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Author | Topic: Jesus - Wholly Man - Wholly God | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Faith writes: I don't question at all that Mary was His biological mother. The question we were discussing is how Jesus came to embody the true nature of God the Father.
Well, that was the point of the formulation that has Him being Wholly God and Wholly Man, and it seems rather a stretch to insist on the term Logos over the fleshly implications of being born in a human womb, but that's what we are told, that he was born in a human womb as flesh and blood so that His being wholly God and wholly Man has that fleshly meaning. That was the whole point of all the theological wrangles that ended up in the Athanasian Creed, that defined His physical being as a "Hypostatic Union." Faith writes: I've read numerous posts of yours and although I often disagree with what you write, you are not stupid. I don't see it as second-guessing the Scriptures but a question of how to understand them. It isn't that simple when you read something meant for an audience 2000 years ago and more, and then simply try and overlay a 21st century understanding over it. Certainly the nativity story is pretty consistent with traditional theology. I do still question it though and don't see it as a particularly important issue.
You make me glad I'm only a stupid fundamentalist who doesn't have to second-guess the scriptures, just believe them. And what I believe does seem to be in synch with the history of traditional Christian theology, which is reassuring too. Faith writes: I pretty much agree. We have as part of our service a piece with the line it; so complex so simple, so clear so mysterious. That's a rather roundabout or abstract way of "understanding the true nature of God in Jesus it seems to me, way too intellectualized. But I don't think the incarnation is the key to that understanding particularly anyway, it merely gives us a solid simple understanding that He was "made flesh and dwelt among us." God is happy to save simpletons so He didn't make the scriptures as hard to understand as all that. The Christian message of that as humans we are to follow the Golden Rule. Pretty simple. It is when we build a theology around that it gets more complicated. ![]() He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Faith writes: Well, the types do happen to be simply THERE, in the Old Testament scriptures themselves, in different books from different periods of time too. These interpretations aren't imposed on the text, they are simply there, and they make a marvelous unity of the 66 books of the Bible which you prefer to see as fragmented. There are a lot more types than the few I mentioned, the OT is thick with them, all defining the nature and character of the Messiah to come, and from times when the idea of that Messiah was very vague and far from the reality who finally appeared in the person of Jesus Christ. If anybody put these types in "neat little boxes" it was the Holy Spirit since the people involved had hardly a clue to any of it. Actually I do agree that the OT isn’t completely fragmented. I see the OT as being a narrative that tells the Israel story with their evolving understanding of Yahweh. There were a variety of understandings about the messiah and a number of the passages that are taken as being messianic were really about Israel. In some, (like the suffering servant is Isaiah), Jesus seems to have appropriated them to Himself.The predominate view, as held by the disciples pre-resurrection and for a short time afterwards was that the messiah, in this case Jesus, would lead them against their enemies and the Jews would become the dominate tribe in the area. Even though He hadn’t mounted an army they still believed it because of the miracles which gave them confidence that God would fight the battles for them. Jesus seems to have sifted the scriptures and fulfilled those which were consistent with His nature and where he could made a point of certain things. A couple of examples would be referring to Himself as the Son of Man’ and of course riding the colt into Jerusalem. Faith writes: The only problem with that though is the last sentence. I still don’t see it as sins plural, but as sin singular. It is all about what is in our hearts that motivates us. A couple of easy examples of that are in the sheep and goats parable from Matthew 25, and of course the Good Samaritan. Yes, no problem with that. I think we commit sin all the time, though, without knowing it, especially since Jesus redefined adultery as including lust in the heart and murder as hatred in the heart. We're violating those and all the other commandments at that level all the time. When He said He fulfilled the Law down to its tiniest punctuation marks He implied that the tiniest of sins against the Law would be held against us except for His fulfillment of it.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Theodoric writes: I was merely pointing out that we all have biases and I wouldn't have thought to have to point out that you would feel that you didn't. I'm sure we all take it for granted that we all have biases, and obviously that includes me and those that we have talked about. Once again, This "faith and belief' forum is for our faiths and beliefs that form our biases in the first place. I'm not at all sure why this is any kind of an issue with you. Never said I did not have any biases. It is very dishonest of you to imply that I feel that way. I have lots of biases. The difference is I am open and honest about them. I am merely pointing out the problems with your sources. They are biased and not historians as you presented them. Yes my sources have biases. All historians have biases. If you disregard those historians who have biased we would no historical accounts at all. We as individuals decide what and who it is that we have faith in, and what we believe.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
He is a theologian who has spent considerable time studying 1st century history.
