ok well american christianity is really off i think. here are some questions i have. 1.) Why do we condemn satan when not even the Arch Angel Michael would not do this? 2.) Why do we look at homosexuality so harshly but pardon adultry when homosexuality is condemned a few times and adultry is one of the ten commandments? 3.) Why do most christians not read there bible at all it seems? i dont read mine near enough but i know more than any of my sunday school teachers, this is not good. 4.) How have we come up with 21 THOUSAND different denominations in this ONE religion? 5.) How can we have so many different versions of a bible in just one language? 6.) Why have parts of our bible ben cut out? Why do the protestants not inclue all of the books of the bible? These are just some of the major questions im sure someone will ask why are christians hypocrites and that is common sense, they are humans and i have yet to meet a person w/o a pinch of hypocracy.
People make these assumptions that someone is not a christian if their not perfect. They assume that a christian never sins, stays quiet, and never does anything wrong. Humans aren't perfect. We are all born with sin. However, even though everyone will continue to make mistakes, a true christian knows when their wrong, and they try not to continue the behavoirs of their past. James 1:22 says, "Do not merely listen to the word, and so decieve yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forget what he looks like". Though a christian will never be perfect, you will know the true ones by their nature.
I don't think stiff bizquette is assuming all christians are perfect. I think the statements reflect that the overall product of the religion has some very serious issues. I have been to countless churches throughout the years and I do find many enlightened people who are searching for a relationship with God and trying to live a good life based on the teachings of Jesus. But I would agree that the overwhelming majority of those i have met are judgemental, pious, and act as if they have the moral advantage - even though they more or less just pay lip service to the religion without truly addressing issues like greed, judgmentalism, acceptance and really being a good human within their own lives. Condemn satan? I agree this is too prevalent in the church. I say, judge not, and God makes the rain fall ont he unjust and just alike, and love your enemy... anyone can love their friends. A kind word turns away anger but a harsh word... blah blah blah... Love in all things, this is the enemy of our enemies. The adultry issue vs. homosexuality is a good point I think. I'll have to remembver that one. Judge not... The bible is a great source of spiritual enlightenment. There are many others too. If you are going to be a teacher your responsibility to know what you speak is ten fold. Spirituality is individual. The true goal of any religion is to foster a relationship with God. There is no such thing as two relationships that are the same. So, there are as many paths to God as there are people on this planet. That is not only the reason we have so many denominations it is also the reason we have so many religions. The reason there are so many versions of the bible and so many books which vary from variety to variety is that the bible is not a book. It is a collection of many books. These books have a variety of sources (which are written in different languages at different times in history). This book as a collection is almost surely the most translated, studied, and researched volumes on earth. The bible itself never proclained it's infallibility or it's uneditability. The Roman church did that to make the religion seem more concrete. Many hundreds of relevant works were left out. God does not only talkt o a few and he did not stop talkign 2000 years ago. I would like to see more writing, more resources. I think the bible is only a starting point for someone who is REALLY interested in discovering what God is all about. PS: The book John is reffering to in Revaltion 22:18 is the book of revelation. The bible did not exist for another 200 years. I am sure he was aware that throughout history well-meaning religious folks had produced dozens if not hundreds of variant copies of scriptures. When the bible was assembled they picked and chose what fit together nicely and dropped the rest. I am sure John was attempting to scare those hwo might edit his text into leaving it alone.
1. cuz archangel michael knows that what you condemn persists and what you love evolves 2. true christians embrace homosexuality...nuff said 3. its easier kicking back and listening to a preacher tell you what to think 4. because folks didn't listen to james 5. language is slippery stuff...especially when it starts getting translated from ancient dialects that aren't spoken anymore 6. emperor constantine wanted to make christianity a state religion so he cut out parts that impeded this and fabricated or emphasized parts that helped this angle
i think u got some of the modern twist of christianity in you. lmfao i love that one and must agree. ty, didnt know that gonna have to do some research correct nice responses so far.
