Jesus Denies being God
- Thread starter Flores
- Start date
Yo Jenyar,Eesh dude ... only a Christian can commit heresy. And even then, it would depend on the denomination. See, it`s pretty complicated. Understanding God should be simple. I find it simple. Inserting man made doctrine into the mix distances man from God. It leads to questions like:
Quote Jenyar
"It doesn't. Jesus was the Son and not the Father - He wasn't the God that the Jews knew, but neither was He the messiah they were expecting. He had to redefine their view of God before they could accept Him. That required teaching them to call God "Father", it required proving to them He was the messiah, and it required God himself to show with what authority Jesus came to do these things."
1. So was Jesus God or not?
2. If yes, who the hell was the Jewish god?
3. If no, who the hell was the Jewish god?
4. If he was the son of God, was he a lesser god?
5. Why did god need a son to intervene on his behalf?
6. Why the need to redifine an omnipotent god?
You see Jenyar it gets so murky as to engender doubt. The seeds of doubt require short, succinct, non-convoluted answers to satisfy the truth. And the truth should be simple.
Allcare.
:m:
What law states the truth should be simple? And what rule says God, of all things, should be simple? But here's your short succinct answers:Allcare said:
1. So was Jesus God or not?
He was the full representation of God on earth. So yes, but it's not an unqualifiedstatement.
2. If yes, who the hell was the Jewish god?
The same God, but with an incomplete understanding of His redemption.
3. If no, who the hell was the Jewish god?
See 2.
4. If he was the son of God, was he a lesser god?
He was no less "God" than your body is less "you", even thought it isn't all there is to you. There is only one God.
5. Why did god need a son to intervene on his behalf?
He came because we needed Him. Our sins were uniquely human, therefore God dealt with them in a uniquely human way. Before, faith meant that God would justify the righteous, now faith means believing that God had justified the righteous.
6. Why the need to redifine an omnipotent god?
Because like you, not many people realize that "omnipotence" doesn't describe who God is or what He does sufficiently.
Cool Jenyar,
Thanks for the response dude.
No law dude, just my humble opinion. When my kid asks me a question. I answer him so that he can understand. I do not want to confuse him. I love him. Get it?
Once again, my opinion only, but all the rationalisation needed to understand the Christian god and his book seems a bit hardcore. Kinda like its a strain to get your head around the dude. Seems unneccasary. To what purpose?
Anyways,
Quote:
"1. So was Jesus God or not?
He was the full representation of God on earth. So yes, but it's not an unqualifiedstatement."
So he kinda was, and he kinda was`nt god? See, is it YES or NO?
Quote:
"2. If yes, who the hell was the Jewish god?
The same God, but with an incomplete understanding of His redemption.
So god changes over time? O.K.
Quote:
"4. If he was the son of God, was he a lesser god?
He was no less "God" than your body is less "you", even thought it isn't all there is to you. There is only one God."
Why make the distinction? Why did the Jews not make this distinction with the same god, their god?
Quote:
"5. Why did god need a son to intervene on his behalf?
He came because we needed Him. Our sins were uniquely human, therefore God dealt with them in a uniquely human way. Before, faith meant that God would justify the righteous, now faith means believing that God had justified the righteous."
Who came? God or his son? Why did God not just intervene? We were made in his image. Uniquely human. Why was faith redefined? Upping the ante?
Quote:
"6. Why the need to redefine an omnipotent god?
Because like you, not many people realize that "omnipotence" doesn't describe who God is or what He does sufficiently."
Why is this god so hard to understand? (reading the OT helps)
Take it easy Jenyar.
Allcare.
:m:
Michael said:
What to you mean.??? Allah, Ellah is "Exalted above all, Only one worthy of worshiping". Only god is worthy of worshiping, and that's the meaning of the word. If you can't get the deep religious meaning behind "Only one worthy of worshiping", then you have a problem.
Let me clarify.
