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Open Conversation Part 1

Nate

So I’ve decided to bring the “Kathy” series to an end. However, we’ve had some fun in those threads when the conversation has gone off into interesting tangents, so I’d like to keep that part of it going for anyone who’s interested. These new threads will no longer focus on Kathy or the things we were discussing with her. So thanks for your time, Kathy! Take care.

There are no real rules for these threads. But to kick off the conversation, I’ll go back to the discussion on Paul that a few of us were having. Laurie views Deut 13 as a prophecy about Paul, so why don’t we take a quick look at it?

“If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, 2 and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’ 3 you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. 4 You shall walk after the Lord your God and fear him and keep his commandments and obey his voice, and you shall serve him and hold fast to him. 5 But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has taught rebellion against the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of slavery, to make you leave the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

6 “If your brother, the son of your mother, or your son or your daughter or the wife you embrace or your friend who is as your own soul entices you secretly, saying, ‘Let us go and serve other gods,’ which neither you nor your fathers have known, 7 some of the gods of the peoples who are around you, whether near you or far off from you, from the one end of the earth to the other, 8 you shall not yield to him or listen to him, nor shall your eye pity him, nor shall you spare him, nor shall you conceal him. 9 But you shall kill him. Your hand shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. 10 You shall stone him to death with stones, because he sought to draw you away from the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. 11 And all Israel shall hear and fear and never again do any such wickedness as this among you.

12 “If you hear in one of your cities, which the Lord your God is giving you to dwell there, 13 that certain worthless fellows have gone out among you and have drawn away the inhabitants of their city, saying, ‘Let us go and serve other gods,’ which you have not known, 14 then you shall inquire and make search and ask diligently. And behold, if it be true and certain that such an abomination has been done among you, 15 you shall surely put the inhabitants of that city to the sword, devoting it to destruction, all who are in it and its cattle, with the edge of the sword. 16 You shall gather all its spoil into the midst of its open square and burn the city and all its spoil with fire, as a whole burnt offering to the Lord your God. It shall be a heap forever. It shall not be built again. 17 None of the devoted things shall stick to your hand, that the Lord may turn from the fierceness of his anger and show you mercy and have compassion on you and multiply you, as he swore to your fathers, 18 if you obey the voice of the Lord your God, keeping all his commandments that I am commanding you today, and doing what is right in the sight of the Lord your God.

I can see how one could apply this to Paul. However, I can also see how Jews could have applied it to Jesus as well, especially if he was claiming divinity for himself. And I’m sure this could have applied to lots of people during Israel’s history. Why should we think it’s pointing to Paul specifically, and why wouldn’t it also apply to Jesus?

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Published by Nate

1,090 thoughts on “Open Conversation Part 1”

  2. Good morning everybody!

    Laurie,

    You’ll forgive me for being…ambivalent about this response?

    Because Paul’s new religion was growing so fast, Luke probably new his book would eventually be destroyed if it didn’t fit in with his theology. When the bible was canonized, some books made the cut and others didn’t. Martin Luther also fought to remove books from the canon. In his 1522 bible he placed James, Jude, Revelation, and Hebrews at the back with a detailed discription of why they were not inspired. Basically because he felt that they went against Paul’s writings.

    The author of Acts wasn’t writing a book per se. I don’t get a sense that the author thought his letter to Theophilus, whoever that was, would ever be a part of a broader canon. Perhaps because there was no canon at the time? Are you suggesting that the author saw into the future that there would be a canon? And that this canon would be centered around the teachings of Paul?

    Why would, if Paul was the false prophet, the author not seek to shut the movement down instead of allowing it to grow? There was much disagreement, as has been documented, among early Christians. It wasn’t a cohesive, unified, organization. Why not set the record straight, once and for all?

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  3. I’d also like to know how and why people like Luther considered themselves authorities on what was and wasn’t inspired? He believed that reason could not lead people to God and that the only way you could learn about God was through divine revelation.

    If you look at this through a neurological lens, what Luther was saying was that in order to know God you must deactivate or atrophy most of the neural circuitry in the newest part of your brain.

    I should add, Luther had disdain for the Jews and called them “the Devil’s people”. Like Hitler, he believed they should be slain.

    So Paul believed he had divine revelation and Luther did as well. How do modern day believers discern?

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  5. “I don’t suppose they’d give me my money back now …”
    I kinda doubt it, Dave – see, that was your problem, even if they’d found it, what do you got? – a bunch of old, rotten wood and fossilized animal manure. Now I donate to the UFO Encounter Project, and when they finally find one, I get free saucer rides and rectal probes – it’s where ALL the smart money’s going —

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  6. Check out the part in Gilgamesh, Dave, where old Utinapishtim disemb-arks and offers a sacrifice – he said that the gods swarmed around it like flies, when they “smelled the sweet savor.” Then check out Gen 8:21: “And the Lord smelled the sweet savor….” – they didn’t even bother to change the wording.

