Of course, the only book in the Bible written by someone who actually knew Jesus is the Gospel of John.I think that most Biblical scholars don't believe this about the Gospel of John, either.
He later acts as the trusted agent of the Jerusalem church to the new foundation of disciples at Antioch (11:22-26), and as their agent to convey funds to the Jerusalem church during famine (11:29-30). These are not the actions of a mere artisan, but of a person of some wealth and standing. ... The most notable merchant with whom Paul has social contact appears to be Lydia of Philippi. On the sabbath, Paul approached a sacred grove where devout women gathered ("there was a place of prayer") and attracted the attention of Lydia, "from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods" (16:14). Wayne Meeks cites three things which indicate that she was no minor merchant, but enjoyed some wealth and status. ... The priests most frequently associated with Paul in the early part of his career were the elite high priests of Jerusalem, whom we located above in the governing class. Priests in other cities also had dealings with Paul. ... From an historical perspective one must wonder how aristocrats dedicated to the promotion of the cult of the Emperor were possibly interested in Paul and his monotheism. Yet Luke's rhetorical strategy concerning Paul's social location indicates that they were his "friends" and patrons. Moreover, if Luke's own portrayal of these figures as leading aristocrats is correct, then they hardly belong in the priestly class, but should be ranked higher in the governing class.Paul could hardly have traveled as extensively as he did, nor for as long as he did, without the help of the wealthy and powerful. I think these contacts helped him influence the dogma of the early church; I would be more surprised if they had little to no influence. He needed to be able to reach people across cultures, and that would involve a greater flexibility of what was required of Gentiles, and of course a great amount of patronage.
Fair enough. But even the traditional view acknowledges that none of the other Gospel writers knew Jesus, which was more my point.I thought that the traditional view was that Matthew was one of the Twelve, and in at least some traditions both Mark and Luke were two of the Seventy.
"We affirm our belief in that of God in every person. Furthermore, we attest that this belief embraces all persons regardless of sexual orientation. [We] affirm that all couples, including those of the same sex, have equal opportunity to be married within the framework of the meeting process. The love between these couples, as it grows, will enrich their relationship, the Meeting, and the world at large. The Meeting is committed to supporting these couples according to their needs."Or
"We believe it is time to eliminate all policies and practices which create barriers and restrictions to the full participation of gay and lesbian Christians in all of the privileges and responsibilities of church membership. Recognizing that our churches still speak and act out of our long-standing prejudices: We hope and pray that we will acknowledge our sin and be forgiven for our ignorance, fear, arrogance and self-righteousness; We rejoice in the refusal of many gay and lesbian Christians to abandon or be forced out of their church homes; We consider these sisters and brothers to be a unique, holy and precious gift to all of us who struggle to become the family of God."Since we have no clergy there's no issue about ordination, and since marriage is self-appointed there's no issue about marriage - in fact, this was among the first denominations to quietly begin honoring gay marriages in the 1980s.
The only things in the bible which are God's words are the ten commandments and the words of JC himself.Huh? There's lots of stuff in the OT supposedly quoting God. Not just the Ten Commandments. And the LORD God said unto Cain blah blah blah, and the LORD God said unto Job blah blah blah, and the LORD God said unto Satan blah blah blah, and on and on.
The Bible, as the inspired recorded of revelation, contains the word of God; that is, it contains those revealed truths which the Holy Ghost wishes to be transmitted in writing. However, all revealed truths are not contained in the Bible (see TRADITION); neither is every truth in the Bible revealed, if by revelation is meant the manifestation of hidden truths which could not other be known. Much of the Scripture came to its writers through the channels of ordinary knowledge, but its sacred character and Divine authority are not limited to those parts which contain revelation strictly so termed. The Bible not only contains the word of God; it is the word of God. The primary author is the Holy Ghost, or, as it is commonly expressed, the human authors wrote under the influence of Divine inspiration. It was declared by the Vatican Council (Sess. III, c. ii) that the sacred and canonical character of Scripture would not be sufficiently explained by saying that the books were composed by human diligence and then approved by the Church, or that they contained revelation without error. They are sacred and canonical "because, having been written by inspiration of the Holy Ghost, that have God for their author, and as such have been handed down to the Church". The inerrancy of the Bible follows as a consequence of this Divine authorship. Wherever the sacred writer makes a statement as his own, that statement is the word of God and infallibly true, whatever be the subject-matter of the statement.Most Protestant sects, as well as (I'm fairly sure) Orthodox churches believe the same thing.