Well I think a lot of answers to the questions involve personal interpretation, and we could probably disagree about the answers for hours. But if I understood correctly in a class I had, the answer to #6 is that the Protestants accepted only the original books of the Bible that were around before the destruction of the Jerusalem, while people of other religions(ex. Catholics) accepted others(ex. Judith, 1&2 Maccabees, Tobit, Wisdom, Baruch, Sirach) that were found after the destruction. I think that's the correct answer to your question, if not, many apologies!! :-D
Ummm... no. True Christians embrace homosexuals, while recognizing, in love, that the lifestyle is sinful. Like what... Greek? Languages do change, but the basics generally do not. Even English, with all it's variations follows a set of rules regarding subject/object placement, verb voices (no English verb has a middle voice, for example), and more. The words change and the definitions change, yes, but in a time when communication was NOT lightning fast or global, changes would happen far more slowly. So is it difficult? Only in that you have to have a good knowledge of history in order to understand the cultural and historical circumstances surrounding the text. Impossibly tricky? Not at all. In fact, there is an entire country that still speaks Greek. To the best of my knowledge, they can read the new testament in the original greek and not have TOO much difficulty. However, I am neither linguist nor Greek scholar, so I freely admit I could be way off. That is pure speculation without a shred of historical evidence. You can point out the circumstances and then say "Wouldn't it make sense that they 'edit' the Scriptures to reinforce their views and strengthen their political position?" However, there is no documentation which backs up this assertion. It is pure opinion with no basis in fact. It is loaded with presuppositions concerning the nature of men and smacks of conspiracy theory. The thing is, history disagrees with you. Marcion was excommunicated in 144 AD. Why? Because he claimed that Jesus was not God and that none of the four NT Gospels (save a version of Luke that he had edited) were authoritative. The church, by 144 at the *latest*, already considered the Gospels (and the Pauline epistles) to be authoritative. This is over 100 years BEFORE Constantine. Still, the Church held several doctrines to be absolute. The most important - Jesus is GOD. The history of the early church disagrees with you, Chief. Also note, it is just as pheasible (actually greatly moreso) that the Niceans simply clarified what most already believed. There were some books that were in dispute, yes. Some of them made it, some did not. But the four NT Gospels and the Pauline Epistles were ALWAYS a part of the scripture. They were accepted from the beginning as authoritative and inspired. So did Constantine and his Nicean "cronies" edit the NT to strengthen their own position? Not likely. In fact, at the council of Nicea, only about 1/3 of the NT was up for debate. The 4 NT Gospels, Acts and the Pauline letters were already 'in'. There is a lot of good information here: http://www.ntcanon.org/ Give it a look.
It's not the Christianity that's off. It's the Christians. Humans aren't perfect and were never meant to be, not even Christians. So it doesn't matter what religion it is, you are going to find crackpots and crackpratices in all of them!
Im not sure I follow you on this one. God alone will condemn Satan to the eternal abyss. That being said, we can probably safely assume 'condoning' Satan or even listening to him is a 'bad idea'. As a Nation, you do NOT have a harsh condemnation of homosexuality. Few other nations on earth (and in history of the planet) have as free and open a homosexual lifestyle as the USA. Gays are extremely popular on television and gays are elected to many offices. Adultery is much more prevalent and certainly more destructive on the whole (because children are often innocent victims) I agree more Christians should be worried about that. I agree with you entirely on this. .. although Ive never met your sunday school teachers. Many who do read their Bible often make simplistic assumptions and simply read (ie James) with a legalistic understanding and no ability to see how it meshes or dovetails with other scriptures (i.e. Galatians) Its probably closer to 211, you could put those into about 21 categories. Its not necessarily a 'bad thing'. Different cultural backgrounds can worship against those backdrops. Because translators are responsible and know that there is no 'word-for-word' way to translate every word. They can give you a 'strict' interpretation or one that is 'flexible' and gives the overall meaning. Addition to that - the english language has changed (degenerated) in the last 400 years. Bible translators have to keep up with that. Again, this is not a 'bad thing' at all. The Apocrypha is not necessarily considered 'on par' with the other books, even in Catholic teachings. If you want to read Apocrypha books then feel free. The Gospel will still remain the Gospel. Christians are hypocrites. To become a Christian you are asked to admit that. This is WHY WE ARE Christians. Because we acknowledge and seek to repent of hypocrisy - which is part of human nature, sadly. Many 'Hypocrite hunters' do not choose to acknowledge they are hypocrites as much as anyone else. Unfortunately, the word 'Hypocrite' has been so misused, abused over the last three decades that it has no real meaning anymore.
embracing would mean accepting. love would attempt to correct the flaws. love while it covers a multitude of sins does not allow blatant sinning when it knows the right and wrong ass u stated it is sinfull.
