Posted on 05/01/2011 7:24:18 AM PDT by Ethan Clive Osgoode
The squabble between Darwin lobbyists who openly hate religion and those who only quietly disdain it grows ever more personal, bitter and pathetic. On one side, evangelizing New or "Gnu" (ha ha) Atheists like Jerry Coyne and his acolytes at Why Evolution Is True. Dr. Coyne is a biologist who teaches and ostensibly researches at the University of Chicago but has a heck of a lot of free time on his hands for blogging and posting pictures of cute cats.
On the other side, so-called accommodationists like the crowd at the National Center for Science Education, who attack the New Atheists for the political offense of being rude to religious believers and supposedly messing up the alliance between religious and irreligious Darwinists.
I say "supposedly" because there's no evidence any substantial body of opinion is actually being changed on religion or evolution by anything the open haters or the quiet disdainers say. Everyone seems to seriously think they're either going to defeat religion, or merely "creationism," or both by blogging for an audience of fellow Darwinists.
Want to see what I mean? This is all pretty strictly a battle of stinkbugs in a bottle. Try to follow it without getting a headache.
Coyne recently drew excited applause from fellow biologist-atheist-blogger PZ Myers for Coyne's "open letter" (published on his blog) to the NCSE and its British equivalent, the British Centre for Science Education. In the letter, Coyne took umbrage at criticism of the New Atheists, mostly on blogs, emanating from the two accommodationist organizations. He vowed that,
We will continue to answer the misguided attacks [on the New Atheists] by people like Josh Rosenau, Roger Stanyard, and Nick Matzke so long as they keep mounting those attacks.Like the NCSE, the BCSE seeks to pump up Darwin in the public mind without scaring religious people. This guy called Stanyard at the BCSE complains of losing a night's sleep over the nastiness of the rhetoric on Coyne's blog. Coyne in turn complained that Stanyard complained that a blog commenter complained that Nick Matzke, formerly of the NCSE, is like "vermin." Coyne also hit out at blogger Jason Rosenhouse for an "epic"-length blog post complaining of New Atheist "incivility." In the blog, Rosenhouse, who teaches math at James Madison University, wrote an update about how he had revised an insulting comment about the NCSE's Josh Rosenau that he, Rosenhouse, made in a previous version of the post.
That last bit briefly confused me. In occasionally skimming the writings of Jason Rosenhouse and Josh Rosenau in the past, I realized now I had been assuming they were the same person. They are not!
It goes on and on. In the course of his own blog post, Professor Coyne disavowed name-calling and berated Stanyard (remember him? The British guy) for "glomming onto" the Matzke-vermin insult like "white on rice, or Kwok on a Leica." What's a Kwok? Not a what but a who -- John Kwok, presumably a pseudonym, one of the most tirelessly obsessive commenters on Darwinist blog sites. Besides lashing at intelligent design, he often writes of his interest in photographic gear such as a camera by Leica. I have the impression that Kwok irritates even fellow Darwinists.
There's no need to keep all the names straight in your head. I certainly can't. I'm only taking your time, recounting just a small part of one confused exchange, to illustrate the culture of these Darwinists who write so impassionedly about religion, whether for abolishing it or befriending it. Writes Coyne in reply to Stanyard,
I'd suggest, then, that you lay off telling us what to do until you've read about our goals. The fact is that we'll always be fighting creationism until religion goes away, and when it does the fight will be over, as it is in Scandinavia.A skeptic might suggest that turning America into Scandinavia, as far as religion goes, is an outsized goal, more like a delusion, for this group as they sit hunched over their computers shooting intemperate comments back and forth at each other all day. Or in poor Stanyard's case, all night.
There's a feverish, terrarium-like and oxygen-starved quality to this world of online Darwinists and atheists. It could only be sustained by the isolation of the Internet. They don't seem to realize that the public accepts Darwinism to the extent it does -- which is not much -- primarily because of what William James would call the sheer, simple "prestige" that the opinion grants. Arguments and evidence have little to do with it.
