Elen1107

Don't want to get back into the conversation,... but just happened to run into this verse. - since we were discussing whether Jesus could read and write earlier, this verse at least states that he could read: Luke 4: 16 He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. He stood up to read, 17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:... Just thought I'd mention and share it.

I myself hope to keep putting God, the HS & JC first, and people and myself second in line after these. I used to do things the other way around and it didn't work out well for me at all. If you call this "theism", that's fine. I rather like the word theism, myself. Where people like Spong and other PCs use the word theism or theistic, I tend to rather use the words deity or deists or deisms. To me it means something like a man in the sky in a robe with a long white beard. As much as I love one of the pictures on the Sistine Chapel, that depicts god like this, I really don't think that's God. It might be and 'indicator' of god or a small pointer to God, put it really doesn't amount to much more than god's fingernail or something like that. -------------------- I think it's just common sense to assume that all people or a certain group, whether Jews or Christians, are not apocalyptic in their thinking.

Read JS Spong's book, 'The Sins of the Scriptures". there's a whole book full of what can be considered "bile", and one could even add to it a bit. I'm not really interested in having this/these conversations, & don't really have the time. You believe that Jesus was an apocalyptic Jew and that he was wrong.... I don't. - - For one thing I think that apocalyptic thinking like this is kind of dumb. To think that one day God is going to blow down this whole wide world and then build it up again in a day or a year or whatever, ta-da, just like that, is just kind of stupid. I don't think that Jesus was or is that dumb. I also don't think that all 1st C. Jews or a whole lot of other people were that dumb either. Apparently some of them were or they wouldn't have be writing letters about it and putting words into JC's mouth that said that was what he thought. - - You believe that books and texts and writings are of primary importance. I believe faith and spirituality and being "in" Christ and God and "in" their love and insight is primary and most important, and experiencing God and Christ is real and open to everyone. This is what gives us the insight to know how to live and get through our days and to know what to do. We are different. Lets just agree to be different and move on.

Well, perhaps it's not ALL the same word. Perhaps some of it IS and some of it isn't. Perhaps some of it has been edited and insertions have been made, to reflect what ever these editors and inserters wanted to add or take away from Jesus's message. If people just accept the Spirit of Christ within them, they/we can better discern what is and are Jesus's true messages and wisdom. Perhaps if people just had that, or just went with that, or gave more credence and importance to just that, then we wouldn't be in the awful, confusing muddle we are in now about what is and what isn't the real and true word and ways of God.

Apparently a number of people who wrote about Jesus were apocalyptic or at least partially apocalyptic in their thinking. This does not mean that Jesus was. It just means that the people who wrote about him after his ministry were. People with true faith and belief in Christ. Or, it could have been just based in their faith in Christ

What we are focusing on is was Jesus apocalyptic and was this the way and the only way that he and the Jews of the 1st C. saw and understood the coming of the Kingdom. I'm saying that it is quite possible that Jesus was not apocalyptic. I'm also saying that it is quite possible that there were Jews and Gentiles who were not apocalyptic, and that they saw the coming of the Kingdom in a different way and form, rather than the apocalyptic one.

The problem with these books is that they are a mixture of truth and fiction and outright bile. Some parts a truth and worth quoting and are good messages. Other parts are vile and mean and even down right evil. The fact that they are mixed and presented as "the word of God" creates a kind of mindbender that really can mess people up and can even create a kind of psychological illness. Those who are into hierarchical thinking and hierarchical ways of living. Those with control trips and who are into controlling others. Governments, religious leaderships, parents, gender dominance, people who are bent on the leader-follower mentality, instead of recognizing and getting along with other people as equals.

No, people first knew about him from his presence and the spoken words that he gave his first followers. Then people knew about him from the spoken words and presence of these followers. Today we can know about him by his spiritual presence in our lives, and the few words that are spoken about him that tell us where and when he walked this earth. The few words, "Jesus is (the) Christ", though they are written down and canonized with a lot of other stuff, can just as well be passed down orally and verbally. That's the way it was in the beginning. Is there any reason why it shouldn't still matter and pertain down to and into this present day?

I thought we were talking about whether Jesus was an apocalyptic Jew or not. If you, and these scholars believe that Jesus was an apocalyptic Jew, because Paul and other Jews were apocalyptic in their thinking,... I don't see how one statement necessarily leads to and concludes the other. On their own simple and inspired faith and the inspired faith of others being passed along orally and spiritually through time and through the ages.