The Players Alexander of Alexandria: Bishop of Alexandria. Said Christ was the 'same substance' as the Father. Convened a council of bishops from Egypt and Libya to anathematize Arius and excommunicate him and his followers. Athanasius: served as a deacon at the Council of Nicaea. He was strongly opposed to Arianism. He helped the Council decide against Arianism, and was later exiled. Also see Arianism Constantine: Emperor of Rome. He called the Council of Nicaea to settle the dispute over Arianism. He was the Emperor who recognized Christianity as a legal religion and later tried to make it the state religion. Eusubius, Bishop of Nicomedia and a supporter of Arius, would later baptize Constantine. Contrary to popular Christian myth, Constantine was a pagan and was baptized on his deathbed. He also never really made Christianity a state religion because Christians couldn't even agree on anything. The power grab of the pagan Trinitarians would be completed after his death. From Brittanica.com, "In his theological interpretation of the idea of God, Arius was interested in maintaining a formal understanding of the oneness of God. In defense of the oneness of God, he was obliged to dispute the sameness of essence of the Son and the Holy Spirit with God the Father, as stressed by the theologians of the Neoplatonic influenced Alexandrian school. From the outset, the controversy between both parties took place upon the common basis of the Napoleonic concept of substance, which was foreign to the New Testament itself. It is no wonder that the continuation of the dispute on the basis of the metaphysics of substance likewise led to concepts that have no foundation in the New Testament--such as the question of the sameness of essence (homoousia) or similarity of essence (homoiousia) of the divine persons." It was 325 A.D. at Nicaea that the doctrine of the Trinity was rammed through by Athanasius (using Mafia tactics) in a Council that was overseen by the Emperor Constantine who, ironically enough, thought of himself as God-incarnate. (Constantine was a Sun Worshiper and only made an official conversion to "Christianity" on his deathbed). Roman coins of the period still portrayed the image of the sun God despite the alleged sudden adoption/conversion of Christianity. Many of those present at the Council Of Nicaea were opposed the doctrine of the Trinity, siding with Arius. Even after the Nicene Creed, the Trinity was still hotly debated for decades and centuries after. A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE CHURCH AFTER NICAEA 325 AD - Constantine convenes the Council of Nicaea in order to develop a statement of faith that can unify the church. The Nicene Creed is written, declaring that "the Father and the Son are of the same substance" (homoousios). Emperor Constantine who was also the high priest of the pagan religion of the Unconquered Sun presided over this council.
I agree that Constantine is given way too much credit as some kind of UberChristian Convert who single-handedly switched Rome from Pagan to Christians. Constantine aside, Christianity was well on its way to establishing itself and growing in leaps and bounds. Its pretty clear Constantine was converting to Christianity and this is far more than some 'myth'. You simply dont arrange Councils and endorse positions unless you have some conversion (or at least HE believed he was converted). But all that aside. Here is the opinion which you added to the end of your post: "It was 325 A.D. at Nicaea that the doctrine of the Trinity was rammed through by Athanasius (using Mafia tactics) ..." I noticed you say 'Rammed' which implies it was rejected or resisted by the majority? You also credit Athanasius with doing this using 'Mafia Tactics'. Please explain why you imagine this happening and how? Do you imagine the scriptures were changed so that homoousia would now appear as the clear truth over homoiousia?
Listen to the whisper of arrogance in the speech present. Nearly all argue the interpretations of man as if they were themselves the teachings of Jesus. Read the words and feel their meaning, but see Jesus in all his splendor, for the life of Jesus was itself the lesson you must learn to enter the Church of God as a Christian. It is pleasing to hear such wisdom from one so young. “Christians, not Christianity”. You will provide shelter during the coming storm.
Protestants dropped the apocrypha, maybe because everyone knew they weren’t quite as authoritative as other parts of the Bible and Protestants had a more all or nothing view of inspiration. I believe we should stop claiming more authority for the Bible than it claims for itself.