Edited by GDR, : Re worded an incredibly poorly written statement.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined:
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Theodoric writes: But you should also point out that he is not a historian as you claimed. The following is from this wiki site A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past, and is regarded as an authority on it.[1] Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is concerned with events preceding written history, the individual is a historian of prehistory. Some historians are recognized by publications or training and experience. Wright fits that definition perfectly. He has studied extensively on Christian history in the context of of it's time and culture. He has taught on the subject all over the world.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Sure. I already mentioned Josephus. I read Robert Wright's book "The Evolution of God". Wright calls himself an agnostic. Another Wright, I(I seem to be big on Wrights) is Ronald Wright book "A Short History of Progress". I've read Dawkins, Hitchens and others of the atheistic POV and read numerous books on basic physics by secularists like Brian Greene.
He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Theodoric writes: OK. You are going to believe what you want. Wright is an ancient historian who can read the documents in their original languages. He is primarily a theologian who studies his theology within their historical context. If you want to reject all of that it is fine with me. Ok now provide us with who considers him an authority. Has he published in historical journals? Has he been employed as a historian? I do not see any position he has as a historian. They have all been theological and apologetics. Apologetics and theology are not history. They use history but in a biased way to arrive at a preordained outcome. The views that I expressed are my beliefs, (this is a faith and belief) forum and you reject Christianity completely, so everything I wrote is all poppycock (as somebody put it earlier) anyway. Carrying on this discussion of Wright's credentials is pointless. Yes, the vast majority of sites with articles concerning Wright is Christian because that is where he goes to teach and speak. His ministry is not aimed at non-Christians but aimed at Christians in order to advance Christian scholarship. Incidentally here is a link to a Time magazine article. Christians Wrong About Heaven, Says Bishop
- TIMEHe has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Tangle writes: I looked through my library and I couldn't find one that would really fit the bill. I have read works by people like Dom Crossan and Markus Borg. They have some interesting insights and both deny the bodily resurrection. (Borg unfortunately passed away last year.) I considered their views but frankly their argument boiled down to the idea that they knew it couldn't happen, (people who are dead stay dead) and so any other explanation is preferable. One idea they put out was that just as people claim to have visions of some sort with loved ones after they have passed on. However, that makes no sense of the accounts of Jesus appearing to multiple people at the same time. Primarily for me though, none of the possibilities of what happened that they put forward made any historical sense for the early rise of Christianity. You get credit for reading those things but - with the exception of Josephus - they're not historical works. I was asking whether you'd read any historians that weren't also theologians writing about 1st century Christianity.I haven't btw, but if I was as interested as you are I would have done. If they exist that is. The point is that and I have done the best I can to read about my faith from as many perspectives as I can. I have found that by looking at Jesus in His historical context, it altered much of what I had previously accepted and so many things fell into place for me. If anyone knows of any good historical books from that era please let me know. Incidentally, I have just pre-ordered a new book by Wright entitled The New Testament in Its World: An Introduction to the History, Literature, and Theology of the First Christians The book I mentioned earlier called The Patient Ferment of the Early Church: The Improbable Rise of Christianity in the Roman Empire was definitely not a book of apologetics even though it was put out by a Christian publishing house. It was very interesting in that it is clear that the early church was not about evangelizing. It was actually primarily a social movement based on Jesus' command to love their neighbours. They were particularly looking to attract new adherents, and those they did attract came because they were attracted to a new way of living based on sacrificial love. They actually had to go through a fairly rigorous process prior to being baptized into the church. In spite of what you may think it was a very well researched historical work. It is my hope and belief that today's church is inching its way back towards that view.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Theodoric writes: The following is from thr preface of a book outlining Wright's views but not by Wright. What ancient languages can he read?quote:He has taught Greek at the university level and also has Latin. I read somewhere that he also gained fluency in Aramaic as well as some of the European languages but I can't remember the source of that information. He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