I just found this on this subject: Jewish Sects of the 1st Century (1) Harvard’s renowned late scholar Jacob Neusner wrote in Judaism When Christianity Began, p.5, 50: “Judaism divides into Judaisms….Judaisms that flourished in Second Temple times, before 70 CE, when the Temple was destroyed.” There were several “Judaisms” in the Holy Land. This two-part topic identifies seven main Jewish religious sects or groups extant in the Land in the 1st century. The time when Jesus lived as a Jew and the temple still existed. Part 1 discusses the Scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees. Part 2 discusses the Herodians, Zealots, Essenes, Nazarenes. https://bibletopicexpo.wordpress.com/2018/05/26/jewish-sects-of-the-1st-century-1/ --------------------------------- I also found a thing that said there were these sects/branches, but also there were all the other regular people. It seems that the "regular people" out numbered these different groups/sects. I'm thinking that Jesus might have been talking mostly to the regular people. Paul however was a Pharisee.

Wow, I wish every state had those kinds of plans. People should be aware that these things can and do happen, so people can do things differently and so they don't keep happening over and over again. So many people get hurt because they are told one thing, and then get another.

I don't know if everyone would call Rohr a "scholar" or not. He did receive his masters degree in theology from the University of Dayton in 1970. Regardless, he's a pretty bright and enlightened guy. --------------------------- The Jews passed down their oral traditions for thousands of years before they were written down. The native Americans in this country have been passing down "sacred" stories for thousands of years, and they have just become written down in this past century or two. I know people who believe that we would still know about Jesus even if the books hadn't been preserved and canonized. Mostly we know Jesus through our faith and through his spirit given to us. All people really need is just a few words about him, just the "good news" and faith and spirit can really take us from there. When people heard the "good news" in the 1st C that was a lot of all they had, and it was something real and enough. If you don't think he has a living spirit that can reach us, then what do you believe in and what is the basis of your faith? ---------------------------- Did 1st C Gentile Christians have OT texts? My understanding is that they were kept in the synagogues on scrolls and were taken out only for readings during services. They weren't in book form and copying them was a long and painstaking process. I believe the Jewish people call them branches. Do Hurtado and Hengel state that all 1st C Jews thought alike in these matters? We are not talking about God's kingdom here, but an apocalyptic view on how this is supposed to happen. I know that today there are many branches, at least that's what I've heard Jewish people say. How many there were back then, I don't know. Regardless, I tend to think that Jesus was able to think independently. --------------------------- Yeah, all this preaching and teaching lead to the books. The question is, how good were/are the books? Maybe the book writers and people behind them were trying to get a handle on and control of Christianity before all people really started believing they were all equal, so they dumped and wrapped all this hierarchical stuff on and into the books and onto Christianity.

My mother was married for over 50 years too. She is out living him by like twenty years or more. Their house was paid for and they thought she could live as long as she wanted after he passed. They needed to use a good amount of their savings to take care of my father in his last years. When he passed she lost part of his pension and part of his social security, and the taxes on the house kept going up and up and up. My sister supported my brother in-law while he got his PHD and wrote his dissertation. Then she gave up her career and followed him around the country till he got tenure teaching in a collage. This took many years and several moves. Then he takes off with a younger woman, and a great career, and my sister got a minimum wage job with no insurance and no security. Luckily my sister and mother were able to team up and between the two of them they were able to keep my sister's house while renting out the basement. They are both ok, but it was with no thanks to their husbands or the "society" that pushed them and kept them in these situations. I see so much of this. Women who are left with next to nothing while their husbands are off with 2 houses and 5 cars and who knows what else. It's wrong and it's not fair. Men are not supposed to make women's lives less safe and less secure. That's not being real men, and if they think it is their perceptions are upside down and the opposite of what is true and what is really real. The people I've met say that their standard of living is better than ours and that they have more security and safety and that they wouldn't give it up for nothing. People also need to learn to be incentivized by something besides just money. It counts up to a point, but a lot of people would be doing a lot what they do anyways. To them it's not just a job it's a vocation. In fact, if they had some real security, that they didn't need to worry about, they would be doing a lot more of it.

