“I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
- Rad Manposted 9 years ago
0“It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.” Dogs being non-Isrealites.
“Do not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel. As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’
"Why do you call me good, there is One who is good, God"
Paul never mentions the virgin birth nor did the first gospel. The earliest manuscripts of the first gospel makes no mention of Jesus appearing after his death.And to make matters worse the Nazoreans believed that Jesus lived during the time of Alexander the Maccabee.
If the Israelites were first chosen would they not be the first sought out to receive a new message? Don't you think, if Jesus existed and came back he'd first say hey to the Christians? Don't you think if he first came back to say hey to the Christians they'd be the first to reject him? And the ones who would never accept him?
As to the gospels. These were written years after the fact. Stories for believers to share amongst themselves. We speculate which came first. We should also speculate what type of believer each was written for and the character of the person writing. Maybe, the virgin birth story wasn't a pivotal point in the minds of either the writer or the reader. Why include it? You have plenty of believers today who don't believe in a virgin birth, so why not then also?First you must claim that a just loving God has a chosen people, which is absurd and then you must claim that when he walked on the earth he told people he was sent only for those people. Then you must claim he called all others dogs, and then told his followers to only help those chosen people. Then you must understand that he himself said he was not God. Then you must understand that Paul, who never meet Jesus and only meet the apostles never mentioned the virgin birth (which is a big part of the story) apparently it was popular among the Gods back then. Then you must understand that the first gospels written never mention the virgin birth or the resurrection. We then must understand that it was Paul who decided it was a religion for all because he wasn't getting enough converts from Jews even though it's know that some of he writings were forgeries.
Sure, you and many can say they don't care about any of that, but they believe in a loving father. Good for them, but for those who adhere to the bible as the word of God, time to read it for what it is.So, basically, everyone has to agree with everything within your first paragraph? Good luck with that.
It always fascinates me why atheists claim to be original thinkers who don't toe any official line, yet insist all other groups agree on everything the individual atheist is against. Probably because the individual atheist isn't thinking as originally as he/she might believe themselves to be.
I get that none of it makes sense to you, through your understanding. What I don't get is why must everyone agree with your understanding?No one has to agree with me at all, they are perfectly welcome to ignore the facts. In reality we have no idea what if anything Jesus may have done or said, all people can do is read the bible and decide if they think any or all of it is factual. To those who think some of it is factual I salute you, to those who think all of it is factual I ask how you rationalize the above scriptures?
Does anyone owe you an explanation? If so, why? Sounds to me as if your primary goal is to promote conflict and discord. Would not the more positive endeavor be to understand a need to promote conflict and discord? In order to resolve the internal conflict which drives the need to promote external conflict?
No, I'm not looking for conflict, you must assume I'm like you. I'm simple asking questions and trying to understand, you on the other hand don't appear to attempt to resolve any problems. All you seem to do is judge character rather than addressing any of the issues.
What I'm asking here is for someone to explain how they can rationalize those scriptures away? Are you going to try to do that or are you going to continue to tell me that I'm a bad person?I am not attempting to judge your character. You must understand that you have listed a great deal of assumptions made that must be agreed upon, per you. All I am saying is that prior to any meaningful dialogue all of those assumptions would have to be either agreed upon, or hammered out as to a mutual understanding of where the other person stood on each issue. There are so many of them that I would think it would be reasonable to assume the chances of addressing all and coming to an agreement would be slim.
So. Since you must already have known that, and are attempting to bypass that stage of agreement I am simply curious as to what drives that desire. If you don't know, that's OK. If you do know and don't want to share it, that's OK. Pretty much I was simply asking for clarification.Which are those "assumptions" that need to be agreed upon?
You do understand that it is sometimes important to read the conversation before asking questions which could have been answered had you read the conversation?
Rad Man said "First you must claim that a just loving God has a chosen people, which is absurd and then you must claim that when he walked on the earth he told people he was sent only for those people. Then you must claim he called all others dogs, and then told his followers to only help those chosen people. Then you must understand that he himself said he was not God. Then you must understand that Paul, who never meet Jesus and only meet the apostles never mentioned the virgin birth (which is a big part of the story) apparently it was popular among the Gods back then. Then you must understand that the first gospels written never mention the virgin birth or the resurrection. We then must understand that it was Paul who decided it was a religion for all because he wasn't getting enough converts from Jews even though it's know that some of he writings were forgeries."
