Mary, Jesus and the Holy Spirit

I'm minded of Lincoln's question. "How many legs does a dog have, if you count the tail as a leg?" There are four. What you consider to be a leg isn't the issue.

The original assertion was that the grasshopper's hind legs didn't count because the grasshopper jumps and doesn't walk with them. But that's wrong. The Israelites would have observed that it does walk with them.

But you've got the real issue correctly. The errors we see are things like this, and rabbits supposedly chewing cud, and imprecise dimensions for a circular vessel, and so on.

There have always been errors in Scripture, of a minor sort that doesn't change anything of the message. But when has there been a widely-accepted Bible with major errors?

Yep. I'm inclined to believe this was introduced long after settlement in Israel.

 

"cheweth the cud"

If memory serves me right "chewing the cud" is m'alah gerah (Hebrew) and has not so much to do with rumination but the manner of ingestion.

alah is a multi purpose word among its many meanings - to lift, exalt - that is to give importance to... to the act of chewing the morsel of food.

The Scripture is distinguishing between those animals that chew their food rather than those that rip, tear and then bolt it down such as scavangers and predators.

HankD

 

Galatian asks:
Are you now telling me that there have not been errors in Scripture?

You seemed to be telling me that the Bible was inerrant. Do you think so or not?

Galatian asks again:
How do you know that there still aren't?

I gather you trust yourself to read the Bible and learn from it. Yet you are errant? How do you trust yourself to do that?

Galatian, earlier:
In spite of Helen's denial, rabbits do not chew cud. That has a very specific meaning. And then we get "well ______ used to mean something different in those days.", a dodge that covers any discrepancy at all.

Of course there are errors in Scripture. The KJV, and others were specifically compiled to reduce the number of errors.

Puritans in England issued the Millenary Petition in 1603, demanding that certain rites and ceremonies of the Church of England be changed, and that a new translation of the Bible be prepared to correct the errors of earlier versions.

The Hampton Court conference was convened by King James to consider these demands. The Puritans got almost nothing but an agreement that a more accurate Bible would be prepared. Work began in 1611, by a panel of distinguished churchmen and scholars. This resulted in the KJV.

And now you know the rest of the story.
I don't know of an error that attends directly to the message of the Bible, however. Do you?

There had been a spate of English translations, but they had generally been the work of one or a few people, and they tended to differ depending on the political or religious ideas of the translators. The purpose of a committee was to make sure that the translation was a neutral as possible.

Well, they both say that they are of Joseph. So we have that problem. My question is then; what difference does it make to your faith in God and His Resurrection if you are wrong, and it is a mistake? What would you do or believe differently about our relationship to Him?

Could be.

Galatian:
If it's important to you that the Bible be correct in the number of legs a grasshopper has, or whether or not rabbits are ruminants, then this is a major problem. Otherwise, you're with the vast majority of Christians, and don't have a problem.

I hope this post helps.

AITB: So how can I believe that the Bible is true where it counts, if it sometimes has errors where it doesn't count?

Galatian, earlier:
How can we be sure the Bible is the word of God at all? Ultimately, we must have faith that it does. And I do.

It seems completely unimportant. What is important is the fall, our doomed attempts to save ourselves, and God's sacrifice of His Son to effect that for us.

Nope. But if it got the 18th digit of pi wrong, I'd conclude that the book, like all things humans copy, had a typo. Since educated humans knew the earth was a sphere hundreds of years before Christ, that would be a pretty major error.

Galatian, earlier:
There's more. We have the tradition of Christians from the beginning.

Since there was no canonical Bible until fairly recently, they wouldn't have thought so. There was considerable difference even within a given nation, of which books were actually inspired.

Galatian, earlier:
And we have extensive scholarship to determine what they wrote and what they thought of it.

That's enough.

That's how it happened. The Bible was compiled by men, relying on tradition, and scholarship and revelation.

Galatian notes:
I think I just answered

Ah, you didn't get the answer you wanted. I understand now.

 

Leviticus 11:21 Yet these may ye eat of every flying creeping thing that goeth
upon all four, which have legs above their feet, to leap withal upon the earth;

The word "all" is in italics, not in the original text.

Actually they have 6 appendages as Clint has already noted. The KJV has "legs above their feet" better would be "legs behind their feet".

Again the Scripture is prioritizing the use of the "legs" and "feet".

Four "feet" primarily to walk with.
Two "legs" primarily to leap with.