Satan can also be exalted above certain humans who choose to serve him. By serving Satan, you have placed yourself under Satan, but since god is exalted above all and the only one worth of worshiping, your Satanic efforts are not worthy, because Satan is under god and the only worship that is worthwhile is that of god.
Do you get it?
Michael said:
See my clarification above. We may choose to exalt anything above ourselves and make a god out of it, that being Satan, money, materials, ect....but we are informed that Allah is exalted above all these things and that he is the only one worthy of cause.
Michael said:
I think you don't know shit about Islam. For the past year that I have known you, you have been trying to confirm your ill conceptions about Islam and you continue to do such a thing so nicely. I hope you are satisfied with your own efforts to ignore Islam.
For your purposes, YES. But if that's as far as you are prepared to believe, you're in the same situation as the Old Tesament Jews.stretched said:
So he kinda was, and he kinda was`nt god? See, is it YES or NO?
No, people learn.
You explain that at one stage people thought the sun revolved around the earth, and today the earth revolves around the sun, not by saying the universe changes - but that we gained better understanding of it. See? Not so hard
As a matter of fact, they did - but they never explained it this way. Look up "God's Spirit" or "Holy Spirit" in the Old Testament. They had no trouble with it then, but because they think Christians mean something else by it, they have a problem with it today.
Once again: people always knew things fell towards earth, they even came close to calling it "gravity" - but until they understood more about it, it never meant "gravity" to them as it does to us.
That was the way God intervened. And as I explained somewhere else, faith meant believing that God would intervene. Now it means that we believe God did intervene. That's simplified a lot of course, but you have to start somewhere.
Some things are harder to understand than other. All you need to know is that He loves you, and that He wants you to know it.
No worries mate.
Have a nice weekend!
Jenyar said:
Don't you think, it's an overstretch to compare him to the old testament Jews? You have no idea about the constituents of his belief and to me he is a very simplistic clear minded dude. The OT jews were as complicated as things could get
Jenyar said:
You have a very twisted selfish convulted way of learning. One that have this crooked "chosed people" in it. Learn what and how? Excuse me, but god doesn't teach people in stages. People have a life span of 70 years. The message is one and unique and could be easily understood by the average bear that be Adam, Noah, Jesus, Bush. We don't learn as generations, we learn as individuals....we are born as individuals, we learn as individuals, we die as individuals, and we are judged as individuals. Based on this and for god to be just, the message has to be the same from the basement of time till now. The 2000 year old salvation king/son is not a universal message. It's a exlusive club doctrine created by a few who think that they are special.
Jenyar said:You explain that at one stage people thought the sun revolved around the earth, and today the earth revolves around the sun, not by saying the universe changes - but that we gained better understanding of it. See? Not so hard
Yet, the example you provide is an irrelevant matter. If I think that the sun revolved around my ass verses the earth, I'm not loosing anything, yet, when I think that my god is a blue eye Jesus and he is not, I'm in big trouble. What's the difference between the billions of people born before Jesus and the ones born after Jesus? Will god have two court rooms to judge each separately? Answer me this?
Jenyar, you don't have any truth. you only have a comfortable cozy illusion that is tricking your brain to think that you are safe. Get out of your cozy little cave, because it's not going to last long.
We learn as both. Individuals don't have to relearn everything their ancestors learned. If we could learn everything we have to know about God in one generation, we wouldn't need the Quran or the Bible.
My example was comletely relevant in the context of learning. You are arguing about what it is we learn. If I learn that my salvation isn't in my hands, but in God's capable hands, then that's significant to say the least. Whether it's technically correct to call a Spirit "Father" or, whether my mental picture of Jesus is accurate, is infintely less significant. But when I've realized that my salvation hasn't been earned, it becomes equally important for me to find out about the nature of that salvation - about God.
