This is from back at post 48, which is where we were the last time I looked at this thread. To all readers, EVCForum has this great feature in which you link right to the post I'm responding to at the bottom of my post.
why would god only keep PART of his word, several hundred years too late? this basically makes god out to be dishonest and a cheat.
Well, I didn't say he would only keep part of his word. Using Isaiah 7:14 as an example, the direct prophecy and fulfillment would have happened back in Ahaz' time within a few years of the prophecy. A maiden would have to have a child, name him Emmanuel, and then, before that child gets too old, Syria and Israel (IIRC) would have to both lose their kings.
I'm just saying that there's nothing stopping God from dropping a sentence in there that would later be changed into Greek, and then rather amazingly applied to a rather amazing incident (assuming that incident happened).
Again, my one point being that taking one sentence out of context as a prophecy is not intrinsically bad, as has been suggested in this thread.
well, i didn't say "all." i said "usually." like i said, ezekiel is a little metaphorical.
Ok, I missed the usually. I thought you were suggesting that if a prophecy didn't fit your description, then there was automatically a problem with it.
truthlover writes:
I'm trying to argue that maybe that is how prophecy works, at least sometimes.
Arachnophilia writes:
I don't agree.
That's great. I know you don't agree, and I want you to tell me why. I understand that we are arguing (in a nice way, I hope), and I want that to happen. However, the very reason I made the above statement is that I felt like my side of the argument was being assumed away, not argued away.
So, please hear me. I'm feeling like I'm shouting in a hurricane. Here's my example, because immediately after saying you don't agree, you did it again.
why would god only keep PART of his word, several hundred years too late? this basically makes god out to be dishonest and a cheat.
Of course, I addressed this above, but I think you can only make this argument, because you're not looking at what I'm saying. I never said He would only keep part of his word. I said that there might be a good reasons for a part of it to hang around for centuries and be encouraging and useful to those who discovered it, even if it isn't the sort of thing that could "prove" God fulfilled a prophecy.
I don't feel like anyone has directly answered it (unless it got covered in posts 50-72, by someone who didn't reply to me), or even really tried to.
well, we don't KNOW that first bit, do we? we can believe it, but it's not a factually backed position.
This is in reference to the virgin birth. Um, uh...well, let's see...uh; ok, I'll just say it. I live in a religious community, ok, so this is difficult, but I don't really believe in the virgin birth, anyway, so I definitely wasn't arguing that it happened.
Hopefully, then, we can set that aside, and address what you said after, which is right on what I was arguing.
and the logic doesn't follow, either. if god had a son on earth born of a virgin, a verse that doesn't say virgin that's about something else entirely still has nothing to do with god's son. it's a forced fit, even if the first bit is true.
It DOES say virgin in the Septuagint. You're right. Isaiah did not say virgin, but the Jews of Alexandria who translated Isaiah into Greek DID say virgin. And the kid born of the virgin would be called "God with us," which is what Emmanuel means. If you believed God's Son was born of a virgin, and you read that in the Scriptures that belong to the physical race of God's Son, then you would be amazed and you would point that out. You would! I'm telling you. And it would encourage you, and it would make you excited, and you would be more affirmed in your faith than ever.
you're failing the see the direction i'm attacking this from.
No, I'm not. I am carefully avoiding addressing the direction you attacked this from, and I approached the issue from the side. That is why I have twice said, "My one point is that a one-line prophecy, pulled out of context, centuries after the prophecy was given, can have a purpose and could be of God."
I have also carefully granted that the reason I am giving that a one-line, out of context prophecy could be useful would never be proof to an unbeliever that God gave the prophecy.
I am not arguing that y'all should drop your point. I am arguing that you have to revise it. I am perfectly okay with you saying, there is no proof whatsoever that Isaiah 7:14 was fulfilled in Jesus. There is no proof whatsoever that Isaiah 53 was fulfilled in Jesus. There is no proof that Prov 8:22 or Ps 45:1 or the passage where God promised David a house long into the future through his Son (one of my favorites, and one I definitely believe was an on-purpose prophecy of Christ by God) was fulfilled in Jesus.
Ok, great. You're right. No proof.
But when you say, "It could not have been a prophecy. It makes no sense, and serves no purpose," then I say you've gone too far, and I'm arguing that you've gone too far, but I don't think you've heard me yet.
all we have is the text, not the events. so we have to attack it backwards, and backwards is the way we SHOULD attack it.
If you're looking for proof it's true, then you're right, that's the way you should attack it. However, if you're trying to prove it is not a prophecy and cannot be a prophecy, then that is not the way we should attack it.
If I'm trying to prove something, that it's true, then I have to address your "what if's." I especially have to address your "that's not normal" arguments. However, if the burden of proof is on you, which it is because you're saying it is definitely not true, then you have to address my what if's.
And my what if is this. If the event is true, and the people who experienced that event find a remarkable reference to the event, out of context, in ancient writings, then then it is reasonable to think that God might have put it there for the encouragement of those who experienced the remarkable event.
if the nt authors are claiming these things as fulfillment of prophesies
Are they? I don't think they are. I think the writers of the Gospels are describing events first and foremost. They are trying to convert you by the events they describe, and they are adding to the events the prophecies they have found. But the events are first and foremost as proof for them, not the prophecies.
The letters, on the other hand, are written to believers, and they are not being offered as proof of anything.
(of course, all this makes sense if matthew is a satire designed to mock and defame christianity)
As an aside, I think this has no merit, because it makes no sense historically. If it was a satire, then NO ONE got it, because no enemies of Christianity picked it up to use it against them, and Christians made it one of their cornerstone books. It would make it the most unsuccessful satire in history.
I always like to "break down" words.
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