Please explain the Watchtower's "Ransom" for me

by Doug Mason 44 Replies latest watchtower bible

• 

  deegee

  4.) Paul, Genesis 3 & The Early Christians:

  http://www.religioustolerance.org/sin_gene.htm :

  http://www.religioustolerance.org/com_geba.htm :

  In the early years of the Christian movement, there were three distinct belief systems, each with its own interpretation of Genesis 3:

  
  The Jewish Christians, centered in Jerusalem, were the first Christian group, founded by the followers of Jesus. They considered Paul to be a heretic.

  Little is known about their specific beliefs. However, they apparently followed the Jewish traditions and beliefs - one of which did not place a great deal of emphasis on Genesis 3. The Jewish Christians were later killed, scattered, and exiled by the Roman Army during two uprisings in the first and second centuries CE.
  

  
  Some Gnostic sects honored the snake of Genesis 3. They did not view the snake as a seducer who led the first couple into sinful behavior. Rather, they saw him/it as a liberator who brought knowledge to Adam and Eve by convincing them to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and thus to become fully human by achieving something that they did not have when they were created: a moral sense.

  Magically, by eating the fruit, they realized for the first time the difference between good and evil. The Gnostics were attacked by the Pauline Christians in one of the first Christian genocides and essentially wiped out by the mainline Christian church.

  
  The Pauline Christians derived most of their theological beliefs from the Pauline Epistles and the Gospel of John. To them, Genesis 3 was of paramount importance. They saw in the passage the reasons for "humanity's corrupt nature and desperate existential situation."
  Paul used the chapter to derive his concept of sin. Later, Augustine used it to develop his idea of original sin - the belief that all of the generations of Adam and Eve's descendents (including ourselves) have inherited the sinful behavior of the first human couple.
  The Pauline Christians survived to evolve into modern Christianity.
• 

  deegee

  3.) ABOUT THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE MYTH:

  Was there any other way to explain mankind's evil nature, the cause of sickness and death etc. without blaming God?

  ___

  Ellen Pagels: Adam, Eve and the serpent:

  Augustine’s novel doctrine of original sin became the new orthodoxy because the Church found this doctrine useful in a Christian Empire.

  A doctrine of man’s freedom and autonomy was useful against a pagan Empire.

  A doctrine that man was imperfect, weak, fallible, and unable to govern himself was more useful to a Roman Empire and a Catholic Church that both wanted obedience.
• 

  deegee

  4.) He contradicts jesus and himself often------ _Morpheus

  http://www.ebonmusings.org/atheism/holding2.html

  discusses some of Paul's contradictions:
  

  - Should Christians Obey Human Laws?

  - What Will Happen to the Jews?

  - On Divorce

  - On Calling Men Master
• 

  dubstepped

  Adam and Eve were 2 people that sinned. How could only one person be sacrificed to balance the scales?
• 

  _Morpheus

  Sigh... they have an answer (of course)

  in a male dominated society adam was viewed as life giver. Adam screwed up so one perfect man could fix it and be life giver for all men (puke) thus jesus is called the last adam (puke again)

  also nonbiblical jewish fairytales say adam had a wife before eve so it was believed the perfect woman was replaceable. The original creation, man (adam) was not.

  All shit, but thats the wt answer and the jewish fairy tale answer
• 

  Simon

  Also: How come people kept dying even after the ransom was paid?

  It makes no sense - we're talking about a story where the all knowing god actually blamed the snake even though, and I'm just putting this out there, I don't think the snake took part in any of the planning. There I said it, snake was innocent - it was a setup.
• 

  EverApostate

  Also: How come people kept dying even after the ransom was paid?

  May be BigJ is living several million light years away and the ransom has not reached there yet.
  
  
• 

  sparrowdown

  In WTworld there is a fourth party involved in the "ransom" the mediator's mediator and that would conveniently be WT itself!

  Even though the ramsom was paid you still have to earn your right to a sucky conditional salvation by dedication and works to this mediator's mediator for the term of your natural life and even then your salvation is iffy!

  Even though when JC was being executed he promisd his fellow execution buddy beside him who was not a follower of his that they would be together in a "paradise" after their death.
• 

  Moster

  _Morpheus

  Thanks for being so long suffering with those of us not so well versed.
  
• 

  _Morpheus

  Moster, slim is very well versed in wt doctrine. He IS a jw. He just likes to be controversial and throws ‘challanges’ arbitrarily (as in asking for a simple quote that he easily could have found)... it keeps things interesting i suppose.

  Please understand i participate in the forum for the exchange of ideas and am always happy to share, its just eyerollingly petty for slim to not put 2 seconds of typing into something he likely knows already. The whole ransom thing is a basic part of jw doctrine, so much so its part of their baptism interview questions.

  Any mild irritation you read into my responses is entirely goodnatured and directed at someone who doing a little soft trolling himself ;)