ta00est@unccvax.uncc.edu (elizabeth s tallant) (01/17/91)
(LONG ARTICLE FOLLOWS) A few days ago, I received a letter from a s.c.i reader. I accidentally erased the address, so I am now posting the letter and my reply on the net in the hopes that the mailer will see it here. >letter. I have a few comments to make , though : And thank you for taking the time to reply. Your letter is quite extensive. > I do not remember the actual statement that I made, but there is not escaping the fact that some churches have contradicted the Bible in their teachings and doctrines, foremost among those is the Roman Catholic Church. Oh yes, I couldn't agree more. While I believe that any Catholic who has dedicated his/her life to Jesus is "saved", several of the Roman Catholic doctrines are either contraditions of or unwarranted additions to the Bible. The main problem here is that Catholics have accepted doctrines other than the Bible. This is one reason why you will find that a great many protestants reject any document other than the Bible as doctrine. >For example : Jesus makes an emphasis on the fact he cam "not to destroy the prophets but to fullfill them.." I believe that Jesus said that he come not to destroy the LAWS and the PROPHECIES but to defend them. >that following the laws is a prerequisite for salvation. According to the Bible, Jesus taught that no man will ever be able to earn salvation because all men, including the prophets, have sinned. Therefore, salvation is a GIFT from God and nothing we can do will ever entitle us to earn it. Thus, following the laws is not a prerequisite for salvation. According to the Bible, Jesus taught that no man will ever get to Heaven or be able to please God simply by following the laws. He made this point over and over in his parables. One such parable is that of a religious leader who followed the law to a "T" who went into a synagog alongside a tax collector. The religious leader prayed "....thank you God that I am not like the tax collector over there....." The tax collector, who was ashamed to even look upon the alter, prayed "....God, I am not worthy to approach you...." Jesus tells us that in that day, it was the tax collector who left the synogog justified. God did not hear the prayer of the religious leader, who followed the laws, because the religious leader was praying for himself. He though that following the law made him better than the tax collector. The verse that drives home the point most clearly is when Jesus said, "For God so loved the world that He sent his only begotton Son, that whosever believes in Him will not perish, but have everlasting life." Jesus also said, "I have water that will cause you to never thirst again." Further, the Pharasis even accused Jesus himself of breaking the law of the Sabbath. Jesus told them "The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath." Jesus also said, "Every law will remain until its purpose has been fulfilled." This brings us around to the other question: The death and resurrection of Jesus fulfilled the law. > Paul on the other hand places the emphasis for salvation on Jesus Christ himself. To obtain salvation, one must believe in J. C., and therefore if one believes in J. C. one will have salvation ( i.e. it is not a prerequisite for salvation to follow the laws). This is exactly right. > This , I believe, is the basis for the fact the Christians eat pork whereas Jews do not. So, do you eat pork ? :-). While your understanding of salvation is correct, your linkage of it to the law is not. If you would like to understand our belief in the law, you can read Romans chapters 1 - 9. According to the Bible, there is the law, and there is grace. We get to please God only by his grace, and not by following the law. Part of the old law is still in effect, while part of it died with Jesus. Paul compares the death of the law to that of a spouse. He points out that if a spouse dies, you can remarry without committing adultery. In the same way, when the law died, we were no longer bound to it. We are still under certain laws. WE cannot murder, steal, lie, commit adultery, be envious, put anything in front of God, etc. These are remaining portions from the old law that we must still obey. On the other hand, God had given us laws that we did not have before. We must love God with everything that we have, love others, love our enemies, etc. The parts of the law that died were parts including animal sacrifices and forbidden foods. One night Peter had a dream in which God lifted down many unclean animals. Peter was very hungry, and three times God told Peter, "...kill and eat..." Three times Peter refused, saying that he would never eat anything unclean. God said to Peter, "How can you call that unclean which I have made clean?" God lifed up the animals and Peter learned his lesson. So, we eat pork because God made it clean. Please don't make the mistake of thinking that we eat pork and do/don't do other things because