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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Of the Bible, but not in the Bible
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
Something strange happened at our prayer meeting last night. I was sharing a short word, reflecting on being temporary residents in a foreign land. And, there was a group effort to translate what I was sharing into Japanese. I used the phrase "in the world, but not of the world" which created some difficulty in translation ... so someone suggested we turn to the Japanese Bible and see how the phrase was translated. Only to find that actually there is no verse in the Bible that actually has that phrase! Passages like John 17 contain the various elements of the phrase, but they aren't actually put together anywhere. It came as a surprise to all of us that there isn't a verse in the Bible that says "you and in the world but not of the world", and we spent a fair bit of time searching electronic Bibles, an old fashioned paper concordance and Google to confirm that there is no such verse.
Which leaves me wondering. What other ideas are there which are clearly described in Scripture and widely used, but where the Bible authors failed to write down the particular sound-bite that we would regularly use as though we're quoting a verse in the Bible?
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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Lyda*Rose
Ship's broken porthole
# 4544
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
Something strange happened at our prayer meeting last night. I was sharing a short word, reflecting on being temporary residents in a foreign land. And, there was a group effort to translate what I was sharing into Japanese. I used the phrase "in the world, but not of the world" which created some difficulty in translation ... so someone suggested we turn to the Japanese Bible and see how the phrase was translated. Only to find that actually there is no verse in the Bible that actually has that phrase! Passages like John 17 contain the various elements of the phrase, but they aren't actually put together anywhere. It came as a surprise to all of us that there isn't a verse in the Bible that says "you and in the world but not of the world", and we spent a fair bit of time searching electronic Bibles, an old fashioned paper concordance and Google to confirm that there is no such verse.
Which leaves me wondering. What other ideas are there which are clearly described in Scripture and widely used, but where the Bible authors failed to write down the particular sound-bite that we would regularly use as though we're quoting a verse in the Bible?
I am so happy to hear this! I just hate that phrase. ![[Frown]](frown.gif) The world is the place I live, you live, Jesus lived, as well as having the Kingdom of God hiding in plain sight. It all belongs to the Godhead. And it all is to be redeemed by God. It is more us-against-them crap and it sounds so smug. Spare me.
[ 23. May 2016, 03:01: Message edited by: Lyda*Rose ]
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"Dear God, whose name I do not know - thank you for my life. I forgot how BIG... thank you. Thank you for my life." ~from Joe Vs the Volcano
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BroJames
Shipmate
# 9636
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
Passages like John 17 contain the various elements of the phrase, but they aren't actually put together anywhere.
My guess is that the phrase comes into being as a kind of summary of the reflection in John 17.11-16 quote:
11 I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name, the name you gave me, so that they may be one as we are one. 12 While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me. None has been lost except the one doomed to destruction so that Scripture would be fulfilled.
13 ‘I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. 14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. 15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of it.
It's important to take account of the usage of the term "world" in John (going right back to John 1), but it would be hard to say that the idea of "in the world but not of the world" (subject to a caveat about what exactly that means) is not present in these verses.
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
Certainly the idea is present (subject, as you say, to interpretation of 'world'), it was the fact that the exact phrase isn't actually a verse in Scripture. And, that all of us in the room were certain that it was until we actually went to look it up. The title I gave the thread seemed to sum it up, a phrase derived from the Bible but not actually there.
It was an interesting evening discussing issues of communication of the gospel message across cultural divides, while still being true to the gospel message (with the usual caveat of some disagreement about the message). Not only did we struggle with translating "in the world but not of the world" into Japanese, we also found that a phrase like "true to the gospel" requires 10-15 sentances to convey in Japanese. What I'd prepared as a short contemplation turned into a very practical demonstration of the challenge.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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ThunderBunk
Stone cold idiot
# 15579
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Posted
It sounds more pauline to me, and not just because I'm not a great fan of his. It goes with his obsession with an imminent parousia: there is no point in conforming oneself to a world which won't be here shortly, or so the argument seems to go....
I suppose the next question is the extent to which this obsession was shared with the gospel writers, and indeed with the object of their accounts.
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ThunderBunk
Stone cold idiot
# 15579
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Posted
Apologies for the double posting, but I've just realised my previous effort was something of a tangent, for which I apologise.
To bring it slightly more on topic, I think I am positing that such ideas are expressions of underlying themes which may well have been present in the cultures and times which immediately produced the biblical texts, particularly those of the NT: they were produced over a far shorter timescale, whatever one takes that to be, making the cultural influences to which they were subject far more comparable than those which produced the OT.
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Currently mostly furious, and occasionally foolish. Normal service may resume eventually. Or it may not. And remember children, "feiern ist wichtig".
Foolish, potentially deranged witterings
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BroJames
Shipmate
# 9636
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Posted
Yes. I didn't have John in mind, as a place where I expected to find the idea, and would also have thought that it was more Pauline.
It is interesting if, for the sake of argument, one accepts that Paul expected an imminent parousia, that the same kind of thinking still finds a place in John's gospel which is often dated to a time when the idea of imminent parousia was tending to fade.
There are quite a lot of ifs in that, but if it is the case, then perhaps the idea is not, after all, so much related to imminent parousia as we might have believed.
[ETA Cross-posted with ThunderBunk's second post]
[ 23. May 2016, 08:28: Message edited by: BroJames ]
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Trudy Scrumptious
BBE Shieldmaiden
# 5647
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Posted
I knew that the concept came from Jesus' prayer in John 17 but I, like Alan, would have thought the phrase was in there word for word, rather than alluded to as it is.
