Goliath

Metacrock,

Prove it.

I am not. I have paraphrased direct quotes from the bible.

Not true. If I had lost the ability to read, I wouldn't be able to respond to your posts.

Yes, I'd think that Shakespeare was a bastard for wanting people to rip their eyeballs out and hate their families.

Prove that this was the author's intention or retract this claim, please.

No. I have no idea who you're talking about.

Sincerely,

Goliath

Vinnie

Meta: obviousy he doesn't expect you to cut out your eye. he's answering the sarcastic exuse of the sinner.

Goliath: Prove that this was the author's intention or retract this claim, please.

You can still lust with one eye. Satisfied?

Vinnie

Goliath

Vinnie,

A simple, straightforward reading of the text accomplishes this. Do you really want me to drag out the bible verse?

Sincerely,

Goliath

Vinnie

Knock yourself out

Please do and explain how gouging out an eye solves the problem Jesus was addressing. Further, do you have eany eidencethat this is meant to be taken literally in the physical sense of self-mutilation?

Vinnie

Goliath

Vinnie,

Okay, from The Skeptics Annotated Bible :

Matt 5:29 "And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee..."

Matt 5:30 "And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee..."

Irrelevant. I need do no such thing. The quotes above are the alleged words of Jesus, and he commanded people to rip out their eyeballs and lop their hands off.

The verses themselves are all the evidence I need.

Sincerely,

Goliath

Vinnie

ROFLOL

I thought you were going to engage in a little exegetical analysis of the hand/eye verses. I already know what they say! Your non-argument dismisses itself. Do you have anything else?

Simple people are able to distinguish between literal and figurative terms. As Latimer said 'if we paint a fox preaching in a friar's hood, nobody imagines that a fox is meant, but that craft and hypocrisy are described, which so often are found disguised in that garb.'

You could at least argue for agnisticism if you have no arguments. Maybe he meant it figuratively or maybe he meant it literaly. That would be the more prudent course of action.

I favor a figurative interpretation because one can still lust with a left eye (or no eyes) and one can still sin with a left hand. The command would break down into "go kill thyself" which is not the natural reading IMO. I find the more plausible solution to be the figurative interpretation. Your wooden-literalism is simply idiotic.

Don't forget to refer to Origen in your next response

Vinnie

Yellum Notnef

Terms like "resurrection"?

lpetrich

ROLAND'S RESPONSE: As Doherty points out, these "sayings" could simply have been a collection of common maxims circulating at the time onto which someone added "Jesus said" over and over. The fact that they seem to exist in a vacuum devoid of any biographical or narrative elements makes his presumption more than possible.

Except that something similar had happened in Islam, where the prophet Mohammed's name got attached to a large volume of anecdotes that were invented to justify this or that practice -- many of the Hadiths are pious frauds.

500 people saw Jesus walk through the streets of bethseda.

???

mike_decock

Are you really trying to argue that the as yourself clause was original to Jesus? Gimme a break. Just read the OT:

Leviticus 19:18
Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.

If you want to see how universal this principle is, just take a look at the Religious Tolerance article on the Shared belief in the Golden Rule.

-Mike...

mike_decock

Origen seemed to have taken it literally.

Whatever one's views of his theology, his life was utterly dedicated to Christ. In his boyhood, when a persecution struck Alexandria hard, he wanted to rush to be martyred. Only a ruse by his mother—who hid his clothes—prevented his leaving the house! Later in life, the church historian Eusebius reported, he castrated himself in literal obedience to Matthew 19:12.

-Mike...