That was what I was commenting on.Emile, he has a point. What assumptions had I listed. I believe I listed a bunch of biblical facts. I asked no one to assume anything. I asked anyone to make sense of the facts.
They aren't facts. They are interpretations of things written. You said you must claim, must claim, must claim..and then some. My only point was that all of these claims are not universally made by Christians and even claims made need to be understood completely because one may say the same thing as another, but upon further discussion it isn't quite the same.
With you putting all of that down as 'fact' you set the stage for confusion and miscommunication before a conversation can even begin.They aren't facts but they are written as facts in the bible.
It is not "universally" made by christians but hindus and Muslims helped in its making!!What is perceived as fact by one is not perceived as such by another. I do wonder how you would feel if someone attempted to force you into a view you didn't have. If someone simply wrote you off as believing something you didn't believe. Would that make their assumptions true, or would it simply make them presumptuous? In your opinion.
Emile, I'm not saying Jesus actually said anything as fact, I'm saying things that the bible says are facts. It's a fact that the bible say that Jesus said "I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel" but that doesn't mean that Jesus said those words. If one says that every word of any holy book are actually truths and spoken by God then they would have to say that what Jesus said about only being there for the Israelites was factual in that he said it.
The question is do you think it's rational to claim the God that many describe would be as horrific as the bible describes? For example ISIS is (believe it or not) behaving exactly as described in the Quran, is it reasonable to assume Allah (the God Muslims love as Christians love) would give instructions to kill non-believers or anyone leaving Islam?He had made it clear in his reply to you.
Either one(a Christian) should pick and choose the bible or think all ot it as truth. RadMan is addressing his question to the latter group, asking how do they reconcile those words with god being impartial.
To the former the question is if they pick and choose then how can they say bible is god's words.
Oh, then the bible doesn't say that Jesus said "I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel"? Is that what we've come to now, saying the holy books don't actually say what they say because what it says goes against some peoples sensitivities? This is exactly what I was talking about.
It is a fact that the bible says Jesus said he was only sent for the lost sheep of Israel" Fact.I think I addressed that and you asked me not to continue posting.
Basically. I commented, you responded and said we had to all agree on the points you noted, I said that was impossible and wondered why you expected everyone to agree on the points you had posted and you told me to stop commenting if I didn't have something to say. I did have something to say. It's simply that you didn't like my thought processes concerning the list of demands. I guess. Maybe not. That's how I perceived the exchange.
He said nothing about you not commenting. I don't see how you got that out of it. Looks like you're pouting to me.
Pouting? To you? Nothing of the sort. Glad to see you monitoring the site and making judgments though. Someone's got to do it. Eh?
But, to clarify. I had questions about his questions and he did say 'if you have something to say about them then please do, otherwise stop telling me I shouldn't ask those questions.' Which meant, to me, that what I had to say didn't qualify as something to say and I should stop asking the questions I was asking. Which I did. How did we get here?
I'll bow out. Obviously, any questions I have are not considered valid enough to be answered; only complained about.
What? How do you go from "Those are things that are said in the bible, if you have something to say about them then please do, otherwise stop telling me I shouldn't ask those questions." to me, telling you, to stop commenting?
"You do understand that it is sometimes important to read the conversation before asking questions which could have been answered had you read the conversation?"
She doesn't even understand her own statement then how do you expect her to understand yours?The speed with which you get lost in a conversation is truly mind boggling.
Naturally your mind boggles, because you ignore the meaning of words and never try to understand what you or anyone says.
That one is only here to preach and think that anyone whose opinion doesn't agree with her is wrong and should not comment.
Interesting and somewhat hypocritical. I am only offering an opinion. If that bothers you, perhaps what you accuse me of applies more aptly to you.
You are not simply giving an opinion but trying to pick up a fight by implying only you have the right to your opinion and to post it in hubpages.
"You do understand that it is sometimes important to read the conversation before asking questions which could have been answered had you read the conversation?"
Good point, so start practicing it.
You still didn't state the assumptions that needed to be agreed.
The assumptions as far as I can see is only this 'god (by definition) is impartial'.
Except for the last part of the last sentence all others are from the bible itself.
I just explained to you what drives me to ask these questions. Read my post from a few posts back. All I did was list a few things that are said in the bible, I made none of them up, you can look them up if you like. Those are things that are said in the bible, if you have something to say about them then please do, otherwise stop telling me I shouldn't ask those questions.