I can only remember the name of one scholar, it was Young. In the late 70's early 80's I did some studying at big city libraries and ecclesiastical libraries. Some of the crap I read really made me cringe. This was before people like Spong and Ehrman and before the internet. Just recently I read someone who was claiming to be a "scholar" who said that all the books of the NT had been written before like 55 CE and that he was sure of it and all this stuff. I didn't save his name or the link, I just closed the page and moved on. I guess that people can find "scholars" to tell them what ever they want to hear no matter what it is. There are experts of all kinds, as I mentioned above. I kind of like Richard Rohr's idea of the "tricycle". He states that experience of God and JC and the HS are the front wheel, and to him, and myself, the more important wheel, and tradition and texts are the rear wheels. Myself, seeing that most if not all of the early Christians just got the faith, and the inspiration and the "experience" of God & & through JC, with no texts what so ever (non-Jewish people had no texts not even the OT), to myself this is of real importance and meaning. Could Jesus read and write? He's only depicted once as writing anything. This is in the sand, with the woman caught in adulatory, (just the woman, no man was brought forth with her). If a person can write, they can read. Stories in Luke tell of him being a very wise youth and talking and arguing with the elders in the temple at age twelve. Does this mean he could read and write? I don't know. Did he need to be able to read and write, and how important is it / was it, is another good question. Same for his followers, both in those days and at any time in terms of getting the faith and the spirit and the experience of God. Children seem to know and experience this best, and they can't really read and write that well or that often. There are NT and Gospel of Thomas verses that pretty much say that children are the "experts". My understanding of Judaism is that they don't have denominations, they have "branches". They are all Jewish, and it's not as separate as the way we understand denominations, but they do have groups, perhaps one could call them sects, that do think differently. This is true today, I can't remember the names of them, but there is a good number of them. I believe this was true back in the 1st C too. Was Paul an apocalyptic Jew? Did he paint his ideas of apocalyptic Judaism on top of Jesus? Is that where we get that from instead of Jesus himself? Like we've mentioned, we don't even know if Jesus could read and write, we have to turn to his spirit inside us as best we can to find out. Perhaps we will never know for sure. Perhaps it is something we can only speculate on and the rest is left up to God/the Higher Spirit. The person and his spirit would still exist, be real, and be true,... even without a book behind or on top of him . 🙂 . I myself would rather use the term 'in-tune' with God . . . but each to their own What do you think is the "big stuff" that is important in friendship?

I can only remember the name of one scholar, it was Young. In the late 70's early 80's I did some studying at big city libraries and ecclesiastical libraries. Some of the crap I read really made me cringe. This was before people like Spong and Ehrman and before the internet. Just recently I read someone who was claiming to be a "scholar" who said that all the books of the NT had been written before like 55 CE and that he was sure of it and all this stuff. I didn't save his name or the link, I just closed the page and moved on. I guess that people can find "scholars" to tell them what ever they want to hear no matter what it is. There are experts of all kinds, as I mentioned above. I kind of like Richard Rohr's idea of the "tricycle". He states that experience of God and JC and the HS are the front wheel, and to him, and myself, the more important wheel, and tradition and texts are the rear wheels. Myself, seeing that most if not all of the early Christians just got the faith, and the inspiration and the "experience" of God & & through JC, with no texts what so ever (non-Jewish people had no texts not even the OT), to myself this is of real importance and meaning. Could Jesus read and write? He's only depicted once as writing anything. This is in the sand, with the woman caught in adulatory, (just the woman, no man was brought forth with her). If a person can write, they can read. Stories in Luke tell of him being a very wise youth and talking and arguing with the elders in the temple at age twelve. Does this mean he could read and write? I don't know. Did he need to be able to read and write, and how important is it / was it, is another good question. Same for his followers, both in those days and at any time in terms of getting the faith and the spirit and the experience of God. Children seem to know and experience this best, and they can't really read and write that well or that often. My understanding of Judaism is that they don't have denominations, they have "branches". They are all Jewish, and it's not as separate as the way we understand denominations, but they do have groups, perhaps one could call them sects, that do think differently. This is true today, I can't remember the names of them, but there is a good number of them. I believe this was true back in the 1st C too. The person and his spirit would still exist, be real, and be true,... even without a book behind or on top of him . 🙂 . I myself would rather use the term 'in-tune' with God . . . but each to their own What do you think is the "big stuff" that is important in friendship?

