John 3:16 questions

Re: Re: Re: John 3:16 questions

1) YHWH impregnated one female, Miriam of Nazareth. Zeus, on the other hand, impregnated many females, both human and divine. I doubt that Zeus could have given appropriate amounts of fatherly attention to all of his children. Yes, Zeus was a slut.

2 & 3) The relevance of the "no magic here" comment and the anecdote mentioned here (Yshua refusing to use his miraculous powers to get down off the cross & save the two thieves, too) were that, if Yshua refused to use his miraculous powers to escape the cross, maybe he wasn't going to use his miraculous powers for pain management purposes either.

4) I don't believe that any of the actors in the death of Jesus were specifically predestined to kill the Messiah. Rather, it was scripted that the Messiah would die and the individuals involved had the free will to do as they chose. I make no speculation as to which direction Judas or Annas and Caiaphas or Pilate or Herod or the Roman soldiers went after their sojourn on Earth. That is up to YHWH, not me.

5) Not sure what the origins of human sacrifice were. But certainly it was practiced among the Canaanites and other Semitics in the Bronze Age. And certainly the story of Abraham being asked by YHWH to sacrifice his son Isaac (Genesis 22) and Isaac's place being taken by a ram at the last minute was YHWH's way of abolishing human sacrifice. In the Old Testament tradition, each Jewish head of household once a year sacrificed a one-year-old male lamb spotless and without blemish (or two turtle doves, if a poor man) for the atonement of the sins of himself and his family. Now, YHWH, in atonement of the sins of his family of man, i.e., all those whom he gave power to become adoptive sons and daughters of God (John 1:12), gave his
only begotten Son to die for their sins, thus putting an end to the sacrificial system. My own understanding of why it had to be His only begotten Son is that, for the atonement to be valid: (a) the sacrifice had to be human to die for humanity's sins and (b) the sacrifice had to be perfect (spotless and without blemish) in order to be acceptable as a sacrifice and thus had to be divine. Presumably, at least according to the Christian tradition, Jesus was both true God and true man and so was the only specimen of humanity that fit the bill for that sacrifice.

6) I wasn't trying to be flip when I said you have the right to make that decision. My only point was that there are many religious traditions out there and each person has the right to pick any religion he/she so chooses or indeed no religion at all. I suppose, on one level, it might be nice (or at least intellectually honest) to make a humungous study of comparative religion, determine the eternal consequences of rejecting any particular religion (assuming that's the "right" religion). And, maybe, based on such an exhaustive, make some determination of what is the "right" religion. But then, who has time for multiple PhD's in Religion? I do not necessarily claim that Christianity is the "right" religion, merely the one in which I happen to be most well-versed. But each person has the right to pick any religion or indeed none at all and accept the consequences. Only after we die will we know whether the consequences are a fiery eternal death, or maybe continuously going around again from one reincarnation to the next till you finally get it right, or just being all dressed up with no place to go. It's your soul, make your best bets.

 

How is the reference to His only begotten Son evidence of adoptionism or Arianism?

Hint: If He (Jesus) was begotten of the Father, He shouldn't need to be adopted, now, should He?

 

John 1:1-18 certainly is interesting and is worth quoting and thinking about:

Jhn 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

What's the "Word"? I tend to think of it as God's dynameis or something, his action. I'd be interested in finding out how intertestamental Judaism understood this concept, but not being a theologican I haven't really studied it.

When somebody speaks to us, we assume that we hear the speaker directy, though there's another sense in which what we hear is the words he spoke. The words transmit and reveal the speaker's ideas and intentions. Words go forth from a speaker and do his work out in the world among his hearers. But we don't typically think that the speaker emits some kind of a secondary being which in turn speaks its own word to us. It's the speaker we hear.

Jhn 1:2 The same was in the beginning with God.

Since God is supposed to be eternal, I suppose that "beginning" means the creation of the world. And since God is supposed to have spoke creation into being, presumbly his Word was his instrument.