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  7. “I get free saucer rides and rectal probes. .. ” Guffaw!!

    Just WHERE do you get this stuff, arch?

    Oh, MY. . . .hand slap to desk. .. 🙂

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  8. “Good morning everybody!” – Bah! Humbug! And most importantly, Bazzfazz!

    “…Theophilus, whoever that was</em" – there have been a couple of actual, historical people named Theophilus, but it may also have been metaphorical, as "Theophilus," in Greek, literally means, "friend of god."

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  9. Messiah spoke a lot about the evil shepards who would lead his people away. I believe that at the time this was written Paul’s group was growing pretty rapidly, and could have been concern over his letter being discarded by the enemy. At this point the only people who were going to benefit from his letter, were people following Paul. There was already a lot of discussion over the false apostles at this time. John the revelator recorded that those is Ephesus found out who those false apostles were. Then Paul says “all those in Asia have turned away from me”. Ephesus wad the capital of Asia. So now it makes great sense, that Paul would call the true apostles false brethren in Galatians 2 and 2 Corinthians 11. He was constantly calling attention to HIS new gospel. If anyone preaches a different gospel or a different Jesus’s, let him be accursed.

    Interesting how Paul cursed people, and delivered them to Satan for the tormenting of the flesh. He believed that a messenger of Satan was sent to keep him from being prideful, a thorn in his flesh. So according to Paul, Lucifer works for YHWH.

    Yes, Luther was very anti-Semitic. He got that from Paul, who called his people The mutilators. It was a lot easier to deceive the goyim then the Jews, so he became hostile to his people.

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  10. Messiah spoke a lot about the evil shepards who would lead his people away.”

    Laurie, do you consider us evil? We have no shepherds, and neither do we consider ourselves shepherds, yet we have discussions that have caused people to question their once unquestioned faith in the god of Abraham.

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  11. No! The scriptures ate very symbolic, a wicked shepard is someone who claims to serve YHWH like the Pharisees, but is teaching false doctrine. The same goes for a wolf in sheep’s clothing, looks like a sheep (follower of the Way) but isn’t. A woman represents a church, if its dressed in white (or called the bride) it is describing the true church, and if it is scarlet, it represents the false church (which is most common). This can be seen all through out scripture, but is most prominent in the Revelation.

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  13. Laurie, thanks for your clarification. I am curious though. How do you discern which scriptures are divinely inspired and which are not? And there is this issue with the Pentateuch. Even conservative Rabbis states that they are works of fiction.

    Rabbi David Wolpe:

    “The rejection of the Bible as literally true is more or less settled and understood among most Conservative rabbis.”

    Professor Magen Broshi, head Archaeologist at the Israel Museum:

    “I think there is no serious scholar in Israel or in the world who does not accept this position. Archaeologists simply do not take the trouble of bringing their discoveries to public attention.”

    World’s leading biblical archaeologist, Prof. Ze’ev Herzog, states::

    “The patriarchs’ acts are legendary stories. The Israelites were never in Egypt, did not wander in the desert, did not conquer the land in a military campaign and did not pass it on to the 12 tribes of Israel. Most of those who are engaged in scientific work in the interlocking spheres of the Bible, archaeology and the history of the Jewish people and who once went into the field looking for proof to corroborate the Bible story now agree that the historic events relating to the stages of the Jewish people’s emergence are radically different from what that story tells.”

    Source

    ———————————

    Another question: I know you don’t believe in hell. But do you believe that someone who doesn’t believe in YHWH or submits to and obeys your god is destine to the same fate as those you label wicked and evil?

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  14. Arch, the ark encounter project is not a search for the ark, it’s ken ham’s project to build a life size ark in kentucky. (I’m embarrassed to admit it now but I used to be a big fan of AIG). Supposedly contributors get their name on a plaque or something. If they ever get it built ill have to sneak on and cross my name out. Your much better off investing in flying saucer rides.

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  16. @Howie:

    You’re certainly right that Christians don’t all agree on what the universal moral law should be. In fact, the biggest issue facing the church today is the question of gay marriage, and there are Christians on both sides. But, even if we disagree about what the law should be, we agree there is a law.