A cockroach has six "feet" and it flies (the big ones), it uses all six with which to walk.

Insects with two "legs" prioritized for "leaping" were clean for the Hebrews. Also they must "leap" upon the earth as a priority (no fleas )

HankD

[ August 05, 2002, 10:14 AM: Message edited by: HankD ]

 

It always amazes me how literalists, when they come to a verse they don't like, go through the most amazing contortions to prove it doesn't say what it does.

 

On the contrary dear brother Galatians, I have proven what it literally says by giving the meaning of what it says in the original language.

BTW Galatian, a literal interpretation of the following Scripture was one of the many reasons I left the Roman Catholic Church.

Exodus 20
4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

HankD

[ August 05, 2002, 02:57 PM: Message edited by: HankD ]

 

Galatian observes:
It always amazes me how literalists, when they come to a verse they don't like, go through the most amazing contortions to prove it doesn't say what it does.

Well, no. But it was certainly an original concept you presented. If you're saying that the error in the Bible is a mistranslation, I'm open to the idea. But reality is obviously not adjustable by clever theology.

Do you believe it's a sin to make a photograph? That's what the above passage says. Do you have pictures in your house? Obviously, you're sinning if you do (assuming that the Bible is inerrant)

This seems odd. Since the Catholic church specifically condemns idolatry, why would you find that objectionable?

BTW, I don't object to someone moving from the Catholic Church to the Baptist Church. If God speaks to you best there, I'd say it was a good thing you moved. Catholic convert found the opposite; good for him, too.

I don't think you sinned by moving, nor do I think you are any less likely to be saved as a Baptist.

 

Dear Galatian,

You posted…

First of all, after reading your entire post especially referring to me as a literalist and saying

"It always amazes me how literalists, when they come to a verse they don't like, go through the most amazing contortions to prove it doesn't say what it does".

Perhaps I should have explained that a literal view of this passage cost me dearly in terms of my family and their reactions toward me for leaving the Church of Rome.
So you are at least partially wrong in what you said.

Now to the questions, yes photographs are images and forbidden by the Law of God.
Yes, I have them in my house and my wallet and on the money that I possess.

And when I am stricken in conscience about this very thing, I acknowledge to God my inability and/or my unwillingness to keep all of His commandments.

RE: Bowing before an image of Mary (or whoever) and praying to her.

Yes the Church of Rome says idolatry is a sin.
They make a distinction between something called "latria" and "hyperdulia", the one is for God the other for created beings.
Personally, I couldn't/don't see the difference.
If the Church of Rome acknowledged that what they are doing with images is wrong and honestly said that they are going to do it anyway, I could live with that.
After all it is part of my own philosophy.

Yes, I shall be saved as you have said (actually, I would use the present tense, I am saved) in spite of my breaking the commandment(s).

Yes, Catholic, Baptist, whatever, God can see the heart, whether it trusts Christ alone or no.
He is our one and only hope.

HankD

 

Barbarian points:
Do you believe it's a sin to make a photograph? That's what the above passage says. Do you have pictures in your house? Obviously, you're sinning if you do (assuming that the Bible is inerrant)

First of all, after reading your entire post especially referring to me as a literalist and saying

"It always amazes me how literalists, when they come to a verse they don't like, go through the most amazing contortions to prove it doesn't say what it does".

Perhaps I should have explained that a literal view of this passage cost me dearly in terms of my family and their reactions toward me for leaving the Church of Rome.

Might have depended on how you handled it. If you left with "you're all pagan idolators", I can see where that might have caused some hard feelings. If, on the other hand, you simply said you felt Baptists were closer to what God's church should be, then they were at fault. Most times, it's somewhere between.

Me, I think anytime someone gets right with God, that's a good thing, regardless.

You might mention to them that Roman Catholic Doctrine is that Baptists are Christians too, and our brothers in Christ, even if they don't have it exactly right.

Well, there are some Roman Catholics who hate Baptists, and think that they are idolators, too. The stuff you sometimes see on this board isn't limited to Baptists.

It's sad, but that's how it is.

That's a good one. When I moved to Louisiana, many years ago, I worked next to this woman who was a very strict Baptist. She was very down on dancing. One night, she was planning to go dancing. I mentioned that she had said it was a sin. Her reply? "Everyone sins."

