I hope this pertains to the thread. I don't really have any opinions regarding it, except that it was interesting reading and made me think of your discussion. I think this has been brought up, but since it's from the Austin paper, it might have some slightly different info. Anyway... In search of Jesus Controversial scholars lead seminars on the Bible By Eileen E. Flynn AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF Wednesday, May 12, 2004 Davidson Loehr is a University of Chicago-trained theologian, a liberal Unitarian who, when asked whether he believes in God, responds, "Define God." He is a minister who argues that Jesus never meant for people to worship him. Roy Blizzard is a former preacher and a Hebrew-speaking Bible scholar who claims that Jesus' teachings are often misunderstood because of poor translations. They hold very different views about Jesus, but both agree that most churches' theological structures are too rigid to allow the faithful to pose intellectual questions. And they are among a number of scholars who are critical of the story most churches teach believers. With renewed interest in the historical Jesus, however, the scholars say there is a greater demand for answers. Loehr, a fellow with the controversial Jesus Seminar, will present "The Truth About Jesus and the Origins of Christianity" Friday and Saturday at First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin. Blizzard, who regularly leads sessions on the Bible, will host classes Thursday, Friday and Saturday that explore science and the Bible and understanding one's identity through creation. Recent books and films have sparked an intense focus on the life and times of Jesus and the authority of the Bible. Dan Brown's best-selling novel, "The Da Vinci Code," presents the theory that the church covered up the sexual relationship between Jesus and Mary Magdalene. Mel Gibson's film, "The Passion of the Christ," portrays the final hours of Jesus' life with Aramaic dialogue and blood-soaked images meant to capture the realism of a Roman crucifixion. Whether or not scholars find the book or the movie accurate, the works have whet the public's appetite for more information about the historical Jesus. "A lot of people are desperate for this," Loehr said. But he acknowledged that many Christians would reject his ideas, which dispute the notion of Jesus as a deity. The Jesus Seminar, a group of Bible scholars and theologians who meet semiannually, has offered other theories that some have labeled heresy. Founded in 1985 by New Testament scholar Robert Funk, the seminar critically examines Christian doctrine from a historical perspective; scholars then vote on whether a belief or saying attributed to Jesus is authentic. They've reached controversial conclusions, including that Jesus never claimed to be the Messiah. Loehr said the four Gospels were written decades after Jesus' death, so the seminar fellows rely on portions of other Gospels not included in the New Testament and other ancient texts that they believe paint a more accurate picture of Jesus. For that reason, Loehr said, his message will not appeal to Christians who believe the Bible is inerrant. Rather, he hopes to appeal to what 18th century German theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher called the "cultured despisers" of religion. He also wants to reach those who attend church but have unanswered questions. To those people, Loehr said he will say, "Let me bring you a picture of Jesus that I can persuade you is far more true . . . than what the churches have given you." Balancing historical inquiry with Christian faith can be a challenge, but Lewis Donelson, professor of New Testament at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, believes most Christians are always seeking a better understanding of Jesus. "A necessary part of Christian life," he said, "is to come up with accounts of who Jesus is. I think we have a permanent engine to produce these things." Donelson said the Jesus Seminar alone doesn't drive that interest among Christians, but it can generate discussion. Some more disturbing theories, though, he said, are "not without cost. Some people don't know how to map their way through this, and it becomes more than a challenge to their faith but kind of a threat." And, from Loehr's perspective, it should be, but the seminar doesn't make Jesus' teachings irrelevant. "If you've been given the choice between the teachings of Jesus and the creeds and dogmas of Christianity," he said, "pick Jesus." Blizzard, who runs the organization Bible Scholars in Austin, offers his own version of the real Jesus, a Hebrew-speaking Messiah. But he's not interested in Christianity. Blizzard has participated in excavations in the Middle East and studied at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Before his visits to Israel and study of Hebrew, he said, he was a "very fundamental conservative Christian." Now, he said, he identifies himself in Hebrew simply as a maamin, or believer. He said the average Christian is not as concerned with authenticity. When he watched "The Passion of the Christ," Blizzard mentally picked apart what he saw as a movie riddled with inaccuracies, while the other viewers in the audience were clearly moved by the film. For them, he said, "It was an emotional experience." But some congregations and individuals, he said, pursue a more intellectual approach to faith. The model for seeking truth, he said, is found in Judaism, which teaches that there can be no faith without knowledge. "Otherwise, all you've got is just belief," he said. Not everyone thinks Blizzard is onto the truth, however. Some scholars reject Blizzard's assertion that Jesus spoke Hebrew; others argue he spoke both Hebrew and Aramaic. Kelley Coblentz-Bautch, assistant professor of religious studies at St. Edward's University, said she applauds Blizzard's dedication to Hebrew and to understanding the Jewishness of Jesus. But she said she's found that Jesus' sayings often take on greater clarity when converted from Greek to Aramaic, not Hebrew. Blizzard maintains that research showing Hebrew as the language of Jesus and the New Testament has not yet been accepted in many academic circles. But it is essential background, he argues, for appreciating Jesus' message. The idea of the Kingdom of God, for example, comes across in Greek as something that would arrive in the future. Read in Hebrew, Jesus is saying the kingdom was already present, according to Blizzard. But Blizzard said the Jesus Seminar's proposal that Jesus never claimed to be the Messiah is another misunderstanding. Jesus, he said, refers to himself as the "green tree," which Jews of the time would have recognized as a messianic claim. eflynn@statesman.com; 445-3812
I think we should lock this thread. It would be a shame that Lindsay Lohan loses to Jesus in popularity simply because this one has been open for a longer period of time.