Is different depending on who one asks. PM has quite a different Islam then your Islam? Is that true? Can you, in brief, tell me logically what Islam is to you?Flores said:
I did only ask a question after all. A valid one I should think? If you can put yourself into the shoes of someone 1600 yr ago, someone who had always worshipped 3 gods and one day someone says - hey there's really just one god. The "one god" idea would probably seem like heresy/sacrilege. I’m sure to peoples that worshipped various gods - perhaps symbolized by a big square rock in the middle of a court yard - those people might have thought anything other than 3 gods was heresy. Even to the point of demanding that the person with the one-god idea bend his/her beliefs to theirs in order for them to help him/her in war. Hence the need to say "above all". Meaning above all other gods. That was my point. I’m sure if you look back in history you’ll find similar events taking place from day dot onward.
Notes on the topic
This is pretty cool. Okay, that's too obscure to explain.
Umm ... where to start?
We could start with the idea of Salvation or Redemption. Let's ask the Christians--What is the relationship between the crucifixion and Salvation?
Now, just to cover a general answer, it seems that many people note the classic, John, 3.16:
• "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." (RSV)
It's a good enough answer for now. Because the question becomes--How does the giving of the Son effect Salvation? What does the one have to do with the other?
And, of course, it's belief. Faith. But rarely discussed in contemporary American Christianity is how the one relates to the other.
In the past, there's been a plethora of theories:
• Ransom: That Christ was a "ransom" for humanity, which was held captive by the Devil.
• Satisfaction: Anselm of Canterbury, pseudo-feudal redemption.
• Moral-Influence: Abelard; a 12th-century response to Satisfaction; the capsule I'm looking at tells me no more than I remember from Russell's discussion of redemption issues; Abelard's contention that Christ's death was the ultimate expression of His love is popular even today, but it has been mutated many times throughout the ages.
• Socinianism: Never mind.
• Divine Justice: Can you tell this was pushed by a seventeenth-century lawyer? It's essentially a Sidney Cartier moment meant to substitute one death for another, though I will make at least the superficial comment that such an idea doesn't make sense if Christ "lives" in any sense, which He must do in order to have triumphed over death.
At any rate, perhaps discussion of the issue is rare, but it's not absent altogether. The page I'm looking at can be found here, and one can say what they want about the validity, as all I care to relate is the idea that there is no standard, orthodox response to the question of how exactly John 3.16 works.
And depending on how one views that salvation process, how one believes in their redemption through Jesus, all sorts of nasty complications can arise. Typically, the modern faith says to just have faith, don't worry about it. It's true: faith is a wonderful device for avoiding the issue.
But not everybody is satisfied with that condition, and neither is that corpus of unsatisfied seekers limited to critics, hecklers, and unbelievers.
The meaning of the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ has been an issue of contention since nearly the beginning. The Apostles themselves, obviously, said what they said, but that first generation afterward, that current running toward a larger institutional orthodoxy--from thirteen people witnessing together in secret to the Vatican--has dominated the Christian experience.
The answers to questions about the Crucifixion and Resurrection were vital to the ante-Nicene period, which culminated with a row between Arius and Athanasius. And while orthodoxy had stressed the humanity of Christ, when put to the test, the bishops sided with something else at Nicaea.
And vanity was cemented in what would become the Catholic and Protestant experience most of us are familiar with.
The idea that Christ was frightened out of his mind doesn't necessarily bother people today. In fact, some modern churches celebrate the idea. But a frail, vulnerable, human Christ was more than Athanasius could bear. His faith could not imagine that a mere human could carry the burden of resurrection.
I think for a moment of my teenage years; the local newspapers were littered with "teen advice" columns that were hilarious. I actually don't know anyone from that period who doesn't recall "Sidewinder," a seventeen year-old high school senior who got laughed at in the shower because his penis curved to the left. I even recall hearing from him on some random television show in the days before I had a television with remote control. Or cable. But in the middle of all that was a countervailing prudish streak; from "Dear Abby" to "Ask Beth" to ... I don't remember the magazine quiz my girlfriend's little sister was reading to me ... YM? Campus Life? Actually, the latter would be ... something just the far side of hilarious. At any rate, there were reminders almost constantly, it sometimes seemed, that fooling around might be fun, but you don't even have to have intercourse to get pregnant.