The prestige of Darwinism is not going to be affected by how the battle between Jerry Coyne and the NCSE turns out. New Atheist arguments are hobbled by the same isolation from what people think and feel. I have not yet read anything by any of these gentlemen or ladies, whether the open haters or the quiet disdainers, that conveys anything like a real comprehension of religious feeling or thought.
Even as they fight over the most effective way to relate to "religion," the open atheists and the accomodationists speak of an abstraction, a cartoon, that no actual religious person would recognize. No one is going to be persuaded if he doesn't already wish to be persuaded for other personal reasons. No faith is under threat from the likes of Jerry Coyne.
You have to "do certain things" sounds like faith is works-based. You "earn" it by works, by doing the right things.
The only thing is you must take a step of faith
That sounds like it's your decision to be 'saved'. You take the step and God saves you. yet your own Bible says God saves whomever he pleases. Maybe you didn't read that part. It appears that in your belief system you are in charge and God simply obliges as you wish.
You say you want to KNOW what God is, well, the first step is to consider that he HAS revealed himself and entertain the idea that the BIBLE just might be the method in which he has done so.
First, ever other religion that has a scriptures says the same thing about their God. All you have to do is make a leap of faith that the Book of Mormon is a way God revealed himself and you are in business!
Then also acknowledge that he continues to reveal himself in nature, through other people.
Oh, yes, that keeps the merchants of faith of every kind in good business. Otherwise they may have to flip hamburgers for their living.
Likely story totally based on your "motivations", as you said.
However, it doesn't leave you off the hook.
The basic claims of Christianity are still there, canon or no canon.
Look beyond your prejudices. Oh yeah you can't do that because you are blind. You are on the wrong site. You undoubtedly have the same opinion about drug manufacturers, doctors, nurses, indian chiefs. They are all in it for the money.
I would reply that you in turn are assuming that whoever wrote John's Gospel was not there observing the conversation. Assuming that he was not based on nothing more than the absence of an explicit claim to the contrary amounts to an argument from silence.
It was at night, but the assumption that Jesus and Nic were the only two present may not be correct:
...The Method Of Teaching in these schools may be easily collected from the Gospels and Acts. The Doctors or Teachers generally sat. Thus our Lord sat down previously to delivering his sermon on the mount (Matt. v. 1.); as Gamaliel also did in his school. (Acts xxii. 3.)
Sometimes, however, the Jewish teachers, like the Greek philosophers, were accustomed to have their disciples around them, wherever they went, and to discourse, as occasion arose, on things either human or divine. In this way our Lord delivered some of his most interesting instructions to his apostles. Allusions to this practice occur in Matt. iv. 20. x. 38. xvi. 24. Mark i. 18. xvi. 24.
An introduction to the critical study and knowledge of the Holy Scriptures. , Volume 2
Thomas Hartwell Horne
Cordially,
No in 7 he once again says "born from above" (not 'again'). The previous verse makes it clear that if you are born of the spirit you are a spirit, not flesh, and only a spirit can enter Israel (the kingdom of God)! That is admittedly some novel theology for Jew who believed in the Torah to profess.
Yes! Yes! Yes! Amen! Amen! Amen!
God's ways are not man's ways, god's thoughts are not man's thoughts.
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from Google ...
Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary
55:6-13 Here is a gracious offer of pardon, and peace, and of all happiness. It shall not be in vain to seek God, now his word is calling to us, and his Spirit is striving with us. But there is a day coming when he will not be found. There may come such a time in this life; it is certain that at death and judgment the door will be shut. There must be not only a change of the way, but a change of the mind. We must alter our judgments about persons and things. It is not enough to break off from evil practices, we must strive against evil thoughts. To repent is to return to our Lord, against whom we have rebelled. If we do so, God will multiply to pardon, as we have multiplied to offend. But let none trifle with this plenteous mercy, or use it as an occasion to sin. Men's thoughts concerning sin, Christ, and holiness, concerning this world and the other, vastly differ from God's; but in nothing more than in the matter of pardon. We forgive, and cannot forget; but when God forgives sin, he remembers it no more. The power of his word in the kingdoms of providence and grace, is as certain as in that of nature. Sacred truth produces a spiritual change in the mind of men, which neither rain nor snow can make on the earth. It shall not return to the Lord without producing important effects. If we take a special view of the church, we shall find what great things God has done, and will do for it. The Jews shall come to their own land; this shall represent the blessings promised. Gospel grace will make a great change in men. Delivered from the wrath to come, the converted sinner finds peace in his conscience; and love constrains him to devote himself to the service of his Redeemer. Instead of being profane, contentious, selfish, or sensual, behold him patient, humble, kind, and peaceable. The hope of helping in such a work should urge us to spread the gospel of salvation. And do thou help us, O Spirit of all truth, to have such views of the fullness, freeness, and greatness of the rich mercy in Christ, as may remove from us all narrow views of sovereign grace.”
