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Your posts represent fine efforts to spiritualize and temporalize, and regionalize, and place scripture within the contexts of particular eras, etc. Unfortunately, you tend to be guilty of insufficient spiritualizing (evaluating the states of mind involved) and overly compromising (accommodating worldly concerns)with things that only provide the context within which our states of mind need to be evaluated.
When the Bible is characterized as a book to be interpreted spiritually, that is not a mere suggestion because the source of the inspirations is entirely focused on our spiritual development, period.
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Originally Posted by MysticPhD
Primarily because it is not understandable. It is an irrational acceptance of contradiction solely to support the unjustified belief that scripture is the word of God and NOT human corruption.
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Originally Posted by Michael Way
It is very understandable to those who do not have a one dimensional view of God. You are not the arbiter of what is understandable to anyone but yourself.
I have no argument with your mystical understandings mystic, but I do agree with mike that you can be “one-sided” “one-dimensional” in outlook
But we all are naturally that way, and it takes effort to be able to understand others points of view/perspectives and get to a higher more global/balanced view
The primary issue is and was the need to present spiritual concepts to primitive and carnal minds, which you allude to, Duval.
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Originally Posted by MysticPhD
The inspirations are at base spiritual but were interpreted carnally by the receivers who had no other reference point (and were terrified of Spirits anyway).
Can you provide any specific examples of this?
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Originally Posted by MysticPhD
Regrettably, they have continued to be interpreted and perpetuated carnally despite sporadic attempts
(derided as heresies) to try to interpret them more spiritually.
But Jesus told His Apostles, "whoever hears you, hears me". If his Apostles and their successors denounce a teaching as false or heretical, we must listen to them.
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Originally Posted by MysticPhD
There is an inherent disconnect between conceptualizing things from a carnal and worldly perspective and doing so from a spiritual perspective. The carnal dominates our lives and conditions our thinking so it obviously is difficult to put aside despite ample clues suggesting that it is our state of mind (spiritual status) when we act that is of concern to God, NOT specific carnal or worldly actions, per se.
This view makes sense if you deny the Incarnation. However, we orthodox Christians believe that Jesus is not merely a messenger sent by God, but IS God. God, the Creator of the Universe, took on human flesh by being born of a woman. Jesus is wholly and completely God.
The implications of this on how we view the world are myriad.
How about I just post the following short discussion on the subject by Old Testament scholar Dr. Michael Heiser. It's about nine minutes long and will give you the gist.
How Did The Ancient Israelites Understand The CONQUEST OF CANAAN?
Paul in Heb. 5 talks about training one's senses. This is one way of bridging the "inherent disconnect".
Paul had a correct church that was wiped out by the Archonic system.
Pretty sure we've been over this. Read all of chapter 5 and you'll see it really doesn't say what you're thinking it says.
This view makes sense if you deny the Incarnation. However, we orthodox Christians believe that Jesus is not merely a messenger sent by God, but IS God. God, the Creator of the Universe, took on human flesh by being born of a woman. Jesus is wholly and completely God.
The implications of this on how we view the world are myriad.
Your view and its implications seem to completely negate the Incarnation entirely. If Jesus was NOT a human being as we are, nothing He did would have any relevance to us because God can do anything. It is precisely because He IS the firstborn HUMAN Son of God that He was able to do what we could NOT do as humans. His HUMAN consciousness became perfectly resonant (IDENTICAL) to God's Holy Spirit of agape love connecting ALL human consciousness with God. None of us could do that but we can achieve some harmonic (imperfect) resonance with Christ's perfect agape love (Grace) thereby attaining His cover for our imperfections.
Your view and its implications seem to completely negate the Incarnation entirely. If Jesus was NOT a human being as we are, nothing He did would have any relevance to us because God can do anything.
Your view and its implications seem to completely negate the Incarnation entirely. If Jesus was NOT a human being as we are, nothing He did would have any relevance to us because God can do anything. It is precisely because He IS the firstborn HUMAN Son of God that He was able to do what we could NOT do as humans. His HUMAN consciousness became perfectly resonant (IDENTICAL) to God's Holy Spirit of agape love connecting ALL human consciousness with God. None of us could do that but we can achieve some harmonic (imperfect) resonance with Christ's perfect agape love (Grace) thereby attaining His cover for our imperfections.
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Originally Posted by EscAlaMike
But Jesus is a human being just as we are...
And ... ????? If you reject my explanation of how He saved us and how His Grace covers us, kindly provide your explanation.
You reject the notion of sacrifice.
Christ saved us because His perfect sacrifice of agape love was more pleasing to God than all of our sins combined were displeasing.
I reject the notion that God required a sacrifice to appease His wrath. I accept that He expected Jesus to be sacrificed to the wrath and vengeance of our savage and brutal ancestors. Do You actually believe that the scourging and crucifixion were remotely pleasing to God???? What kind of God do you claim to love??? Don't you see that in your answer you actually refer to Christ's agape love as pleasing God, NOT the sacrifice of His blood to appease God's wrath? Which makes more sense to you as the likely reaction of a loving God who, as Jesus said, IS agape love?
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