I think I'll go a little further into tis
Faith writes: I want to go a little further into this which is one of the main points I was trying to make in the talk, and a point I think we will disagree on. A know that there are Gospel accounts that seem to contradict my point but I do not see Jesus the human being having supernatural knowledge of either the future or of any any life prior to His earthly existence. As an aside I agree with John Polkinghorne, (who first got me thinking about this), when he claims that God does not know the future either as the future is open and not there to be known. Traditional Christology has no problem seeing Jesus as God in human flesh, that's what the term "incarnate" means, it's perfectly standard. He is also the Logos or the Word made flesh, but Jesus IS God, begotten by God, there is no need to get so "careful" about this. Yes, I believe that Jesus and others gain insight that from their beliefs, (not knowledge), through prayer and the study of the Scriptures, however the response is based on faith. I contend that this was true of Jesus. I suggest that this is clearest in Jesus' prayer in Gethsemane . As an aside, I am not saying by this that the miracles didn't happen, but I would contend that the miracles happened by God the Father responding to the prayers of Jesus. I outlined at the end of the talk how I see us coming to understand Jesus as God or maybe more accurately as Lord. He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Faith writes: I'd just like to focus on this. I don't see Jesus' self understanding as seeing Himself as God. He did however in my view combine two threads out of the Hebrew Scriptures and apply them to Himself. I reject the idea that Jesus was in any way ignorant of His divinity while on Earth. The first was the arrival of the messiah and the second was the return of Yahweh to the Jews. He certainly saw Himself as the messiah for a multitude of reasons but He also IMHO saw Himself as somehow embodying the return of Yahweh. He clearly demonstrated the He saw Himself as a Temple replacement by forgiving sins. He even talked about the Jews missing the time of Yahweh's visitation. He also talked in seeing Him they were also seeing the Father, and by this, it seems clear to me that He understood that He was embodying the true nature of the Father. Once again though I don't think that this came to Him supernaturally but simply through prayer and His understanding of Scriptures, which He seemed to have understood in a way that none of His countrymen, (at least that we know of), did at the time.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Just to touch on a couple of things. The quotes you used from the OT were about the return of Yahweh. They were not messianic. Here is a wiki article that talks about Jewish belief about a messiah.
Messiah - Wikipedia The messiah was only believed to be a human who would lead the presumably in battle but would be the anointed one of God to do that. Jesus wove together the two Jewish ideas, a human messiah to lead them and the return of Yahweh into Himself. Of course He wasn't the messiah that the Jews expected or wanted, and they missed completely the time of Yahweh's visitation.
Faith writes: Well, as you know I disagree with that. I don't believe at all that he authored them but I would have confidence that He had them memorized, but in the same way that other Jewish teachers of His day would have them memorized.
Of course as God He actually authored the scriptures, so He would simply have known them, they didn't even need to "come to Him" as they might to us. Faith writes: For the Jews to be forgiven sins they brought sacrifices to the Temple and asked God for forgiveness. Jesus forgave sins on the spot and said that He desired mercy and not sacrifice.
"Who can forgive sins but God" is what that passage says, it doesn't impute the forgiveness of sins to the Temple. Faith writes: We'll just disagree on that.
And of course referring to Himself as the visitation of God He is claiming to BE God, not just represent Him, also in the case of claiming to show the Father through His own Person -- can't accept your reducing that to a matter of showing God simply through His character. Faith writes: Not at all. Jesus wanted to lead the Jews in a direction that was peaceful instead of the revolutionary road they were headed down. It would have avoided the slaughter of many thousand Jews as well as the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. Then there was where He says how He had wanted to comfort Jerusalem but "you wouldn't come to Me" He's clearly saying He's God, not a representation of God.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Faith writes: No. The messiah was to be the one human anointed by God to lead the Jews. The return of Yahweh was a different matter but Jesus combined the two strands of Jewish belief.