I'm not sure I know what "American Christianity" is but let try to answer your questions. I don't condemn Satan, it's not my job but I don't consider him to be a Good example to follow. The Bible is a set of guidelines for our lives, the closer we live by those guidelines the better our lives. Both homosexuality and adultery are outside those guidelines and by engaging in them means that we are not getting the most out of our lives. One is not any better or worse than the other. People tend to be lazy and would rather let others tell them what the "Bible says" and will believe what they are told even if what they are told is contradictory and not even close to what the Bible says. I don't think we came up with "21 THOUSAND different denominations". If you believe Satan exists and is opposed to God and his purposes, wouldn't a logical tactic be to obfuscate the truth by mixing the one true way to worship God in with "21 THOUSAND different denominations" so it would be difficult find true worship. Well for one thing, the Bible itself was written in at least three different languages, some of which are somewhat dead languages. Also Translation is not an exact science. What parts did you have in mind as having been cut out? There are some "books of the Bible" that have been left out because they do not appear to be parts of the original manuscripts.
Assuming the OP is still alive and interested, just a few comments. These questions deal with things I, as a (Progressive) Christian, find really peripheral to my faith: I condemn Satan because he's evil--indeed the very embodiment of evil. I hasten to add I think of Satan as a metaphor. I've learned not to tell people I encountered Satan and Jesus in the checkout line at WalMart--people are such literalists! Is Satan real? I think so. Metaphors express real truths, sometimes more profoundly than factual statements. Is Satan a factual, wilful being? I don't think so. He's in the same class with Santa. (Note the similarity in the letters). Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus! Why wouldn't the Arch Angel Michael condemn Satan? Beats me. I wasn't even aware that he wouldn't. Apart from my thinking that Archangel Michael is another one of those metaphors, where did you get this information? The closest I come is Revelation 12:7–10 (NIV): 7 "Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 9 The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him." Saint Michael may not have "condemned" Satan verbally because he was too busy kicking his ass. (How much more condemnation do you want?) There are two problems with this question. When you say we "pardon" adultery, pardoning applies to all sin that is repented, and it's God, not us, who's doing the pardoning. (as sinners ourselves, we have no standing to judge.) You must be thinking of the famous passage in John 7:53-8:11 in which Jesus encounters an adultress about to be stoned and saves her by telling the mob "Let you among you who are without sin cast the first stone." This passage seems not to have been in the original John gospel, but I'll skip that controversy and note that Jesus doesn't say adultery isn't bad. He tells the woman to go and "sin no more". He's making the important distinction between loving the sinner and hating the sin. I think we could also ask the question why "we" make such a big deal about homosexuality when we seem to be pretty casual about divorce--something Jesus made a big deal about being wrong? (He said nothing about homosexuality.) Good question. As for homosexuality, that's a complicated subject, but my own take is that although some translations of the Bible do indicate that it's condemned as such, the context indicates the practices referred to are about exploitative, lustful relations instead of loving ones. Reading the Bible isn't easy. Many people give up with the begats. And understanding it is even harder, because reading it without context can give a misleading impression. Many folks settle for out of context "proof texts". I've been reading it for years and feel I've only scratched the surface. The important thing is to read enough to get by. I'd recommend Mark 12:30-31: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."" That's the key to the rest. The number of denominations ranges between around a thousand List of Christian denominations by number of members - Wikipedia and over 30 thousand How many Christian denominations are there? , depending on how "denomination" is defined. Why are there so many? Because Christians are people, and people tend to disagree and are often disagreeable. For example, a lot of what I've said so far would be deeply offensive to traditional Christians, who might say I'm not really a Christian at all (Same to you, buddy). I regularly attend a Methodist Sunday school, where the others think pretty much the way I do. A few flights downstairs, there's another Sunday school in the same church where the members think very differently from the way I do--to the point of being practically a different religion. Soon my church may split over the gay issue, in which case I'll go with the progressives. There are disagreements over interpretations of scripture, how much ritual people like, and traditions passed on from one generation to another. As in all other things human, nothing is certain--not even