Was Jesus the first creation.

by ajie 221 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  Narkissos

  Ross,If you mean a discussion of proskuneô, it might be worth another thread, but I personally feel the point is moot.

  Yes, the NWT is guilty of formal inconsistency in translating it "worship" when referring to God and "pay obeisance to" when referring to Jesus (if my memory serves).

  But I think "worship" is perhaps too strong and certainly too abstract a definition for proskuneô, whatever the referent (and here I know I go against some major lexica, e.g. BAGD). I mean, the verb originally denotes a concrete gesture (bowing and lying prostrate, at least in a Jewish context), which can be made in a temple before a god (in that case implying worship, but this is not the same as saying the very word means worship), but also in other circumstances before authority figures as the LXX uses show. Yes, in Acts and Revelation Peter and an angel decline proskunèsis, which Jesus accepts in the Gospels. But I still feel rendering the latter uses as "worship" is an overtranslation. Even if those texts suggest some "divinity" of Jesus they do so in an allusive way, not in the explicit way "worship" would carry.
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  gumby

  Nark....I'd kiss ya on that cute ol' gray beard of yours if I could for that CLEAR statement my handicapped mind usually cannot follow my friend!....(and I ain't gay either)

  Seriously, you have answered something I've wondered for some time and never found a satisfactory answer in the way you described,.......but you confirmed my feelings of what I knew and felt.

  I wonder how the jesus would have answered if the diciples had asked him directly...."Lord, when you enter your kingdom, should we worship you or the father", how he would have replied?

  * of the' i'll bet he woulda said something confusing' class and I'd still be baffled *

  Gumby
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  hamsterbait

  
  I haven't had time to read all this as I am going out. (Apologies in advance if i repeat a point)

  Jesus is called "the only BEGOTTEN son" the "only BEGOTTEN god"-

  IF these writers meant he was just the first to be created in the same way as everything else, why not say so.

  The use of BEGOTTEN shows the writers are trying to point something important about the nature of Christ.

  He is not a mere bigger better creation than a squirrel or a universe or a virus. With regard to creation the WTS among others seem to have the "apprenticeship" idea. On earth Christ was apprenticed to a carpenter until he could make nice chairs. In heaven he was apprenticed to God until he could make nice universes. Hmmm.

  HB
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  JosephMalik

  Does "invisible" (aoratos) in the first instance mean "far away as..." the Pleiades? Narkissos, No, it simply means” 1) unseen, or that which can not be seen, e.g. invisible. No literal location is specified in either case thus your argument has no merit. And since Paul is talking about human governments there is no reason to think off planet in the case of such governments as you suggested. What is it that causes so many readers to disregard the reality of the text and go off world like this? Joseph
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  biddie

  Mouthy- I couldn't have said it better!! Biddie
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  Narkissos

  Hamsterbait,

  Earlier in this thread I suggested that only-begotten is an overtranslation of monogenès, which actually means only of his/her kind -- especially but not exclusively "only son/daughter".

  In the LXX it is applied to the daughter of Jephthah (Judges 11:34), to Sarah the daughter of Raguel and Tobias (Tobit 3:15; 6:11; 8:17); in the NT to the widow's son (Luke 7:12), to the daughter of Jairus (8:42), to the demonised son of an unnamed man (9:38), to Isaac son of Abraham (Hebrews 11:17)

  In the LXX it also means "my unique" in parallel to "my soul, psukhè" (Psalm 21:21; 34:17), "lonely" (24:16); "unique" as the spirit of Wisdom (Wisdom of Solomon 7:22).

  Iow, the simple translation "only son" is much better than "only-begotten son". The debate "begotten" vs. "created" only makes sense from a later perspective (dependent on 2nd-century Gnostic "genealogies" as I suggested earlier in this thread).
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  Narkissos

  No, it simply means” 1) unseen, or that which can not be seen, e.g. invisible.

  Yes... and this should apply to the Roman government (which btw had a lot of visible officials and institutions representing it throughout the empire)?

  And since Paul is talking about human governments there is no reason to think off planet in the case of such governments as you suggested.

  Circular reasoning. In close circles.

  What is it that causes so many readers to disregard the reality of the text and go off world like this?

  Yes, what?
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  biddie

  Hellrider- this is true. Bracketing was added later, after other Christian translators protested the non-bracketed stuff! Biddie
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  JosephMalik

  This is why many interpret the case as a genitive of subordination, i.e. "firstborn over creation," as implying the kind of domination that is explicitly explained in v. 16-18.

  Leolaia,

  That was good and the real point being made by Paul. We should also understand that all does not mean everything and we must depend on (as you show) the material being discussed (context) to determine what is meant. The scriptures do not explain how or when the Word that became Jesus came into existence or if this Word is simply a part of God like the rib God took from Adam to make Eve. The same is true for the angels that support God's creation. What we do know is that the blood of Christ was not meant to redeem them and their fate has already been predestined.

  Joseph
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  JosephMalik

  Say Gumby,

  Maybe I just try to think like a Jew and not jump to conclusions since their use of the word Heaven(s) had many uses and applications that go far beyond the way you think.

  Joseph