There's an ambiguity in the idea of instrumentality. If God unleashes a plague of locusts to smite somebody, then who is doing the smiting, God or a bunch of insects? We certainly wouldn't want to call the insects incarnations of God, but nevertheless their actions are simultaneouly God's actions in some sense.

I might be totally wrong, but I suspect that the Jews of the time would have understood their Messiah like that. The Messiah wasn't going to be God himself come down to earth and walking around in the flesh, but the Messiah would nevertheless embody God's action here on earth. When the Messiah acted, it would be God acting.

Jhn 1:3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

Which seems to be consistent with God's Word being his spoken instrumentality in creation.

Jhn 1:4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

Jhn 1:5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

Jhn 1:6 There was a man sent from God, whose name [was] John.

I assume that this refers to John the Baptist. John wasn't God's incarnation but he was God's instrument. He was "sent from God" in some non-literal sense of agency.

Jhn 1:7 The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all [men] through him might believe.

Jhn 1:8 He was not that Light, but [was sent] to bear witness of that Light.

Jhn 1:9 [That] was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

Jhn 1:10 He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

But John was not that greatest of instruments through which God originally spoke creation into being.

Jhn 1:11 He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

I don't know what "his own" means. The Jews? Or mankind in general? If God created man through sending forth his voice, his Word, then presumably the meaning, the intention expressed in that Word represents what man was supposed to be.

Jhn 1:12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, [even] to them that believe on his name:

Jhn 1:13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

This divinization theme is kind of fascinating to me. It seems to have dropped out of most of contemporary Christianity, though I think that it's still alive in some of the mystical spirituality of the Orthodox churches.

It would be a little bizarre if it was interpreted literally to mean mankind becoming gods. But it makes more sense (to me at least) if it's interpretd as man conforming to God's original plan and purpose for mankind, embodied in God's first speaking him into being.

So finally mankind would be as he was intended to be, as he was created by God. The "sonship" presumably consists of the fact that what people are would come from God, and not from the corrupted influences of the world and the "flesh".

Jhn 1:14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

Jhn 1:15 John bare witness of him, and cried, saying, This was he of whom I spake, He that cometh after me is preferred before me: for he was before me.

Jhn 1:16 And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace.

Jhn 1:17 For the law was given by Moses, [but] grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.

Both Moses and Jesus served as God's instruments, though for different purposes.

Jhn 1:18 No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared [him].

This verse could be problematic to those equating God and the Son, since to see the Son would be to see God. But it seems to be consistent with the dynameis theory.

Obviously I'm a total layman at this. I certainly don't want to fight some Quixotic battle against Christian orthodoxy, nor do I want to challenge anyone's faith.

But in my own thinking about Christianity, I can't help feeling that the Bible should be read in a Jewish manner, as reflecting how the Jews would have understood these matters at that time. And I also feel that maybe the Bible should be read in such a way that the various heresies make sense as alternative readings of the early tradition.

Of course, I see the Bible as an illustration of a tremendously infludential moment in the history of ideas, rather than as another of God's instruments and quasi-divine in its own right.

 

I wonder if it is true, as I have read, that NFL telecasts stopped showing extra point kicks from the angle which showed people in the stands behind the goalpost not because of the ones holding up the big "John 3:16" signs, but because of the ones behind them holding up the "Song of Solomon 4:5" (and comparable) signs.

 

Possibly the single best recent source for those interested in issues related to claims of followers of Yeshua (Jesus) related to His Identity within God as the "Word" (Logos, or in Jewish Aramaic the Memra) is a rather thin volume by Anglican writer Richard Bauckham called God Crucified (http://tinyurl.com/ay5wq) (a shorter version of his thesis in this book is found online at http://forananswer.org/Top_JW/Richard_Bauckham.pdf)

Bauckham demonstrates convincingly that the idea of the Word being within God's own identity, even in a strictly monotheistic conception of God as was the case in forst century Judaism, is not only plausible generally, but clearly demonstrated in the Scriptures themselves, as the *Jewish* writers of the NT Scriptures (all were Jewish except Luke) apply that which was the prerogitive only of God (e.g., to accept worship) to Jesus.