I agree, what I'm trying to say is that it probably didn't translate well. I'm not disagreeing with what you're saying about the Gospel.
Can someone explain to me how a quote from the Bible got into my second to last post? Before the one before this one. I didn't type all that up. Anyways.. KB, What I'm arguing is that Christianity teaches all those things, not the Bible. Christianity teaches that the Holy Spirit is God, while the subject is iffy in the Bible. You accept it as a Christian, but as I said, a non-Christian more than likely wouldn't make that connection, not from any of the quotes you cited. It is not a fact that the Bible teaches that the Holy Spirit is God, that's a belief. I've read the exact same quotes youv'e read, and the connection is not apparent to me. It can be made, but it is a vague possibility. BTW, I would like to see where you're getting this "Elohim" thing from. As I mentioned, Aramaik is very close to Arabic, and it soudns to me that Elohim is the translation of Allahumma in Arabic, which translates to "God". Maybe the Bible, like the Qura;an, wasn't meant to be translated either?
Elohim is the Hebrew word for "God," but it is plural. Same word translated "gods" in other parts of the Bible. However, when speaking of "God," the language used in association with Elohim is singular. For example: “For the Lord your God [plural] is a compassionate God [singular]; He will not fail you nor destroy you nor forget the covenant with your fathers which He swore to them. (Deuteronomy 4:31). One problem I have with this is that the New Testament (written in Greek) frequently makes use Old Testament (mostly Hebrew with a little bit of Aramaic) passages translated into Greek. If it wasn't meant to be translated into other languages, I can't imagine the New Testament would use portions of the Old Testament translated into Greek. Thanks for article, Deckard. I always enjoy reading Jesus Seminar-type articles. Far more often than not, they contain bold assertions without much "proof," but they are interesting. I've been fascinated with the Jesus Seminar lately--especially guys like Crossan, Borg, Spong, and Paigels (actually, she's a gal). They usually give them impression that all scholars agree with them, although it's completely untrue. In order to prove their point, they just redefine the word "scholar." I don't know exactly what they're definition is, but it's something like this: someone who agrees with us. For that reason, I've also enjoyed some of the critiques of their work: "The Real Jesus" by Luke Timothy Johnson "Who Was Jesus?" by N.T. Wright "Jesus under Siege" by Gregory Boyd (kind of a beginners approach to the Jesus Seminar arguments, and probably the best of those I've read) "Cynic, Sage, or Son of God?" by Gregory Boyd (I don't actually have this one yet, but it's the scholarly version of "Jesus under Siege" (in a sense)--much larger work with a more in-depth look at the questions involved.
Batman, First, I don't consider myself a "religious" person, but I know what you meant. I guess committed Christians fit the definition of "religious." I think a Christian should always be thinking about what Jesus would do in a given situation, and/or what Jesus would want him/her to do. Jesus was the ultimate role model. Regarding your question about Jesus, I'd rather not give a "best guess." If you're asking me whether I think Jesus would have suppported the decision to go to war, my answer is "I don't know." I supported the decision to go to war. Was I right to support that decision? I don't know. I've never risked my life to protect a fellow American. I am eternally grateful to anyone in this country—and around the world—who is risking his/her life to protect me. I am eternally grateful to all those who have gone before them. God bless our troops. God bless the families of our troops. God bless the Iraqi people.
