Causes of human sickness

[webdog]

I didn't see marriage on the list. Nor children



Church nurseries would be #1 on the list.

 

[Earth Wind and Fire]

I didn't see marriage on the list. Nor children



Church nurseries would be #1 on the list.

Modern churches would be the 1st on my list.

 

[Jope]

The septuagint includes the human will in human sickness:

Proverbs 18:9, Amplified Bible
He who is loose and slack in his work is brother to him who is a destroyer and he who does not use his endeavors to heal himself is brother to him who commits suicide.​

The human will plays a role in the immune system. It's a phenomenon in the medical world.

Forgot to mention this one in the list.

 

[Jope]

I didn't see marriage on the list. Nor children



Church nurseries would be #1 on the list.

I disagree!

The work, a groundbreaking study that helped establish the field of medical statistics, showed that the unmarried died from disease “in undue proportion” to their married counterparts. And the widowed, Farr found, fared worst of all.


Parker-Pope, T. (2010). Is Marriage Good for Your Health? The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/18/magazine/18marriage-t.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Proverbs 18:22, Amplified Bible
He who finds a [true] wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord.​

 

[quantumfaith]

You have to admit though, individual genes and DNA have a big effect on health. For example, we are warned about smoking and lung cancer. I have known people who got lung cancer and never smoked. I have literally known others 90 years old that smoked all of their lives. I certainly would not advocate smoking to test your resistance, but that is a fact.

Of course. I would add that the deciphering of the human genome code will be likely be leading to many new treatment and prevention techniques for many diseases which have a genetic component.

 

[Jope]

Oppression

There is another. The septuagint reads (Poole, 1996):

Ecclesiastes 7:7
For extortion drives [the wise man mad], and destroys the [magnanimity of his heart].​

(In case you were wondering what magnanimity meant):

loftiness of spirit enabling one to bear trouble calmly, to disdain meanness and pettiness, and to display a noble generosity

magnanimity. 2013. In Merriam-Webster.com.
Retrieved August 19, 2013, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/magnanimity​

This same word, translated into our english, "extortion", is used in the septuagint Job in the following phrase (Pool, 1996):

Job 35:9, bold emphasis mine
[The ones being extorted by a multitude] shall cry out; they shall yell because of the arm of many.​

I read a section in a psychology book about how “the problems specific to oppressed and exploited groups tend to reflect a perfectly understandable and normal reaction to abnormal circumstances” (Collin, Benson, Ginsburg, Grand, Lazyan, & Weeks, 2012, p. 257).

Thankfully, we do read of a better end for such exploited individuals.

For one, in the millennium we read that this will take place. Christ will "deliver the sons of the needy, and shall humble the extortioner" (Pool, 1996, Psalm 72:4).

I am trying to find a verse that would explicitly say that God gives a better end for exploited individuals in this age. Maybe someone can beat me to it. Ecclesiastes 5:8 is perhaps borderline.

Anyways, as for health for such a sickness, it would seem, from Ecclesiastes 4, that comfort doth heal these extorted individuals (Pool, 1996, Eccles. 4:1):

And I turned and I beheld all the extortions, the ones happening under the sun. And behold, the tear of the ones being extorted, and there is not one comforting them. And by the hand of ones extorting them was by strength, and there is not one comforting them.​

Which has the medical world in agreement (Ornish, 2004).

References

Collin, C., Benson, N., Ginsburg, J., Grand, V., Lazyan, M. & Weeks, M. (2012). The Psychology Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained. New York, USA: Dorling Kindersley.

Ornish, D. (2004). Dean Ornish: Healing through diet [Video file]. Retrieved from TED:
http://www.ted.com/talks/dean_ornish_on_healing.html

Pool, C. V. D. (1996). Apostolic Bible Polyglot. Charles Van der Pool.
www.apostolicbible.com​

 

[Jope]

I disagree!

Proverbs 18:22, Amplified Bible
He who finds a [true] wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord.​

I guess there might be exception to this though webdog. Depending on what kind of woman it is that one's wife is (cp. Prov. 12:4). Even then I wonder if a not-so-noble-wife-as-she-could-be extends life for her husband, as contrasted to a person who does not marry at all.

 

[Jope]

Romans 4:19 tells us that Abraham's body was dead, though it was 100 years old.