By fine print I mean; make sure that your spouse and or family will really be taken care of if you pass on. Sometimes they make you think that everything will be fine and fall into place, when the truth is that it is not and does not. I've worked with people both from Canada and Germany. Both groups of people have told me that they think they have it better than we do. They work fewer hours, they have guaranteed healthcare, (this helps them not be so chained to 1 job and corporation), they have guaranteed childcare, (don't need to worry if they will be able to take care of their children). The folks I met from Germany told me that they had a 35 hr. work week, and 6 weeks vacation. This would make for a lot less burnout and even fewer heart attacks. It also creates more jobs, for every 7 people who aren't working those last 5 hrs. there's one more 35 hr. job available for someone else. Women get 3 months maternity leave with full pay and then 2 years leave with 1/3rd of their salary and then get their jobs back. (don't see why this last part couldn't be split between both parents, if they so choose, with the mother prob. taking the 1st year). Germany btw is the richest country in the Euro. In France I know that they need real grounds for firing someone, and they can't just get rid of them when their retirement becomes vested or something. ------------------------ Back in the 50's and early 60's we really did have "the best country in the world". Yeah it was just for white people and men only breadwinners, but all the same it might have been the first time in the history of the world that so many had so much and so many actually had a decent living standard. I love the 'American Dream' in it's different shapes and forms. I wish we could return to the 40 or even 60 hr. family, with 2 parents splitting the work week and the house/home work, but the rich make more if they can exploit more people, so there it is. "It is what it is". ------------------------- A lot of people choose to change a country, the US, from within. Believe it or not they do have some real patriotism, part of which is to make things even better and better and better. After all, isn't that part of being an American? Also it's not that easy to leave. Other countries have citizen requirements, just like we do. it also takes money and leaving friends and family. I don't think it's very patriotic to tell people to just leave. Patriotism is making things as good as possible and not being stuck in the past, but keep rising to meet the dream.

Here are two verses from the Pauline letters about the Sabbath:, There might be more, I'm not sure. Colossians 2:16 https://www.biblehub.com/colossians/2-16.htm Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. Romans 14:5 https://www.biblehub.com/romans/14-5.htm In the same way, some think one day is more holy than another day, while others think every day is alike. You should each be fully convinced that whichever day you choose is acceptable.

All I know is that no one used to say that about Jesus. All of a sudden it became pop, and trendy and the thing to say to make a person look intelligent, & then everyone was saying it. I've encountered "serious" scholars that have been at it for decades. Some of them have a lot of good insights and info. that they pass along and others, not so much. Most of them are a mixed package. For myself right now it seems to be about how much of a mix of what and what are they conveying, (to use the words of one of the early church fathers, "mix of truth and bile")? I'm finding that I don't agree with anyone completely, and that's just life. Wish I did, but I don't, so I just have to deal with it and try to figure it out. All I have is my own intelligence, (just the same as anyone else), so I do the best, hopefully the very best) I can with that. I myself would have a hard time calling Jesus "limited in many ways". But we all have our own right to our own take on things. After all we do live in free countries in this respect. I'm not good at remembering chapter and verse, if I have time, I'll look them up. I don't see Paul's world view as necessarily being that of Jesus or that of all 1st C Jews. One can have a bunch of 1st C Jews thinking one way, and another bunch thinking another way, (from what I've learned, they didn't all think the same, then or now). There can even be an individual who thinks their own, independent way thinking, and Jesus could quite possibly been one of these. I agree with you that there are differences between Jesus and Paul and also differences between Jesus and each gospel writer. So what do we have left, but the spirit of Jesus within us. (& no book 🙂 ) Myself, I can do without the word "obedience", but each to our own I guess. To me, one just lives in Love and peace and joy, and there's no "obedience". Can I ask, what do you mean by "the big stuff that makes or breaks a life and a marriage"? ---------------------------- Edit> found at least 2 of those verses. Different versions put it in different words https://www.biblehub.com/luke/17-20.htm https://www.biblehub.com/luke/17-21.htm

For myself, what God wants me to do is also, plain and simple, what I want to be doing. It's just as much happily going along with God as with my true christ/godish self. Yeah, God shows me/us what this/these things are and how to go about things through our insight and understanding, but there is no conflict here and no "obedience". To Love God is to Love doing what one wants to do and one just wants to do what one can do inside of God. One doesn't want to do anything outside of God or outside of the holy spirit of things. I don't really think that anyone should be "obedient" to anyone. Yeah, sometimes one does what the other person wants to do, when they don't really want to. But that's not "obedience", that's just being nice. If the other person doesn't do the same in return, then people have to work that out. With God it's different, one just needs to be inline and in-tune with God and there is no conflict, one is just merrily going along doing what one wants to do anyways, and they end up being the same thing. It is important to realize where the higher insight and inspiration is coming from, that's just being honest with oneself and giving real credit where it's due. Being In-tune with God and in harmony with God is a lot better than being "obedient" to God. To me it just makes a lot more positive sense.

I know that this is the pop, trendy, group-think, modern way of understanding Jesus nower days, even among scholars. I myself just don't think it's true. I think there was and is more to the man.

