Orthodox_Freethinker

First of all, what did the Pharisees say to Jesus when He forgave sin?
"Why doth this man thus speak blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God only?" (Mark 2:7) Jesus replies, "But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins." Mark 2:10

Isaiah 43:25
I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins.

The Jews to this day still believe that only can forgive sins, which is why they do not seek forgiveness from Jesus, given their disbelief of Him being God.

"The Bible uses the words 'know' in a number of different ways. Sometimes it is used to mean 'proclaim', 'reveal', or 'make known'. It can also mean to know in an intimate fashion (Genesis 4:1; Amos 3:1-2). In his first letter to the Corinthians, St Paul reminds the Corinthians that during his visit he "decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified" (1 Corinthians 2:2). The book of Genesis includes the story of Abraham going to sacrifice his son Isaac (Genesis 22:1-19). In this story the angel of the Lord says to Abraham, "now I know that you fear God" (Genesis 22:12).

It is possible to interpret these words of the angel to mean that Abraham's fear of God has been made known. The purpose of the trial was for Abraham to intimately know how much he feared God, and it is reasonable to say Abraham learnt how much he feared God. God knows things because they are his works and he enables them to occur, so he knows Abraham's fear of God by enabling Abraham to carry out the trial. By enabling Abraham to carry out the trial, God has enabled Abraham to know how much he fears God.

Jesus Christ is using the word 'knows' in this sense in Matthew 24:36 and Mark 13:32. (St Augustine, ON THE TRINITY, Book 1, Chapter 12; online edition) (St Thomas Aquinas, SUMMA THEOLOGICA, 3rd Part, Question 10, Article 2, Reply to Objection 1, online edition)

Mere human beings obviously do not possess knowledge of when the day of judgement will be. Therefore, in saying that no human being knows the day or the hour, Jesus is warning his followers against attempting to work out when judgement day will be, and against proclaiming their guesses to other people. He is also telling us to ignore anyone who proclaims the time of judgement day. In the same chapter of Matthew's Gospel, Jesus says:

If anyone says to you, "Look! Here is the Messiah!" or "There he is!" - do not believe it. For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and produce great signs and omens, to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Take note, I have told you beforehand. So, if they say to you, "Look! He is in the wilderness", do not go out. If they say, "Look! He is in the inner rooms", do not believe it. For as lightening comes from the east and flashes as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man... Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour. (Matthew 24:23-27, 41-44; see also Mark 13:21-23, 32-37)

Angels may or may not have knowledge of the time of judgement day. Either way, Jesus Christ is telling us that the angels are not permitted to speak to human beings about the time of judgement day. All the good angels are faithful to this restriction because they are perfectly obedient to God. Therefore, any angel that speaks to human beings about the time of judgement day must be one of the fallen angels (also known as demons). Such an angel should definitely be ignored and kept out of our lives.

Jesus Christ has perfect knowledge of the time of judgement day. The Bible tells us that all things were made through Jesus Christ, the Son and Word of God (John 1:1-3, 14-18; Colossians 1:15-17; Hebrews 1:1-2). This means that all times were made through him, including the day of judgement. The Bible also tells us that Jesus Christ is the one who will judge all people (Matthew 25:31-46; John 5:22, 27-29; Acts 17:31). Since the day of judgement was made through Jesus Christ and he will be the judge on that day, it is reasonable to say that he has perfect knowledge of when that day will be. (St Thomas Aquinas, SUMMA THEOLOGICA, 3rd Part, Question 10, Article 2, Reply to Objection 1)

In Matthew 24:36 and Mark 13:32, Jesus Christ is telling his disciples that it is not part of his mission to reveal the time of judgement day. By doing this, he is discouraging his disciples, and us, from asking him when judgement day will be. Jesus does this by using a manner of speaking that his disciples were familiar with and can be understood by people familiar with the Bible, as I briefly explained above. After his resurrection, Jesus tells his disciples that they are not meant to know the times and periods determined by God (Acts 1:6-7). (Archbishop Michael Sheehan, Apologetics and Catholic Doctrine, A new edition revised by Fr Peter Joseph, The Saint Austin Press, London, 2001, pp. 384-385)

The Father has perfect knowledge of judgement day because he is God and therefore has perfect knowledge (John 17:1-3). He is said to know or reveal it because he always reveals it to the Son, because he gives the fullness of Divinity to the Son (John 3:35; 5:22, 27; 10:29; 16:15; Colossians 1:19). Also, the Father did not become Man and was not standing among the apostles. Therefore, he did not have to warn the apostles against asking him about the day of judgement like Jesus did."
http://answering-islam.org/Wales/really_god.htm


"Freethought is used to refer to different things by different people. An orthodox believer in any faith, for example, may be a freethinker if he or she has come to accept those beliefs on the basis of reason, if they question and/or reject one or more articles of their religion's doctrines, or if they have rejected alternative beliefs on the basis of free and rational thought in accordance with reason."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freethinker

Peace.