    Looking back I wish I had a better term than “anti-Paul sect” because that does sound like I’m assuming too much about Laurie’s views. It was intended to reference the idea that Paul was false and since this is breaking off of mainstream Christianity it meets the sociological definition of a sect. There’s probably a better way to refer to this specific idea. And, maybe Laurie should be the one to decide what it is instead of me. 🙂

    Unity is really important to me too, and unfortunately Christianity is rife with ugly disputes over doctrine. This was a huge turnoff for me all of my life from being in a fundamentalist home until deconverting and even now. I applaud the peaceful environment that the Unitarian Universalists have created, but it seems the cost is quite significant. At least from my perspective (and I could be wrong) their assembly can never be a substantive confession of faith, so they must drain the essence of religions and make them look like inspirational literature, virtually as fictional novels. Maybe that’s what religions should be if they are all false.

    A confession of faith by nature is a breaking away with the whole of humanity who don’t believe. Some postmodern thinkers have gone as far as to suggest that any truth claim at all is essentially hostile and militating. I happen to think there’s something true about this, but it doesn’t need to change how we view and treat each other. Christians can express ecumenism, interfaith respect, and promote an environment of inquiry and spiritual growth, in other words, without mind control and authoritative decrees. But, here in Murica we tend to hear about the scandals, the hate, the tribalism, the cultures wars, the anti-intellectualism, the petty infighting and so on. I wish this wasn’t the case. No matter how different our beliefs are from other groups, Christians should primarily be governed by love for our neighbors.

    I’m just thinking out loud at this point!

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  18. Laurie, way back before we got on the subject of spanking, I posted a couple of questions for you and I don’t think you ever answered. I could be mistaken as you have posted numerous scriptures and comments about your beliefs, but I don’t feel my particular ones were addressed. I could be mistaken and if so, perhaps you can point me to your answer? Thx.

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  19. Dave, you remember that little window that was on the ark? There was only one on the heavenly blueprints (Gen 6:16), and it was only 1 cubit (18 inches) square, and closed for the majority of the time.

    8:5, “And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month, on the first day of the month, were the tops of the mountains seen.”

    Are you keeping count? They have now been cooped up for eight months, with either two or seven, depending on whom you believe, of every animal in the world.

    8:6, “And it came to pass at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made:”

    So if you’re not too busy, let’s talk for a moment about cows.

    Cows munch mostly grass and hay – yet they grow big and hefty. Why? Because of the rumen, the first and largest of a cow’s four stomachs. The rumen holds 160 liters (42 gallons) of food and billions of microbes. These microscopic bacteria and protozoa (single-celled organisms that reproduce by dividing) break down cellulose (plant-wall substance) and fiber into digestible nutrients. “A cow couldn’t live without its microbes,” says animal nutrition expert Dr. Floyd Byers of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

    But as the microbes digest cellulose, they release methane. The process, called enteric fermentation, occurs in all animals with a rumen (cows, sheep, and goats, for example), and it makes them very gassy.

    “It’s part of their normal digestion process,” says Tom Wirth of the EPA. “When they chew their cud, they regurgitate some food to rechew it, and all this gas comes out.”

    The average cow expels 600 liters – 157 gallons – of methane gas per day, climate researchers report. Let me repeat that, just so I can be sure you understand – one cow – ONE, count ’em, ONE! – produces 157 gallons of methane each day. Assuming a 28-30 day month, let’s go with 28, just to be on the conservative side – over the 9-month, ten-day voyage, one single cow on board would have produced six thousand, eighty-six point forty-seven cubic feet of methane gas! And we know that there were either one or seven pairs of cattle on board. Assuming only one pair – again, to be conservative – that’s still 12,172.947 cubic feet of methane gas, just for the two cows!

    We have no way of knowing how many other species of animals there were on board – by all indications, thousands!

    Now the ark, by this god’s own blueprints (Genesis, 6:15) was three hundred cubits long, by fifty cubits wide, by thirty cubits deep – translated, assuming a cubit to be the standard definition’s eighteen inches, that means the ark was 450 feet long, by 75 feet wide, by 45 feet deep – basically the size of a small ocean liner. Volume-wise (450 X 75 X 45), that amounts to an entire volume of 1,518,750 cubic feet.

    Now the ark would have been built to be water-tight throughout a forty-day (and night) deluge, and water-tight means airtight. That means that it would have taken less than 250 such animals to completely fill the ark with methane gas in less than the time the ark was closed up.

    With only one window, on a boat that large, and it, closed for the entire nine months and ten days – the ark was dark – that was one dark ark. I mean, without a window, in an air-tight ark, you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face.

    But surely they had lanterns, didn’t they? Or at least candles?

    Have you ever heard of a kid holding a lit match near his rear end, to see if the gas in his fart will light? Trust me, it will, but I’ve been assured that the hair will grow back. Methane is one of the most flammable gasses on the planet. Check with your friendly neighborhood meth dealer if you don’t believe me.