Even when Jesus says, "I am the Way the Truth and the Life", he is applying to Himself not merely descriptions, but titles which are meant to be applicable only to God.

I see the point of Job as being primarily two-fold: 1) Suffering cannot merely be attributed to cause-and-effect relationships; e.g., it does not have merely a karma-phala cause, but there are often unseen things at work. 2) Throughout the book, Job insists (correctly) that he's done nothing deserving of his suffering, but wants God to answer why he has suffered so. God finally reveals HIMSELF to Job; this is not a "don't question!" "bullying" by God, but rather His graciously revealing Himself as the answer. He never answers Job's question, but for Job, the Answer is the vision of God: I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You." (Job 42:5)

Matt

 

Now that's funny!

Ever wonder what the beloved in Song of Solomon 4 & 7 would look like if it were read literally?

http://www.acts17-11.com/snip_song.htm

Mattl

 

The Logos doctrine in the John prologue is in my understanding the culmination of the Hellenic Logos doctrine first (I think) articulated by Heraclitus, and the Jewish idea of the Memra, the Aramaic word for which was inserted in a number of places in the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrases of the OT.

The Greeks developed a doctrine of the Logos as being the "Divine soul of the World", and especially by Plato in his Timeaus, where the Logos is described as the "Divine force from which the world has arisen". From the Greek side, this perhaps culminated in the Stoic idea of the Logos spermatikos being identified fully with deity.

In the Targums, the word Memra was used in places where the Hebrew text had only the LORD (that is, YHWH). Thus, while the Hebrew text of Deut. 26:17 is translated,"Today you have proclaimed YHWH to be your God", in the Targum on Deut. 26: 17, the first part reads, “Ye have appointed the Word of God
[e.g., the Memra] a king over you this day, that he may be your God.” Thus on some level, the Word was being identified with God.

These two streams were synthesized in Alexandria by the Hellenic-Jewish philosopher Philo, who essentially merged the two in his own version fo the Logos doctrine. Most interestingly, among Philo's many titles for this Divine Logos was "the Eldest or Firstborn Son of God."

"Son of God", particularly in the John prologue, is thus a parallel to Logos, the Word. Worth noting as well that in first century Judaism, "Son of God" was also a Davidic title for Messiah.

Anyway, this is obviously a seriously abbreviated treatment of what is a very deep topic. Nonetheless, I hope somebody finds this helpful.

Peace,

Matt

 

One of my favorite books. Five kids and counting, pretty much tells it all.

 

By the way, Song of Solomon gets rather racy by modern church-goer standards, and I don't just mean the stuff about the breasts. You tell me that there aren't some veiled references to certain sexual practices that would make a prude blush eight different colors.

If I can be so presumptuous, let me say that G-d is no Victorian. By most modern standards, the ancient Hebrews were astonishingly frank, matter-of-fact, and forward about sexuality.

Imagine a sermon in any average American Christian church on the Song of Solomon or the story of Boaz and Ruth, or Esther and her presentation to King Ahaserus and what apparently went on thereafter that made him exclaim that she was quite the best of all the maidens and must be his new queen.

We're simultaneously too prudish and too licentious in this culture. We make sex into something dirty, only practiced by starlets and unmarrieds, but don't dare discuss it in church--wouldn't want to offend the blue hairs! Maybe if the church took sex back and acknowledged frankly its joys--became more Hebraic about it--it wopuldn't be the forbidden fruit that entices so many to destruction when they use it in a way that the Creator thereof never intended.

 

Hi little fauss.

I have a quick moment to answer one of your questions now.

Perhaps me and my grand incredible mind have a keen sense of "not God's ways."

It's not delusions of the grandeur of my mind that lead me to the questions I posted. How much mind does it take to call BS on this notion of vicarious atonement of sins?

Vicarious atonement for the forgiveness of sins appears to me to break the law of cause and effect, and IMO, tends to lead more towards corruption than redemption.

