Block, Automoderated users, edit
398
edits
Changes
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
Line 28:
Line 28: + + + + + +
Talk:John 15-21 (Translated) (view source)
Revision as of 19:10, March 17, 2010
, 19:10, March 17, 2010→Reversion explained
::::::As for the whole "right versus left" = "conservative versus liberal" in the Bible . . . aside from the fact that Jesus simply refused to let Himself be used by or drawn into political agendas (always redirecting people BACK to focusing on serving God), I simply do not believe that Jesus was then going to make several HIDDEN political statements that could NOT be fully understood by ANY believers during the first 1800 or 1900 years of Christianity, and could only be properly decoded by English speaking Americans (or French speaking Europeans) almost two THOUSAND years later. That simply does not fit. The teachings of scripture are UNIVERSAL, they transcend culture and era, and Jesus taught ABSOLUTE Truth, NOT American political views. Anything that is true of the political "Conservative" view is because WE line up with God's position, NOT because He agrees with ours. In Joshua 5:13, when Joshua encountered the the commander of the Lord's armies, Joshua asked him: "Are you for us or for our enemies." Despite the fact that Israel was OBEYING God and doing the will of God, the answer was "neither." God does not "join" our positions, we join HIS. The question is NOT whether or not He is with us, the question is whether or not we are with HIM. Speaking as a life long Conservative, I can say with no hesitation that God is NOT a right wing conservative (it is NOT a conservative political position that one MUST be a follower of Jesus to be a conservative, as there are very prominent, NON-Christian JEWISH conservatives in America - and that IS the central message of the Bible). God is not a member of OUR coalition. If we are correct, if we proclaim Truth, it is because we have joined HIS side, NOT because He has joined ours. If there is some deeper meaning to be attributed to His use of "right," it needs to be drawn from how the words were used, and what their meanings were, during the first century, NOT how a tiny group of believers (historically speaking) would use those words two thousand years later in modern American political culture.--[[User:MBack|Michael Back]] 13:46, 17 March 2010 (EDT)
::::::As for the whole "right versus left" = "conservative versus liberal" in the Bible . . . aside from the fact that Jesus simply refused to let Himself be used by or drawn into political agendas (always redirecting people BACK to focusing on serving God), I simply do not believe that Jesus was then going to make several HIDDEN political statements that could NOT be fully understood by ANY believers during the first 1800 or 1900 years of Christianity, and could only be properly decoded by English speaking Americans (or French speaking Europeans) almost two THOUSAND years later. That simply does not fit. The teachings of scripture are UNIVERSAL, they transcend culture and era, and Jesus taught ABSOLUTE Truth, NOT American political views. Anything that is true of the political "Conservative" view is because WE line up with God's position, NOT because He agrees with ours. In Joshua 5:13, when Joshua encountered the the commander of the Lord's armies, Joshua asked him: "Are you for us or for our enemies." Despite the fact that Israel was OBEYING God and doing the will of God, the answer was "neither." God does not "join" our positions, we join HIS. The question is NOT whether or not He is with us, the question is whether or not we are with HIM. Speaking as a life long Conservative, I can say with no hesitation that God is NOT a right wing conservative (it is NOT a conservative political position that one MUST be a follower of Jesus to be a conservative, as there are very prominent, NON-Christian JEWISH conservatives in America - and that IS the central message of the Bible). God is not a member of OUR coalition. If we are correct, if we proclaim Truth, it is because we have joined HIS side, NOT because He has joined ours. If there is some deeper meaning to be attributed to His use of "right," it needs to be drawn from how the words were used, and what their meanings were, during the first century, NOT how a tiny group of believers (historically speaking) would use those words two thousand years later in modern American political culture.--[[User:MBack|Michael Back]] 13:46, 17 March 2010 (EDT)
== Validity of Chapter 21 ==
This is a response to the note at the beginning of chapter 21. This idea is so completely without merit that I cannot understand why we would even give it the recognition of mentioning that it exists. We need to dispense once and for all with giving any kind of authority or credibility to views derived from perceived "style" changes within the Bible. Those "observations" never pan out. First, John actually varies his style in several places within this gospel, so singling out the last chapter just shows a lack of knowledge about the book and about Greek. Second, John references himself in the third person throughout the entire book. Further, one use of the third person in chapter 21 is a direct reference back to the use of the third person in chapter 13 (where John leans up against Jesus' chest). Phrased EXACTLY the same in both places. Further, his use of the third person also matches when John is giving a direct, eye-witness account of seeing blood and water come out of Jesus' side in chapter 19. He maintains the THIRD PERSON, despite wanting the reader to know that this is an eye-witness report. What would be a STRANGE, abnormal switch in style would be if he suddenly referenced himself in the FIRST PERSON in chapter 21. Further, the vocabulary within the last chapter is uniformly consistent with the vocabulary within the rest of the book. Almost every chapter of John contains a few words not used by John anywhere else, and then several words that are favorites of John. The last chapter is exactly the same. A few words not found anywhere else in John's writings (ἀριστάω - breakfast, δίκτυον - net, αἰγιαλός - beach) that unavoidably MUST be used to describe the setting, and several words that John uses a lot (φανερόω, ἐγείρω).
Finally, as mentioned in the note, every copy of John ever found which contains the end of the book includes the last chapter, including the oldest copy of John in existence, P66 (the very last page of P66 is missing, but the second to last page still exists, and it contains 21 all the way up to verse 9). P66 dates from somewhere in the middle of the second century, making it within one generation of the original. This is the OLDEST nearly complete copy of ANY book in the NT, with only about 40 - 60 years between the original and this copy, and although the speed with which it was copied created huge numbers of copy errors, giving it less weight on the details, the sheer age of the document means it carries a huge amount of weight as to the general layout and content of the original. With only 40-60 years between it and the original, it also stands alone as the shortest distance between an original and a nearly complete existing copy of ANY ancient document, secular or biblical, in existence today (in fact, nearly all of the top ten are biblical manuscripts, with p75 coming in second, p46 possibly third - depending on which scholar you believe, etc - you have to go down the list to several hundred years between an original and an existing copy before you encounter the first ancient secular manuscript on the list). In short, P66 settles the issue. If it doesn't prove that chapter 21 is original, then no textual evidence on any topic, dealing with any manuscript, in any field, secular or biblical, means ANYTHING, as no other manuscript that I am aware of even comes close to this one.--[[User:MBack|MBack]] 15:10, 17 March 2010 (EDT)