(Seriously, people ... if you're under 20 ... really, generations before you were raised on a steady stream of moralizing absurdities. You think the prudes are weird now?)
Yet this point about pregnancy is considered absurd when the Virgin Birth took place. Among the heretics were ideas that demanded the humanity of Jesus (as well as some that relied too heavily on His divinity, to be sure; but these only serve to remind of the diversity from which orthodoxy springs.) And it's all related to redemption and how the Crucifixion and Resurrection relate.
In modern times, Americans at least speak often of God's love, according to John 3.16, and the idea of a tremendous gift given through tremendous suffering.
This, too, demands a very human Savior.
Which is the problem with making Jesus equivalent to God. The Crucifixion and Resurrection become mere mechanical operations according to a script of necessity, and the significance of Christ's suffering is undermined.
Additionally, I wanted to note that the Revelation is not the best citation for the occasion:
I note the NAB introduction to the Revelation because the NAB is a Catholic book, and this teaching is in line with my Catholic school years, and also with two-thirds of my Lutheran experience at least. Issues of Christ's appearances outside the four Gospels have always been contentious , to my experience, to all but the most blindly faithful.
Nonetheless, all that doesn't necessarily make 1Dude's analysis of verses invalid. Rather, putting those verses against the topic verses, I think we see conflicting messages within the Bible that perhaps we might look to the faithful to help others resolve.
But in the case of the Revelation, even more than Paul, I read cautiously what Jesus says in visions. It's a matter of habit.
It seems a fair assertion to say that if these issues were easy to resolve, they would have been resolved at least at Nicaea, if not before.
Notes:
• New American Bible. See http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/index.htm
• The Bible, Revised Standard Version. See http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/rsv.browse.html
See Also:
• Dulle, Jason. "What is the Meaning of Christ's Death?" See http://www.apostolic.net/biblicalstudies/atonement.htm
Related Link:
• Phillip, T. V. "Obedience to the Heavenly Vision." See http://www.religion-online.org/cgi-bin/relsearchd.dll/showarticle?item_id=1547
This is pretty cool. Okay, that's too obscure to explain.
Umm ... where to start?
We could start with the idea of Salvation or Redemption. Let's ask the Christians--What is the relationship between the crucifixion and Salvation?
Now, just to cover a general answer, it seems that many people note the classic, John, 3.16:
• "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." (RSV)
It's a good enough answer for now. Because the question becomes--How does the giving of the Son effect Salvation? What does the one have to do with the other?
And, of course, it's belief. Faith. But rarely discussed in contemporary American Christianity is how the one relates to the other.
In the past, there's been a plethora of theories:
• Ransom: That Christ was a "ransom" for humanity, which was held captive by the Devil.
• Satisfaction: Anselm of Canterbury, pseudo-feudal redemption.
• Moral-Influence: Abelard; a 12th-century response to Satisfaction; the capsule I'm looking at tells me no more than I remember from Russell's discussion of redemption issues; Abelard's contention that Christ's death was the ultimate expression of His love is popular even today, but it has been mutated many times throughout the ages.
• Socinianism: Never mind.
• Divine Justice: Can you tell this was pushed by a seventeenth-century lawyer? It's essentially a Sidney Cartier moment meant to substitute one death for another, though I will make at least the superficial comment that such an idea doesn't make sense if Christ "lives" in any sense, which He must do in order to have triumphed over death.
At any rate, perhaps discussion of the issue is rare, but it's not absent altogether. The page I'm looking at can be found here, and one can say what they want about the validity, as all I care to relate is the idea that there is no standard, orthodox response to the question of how exactly John 3.16 works.
