Gamera

Do you know if Price deals with the "love your enemy" admonition, which appears unique.

Johnny Skeptic

There is not any credible evidence that Jesus ever said to love your enemies. Didn't you say that you are not an ierrantist? While inerrancy is of course absurd, not being an inerrantist does have its problems because you have to come up with reliable criteria for which parts of the Bible are inerrant and which parts are not inerrant.

If you love your enemies, you most certainly don't send them to hell without ever giving them an opportunity to go on parole for a second chance.

aa5874

But the unknown author of Matthew 10:34 states, 'Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth, I did not come to bring peace, but a sword'.

This is crazy.

RUmike

Where in the NT does Jesus send anyone to hell? And, if that does indeed occur, what makes that more historically reliable than "love your enemies"?

Doug Shaver

Yes, but not very parsimoniously. I think the most parsimonious explanation of the texts is that they're all fiction.

Solo

The problem with attributing the love-enemies maxim to Jesus, is that Paul uses it in Romans (12:14-21) without invoking it as Jesus' teaching.

Further, as you say, one cannot love, the way Paul wanted his flock to "love" their enemies. He says in the passage "if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he's thirsty give him drink, for by so doing you will heap burning coals upon his head". Well, is that really kindness and solicitousness ? Can love be also used to consign its recipients to hell ?

But, not to run away from the topic here, the grandiose posturing and the transparent fusion of hostility and affection is quite common in bipolars (manic-depressives) and very often signals added diagnostic issues.

Here are some other samples of cognitive traces of manic temperament in NT which often announces itself in moody arbitrariness, reckless abandon, and contempt for accepted ways and customs:

Mk 10:21 (Lk 12:33) And Jesus looking upon him loved him, and said to him, ‘You lack one thing; go sell what you have, and give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me.’

Mt 6:26 Look at the birds in the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.

Mat 8:21-22 (Lk 9:59-60) Another disciple said to him, ‘Lord, first let me go and bury my father.’ But Jesus told him, ‘Follow me, and let the dead bury their dead.’

Mt 13:10-12 And the disciples came and said to him ‘Why do you speak to them in parables ?’. And he answered them, ‘To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For to him who has will more be given; but from him who has not, even that he has will be taken away.’

Rom 9:14-16 Is there injustice on God’s part ? By no means ! For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion’. So it depends not on man’s will or exertion, but on God’s mercy.

Rom 12:19-20 Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God; for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord’. No, if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals upon his head.

[one may not be solicitous and kind and at the same time (or, by that very token,) consign the recipient of kindness to hell]

2 Cor 8:1-5 We want you to know, brethren, about the grace of God which has been shown in the churches of Macedonia, for in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and in their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of liberality on their part. For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their means , of their own free will, begging us earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of saints.

etc, etc......

JS

Wisdumb

This is one of the most misunderstood quotes in the New Testament. Jesus did not mean it literally. It was a metaphor....believe it or not the Bible is profound, dont take it all at surface level. Instead of taking the quote out of context to prove your point, read what comes directly after it.

34 ‘Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
35For I have come to set a man against his father,
and a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;

The sword represents a divide between the old and new generations of religion. He set out to revolutionize Judasim itself. So by saying daughter in law against mother in law etc, these represent the old and new ways of believing in God. Jesus' mission was to promote love and to change all the things he felt was wrong in the jewish religion at the time.

aa5874

Now this is crazier. The followers of Judaism claims Jesus is a fraud or heretic, they do not really care if he lived or not. And by the way Jesus never revolutionised Judaism, they still worship the God of Abraham, not the Son of the Ghost.

RUmike

What's your evidence to back this up? This may be good Christian exegesis for a preacher to preach, but it does not make for a good argument about what Jesus actually meant. The saying actually coheres with Jesus' poor attitude about family and his poor relationship with his own family, so there is little or no reason to take it metaphorically. On the other hand it is essentially a repeat of an OT passage, and so I am reluctant to credit this to Jesus and not some early Christian.

Solo

Ever read any Vonnegut ? The NT did not really start as fiction; it started as kind of Bokonon, "not a religion but a technique".

I invited in a letter a learned New Testament exeget, who believes there is no question about Jesus originating as a myth, to consider the following. Imagine, if you will, I wrote, that at the moment that Vivian, Lady of the Lake, finishes conjuring her tower around Merlin to imprison him, her family appears on the scene, waving their hands and shouting: “Hello, please excuse us, …no, please, no tower, no way Vivian can do that sort of thing,…please excuse her; …yes you are right, she is out of her mind”. Certainly, if the Arthurian legends were written in that sort of code we would have a very different view of them. But that is exactly how much of the New Testament is written. The unbelief of those who witness Jesus performing miracles, including his kinfolk, simply cancels the mythical panoply for which they are constructed, and allows the reality racket to romp with impunity over the supernatural. That is both unprecedented and quite unparalleled in the history of mythology and religion.

JS