by A-Team 212 Replies latest watchtower bible
I find that the only way to loosen the grip of the WT overbearing control on people is to those peopls that the WT isn't always corrent in its "scholarship and motive". That then opens the door for people to feel okay about thinking for themselves.
AO
AO:
Not easily done as this thread proves. The WT has some powerful voodoo!
Frank75
Frank
I find that the only way to loosen the grip of the WT overbearing control on people is to those peopls that the WT isn't always corrent in its "scholarship and motive". That then opens the door for people to feel okay about thinking for themselves.
AO
AO:
Not easily done as this thread proves. The WT has some powerful voodoo!
Frank75
No, not easily done, but one of the JWs that I study with is showing the signs
No, not easily done, but one of the JWs that I study with is showing the signs
AO:
You dirty dog you!
.....do tell though! Have you brought up the page 7 quotes in the Trinity brochure? What's your plan?
Frank75
I wasn't a dubby and still am not , I still don't believe the trinity . I have read alot of their literature .There's only a few arguments they make that I still agree with and that being one of them . I don't believe eternal pain and suffering for evil people and I don't believe that all people get instantaneous resurection .
PS: if anyone wants to check out the article I gave a link to before, please
use this web site (the other isn't registering the most recent updates, for some
reason):
http://www.freewebs.com/glenster1/index.htm
I called it "Glenster's Guide to GTJ Brooklyn" because I've also written a
couple of GTA walk-throughs, which are what the first ten links there are for.
A number of posters have suggested (perhaps facetiously) that the expression ho theos mou was analoguous to the English and French exclamatory expressions My God! and Mon Dieu! (in which the pragmatic reference is to the situation -- not a literal deity), but it should be pointed out that this is NOT a Greek expression and should not be anachronistically presumed in the passage. Similarly, the English expression should not anachronistically be interpreted as a vocative appeal to God, anymore than "holy cow!" addresses a particular sacred bovine.
Okay Leo, that is quite a sweeping statement. Just what do you base your assertion on?
Forscher
DttP: In LXX-NT Greek the article is not absolutely required by the possessive with theos (Matthew 27:46, vocative; Luke 1:78, genitive; John 8:54, predicate nominative; 20:17, accusative in a series; 2 Corinthians 6:16, predicate nominative, cf. Hebrews 11:16; Revelation 21:3). But it is certainly the main usage and so I agree that its presence in John 20:28 is not distinctive.
DttP: In LXX-NT Greek the article is not absolutely required by the possessive with theos (Matthew 27:46, vocative; Luke 1:78, genitive; John 8:54, predicate nominative; 20:17, accusative in a series; 2 Corinthians 6:16, predicate nominative, cf. Hebrews 11:16; Revelation 21:3). But it is certainly the main usage and so I agree that its presence in John 20:28 is not distinctive.Interesting, as a non-trinitarian I am comfortable with my own understanding of "Ho Theos" and how it is used, but could you give a brief theological explanation on John 20:28 from your point of view? I like to have different viewpoints in my notes.
I'm afraid I have nothing mindblowing to add, only the following which will hardly come as a surprise :
- John 20:28 is clearly an address to Jesus (apekrithè Thômas kai eipen autô, literally "Thomas replied and said to him").
- John 20:28 holds a climactic position in the structure of the Gospel at one of its major stages of composition, i.e. after the addition of the Prologue which it echoes in the way of inclusio, and before the addition of chapter 21 which follows the previous conclusion, 20:30f). In that sense it is structurally similar to the conclusion of 1 John, houtos estin ho alèthinos theos kai zôè aiônios, "this one is the true God and eternal life".
- I do agree that the legal notion of representative identity (which you have advocated elsewhere, if memory serves: he is God inasmuch as he represents God to the believers) lies in the background, yet I believe that in Johannine theology (contrary to the Synoptics) this notion goes through a particular development where the purely formal or legal aspects give way to more "ontological" and "mystical" ones (as is apparent in the Prologue).
- Last but not least, this Johannine particularism takes place within a (proto-Gnostic) notion of "God" which is both more fluid and more inclusive than later Christian theism (either Trinitarian or Arian), since it extends, through Christ as the Revealer, to the believers themselves: those are ultimately restored to the divine oneness in which they originally belonged (e.g. 1:3f; 6:37ff; 10:3ff, 14f,27ff; 11:52; 17:6,9ff,21ff).
I would be curious as well for an expanded explication Narkissos. I am not trying to get into a conflict with you or Leo on the matter. I am just curious about Leos blanket statement about [i]ho theos mou[/i] not being a Greek statement and her basis for it.
Forscher
