by booker-t 251 Replies latest watchtower scandals
Find something worthy of your time and effort that will benefit your life. This isn't it.
And now....back to my own life which is, thankfully now devoid of the above cast of characters....
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Has Terry found something deep, meaningful and WORTHY of the effort that will actually benefit his life?
Kenneson,
In Rev. 19:9-10 an angel refuses worship from John. Yet in Heb. 1:6 are we to imagine that all the other angels are told by God to worship an archangel? I doubt it.
The New Jerusalem Bible translates Heb.1:6 this way: ""Again, when he brings the First-born into the world, he says: Let all the angels of God pay him homage." The Blue Letter Bible site's Lexicon gave this list of meanings for Strong's # 4352 translated as "homage" in the NJB and "worship" in other Bibles.
1) to kiss the hand to (towards) one, in token of reverence
2) among the Orientals, esp. the Persians, to fall upon the knees and touch the ground with the forehead as an expression of profound reverence
3) in the NT by kneeling or prostration to do homage (to one) or make obeisance, whether in order to express respect or to make supplication
a) used of homage shown to men and beings of superior rank
1) to the Jewish high priests
2) to God
3) to Christ
4) to heavenly beings
5) to demons
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In the parable of The Unforgiving Servant, the King James and the New King James translate Matthew 18:26 this way:
KJ - "The servant therefore fell down, and worshipped [Strong's #4352] him, saying, Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all."
NKJ- "The servant therefore fell down before him, saying, 'Master, have patience with me, and I will pay you all."
The NKJ has changed "fell down and worshipped" to "fell down before him", yet the interlinear traslation for that verse contains the same Greek word, the same Strongs # .
My point? The word translated as worship can also mean homage, or to bow down, just as the New Jerusalem Bible uses it and therefore I do not believe in any way whatsoever that the Apostle Paul was saying the angels worshipped Jesus in the same way they worship God but rather they paid homage to Jesus. To worship Jesus as we woship God would go contrary to what Jesus taught his disciples and to what the entire OT teaches.
The greater weight of scripture must be allowed to stand and to help us interpret those individual scriptures which can be translated differently. Not the other way around. In my opinion.
Sabrina
Through one man sin entered the world and through another the basis for forgiveness of sin . Jesus was the perpetual sacrifice for sin and abolished the mosaic law covenant with his sacrifice for all mankind .
Why do you throw this line in? I fail to see where it has anything to do wth the issue at hand of whether Michael is Jesus. By throwing in some undisputed and unrelated statement is that supposed to now give strength or credibility to the Jesus and Michael discussion?
Either way, the house or rather should I say shack or shanty of an argument that Michael is Jesus seems to be built on a mound of sand. Requires reading things into the bible which don't exist, making dozens of assumptions and ignoring other aspects of the bible which are written. It strikes me as the same type of attempt that WT used to select dates for Armaggedon - reading things in the bible which aren' there and ignoring others which are just because they wanted people to believe there version. Why the desperate attempt with Michael and Jesus to do so when it seems so unimportant and unpivotol? Is it solely just to refute a trinity doctrine?
Happy Guy,
Either way, the house or rather should I say shack or shanty of an argument that Michael is Jesus seems to be built on a mound of sand.
I have respected your views and your beliefs though I may not share all of them. I believe the best thing is to explain ourselves as best we can and with whatever scriptural support we may have.
I don't think it's right to characterize another's belief as a "shack or shanty of an argument." If we don't agree we don't agree. There is nothing new under the sun and divergent religious views will continue until Jesus arrives.
Respectfully,
Sabrina
Your right GPTSM
I was characterizing the argument but it was not my intent for it to be interpreted as a characterization of the individual. Please accept my apologies.
Hi Happy Guy,
Thank you so much.
There are some who on Bible discussions make derogatory remarks about everything and to those I am trying to remain silent. But when it comes to those like you and me and others on this thread who have an interest in Bible topics and are willing to discuss it, it means so much to be able to discuss among friends.
Still with even greater respect,
Sabrina
Ellderwho,You still do not answer the question what happened to Michael in heaven?
Or better yet what came down from heaven?
Michael comes and goes from heaven at God's direction, he might have been there with Mary and Joseph at the birth for all we know, but if It was Michael being born on earth then, wouldn't the angel that visited Mary before conception(?) tell Mary to call him Michael (archangel[ with us])instead of Emmanuel?(God with us)
You misunderstand me.
I do not hold that Michael and Jesus are the same personage.
What Im trying to do is to get Sabrina to think.
With this in mind, through out the scriptual approach. Lets break it down into terms that allows her to think about how the mechanics of her argument works or does not.
This takes her down a road less traveled by the witness. She is not familiar with looking at her position from other angels.
She has yet to tackle the thought of Michael "willing" himself out of existance (wt position) which is either suicide on Michaels part or murder on Gods part. you pick.
Further who is it that rose from the dead, Michael or Jesus?
And what is that entities description, man or angel?
