peacefulpete
JoinedPosts by peacefulpete
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35
Hey, Regarding the "Resurrection" thing and the WT denial of the Mt 27:51-53 incident...
by FragrantAddendum inso according to bible.
elisha's bones were there when jehovah resurrected some other dude.
jesus could heal from a distance by power of god.
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35
Hey, Regarding the "Resurrection" thing and the WT denial of the Mt 27:51-53 incident...
by FragrantAddendum inso according to bible.
elisha's bones were there when jehovah resurrected some other dude.
jesus could heal from a distance by power of god.
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peacefulpete
The redactor that changed Mark in this passage,(into what is called Matt) is probably expressing his conviction that the return of Jesus was imminent. Like Kaleb said there were expectations that the 'saints' would be resurrected at the end of the age. The earthquake might well have been similarly figured in this way. The later redactor resposible for what is now called Luke, didn't included it, perhaps too many years had passed and he had different expectations. These were word plays, not historical documents. The freeness the redactors felt to make such changes ought to impress that on us.I feel we need to consider the wide diversity of Jewish views of death and immortality. Volumes have been written on it but for now consider Josephus' review of dominant opinions.:
3. Now, for the Pharisees, .....They also believe that souls have an immortal rigor in them, and that under the earth there will be rewards or punishments, according as they have lived virtuously or viciously in this life; and the latter are to be detained in an everlasting prison, but that the former shall have power to revive and live again; ....
4. But the doctrine of the Sadducees is this: That souls die with the bodies;............
5. The doctrine of the Essens is this: .... They teach the immortality of souls..........Paul, at least what we have to go on, seems to have vacillated between a future resurrection to a spirit 'body' or an immediate one. Perhaps the immediate concept was rooted in the idea that the judgment was near. It seems a hybrid of ideas, his arguments are confusing to say the least, and may have been the result of a Greek dismissal of the idea of physical resurrection.
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There is no 1900 year old faithful and discreet slave
by Longlivetherenegades innow that the long-expected kingdom had become an established reality in heaven, surely its growing interests in the earth after 1919 would not be left in the hands of a novice organization of spiritual babes.
and that proved to be true.
it was the 1900-year-old “faithful and discreet slave,” the old christian congregation, that was entrusted with this precious kingdom service.
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peacefulpete
LongLive...I completely agree. My comment was just in response to the implication that religion that changes offers nothing to believe in. As I see it, beliefs should change with increasing understanding of the world and human nature.
In my mind, the ideal religion focuses upon basic human needs, a healthy society, a healthy world. It's probably a mute point in this WT case as the 'beliefs' are all just trivial twists on people-hating sectarian apocalypticism. That's what I meant by the one really meaningful change would be its extent and method of controlling people's lives. Part of that would be ending the isolation producing contempt for society.
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There is no 1900 year old faithful and discreet slave
by Longlivetherenegades innow that the long-expected kingdom had become an established reality in heaven, surely its growing interests in the earth after 1919 would not be left in the hands of a novice organization of spiritual babes.
and that proved to be true.
it was the 1900-year-old “faithful and discreet slave,” the old christian congregation, that was entrusted with this precious kingdom service.
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peacefulpete
I'm going to take the position that change is healthy for religions, they stay meaningful and practical. Religions that become artifacts of the past produce strange, out of touch followers. They risk becoming parodies of what they meant to people centuries before. They become obstacles rather than facilitators of progress. A fixture rather than a fixer.
The changes in WT doctrine are not the problem, the fact that some of us think it is, suggests the changes have been too slow in coming and people were in love with a fixture, not a vibrant support community.
The real problem with the WT is the extent and methods of control. The one meaningful change toward a healthy religion they could have made was not changed.
Religion should inspire not dictate.
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Alteration of Revelation 3:14 in the 4th century to support the emerging Trinity doctrine
by slimboyfat inin an earlier thread another poster asserted that there is no evidence that revelation 3:14 played a part in the 4th controversy that led to the trinity doctrine.
this was claimed as evidence that the description of jesus as “the beginning of the creation of god” in the verse was not understood to mean that jesus was god’s first creation.
the scholarly greek–english lexicon of the new testament & other early christian literature 3e (2001) by bauer, arndt, gingrich, and danker, in its latest edition states that “first creation” is indeed the probable meaning of the greek phrase.
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peacefulpete
Kaleb has made some enlightened comments. For us who grew up to believe that Christianity was originally about correct interpretation of proof texts, it probably sounds gibberish. However, the influence and attraction of Christianity was it's elevated sense of piety, community and comfort. Someone and something to believe in a world of disappointment and despair. The eventual, perhaps inevitable, orthodoxy set boundaries and limits for acceptance into this community as humans tend to do. Written texts carried with them a permanence that for some reduced the dynamic faith into a catechism.
Modern literacy and literalism have spawned divisions anew as the texts themselves were the product of an earlier, less rigorous stage and lend themselves to selective perception.
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Farmer Noah
by peacefulpete init has been occasionally mentioned on this forum how the flood stories (j,p) interrupt the flow of the narrative of j (conventional name for primary narrative source for the primeval history) and create plot holes.
note how the removal of the flood stories leaves an unbroken narrative:.
28 when lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son.
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peacefulpete
I found another solution to the Hamm/Canaan switch. Noah’s Nakedness: How the Canaan-Ham Curse Conundrum Came to Be - TheTorah.com
The author suggests the J source knew Noah's son as Canaan not Hamm. P on the other hand had Hamm. In the comingling of these sources the editor made a couple adjustments.
