mdarus

Bobinus,

You are making John 14:6 say things it does not say.

John 14:6 does not say anything about what someone must believe in order for Jesus to be the way for them. It does not say that Jesus cannot be the way for those who never hear about him. You are adding words that are not there, Your version is something like:

I am the the way, the truth and the life (for those who have heard my message and believe that I am the divine Son of God and that I died on the cross for their sins). No man (who lived at any time) cometh to the Father except by (believing in) me (with a full and proper understanding of my deity and death on the cross).

Sorry, but that is just bad hermeneutics. You may have heard it that way from an enthusiastic preacher but that is not what it says. If you want to criticize sayings attributed to Jesus, do it based on what it really says, please.

Bobinius

It is anachronistic because it transferring a meaning only available at the present time to a time where that meaning did not exist. You are building your case based on the conception of the people that lived after Jesus died and transfering that unto the people that lived before him.

What Jesus required was to be identified with the Christ, with the Messiah. Just a belief in a future coming Messiah is not going to save anybody. He tells the apostles you have seen the signs, but do not believe. The work is to believe in Jesus.

Says who. You are just making things up as we go along.

Faith in Vishnu will do? Faith in God the Allmighty (not a Son or Three Gods)?
Faith in Zeus? Manitou? Osiris?

You keep forgetting that God condemnes and burns all the people that were unaware of the 'anticipatory' faith and Judaism.

8 The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: "All nations will be blessed through you."

9 So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.

What did I say about anachronism? You keep bringing people that lived after Jesus in order to 'explain' what the people before Jesus believed. Bring people before Jesus and Jesus.

This does not say anything explicit about 'faith'. Faith in what? Just insert whatever you want.

"All nations will be blessed through you" means what? That the people before believed in the Son of God, in Jesus Christ ? Paul is totally contradicted by the Old Testament:

Genesis 22:

15 The angel of the LORD called to Abraham from heaven a second time

16 and said, "I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son,

17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies,

18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me."

Please tell me where is faith in Jesus or the Messiah affirmed here. Where is that 'anticipatory faith'? The blessing, as God says (tell me he is wrong too), is that Abraham will have many successful descendants that will rule the Earth and through them, through these descendants, all the nations will be blessed. Not through some faith in Jesus Christ.

And the reason God does this is: 'because you have obeyed me'. This is Abraham's work. As James says:

James 2

21 Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar?

22 You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did.

23 And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness," and he was called God's friend.

24 You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.

Where is the 'man of faith' Abraham that Paul is talking about? It is just a malformed adaptation, not only anachronistic, but totally false. There is no 'anticipatory faith'.

Compare Genesis and James with Galatians:

Galatians 2

16 Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

21 I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.

UUps! Christ is dead in vain. Just as I said: If Christ is not necessary, if people were saved before him, and the OT says Abraham was saved through his works, not the invented 'anticipatory faith', then Christ is dead in vain.

People before believed in Jesus Christ? Before he was even born? Those people believed that the law will save them. Bring me a verse where the OT people believed that salvation is by faith, not works, and that faith was in Jesus Christ, as Jesus and Paul require.

Incoherence. The case is stronger than ever.

All your defense is ad-hoc and made up. The anticipatory faith defense has no support. See above.

The problem with anachronism is that Paul thinks that what he believes after the fact is what people before the fact believed. It is just his imagination. If you want a case,bring forth what the people BC believed in.

Bring forth what Jesus is talking about. Bring the OT passages that 'talk' about him.

Again, the content of the 'anticipation' is not expressed. 'About me'. That's all. What are you going to introduce here? Jesus is reffering to the same blessing of Abraham, which has nothing to do with faith or faith in Jesus.

Genesis 26

4 I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and will give them all these lands, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed,

5 because Abraham obeyed me and kept my requirements, my commands, my decrees and my laws."

a. The nations are not blessed through Jesus or faith in him, but through the offspring of Abraham (Isaac -> Jews; Ismael ->Arabs).

b. The nations are not blessed because Abraham was a 'man of faith', or because he had faith in Jesus (he did not), but because he kept the commands and the laws. Because of his works.