we think that we will go to Heaven no matter what. Instead, we do not follow certain laws because we are not bound to them. Yet, there are still certain laws that we must observe. We cannot lose our salvation if we fail to follow them, but God will 1)take away much of the pleasure of sinning 2)punish us for breaking those laws to which we are still bound. For this reason, Christains can serve God simply because they love HIm and want to please Him. We do not need to worry about getting enough brownie points to get into Heaven. We can serve God for God instead of serving Him for ourselves. > The other thing is that when one makes the statement : I will not take into account anything the Church says when it contradits the Bible, a very interesting question arises : Whih Bible ? Since there quite a number of (sometimes) entirely different VERSIONS exist. For example as far as I know, there is not John 3:16 in the Revised Standard Version of the Bible ( this is the only explicitly trinitarian verse in the Bible). There are other examples as well. There is only one true version of the Bible. I believe what you are referring to are different TRANSLATIONS. The generally accepted translations are from the oldest known manuscripts. There are also paraphrases, such as the Living Bible, which gives interpretations along with the scripture to help children and new Christians better understand the Bible. The King James version, New International, and Revised Standard are three well-known translations. I had a parallel Bible with all three of them, and in a period of around six months, I found minor differences in about four senteneces. I also have ARabic friends who use and Arabic translation of the Bible, and they tell me that their translation has the same meaning as mine. As I said before, I have used a Revised Standard version. It does contain John 3:16. Even if the Bible did not contain John 3:16, there is an abundance of words in the Bible which convey the same message. > I do not agree with that statement. It is well known that Paul and the disciples were in disagreement on several issues, one of which seemed to have been the nature of J. C. According to the Bible, the main disagreement was over following the old Jewish laws. The disciples knew that Jesus is God. They watched Him forgive sins and tell others that he is God. Only God can truly forgive sins and claim himself as God. > The disciples ( led by Thomas ) do not appear to have espoused the idea the J. C. was God. They seemed to prefer the concept of the Messaiah in human form. According to the Bible, Peter became the leader after the resurrection. Peter, who was also one of the twelve main disciples of Christ, told Christ in the Garden of Gethsemine that he knew that he is God. According to the Bible, the eleven disciples believed in Jesus as God. > That, unfortunately is a half-truth : The writers of the bible were mostly students of Paul and hence it is his view that would appear there. In other Gospels such as the Gospel of Thomas that claim is not made. All of the writers of the Bible were students of Christ, including Paul. The eleven disciples, of whom (5?) contributed writings to the Bible, were not students of Paul because Paul did not even becomes a Christian until after Christ's resurrection. Further, there is no Gospel of Thomas. Up until this point, you and I have been doing fine. However, here, you begin to use information that did not come out of the Bible. Above, you speak of a gospel which is either a heresy or does not exist, and below, you speak of a proposition that Jesus and Thomas were twins. According to the Bible, Jesus' brothers were James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas. Since Thomas was not even Jesus' brother, he could not have been his twin. As I said before, I do not regonize anything as doctrine except for the Bible. Above, we criticized the Catholic church for recognizing as doctrine that other than the Bible. We should not make the same mistake. >>Further, the Old Testament even promises a Messiah which is God Himself >"THe virgin will be with child and will call him Immanuel..." (Immanuel >means 'God with us.'" - Isaiah 7:14 It is the Bible that tells us that Immanuel means "God with us." This is not a man-made definition. >>As far as Deut. 18:18, I would have to ask my preacher which particular >prophet it is referring to. However, I understand that Islamic people >try to say that this verse refers to Mohammed. The verse could not >possibly refer to Mohammed because it says that the prophet will be >from "among their brothers" and the scripture is addressing the ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >descendents of Jacob, not the descendents of Ishmael. > that only serves to enforce the hypothesis : If you read in Isiah ( can't remember the exact ref. ) "And Ishmael dwelled among his brethren." When the bible was refering to the children of Isaac. Thus "their brethren" are the