John 10:15

by LittleToe 38 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

mdb

Aaaargh. I hate copy - paste here... it's such an ordeal. Never pastes everything!
mdb

Isn't it possible that, when talking of either God, the spirit or heaven itself we are not talking about literal, physical or personalized 'things' I know it is easier to imagine God as a person, just as it was, and still is, easier for many to relate to God while gazing on a statue representing Jesus. But when we anthropomorphically personalize God we run into problems such as explaining John 10. Maybe it would be worth a moment to try and grasp the 'experience' instead of codifying the nature of God.
To me, knowing God is the experiencing of him, the sense of presence rather than a technical and absolute description of his being.
Knowing God is the key. If you know Jesus Christ, you know the Father because they are one. Christ is equal to the Father (John 10:30; Phil 2:6). Jesus claimed His deity while here on earth. He said He was the "I AM". It was at this and another instance when He claimed to be the Son of God that the Jews took up stones to kill Him for they thought He was committing Blasphemy - an offense requiring the offender to be stoned to death (Lev 24:16). The Jews knew exactly what Jesus meant by His proclamations. My point here is that Jesus was and is very personal. He came to earth in the form of man to save man from their sins. If Jesus is who He claimed to be (God - and He is), then God is very personal and not just a force we experience.

Now, with this in mind, if Jesus is God, then we should also be able to find evidence of Him in the Old Testament. He wouldn't have simply "popped up" in human history around the time of Christ. So where is He? Let's take a look.

The Lord (Jesus) wrestled with Jacob:
Then Jacob was left alone; and a Man wrestled with him until the breaking of day. Now when He saw that He did not prevail against him, He touched the socket of his hip; and the socket of Jacob’s hip was out of joint as He wrestled with him. And He said, “Let Me go, for the day breaks.”
But he said, “I will not let You go unless You bless me!”
So He said to him, “What is your name?”
He said, “Jacob.”
And He said, “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed.”
Then Jacob asked, saying, “Tell me Your name, I pray.”
And He said, “Why is it that you ask about My name?” And He blessed him there.
So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: “For I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.”(Gen 32:24-30)

The Lord (Jesus) appeared to Abraham:
And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect. And I will make my covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly. And Abram fell on his face: and God talked with him, saying,(Gen 17:1-3)

Now, above we see that the Lord has introduced Himself to Abraham as “Almighty God”. This is significant in the following verses.

And the LORD appeared unto him in the plains of Mamre: and he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day; And he lift up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself toward the ground, And said, My Lord, if now I have found favour in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant: Let a little water, I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree: And I will fetch a morsel of bread, and comfort ye your hearts; after that ye shall pass on: for therefore are ye come to your servant. And they said, So do, as thou hast said.(Gen 18:1-5)

What is significant here is that Abraham recognized the Lord and knew which of the three was He. Later in the book of Genesis we again find something worth noting with regard to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah:

Then the LORD rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the LORD out of heaven; And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.(Gen 19:24,25)

How many Lords are represented here in Gen 19:24,25? Remember, there is only one true God. (Deut 6:4;32:39; Isaiah 44:6,8; 45:5,18,21,22).

Worthy of note is also Jesus’ words in John 8:56-58:

Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad. Then said the Jews unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.

The Lord (Jesus) appears to Isaiah:
In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the LORD of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke.
Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts.(Isaiah 6:1-5)

One last thing to mention, the Scriptures say that none can see God without dying. So who is this “Almighty God” that Abraham saw, the Lord sitting on the throne that Isaiah saw, and the God that Jacob wristled with? God that man can see without dying.

And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live.(Exodus 33:20)

No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.(John 1:18)
defd

Joh 10:15 As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep.