    Had I not already known about the other Mesopotamian flood stories, but written hundreds of years earlier, from which this one was clearly copied, the 9-month, 10-day buildup of methane, and the 9-month, 10-day enforced blackout, would have been enough to convince me this story never happened, and if we can’t believe the Bible, well, where would we be?

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  21. @Dave

    “Rather than assuming a god exists philosophically, you are saying that IF one did exist we should start by asking ourselves if this god could be considered good given the problem of evil and that this mental will expose any biases we may have. Am I correct so far?”
    Yes, especially as an ex-Christian, if your deconversion looked anything like mine, arguments like Hitchens’ God is Not Good are powerful. When I did not think God could be good, I did not want to believe and this made me biased against the religious impulse. Suddenly I could see no evidence. Anyhow, I think an ex-Christian must start with thinking it’s at least possible that God is good. Like, how can God order genocide and be good? How can God order gay sex offenders to be stoned? If you can’t even imagine there being theodicy, then the question of divine inspiration is probably irrelevant.

    “Well, let’s say for a minute that the problem of evil did not exist. Aren’t we still at a standstill on the question of determining whether some text is divinely inspired or not?”
    Yes, I agree with you here.

    “. . . we have no way of knowing whether a text is divinely inspired or not.”
    I think this is true. We have no epistemological ground for knowing whether a text is divinely inspired. Neither do we have epistemological ground for knowing why matter, space, and time exist which ought to disturb us! If you’re going to believe anything about these two problems, it will be subjective judgment. You can call it “rational” and it will be rational for you. You might say that your rational analysis suggests the bible is not divinely inspired and your rational analysis of why anything exists is just admitting you don’t know. But, we adopt our rational principles on a subjective basis. There is no objective criterion for determining what is divinely inspired just like there is no objective criterion for determining why things exist. There is a criterion for determining if an Ebola vaccine works, that is simply empirically observing that it works! But, the question of divine inspiration is different.

    “I wonder if you would accept that the burden of proof is on you to show that the books in the bible are anything other than purely man-made.”
    I don’t think you would ever agree with my criteria and you shouldn’t if you are an atheist. For you to think that scripture is divinely inspired you would have to think that God exists and for you to think that God exists, I’m guessing you would need to think that God is good.

    Do you agree with any of this, or do you think I’m way out in left field? 🙂

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  22. @Laurie

    “We have been through this. . .”
    I wasn’t there for this. So, you can show me what you’re talking about. But, it sounds like you are going to have to reject Hebrews on top of Mark, Luke, Acts, the Pauline epistles, 1 Peter, and 2 Peter. Does that not disturb you a little?

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  23. @Laurie,

    I’ve read those Galatians and 2 Corinthians passages a few times in the past few days and I’m not seeing that Paul is really naming the false apostles he is speaking of. It’s hard to tell who they were at all from those passages, and Galations 2:9 and surrounding verses seems to indicate that he is very likely not talking about James, Peter and John (at least those 3 are named in a positive way). The people he was talking about could have been from some other group since there were several splinter groups at that time. How do you know who he is talking about when he says “false apostles” or “false brothers”?

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  24. Laurie,

    “We have been through this, quite painfully I might add, with Kathy already. As much as I hate to beat a dead horse, the plan of redemption for mankind is layed out in the 7 feasts, and had not been finished yet. ”

    Laurie, I’ve been following your debate with Brandon.

    You never adequately answered my question/ point Laurie.. it’s not a “dead horse”.. Your beliefs claim that God had His Son suffer and die on the cross as part the “7 feasts plan”.. His sacrifice was a “step” in that plan. By contrast, Paul is saying that Jesus’ sacrifice IS the plan. You put Jesus in the background, Paul puts Jesus and His love for us in the forefront. You claim that what Jesus did on the cross is not enough to save us.. Paul said that what He did is the ONLY way we can be saved.

    Your beliefs mean people who are saved deserve credit for their salvation.. that it isn’t all owed to Him. Paul is stating that we owe it all to Him. We are not capable of saving ourselves by following the law.. it’s impossible.

    You focus on a few choice scriptures to support your claims about Paul, but you ignore the overall context.. all the other scriptures that don’t support your interpretations of those few.

    Brandon’s been giving you good points, especially this one:

    “The key question for Christians to ask is, what does the cross and resurrection means for the law? How does it augment things? Paul thinks that the cross and resurrection make the law unnecessary which is most clearly stated in Ephesians 2.”

    Jesus isn’t a “step” in the plan. By His own words, He came to fulfill the law.. (the plan).

    Suggesting anything less isn’t reasonable.. it doesn’t come close to explaining how God would allow His Son to suffer.

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