True, I guess, but I don't make plans to do it. I'm more of a spontaneous sinner, I guess. When I have time to think about it, it takes all the fun out of it. But that may be the Catholic tradition that premeditatively sinning, even though you have considered that it is offensive to God, is particularly evil.

To be more precise:

"An essential difference exists between idolatry and the veneration of images practised in the Catholic Church, viz., that while the idolater credits the image he reverences with Divinity or Divine powers, the Catholic knows "that in images there is no divinity or virtue on account of which they are to be worshipped, that no petitions can be addressed to them, and that no trust is to be placed in them. . . that the honour which is given to them is referred to the objects (prototypa) which they represent, so that through the images which we kiss, and before which we uncover our heads and kneel, we adore Christ and venerate the Saints whose likenesses they are" (Conc. find., Sess. XXV, "de invocatione Sanctorum").

You probably wouldn't be a Baptist if you could.

My take on it is that we aren't bound by the Old Covenant.

I'm pleased for you. Is it your opinion that there is nothing you can do to lose salvation at this point?

 

Dear Galatians,

You wrote…

There was some of that. I was young and on a crusade. I tried to be kind and I didn't want to hurt anyone, on the other hand I wanted my family to know that I felt strongly about it. My first move was to the Lutheran Church, later as I studied the Scriptures, I gravitated towards the Baptist distinctives.

Yes, but I am a defector and under a blanket excommunication.

REremeditative sin: This is why I used the both the words "inability and unwillingness".

The Law of God is there for more than one reason. Besides restraining the flesh the world is under the conviction/reproval of the Holy Spirit via the Law: "sin is the transgression of the law"

The Law drives us to Christ for forgiveness.

The sins against the second commandment are nearly impossible to avoid and stay in the world as a functioning individual. Images are everywhere including on our money.
I am more unable than unwilling to keep the second commandment in terms of images, pictures, etc. So one day I acknowledged to God my inability to keep all that the second commandment requires. I don't have a problem with it anymore.

There are other things which I am more unwilling to let go of than unable.

In either case, when my conscience hurts, I acknowledge my inability/unwillingness to our heavenly Father.

Yes, this is also true, yet I must honestly say that when I wander from the leading of the Spirit and covet (10th commandment) that which I shouldn't have, I hear again the thunder from Mt Sinai until I come back to His leading.

Correct, there is nothing I could do, God would have to do it. After all He is the one who saved me in the first place.

HankD

[ August 05, 2002, 06:51 PM: Message edited by: HankD ]

 

Thanks for bringing this up. Could you point me to the words "personal Savior" in Scripture?

[ August 06, 2002, 08:10 AM: Message edited by: trying2understand ]

 

Fortunately for both Baptists and Catholics, God gets to decide. The Phairasees are the ones whose salvation is at risk, not decent Catholics and Baptists.

Actually, God can save people, even in places like North Korea, where they never get a chance to hear about that. He's very capable, and He doesn't want anyone to go to Hell.

My wife is an Episcopalian. They are no less aware than Catholics and Baptists of this fact. I suspect that your situation was a personal one, but one which sent you on a mission to find that meaning elsewhere. A good result, after all.

If you were Catholic, you would. You couldn't get out of basic Catechism without that knowledge. I believe Anglicans are no different. It is referred to in the Catholic Church as the Baptism of desire, such as the Good Thief underwent on the cross.

 

AITB,
My point is that for whatever reason, sometimes the message just doesn't "take" when presented in the context of the faith in which one was raised.

At that point, it's time to find another way.

It's always possible that one's teachers just did a crummy job of telling one about God and His relationship with us. Or maybe we just aren't ready to hear it that way.

I will tell you that as I grow older, my understanding and appreciation of the Lord increases.

All I can say is that you were unfortunate in not getting Him in the Anglican faith, but you took the right steps to remedy that. There is no difference in God's eyes, and that's all that counts.

 

Hi T2U,

If we want any kind of unity at all or even a move in that direction, I believe we must avoid these kind of na-na-na-na-na-na games and yes everyone is guilty including myself.

For instance, where is the word "transubstantiation" found in the Scripture?

I have asked this question of Catholics and John Chapter 6 is the official proof text of the RCC.
Why? Because you believe the concept of "transubstantiation" is taught there though the word itself is not used.

Jesus made His salvation personal on more than one occasion without using the words "personal Savior":

John 11:
24 Martha saith unto him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.
25 Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:
26 And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?
27 She saith unto him, Yea, Lord: I believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world.

HankD