Yes, nothing about Jesus. It must be a passage where the writer erred.


If you want to talk about hermeneutics, use the context. See what was said in the OT, not just quote Paul.

Victor was wrong. John 14:6 adresses the content of faith: by me. Believe in Jesus Christ. The same John says what does that mean:

John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

John 3:18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son.

This is the context. This is how Jesus provides the atonement. How are you imagining that Jesus provides attonement? By not believing he was the Son of God? See your Galatians for chrissakes. 'Whoever believes in him shall not perish', not 'Whoever believes in him ,except those who lived before him,shall not perish.'

Jesus did not claim any exceptions. He said NO MAN.

And where are you infering from that those that lived before the light were saved in a different way? Was it ok for them then? Without any light to come to?

Don't tell me: the light was already there, anticipated.


You are suggesting just that. Defending a contradiction with another contradiction. This just shows that Christianity is incoherent. From the 'now' theory, the 'anticipatory faith' theory, the 'Jesus is not necessary to believe in him' theory, the Fallacy of Accident theory we arrived at 'it is not necessary to believe in order to believe'.

what's next man? Why are you torturing thinking like that, in order to save some contradictory doctrine?

Abraham has nothing to do with it. It is just a strech of imagination.

I already adressed this issue: faith in some abstract coming Messiah is not equivalent with the belief that Jesus is the Messiah. Jesus requires them to believe HE is the Messiah. To identify him with the Messiah in order to be saved.

Jesus B can't be called Jesus: this is anachronism again. If you asked Moses if he believes in the coming of Jesus he would have said "What are you talking about?" They did not knew what Jesus meant. Jesus makes sense only after he was born, after he existed.

The Messiah of the OT is not described as God. God will send a Messiah. The Messiah is never described as the Son of God. It wasn't necessary that the Messiah is divine.

Again, if mere faith in a coming Messiah was sufficient (but the OT says that works are sufficient and it talks about faith in God, not the Messiah), then Jesus died in vain. It was illogical for God to send his Son to die in order to save us, when we were already saved.

No, it does not. But I prophesize now that this thread can probably go on forever. You value faith in God more than the truth.

When I explained what Affirming the Consequent means, I showed that you were adopting the same form in the argument.

IF 'people are saved', THEN 'they have faith in Jesus Christ and his message'.

'People that lived before Jesus Christ had faith in Jesus Christ and his message'
--------

'People that lived before Jesus Christ are saved.'

That's affirming the consequent.

It is a rhetorical why: the situation is logically contradictory. God sends his Son to die in order to save people that were already saved. Got it now?

I made it very explicit, and without adding anything. I also put it in the context of John, who explaines what he means. BY ME.

Ok, so someone must believe that Brahman is God? That God does not have a Son?

It does not say that Santa Claus does not exist. Does it mean that it exists?

It does not say that Jesus is the way for those who never heard of him. That is the problem.

If Jesus is the way for those who never heared about him, and do not believe in him, why did he have to be born? You are totally incoherent.

Compare these two:

Bobinius:

This excludes (no man) all the people that did not believe in Jesus, from salvation (cometh unto the Father), except (but) those who believe in Jesus (by me).

mdarus:

I am the the way, the truth and the life (for those who have heard my message and believe that I am the divine Son of God and that I died on the cross for their sins). No man (who lived at any time) cometh to the Father except by (believing in) me (with a full and proper understanding of my deity and death on the cross).

You are making a straw man. 'With a full ...'. Be serious. Belief in him = Jesus is Messiah and the Son of God. If someone does not believe Jesus is the messiah or the the son of god, he is condemned.

No man means exclusion. You are adding No man except those who lived before me.

Now where on Earth did you obtained that from? Talking about bad hermeneutics. You are adding things that are not there. Jesus only excludes from damnation the ones that believe in him.