Maybe age would fall somewhere in the list too.

"I go the way of all the earth..." (1 Kings 2:2, KJV).​

 

[Jope]

In another thread I said that Proverbs 27:5-6 had been on my mind. This post shows the thought I have given on the subject of whether or not correcting should be done to the afflicted and broken spirited.

I have thought, that comforting the broken spirited, more than or instead of correcting them, is the correct option.

"To him that is afflicted pity should be shewed from his friend" (Job 6:14a, KJV).

It is a wise and true proverb, "A man's spirit will endure sickness, but a crushed spirit who can bear?" (Pr. 18:14, ESV). Job 12:5 tells us that "He who is at ease holds calamity in contempt" (NASB).

Job complains, when "his grief was very great" (Job 2:13, KJV), that his friend(s) were miserable comforters:

Job 16, ESV, bold emphases mine
2 “I have heard many such things;
miserable comforters are you all.
3 Shall windy words have an end?
Or what provokes you that you answer?
4 I also could speak as you do,
if you were in my place;
I could join words together against you
and shake my head at you.
5 I could strengthen you with my mouth,
and the solace of my lips would assuage your pain.​

His friends had been saying, that he was talking too much:

"Therefore Job opens his mouth in vain;
He multiplies words without knowledge." (Job 35:16, NKJV).

"Should not the multitude of words be answered? and should a man full of talk be justified?" (Job 11:2, KJV).

"How long wilt thou speak these things? and how long shall the words of thy mouth be like a strong wind?" (Job 8:2, KJV).

"“Should a wise man answer with empty knowledge,
And fill himself with the east wind?" (Job 15:2, NKJV).​

One accused him of doing evil, because God, being just, must render to men their due reward:

Job 34, NKJV
7 What man is like Job,
Who drinks scorn like water,
8 Who goes in company with the workers of iniquity,
And walks with wicked men?
9 For he has said, ‘It profits a man nothing
That he should delight in God.’

10 “Therefore listen to me, you men of understanding:
Far be it from God to do wickedness,
And from the Almighty to commit iniquity.
11 For He repays man according to his work,
And makes man to find a reward according to his way.​

We know that Job's words were right, and his friend's wrong, God giving witness (Job 42:7):

NKJV
the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, “My wrath is aroused against you and your two friends, for you have not spoken of Me what is right, as My servant Job has.​

Job said, "Do you intend to rebuke my words, And the speeches of a desperate one, which are as wind?" (6:26, NKJV). The answer is an implied "no". So I do think that comfort, more than, or instead of rebuking/correcting the afflicted, is what should be done.

 

[Jope]

Wow man.

Thanks for this post!!

I like the last one, injury. I didn't think that the Bible would've said that injury causes sickness.

"And Ahaziah fell down through a lattice in his upper chamber that was in Samaria, and was sick" (2 Kings 1:2, KJV).

 

[Jope]

I like the last one, injury. I didn't think that the Bible would've said that injury causes sickness.

"And Ahaziah fell down through a lattice in his upper chamber that was in Samaria, and was sick" (2 Kings 1:2, KJV).

(The medical world would agree with this).

 

[Jope]

I guess Proverbs 17:25 would say that foolish children don't promote health too, webdog.

"A foolish son is a grief to his father, and bitterness to her that bare him" (KJV).

 

[Jope]

There is another. The septuagint reads (Poole, 1996):

Ecclesiastes 7:7
For extortion drives [the wise man mad], and destroys the [magnanimity of his heart].​

(In case you were wondering what magnanimity meant):

loftiness of spirit enabling one to bear trouble calmly, to disdain meanness and pettiness, and to display a noble generosity

magnanimity. 2013. In Merriam-Webster.com.
Retrieved August 19, 2013, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/magnanimity​

I found something by Plato, which I thought matched nicely with Ecclesiastes 7:7 above,

Such is the manner in which diseases of the body arise ; the disorders of the soul, which depend upon the body, originate as follows. We must acknowledge disease of the mind to be a want of intelligence ; and of this there are two kinds ; to wit, madness and ignorance. In whatever state a man experiences either of them, that state may be called disease ; and excessive pains and pleasures are justly to be regarded as the greatest diseases to which the soul is liable. For a man who is in great joy or in great pain, in his unseasonable eagerness to attain the one and to avoid the other, is not able to see or to hear anything rightly ; but he is mad, and is at the time utterly incapable of any participation in reason.

