Re: The unforgiveable sin etc.

sarban@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

> Revd. Eric Potts wrote:
> > In another thread the following was posted. I responded to it in the
> > context there but thought some further consideration might be
> > appropriate.
> >
> > > >> Jewels: If you believe that ALL will be forgiven then I presume that you
> > > >> have no belief in the unforgivable sin? If so, how would you explain
> > > >> these
> > > >> scriptures: Matt. 12:32: "And whoever shall speak a word against the Son
> > > >> of
> > > >> Man, it shall be forgiven him; but whoever shall speak against the Holy
> > > >> Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, either in this age, or in the age
> > > >> to
> > > >> come." And in Luke 12:10. Jesus said, "And everyone who will speak a
> > > >> word
> > > >> against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him; but he who blasphemes
> > > >> against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him." .
> > > >
> > > > I wouldn't. I find it inexplicable, and I'm sure I'm not the first to
> > > > do so. But once again I would want to read it in the historical context
> > > > of the gospels as mentioned above
> >
> > I speak of context. What context?
> >
> <BIG SNIP>
> >
> >
> > Now, take this and put in the time context of the period when the
> > Gospels were written, when the continuing Israel and the new Christians
> > were already at daggers drawn; and one can see how the evangelists
> > piled one saying upon another, both to justify their own separation
> > from the Jews and to claim that they were the real Israel now.
> >
> > That then is the context in which I would think one can set the sayings
> > about the unforgiveable sin which, interestingly, appear only in
> > Matthew and Luke. If I were to guess, and it would be no more than a
> > guess, Jesus is pointing to those who see good and call it evil, who
> > have truth but refuse to share it, and who, thereby, grieve the spirit
> > of God. Whether or not he himself said such an offence was
> > unforgiveable, or whether this was part of Matthew's hostility to the
> > Jews who had cast him and his people out, I do not know. But either
> > way, it is not a statement of eternal doctrine but a highly charged
> > riposte to a particular situation and is not to be taken literally or
> > applied beyond that particularly critical moment in time.
> >
> > (Well, Jewels, you did ask what I made of it.)
> >
> Mark 3:28-29 "Truly I say to you, all sins shall be forgiven the sons
> of men, and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes
> against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an
> eternal sin". Appears to be parallel with Matthew 12:31-32
> and Luke 12:10 particularly with Matthew 12:31 "Therefore I say to you,
> any sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven men, but blasphemy against the
> Spirit shall not be forgiven"
> with a variant of the saying in 12:32. Luke 12:10 appears to combine
> both forms of the
> saying.
>
> According to traditional ideas about the Synoptic problem this suggests
> that a form of
> the saying about the unforgivable sin was present in both Mark and Q
> and is presumably
> very early.
>
> It is unlikely to be a response to the events of 70 CE or later.
>
> Andrew Criddle

The issue I have with all of this is that Eric's position assumes bad
faith on the part of thw writers of the gospels, or on the part of
those who told them about what Jesus said. It puts these people in a
position where we must assume that they intended to express their own
doctrine rather than what they believed was true.

Now thats all well and good but if you to say that they are unreliable
because they added and altered what they heard in order to suit the
prevailing Christian teaching one must then ascertain the source of
that teaching. 70AD was a while after the death of Jesus and it is
likely that eye witness accounts were hard to come by orally however
the people that we are talking about are/were Jewish and the Jews have
a history of keeping written records and of treating them extremely
seriously and trying to avoid altering the original. It is, therefore
quite likely that many of the sayings and actions of Jesus were written
down before the gospels, as such, were out together.

That has two effects

1) It makes it more difficult to alter what is taught because people
can check whether it matches what is written down.

2) It makes it likely that more people would be aware of the actualy
sayings and so altering them would be more likely to be spotted by a
hearer.

Also taking the tack that the scriptures were altered in such a way
that they completely changed doctrine just makes it impossible to trust
any part of it. How can Eric be sure, or even vaguely certain that it
isnt the so called unversalist verses that were added in order to
soften the harshness of the gospel to Jewish hearers and to make more
converts?

The answer of course is that he can have no assurance of that so whilst
his position has the advanatge, in his eyes at least presumably, of
robbing the gainsayers of ammunition to combat his position it actually
completely undermines the very texts that he uses to show that his
position is scriptural.

This double edged effect is largely ignored by liberals but is
blindingly obvious one wonders how they miss it.

Take a statement concerning 3 cups

"One of these cups has poison in it" and say that some part of this
statement is untrue

the untrue parts could be

1) that there is any poison
2) that the poison is "in" a cup
3) that there is poison in only 1 cup
4) that the cup with poison in is one of these and not some other cup
5) that the things indicated are in fact cups

etc etc etc

You see the problem. And yet liberals are dogmatic about doctrine based
on such dodgy foundations. Im sure that the removal of as few as 50
verses from scripture would make the universalists position
unsupportable from scriptures to even its most ardent proponent and yet
they continue.

It should be noted I am not advocating removing those verses. I think
that the whole of scripture sufficently explains the verses that are
misrepresented as claiming universalism.

regards

Phil
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: atheists for freedom
    ... I don't think you're being deliberately dishonest I ... No. I'm saying what he is saying is not what you think he's saying. ... ignored the context and have reached the wrong conclusion. ... If you read what he said he is not saying that in equations in physics ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Socialist Realism
    ... I'm not saying that your inferences about what he meant or what his or ... But context does matter. ... well-read" people were sold a complete pup. ... It's generally accepted in Russia that both Gorky and his son, ...
    (rec.music.opera)
  • Re: Rules for avoiding crap books
    ... but it's the best book of the twentieth century. ... I referred the the POLL that named LOTR as the ... I'm saying that you can find ... When you snip the context it certainly appears that way. ...
    (rec.arts.sf.written)
  • Re: Evolution of man
    ... read the scriptures over and over I can honestly say that I ... Words in context have meaning. ... about a particular age delineated group of children. ... "He brought up reference to an age of responsibility. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: delivering wives in Bible texts
    ... limitless within each condition but the quote also says "ONLY ... Saying that if everyone else will eventually come to see things ... Writings say we have inumerable. ... I have researched this quote in context with other direct and ...
    (soc.religion.bahai)