And depending on how one views that salvation process, how one believes in their redemption through Jesus, all sorts of nasty complications can arise. Typically, the modern faith says to just have faith, don't worry about it. It's true: faith is a wonderful device for avoiding the issue.
But not everybody is satisfied with that condition, and neither is that corpus of unsatisfied seekers limited to critics, hecklers, and unbelievers.
The meaning of the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ has been an issue of contention since nearly the beginning. The Apostles themselves, obviously, said what they said, but that first generation afterward, that current running toward a larger institutional orthodoxy--from thirteen people witnessing together in secret to the Vatican--has dominated the Christian experience.
The answers to questions about the Crucifixion and Resurrection were vital to the ante-Nicene period, which culminated with a row between Arius and Athanasius. And while orthodoxy had stressed the humanity of Christ, when put to the test, the bishops sided with something else at Nicaea.
And vanity was cemented in what would become the Catholic and Protestant experience most of us are familiar with.
The idea that Christ was frightened out of his mind doesn't necessarily bother people today. In fact, some modern churches celebrate the idea. But a frail, vulnerable, human Christ was more than Athanasius could bear. His faith could not imagine that a mere human could carry the burden of resurrection.
I think for a moment of my teenage years; the local newspapers were littered with "teen advice" columns that were hilarious. I actually don't know anyone from that period who doesn't recall "Sidewinder," a seventeen year-old high school senior who got laughed at in the shower because his penis curved to the left. I even recall hearing from him on some random television show in the days before I had a television with remote control. Or cable. But in the middle of all that was a countervailing prudish streak; from "Dear Abby" to "Ask Beth" to ... I don't remember the magazine quiz my girlfriend's little sister was reading to me ... YM? Campus Life? Actually, the latter would be ... something just the far side of hilarious. At any rate, there were reminders almost constantly, it sometimes seemed, that fooling around might be fun, but you don't even have to have intercourse to get pregnant.
(Seriously, people ... if you're under 20 ... really, generations before you were raised on a steady stream of moralizing absurdities. You think the prudes are weird now?)
Yet this point about pregnancy is considered absurd when the Virgin Birth took place. Among the heretics were ideas that demanded the humanity of Jesus (as well as some that relied too heavily on His divinity, to be sure; but these only serve to remind of the diversity from which orthodoxy springs.) And it's all related to redemption and how the Crucifixion and Resurrection relate.
In modern times, Americans at least speak often of God's love, according to John 3.16, and the idea of a tremendous gift given through tremendous suffering.
This, too, demands a very human Savior.
Which is the problem with making Jesus equivalent to God. The Crucifixion and Resurrection become mere mechanical operations according to a script of necessity, and the significance of Christ's suffering is undermined.
Additionally, I wanted to note that the Revelation is not the best citation for the occasion:
And the words which were revealed, while they do claim Jesus' divinity, hearken back to Isaiah, including the very 44.6 already on record.
I note the NAB introduction to the Revelation because the NAB is a Catholic book, and this teaching is in line with my Catholic school years, and also with two-thirds of my Lutheran experience at least. Issues of Christ's appearances outside the four Gospels have always been contentious , to my experience, to all but the most blindly faithful.
Nonetheless, all that doesn't necessarily make 1Dude's analysis of verses invalid. Rather, putting those verses against the topic verses, I think we see conflicting messages within the Bible that perhaps we might look to the faithful to help others resolve.
But in the case of the Revelation, even more than Paul, I read cautiously what Jesus says in visions. It's a matter of habit.
It seems a fair assertion to say that if these issues were easy to resolve, they would have been resolved at least at Nicaea, if not before.
Notes:
• New American Bible. See http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/index.htm
• The Bible, Revised Standard Version. See http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/rsv.browse.html
See Also:
• Dulle, Jason. "What is the Meaning of Christ's Death?" See http://www.apostolic.net/biblicalstudies/atonement.htm
Related Link:
• Phillip, T. V. "Obedience to the Heavenly Vision." See http://www.religion-online.org/cgi-bin/relsearchd.dll/showarticle?item_id=1547
Yo Jenyar,(I had a great weekend thanks sport!)
