rhutchin

This gets into the trinity and many books and commentaries have been written in an attempt to explain this.

Can't explain it. What seems to have happened is that God has done something to me that has resulted in me thinking this way.

show_no_mercy

2 Timothy and our current version of John were written to combat Gnostic heresies in the 2nd century. Luke, writing in the first century, isn't writing to combat Gnosticism and is unaware of the doctrine of Jesus' preeminence. All he's doing is expanding on the "son of God" theme found in Mark, combatting the adoptionist Christology found in Mark. There's no evidence of any theme of a preeminence Christology in the 1st century.

As a simple line of evidence - can you name an orthodox Christian who quotes from 2 Timothy prior to Irenaeus? Can you name an orthodox Christian who writes "according to John's gospel..." prior to Irenaeus?

Why is it that the Alogi said that "John's" gospel (it wasn't called "according to John" when they polemicized against it - it was probably just called the "logos gospel" in the mid 2nd century) was written by a Gnostic named Cerinthus?

Amaleq13

This is your belief that you are imposing upon Luke's story. It does not exist in the story, itself. Once again, your imagination does not serve as evidence or logical support for your conclusion.

Repeating your belief still does not constitute evidence or logical support for it.

:rolling:

I was already quite familiar with the tendency of the "Christian mindset" to reinterpret anything in the Bible to comport with itself (ie circular reasoning) before you amply demonstrated it but you've given no good reason to think the author of Luke shared that "mindset". All you've done is insist that the clear context isn't clear and the words don't really mean what they seem to mean. Oh, and you've shared fantasies about what the author might have been thinking when he wrote something that only seems to be clear but actually means something entirely different. :banghead:

Do you truly not see that you have no rational argument that has even the slightest hope of convincing someone who doesn't already agree with you?

The author provides a very clear context for "when they had performed all things according to the law of the Lord" and that is obviously the requirements of the Law in Hebrew Scripture. All you have offered to contradict that plain reading is your belief that the stories must agree and your ability to imagine why the author's choice of words only "seems" to suggest otherwise. There isn't the slightest indication that the author was aware of Matthew's trip to Egypt or the related events.

Luke considers Nazareth the family's hometown with Bethlehem as a birthplace only because of a farcical tax while Matthew considers Nazareth a relocation from their hometown of Bethlehem due to fear of Herod. The stories are internally consistent but they are simply incompatible as a single story.

The nonsense you've been preaching only works on the choir, padre. :wave:

kcdad

The why did he pray to himself?

kcdad

right "in an ATTEMPT"
Really? You blame God for that?

aChristian

He didn't. He prayed to his father. The bible clearly states that they are separate persons and that both are the one God. Our minds cannot comprehend that (surprise, you are talking about God!) but the Bible clearly teaches it and we can easily understand that it teaches that. God has revealed something about himself that we can only partially understand. Now you can prove beyond reasonable doubt based on what you can understand that the Bible is the very word of God and after you have established that you can accept some things that he reveals to you that you can't totally understand. Would you really expect to be able to totally understand everything about God with your finite mind?

Toto

Where does "the Bible" clearly state this?

I have some reasons to doubt this

Was the creator god so incompetant that he couldn't even put together a Bible with no contradictions?

kcdad

OK.. separate persons... distinct identities... but both are God. God is infinite, right? Here are two distinct persons with a "space" between them. What is in that space? More God? The Holy Spirit, perhaps?

Do you really expect to understand ANYTHING about God with your finite mind?

show_no_mercy

"Colorless green ideas sleep furiously".

Because the above sentence makes no sense in your "finite mind", it must be true, right?

Amaleq13

First, it is impossible to "clearly" state such an inherently incoherent concept. Second, the Bible never "clearly states" any such thing.