Clarice O'C

Getting back to what the text actually says, Abraham's faith in Yahweh was so strong that he offered his son as a sacrifice. The Jews took Yahweh seriously enough to write that they should kill their families if they even suggested serving other gods, their first commandment. This is how all nations would be blessed, by remaining faithful to Yahweh. They needed nothing else. It was through Yahweh that they and the whole world were already saved.

If your brother, the son of your father or of your mother, or your son or daughter, or the spouse whom you embrace, or your most intimate friend, tries to secretly seduce you, saying, “Let us go and serve other gods,� unknown to you or your ancestors before you, gods of the peoples surrounding you, whether near you or far away, anywhere throughout the world, you must not consent, you must not listen to him; you must show him no pity, you must not spare him or conceal his guilt. No, you must kill him, your hand must strike the first blow in putting him to death and the hands of the rest of the people following. You must stone him to death, since he has tried to divert you from Yahweh your God. . . .(Deuteronomy 13:7–11)

--------------
Shucks, I also meant to say that Jesus turned out to be one of the cult gods that the Israelites were warned against.

mdarus

:banghead:
If Paul cannot be a representative of the Christian position of the common content of faith between OT believers and NT believers, you strip me of any means to respond. You are arguing against something other than Christianity.

Bobinius

Paul can be a representative of the Christian position and Christian faith. He is not representative of Judaism or the OT's position.

But Jesus is the most representative, what da ya think? If you don't have Paul let's say, Jesus is not enough?

But don't offer me what Paul said about the beliefs of people that lived BC in as support that they really believed that. That is only what Paul believes (or is he omniscient too?). Offer me what the OT people believed. As you can see, they contradict Paul. Even Jesus contradicts Paul's faith solution when he recommends that young rich guy to respect the laws in order to get to heaven (in Mathew).

If Paul wanted to force logic in order to equivalate the israelites' faith in YHW, with faith in Jesus, does not mean he is right. Just look at what the israelites believed and wrote. They had absolutely no idea that God has a Son, or that he is Trinitary, or that God himself has to be the messiah. Why do you think that John the Baptist kept saying he is not the messiah? And he was a man. Jews had no problem with the Messiah being a chosen man, a leader. But nowhere does it say he was the Son of God. And that would have been pretty important.

But anyway, even if I grant you the idea that all the jews were saved and they were actually Christians, you have left all other people outside of Judaism, that are condemned because it was out of their power to hear about God. How about the children that were slaughtered by Irod? Did they have anticipatory faith too? In Judaism they are saved because they are innocent and did nothing wrong. In Paul's Chrisitianity they are condemned because they lack faith in Jesus. And works without faith is useless.

mdarus

Paul can be a representative of the Christian position and Christian faith. He I was walking along today thinking about our discussion and realized something about the anachronism problem. When Jesus said "I am the way..." he had not died yet, nor been raised, nor given the Holy Spirit. Jesus can't be requiring faith in his death on the cross because it hadn't happened yet. Then, when tells the thief on the cross next door that he would be with him in paradise, he did not require faith in either his deity or that his dying on the cross was an atonement. Jesus was looking for people who had faith in God's promise of providing a solution, not people who had all the right doctrine about his identity.

Hebrews 11 is a pretty interesting NT analysis of OT faith. Your question is a good one in that it asks what did they really believe instead of imposing on them what we want them to have believed. Hebrews 11 is an attempt at an analysis of the OT to find the common elements of faith. I don't think I could do better. It has the same problem you site with Paul in that it is an historical analysis.

AIt is entirely consistent to state that only by faith one is justified by God and to say that faith is evidenced in many different way. The "conflict" between Jesus Paul and James is not over the means of faith, but over the context that they communicate. Jesus deals with individuals and tells each what they need to hear. It is not about correct doctrine, it is about their individual issues. Paul speaks about the broad theory. He is fighting misconceptions and false teachings that threaten to undermine the priority of grace. James as a leader in the Jerusalem church affirms faith but he will believe it when he sees it. All agree that true faith is followed by works consistent with the faith.