Fallenness on Display Power Corrupts BreakPoint with Charles Colson May 10, 2004 Note: This commentary was delivered by Prison Fellowship President Mark Earley. The more we read and learn about the mistreatment of prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, the worse it gets. New revelations about the conduct of American soldiers shock and surprise us. But one person who wasn’t surprised by what he learned is Dr. Philip Zimbardo of Stanford University. He has seen it all before. In 1971, Zimbardo and his colleagues conducted an experiment in the basement of Stanford’s psychology building. After creating a simulated prison, they randomly assigned twenty-four Stanford students to be either guards or prisoners. Within a few days, the students playing guards had become sadistic. They placed bags over the “prisoners’” heads. They forced them to strip naked and subjected them to humiliating sexual pranks. Students from one of America’s most prestigious schools descended into barbarism at an alarming speed. Zimbardo was forced to end the experiment less than a week after it began. The results at Stanford, while dramatic, weren’t unique. An earlier experiment at Yale tested people’s willingness to inflict pain on others. They were told to push a switch that supposedly delivered an electric shock every time another subject answered a question incorrectly. With only the researcher’s insistence for motivation, two-thirds of the participants were willing to deliver potentially lethal shocks to the victim—even though they could hear his screams. Although the set-up was fake, the willingness of one person to inflict suffering on another was all too real, just as at Stanford. Seeing ordinary college students become sadistic thugs caused Zimbardo to tell the New York Times recently that he wasn’t at all surprised at what happened in Iraq. According to Zimbardo, it wasn’t a case of simply putting “bad apples in a good barrel,” but the opposite. Prisons, “where the balance of power [between guards and prisoners] is so unequal,” are, almost by definition, brutal places. This makes it vital for authorities to rein in the guard’s worst impulses. Otherwise, as the nineteenth-century Christian statesman Lord Acton famously put it, power will corrupt. This corruption is the product of our fallenness. We are certainly capable of generosity and kindness, but because we are, as C. S. Lewis called it, “bent,” we are also capable of cruelty and even savagery. And our backgrounds don’t make a difference; because of our sinful nature, given the right circumstances, the potential for what happened at Abu Ghraib lies within all of us. The founders understood this. This is why we have the separation of powers to guard against the temptation and corruption that comes with power. The correctional system knows this. That’s why they carefully train and monitor corrections officers. The actions at Abu Ghraib that, as columnist Peggy Noonan put it, “humiliated [our] country” are timely reminders that, whenever and wherever humans are incarcerated or institutionalized, those in positions of responsibility must be vigilant. That’s why Americans, especially Christians, should not settle for responses that treat what happened as the actions of just a few “bad apples.” Going forward, wise leadership must take into account human sin and depravity—a truth that is not only demonstrable, but is central to a Christian worldview. http://www.pfm.org/BPtemplate.cfm?S...EMPLATE=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm
The Jesus Seminar Under Fire by Gregory Koukl Brace yourself. With Easter just around the corner, we're about to see a flood of articles in the news weeklies and local papers about a very specific kind of missionary group. These preachers practice evangelism in reverse, for they don't want you to commit your life to the Christ of the Gospels; they want you to surrender that commitment. And they claim to have history, science and scholarship on their side. They're called the Jesus Seminar. These are people with a mission. Robert Funk, the Seminar's founder, says, "It is time for us [scholars] to quit the library and study and speak up....The Jesus Seminar is a clarion call to enlightenment. It is for those who prefer facts to fancies, history to histrionics, science to superstition." This is a strong challenge to evangelicals, depicted here as preferring nice stories to accurate history. Sometimes the best defense is knowing the right questions to ask. Here are the ones you need when the Jesus Seminar hits the newsstands. — What Are Their Assumptions? The most important question one can ask of any point of view (a question almost never asked by the press) is this: Why do they believe it? This allows us to determine whether the reasons lead properly to the conclusions. Everyone has a starting point. The place the Seminar begins is carefully concealed from the public at large, but it's the most critical issue. Why do they claim there is no evidence for the resurrection? That is the key question. Their reasoning goes something like this: It's impossible for the Gospels to be historically accurate, because they record things that simply can't happen, like dead people coming alive again and food multiplying—miracles, in other words. We live in a closed universe of natural order, with God (if there is a God) locked out of the system. If miracles can't happen, then the reports in the New Testament must be fabrications. Therefore, the Gospels are not historical. Further, if miracles can't happen, then prophecy (a kind of miraculous knowledge) can't happen. The Gospels report that Jesus prophesied the fall of Jerusalem. Therefore, they could not have been written early, but after the invasion of Titus of Rome in 70 A.D. In addition, they could not have been written by eye-witnesses, as the early church Fathers claimed. Notice that the Jesus Seminar doesn't start with historical evidence; it starts with presuppositions, assumptions it makes no attempt to prove. This is not history; it's philosophy, specifically, the philosophy of naturalism. Robert Funk admits as much: "The Gospels are now assumed to be narratives in which the memory of Jesus is embellished by mythic elements that express the church's faith in him, and by plausible fictions that enhance the telling of the gospel story for first-century listeners..." [emphasis added] The press reports the following conclusions that the Jesus Seminar says are based on scientific, historical analysis: the resurrection didn't happen; the miracles are myths; there is no authentic prophecy in the Bible; the Gospels were written long after the events took place; they were not written by eyewitnesses; the testimony of the early church Fathers can't be trusted. This is misleading, though, because the Jesus Seminar doesn't conclude the Gospels are inaccurate. That's where they begin before they've looked at one single shred of actual historical evidence. When you start with your conclusions, you're cheating. You haven't proved anything at all. http://www.str.org/free/commentaries/apologetics/bible/jsuf.htm
When you start with your conclusions, you're cheating. Hmmmm. Methinks the pot is calling the kettle black.