Jenyar, I think trying to understand the Christian god and reconciling all the shite in the good book to a LOVING, COMPASSIONATE and OMNIPOTENT god is like trying to force a square peg into a round hole. You can get it in, but it does`t fit.
Let`s go back briefly.
Quote:
S -1. So was Jesus God or not?
J - He was the full representation of God on earth. So yes, but it's not an unqualifiedstatement."
S - So he kinda was, and he kinda was`nt god? See, is it YES or NO?
J - For your purposes, YES. But if that's as far as you are prepared to believe, you're in the same situation as the Old Tesament Jews.
Yo dude, the OT Jews, and Jews today had their (very valid) reasons for denying the divinity of Jesus. In a nutshell - What Jews believe:
"We do not believe that it is prophesied that the Messiah will be crucified. We do not believe that the Messiah will be the son of G-d. We do not believe that he will be raised from the dead any more than anyone else. We do not believe that he will appear twice, in what some Christians call a second coming. We do not believe that the Messiah will be our "savior" in the sense that he will redeem us from our sins."
Now why do they believe that?
"These are all fascinating claims to make concerning anyone, but they are all irrelevant to the Messiah for whom the Jews have awaited these three thousand years. None of these things are prophesied in the Jewish Bible."
Excerpts respectfully plagiarised from: http://www.beingjewish.com/toshuv/whynotbrief.html
So now Jenyar, I have to ask you: If Jesus is God (for my purposes) is Jesus the God of the OT?
If Jesus is the God of the OT why are the prophesies (particularly the second coming) not in the Torah? If one is after the truth these questions cannot be swept under the carpet or square pegged.
Quote:
S - 2. If yes, who the hell was the Jewish god?
J - The same God, but with an incomplete understanding of His redemption.
S - So god changes over time? O.K.
J - No, people learn.
You explain that at one stage people thought the sun revolved around the earth, and today the earth revolves around the sun, not by saying the universe changes - but that we gained better understanding of it. See? Not so hard.
Nope Jenyar, the Jews still understand their (unchanging) God and the Torah 100%, this is just an example of the unnecassary convolution of Christian doctrine to make it fit the shoe. Remember that Copernicus was almost burnt on a Christian stake for his sun heresy. The dark ages embraced the OT and NT. Better understanding, my sweet candy ass!
Quote:
S - Why make the distinction? Why did the Jews not make this distinction with the same god, their god?
J - As a matter of fact, they did - but they never explained it this way. Look up "God's Spirit" or "Holy Spirit" in the Old Testament. They had no trouble with it then, but because they think Christians mean something else by it, they have a problem with it today.
They MAY not have had any trouble then, as it only became doctrine in the 4th century, but they have GOOD reason to have trouble with it today.
From: http://www.ohr.org.il/ask/ask00j.htm (thanks rabbi dude)
"The Christian idea of a trinity contradicts the most basic tenet of Judaism - that G-d is One. Jews have declared their belief in a single unified G-d twice daily ever since the giving of the Torah at Sinai - almost two thousand years before Christianity.
The trinity suggests a three part deity: The Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost (Matthew 28:19).
In Jewish law, worship of a three-part god is considered idolatry; one of the three cardinal sins for which a person should rather give up his life than transgress. The idea of the trinity is absolutely incompatible with Judaism."
And Jenyar, I suppose all these questions can go away if you dudes can lose that embarrasing OT. But there you have it.
Quote:
S - Why is this god so hard to understand? (reading the OT helps)
J - Some things are harder to understand than other. All you need to know is that He loves you, and that He wants you to know it.
That`s the point mate, I KNOW my god loves me, but I don`t have to love the OT god that man made, or try to rationalise his VERY scary and human traits. My god needs no name, book, cross or building.
Allcare.
