The bibles missing books

by jacethespace 28 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • Tuesday
    Tuesday
    By the time Jesus came the hebrew scrolls considered inspired are as we have today

    Source please?

    And on the greek scripture the time period to be part of the canon was very small and those within it are quite set.

    Source please? There were other gospels and other letters to congregations.

    Revelation was only doubted because of content, with it's talk on resurrection and armageddon very much at odds with you die and goto heaven or hell doctrine of the later trinitarians

    That and it's written like someone tripping out on shrooms or LSD.

    Final

    ly you talk of the appocrypha but have any of you read them?

    Yes.

    Try enoch and it's obsession with Angels sex lifes and maybe you will see how far removed they are from the actual books we do use in the bible.

    Other books of the bible are obsessed with human's sex lives. I don't see how that is far removed at all. Do you want us to cite all the examples of the bible talking graphically about people's sex lives?

    While some non-inspired imperfect books might have info worth refering too by inspired authors this does not make them canon and never did.

    According to who? If you really only want half the story, and if you don't want to see why the book needed to be referenced in the first place sure I guess you can avoid them. Would you mind telling me exactly how you can figure out that one book saying it's inspired by God is actually inspired by God and another one saying the same thing isn't? Especially if the book you're saying IS inspired by God references this other book that you say isn't. Please dear, the floor is yours:

  • PSacramento
    PSacramento

    It makes sense that 1Enoch, for example, would be viewed as apostate or "imperfect" by the WT, anyone who has read it can see why, primarly it would be the fact that Enoch mentions 7 Archangels, not just one and he names them all, thus taking aways the importance of Michael in the WT doctrine.

  • Leolaia
    Leolaia
    Revelation was only doubted because of content, with it's talk on resurrection and armageddon very much at odds with you die and goto heaven or hell doctrine of the later trinitarians.

    First of all, what does trinitarian theology have to do with "heaven or hell" eschatology? Second, it was doubted on account of its chiliast eschatology, which is unique in the Bible and which reflects a rather sectarian view popular in Asia Minor (as it is found also in the writings of Papias of Hierapolis, in Irenaeus, in the Epistula Apostolorum, in the views attributed to Cerinthus, in later Phrygian Montanism, etc.), which may indeed reflect pagan Zoroastrian influence (in fact, there are striking parallels between Revelation and the Zoroastrian Oracles of Hystaspes). It was also doubted on account of the very different eschatology, theology, and language of the gospel of John (Revelation was written in rather poor Greek), such that both could not have been written by the same person (cf. Dionysius of Alexandria).

    Third, the personal eschatology of Revelation is much closer to the simplified "heaven or hell" modern doctrine than you realize. The apocalyptic view usually encountered in the NT and in early Jewish and Christian writings is that one goes to a place of rest immediately at death (often heaven, as in Josephus and Paul) where one awaits resurrection, and then in the resurrection the person is judged (on Judgment Day) on account of the works done prior to death, with the righteous being given eternal life and the wicked being given eternal punishment (not as a disembodied soul but as a resurrected person) in a fiery Gehenna. This is quite representative of the eschatology of Revelation; the "souls" (the only place in the NT where psukhé is used to refer to the part of a person that survives death) of dead martyrs await their resurrection in heaven and then when the resurrection occurs, eternal torture is given to those who are judged wicked. The modern "heaven or hell" view results from taking resurrection out of the picture, with judgment occurring individually at death instead of in a future time. This represents the shift in later Christianity away from apocalypticism towards realized eschatologies (such as amillenialism), which represents a response to millennial movements that would spring up every now and then predicting an "end of the world" and the time of Judgment Day.

    Try enoch and it's obsession with Angels sex lifes and maybe you will see how far removed they are from the actual books we do use in the bible.

    Is it really? It is not "obsessed" with the sex lives of angels; the book is much more interested in divine judgment on their actions. The main thing it adds to Genesis 6 (which is where the idea of angels mating with humans came from) is that it was unnatural and perverted for the angels to do this, that this involved an abandonment of their nature and heavenly abode to come to earth to marry women. This theme is taken up in the NT, particularly in Jude 6-7 which is directly dependent on 1 Enoch. 1 Enoch is also quoted verbatim in Jude 14-15 as inspired "prophecy" and signs of its influence are found all over the place in the NT. Revelation, for instance, contains many ideas and motifs that appeared for the first time in 1 Enoch and which are not found at all in the OT.