This is where I really want to go. I already hinted that my position on this may be a surprise. An internet search brought up a lot of "answers" to the question that I find unconvincing mostly because they do not include the conversation we just had about OT believers. I am not satisfied with these answers:

1. Universalism - everyone gets a free ticket to heaven because God is love.
2. Inclusiveness - All religions are pretty much the same so if you have faith in anything you are OK.
3. Omniscient election - God knew who would not believe if they had they chance so it was not worth the trouble to give them a chance.
4. Universal Opportunity - I like this one a little but I think it is idealistic to think that God gives everyone some kind of opportunity to make an informed choice.
5. Agnostic - I can't figure it out but God knows best.

The other list that I don't but is ways to diminish hell so it is OK that they never heard because the consequence is not so bad.

1. Annihilation - No existence is better than eternal torment so we'll just say those who never heard cease to exist.
2. Isolation from God - I like this too but it bends my mind too much. If people don't like God and don't want to spend eternity in his presence, God will grant their wish by giving them a corner of the universe where he will not bother them.

I submit that people can be saved today without knowing about Jesus just like they could before Jesus lived. They only need to trust that God has provided the way for them. They don't need to know his name but it helps a lot. They don't need to know all the doctrine although denying it is harmful.

I met a Chinese lady the other day. Her husband had died. She sort of wanted a Christian service but she wasn't sure. "I am a scientist" she said, "I believe in what can be proved and then repeated again and again.
"My parents were Buddhists. I respect my ancestors. I don't believe that billions of Chinese are..." She also said, "I want to be his wife in the next life." She had been to a Christian college. She wanted the kingdom and the gospel. She got a Christian service from a Lutheran pastor. The end of the story is more of a question than an answer. What does a good representation of Jesus' gospel looks like that can deal with the depth of her ques ions?

I don't think we hear it every day.
Here are some thoughts.

Jesus' death was sufficient for the sins of everyone.
People have a real choice about what to do with their lives.
The choice we make in this life matters. It matters a lot.
Presenting the gospel as a choice between heaven and hell has little resemblance to Jesus' invitation to enter the kingdom of heaven.
Entering the kingdom of heaven has little to do with making or following laws.
Correct doctrine is helpful; false beliefs cause harm; but it is not about ascribing to the right theology.

Romans come closest to dealing with this question directly. It focuses on what eliminates excuses but these also produce opportunities: natural revelation, conscience, and special revelation.

Decypher

"No Other Name":A Middle Knowledge Perspective on the Exclusivity of Salvation Through Christ
Dr. William Lane Craig

http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billc...s/middle2.html

John A. Broussard

Is your god omniscient?

Just curious.

mdarus

It seems like that would be easy to answer, but it is full of stickers and pricklies. I have trouble with the "omnis." They are often mis-stated. To say "God is omnipotent" does not mean "God can do anything." There are biblical references to things God cannot or will not do. The same is true of omniscience. It does not have to mean that God knows everything. It can mean that God knows everything he needs to know or wants to know.

Maybe I am unable to comprehend the depth and riches of some speculations. However, I just don't get the idea that God experiences the past, present and future simultaneously with full and complete knowledge of all that has, does, or will happen. I propose that an all-mighty God is able to be self-limiting. This is illustrated in the incarnation of Jesus. Otherwise it is inconceivalble for all the omni's to fit into a human frame or even to allow for the possiblity of an incarnation.

It is possible to get the omnis from the Bible, but it takes a lot of work and is not entirely conclusive. My tendency is to value information about God from direct revelation like Jesus or a prophet rather than philosophical constructs. This can provide a good deal of self-limitation by the Almighty.

I am drawn toward some concepts of Open Theism. It redefines some of the omni's allowhing for God to be surprized and even changed in the context of relationships with people created in his image capable of real interactions.

John A. Broussard

I, too, have trouble with the "omnis." To my way of thinking, to say that a given sentient being is omniscient, means that that being knows everything.

I'm quite willing to accept some other definition of the word for the sake of discussion, but I would want the postulated limits placed on the omniscient being to be very clear.

It's easy to discuss a being that knows "everything."

It's extremely difficult to discuss a being who knows everything except for some undefined "somethings."