:m:
I don't think you've understood me yet. Our emphasis have changed. Most specifically, it has changed from an environment of spiritual and physical survival to one of spiritual and physical prospering. You're not talking about reconciliation, you're talking about explaining away, which we're not. You'll have to deny that God ever showed compassion in the Old Testament, or that He ever had compassion in mind when He made His covenants. Like, JustARide, you'll have to believe that God is a tyrant and nothing less. You'll have to take out the whole book of Psalms, for that matter.
... there is no disconnect here between the Testaments. The God of the Old Testament is the same as the one we read about in the New. He is a God of love as well as a holy God who judges evil people. As we read from Genesis to Revelation, we see not a character change but an unfolding story of God's great victory over sin, evil, and death. This takes place through mighty acts of justice?that is, again and again, acts of retributive judgment. Goodness and severity go together in this story.
...From Genesis to Revelation, God's character remains consistent. He is a loving, powerful, holy judge?and warrior against evil?from beginning to end.
- Christianity today article: the God of Warhttp://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2003/005/30.62.html
...From Genesis to Revelation, God's character remains consistent. He is a loving, powerful, holy judge?and warrior against evil?from beginning to end.
- Christianity today article: the God of Warhttp://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2003/005/30.62.html
You honestly also have to ask whether this is what they've always believed, or do they just believe it in comparison to Jesus? According to this quote, they are willing to expect things from people (their messiahs, wounded healers, good shepherds, kings, priests, prophets, etc.) that they won't accept from God himself. They depend on priests and sacrifices to atone for their sins, while it's God who suffers them, and it's God who forgives them. That's quite troubling in the context of faith.
This is also from a Jewish source (Zohar):
"`He was wounded for our transgressions,' etc....There is in the Garden of Eden a palace called the Palace of the Sons of Sickness; this palace the Messiah then enters, and summons every sickness, every pain, and every chastisement of Israel; they all come and rest upon him. And were it not that he had thus lightened them off Israel and taken them upon himself, there had been no man able to bear Israel's chastisements for the transgression of the law: and this is that which is written, `Surely our sicknesses he hath carried.'"
"Irrelevant"?, I think not... and if you look at Isaiah's prophecies about Israel, it's hard not to see why first century Jews saw in Jesus their messiah, and much more:53:6 -- Messiah would carry away our iniquities.
53:8. -- he would die childless for the transgressions of Israel
53:12 -- he would pour out his life unto death to intercede for transgressors
53:10 -- His life would be a guilt offering
53:11 -- he would be raised from the dead.
Apart from this, from Isaiah 59:17, 63:5, 43:11, and 49:26, it's clear that God himself is personally working their salvation. So essentially the Jews have the same problem you have with Christianity: if the messiah will intercede for their transgression, and at the same time it's something only God can do, clearly they're ignoring something for the sake of denying Jesus.
You should have a look at these Messianic and Apocalyptic Biblical texts. Jesus is not only the messiah, He is many things beside, all of which appear in the OT. To the Jews, there is no "second coming", because they are still waiting for the first. He came first to fulfill the law and to be recognized as the messiah, and to tel us He will come again. Obviously, if you don't believe Jesus was genuine you wouldn't hear those words.
Read here: Dead Messiah's who don't return for more relevant material.
That's obviously based on the misunderstanding (or wilfull obstinance) of the fact that Christians believe in three gods. We don't, and we never have. We believe it's the same God who does all these things. Not Jesus, not the Holy Spirit, not even the Father - but God himself. We are simply forced to reconcile our understanding about a "triune God", because we can't see around corners. That doesn't mean God shares our limitations.
Isaiah 45
23 By myself I have sworn,
my mouth has uttered in all integrity
a word that will not be revoked:
Before me every knee will bow;
by me every tongue will swear.
Now tell me, aren't God's words still part of Him, even if they cannot be revoked? Do you think God's words become sound waves and disappear, or do they stay part of Him, living, forever?
You mean, you don't have to be afraid of him? How convienient.