So basically, the same word is used for plural and singular? About the translations, I don't know. It's fair to think that something so sensitive shouldn't be really be translated. It's gone from through Aramaik, Hebrew and greek to English now? I have no idea if it was or wasn't meant to be translated, but maybe it shouldn't have been, for the sake of accuracy?
Isn't this exactly how you've been debating in this thread? Besides, isn't it unimportant if you start with the conclusino, as long as you follow with your proof/case/argument?
False Advertising Da Vinci Doesn’t Even Get Heresy Right BreakPoint with Charles Colson May 27, 2004 Dan Brown’s historical thriller The Da Vinci Code has now reached its sixtieth week on the bestseller list with more than five million copies sold in the United States alone. Plans are being made to turn the book into a movie. It would seem that the influence of Brown’s novel—which is based on the premise that Jesus was only human, not divine—has never been greater. Yet a number of Christian voices are now speaking out about the flaws and fabrications of The Da Vinci Code. The New York Times reports that in the past couple of months, at least ten books refuting Brown’s argument have been released. One such book is Dr. Darrell Bock’s Breaking The Da Vinci Code. A lot of people don’t understand why Christians are making so much fuss about a mere adventure novel. But in his book, Bock asserts that The Da Vinci Code is much more than a novel. The book is an attempt to promote a worldview, one that’s deeply antithetical to the Christian worldview. Through his characters, Brown argues that the divinity of Jesus and the authority of the four Gospels were not decided until the Council of Nicea in the fourth century. He also claims that the church unjustly suppressed the view of the Gnostics. By examining church history, however, Bock proves Brown wrong on all counts. The Gnostic gospels of which Brown writes were written well after the Gospels in our New Testament, and the church never considered them authoritative. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were always considered the “preeminent” sources of authority on Jesus’ life. Bock also points out what any serious reader of the Bible would realize: The original Gospels proclaimed Jesus the Son of God, and they were accepted centuries before the Council of Nicea. Gnosticism was rejected, in fact, because it differed from this long accepted and practiced belief. What’s really surprising is that Brown doesn’t even get his facts about Gnosticism straight. According to the Gnostic gospels, Jesus is a spiritual being who didn’t die on the cross; a human “substitute” was crucified by the people while the real Jesus was “laughing at their ignorance.” And Gnosticism teaches that salvation comes not through God’s grace, but through secret knowledge that is given only to those intelligent and self-aware enough to receive it—nice if you’re one of the chosen ones, but not so nice for the rest of us. But we get none of this in Brown’s account. To the contrary, Brown misstates Gnosticism by asserting Jesus was human. The book is yet another example of what Frederica Mathewes-Green calls “our culture’s penchant for pick-and-choose religion.” She goes on to say that, “every pick-and-choose religion has this limitation: The follower can never grow any larger than his own preconceptions. He has established himself a priori as the ultimate authority, and his thoughts will never be larger than his hat size.” By contrast, Christian truth is rooted in the authority of the Scriptures—tested, reflected upon, and debated over two millennia—and is rooted in the Church and creed, not in personal preferences. Critiquing The Da Vinci Code is a matter of defending truth, and you need to learn to do this from Bock’s book or from another. Set your neighbors straight; with five million copies out there we’ve got a big job. http://www.pfm.org/BPtemplate.cfm?S...Management/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=12548 Breaking The Da Vinci Code : Answers to the Questions Everybody's Asking http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...f=sr_1_3/103-8252925-4546203?v=glance&s=books
Christian, What is your view of predestination? I believe that the Reformed view of predestination is correct. The Five Points of Calvinism T—Total Depravity U—Unconditional Election (Sovereign Election) L—Limited Atonement (Particular Redemption) I—Irresistible Grace (Effectual Grace) P—Perseverance of the Saints (Preservation of the Saints) sola fide—by faith alone sola gratia—by grace alone soli deo gloria—to God alone be the glory