"Like us in all ways but sin." I haven't heard that line in a long time. Can I ask, do you believe in the virgin birth/conception? Is that how he was so free of the human "sinful" nature, or do you believe he had the same nature, but didn't sin and was able to overcome and not actually commit/do any sins? I myself think that he might have had a bit more going for him than the world view of a 1C CE Jew. Nothing against them, I just think he knew and was aware of more. Did he know the future, in full or in part(s)? I don't know. He might have had a clue or two like we all do, if you do x, y is probably going to happen. If you say "all people are created equal", Rome or the Jewish leaders, or The 1776 English crown, or the hyper-hierarchists, or the fundamentalists are going to get mad at you. So what does one do then? Stick to it and keep bringing up the idea again and again until people get it I guess. I'm not much for "obedience" to God. I'm also not much for the 'commandment' to love God. To me, if one knows God, one loves God, it's that simple. If one knows God and loves God then it's not "obedience". One just wants to do the right thing(s) gladly and happily, and with an open and smiling heart, and there's no real "obedience" tacked on to it. Of course I've never been asked to go to a cross, or have my throat slit for my beliefs, but I still think there might be more to it. Competition? I've known some people who seem to go into competition with Christ. It's like it's about, 'who's the greatest person ' in town or in all eternity for that matter. They are always trying to bring Christ down and or build themselves up. Maybe so they can take Christ's or God's place in other people's lives, I don't know. Maybe they had a mommy or daddy who put them first, before even god, and they want and expect that from everyone else and don't get why they are not getting it. I don't know, but I've seen it happen. If you're not looking to the gospels then you are looking to the Pauline letters. That's fine, but then you are placing Paul and Paul's world view onto Christ. They are not the same thing or the same person. Paul was brilliant at sometimes and not so brilliant at other times. He doesn't and shouldn't speak for Christ in all things. I don't know if or how much Jesus saw into the future. I don't know what God showed him or told him. Just like I said above, I don't know how much Jesus knew or was told by God. If it's true, he might have known that we evolved instead of came into being through the Genesis stories, and he just chose not to tell everyone, cause he knew they couldn't handle it and wouldn't believe it. Plus it wasn't that important for their "salvation" and understanding of eternity, just like their understanding that the earth is round or that it revolves around the sun wasn't/isn't. Don't know what his limits were are weren't. Maybe someday we'll find out. Maybe it's not our business and we just get to know what we need to know, (for where we're at) and that's it.

I get a little tired of foo-foo "scholars and experts" sometimes, (though at other times I do appreciate them). It shouldn't be so incredibly complicated and people shouldn't need 3 PHDs to understand the basic faith and love in Christ. They shouldn't even have to read and write and a whole bunch of other technical stuff that seems to be spread all over and under the life and eternity of Christ. It's my understanding that some Jews believe in eternity and some don't. Which are which, I couldn't tell you. If you are going to get your understanding of Christ just from Paul, then you are layering Paul onto Christ. Just because he was the first writer in the cannon, doesn't mean he was always right, or always knew everything. There's the difference in his letters and the pseudo-Paul letter(s) that the reresection had already begun, or that people were already stepping into eternity, or whether this happened later, or even and including after death. I just tend to think that Jesus knew more. He had some idea that the coming of the kingdom was not this once and for all time apocalyptic event. If one looks at it from one point of view, one could say that when one passes into Christ, that one passes into another spiritual "dimension", where eternity really is inside and all around one. Looking at it from another point of view, one could say that "apocalypses" have been happening in some form or other all through out history. Whether it's the destruction of the 2nd temple, the fall of Rome, the black plague, the world wars, covid, etc. I don't know how it fits together and probably never will. I do try to focus on the positive side, for myself it just seems better and makes my mind clearer.

I totally agree with you Though it is sometimes nice to have a full day of rest with NO work. Just to restore and rejuvenate. Even God took a day to rest, . . . sometimes I wonder what that feels like.

Would you say that to all our nurses and doctors and firefighters? Those who risk their lives in order to save and protect the rest of us. Or would you just tell them, after all they give, that they are just going to hell? Better to do what Paul said, everyone can choose which day they want to dedicate to God and spirituality.

Oh Gawd! I hadn't even heard of this QAnon thing. Went and googled it. Oh Gawd . ! . . Don't know what to think of it yet. Hope it just goes away. Oh Gawd! It reminds me just a bit of nazism. Perhaps this is what starts to happen when one group starts to feel overwhelmed by another. - Crazy stuff - There are much more sensible and forthright ways of dealing with it than what ever this stuff is. This earth is big enough for all of us, whether we want to culturally-centric or integrated or any and all combinations of the two. Oh Gawd! I really didn't need to know about this Q thing right now. This world has enough problems. Oh Gawd! Hopefully Gawd can handle some of it so we don't have to, or so we don't even have to look at it. Oh Gawd! ------------------- Edit> Sounds like a form of al-anon with the 'al' taken out and a 'Q" put in. Maybe they are recovering from something, . . . super-selfie-ism ? ... ?