Timaeus (360 B.C.E.). Translated by Benjamin Jowett. Para. 118.

I do realize that "mad" can be translated as either anger or insane, and I am in a dilemma between which one I suppose it means. If it means insane, then the sickness of Ecclesiastes 7:7, I think, can be given to both the person viewing the oppression and the victim of oppression. Since the wise man hates oppression, and sympathizes with the victim, he would experience the pain that the victim is going through, and according to Plato, since he is in "great pain" with the victim, he "is not able to see or to hear anything rightly ; but is mad, and is at the time utterly incapable of any participation in reason".

The septuagint Proverbs 22:16 also tells us that the oppressor "produces for himself many evils" (Pool, 1996). Maybe this would involve sickness (cp. Pharaoh and his oppression in the Pentateuch).

Pool, C. V. D. (1996). Apostolic Bible Polyglot. Charles Van der Pool.
www.apostolicbible.com​

 

[Jope]

Poor physical exercise

"bodily training is of some value" (1 Tim. 4:8, ESV).

Plato said, "the due proportion of mind and body is the fairest and loveliest of all sights to him who has the seeing eye", and that "we should not move the body without the soul or the soul without the body, and thus they will be on their guard against each other, and be healthy and well balanced":

There is a corresponding enquiry concerning the mode of treatment by which the mind and the body are to be preserved, about which it is meet and right that I should say a word in turn ; for it is more our duty to speak of the good than of the evil. Everything that is good is fair, and the animal fair is not without proportion, and the animal which is to be fair must have due proportion. Now we perceive lesser symmetries or proportions and reason about them, but of the highest and greatest we take no heed ; for there is no proportion or disproportion more productive of health and disease, and virtue and vice, than that between soul and body. This however we do not perceive, nor do we reflect that when a weak or small frame is the vehicle of a great and mighty soul, or conversely, when a little soul is encased in a large body, then the whole animal is not fair, for it lacks the most important of all symmetries ; but the due proportion of mind and body is the fairest and loveliest of all sights to him who has the seeing eye. Just as a body which has a leg too long, or which is unsymmetrical in some other respect, is an unpleasant sight, and also, when doing its share of work, is much distressed and makes convulsive efforts, and often stumbles through awkwardness, and is the cause of infinite evil to its own self — in like manner we should conceive of the double nature which we call the living being ; and when in this compound there is an impassioned soul more powerful than the body, that soul, I say, convulses and fills with disorders the whole inner nature of man ; and when eager in the pursuit of some sort of learning or study, causes wasting ; or again, when teaching or disputing in private or in public, and strifes and controversies arise, inflames and dissolves the composite frame of man and introduces rheums ; and the nature of this phenomenon is not understood by most professors of medicine, who ascribe it to the opposite of the real cause. And once more, when body large and too strong for the soul is united to a small and weak intelligence, then inasmuch as there are two desires natural to man, — one of food for the sake of the body, and one of wisdom for the sake of the diviner part of us — then, I say, the motions of the stronger, getting the better and increasing their own power, but making the soul dull, and stupid, and forgetful, engender ignorance, which is the greatest of diseases. There is one protection against both kinds of disproportion : — that we should not move the body without the soul or the soul without the body, and thus they will be on their guard against each other, and be healthy and well balanced. And therefore the mathematician or any one else whose thoughts are much absorbed in some intellectual pursuit, must allow his body also to have due exercise, and practise gymnastic ; and he who is careful to fashion the body, should in turn impart to the soul its proper motions, and should cultivate music and all philosophy, if he would deserve to be called truly fair and truly good. And the separate parts should be treated in the same manner, in imitation of the pattern of the universe ; for as the body is heated and also cooled within by the elements which enter into it, and is again dried up and moistened by external things, and experiences these and the like affections from both kinds of motions, the result is that the body if given up to motion when in a state of quiescence is overmastered and perishes ; but if any one, in imitation of that which we call the foster-mother and nurse of the universe, will not allow the body ever to be inactive, but is always producing motions and agitations through its whole extent, which form the natural defence against other motions both internal and external, and by moderate exercise reduces to order according to their affinities the particles and affections which are wandering about the body, as we have already said when speaking of the universe, he will not allow enemy placed by the side of enemy to stir up wars and disorders in the body, but he will place friend by the side of friend, so as to create health.

