Protecting God’s Word From “Bible Christians”

Crisis Magazine ^ | October 3, 2014 | RICHARD BECKER

[boatbums]

We have a good outline of HTML right here on Free Republic. Here's the link:

HTML Sandbox 2012

[Religion Moderator]

The post 506 issue has already been addressed.

The others are not childish insults and allusions.

For instance, the claim, true or false, that "Scientologists are dishonest is not a childish insult or allusion. However, the claim that "Scientologists are just like Nazis" and that "Scientologists are slack-jawed, knuckle draggers" are childish insults and allusions.

[Springfield Reformer]

Jesus turns wine into his blood and then commands his Apostles to drink it.

Not what the text says. The verb of being is used, estin, simply stating a direct metaphor in standard form. "A is B" is not at all the linguistic equivalent of "Subject turned A into B." The meal is stated to be a memorial. No other purpose is given. If the ritual was designed to mystically transmit eternal life to the participants, it would seem a great oversight not to at least mention that.

Peace,

SR

[narses]

[narses]

My soul magnifies the Lord,
And my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For He has regarded the low estate of His handmaiden,
For behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
For He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name. And His mercy is on those who fear Him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with His arm:
He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted those of low degree.
He has filled the hungry with good things;
and the rich He has sent empty away.
He has helped His servant Israel, in remembrance of His mercy;
As He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to His posterity forever.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen

Magníficat ánima mea Dóminum,
et exsultávit spíritus meus
in Deo salvatóre meo,
quia respéxit humilitátem
ancíllæ suæ.

Ecce enim ex hoc beátam
me dicent omnes generatiónes,
quia fecit mihi magna,
qui potens est,
et sanctum nomen eius,
et misericórdia eius in progénies
et progénies timéntibus eum.
Fecit poténtiam in bráchio suo,
dispérsit supérbos mente cordis sui;
depósuit poténtes de sede
et exaltávit húmiles.
Esuriéntes implévit bonis
et dívites dimísit inánes.
Suscépit Ísrael púerum suum,
recordátus misericórdiæ,
sicut locútus est ad patres nostros,
Ábraham et sémini eius in sæcula.

Glória Patri et Fílio
et Spirítui Sancto.
Sicut erat in princípio,
et nunc et semper,
et in sæcula sæculórum.

Amen.

She became the Mother of God, in which work so many and such great good things are bestowed on her as pass man’s understanding. For on this there follows all honor, all blessedness, and her unique place in the whole of mankind, among which she has no equal, namely, that she had a child by the Father in heaven, and such a Child . . . Hence men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her the Mother of God . . . None can say of her nor announce to her greater things, even though he had as many tongues as the earth possesses flowers and blades of grass: the sky, stars; and the sea, grains of sand. It needs to be pondered in the heart what it means to be the Mother of God.

(Commentary on the Magnificat, 1521; in Luther’s Works, Pelikan et al, vol. 21, 326)

[Springfield Reformer]

Very pretty picture. Too bad it contributes exactly nothing to the substance of the conversation. Your choice. But please keep dong the fractals. I like ‘em. :)

Peace,

SR

[NewCenturions]

Sad to see so many attacks coming from ‘our separated brethren’.

[ronnietherocket3]

But my relatives, AFAIK, never heard of Theotokos, or Chalcedon, or Nestorius, etc. Without that intensive background, when you say "Mother of God," you trigger biological models of understanding based on practical human experience. "Mother" is the First Cause of the child. If the child has the essence of absolute deity, "Mother" becomes First Cause even to that. Yes, I know the councils and the teaching don't say that. The focus at Chalcedon was preserving the seamless, hypostatic union of both human and divine natures in Christ, despite having acquired His human nature by birth to Mary. And yes, I am aware there are debates even about the exact timing and origin of His human nature (preexistence of souls question etc.).

A problem with saying Mother of God in the modern world is the modern understanding of how someone is born.