This works better in my mind, but we will have to leave that, and so much of this compilation and redaction process, without a firm solution.
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Farmer Noah
by peacefulpete init has been occasionally mentioned on this forum how the flood stories (j,p) interrupt the flow of the narrative of j (conventional name for primary narrative source for the primeval history) and create plot holes.
note how the removal of the flood stories leaves an unbroken narrative:.
28 when lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son.
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peacefulpete
I should mention that the identification of Noah as the "man of the land" as it reads has been questioned as well. The phrase appears now in a unit apparently describing a sexual assault resulting in curses and blessings. Everyone who has read the text has noticed the odd shift from Hamm to Canaan as the object of the curse, and some have suggested the story originally was about Hamm and his son Canaan with the shift to Noah made to facilitate it's reuse as the basis for blessings on Israel as master of Canaan. Anyway, it's a beautiful mashup of traditions that has left Rabbis and scholars alike confused.
Ultimately, the 'man of the land' label having been originally about Hamm doesn't really alter the reconstruction of Noah being the one who brought comfort and ended the curse of the ground.
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Farmer Noah
by peacefulpete init has been occasionally mentioned on this forum how the flood stories (j,p) interrupt the flow of the narrative of j (conventional name for primary narrative source for the primeval history) and create plot holes.
note how the removal of the flood stories leaves an unbroken narrative:.
28 when lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son.
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peacefulpete
It has been occasionally mentioned on this forum how the Flood stories (J,P) interrupt the flow of the narrative of J (conventional name for primary narrative source for the Primeval History) and create plot holes.
Note how the removal of the Flood stories leaves an unbroken narrative:
28 When Lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son. 29 He named him Noah[c] and said, “He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the Lord has cursed.” 30 After Noah was born, Lamech lived 595 years and had other sons and daughters. 31 Altogether, Lamech lived a total of 777 years, and then he died.
32 After Noah was 500 years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham and Japheth..................................................Flood.................................................
19 These were the three sons of Noah, and from them came the people who were scattered over the whole earth.
20 Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded[a] to plant a vineyard.Storylines involving Nephilim, which ought to have ended in the Flood, continue through till the conquest stories. Similarly, the infamous Jabel and Jubal ( https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5926835157204992/jabal-jubal-tubal-song-sword) who were described as the 'Fathers of all who raise livestock or play instruments', an odd description of a dead-end genealogy.
A number of scholars have concluded Noah in the original J source was an exceptional worshiper of Yahweh who appeased Yahweh, resulting in the ending of the agricultural curse of famine from Adam. A few of the key elements that reveal the original form of the source material are:
Gen 3:
17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat food from it all the days of your life
Gen 5:
28 When Lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son. 29 He named him Noah (comfort) and said, “He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the Lord has cursed.”
Consistently in the OT, a curse on the land/ground involves famine and drought, aka. a lack of rain.
Gen 6:But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.Gen 8: And the Lord God smelled a smell of sweetness, and the Lord God having considered, said, I will not any more curse the earth, because of the works of men, because the imagination of man is intently bent upon evil things from his youth...All the days of the earth, seed and harvest, cold and heat, summer and spring, (agricultural norms) shall not cease by day or night. (LXX) "for all time" (SP)Gen 9: Noah was a "man of the land" and planted a vineyard (symbol of agricultural prosperity)It would seem the popularity of the Babylonian flood epic inspired parallel, yet unique, Hebrew versions (P and J) of a flood story in which the hero was Noah, the man who was formerly a 'man of the land' whose worship of Yahweh ended the curse of the land. These flood stories were merged into the existing J narrative creating the odd readings and plot holes we now have. It is conjectured that in the original story the curse's lifting resulted in rain (40 days?) and this lent to the placement and choice of Noah as the flood hero. Maybe the way he was described as a uniquely righteous man lent to the choice.There is a lot more to consider on this topic, so I've provided a couple links to excellent work. -
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Italy goes after Protestant religions re taxes due
by blondie inhttps://cne.news/article/4320-small-church-in-rome-goes-to-the-big-court-in-strasbourg-to-find-justice?push=null .
the evangelical church in rome will move to strasbourg to seek justice from the european court on human rights (ecthr) to eliminate the huge tax burden.
in the meantime, protestants all over the world are amazed by what is happening in italy..
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peacefulpete
The desire was to have a configuration that could be adjusted if necessary and be used in a multifunctional way.
I'm thinking we haven't gotten the whole story. There are thousands of protestant churches that do not have the Catholic accoutrement in Italy and get tax exemption. It smells like a group wanted their cake and eat it too. Use a space as a meeting for religion and other purposes.
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JWs obtaining fake degrees from a US institution to teach English as a foreign language
by truthseeker inteaching english as a foreign language in asian countries is quite popular for those looking to travel and explore and make some money.
if you have the tefl qualification you're pretty much good to go and don't need a degree.i don't know how lucrative these overseas jobs are but i do know one jw from my congregation in england who decided to move to the caribbean and teach english as a foreign language.
i'm not knocking this individual.
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peacefulpete
If you register with an email address and username they give you access to more. First thing they do is brag that they are not an "instructional institution". They are selling diplomas for past preaching and work experience. They may require students to perform demonstrations and speeches. The application includes details about your life experience and 2 very short essays. I imagine this is the screening process. You are then informed of whether you can enroll. Costs are little over $2000 for bachelor's degree. There is a "committee review" fee of $129.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fntgdibbfpI&feature=youtu.be