Something suddenly struck me, while reading the aforementioned verse.
If the Fatherknows everything (ginosko - to know "absolutely") and hence knows Jesus intimately; how is it possible for Jesus to know ;the Father ;in the same way if he's merely an angel or "perfect" human? Little toe I think you are reaching abit. Jesus just said he knows his Father. Who knows how long Jesus spent with Jehovah before they started thier creative acts. Millions of yrs.......Billions of yrs.........? D.
coolhandluke

Little toe I think you are reaching abit. Jesus just said he knows his Father. Who knows how long Jesus spent with Jehovah before they started thier creative acts. Millions of yrs.......Billions of yrs.........?
No one knows all things except the father. Is this not so Defd? Of those things Jesus must be included, however the question arises when Jesus compares his understanding of Jehovah and places it on par with Jehovah's understanding of him. Whatdya think?
Narkissos

Along with the drifting...
I tend to think that the "personality of the Holy Spirit" is the weakest link in the Trinitarian chain -- at least in its popularised version, for there is some semantic difference between the Greek hupostasis and the Latin persona on the one hand, and the common sense of the English "person" on the other hand.
I also feel that the Gospel of John often toys with the idea of an impersonal (or, perhaps, more than personal) divine... One case in point is the famous God is Spirit -- pneuma ho theos, 4:24 -- which is structurally echoed in the epistles by God is Light (ho theos phôs estin, 1 John 1:5; phôs is neuter) and God is Love (ho theos agapè estin, 4:8,16; agapè is feminine).
One other important play on the indetermined neuter (i.e., not explicitly referring to the pneuma or another neutral noun) is found in John 6:37ff:
Everything (pan, neuter) that the Father gives me will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never drive away; for I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all (pan) that he has given me [but raise it (auto, neuter) up on the last day]. This is indeed the will of my Father, that all who see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life; [and I will raise them up on the last day.]
(The square brackets [] points to the probable "orthodox" interpolation, reinscribing the idea of future resurrection; in the first one some mss agree with the contextual neuter, others have auton, masculine.)
This is quite puzzling from an orthodox viewpoint -- what does the neuter refer to? Otoh from a broad Gnostic perspective (the Revealer gathers the scattered sparks of the divine into the original One, to hen) it makes perfect sense.
LittleToe

Defd:CoolHandLuke has correctly identified my angle on this.
CHL:
Didier:I can't disagree with a thing you've said, in your last post
Steve:
I love the fact that while we've had different starting points we've reached similar conclusions.
The fact that you ahve an engineering background, and that mine (believe it or not) had a skeptical scientific bent before "experience" overtook me, makes the comparison all the more delicious!
mdb:
You articulate yourself well. Keep up the good work.
John Ten concludes with folks seemingly getting Jesus' inference and attempting to grab him.
Regardless of whether an individual (JW or not) views Jesus as Divine, it seems pretty clear that the gospel of John is asserting exactly that!
A question is raised, following on from the points that several other posters make; is it possible for us to aspire to something similar, via Theosis?
I don't mean that in any sense to detract from Jesus' unique role as the "only-begotten" Son of God, however he was to the firstborn amongst many brethren...
Midget-Sasquatch

Why do you limit your comments to non-christian mystics?

Ooops, that was an old habit creeping up. To avoid any trouble while growing up JW, I'd always be sure to talk about any novel ideas as being foreign to (the WT's version of) christianity. Needless to say, all of you here and your open-mindedness are much appreciated.
Besides the Gospel of John, there are also some of Paul's writings that talk about this mystical attainment of glory and fullness.
But as I understand it, 2Peter was a pro-orthodox letter, apparently even having some anti-gnostic things to say. So what was the author saying at 2 Peter 1:4 about theosis?
In the Basic English Bible it says:
"And through this he has given us the hope of great rewards highly to be valued; so that by them we might have our part in God's being, and be made free from the destruction which is in the world through the desires of the flesh."
That translation sides nicely with the kind of union talked about in John.
In the New Revised Standard Version it says:
Thus he has given us, through these things, his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust, and may become participants of the divine nature.
Is the author's concept closer to that of the WT's where there's a limited sharing in the divine nature?
LittleToe

I'm not sure I would agree that the WTS believes in a limited sharing in the Divine Nature. They have difficulty enough subscribing to the idea of Jesus having it LOL
The closest they seem to get is the idea that some (144k) will have "eternal" life, but that's about it. What of everyone else???
Midget-Sasquatch

LittleToe
I'm with you you on there being no basis for excluding so many believers from that same hope. What you mentioned was exactly the shared trait of divinty that I was thinking about. That God, Jesus and the 144,000 are the only beings that are immortal. The WTS has no other way around it but to concede that (I'll better qualify it this time) extremely limited ...... idea of theosis.

John 10:15

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