  • Mad Dawg
    Mad Dawg

    Tuesday said:

    If you really only want half the story, and if you don't want to see why the book needed to be referenced in the first place sure I guess you can avoid them.

    Said books do indeed have valuable writings in them. In fact, people should familiarize themselves with them. This has no affect on the canonicity of the books in question.

    Would you mind telling me exactly how you can figure out that one book saying it's inspired by God is actually inspired by God

    The canon was set by examining those books that had been generally accepted by the Christian community as a whole. The group of marginal books was fairly small, about a half dozen. The difference in the nature of the texts is quite pronounced.

    See here and here

    and another one saying the same thing isn't?

    The only book that comes immediately to mind that “says the same thing” is the Shepherd of Hermas which is similar to Psalms and Proverbs. There is no problem in according this book a high status, even if we deny that it is part of the canon. The early fathers quoted this book.

    Especially if the book you're saying IS inspired by God references this other book that you say isn't.

    So? What is the problem here? Through-out history, it has been common practice to cite other sources. If the Bible writers didn’t, you would be trying to use that to make some sort of point.

  • PSacramento
    PSacramento

    Leolaia,

    That was an excellent post, thank you.

  • loosie
    loosie

    I have read a little bit of the apocryphal books. LOL the one about solomon makes him look wackier than the books that made it into the bible. I think the men who decided which books made it into the bible must have based their decision on what could be believed and what was to diffult to swallow didn't make it in.

  • JustHuman14
    JustHuman14

    PSacramento:

    Well, there is also the case that, IF there is one church that has an "unbroken" line to the apostles, its the RCC or perhaps/aslo the Orthodox church.

    Everyone else is an "off shot" of them.

    So, in theory, all of us are apostates

    You got it!!! In fact the RCC after the Schisma of 1040 A.D has fallen into serious mistakes, specially the issue of Filioque and the authority of Pope. That is why in the Orthodox Chuch all Bishops are equal and most off all in serious matters the majority will decide, just like it happened in the first Synodos of Nicaia when the Arian Herecy started to be vary dangerous.

    Unfortunately the only reason that the Papal Church left the East Orthodox Church has to do with political games by the Franks. That is why many Popes new this fact and try to guard the Unity of the Church, like Pope Leontios who carved in silver plates the Symbol of Faith in Saint Paul's Church at Rome.

    The Protestand movement instead of looking back to the Original church, has broken from the Catholics. As a result we have thousands of Protestand groups, claiming that they are the real followers of Christ...

    But at the end of the day we will are all going to be judged according to our deeds and our heart. God is righteous and with Jesus sacrifice we are all going to have a fair judgement by the God of Love. This is one of the major teaching of the Holy Apostolic Orthodox Church..

  • reniaa
    reniaa

    hi leolaia

    I admit I was simplistic in my reply I could have put thats it's eschatology was as odds with what later christians believed I think my reply was near enough to yours though a simplistic answer. There is a great level of acceptance in hebrew scriptures that God will resurrect us and leave it with faith at that although we do get the Jesus endorced Daniel doing a similar thing to Revelations and going into complex symbolic prophecies so I would say Revelation has a contempory in the hebrew scriptures.

    Also we cannot assume that the Author is also the writer in a time when as we know from Paul scribes were the norm, revelation could have been dictated in less than ideal circumstances by an old man to a scribe not as good in grammer as John, similar expressions are used like both john and revelation calling Jesus lamb.

    At this late a date in time there can be no authority to lift an apocrypha to canon or negate a book from the canon and so away from the bible, this discussion while interesting ultimately is only a way of trying to invalidate the bible as a whole by casting doubt on one or more books.

    Reniaa

  • Spike Tassel
    Spike Tassel

    Origen [as translated for Reader's Digest's The Bible Through the Ages] is recorded as writing the following:— "The Scriptures were composed through the Spirit of God, and have both a meaning which is obvious and another which is hidden from most readers. The inspired meaning is not recognized by all—only by those who are gifted with the grace of the Holy Spirit in the word of wisdom and knowledge."

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