Then why did you answer? Don't you know that there is no compulsion in hubpages to reply to forum posts. He has asked a question, people who are willing can answer and as per hubpage rules it should be in relation to the question or topic in discussion.
Cute.
So, you and only you are right, eh? Doesn't that make you, you know, God?Oh! Oh! I've been cut to the quick! You quick-witted rascal you! Bravo!
You, of course, completely missed the point, but you made a funny!Didn't miss, but it was not worth my while. The first person who realize a fact is never god.
No, you missed it. Either that or you're putting yourself in the same boat that I had Rad in. The difference being that, in all likelihood, Rad and I will talk and come to some kind of understanding, even if we don't agree. You and I won't.
No we won't. I insist on defining the crucial terms and holding to the definition through out the conversation but you want the freedom to commit equivocation.
Keep telling yourself that. Unfortunately, the facts refute you.
And everone will agree with you just like they agree with you in every word you say!!
You want me to praise you like one hubber was doing a few days before?A Hubber was praising me? I missed that. Not surprising. Who was it? Geanea? I knew she'd come around.
Well that just won't do. If you get me all excited about someone actually agreeing with me on something you can't lack follow through.
Find it. Chop chop.I think it may have been me, a few days ago you were making sense.
Well, don't take this the wrong way but you must currently be delusional. I've never made sense to you.
One of us must be loosing it. Could be me, I'll have to give this some thought. I believe you were making perfect sense until you told me I can't say what you just said. Something like that.
Or, you want to hold fast to what you want to hold fast to, even if the definitions might only make sense in supporting what you want. Bigger pictures be damned, you believe what you believe and no one will ever show you otherwise, no matter what.
Ironic, no?You do know that the only purpose of a definition is to help people understand each other clearly and precisely and that a "definition" is simply clarifying the meaning of a term. [Eg: love exists, chair exists: you certainly know that the meaning of exist is different in both the sentences. Here the context help as to know but everytime a context may not help. A honest person will tell you the definition of exist before he start discussion while a dishonest will start with one meaning and end with another and insist on not defining so that he can continue to use the fallacy of equivocation and deceive] If the picture is indeed bigger a definition can never make it smaller unless the picture is based on vagueness and deceptions and a lot of 'you knows' and wink winks.
No! Really! All the years of school, my grammar Nazi grandmother, the studying, all that and I STILL didn't get it?
Or maybe you didn't. Because a definition is NOT a straightjacket that you can wrap people in and forever say, "It's that or you're stupid!" (Or a liar, or whatever...) Which is basically what you're doing.
Definitions are not infinitely elastic, to be sure, but neither are they permanently static. And often there can be more than one definition. (I mean, you DID understand that, right? Looked in a dictionary lately?)
So yes, they can be a good place to start, but just because there is a definition that YOU accept does not mean it is the ONLY acceptable definition.
And baby, Frank Black was right. I want to live on an abstract plane...Aren't you listening? I am not saying that the definition should be the same for centuries but it should be the same for the given discussion. Otherwise the meaning intended by the speaker will be different from the one assumed by the audience.
And definition SHOULD BE OBJECTIVE.AND IT IS.
The more you yell and try to prove me as not that smart, the more you fail.Yell?? You do know that capital is also used to stress the matter. This is a good example of what I was saying, I meant it one way and you understood it another but of course I can say about the "big picture" or something to that effect to mislead and imply that you are a fool who never understands, but clearly that is not true, is it? If you don't understand what I said it is my failure to communicate.
There is nothing further to add, either you want yourself to be understood or you do not. If you want the former you define the crucial terms, if not you do not. The former is what honest people, at least when it is pointed out that there are another meanings to what they say, do. You decide.A) On the internet, all caps is YELLING. It just is. I did not determine that, and I've heard about it more than once when I was a newb and did all caps for emphasis. So you may have meant it for one kind of emphasis, but most people would understand it as a different kind of emphatic.
B) You have not failed to communicate. I understand you perfectly.
C) I have not failed to define terms. In fact, I have done so more than once. Your rejection of that definition does not mean either that I failed to define or that my definition is invalid.
I have obfuscated nothing. That you continually accuse me of attempting to do so is not my fault.
The end.Thank you for the information, I didn't know in net it has only one meaning(and I put only the part I want to stress in capital not the whole sentence). I used capital instead of italics because I had only one hand free at that time.
Thank you.