Albert Pike, civil war general and philosopher, says it this way (though knowing Pike's predilection for quoting others without citation, it may well be the words of another)

Anyway...

Have a great weekend.

We're off to the KC Renaissance Festival this weekend. That place brings out the Zeus in me sometimes. ~^~^

 

I never saw your reply until this moment. But at the risk of beating a dead horse well after the fact, of course vicarious atonement breaks the law of cause and effect, of course it seems like something dropping out of the backside of a bull to the human mind.

Of course. One is quite right to ask: "Why should a murderer in Toledo get off the hook because some hapless fellow in Poughkeepsie gets hung?" Doesn't make sense--that's what you're saying, as near as I can tell.

Again, I'll keep circling back: why do you expect G-d to make sense (whatever that means, really)?

Does Quantum Mechanics make sense?

Does Relativity make sense?

Do women make sense? (boy, that should draw the comments, so let me amend it: having attended both a tractor pull, an NFL game, and two Adam Sandler movies, perhaps I should say "Do guys make sense?)

Why must G-d make any sense at all? Anyone who has a G-d that they can put in an easily-understood box has a G-d that not only does not exist, but I would argue--given that our notions of "make sense" are likely asinine little bits of ignorance--cannot exist.

G-d is too big for our logic, too big for the rules of cause and effect. His ways are not our ways. But if you can't see a need in your life for something greater than that which you can comprehend, perhaps I'm wasting my time, at least at this point in the game. But someday, maybe things will change. Who knows?

Now, go read Pascal.

 

Another argument on this was that given by Athanasius in his brilliant On the Incarnation of the Word (happily available free, including CS Lewis' introduction to this relatively recent translation, at this site: http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/history/ath-inc.htm). Athanasius argues that it was not merely the "price" of our sin (which was death), but the fact that our (as a race) having fallen into sin had distorted the very Image of God in which we were made. The only way to correct that was for the Creator Himself (the Word, or Logos, Who was within God) to become an actual human and take on our death penalty. He was the only one who could take the "death pill" and spit it back up again! This is why being joined to him by faith is what saves; not only is our sin penalty of death covered, but we become joined to all that He is.

Athanasius says it a lot better, but that is the gist of it.

As for the Pike quote below, I would pretty strongly disagree. The antinomian tendencies of many professing Christians aside, the truth is that those who are in Christ are meant to follow Him in their lives as a matter of not merely gratitude. If we are in Christ, the idea in Scripture is that we are meant to be saved not merely from the consequences of sin, but from sin itself, and to be gradually transformed increasingly into His likeness. Theat is the progression, for example, in the book of Ephesians: First, sits with Christ by being joined to Him (Ephesians 2:6), joining Him in the place of rest from trying to somehow "make it" by one's own deeds; it is in resting in him that one is then enabled and empowered to walk in Christ in this world (Ephesians 4:1ff). An excellent little book on this is the late Chinese expositor Watchman Nee's Sit, Walk Stand (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0842358935/104-4712953-9939145?v=glance).

Hope someone finds this helpful.

Peace,

Matt

 

Brings to mind Anne Hutchinson.

 

Because the scheme, as I understand it, puts the ball of my salvation in my court.

According to the rules, I have to accept this scheme as the truth or suffer eternally.

(flash to dcv in hell)

"Awwww, man... Good one, god. You gave me tools to discern truth, then based my eternal fate on me accepting some far fetched tale that doesn't accord with the reason you gave me."

I can most definitely see a need for something greater than I can comprehend. That's not a pass for me to uncritically accept things that don't even make sense.

Why do you recommend Pascal? My belief in deity is not based in fear of losing something or hope of gain.

 

That depends upon one's belief system. There are those who believe in predestinarianism, which says the YHWH already predestined most to Hell (and a token few to Heaven) and, therefore, whichever way you (or I) might be going, NEITHER OF US HAVE ANY CHOICE IN THE MATTER. Then there's the arminians, who seem to think that, sooner or later, everyone's going to be saved; according to such cheap grace thinking, YOU'RE TRAPPED --- YOU'RE GOING TO HEAVEN WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT.