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Isaiah 55:8
“King James Bible
“For my thoughts [are] not your thoughts, neither [are] your ways my ways, saith the LORD.”
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Faith, hope, trust, ....
faith ... in believing there is a plan and a purpose to our life.
Hope ... in it being possible to effect our own life, and it is good to have hope in the future
“I set before thee life and death, blessing and cursing, CHOOSE LIFE” Deut. 30:19
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King James Bible
I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, [that] I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:”
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Hope in eternal life in the presence of God ...
Love in seeing the goodness of God, treating our neighbor as our self. Doing to others as we would have them do to our self.
It pleased God to create man. Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
Philippians 4:8
King James Version (KJV)
8.Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.” Praise the LORD!
No one quesitons the historicity (end of first century) but the authoriship of John's Gospel.
Yes, to the Jews it means and always meant Israel. Since the Jews wrote it supposedly, and since one Jew spoke to another Jew (especially to a Sanhedrin) that would be very clear.
you have never even acknowledged that Peter uses "ἀναγεννάω" BORN AGAIN
Yes, the ἀναγεννάω (1 Peter 1:3) means regenerated, in this case associated with a new hope based on the resurrection and not some literal baptismal "new birth" of the spirit and water from above. Slightly different concept than John 3:3,5,7.
And in 1 Pet 1:23 it is associated with the "living word of enduring God", not the spirit or the water. So, clearly the concept, linguistically and conceptually different from John's "except one" [not man as some trnalsaitons say] is born form above?spirit/water/ he can inter Israel, but in Peter's rendition it is a hope given through the resurrection/living word of God. Night and day.
Except no one else recorded it, Cronos. ten thousand people "saw" the Sun falling towards the earth in Fatima in 1917...
the Greeks at that time, like the Romans were already sceptical of their gods and they already knew of many stories of folks rising from the dead even earlier deity myths
The Greeks were actively seeking mystery religions to replace their skepticism.
They could have said "Show me your proof
Why do you think the Jews rejected Christian claims? Don;t you think Jesus would have saved everyone the trouble if he had appeared before the skeptical Sanhedrin and Pilate? Think of all the blood and guts and horrors he would have prevented that followed if he convinced his enemies that he was God. Or do you think God "enjoys" when people kill each other over him?
I see you are the follower of a tekton god as your source...or is he a mere mortal with his own motivation and interpretation, that could be equally fallible as anyone else's?
LOL, that is one of the dumbest things I have read so far on the thread.
So is assuming that he was.
John used a Greek word meaning from the beginning, anew, from the top, and it is a misunderstanding to argue that “anothen” meant “from heaven or above” in John 3.
Nicodemus responded to what he heard and understood in Hebrew and trying to say he couldn't understand the words spoken to him is just pettifogging. He actually heard Jesus’ words and you haven't.
Nicodemus had been born of the flesh and it was necessary that he be born of the spirit, “born again”.
“That is admittedly some novel theology for Jew who believed in the Torah to profess.”
No, it wasn't. Nicodemus was a teacher and as Jesus said he should have known those things and yet here Nicodemus was asking Jesus questions since Nicodemus didn't have God's blessing and couldn't understand what he was supposed to be teaching.
Thank you very much.
Because you say so, and because you were therev too?
