lew@ihuxr.UUCP (Lew Mammel, Jr.) (05/24/84)
Dave Norris wants to know what conservative Christian scholars have
admitted to a failed prophecy of Jesus's, as I claimed. The reference
I had in mind was in The Interpreters Bible, in the exegesis (as distinct
from the commentary) for yet another verse, Matthew 16:28, "Verily, I say
unto you, There will be some standing here, which shall not taste of death,
till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom."
The exegesis begins:
Mark's saying (9:1) had nothing to do with the idea of the Son of
man and probably is not from the same source as the foregoing. The
prediction was not fulfilled, and later Christians found it necessary
to explain that it was metaphorical and had been fulfilled at
Pentecost. John 21:22-23 deals with a similar promise that the
"beloved disciple" would not die, and tries to explain it as a
misunderstanding.
By the way, I do not own a copy of The Interpreters Bible! I consult
the reference copy at the Wheaton Public Library. The WPL, incidentally,
is a stone's throw from the Billy Graham Center, which is on the campus
of Wheaton College. I take great comfort that the staff of WPL, in this
town that has been described by the Chicago Tribune as a "fundamentalist
community", has classified Morris's SCIENTIFIC CREATIONISM in the religion
section along with other Biblical commentaries. And without even a
court order :-)
Changing the topic a bit, I did shell out $30 or so for THE PSEUDEPIGRAPHA
edited by ?. ?. Charlesworth. This features the books of Enoch prominently,
and includes a lot of notes on sources etc. It is very new ('82 I think),
and I have been having trouble reconciling what I read there with Russell
Anderson's claims. I'll post more on this later.
Lew Mammel, Jr. ihnp4!ihuxr!lew