The Evangelical Universalist Forum

Two Swords are Enough

Theology Biblical Theology
#88

Steve, the entire literal nation of Israel was not Israel. In looking at this verse again,
LLC wrote:
Isa 53:12 Therefore I will divide Him a portion with the great, and He shall divide the spoil with the strong, because He poured out His soul unto death, and He was numbered with the transgressors, and He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.

The entire nation did not pour out their souls unto death, nor did the entire nation make intercession for the transgressors, as many of them WERE the transgressors. The servants who remained faithful to God were the ones making intercession for the transgressors. Jesus was not the only one God ever sent.

I’m only explaining how the Rabbis explained “the suffering servant” not my view. Another popular view they had was that there was a new Messiah hidden in each generation.

#89

Steve, I don’t think Isaiah, in writing this verse, saw all Jewish people as suffering servants. In fact he describes many of them as adulterous harlots, who had forsaken and forgotten the God who begat them.

I can agree with this. I believe the writers of the Bible saw things as cyclic, maybe or maybe not in each generation, but at least in one to come. You can see this as they kept track of the generations. From Adam to Noah was ten generations. From Noah to Abraham was another ten, Abraham to David was fourteen, David to Babylon was fourteen, Babylon to Jesus was fourteen. All this equals sixty two generations plus the seventy years until the end when the nation of Israel came to a complete end. I personally don’t get into the numerology of it all. I think numbers can be fudged to make it all add up. Besides which, Jesus tells us that no one knows the day or hour, nor can any earthly king save. It is when people return to the truth and the ways of God.

#90

Again, no real argument on that score… Jesus was the first OF the firstfruits. The pantelist position understands that… the early apostles/disciples constituted “the firstfruit saints” of Israel, of which Jesus their Master was the FIRST, whom they followed in service/martyrdom/vindication in that 40yr covenant-transition period AD30-70… emulating Israel’s own historical 40yr transition period through trial and tribulation out of Egypt (bondage) into Canaan (freedom) — faithfulness or, “the faith OF Christ” was the key to… “to him who overcomes will I grant…” etc.

It was this body (singular) of believers that constituted the writer of Hebrew’s “the church of the firstborn” — firstborn in the Greek is plural, so is a reference not the Christ, but of His followers, i.e., ‘the Body of Christ’ aka “the Bride of Christ”. Believers POST-parousia are not “the Bride” but rather, the offspring of Christ and His Bride; thus the AD70 Consummation was not the end but the most glorious of beginnings… where the new age, i.e., “the age to come” was fully dawned.

#91

LLC, do the following statement from the writings of Moses support or contradict your statement quoted above?

Joshua also believed that God had instructed Moses to destroy all the inhabitants of “the promised land” and the Israelites continued in this slaughter:

#92

“So what exactly is it Dave are you saying I… “cannot seem to grasp or even understand” that means something?”

I just drove in from a road trip, Oregon to Mesa Az, to purchase a new camper, thence to Sierra Vista Az and back to Oregon, with misadventures a-plenty but also spent time with good friends, good food, big beautiful open skies. Good time to decompress and renew.

On the last leg, from Fresno this morning to home in Medford this evening, I had a little time to reflect on your question, and my motives/reasons for taking the tack I did. As I mentioned to Brad, I was in part poking fun at the way ‘some folks’ ridiculed ‘others’ by saying the ‘others’ could not see, nor understand, or grasp what the ‘some folks’ thought should be obvious. I don’t like being talked down to, or condescended to, and my perception was that I (we) were being lectured to. That was my perception, though I freely admit I may have construed the offending language as ridicule, where it might not have been meant that way. If so, I’m sorry.

As to the ‘exactly’ business: I remember being impressed, during the OJ Simpson trial for murder, at the power of ‘story’. Almost everyone knew that OJ was guilty, but the defense was able to tell an alternate story that accounted for all (or most) of the facts, and was able to sow a seed of doubt with the jury.

Now in our disagreements re: pantelism - noone is guilty or innocent of course; my point just being that there are two stories being told - one is pantelist, the other is not - and each pretty much covers all the evidence, but interprets it differently. And the reason for that difference is probably pre-suppositional; or more to the point, a basic difference in suppositions about what type of book(s) the Bible is; a difference in interpreting the ‘arc’ of the entire Biblical story; a difference in understanding what hermeneutics is; and other things as well.