In the Nicene Creed Christians confess their belief that the Holy Spirit "has spoken through the prophets." This creed has been normative for Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Anglicans, Lutherans and most mainline Protestant denominations. As noted by Alister E. McGrath, "An important element in any discussion of the manner in which Scripture is inspired, and the significance which is attached to this, is 2 Timothy 3:16-17, which speaks of Scripture as 'God-breathed' (theopneustos)." According to McGrath, "the reformers did not see the issue of inspiration as linked with the absolute historical reliability or factual inerrancy of the biblical texts." He says, "The development of ideas of 'biblical infallibility' or 'inerrancy' within Protestantism can be traced to the United States in the middle of the nineteenth century."[32]posted by empath at 5:32 PM on October 2, 2011
People who believe in inerrancy think that the Bible does not merely contain the Word of God, but every word of it is, because of verbal inspiration, the direct, immediate word of God.[33] The Lutheran Apology of the Augsburg Confession identifies Holy Scripture with the Word of God[34] and calls the Holy Spirit the author of the Bible.[35] Because of this, Lutherans confess in the Formula of Concord, "we receive and embrace with our whole heart the prophetic and apostolic Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as the pure, clear fountain of Israel."[36] The apocryphal books were not written by the prophets, by inspiration; they contain errors[37] and were never included in the Palestinian Canon that Jesus used,[38] and therefore are not a part of Holy Scripture.[39] The prophetic and apostolic Scriptures are authentic as written by the prophets and apostles. A correct translation of their writings is God's Word because it has the same meaning as the original Hebrew and Greek.[39] A mistranslation is not God's word, and no human authority can invest it with divine authority.[39]
Early and Middle Christianityposted by TheophileEscargot at 8:11 AM on October 3, 2011 [2 favorites]
For a while a few people in the Greco-Roman world had been interested in the religion of the Jews: it was intriguingly exotic and there were a lot of them scattered around as a result of various political calamities. It didn't take off though: the purity laws were dauntingly strict and for men even involved having a bit of your penis chopped off: this was a lot more likely to happen if you were a baby male rather than an adult able to resist.
Eventually Romanized Jew named Paul, a follower of a deceased Jewish revivalist preacher, hit on some radical new ideas. The teachings of his guru superseded the old law so much that you could eat pork and retain the whole of your penis. The humiliating execution and death of the guru, formerly an embarrassment, turned out to be a symbolic sacrifice like that of the Jews' Passover lamb, which absolved you of your sins in the same way, without the inconvenience of travelling to the single Jewish Temple.
You still kept the morally good single God rather than those embarrassingly degenerate polytheistic ones, and you put your money together and helped out your buddies in the group, which was a big practical help in an uncertain world. Also by combining a few cryptic passages in the old masters recorded speeches with some of the wilder philosophical speculations, he discovered that if you were good and stuck to the new rules, Jehovah would resurrect you after death and grant you eternal life.
It was a good package. This new cult proved popular and spread, not explosively but steadily, expanding converts by a few percent every year.
Remarkably this growth continued for centuries: normally people got tired of new cults and drifted away to others. Even more remarkably, it kept growing despite persecution; first by polytheists disturbed by dark rumours and the refusal of the cultists to sacrifice to their gods; then officially by the Roman state, disturbed by the thought of a rival authority to the Imperial cults.
Things really took off when a first would-be, then actual Emperor, called Constantine started favouring the new cult, probably even converting to it himself at some point. He recognized that their hierarchical structure of priests and bishops could be powerfully useful if they could actually agree on what they believed in.
There was a great diversity of beliefs at the time. Paul had shrewdly made the main focus of the religion the persuasive but safely out-of-the-way preacher Jesus the Anointed (Christ), not himself. But some of the Christians thought Jesus to be divine, some human, some followed more of the older Jewish laws, some thought there were two Gods one of the old and one of the new scriptures.
It was all a bit of a mess, so Constantine brought as many bishops as he could together at the Council of Nicea, dangling before them the vast and juicy carrot of acceptance as a state religion, and subtly thwacking the stick of more state persecution into the palm his hand. Eventually they thrashed out a compromise. Jesus was, um, wholly human and wholly divine.
Not everyone agreed to the new settlement of course, but a few decades of official persecution, now aided by their more cooperative Christian brothers, meant that those-who-believed-correctly (the "orthodox") kept a firm supremacy over those-who-chose-what-to-believe (the "heretics"). Half a century later emperor Theodosius finished the job of making Christianity the official state religion. By now the bishop of the Rome was capo di tutti capi.
So now the most persuasive religious deal in town was packaged up with the power of the Imperial Roman state. Popularity of the religion rocketed. When a few Emperors later one called Julian the Apostate tried to roll back the changes, the new religion was too strong, resisted, and made even more gains after his death. Christianity was now a big deal, and would remain so even as the power of the Western Roman Empire waned.
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Too late for that, ma'am. That dog was shot a long time ago.
posted by Malice at 12:10 PM on October 1, 2011 [16 favorites]