Arabs. If it was referring to the Jews it would have simply said : from among themselves. I have looked through a concordence and a reference, and I cannot find any verse that says the above. Instead, I found that the Bible tells us in Genesis chapter 25 that Ishmael's descendents lived in the area of Nothern Egypt and that they were constantly at war with each other. Furthermore, Ishmael grew up in Egypt after Abraham banished him. Hagar was an Egyptian and not a Hebrew, so she took her son to grow up in her home country. Ishmael married Egyptian women, not Hebrew women. The verse from "among their brothers" is found in Deut. which was written a considerable time AFTER Genesis 25. Therefore, this verse could not be addressing descendents of Ishmael because because they were not living with the descendents of Jacob. I suppose that we could go on and on about what you said, but the main idea here is that the Annoited One was to come from Isaac's linage. Gensis says, "...through Isaac shall they seed be called." That seed is Jesus. There are also other prophecies which tell us that he will be a descendent of other prophets such as David. >Further, a prophet is someone to whom God fortells what will happen in >the future. Even if God speaks to a particular person, he or she is not >a prophet unless they have the gift of prophecy, which is knowing what >will happen in the future. So ? I wrote this to let you know that the Islamic definition of a prophet is different than the Christian or Jewish definition of a prophet. >God can manifest Himself in human form. If you think that He cannot, >then you obviously don't give God much credit for His abilities. I'll elaborate on that further later on. I'm waiting. -) >>Before you decide whether or not the New Testament contradicts itself, please >read it. I would suggest starting with the gospel of John, which follows the >gospel of Luke. I prefer the New International version or the Living Bible >version. If you prefer, there are also Arabic translations. > I have read a considerable chunk of the bible, which is the reason for my "disbelief" if you like. Which portions have you read? I can tell from your replies that you have read very little, if any, of the New Testament. There are some parts of the Bible that explain our beliefs better than others. If you have been reading only the Old Testament, you have been missing much. If you wish to make a short committment for better understanding, the best place to start reading is in the Gospel of John. If you wish to better understand the laws, read Romans. Of all of the Islamic people who have claimed to me that they have read the Bible and that it is "wrong", all have a showed an amazingly low level of Biblical knowledge. I can tell simply from their questions and replies that they have read either very little or none at all of the scripture. Most of what I discuss is not debate over the Bible but simply a reiteration of what the Bible says. I am not sure what is at fault, but I have a few good ideas: 1) From what I have read of the Koran, it says that Christians believe things that we do not believe and that the Bible says things that it does not say. For example, the Koran says that Christians believe that God created a son. This is not what we believe because the Bible states that the Son of God was never created (has always existed) and that he is none other than a manifestation of God Himself. 2) Islamic literature on the subject of Christianity is just as faulty as the Koran. Once, an Imam gave me a book which supposedly showed that the Bible predicts Mohammed and not Jesus. It started using "quotes" from the Bible. After several pages of really "weird stuff", I turned to my Bible only to find that the "quotes" in the Islamic literature were NOT quotes from the Bible. Some were of a total alien nature, while others had taken Biblic quotes, changed the original wording, twisted the meaning, and come out with a totally different idea. 3) Among Islamic people, there seems to be a fear of reading the Bible. Perhaps they are afraid that they will believe in it if they read it. Once, I read a short passage of scripture to an Islamic man after I had listened to him read a passage from the Koran. Instead of listening to the Bible, he started muttering something under his breath which I understood to be a prayer asking allah to keep the scripture from having an effect upon him. Islamic people often talk among themselves about how infidel Christians are and how we believe this and that. Then, based upon what they believe that Christians believe, they attempt to argue and prove that Christians are "wrong." All of that would be OK, except for the fact that 99.9% of Islamic people have totally erroneous and alien ideas regareding Christian beliefs and the Bible. As I said above, most of the "discussion time" is simply stating what the Bible says and what we believe. It has little to do with defending the basis for our beliefs.