I've always found those verses (and everything Jesus says about "the world") much easier to take since reading Walter Wink, with his theories about "the World" = "the System"; as disciples we live in the same world as everyone else but we don't have to live by its system of domination and power.
The most famous "you think it's in the Bible but it's not" phrase is, I guess, "God helps those who help themselves," which a lot of people who aren't well-versed in Scripture really do believe is in there, but in that case I don't think even the concept is in there. The Bible has a lot of apparently contradictory things to say about helping yourself, but the overall message in much of the NT particularly seems to be more like "God helps those who have absolutely no ability to help themselves."
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BroJames
Shipmate
# 9636
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Trudy Scrumptious:
The most famous "you think it's in the Bible but it's not" phrase is, I guess, "God helps those who help themselves," which a lot of people who aren't well-versed in Scripture really do believe is in there, but in that case I don't think even the concept is in there.
Neither in nor of the Bible, in fact. ![[Smile]](smile.gif) IIRC it comes from Aesop's fables.
And doesn't the Bible say, "Charity begins at home" - Hezekiah 5.21, I think. ![[Cool]](cool.gif)
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
What other ideas are there which are clearly described in Scripture and widely used, but where the Bible authors failed to write down the particular sound-bite that we would regularly use as though we're quoting a verse in the Bible?
Would the Trinity count?
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
But Alan
It is in the Bible just not in the short succinct form, try John 17:11-16. There are reasons why you did not spot it.
- Jesus is praying to God, so the pronoun is "they" and not "you"
- The two halves are split with a lot of talk about Jesus-God relationship. So in vs 11 is "they are in the world" and in vs 14, "they are not of the world".
Jengie
[ 24. May 2016, 13:04: Message edited by: Jengie jon ]
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
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venbede
Shipmate
# 16669
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Trudy Scrumptious:
The Bible has a lot of apparently contradictory things to say about helping yourself, but the overall message in much of the NT particularly seems to be more like "God helps those who have absolutely no ability to help themselves."
Total tangent, but Like.
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Thro' the world we safely go.
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
I thought that was the point I was making. It's clear that in that prayer Jesus says we (if we assume Jesus is talking about us) are sent into the world. And, that we are not of the world. But, there are a few verses between the two parts. The particular soundbite doesn't appear together in a single verse, and yet it appears quite common to think that it actually does.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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Kwesi
Shipmate
# 10274
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Posted
Alan Cresswell quote:
I was sharing a short word, reflecting on being temporary residents in a foreign land
I am somewhat curious as to why you sought to tackle your problem through John's gospel. Would it not have been closer to your purpose to have made reference to Hebrews 11: 9 "9 By faith he [Abraham] stayed for a time in the land he had been promised, as in a foreign land, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise"; and Hebrews 11: 13-14 " All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland"?
Posts: 1641 | From: South Ofankor | Registered: Sep 2005
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BroJames
Shipmate
# 9636
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Posted
I don't think Alan was saying that his sharing began with John 17, but that it included the idea of being in the world but not of the world. The translator struggled with making the distinction in Japanese, so they turned to the Bible to discover how the Bible translators had dealt with it - only to discover that while John 17 is closest to using the phrase, in fact the phrase itself doesn't appear in the Bible. John 17 came up as a result of looking for the phrase, not because it was the basis of Alan's reflection.
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Hedgehog
Ship's Shortstop
# 14125
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Posted
Another phrase that I have not yet found in the Bible is: "The Lord hears the cry of the poor."
As with Alan's example, the concept is there in Psalm 34, particularly verse 6 (or 7 in the Complete Jewish Bible), but the actual phrasing is not.
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"We must regain the conviction that we need one another, that we have a shared responsibility for others and the world, and that being good and decent are worth it."--Pope Francis, Laudato Si'
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Alan Cresswell quote:
I was sharing a short word, reflecting on being temporary residents in a foreign land
I am somewhat curious as to why you sought to tackle your problem through John's gospel.
I started in 1 Peter 1:17 ("live out your time as foreigners here"). Marking the end of my time as a foreigner here. It was also a passage I preached on two years ago, before moving over here, and I was looking at how experience had changed my thoughts on the subject over that time.
As BroJames said, John 17 came up as an aid to help translate.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Hedgehog:
Another phrase that I have not yet found in the Bible is: "The Lord hears the cry of the poor."
As with Alan's example, the concept is there in Psalm 34, particularly verse 6 (or 7 in the Complete Jewish Bible), but the actual phrasing is not.
You could also try Psalm 69:33 ("The Lord hears the needy"), which lacks the 'cry'. Or, Job 34:28 ("They [the wicked] caused the cry of the poor to come before him, so that he heard the cry of the needy.") which is part of the speech of Elihu.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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Nigel M
Shipmate
# 11256
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
What other ideas are there which are clearly described in Scripture and widely used, but where the Bible authors failed to write down the particular sound-bite that we would regularly use as though we're quoting a verse in the Bible?
Would the Trinity count?
A few months ago I stumbled across a series of podcasts on this subject that awakened an interest. After (getting on for) nearly 2,000 years of debate on the doctrine, it seems Christianity is no nearer reaching an agreed definition. It's not just a rather simple Trinitarian versus Unitarian position now, but rather a reflection on the context of the first few centuries AD that led to the credal formulae. The thought occurred to me, though, that the Bible itself - and particularly the Jewish scriptures - opened things up to later debates. What with the divine council, the mixing of "God being up there" and at the same time "down here", and the idea of a "word" of God being present to humans, it seems that the seeds of what we later came to call 'Trinity' were indeed all there.
Seeds that grew into fantastic shaped plants, mind.
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