Those are ‘exactly’ the things that I am talking about - what is very obvious to me as to the answers to the basic differences are NOT at all obvious to you (and perhaps others) - likewise, what you take as a given, and should be obvious, even to muddle-headed David Bagwill, is in fact NOT obvious to me at all.

Overall I think Chad was right when he opined that we will probably never agree on some of those differences, and though we are invested in our ‘take’ on things we consider to be crucial, we just have to live with that and aim for Christian charity.

#93

I can appreciate where you’re coming from Dave and appreciate your broader post. If you haven’t already and have a spare 58min have a look at the presentation at my link HERE that covers a good bit of material to where my position gravitates.

#94

Davo, From what I understand, Jesus was not literally the first of the firstfruits. In other words, He was not the first person ever to be born of the Spirit of God-the first righteous person, the first Son of God.
Genesis 1:27-28 "So God created man in his own image; in the image of God He created him ; male and female He created them. Then God blessed them and God said to them “Be fruitful and multiply…” Adam and Eve then had Cain and Abel. Abel was righteous but unfortunately, he was killed. However, God supplied another “seed” in Seth.

Exodus 22:29 “You shall not delay to offer the first of your ripe fruit and of your liquors: the firstborn of your sons you shall give to Me.” The first born of the sons was not always the one that literally came first. He was the one who followed God, firstfruit meaning of the very best quality.

Romans 11:16 “For if the firstfruit is holy, the lump is also holy, and if the root is holy so are the branches.”
Romans 15:12 'And again Isaiah says “There shall be a root of Jesse; and He shall rise to reign over the Gentiles…”
Jesse, king David’s father was said to be sinless.

1 cor. 15:20 "But now Christ is risen from the dead and become the firstfruits of them that slept. Dead does not always mean sinful or “dead in sin”.
Dead also means physically dead, or something that is no longer in practice. The one true God of Israel, whom the forefathers believed in and followed was forgotten and forsaken by many who took up other gods.

#95

Paidion, As Moses says in Deut. 31:29 " For I know that after my death you will become utterly corrupt, and turn aside from the way which I commanded you; and evil will befall you because you will do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke him to anger through the work of your hands."

He also says in Deut 31:26 "Take this book of the Law, and put it beside the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be a witness against you.

This “book of the Law”, that being the Law of Christ, was brought forth many times by the prophets during Israel’s trials and tribulations. One of these prophets was Jesus.

As I mentioned before, the Bible is a product of different authors, expressing spiritual truths in different ways. Some of it is literal history, and I would say that some of the authors even had different beliefs. I don’t think what the Bible claims Moses said or wrote was actually written or said by Moses himself. One can tell this by the discrepancies. The Levitical laws in the first five books are a stumbling block for many who believe that the Bible is the infallible word, and I believe this was the case with a lot of the Jewish people as well. I don’t think they all came from Moses, and if so, they were often times misinterpreted or not followed.
As an added note: I believe this is the problem with evolutionist, and those who come from a progressive viewpoint. They think that man was stupid in the beginning, that they were primitive and didn’t have the knowledge that we do today. To me, this is not true at all.

#96

My… “Jesus was the first OF the firstfruits” was in terms of what Yahweh was then doing in bringing to fulfillment Israel’s covenant renewal, as promised (Ezek 36:26-27; 38:1-14; Jer 31:31-34) i.e., Jesus was the FIRST of the firstfruits of this, as per…

It needs to be noted that these texts do NOT say Jesus was raised ‘from death’ — NO he wasn’t! Jesus was the FIRST to rise up out of “the dead” (Gk. plural) aka old covenant Israel — those “dead in trespasses and sins”. From this was Jesus THE firstfruit in terms of Israel’s covenant renewal. What God was NOW doing in finality He was doing in Christ for Israel’s redemption. This then had the Divinely intended knock-on effect in terms of the wider world’s reconciliation where God is now “all in all”.

#97

Davo wrote: “If you haven’t already and have a spare 58min have a look at the presentation at my link HERE that covers a good bit of material to where my position gravitates.”

That was an interesting presentation. What do you find compelling about that way of thinking?

#98

Well, apart from the obvious eschatological agreement… it makes sense; it’s an outside of Christianity perspective dovetailed onto it explaining how some of that message was/is transmitted and does that respectfully without undermining Christianity; it is an historical and sociological approach; plus it is somewhat fresh… to me at least, or as you say “interesting”.

#99

Jesus wasn’t raised from death? Is your Pantelism/Full Preterism theology here denying the physical death & bodily resurrection of the Lord?

