Evil Sentient Duck

Hey,
I will readily admit that I'm not as well read as many here, so I can easily display myself as a dumbass... It was only a thought.
So, in a further venture toward making myself look like a dumbass, I'll ask...
1.) Aren't the Qumran documents regard as Essene? And wasnt the War Scroll found at Qumran?
2.) I had read (Don't ask me where, cuz I forget) that the suffering servent concept tied to a person instead of to collective Israel was an Essene concept that may have been tied to one of their founders. The Jesus before Jesus stuff...
3.) Based on the same assumptions in my reply at #1....
4.) Based on the same assumptions in my reply at #2....

Regards.

Amaleq13

Thanks. That isn't quite what Jim claimed, though. He specified 30 as an assumption we could make about the age of Jesus as he started his ministry but the evidence of his Bible suggests that is much more specific than is warranted.

ex-preacher

You'll need to bring a little more solid evidence to accomplish that goal.

I'm sorry, but such threats stopped working on me a long time ago.


Which is obviously why you can't accept the Qu'ran and Book of Mormon.


I agree; the Bible is a mixture of history, myth, poetry, laws, and psychotic ramblings.



Why were you agnostic?


The same could be said of any religion, including the ones you dismiss.

Yeah, things like Alzheimer's, leukemia, malaria, cholera, small pox, AIDS, tsunamis, earthquakes these were obviously planned by an intelligent, evil designer.

What a beuatiful apology. You're a real gentleman.

Jim Larmore

This taken from http://www.ynca.com/Mini%20Studies/s...untability.htm

Jews Hold Bar-Mitzvah at 13

Luke chapter 2 relates how Yahshua was left behind by His parents in Jerusalem following the Passover and the days of Unleavened Bread. He was about age 13, and even today Jewish boys have a ceremony known as "Bar-Mitzvah," meaning Son of the Covenant, when they are accepted into the congregation. Is 13 the age of accountability, the age when one can with complete understanding repent and then be immersed?

Some groups immerse young people at the early age of 10 or 12. It is difficult to find Biblical justification to immerse at that age. Let us continue considering other examples and alternatives.

The Savior Himself did not begin His ministry until He was 30 years of age, right after His baptism. Early on, the priests began their service at age 30 as well. (emphasis mine)

Surely at 30 one is mature and responsible for one’s behavior. Most of us would wonder whether at 30 too many years have already passed before making a commitment to Yahweh. Does the Bible speak of a younger age?
Christ was to take on the priest-hood on the order of Melchisidec (ms) and as such he stayed with the custom of the early appointment of priesthood so this is not "arbitrary".
The math does indeed work and Levi was an apostle, Luke wasn't.

If you are implying that He was to do the father's will then you are correct, if your implication is that He had some agenda of His own then you are apparently not reading the same Bible I have been.

You'd be right along with the scribes and Pharisees on this idea. Christ's mission was to fulfill the plan of salvation which was instituted before the foundation of the world. Right now He is officiating as our High Priest in the sanctuary in heaven as our mediator before God the father.

I don't have a big problem with this statement other than He made it very plain to everyone who would listen that He was the messiah. The woman at the well, the pharasees.

Peez

Sorry for the OT post, I just wanted to remind Jim:Hi Jim,

I hope that you are well. I can certainly understand that ‘real life' is much more important than posting messages on the net.




(highlight mine) There have been about 40 posts in that thread after your last post, including at least two that answer your challenge in detail. You were PM'ed about it, but did not even respond to the PM.

You posted six times that day, and 111 times in the three months up to and including that date (by a quick count), but not a single post for the next three months. It is always possible that your life got suddenly more busy, it has happened to me, but the timing was notable. Of course you did eventually post again, 109 times (by a quick count), but never in Evolution/Creation, as far as I could see.

So, nobody expects you to make responding to threads here a top priority in your life. What we do expect is a little courtesy. You were participating in a thread, made challenges, then when these challenges were answered you disappeared without explanation. You have since found time to compose and submit 109 posts, but never came back to address the responses to your challenge. Of course you could have simply forgotten, but then when the thread is pointed out you just evade by implying that you don't have time? This is just plain rude.

Peez

spin

The War Scroll was found at Qumran, and lots of religious scholars believe that the Essenes wrote the scrolls, but there's not ascrap of evidence for the claim.

The suffering servant is from Isaiah.

As I've told many people here, a community that has the priestly families as heads of the community (sons of Aaron, sons of Levi, etc.) aren't a bunch of celibate groupies excluded from the temple as the Essenes were. The Essene connection is a crock of sh*te.


spin

Sven

Well, then please present one non-fundie biblical scholar who accepts the Josephus fable we are talking about (Alexander) as true.

And I'm still interested in answers to those questions:

And how do you possibly know who of us is deceived by satan and who is not?

Prophecies which as well could have been put there by Satan, to deceive you believing in a false god. How do you rule this out?

Evil Sentient Duck

Yes,
I understand that... but as I understand it, and I could be way off , there were two interpretations of Isaiah's prophecy. One was the rather mainstream view that Israel, as a chosen people, were the suffering servant. The other, from what I have gathered, rightly or wrongly, was an Essene interpretation that applied the suffering servant concept to a particular person.