But the return of God IS the coming of the Messiah, the Messiah IS God. Faith writes:
I don't see anything in Luke's account of Simeon and Anna that indicate that they thought the messiah was a deity. They certainly believed Him to be the messiah and that He would bring a renewal to the Israelites, but as the human messiah annointed by God. Even the term Son of God was essentially a messianic term and it was quite a bit later that the early Christians denoted and understood that the term meant more than simply being anointed by God but to actually claim Jesus as part of the godhead.
The Jews were wrong about the Messiah, as Jesus makes amply clear. He criticizes the Pharisees endlessly, because they were wrong in their understanding of the scriptures in all the ways He says. As Christians we are to understand the Old Testament through the New Testament, we are not to follow the Jewish understanding. The appearance of the Messiah in Jesus was anticipated rightly only by very few of the Jews who read the scriptures rightly: Anna and Simeon in the temple were two of those. The vast majority got it wrong and had to learn the truth from Jesus Himself. They had the Book of Daniel to tell them when it would be so most got the timing rightish, which is why there were so many would-be Messiahs popping up around that period of time, but the character of the Messiah, no. That He was to be God Himself in human flesh, that's all in the OT but they missed it. Faith writes:
Yes, but that was Jesus' understanding and not the understanding held by the Jews in general. I agree that it wasn't just about Rome but the broader problem of evil itself.
Jesus didn't do any weaving of these things, He simply fulfills the prophecies as written, to be the Suffering Servant of Isaiah in His first advent, as He explained in the synagogue when He read from the first part of Isaiah 61, stopping right before the line about God's vengeance, and then on His second coming to be the conquering hero of that line He left out, but not against Rome, against all of God's enemies. Faith writes:
Yes, just as I believe that Lewis, Wright and numerous others have been inspired to write what they do. That doesn't impute inerrancy to what they write.
Yes we disagree about that. Do you know that the Greek for "inspired" where the scriptures are described as inspired literally means "God-breathed?"Faith writes: But you didn’t finish the quote. You need the verses following. When Jesus says this as directly as He did, how He Himself wanted to do this, He is clearly identifying Himself as God who wanted to gather Jerusalem to Himself to comfort them and they kept refusing Him.quote:It is about the one who comes in the name of the Lord, which is quite different from how you understood it when you left off the final verses of the passage. He is speaking on behalf of the Father. He is likely also referring back to Psalm 118 vs 26 where it is clearly about humans who come in the name of the Lord. Faith writes: (I’ll try to do a better job of answering this. ) Then there was where He says how He had wanted to comfort Jerusalem but "you wouldn't come to Me" He's clearly saying He's God, not a representation of God.Not at all. Why couldn’t He comfort Jerusalem as God’s representative as you put it. He they had believed He was God’s anointed one it would seem reasonable that He could have comforted Jerusalem. He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
Faith writes: The Jews weren't really sure of how it would look with the return of Yahweh. They looked back to the Exodus out of Egypt and the parting of the Red Sea, and anticipated something like that. At the same time they also hoped for a Jewish messiah. Here is material from a wiki site. What sort of "return of Yahweh" could there be apart from the Messiah? What are you anticipating? When is it to happen, or has it happened?quote:The messiah, as I've said, was to be the one anointed by God to lead them, but very human. They were two different strands of Jewish thought. Jesus through prayer and through His Scriptural knowledge combined the two strands together into His own life. He would also have experienced God the Father working through Him in ways that were unique to Him. So yes, Jesus did embody Yahweh's return but as a very human messiah. The "Word" became flesh, with the "Word" representing God's nature and His message for mankind.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6223 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: |
I wonder if you have considered this Faith. It seems to me that the views that you have expressed of Jesus’ divine knowledge actually diminishes what He was as a man, and what He did as a man. How many Christians, (and non-Christians for that matter), have over the centuries sacrificed their lives out of love for others. These people gave up their lives simply on the faith that this was the human, or the right thing to do.
If Jesus had the kind of supernatural knowledge that I think you believe He had, then He would have knowledge of His resurrection, which diminishes His sacrifice on the cross. However if,( as I believe and also contend is consistent with the NT accounts), with faith and belief, not knowledge, that His Father was somehow going to redeem His torturous humiliating death, then it takes on a whole new and far more relevant meaning. He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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