that. Faith is, as Luther put it, a "joyful bet". I use my best judgment, trust in the Lord, and take my chances. The versions are all translations of ancient Greek and Hebrew manuscripts, of which we have copies of copies of copies of copies, etc. New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman often says “There are more variants in copies of the New Testament than there are words in the New Testament”--fortunately most insignificant, but some not. There are grammatical challenges in translating one language to another. Punctuation in the Greek manuscripts is sparse to nonexistent, some words are difficult to find an English counterpart to, and words can have more than one meaning. The Latin Vulgate translation prepared by Saint Jerome tells us that when Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments he had horns! (cornuta esset facies sua). He seems to have mistranslated the Hebrew word "keren" (which can mean either "horn" or "ray of light", for the former instead of the latter. That's why when you see Michelangelo's famous statue of Moses, you'll see horns protruding from his head! Also, idioms can be a problem (e.g, in English if we said someone was horny we'd be conveying something different from the literal meaning). For example, in Ruth 3:4, Naomi tells her daughter-in-law Ruth: "When he lies down, note the place where he is lying. Then go and uncover his feet and lie down." One might expect Boaz, the man being referred to, might be annoyed, especially if it was a cold night and some woman took the covers off of his feet, but that's not the meaning intended. When is a Foot Really a Penis? And Other Things the Bible Taught Me. Then there are the issues of whether to follow the original language or to give a rendering more in keeping with contemporary language, so that modern readers can better understand it, and whether to use explicit language for matters that might seem indelicate to some readers. These issues become particularly important in the discussion of homosexuality in the Bible. For example, in the King James Bible, we are told : If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them (Leviticus, 18-22). This is a rendering of the Hebrew which says literally "And with a male you shall not lay lyings of a woman". What the hey? Does this mean that males shouldn't have sex together in a woman's bed? Or, as translators suppose, that they mustn't have sexual intercourse with a male as they would with a woman. And what does that mean? Do we accept a broad definition of sex, or would Bill Clinton's version get us by? And then there's 1 Corinthans 6:9 telling us that the malakoi and arsenokoitai won't enter the kingdom of heaven. Malakoi means soft, and some early translations thought it meant "morally weak" instead of homosexual. Aresnkotai seems to be a word coined by Saint Paul meaning literally "man bedder". The KJV translated these terms as "effeminate" and "abusers of themselves with mankind", respectively--the former calling to mind limp wrists and lisps, the latter something even vaguer. The traditional consensus was that these referred to the passive and active partners in a homosexual relationship. The non-literalist Good News Translation cuts to the chase : "homosexual perverts". What do you mean "parts of our Bible"? The Bibles used by Jews and Christians today are products of canonization, in which groups of clerics recognized as authorities decided which writings were inspired, to be included as scripture, and which were not, and therefore rejected. Some of the parts rejected had been used as scripture by various communities thinking of themselves as Jewish or Christian. It wouldn't be accurate to say "parts of our bible" have been "cut out". That implies that they were once part of the Bible, together with the rest of the books, and were deliberately eliminated. Where the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) is concerned, we know that some 22 books existed that have simply been lost. 22 Lost books that are mentioned in the Bible That was before the Hebrew books that became part of the Bible were put together in a single book. Then there were others who, at the time the Hebrew scriptures were canonized, were consciously rejected. Jubilees, Jasher, Enoch, etc. The Book of Enoch, with its fascinating treatment of demons and giants, was kept by the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, but not the Jews and Christians, although the Book of Jude and other early Christian writings seem to accept it as scripture. There are also the Catholic Deuterocanonical books, considered Apocryphal by Protestants: First and Second Maccabes, Judith, Baruch, etc, which give the Catholics seven extra books to the 66 of the Protestant Bible.The Apocrypha were not in the original New Testament, but were included in the Latin Vulgate in the early 5th century. Protestants excluded them because they thought their inspired status was questionable, particularly in supporting such "popish" notions as intercession of the saints and prayers for the dead. Neither Catholics nor Protestants accept the Gnostic Books of the Nag Hammadi library, and both also rejected other works that were used by various early Christian congregations, like the virulently Anti-Semitic Gospel of Peter with its talking cross and giant Jesus. Oldies but goodies!