Specifically a man and woman have sex. A sperm cell then enters an egg cell and a human being is formed (sidestepping pre-existence of souls). Nine months later a baby pops out. The human egg cell was only discovered in the 19th century. This raises a question of how was motherhood understood in the 4th century. AFAIK, back then it was understood that a man and woman have sex, nine months later a baby pops out.

I would disagree with your statement that Mother is the first cause and say that the Father of the child is the first cause. It is by his action (usually, I am sure you can find some exceptions) that the child is conceived; the question concerning the mother is did she willingly cooperate or was she raped?

But having a pope actually call her Queen of Heaven? Is not the queen coequal regent with the king? And if equal in rank, under monotheistic principles, how do we see her as not some way entangled with the Trinity as a peer?

Queen is the female title equivalent to King; however, it is (usually, Elizabeth II is an exception) the King that rules by right. The Queen is determined by hr relationship to the King. In some monarchies, it is the wife of the King that is Queen. In Czarist Russia, the Czarina was the Mother of the King. However, if he dies/abdicates, she ceases to be Queen. If she dies/abdicates, he does not. The Queen does not have her own power.

[dsc]

515: Papist fantasy and misrepresentation

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
“Papist is a (usually disparaging) term or an anti-Catholic slur, referring to the Roman Catholic Church, its teachings, practices, or adherents.” A childish insult.

561: “They’ve educated themselves into spiritual imbecility and blindness.”

Needlessly insulting; serves only to provoke.

519: “The tactic that I see at work here is that the FRoman Catholics are taking a beating and are now pushing the RF guidelines, hoping to get the thread locked…”

Mind-reading.

521: “I haven’t encountered a Catholic with enough honesty and integrity to ever TRY to understand…”

A childish insult, and probably mind-reading, in that the writer assumes that Catholics disagree because they lack honesty and integrity.

All-in-all, troublemaking.

[ronnietherocket3]

Congratulations on getting something right and engaging in fraternal correction.

I would not call boatbums' response to ES's "fraternal correction". ES is not a protestant. I am unsure what to classify him as, perhaps a Judaizer (some might call him a Messianic Jew). However, neither of those groups are Protestant. He goes around and preaches that observance of the Written Mosaic Law is necessary. Unlike protestants, he believes there are errors in the NT that we have. I find his position to be utterly devoid of reasonableness.

While I disagree with Protestants on the question of whether or not Tradition and the Magisterium can be considered equal to Scripture, their position does appear reasonable. Concerning Tradition, this requires that a chain of men (not God) can remember something well. E.g., how do we know that the essential rite of ordaining priests actually dates back to Christ and was not bungled somewhere along the route. The children's game of telephone is a good example of this problem. Concerning the Magisterium, how do we know that the Holy Spirit actually guided the councils and it was not the mistake of fallible men? The simple answer to both these questions is faith in the promise of Christ that the gates of hell will not prevail against his Church. However, we are presented with a problem. How do we identify which Church this is?

I think this is how we arrive at the delusion expressed by ES. The final question in challenging Tradition and the Magisterium is: "How do we know that the Bible at the time of the Reformation was the same Bible that the Apostles had? Could the Church have introduced errors?" (Note: I am avoiding the question of the Deuteros). As boatbums pointed out, we have a significant number of Manuscripts from the second century, which is before the foundation of the Catholic Church according to ES.

[ronnietherocket3]

Christ did not die on the Cross so 21st cent. Christians could whine about how they are treated on the internet.

[Religion Moderator]

The debate on "open" Religion Forum threads is often contentious because it is the only place Freepers can argue against beliefs.

Some offensive terms occur not only in the present day debate but in the official and historical documents, e.g. anathema, heretic, cult, apostasy, snake handler, Papist.

If contentious debate and terms like that offend you, then you should IGNORE "open" Religion Forum threads altogether and instead read and post the RF threads labeled "caucus" "ecumenical" "prayer" or "devotional."

