Theological Opinions , PART II

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by Count Comfect

Lief, it's hardly my fault you can't read Hebrew. Look up a Hebrew bible at some point, look at the passages in question. As for the LORD our righteousness, it's also not hyphenated (yhvh tzidkenu), and translated by Jews "the LORD is our righteousness" - meaning that people will celebrate the LORD when invoking the wonders he has done, not that he is the LORD himself. Same as you've got lots of Muslims nowadays lying around with names derived from Allahu Akbar, God is Great - doesn't mean they're God.

I suspect your translation is wrong for two reasons. First is that I checked out the major Jewish websites responding to Christianity on these passages, and none of them attempted to use this simple argument you have forwarded, though they used many others. I can't find anything on Google about this, for or against.

Second, my NIV Bible translation translates the scripture the way it does, and it is based upon the early Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic texts, and the translation was worked out by over a hundred scholars.

These things aren't a powerful refutation of your point, but they do leave me questioning it and with my hands tied as to finding evidence confirming or denying your position. Sometimes people translate in a purposely biased or misleading way, in order to support their theological perspective. I need to examine the validity of your argument more closely before I can accept it, and I don't have access to the information.

Originally Posted by Count Comfect

Just because two of your books (Matthew and Luke) can't agree on Joseph's lineage doesn't mean they aren't both trying to describe that lineage; there is no grammatical reason to read "being, as it was supposed, the son of Joseph, the son of Heli" and so on through all the "sons of" as anything but a list going back starting with Joseph, especially as the KJV has "Joseph, WHICH WAS the son of Heli" and so on.

The grammar of the sentence could just as easily refer to Jesus as to Joseph. As an English major, I can assert this, but you can see it for yourself if you look at the sentence in an unbiased way. And the differences between the genealogies would imply that it's the genealogy of Mary, unless you go by the assumption that a genealogy is wrong.

But if you're going to just assume that the Bible is wrong rather than proving it's wrong, then what's the point of a debate?

And I wouldn't go by the King James Version's translation over the more recent translations. The King James Version was based on the Textus Receptus, which was compiled by Erasmus.

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

Erasmus' first edition of the Greek New Testament was prepared in haste, because his publisher Johann Froben wished to beat into print the Greek New Testament being prepared in Spain as part of the great Complutensian Polyglot Bible project. Typographical errors attributed to the rush to complete the work abounded in the published text. Erasmus also lacked a complete copy of the book of Revelation and was forced to translate the last six verses back into Greek from the Latin in order to finish his edition. Erasmus adjusted the text in many places to correspond with readings found in the Latin Vulgate, or as quoted in the Church Fathers; and consequently, although the Textus Receptus is classified by scholars as a late Byzantine text, it differs in nearly two thousand readings from standard form of that text-type; as represented by the "Majority Text" of Hodges and Farstad (Wallace 1989). The edition was a sell-out commercial success; and was reprinted in 1519, with most - though not all - the typographical errors corrected.

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

No school of textual scholarship now continues to defend the superiority of the Textus Receptus; although this position does still find adherents amongst Protestant groups hostile to the whole discipline of text criticism - as appplied to scripture - and suspicious of any departure from Reformation traditions.

I'm not saying that the King James Version is devoid of value. It has beautiful poetic language and certainly is accurate in many, many parts. It's just that there is a large enough error quantity in it that when it contrasts with more recent translations, which have been assembled through the studies and efforts of over a hundred scholars, there's really no comparison.

Originally Posted by Count Comfect

I don't have any problem with someone calling the Messiah Abi-Ad, which is Eternal Father. It's a name. It's a highfalutin name. But it's not Avinu-Ad, which is OUR everlasting father, it's just Father in general.

Yeah, I can think of a dozen fathers right off the bat who are eternal .

Originally Posted by Count Comfect

The sentence in which you were completely confused about what I meant with Abraham is only confusing because you chopped my paragraph up. "He" in the 2nd sentence is Jesus, it's a conclusion of the paragraph.

Second sentence of what verse and chapter? Forgive me if you think I'm thick.

Originally Posted by Count Comfect

As for right hand, let's start with Exodus 15:6 Thy right hand, O LORD, is become glorious in power

Okay, good point.

Originally Posted by Count Comfect

David did not necessarily write the psalm in question, nor if he did did he necessarily write it for his own singing. It is a psalm "l'david" which can translate as from David (ie by David) or about David. In the latter case, my sovereign is David.

Psalm 110 was considered to be Messianic by the Jews at the time Jesus showed up, according to my NIV text note.

Which Hebrew Old Testament translation are you using?

Originally Posted by Count Comfect

As for names; I see, so there must be a literal child named the spoil speedeth, the prey hasteneth? Because every interpretation I know of takes that as a metaphor, introduced just to express how destroyed those nations will be; and I see no reason the next chapter can't be a metaphor for just how saved Israel will be. All actions trademark God Inc, YHVH sole proprietor.

Repeatedly in the Old Testament, God makes prophecies with physical people used as symbols for revealed truths. For instance, through Elijah he told a king at one point to slam arrows against the ground. The king did three times, and hence he was allowed to defeat the Arameans three times. Then there's Hosea, where the prophet is told to marry an adulterous wife, and Hosea's life takes on the symbolic role of prophecy involving the unfaithfulness of Israel.

The thing is, these passages are all written of as physical events. They aren't written in poetic form, and in no passage does it say they are visions, dreams or words from the Lord. Hence it would have to be a modern interpretation imposed on the text that says this was a non-historical event, a metaphor. When it's written as historical and interpreted as non-historical, we're getting into people deciding for themselves what their religion is and what their God is saying. They aren't hearing God and listening to him anymore, but rather are making up their own religion on their terms, rather than accepting what the Bible says. That's the major error of religious liberalism. It has no ground to stand on and rely on- only the slush of a swamp.