 

With what are you disagreeing? Perhaps this part:

If I understand your position correctly, you're stating that those who accept John 3:16 will somehow become more christ-like and commit less sin.
The disconnect between this rosy image and reality as I perceive it is staggering.

Pike is communicating wisdom to those strong enough to recognize and accept their responsibility. John 3:16 seems to be offering a fantasy for those wishing to escape their responsibility.

 

I'm referring specifically to the belief system reflected in John 3:16.

 

She has some parkway. Great curves.

 

I think that I agree with all of that. But doesn't that line of reasoning lead rather inexorably to agnosticism? I consider myself a religious agnostic and my reasons look very much like what you have just written.

Aren't we already slipping away from the transcendence principle by introducing the pronoun 'his'?

I agree that there may be some ultimate ground of being, some reason why something exists rather than nothing. But I certainly don't know what it is. I don't even know how to conceive of it without circularity or infinite regress. I can give it a name, 'God' perhaps, but it remains a blank, a cypher. It's probably least misleading to just speak of 'the unknown'.

The problem is that anthropomorphizing it, imagining it as if it were a giant human being in the sky, and imagining that we know its very human-like purposes, its likes and dislikes, is precisely the kind of thing you denounce up above. It seems to be an attempt by human beings to put the unknown into a convenient box, to characterize it, and to give it a comprehensible and emotionally evocative human face. I agree that such an imaginative construction most likely doesn't correspond to reality at all.

I agree that human beings have a need for... I don't know if there's a word... attunement, maybe. But if the goal is to attune ourselves, to find peace in a reality that exceeds all human understanding, then perhaps we might be better off pursuing a more non-cognitive form of religiosity.

This is why I'm fascinated by apophatic "negative" theology in the Christian tradition, and by the Indian traditions' deep philosophical investigation of these matters. It's why I mentioned pragmatic religious non-realism in previous posts.

Or the pseudo-Dionysius and some of the medieval mystics. Or Nagarjuna maybe.

 

Hi Folks,

Jimmy noted that

That one really had me stumped. I googled her name and discovered that

I don't think I have any trouble with what she said, except to note that even for those with God's grace in their heart, sanctification is gradual (or perhaps gradually worked into one's life, like yeast worked through the dough, cf. Matthew 13:33), and straying can be brought to Messiah for forgiveness.

DCV, I don't think you've quite understood me on this. Though belief in Christ is often in a Western context communicated in sound bytes that make it seem like the main thing is mere mental assent to some principle (e.g., such as in John 3:16) or by joining a particular club, it's more in terms of what "believe means in the original language of the passage: "used in the NT of the conviction and trust to which a man is impelled by a certain inner and higher prerogative and law of soul" (Strong's).

Part of the problem, again particularly (though by no means exclusively) in the US is that while there are those who would say, "I am somehow stumbling along, but bit by bit He's changing me", there are also those who would say, "It doesn't matter what I do or how I live, because I am saved!", and proceed to willfully live in a manner antithetical to the teachings of Christ (which is what I meant by "antinomianism").

As I understand it, our problem is that there is no one who is "strong enough to recognize and accept their responsibility"; which is why we need Christ. Clinging to Him for salvation is no more a "fantasy for those wishing to escape their responsibility" than is a ship's passenger clinging to a wooden plank (or better, choosing to use a lifeboat) left over from a shipwreck in the open sea, rather than swimming for it.

I suspect it would have been recognized as being the case by both Pseudo-Dionysius and the medieval mystics as well as Pascal; I personally enjoy them all. Indeed, it's interesting to note the influence the writings of these early writers (e.g., Ephrem the Syrian and others) had on Reformers such as John Wesley, whose teaching on sanctification is actually something of a modified version of early-church teaching on theosis. All of these would have pointed to Christ as the one who makes union with God (in the sense of relationship, not "dissolving") possible.

Enjoying the interaction,

Peace to all,

Matt