[editor-surveyor]

>> “The simple answer to both these questions is faith in the promise of Christ that the gates of hell will not prevail against his Church. However, we are presented with a problem. How do we identify which Church this is?” <<

.
Humanist balderdash!

Yeshua is not depending on any fallible human corporation to deliver his bride.

He didn’t found a ‘church,’ he announced his Kehillah, congregation, assembly, not an organization.

Yeshua’s assembly has no human officers to guide its affairs; he denounced that model in his letters to the seven churches in Asia. He called their officers Nicolaitanes, and didn’t disguise his hatred for them.

Satan cannot prevail against Yeshua’s assembly because they are not gathered together for him to defeat. On the contrary, Satan will gather his assembly in his assault on Jerusalem, and Yeshua will crush them conpletely.

Sorry to present you with nothing to classify and put in a box. You wouldn’t be in a box yourself, had you not placed yourself there voluntarily. You can leave it anytime you wish to join Yeshua. He’ll write his Torah on your heart!
.

[daniel1212]

I doubt Second Temple Jews were adopting Pagan practices, particularly after the Maccabean revolt

But Goldhammer said prayer for the dead was not practiced around that time, but 100 years later and only by some Jews. A lot can happen in two generations, and did.

Not giving heed to Jewish fables, and commandments of men, that turn from the truth. (Titus 1:14)

And it remains that praying to the departed in Heaven is utterly absent in Scripture, except by pagans, while prayer to God abounds,

and is specifically instructed to be addressed by the Lord in teaching the how to pray,

and with only God being the only one shown having the ability to hear and respond to infinite amounts of prayer,

and with Christ being manifest as the only and all sufficient Heavenly intercessor,

and with believers having direct access by Him into the holy of holies to worship commune and petition God.

Your quote establishes that it was in Jewish thought a century before the Apostles and not an innovation of the Catholic Church.

The point is that it was an innovation, utterly absent in Scripture despite over 150 prayers, and contrary to the power and position saints are shown to have, in contrast to God/Christ.

Given Jesus' repeated interactions with the Pharisees and Paul's' statement that he had been a disciple of Gamaliel, I would expect to be able to find them giving an unqualified put down of all Pharisaic notions.

That is another case in which the conclusion is unwarranted. At is takes is one major rejection of Truth and they are invalidated, while that the Pharisees supported prayer for the dead, let alone to the departed, is never shown or inferred.

The best anyone has been able to show to date is a put down of a specific tradition or two.

Really? You have the notion that "out of Galilee ariseth no prophet," plus that the common people could not be right versus them, and that itinerant preachers could not be valid if they rebuked the historical magisterium, both of which are quite like Rome when claiming assured veracity.

Then answered them the Pharisees, Are ye also deceived? Have any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed on him? But this people who knoweth not the law are cursed. (John 7:47-49)

Doth our law judge any man, before it hear him, and know what he doeth? They answered and said unto him, Art thou also of Galilee? Search, and look: for out of Galilee ariseth no prophet. (John 7:51-52)

[dsc]

“If contentious debate and terms like that offend you, then you should IGNORE “open” Religion Forum threads altogether and instead read and post the RF threads labeled “caucus” “ecumenical” “prayer” or “devotional.”

I can handle far more than those lackwits can hand out. I just keep hoping, irrationally, for some *real* consistency in moderating.

[rwilson99]

How would Genesis 1:27 not apply to Mary?

[dsc]

“Christ did not die on the Cross so 21st cent. Christians could whine about how they are treated on the internet.”

Right. So when the Golden Rule is violated, it is despicable to take note of it in any way.

[dsc]

Oh, and you forgot to deal with the mind-reading.

[Religion Moderator]

For a statement to be "mind reading" by the Religion Forum guidelines, it must be speaking of another Freeper, personally.

For instance, if you said "Mormons think they are better than anyone else" that would not be mind reading, but if you said "You think you're better than anyone else" it would be mind reading.