Chili

Joseph the carpenter, remember him? . . . and he was a carpenter only because carpenters are known to make many things and since all things are made in sin it can be said that Joseph was a big sinner and therefore 'hauled' back the Bethlehem to give an account of himself there as sinner.

Rev.21:22 (I think) tell us that, but, why should we go to church if we have the mind of Christ? To pull taffy?

Chili

That's OK too, Joan, and I would like to explain myself but it seems that things get worse when I try to do that.

Chili

I would say that Jesus was in charge of his own destiny and knew that he was God-in-becoming but was not God until he was crucified and raised. The "it is finished" in John tells us that.

We are expected to follow him and do the same since it would show great defeat to enter the race and not finish it.

Joan of Bark

I thought you might be referring to Joseph-the-son-of-Jacob.

So my question is: How do you figure that Jesus is the reborn Joseph? Do you have any scriptural evidence, or is this just a philosophical hypothesis?

Chili

To me it is not a hypothesis but a sure thing and I have lots of scriptural evidence for this but probably none of it will stand on its own. I am not a bible reader, you see, but just a poor Catholic who may have found favor with Mary. Having said this I must add that we all know that Mary is just a figment of our imagination but who really cares if reality is the basis for our imagination (which actually allows us to claim Mary as our very own instead of Jesusw ho so becomes our brother).

I would call it the philosophy of religion and that requires some insight on our part. It can now be said that insight is a gift of God who, as it was with Joseph, is us in our innermost being that we cannot enter on our own or it would not be a gift. This gift is contained by the woman who presides over the Tree of Life (our subcionscious mind) which therefore holds the limits of our imagination (= our song to sing).

So now you know who Mary is you can figure out that Jesus is a name given to a certain stage of awakening and that the exposition of Mary is what this awakening is all about.

My best line for this is that the Annunciation in Luke came across to Joseph as a dream. For this to work the Gospels give us different perspectives of an allegory to bring out the reality behind it which here means that the rebirth of Joseph was incipient from God and thus 'from above' (no altar call was needed or wanted ).

Chili

Some people here must just love that line, but really, aren't men intuitly 'proud of their better half.'

mikem

Actually, the passage you have quoted is Mark 10: 17,18. Matthew actually changes Mark's version at this point. Matthew 19:16, 17 says:

"Behold, one came to him saying " Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?" And he (Jesus) said to him "Why do you ask me about what is good?"

Did Matthew not like Mark's implication that Jesus was not good? And does this imply that Matthew did regard Jesus as in some way divine?