Steven Carr

Modern Bible scholars often disagree with what Jesus meant in passages like Mark 13.

But early Christians were remarkably united in their ability to interpret the teachings of Jesus.

They were regarded as non-controversial. Everybody knew what they meant. Nobody twisted the meaning of anything Jesus had said. It could be taken for granted that even Christians you hated would never change anything Jesus had said to suit their own agenda.

But early Christians did argue about what various *other* teachings meant.

2 Peter 3
So also our beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, speaking of this as he does in all his letters. There are some things in them hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other scriptures.

SO Christians had conflicting opinions about what Paul had said, and 'Peter' condemns them.

And Christians had conflicting opinions about what the scriptures had said, and 'Peter' condemns them.

But it seems early Christians never realised that Jesus had been a teacher, and they could invent new teachings of his.

Either that, or 'Peter' didn't want to condemn them for twisting the words of Jesus (but if they changed what Paul said, there was Hell to pay)

2 Peter 1
First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation....

It seems 'Peter' is adamant that there are right and wrong ways to interpret scripture.

Did he think that anybody was interpreting the words of Jesus incorrectly?

If he did, it seems it wasn't any concern of his how people interpreted the teachings of Jesus.

Or perhaps nobody was inventing teachings of Jesus.

1 Corinthians 12
To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.

I guess nobody was tasked with remembering what Jesus had taught....

Or even preparing a sermon based on what Jesus had taught.

1 Corinthians 14
When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation.

But not a telling of a Jesus story....

Where did the teachings of Jesus go?

How could Jesus have been such a great teacher that his words were so clear that nobody could possibly misinterpret them, even by deliberate deceit?

sotto voce

Isn't it amazing, how people have hallucinations when they read the Bible. Instead of seeing 'the ignorant and unstable' they see 'Christians'.

Misinterpretation is precisely what our poster has done, anyway. What Peter wrote was that no prophecy came from the prophet's own ideas. Of course there are right and wrong ways to interpret Scripture, but Peter was not suggesting that the church was guilty of false interpretation; just that the words of the prophets were entirely reliable. He went on, yes, to say this:

'There will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive opinions.'

Which is only as Jesus taught:

Jesus warned about just that. He said that people would be 'wolves in sheeps' clothing'. Not might be.

Though hardly anyone seems to notice. Now I wonder why that might be?

Steven Carr

SV
Isn't it amazing, how people have hallucinations when they read the Bible. Instead of seeing 'the ignorant and unstable' they see 'Christians'.

CARR
It must have been all those pagans who were avidly reading Paul's letters.

There is nothing more that a Roman reader wanted , after he had gorged on Horace and Livy than to turn to 1 Thessalonians, and try to twist what had been written.

sotto voce

Of course. Paul had marked their cards. Not half. He called 'em

'lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, inhuman, implacable, slanderers, profligates, brutes, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to the outward form of godliness but denying its power'.

A fine description of your church, Steven? Catholic, anyway!

Many a true word spoken in sarcasm.

Oh, there were so many who gorged on Horace. Old Horry was all the rage in Thessalonica, Jerusalem, Antioch and indeed throughout Peter's entire diaspora.

Try not to write fatuous crapola, Steven.

Though it may provide mild diversion.

Steven Carr

Is there anywhere to stop Sotto Voce claiming that the people who read Paul's letters were not Christians?

I mean, the reputation of this forum will go down the toilet if it gets out that people here claim that Paul's letters were not read by Christians.

sotto voce

Then, as now.

Chili

Nice exposition Steven, but you are looking for trouble, I think, and have a bite already, I see.

stephan huller

In all fairness though, if Jesus came from heaven to correct the mistakes of the original creation and we were created in the image a flawed god, that is one tall order to fill. You can never fully take the rescue shelter out of the rescue dog.

steve_bnk

The meek shall inherit the Earth.

Which Jesus?

The character called Jesus varies across the gospels from the sarcastic barb throwing antagonist to the meek submissive pacifist.

There is no singular Jesus in the gospels, only a chracter each of the writers used to convey a messge/image.

The NT is a set of disjointed writings written by idifferent people in different years. How can anyone expect there to be consistency across all the writings.

The Jesus character was apocalyptic. He was identfied as a Jewih rabai who referenced Jewish scripturesand characters. He did not renounce Judaism or cteat a new religion.

If there was an HJ on which the tales were spun, he was a Jew. He had no need to invent. He had Jewish lore.

Unless there were scrbes following him around, it wuld have all been hearsay.

J-D

I don't see what basis you could possibly have for that claim ...... or that one ...... or that one ...... or that one ...... or that one.