John used a Greek word meaning from the beginning, anew, from the top, and it is a misunderstanding to argue that “anothen” meant “from heaven or above” in John 3
Anothen doesn't mean anew or again. It means from above, from the top, from the beginning, and figuratively from heaven. It is never, ever, used in the whole Bible by itself to mean "again".
Nicodemus responded to what he heard and understood in Hebrew
How do you know it was in Hebrew? Been there, right?
Nicodemus had been born of the flesh and it was necessary that he be born of the spirit, “born again”
then he would cease to be flesh and he would spirit (John 3:4). That's not being born again...that's being recreated into something else.
Nicodemus was asking Jesus questions since Nicodemus didn't have God's blessing and couldn't understand what he was supposed to be teaching
I guess you spoke with God last night and he told you so, right?
Ezekiel 36:25-27: "I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit __in__ you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit __in__ you and move you to follow my decrees..."
Similar sentiments are found elsewhere in Jewish literature. Here is another passage from the Qumran material (1QS 4:19-21):
He will cleanse him of all wicked deeds by means of a holy spirit; like purifying waters He will sprinkle upon him the spirit of truth.
NT:
Matthew - Chapter 8: 21-22
Another of the disciples said to him, "Lord, let me first go and bury my father."
And Jesus said to him, "Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead."
Spiritual death is when a person is alive physically, but dead spiritually.
[But] you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins in which you once lived, following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient. All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else (Ephesians 2:1-3).
The wayward son was said to have been spiritually dead. "But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found (Luke 15:32).
The fact that you restate your assertion still fails to demonstrate its alleged truth.
Yes, the ἀναγεννάω (1 Peter 1:3) means regenerated, in this case associated with a new hope based on the resurrection and not some literal baptismal "new birth" of the spirit and water from above. Slightly different concept than John 3:3,5,7.
And in 1 Pet 1:23 it is associated with the "living word of enduring God", not the spirit or the water. So, clearly the concept, linguistically and conceptually different from John's "except one" [not man as some trnalsaitons say] is born form above?spirit/water/ he can inter Israel, but in Peter's rendition it is a hope given through the resurrection/living word of God. Night and day.
So you are admitting that Peter used the words "born again" in verse 23 even though you assert a different meaning for "ἀναγεννάω" in verse 3.
Yet your argument avers that John is made up. Well, Peter uses "born again", despite your argument that it is associated as the "living word of God"(John's concept) and not spirit or water. And then you conclude with the astonishing conclusion that Peter was talking about hope and not describing a quality demonstrated in his audience which it clearly is.
Final question if the Greek words presented up to now do not communicate "born again" or "reborn" what Greek words do?
kosta50 replied: "then he would cease to be flesh and he would spirit (John 3:4). That's not being born again...that's being recreated into something else."
Not so.
1 Cor. 4:20-1 For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power. ..
God's kingdom is something indwelling believers. 1 Cor. 6:9-10//Gal. 5:21 lists (spiritually dead) non-believers.
As Witherington puts it (57-8), Paul views the KoG "at least in the present as something that is primarily spiritual in character and effect, not material or physical. He sees it as having to do with the spiritual transformation of human beings in the present, not the physical transformation of the cosmos." However, Paul does "associate material transformation of both persons and world with what will happen on the future" when Christ returns at the resurrection.
1 Cor. 15:50 Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. "Flesh and blood" is of course a metaphor for human weakness. It thus says the same thing as other passages that stress you need to be changed to inherit the Kingdom. Here on earth we participate as the Spirit indwells us and acts as a "deposit" for the Resurrection body.
Yes it does. That is the Greek word John used to translate Jesus’ words and that is how Nicodemus understood Jesus’ words, a “second” birth or being born again, anew.
Context, context, context.
“How do you know it was in Hebrew?”
Well you think maybe Nicodemus spoke English?
“then he would cease to be flesh and he would spirit (John 3:4). That's not being born again...that's being recreated into something else.”
I'm not going to explain the Biblical “born again” to you here though your misunderstanding is obvious.
I think you missed the part "theology for Jew who believed in the Torah." Eze is not the Torah.
Good points! Good night :-P
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