Anyway, my basic question regarding Daniel was an, evidently a half assed, attempt at asking if it could be possible that Daniel’s prophecy was sincere. And that this prophesy was expected to be fulfilled in and around the time of Christ. That certain groups could have been prepared for it. That one person, Jesus, and his cadre of disciples sincerely expected to fulfill it. That in the end they were sincere, but sincerely mistaken.

That's all I was driving at.

Regards.

Amaleq13

I was unable to access this website. Even ynbca.com obtains a "can't find server" message. Thanks to Anat, though, we can see from your own Bible that there is no basis for the assumption of age 30. In addition, you seem to be conflating the idea of beginning one's priesthood with beginning to take on one's messianic duties. Establishing an age where the former might have typically begun is not the same as establishing an age where the latter typically began. IOW, this is not helping support your assertion that Jesus beginning his ministry should be equated with the allegedly prophesied appearance of the Messsiah in Daniel.

Based on Luke's nativity story, Jesus turned thirty around 36CE. According to your argument, that would be when he started his ministry and when we should consider him to have begun carrying out his messianic duties but your math doesn't work for that year. You should keep ignoring Luke, I think.

We have already seen that your Bible says otherwise with regard to the traditional age of beginning priesthood. He could have been anywhere between 30 and 50. IIRC, GJn has someone declare that Jesus is "not yet fifty" which seems to suggest he was closer to that end of the range. Looks like John doesn't help you get the "right" result either.

Your choice of 4BCE as Jesus' birth year when the author of Matthew actually only indicates this to be the latest possible year appears to be either arbitrary or deliberately chosen just to make the math work.

Your claim that Jesus beginning his ministry is the same as beginning a priesthood which is the same as taking on messianic duties appears to be either arbitrary or a deliberate effort to make the math work. IOW, becoming a preacher doesn't make one a priest and becoming a priest doesn't make one a messiah yet you are equating all three.

BTW, Hebrews says Jesus was not a priest except in heaven after the resurrection:

"For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law:"(8:4, KJV, emphasis added)

The math only works if your assumptions/assertions are accepted but, so far, you haven't offered any apparently credible reasons to accept them. Discussion of your additional assumptions about Gospel authorship will likely lead to a tangent but I would point out that the author of Luke claims to be providing, after considering multiple sources, that which is "most surely believed among" his fellow Christians.

My point is that you are equating Jesus' ministry with his messianic duties but it is clear from the Gospel stories and Paul's letters than his actual messianic duties had much more to do with his crucifixion and resurrection. Therefore, your attempt to equate these two does not appear legitimate. If taking on his messianic duties is the focus of the prophecy, then the predicted year is that of the crucifixion/resurrection not the beginning of the ministry. You will need a different reason to choose the latter.

According to the author of Mark, Jesus would confirm anyone's suspicions but asked them to keep it secret. He only "went public" when he entered Jerusalem. As I said above, if making his identity as the messiah known is how we are to determine the "Messiah onset", his entry into Jerusalem would appear to be the most obvious point. That means you need to offer a different reason for your choice of considering the beginning of his ministry as fulfilling the prophecy.

Jim Larmore

Sven, If you concede any at all to the existence of satan then you are accepting the existence of supernatural beings. The Bible and all of its message is from the pen of inspired men influenced by these good supernatural beings.
Being unnecessary doesn't make him not real or non-existent, feces happens is at least a modicum of a concession that evil exists in our world.

Actually thats a pretty easy one, in Isa 8:20 it says "To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word , it is because ther is no light in them." Then in the New Testament Jesus said by their fruits you shall know them. If someone is believing and conducting their lives in defiance of God's word then they are being deceived by Satan and possibly themselves too. If their lives are being conducted with hate and strife in it then they are being influenced by the originator of evil Satan or one of his fallen angels.

Let me ask you this, do you believe that demon possession exists or is it a hoax?
One way to tell is what they write, is it consistent with the rest of the scriptures? Does it uphold and give Glory to God the Creator of the universe? Another way is to see if it aligns with other similar prophecys. For instance the 42 months or 1260 days is given 7 times in the old and new testament. This is not a mistake, God repeats on prophecies of such import and He expands them too. Another is by the life of the one who wrote it. Daniel who wrote the book bearing his name was a pious man of God, John the Revelator who wrote Revelations was one of the original 12 apostles and was a pious man of God. Satan may inspire men to do things but I don't think you'll find any of his work in the Bible written down as prophecies.

I've never equated unassisted abiogenesis with evolution, I see the two going hand in hand to an extent. I've never had any trouble with micro-evolution its pretty much a solid fact, macro-evolution specifically RM+Ns to describe the diversity in the biota is a crock.

I have studied the research papers on a lot of the work thats been done and its not too convincing to say the least. For instance one of the funniest parts of OOL research is ribozyme research where they take existing ligases and get them to replicate but they have to start out with organic molecules that were already produced by living entities. Don't you see a problem with this? Like I've said many many times if you can show me an experiment where you come up with some of these ligases or ribozymes from scratch without intelligent input or pre-existing biomolecules then I'll start to beleive in it, but I don't think that will ever happen. Dead inanimate undirected inorganic matter will never produce life and it never did. God produced life.
And you gullability as a scientist is amazing.