and feelings of the ones who wrote the texts. If these texts are divine revelation then the meaning would often be beyond them.
Jesus is a different matter. It definitely matters how He understood it.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
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