Burl

Absolutely not. Jesus taught that the self can be eternal if one subordinates self-will to the will of God. The resurrection was a positive demonstration. Those who live by self-will do perish.

There are rumors of a Progressive Nihilist website somewhere, but no one can find the URL. Personally, I am confident that I am my physical self. Cogito ergo zoom.

In Christianity, the body and this physical world is our reason for being. Many other non-incarnate entities were created by God, but mankind holds a unique place because of our physicality. The physical self is unique and absolutely central to our purpose. Is this not completely and undeniably obvious? I do not believe death is the end of the self, but it is an absolute reality.

Reincarnation and karma do not make sense unless there is a durable 'self' which maintains its integrity after death. My personal view is that these are folk beliefs which persist because they do a good job of explaining why life is not fair.

So no karma, reincarnation, etc.? Buddhism leaves all that behind with its Hindu roots?

Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. John 15:13

"Scripture" in the NT always refers to the Tanach (Hebrew Bible).

Best article I have read here, JosephM.

Bill, you are taking a lot out of context and too literally. There are difficult passages, so feel free to start a thread about one. Discounting an isolated verse because of its literal English meaning is the same faulty logic used by those who accept Scripture on the basis. The passage in 2 Timothy says all scripture is useful for teaching righteousness. It does not say that all is literally true, or that all are positive examples. Take the passage where Jesus tells the apostles to buy swords. You know they are not going to join the army or kill people. The Roman short sword was a multi-purpose instrument in a day when steel was still precious. The sword was used to chop trees, kill & dress game and even as a shovel. Kind of a hunting knife/axe/machete. It was the most available tool, and valuable for people about to be persecuted and driven to every corner of the near east.

>>It was never a place of fellowship, in that just about everyone at least twice my age<< After 45 years, I'm guessing this is not an issue anymore Seriously, it is hard to find a good church but there are things to look for. One is to find a church with a strong social justice ministry. Get involved in what the church does outside the walls. A second is to look for a church with a lot of retired clergy. They will be able to discuss theology on an intelligent level. Third is to look for a church with an eye for what you can bring to it rather than what it can bring to you. Disciples of Christ or the Wesleyan Church are often good liberal choices. Free-thinking, but still based on Christ and not pop psychology.

Dali's 'Corpus Hypercubis' https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crucifixion_(Corpus_Hypercubus)

From Ecclesiastes

God only grudgingly allowed the selection of a king of Israel. Prophets, priests and judges yes but it was the arrogance of Israel which demanded a king. See 1 Samuel 12.

All of the above. Before Jesus, there was a firm separation between mankind and God. God only reached mankind through the prophets. At Pentecost, we see this separation destroyed and mankind capable of developing a direct relationship with God. Jesus is not a matter of belief. Jesus enabled our ability to directly connect with God.

2 Timothy 3:14-4:2English Standard Version (ESV) 14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom[a] you learned it 15 and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. 4 I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.

Amen.

You are a bit confused, Bill. We were created human by a non-human entity. How can an omniscent God experience fear? How can an omnipotent God experience temptation? How can an impassible God experience suffering? Experience is not the same thing as knowledge. Ask any woman who has been through childbirth. The experiences of fear, suffering and temptation were all brought to the divine council by Jesus. They previously had knowledge, but not experience. Now we have a perfect human advocate in heaven who has lived our problems and who has been placed in authority as our lord and mediator. (Hebrews 4:14-5:12)

Great question. First, the kingdom of God is not heaven. A common confound that needs to be put aside immediately. The kingdom of God is where God's will is honored "on earth as it is in heaven". Because of sin it is diffuse and incomplete, but still here. The effects of sin are not predictable or proportional. Reducing sin and increasing self-sacrifice for the sake of others is the key to ushering in the kingdom of God.

God and good are synonyms. Good is not an attribute of God; it is his definition. Paul did not "let go" of the Jewish God. Jewish worship became impossible after the destruction of the second temple, and Paul said the Jews were grafted on to Jesus's rootstock. This was Jesus role as messiah. Today Jews worship, sacrifice and purify via prayer instead of blood. They have adopted Christian methods. A good thought now that the High holy days have just closed.

In "Hold to that which is good", good refers to God. We do not get to define good, but are expected to compare results with the objective good defined in scripture. Paul is not inviting us into narcissism. It is not "Hold to that which you think is good". That would make Paul would sound a lot like Trump ;-)

We need to balance Scripture, experience, tradition, and reason. We are not isolated intelligences responsible only to ourselves. The human race - past, present and future - are responsible for repairing this broken world together. It is a group project, and Jesus is the crux where the human and the divine intersect.

The NT, as we have it, is the best available data. Even in English bible. This is not theory. We cannot procrastinate demanding an unassailable truth. We need to make a command decision - immediately! - based on the most reliable data available to us. The teachings of Jesus, which is indeed the New Testament, should guide every moment of every day. We are like Captain Kirk and we need to make a decision. Now. We cannot waffle, or be indecisive, or waste time smooching strange alien women. Every moment counts. The moving finger writes . . . We follow Jesus, and the Bible is the only reliable data. Not doctrine; data. Old and incomplete, but good enough to form saints and science, art and western civilization. Mendel, Newton, Descartes, Carravagio, Michelangelo, St. Francis - the NT is has an excellent track record.

The NT does contain some Aramaic phrases. I guess it is possible some of the NT was originally Aramaic, but it seems unlikely the apostles hired scribes to write in a localized dialect when the universal language of Greek was so common. Rome even hired rabbis to translate the Hebrew Bible into Greek decades earlier. The literary trend had established Greek as a standard long before Jesus. It is more likely the Greek was translated back to Aramaic. If you want to noodle over non-existent Aramaic autographs, you still have all of the issues surrounding the Greek plus many more including an increasing irrelevancy to the present. Even the Aramaic targums were based on the Greek text. I think Aramaic is best left to ancient language doctoral candidates in search of dissertation material. I don't think it is going to be of much benefit to contemporary people without deep scholastic analysis.

There are many more than three choices. I think the simplest is that God has a plan for humanity, but that individual free will makes small changes which have no effect on the final outcome. The casino is a good analogy. The house controls and correctly predicts the profit every year to a mathematical certainty but to the individual player everything is random.

No one has found original autographs. The Nestle-Aland is the version I use, primarily because the tagging is very good and my Greek is very poor. Orthodox prefer the Textus Receptus. In English bible I use different translations for different purposes. I like the ESV in general and grudgingly overlook the occasional Calvinist bias. Everything we have in NT was written in the Koine Greek language where the entire book is just one long, uninterrupted string of letters without even spaces between the words. Undoubtedly the autographs were as well, which is what I meant by my post.