Timaeus. (360 B.C.E.). Translated by Benjamin Jowett. Para. 119.

 

[The Biblicist]

The following is a list of causes of sickness from scripture.

If you can think of anymore additions to this list, please add.

Bread (Isa. 3:7; Acts 27:34).

Clothing (Isa. 3:7).

Envy (Prov. 14:30). (Sophocles said, that "despair often breeds disease").

Sin (James 5:14-15).

Poor social support (Prov. 12:25; 17:22; 13:20; Eccles. 4:10).

Testing from God (Job 1-2).

Physical object (Mark 16:18).

Ecclesiastes says that there are righteous men who are rewarded with what the evil deserve (Eccles. 8:14). Maybe this should fall in with Job 1-2 above though.​

You are confusing secondary causes with the one and only primary cause - sin. The wages of sin is death and death is inclusive of everything that leads up eternal death. Sickness is merely death at work or what Paul describes as "corruption" caused by sin that makes us our physical nature subject to mortality.

Our physical death can have a myrid of secondary causes but the cheif cause is the law of sin at work within us making us corruptible and mortal in our physical nature.

With the exception of death caused by an external action (murder, accident, etc.) all death is due to disease or the break down of tissues or corruption manifest in aging or the first and second laws of thermodynamics. "DYING thou shalt surely die" is the literal rendering in Genesis 2:17. There was no present tense "dying" previous to sin.

 

[Yeshua1]

You are confusing secondary causes with the one and only primary cause - sin. The wages of sin is death and death is inclusive of everything that leads up eternal death. Sickness is merely death at work or what Paul describes as "corruption" caused by sin that makes us our physical nature subject to mortality.

Our physical death can have a myrid of secondary causes but the cheif cause is the law of sin at work within us making us corruptible and mortal in our physical nature.

With the exception of death caused by an external action (murder, accident, etc.) all death is due to disease or the break down of tissues or corruption manifest in aging or the first and second laws of thermodynamics. "DYING thou shalt surely die" is the literal rendering in Genesis 2:17. There was no present tense "dying" previous to sin.

true, as the cause of all suffering/sorrows/sickness etc goes abck to when Adam and Eve decided to NOT trust the Lord, but heeded the Devil instead!

 

[Jope]

You are confusing secondary causes with the one and only primary cause - sin. The wages of sin is death and death is inclusive of everything that leads up eternal death. Sickness is merely death at work or what Paul describes as "corruption" caused by sin that makes us our physical nature subject to mortality.

Our physical death can have a myrid of secondary causes but the cheif cause is the law of sin at work within us making us corruptible and mortal in our physical nature.

With the exception of death caused by an external action (murder, accident, etc.) all death is due to disease or the break down of tissues or corruption manifest in aging or the first and second laws of thermodynamics. "DYING thou shalt surely die" is the literal rendering in Genesis 2:17. There was no present tense "dying" previous to sin.

Hm. Nice to hear from you again Biblicist

A thought of mine about Genesis 2:17 is, maybe Adam and Eve could've still gotten sick without dying before the sin came.

(Are "deadly thing", Mark 16:18, KJV, the result of sin?)

If the millennium is the era in which there will be the tree of healing (Rev. 22:1-2) and no sin, what need of healing would there be if there was no sickness?

(Maybe the answer would be, that the tree of healing will be for sicknesses that aren't the result of sin, accidents being one cause, 2 Sam. 4:4, deadly things, Mark 16:18, being another).

Also, in the case of Job's friend, he was wrong to claim that Job's disaster (which included sickness) was the result of sin:

One accused him of doing evil, because God, being just, must render to men their due reward:

Job 34, NKJV
7 What man is like Job,
Who drinks scorn like water,
8 Who goes in company with the workers of iniquity,
And walks with wicked men?
9 For he has said, ‘It profits a man nothing
That he should delight in God.’

