Does this mean anything?
Interesting video Michael, but I really think we should avoid this sort of slandering. Unfortunately, too many Christians just suffer from paranoid apophenia. The scriptures aren’t tea leaves. The Bible is not a crystal ball. We’re never asked to discern the possible outworkings of the eschaton or fear and hate this or that “anti-Christ”. If Obama is an incarnation of Satan, this doesn’t really make any practical difference to our love for God, our friends, our enemies and him.
I know this might seem an odd thing to say on a forum that is largely concerned with the eschaton. But I’m beginning to suspect we’ve all lost the point of everything Yeshua stood (and died) for.
I think it means some deluded individual in 2009 had too much time on his hands and used it to make a mischievous, ignorant and nonsensical inference, attempting to enlist biblical support to bolster his barmy idea. Nuff said.
I didn’t say it meant something, I asked “if” it meant anything.
Now, is God in control of the tea leaves here?
Did He will them (is His eternal now) to fall the way they did?
I mean Jesus did say “I saw Satan fall as lightening from heaven.”
If “barak ubama” is how you would say “lightening out of heaven” in Aramaic, is that supposed to mean something, or is it just “coincidence”?
What is “coincidence,” and is there a better word for Theists to use (for things like this, that don’t mean anything–if this doesn’t mean anything)?
So God knew before the big bang that this individual in 2009 would have too much time on his hands, and He willed the linguistic material from which he drew his inference, right?
Why?
Is there a reason for everything?
I believe the Hebrew Gamatria for William Jefferson Clinton, and Hillary Clinton adds up to six hundred and sixty six, and Ronald Wilson Reagan had six letters in each of his names.
Do these things mean something?
Are all things intended to mean something to someone (and if not, do we call things that aren’t “coincidence,” or something else)?
And finally, why would there be meaningless things in a universe governed by an atemporal Supreme Being with absolute foreknowledge?
No.
I don’t think it means anything either, but why would there be seemingly meaningful coincidences that don’t really mean anything in a universe that’s the product of a timeless, all knowing Supreme Being?
If a grieving loved one sees something that could reasonably be taken as a sign of hope for his dear departed, but the only reason he can see for it being where it is is the presence of an LDS Temple, then he stumbles upon someone named “Temple” who shares his dear departed’s first name, must it all mean something?
And if it doesn’t, does that mean there is no God?
Is it true that there’s no such things as “coincidence,” or is everything “coincidence” (and does anything in between make any sense)?
If you can demonstrate that ‘Barak Obama’ was mentioned in Scripture prior to His office, then there is something here. If not, then it is someone stretching and manipulating.
But why did a timeless, all knowing God (for whom past, present, and future are one eternal now) give them the material to stretch and manipulate?
If the phonetics of the Aramaic text were different, and there was no similarity between"Barack Obama" and “lightning out of heaven,” there’d be nothing in the text of Luke 10:18 to “stretch or manipulate,” would there?
Why is the material there if it doesn’t mean anything?
Didn’t God know it would be “stretched and manipulated”?
Suppose someone assassinates the President because of that web site (in which case I think we can be sure he wasn’t the antiChrist), would it be God’s will?
God would surely have known (before the foundation of the world) that the Aramaic language would develop a word for lightening that sounds similar to the Arabic name “Barack,” a word for heaven that sounds similar to “Bama,” and a connective that sounds like “Oh” (or “OO.”)
He certainly knew (again, before the foundation of the world) what the text of Luke 10:18 would say, and how it would read in Aramaic.
He would also know (from before the foundation of the world) if someone is gonna take these facts, and act upon them.
If someone does (and there’s no such thing as coincidence), wouldn’t that have to be God’s will?
And if it’s coincidence, wouldn’t that mean there is no God (who knew all this before the foundation of the world)?
The only reason I brought the Obama video up was to see how many of you really believe that there’s no such thing as coincidence, and how you reconcile “coincidence” with your belief in a Supreme Being.
That’s the question I’m really interested in here.
And btw: If there are circumstances in my life that I can only interpret as pure coincidence, if I can find no way to reconcile that with the idea of a Supreme Being, and if I die an unbeliever (perhaps at my own hand), was that God’s will?
If nobody saw this prior to Obama coming to power when it was always phonetically there, then it isn’t written there phonetically.
You keep coming back to the Obama video, so it must really bother you.
I’m not really interested in the Obama thing (i.e. I don’t think he’s the antiChrist, and I’m certain that if he is there’s nothing that anybody can do about it.)
What I’m interested in is your thoughts on "coincidence.
You wrote
Why?
Who put it there if not God?
If He put it there, must it be there for a reason?
Must it mean something?
What does that mean, exactly?
Letters (in any language) are phonetic symbols.
What does it mean for something not to be written phonetically?