Michael said:
Islam to me is not a cookie cutter or a set of spoken words that I can preach to another. It's a private nourished jealous relationship that I have with a creator....Noone, no matter how close to me is allowed to be involved, tamper, or interfere with that relationship, and because of that, it's impossible to impart information about my relationship to another soul.
If you ask me to justify to you why I love my husband, I might be able to come up with some pointers, but the full picture will always remain with me. My relationship with god is much more private and complex.
Although that's what some like to believe, that's not what I'm saying at all. But believing in a God who has no power to be just isn't faith at all - it's just convenient, as I said. "Don't fear people, who can only kill your body, but fear God, who is able to judge you eternally".stretched said:
God is love, but that doesn't mean he has to love evil, or even tolerate it.
Yo Jenyar,
I think what you mean is you are "God fearing" You have a healthy dose of respect for God. That I can dig. Bit if God is love...there is no place for fear of any description. Not fear of judgement. Not fear of eternal fire. Not fear of death. The God of the OT is certainly "fearful". That is why I cannot regard the OT as anything else but a tribal history, complete with man made tribal god.
Regarding evil. Bottom line, if indeed god created us in his image, we were created complete, with evil. Human nature has an inherent evil side. God given. God is compelled to tolerate what he has created. The task for us is to strike the balance towards the light. Our journey is an ongoing pursuit of improvement in the good. The knowledge of the "good" is also god given. It is up to us.
Allcare.
I think what you mean is you are "God fearing" You have a healthy dose of respect for God. That I can dig. Bit if God is love...there is no place for fear of any description. Not fear of judgement. Not fear of eternal fire. Not fear of death. The God of the OT is certainly "fearful". That is why I cannot regard the OT as anything else but a tribal history, complete with man made tribal god.
Regarding evil. Bottom line, if indeed god created us in his image, we were created complete, with evil. Human nature has an inherent evil side. God given. God is compelled to tolerate what he has created. The task for us is to strike the balance towards the light. Our journey is an ongoing pursuit of improvement in the good. The knowledge of the "good" is also god given. It is up to us.
Allcare.
This might help to clarify it for you:
The only reason for fear is if we place ourselves outside God's grace. "Respect" doesn't really describe it. Sure, you respect the judge who is about to decide your guilt or innocence, but that respect easily becomes fear if you know you are guilty. The reason why it's called "fear of God" is because the opposite, no fear of God, is a symptom of sin; the false feeling that "God can't touch you".
Surely you won't say that we all were born with the need to jump over cliffs, and we just have to balance that with the need not to? Actualy, that's a possibility Freud explored (thanatos), but that doesn't mean we are born half dead and half alive - only that we get to choose. The same is true for evil - even though the possiblity is there, and we should choose between good and evil, it doesn't mean we are just as evil as we are good. It comes down to the same decision: life or death. Only, we can choose death easily enough, but choosing life is impossible without God making it possible.
"The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished..." (Ex.34:6)
You can be perfectly good and still sin. We were not created with a "balance between good and evil", but good, with the freedom to act independently. It doesn't mean we are created or born knowing evil, just that when we dabble in it we lose our label of being "good".The only reason for fear is if we place ourselves outside God's grace. "Respect" doesn't really describe it. Sure, you respect the judge who is about to decide your guilt or innocence, but that respect easily becomes fear if you know you are guilty. The reason why it's called "fear of God" is because the opposite, no fear of God, is a symptom of sin; the false feeling that "God can't touch you".
Surely you won't say that we all were born with the need to jump over cliffs, and we just have to balance that with the need not to? Actualy, that's a possibility Freud explored (thanatos), but that doesn't mean we are born half dead and half alive - only that we get to choose. The same is true for evil - even though the possiblity is there, and we should choose between good and evil, it doesn't mean we are just as evil as we are good. It comes down to the same decision: life or death. Only, we can choose death easily enough, but choosing life is impossible without God making it possible.
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