#100

NO of course not. :unamused:

#101

Yet you said “Jesus was raised ‘from death’ — NO he wasn’t!”

#102

I’ve highlighted in red the eleven words immediately prior to your partial quote which hopefully will aid you in understanding the CONTEXT of the fuller statement… hopefully you can grasp this.

The… “— NO he wasn’t!” was/is directly related to “from the dead” which literally in the Greek = “dead ones” NOT “death” — AGAIN in relation to the verses directly being dealt with.

#103

Davo, I watched some of the presentation that you suggested. However, I turned it off after about ten minutes. No offence, but I don’t believe in the evolution theory. They pint out that women are enjoying more freedom today as if this proves their claim. According to Genesis, God created male and female, and they were one flesh. In the ancient Egyptian culture, women were viewed as equals. They enjoyed just as much freedom as the men. It was often taught that Columbus was ahead of his time in thinking that the world was round. However, this was known thousands of years before. To say that we are becoming more enlightened as time goes on, is simply not true.

As John says, the word was there in the beginning, and the Spirit of God has been producing fruit ever since. The harvest may not be as great in some years or generations as compared to others. But it does not come back void.

#104

That’s a shame… the actual ‘evolution’ under discussion if you’d stuck with it was in fact societal evolution. Never mind :slight_smile:

#105

"Jesus remaining a human being refutes your entire eschatology

for if Christ is physical then the resurrection is physical

if the resurrection is physical it did not happen in 70 a.d.

Hello

Kiss your eschatology goodbye"

forums.carm.org/vb5/forum/relig … res/page10

#106

Davo - you and perhaps others might be interested in Robert Bellah’s “Religion in Human Evolution”, which I’ve been tempted to read myself. You can read some reviews at amazon.com/Religion-Human-E … op?ie=UTF8 to see what it’s all about.

According to what I’ve read about that book, Bellah believes that religion has a real role to play in society, though he definitely does not believe in any god, nor supernatural beings. As humans and their societies and cultures evolved, so I gather, so did their necessity for the explanatory power, heuristic guidance, and the comforts of a transcendent Power.

When I studied Post-Modernism - as a philosophy - I became acquainted with the concept of meta-nattarive, and wary of PoMo’s insistence on the destruction of all meta-narratives:
(Definition: an overarching account or interpretation of events and circumstances that provides a pattern or structure for people’s beliefs and gives meaning to their experiences.
“traditional religions provide stories that deliver a metanarrative about how we should live our lives”) - wiki

Post-moderns (Pomo’s) believe that there is NO overarching story; no background reality against which we can measure meaning, or goodness, or beauty - all of that must be ‘deconstructed’, taken apart, so that we can see only the immediate, the surface, and not worry ourselves about meaning, etc.

I have not read Bellah, but I have read similar approaches, from Evolutionary theory to sociobiological theory among others, and the significance for me was their attempt to develop a meta-narrative that explains (almost) everything - including religion. Something ‘outside’ religion, something ‘bigger’, something that is the whole enchilada. Evolution theory, for me, whether societal or biological, is such an attempt at meta-narrative; so is myth, in many respects; sociobiology definitely is as well.

Now whether those explanations are true or not, it’s easy to see what the result is, when religion is subordinated to any other controlling narrative. I leave that exercise to the reader. :slight_smile:
The narrative I am most comfortable with, intellectually, emotionally, psychologically, is this one:

-Creation by God the Father
-the Fall
-Israel
-the glorious appearance, life death and resurrection, and the seating at the right hand of the Father, of our Lord.
-the Church as the body of Christ, a Form that is ongoing from Pentecost to the Day, seeking to heal the world’s wounds, and may that Day come soon!
-the Life after ‘life after death’!!

My feeling is that ALL other narratives are measured by that one -it is the meta-narrative, and lesser narratives no matter how lofty, how speculative, how thrilling to the imagination and intellect, do not have the power to deconstruct that one; and what power they do have can be assessed as to its worthiness and meaningfulness only as it fits under sovereign Love.

I do not discount the impressive world-building speculations of a Darwin, a Descartes, a Hegel, E.O. Wilson, or Bellah - I just try to keep the hierarchy of Heaven and Earth intact and in focus.
$.02
If you read Bellah let me know.

#107

Thanks Dave, that’s really interesting… also might have to check out Bellah’s “Religion in Human Evolution”.