Your definition was not objective for it contained an inherent contradiction. Married bachelor, square circle, non rocky rock are all contradictions. No one can make sense of a sentence that use (these) contraindications together as synonyms. Your definition also had a similar contradiction which I repeatedly pointed out but you failed to acknowledge.
Where exactly did I say I was the only one that is right? There are some facts about scripture that we either ignore or accept as truth. That is a fact. For example what ISIS is doing to adopting Sharia law exactly as it was written because they are told it's direct instructions from Allah. Iran and Saudi Arabia does the same while countries like Turkey have secular laws. Is it rational to assume Allah would want those who attempt to leave Islam or those who like me don't believe in any God killed? Is it rational that God would ask people to kill disobedient children and permiscuous girls?
Okay, but what you actually said (and I quoted,) does not suggest that level or even that kind of analysis. What you said was, I quote,"No one has to agree with me at all, they are perfectly welcome to ignore the facts."
You ask what you said, that was what you said.Yes, the facts. There are things written in the bible that like "I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel". It's a fact that that was written, I have no idea if it was ever said.
But once again, you cherry pick a few things and then try to make an argument out of it as if your case were iron-clad and anyone who is disagreeing with you is ignoring the facts. maybe what we're doing is taking all the facts into account, including the ones you didn't include.
Okay, so you say that because I cherry picked these things that factually exist in the bible, because I cherry picked them they are meaningless? This is exactly what I was getting at, they are somehow dismissed because they don't line up with your perception of the rest of the bible.
No, what I'm saying is that because you cherry pick a few things and build the argument on them, the larger point is missed. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you're saying that because Jesus said He was sent for the Children of Israel, the implication is that no non-Jews should be Christian? That's what I got from your post.
Hey! Look who's back from his latest banning! Welcome back Chris. Try not to say anything other than, "You're right and I couldn't agree with you more" and maybe you'll last a few days.
Even with that, someone will find a way to be offended.
You can say anything you like to me, I don't hit the ban button, but then again someone else may read it.
Tell the mouse in your pocket to stop causing trouble and keep his paws off your keyboard.
The last time I got banned you had nothing to do with it.
As far as I know, you've never had anything to do with when I've been banned, but I know exactly what happened last time.
Glad you are back BTW. It just wasn't the same without you.
First you must claim that a just loving God has a chosen people,
-----
me
The way I understand what is written is ... One day God was looking around at all that was going on on earth and said, I need to show myself to these people. I will pick one of these nationalities of people and I will make a covenant with them I will be their protector and they will follow my laws, in this way I will show myself to the world.
The Hebrews weren't "Chosen" for any outstanding characteristic, They were simply picked like a grab bag from a barrel.
These laws which came into existence under this covenant didn't apply to any other group of people.
And those other peoples were not Judged by these laws for they were not under the covenant.
==========================
radman
which is absurd and then you must claim that when he walked on the earth he told people he was sent only for those people.
---
me ...
Why would that be absurd? It seems to me that he came but for the lawbreakers of the covenant. He came with a pardon for them. We did not come for those who were not under the law.
======================
Then you must understand that he himself said he was not God.
---
me
That is how I understand it. And I think he said that we were all sons of God. He said he is not saying anything that the father has not told him to say. He and the father are one (one minded ??)
=================
Then you must understand that Paul, who never meet Jesus and only meet the apostles never mentioned the virgin birth (which is a big part of the story) apparently it was popular among the Gods back then. Then you must understand that the first gospels written never mention the virgin birth or the resurrection. We then must understand that it was Paul who decided it was a religion for all because he wasn't getting enough converts from Jews even though it's know that some of he writings were forgeries.
Sure, you and many can say they don't care about any of that, but they believe in a loving father. Good for them, but for those who adhere to the bible as the word of God, time to read it for what it is.
---
I don't think it matters as much about what Paud said or what he didn't say. ??? I think that if we read the letters which are written in read , and agree with those, and become as if one minded with them, we would then be following Christ for real.
If I posted here ... your next comment would be ... OK , so why don't I sell all of my belongings and give them to the poor?
I think he said that one time and that was to an arrogant and pompous rich man.
He never said for the poor people to sell their stuff and give it away. However, about 25 years later people were selling their stuff and giving it to a community fund which was to finance their exit out of Jerusalem, and building communal societies out in the desert. But that is a different story.
Those people were fleeing Jerusalem as they believed Jesus to be instructing them to do in Matthew 24: 15-20.
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