Vorkosigan

The writer of Mark had many gaps in his knowledge of Judaism, and here's one. Please show that the Pharisees would have objected to the line "But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins." As far as anyone knows, there is nothing theologically objectionable in it, although some scholars have argued that Jesus was challenging the Temple establishment in doing so -- but that would not have bothered the Pharisees either.

In addition to the nonsensical Pharisee response, there is little or no evidence of Pharisees in Galilee at this time. Further, the sequence of the healed paralytic is typological in two ways: first, it is based on the story of Ahaziah in 2 Kings 1:2-17 (Price 2003, p149). The author of Mark has inverted the story in illuminating ways, however. In that tale, the hapless King Ahaziah has fallen through a lattice, and asks the oracle of Ba'al-zebub whether he will get better. YHWH, miffed at the King's lack of faith in him, sends Elijah to head off the King's emissaries to the Philistine oracle. Elijah informs that that they can abandon their mission because YHWH has said the King is doomed. In Mark, the man descends through a roof to healing, not death, and is saved by his friends' faith in Jesus. Ahaziah, by contrast, descends through a lattice, and is doomed by his lack of faith. The parallel is inverted.

Second, it functions as a typology for Jesus' own death and resurrection (such typologies are a common feature of Greek fiction). Neil Godfrey, who posts here from time to time, has suggested that this sequence is a doublet of the Tomb Scene in Mk 16:1-8. Just as the Tomb is blocked by a large stone, so the door is blocked by a large crowd. The paralytic resembles a cadaver, while the digging out of the roof resembles the removal of rock to make the Tomb. Scribes sit watching Jesus just as a young man is sitting as the women enter. Jesus knows what is the hearts of the scribes, just as the young man knows what is the hearts of the women. The correspondences are loose, and often not direct. But the resemblence is there. The scenes in which the dead are raised in Mark often suggest or echo the Death, Resurrection, or Tomb scene later on.

Clearly incorrect as we have already covered. Jews did believe that a human could remove sin, there is both Biblical warrant (Lev 10:17 and Ex 28:36-38, for example) and evidence from the scroll of Nabonidus referenced above . Your position is wrong. Isn't it about time you said oops?

Vorkosigan

SaintCog

OK, got it.

Mental note: Be sure to ignore all angels who speak to me about judgment day.

Steven Carr

OrthodoxFreethinker thinks nothing of contradicting the unanimous testimony of early church fathers whenever it suits him.......

They all said Matthew wrote first.

Still, as Christianity consists of ad hoc , contradictory rationalisations, who can be surprised when its followers use arguments which directly contradict each other?

Steven Carr

Typology is special pleading for people recycling stories to become new stories.

See http://www.bowness.demon.co.uk/mirc1.htm where we see Christians demolishing the Book of Mormon and the Koran for *exactly* the same sort of thing which appears in the Gospels.

Steven Carr

Strange that on the cross, God the Son totally forgot that God the Son had the power to forgive sins, and had to ask God the Father to forgive them, although God the Son had just said that God the Father had forsaken God the Son, which makes petitions rather pointless.

Of course, all of that is to be read in the context of there only being one God, indivisible and immutable, and that Jesus was fully God, at the time when God the Son said that God the Father had forsaken God the Son.

SaintCog

Good luck getting a reply to this. I'm still waiting for a reply to the three points I laid out in response to OF's assumption that the church fathers, simply by virtue of their antiquity, are necessarily more reliable than modern scholars.

In case you forgot, OF, It's the November 27, 11:13 PM post in the "Inconsistency of the Jesus Seminar" thread.

Orthodox_Freethinker

According to the original Aramaic, the language which Jesus spoke, Jesus did not say, "Why have you forsaken me?" but, "For this I was spared!", I triumphant proclamation that dying on the cross was His destiny.

Furthermore, Jesus forgives sin with the authority which the Father has given Him. Jesus is the mediator between the Father and man. When we request Jesus to forgive us of our sins, He mediates that request to the Father.
Why do we need a middle man? Because Christ paid for our forgiveness with His blood given that atonement requires sacrifice.

Peace.

Orthodox_Freethinker

I don't respond to everyone's posts, all the time. I didn't start that thread to have a debate but to share a good article. This isn't even the formal debate forum. I am here for discussion and dialog, not nit-picking.

Peace.

Steven Carr

OF has a copy of the original Aramaic?

I always thought they were written in Greek.

But at least I know now not to trust what I read in the Bible, as the authors really messed up on reporting the words of Jesus.