To worship Jesus as we woship God would go contrary to what Jesus taught his disciples and to what the entire OT teaches.
Rev. 5:12 the Lamb that is in the midst of the throne gets whorship and a whole lot more.
Terry....At least for my part, I am not arguing for any existential reality to the concepts expressed in these ancient texts; I'm only interested in what concepts these texts might express, just as one would interpret the sources and concepts in Shakespeare, Sophocles, or the Upanishads.
leolaia -- who exactly is it that gives these books you keep mentioning that are not in the bible the credit that they are authentic . I do agree with Terry on the point that the apostates were in charge of authenticating the scriptures but I've also seen evidence that they were thorough on what was official and not.
heathen....Well, for one, Jude does vouch for 1 Enoch as being legitimate, referring to the passage he quotes as "prophecy" (v. 14), which automatically means he considers it to be divinely inspired. Since Jude is canonical "scripture," and since you approach the Bible as a globalizing whole, the "Bible" would then treat 1 Enoch as inspired prophecy.
Sabrina....The problem is that your interpretation of Revelation 12 is not grounded in actually attested motifs and allusions but in stipulative suppositions ("this may be"..."at Christ's crucifixion possibly"..."could very well be"...etc.), just the same manner as the Society interprets Revelation arbitrarily in the Revelation Climax book. A more faithful interpretation would be one that considers what the tropes and motifs meant at the time by their attestation and use in prophetic and apocalyptic literature; thus, the allusion to the "male child who is to rule the nations with an iron sceptre" is a very specific reference to the Messiah, as it was widely attested with this meaning. You are correct about the "woman" signifying either Israel or spiritual Israel, as this is also a commonplace of OT and apocalyptic literature (as well as the twelve stars being an allusion to the twelve tribes, as the same motif has this application in a dream vision in Genesis), and the persecution of the woman recalls the persecution of the Jews or Christians in the respective eras. The problem that I was pointing out, which is being overlooked, is that Michael and the Messiah child are being distinguished because in the same scene one is defending the other against the dragon. The logic of the scene does not work by conflating one with the other. One must also not insist that Michael is conceived as being Jesus because only Jesus can fight and defeat the dragon and his angels; in Daniel, Michael defeats the kingdoms ruled by the other angelic princes, in 1 Enoch, Michael binds the leading rebel angel under the rocks of the earth until Judgment Day, and finally in the War Scroll Michael has just this role of fighting against the forces of darkness. Rather, Michael fights on the behalf of the Messiah, protecting him and his people (the woman) at a time when they are most vulnerable.
And while Revelation 12 is somewhat ambiguous because of the language of the apoacyptic genre, there is no equivocation in Hebrews 1 which is specifically designed to deny any angel christology for Jesus.
May I begin by saying that I respect and appreciate all those posting on this board, and by no means wish to insult or offend anyone. It is a blessing that we have an open forum where we can discuss at great length topics such as this from so many different angles--I appreciate all of your (pl) input, and am interested in how the discussion proceeds.
Happy Guy, you said,"By the same token and without being facetious I find your logic ridiculous. To suggest that Jesus did not really mean what he was saying that there was no meaning or depth to it but rather he was mindlessly attempting to regurgitate scripture without any actually meaning behind it is really reaching."
I am not suggesting this at all. "Recalling," "echoing," or even "quoting" do not constitute mindless regurgitation in my view.
"The bible says that Jesus said this just before he died. It is a significant statement as it indicates Jesus' fear. Why would you want to deny that this happened?"
Two gospels do report that this is what he said near the moment he died. Both gospel writers also report that this led to a confusion that Jesus was thought to have been calling Elijah. That it was an impassioned thing to say at that moment I don't doubt--knowledgeable bystanders could even have concluded that his plight was similar to that of David's in hiding, wherein each man felt himself forsaken and alone. Fear might well be a natural outgrowth of that emotion. But The Text Does Not Say Jesus Was Afraid. So then, why is it not an interpolation to say that Jesus must have been afraid, especially since you wisely warn against positing "that [the text] says things that it actually does not say"?
And as I have already pointed out, I am not arguing that Jesus and Michael are the same entity, persona, or character, fleshly or otherwise. I think a sophisticated understanding of the Scriptures explores with critical methods that don't add to the Scriptures, nor takes away. Of all people I can assure you I am committed to keeping within the text! Leolaia's input has been extremely valuable as it shows that other texts, which almost certainly were source material and widely disseminated at the time, can enhance understanding of the scant occurrences there are for mention of Michael. As best I can tell, those references seem to point to the fact that Jesus and Michael were not imagined by the Bible writers (or Jesus, if you wish to take that liberty) to be one and the same. Nowhere does Jesus say, I am Michael. No writer says, Michael and Jesus are the same. If to say so becomes (or did become) a necessity theologically, which hearkens back to my question to Sabrina, then so be it. I think the *reason* for the disagreement might help us to understand the issue better.
As always, offered with the utmost respect.
