In Judaism each human is a child of God and no one else can ransom them or redeem them. Judaism maintains the idea of 'the perfectability of humans' no human sacrifices allowed. The Talmud maintains this- "If a man says I am God, he lies; if he says I am the son of God he will rue it; and if he says, I shall ascend to heaven, he will surely fail'."
If Jesus is god???!!!
by El_Guapo 54 Replies latest jw friends
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Band on the Run
The scriptures are very unclear about whether Jesus is God. Son of God could mean any notable male Israelite. Son of man is ithe interesting designation. In secular NT classes and in the academic literature, scholars go to great lengths to say the scriptures do not establish either view. It was not important to Jesus or the first Christians.
There are some scriptures that place the affirmation that Jesus is God in the mouth of another actor. If he had a few minutes to be clear as to nature, it was during his trial before Pilate. I ran a search of Jesus' trial on an academic database. My expectation was that there would several hundred articles. I found about ten thousand articles. Perhaps this topic is the primary interest in research. I downloaded some of the articles but only was able to skim a few.
Crossan states there is no clear statement in scripture. The list of academics could go endlessly. Seminarians will have the view of their faith.
Since I started reading scripture without any aids and focus on the text as in law, I am shocked by what scripture does not address at all. Considering the bloodshed and the religious/political results of these epic battles, I wonder what all the fuss is about.
When it comes to the Trinity, however, I do feel Jesus being God is important to viewing Jesus. Jesus is so much nicer than YHWH. Paul approaches the Trinity in his genuine letters. I have read of Arianism, though, when reading historical fiction. Contrary to my belief, Arianism was not suppressed for a long time. If the scriptures were so clear as people believe, there would be grounds for resisting the Trinity or whatever the Witness view is.
I also read there was a big difference between Arians and others who believe in adoptionsim believe and what the Witnesses teach. It went right over my head.
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designs
'Jesus says to those on the left Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire'..Then they will go away to eternal punishment' Matt.25: 41-46. Jesus nicer than who whaa
You can always tell a budding sociopath by the threats they make...
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mP
Designs:
In Judaism each human is a child of God and no one else can ransom them or redeem them. Judaism maintains the idea of 'the perfectability of humans' no human sacrifices allowed. The Talmud maintains this- "If a man says I am God, he lies; if he says I am the son of God he will rue it; and if he says, I shall ascend to heaven, he will surely fail'."
mP:
Not in the Bible thats completely untrue. There are two types of human, the elevated special Jews and the lesser gentiles who are condemned to slavery and subserviance. There are dozens of laws about this in the Torah. You are thinking that man means everyone it doesnt. We saw the same in the US constitution, where all MEN are created equal, but of course their MEN didnt mean blacks back then. If we look a bit harder we can see the same different definition in both cases.
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wolfman85
Stephen didn't see the HS because the HS was with Stephen at that time.
Acts 7:55
New International Version (NIV)
55 But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. -
designs
mP- Slavery or human bondage is a evil that infected Jewish life for many centuries as it did much of the know world back then and shows why Judaism like all religion is simply of human origin. Few people contemplated the morality of slavery and many actually argued in favor of it including the great Plato and Aristotle. Hammurabi, the Greek Euripides were the few to speak about the disturbing practice of human bondage, Jesus did not speak out against it.
Whoever wrote the Book of Job challenged and raised the important question of the morality of human bondage- 'Did not He that made me in the womb make him? And did not One fashion us in the womb?' 31:15
A century before Jesus Jewish philosopher and Rabbi Philo observed about the Essenes- 'There is not a single slave among them, but they are all free, serving one another; they condemn masters not only for representing a system of unrighteousness in opposition to that of equality, but as personifications of wickedness in that they violate the law of nature which made us all brethren, created alike.' Philo also wrote about another Jewish community, the Therapeute, he observed- 'They do not have slaves to wait upon them as they consider the ownership of slaves to be against nature. For nature has born all men to be free'.
It was the Mishnah Rabbi Akiba ben Joseph who pushed for the abolishment of concubines. The ownership of slaves rapidly died out during the Maccabean Period.
Paul speaks of slaves as a matter of fact and makes no philosophical strides to call an end to slavery, neither did Jesus who is often quoted in favor of Rome over his fellow Jews- 'pay Caesar's things to Caesar' was one of the more cowardly things attributed to Jesus as he acted to further the subjugation of his people to the boot of the Romans, he was no God.
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J. Hofer
the only way the trinity would make sense, is to have god being a legal entity (just like a company or enterprise) and the father, son and holy spirit being the shareholders or CEO/CTO etc. so they're all god and represent god, but are different persons. i know that some trinities state something about them not being different persons, which doesn't make sense. i think most of these discussions are about a few little words and in the end trinitarians and non-trinitarians believe pretty much the same thing (or should i say "crap").
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Phizzy
Thank you for the thread,and thanks to all who have taken part, I especially love the succinct answers that get you out of a protracted discussion with JW's about this, always a waste of time.
PSacs, "THe Trinity is a doctrine of Nature and not Identity" is excellent, closely followed by Punks "The Watchtower are full of lies and shit"
Both succinct.
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ÁrbolesdeArabia
London111 your example is too simple for the phD scholars with time on their hands to formulate various ideas of the nature of Christ. Did Athanasius teach followers of Christ could become of the same substance as the Father, becoming close to the Father's very nature?
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FingersCrossed
Great thread! Marking for future reading