10 “Therefore listen to me, you men of understanding:
Far be it from God to do wickedness,
And from the Almighty to commit iniquity.
11 For He repays man according to his work,
And makes man to find a reward according to his way.​

We know that Job's words were right, and his friend's wrong, God giving witness (Job 42:7):

NKJV
the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, “My wrath is aroused against you and your two friends, for you have not spoken of Me what is right, as My servant Job has.​

 

[Jope]

Also, are poor clothing and nutrition the result of sin?

Or having an injury (2 Kings 1:2)?

Maybe Rheumatoid arthritis or Alzheimer's disease (the causes of which are not fully known) are not the result of sin, and should fall under the category of Ecclesiastes 8:14: "there are righteous people to whom it happens according to the deeds of the wicked" (ESV). Maybe someone having an injury or the poor who are poorly fed and clothed (all valid causes of sickness) would fall under this category of Ecclesiastes 8:14 too.

*I don't think that it's up to anyone to try and decypher the meaning behind someone's sickness though (2 Chronicles 6:29: "each knowing his own affliction and his own sorrow [maybe, as has been shown, there was no sin to cause the sickness, maybe there was]", ESV), but instead, do what David and/or Christ did: "But I, when they were sick- ​​​​​​​I wore sackcloth; ​​​​​​​I afflicted myself with fasting; ​​​​​​​I prayed with head bowed on my chest" (Ps. 35:13, ESV).

**In the other thread, that is now closed, I posted about David's prayer to turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness (to the subjective audience of Ahithophel). I commented on Christ's prayer and fasting too, to cause the demon to depart. I just wanted to clear up any possible misunderstandings. What I meant about David's prayer was, that his prayer was for God to coerce the thoughts of men. If demons are responsible for thoughts of men, and Christ also prayed for the demon to depart, then there would be similarity there.

 

[The Biblicist]

Hm. Nice to hear from you again Biblicist

A thought of mine about Genesis 2:17 is, maybe Adam and Eve could've still gotten sick without dying before the sin came.

(Are "deadly thing", Mark 16:18, KJV, the result of sin?)

The very word "deadly" has absolutely no meaning apart from death and death is the wages of sin. Sickness is the breakdown of the health of the body that is due to being "corruptible" due again to sin.

If the millennium is the era in which there will be the tree of healing (Rev. 22:1-2) and no sin, what need of healing would there be if there was no sickness?

Note carefully that this is restricted only to the "nations" of the saved that dwell upon the earth and it is not referring to the millennium but to the new heaven and earth as the tree is found in the New Jerusalem not in the millenninal or on new pre millennial created earth.

The obvious symbolism is being overlooked. Remember in Eden where the tree of life originally existed that when man sinned he took leaves to cover his shame due to sin. However, salvation was provided in Eden (Gen. 3;15) before he was kicked out. Hence, he was a saved person prior to being kicked out. The leaves were replaced by the skins of lambs or what God recognized as the acceptable sacrifice by Able (Heb. 11:4). However, the point is that leaves symbolize those OUTSIDE as does the word "Gentiles". They are "saved" but OUTSIDE the New Jerusalem due to their sins in their previous pre-resurrected life. They are outside the New Jerusalem then because they are outside God's way of SERVICE now.

 

[Yeshua1]

The very word "deadly" has absolutely no meaning apart from death and death is the wages of sin. Sickness is the breakdown of the health of the body that is due to being "corruptible" due again to sin.



Note carefully that this is restricted only to the "nations" of the saved that dwell upon the earth and it is not referring to the millennium but to the new heaven and earth as the tree is found in the New Jerusalem not in the millenninal or on new pre millennial created earth.

The obvious symbolism is being overlooked. Remember in Eden where the tree of life originally existed that when man sinned he took leaves to cover his shame due to sin. However, salvation was provided in Eden (Gen. 3;15) before he was kicked out. Hence, he was a saved person prior to being kicked out. The leaves were replaced by the skins of lambs or what God recognized as the acceptable sacrifice by Able (Heb. 11:4). However, the point is that leaves symbolize those OUTSIDE as does the word "Gentiles". They are "saved" but OUTSIDE the New Jerusalem due to their sins in their previous pre-resurrected life. They are outside the New Jerusalem then because they are outside God's way of SERVICE now.

Aren't all saved persons though residing in the new Jerusalem in the final/eternal state of things?