The "Gospel" Of John

john seems the support the name of god found in the targums, Memra, which is aramaic for "to speak" (or "the word" if you will).

err, sorry, wrong verse. genesis 6:10.

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Genesis 5:32

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When Noah had lived 500 years, Noah begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth

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Genesis 6:10

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Noah begat three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

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here's another:

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Genesis 6:5

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The LORD saw how great was man's wickedness on earth, and how every plan devised by his mind was nothing but evil all the time

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Genesis 6:11,12
The earth became corrupt before God; the earth was filled lawlessness. When God saw God saw how corrupt the earth was, for all flesh had corrupted its ways on earth....

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notice one calls god by name, and the other calls god "god?"the stories are slightly different foci, but they are very separate stories.

my belief really has very little to do with the bible. i believe the bible to be a collection of writings of men regarding religion and god, not the word of god regarding men. so i have very little problems with seeing the bible as flawed -- it doesn't say anything about god.but, you raise an interesting question: if the bible cannot withstand questioning and invesigation, why should anyone believe it?

you've mostly missed the point here, swift. these are not questions you will be able to answer for me, nor are they based on single verses you can apologize for and address to make my concerns go away. they are based on years of belief and study. part of that belief i now question. i guarantee you i've read whatever verse you quote at me. and referencing john certainly will not help at all. the point of this thread is to question the gospel of john.in answer to your question, no, i would not believe him. probably not even if he DID "prove" it. jesus did not claim to be god in the other gospels; nor is he claiming any such thing in that verse either. ehe even says "the father is greater than i" which makes him, according to his own words, LESS THAN GOD. like the passage says, god would rather we do his will, and follow his law than make sacrifices.please go back to leviticus or exodus and read the requirements for sin offerings. a sin offering is an animal from your flock (a bull, usually). you have to own the animal. you (or the priest, depending) slit it's throat, drain its blood, put it on the altar with your finger, and then drain the rest at the base of the altar. then you take the coating of the intestines, the gall bladder, and the kidneys, and burn them on the altar. then you take bull and it's excriment, and burn it outside the city.so, tell me:
do you own a jesus?
is jesus a bull?
did jesus have his throat slit?
was jesus's blood drained, and spread on the altar in jerusalem?
was jesus gutted, and his internal organs burned on the alter in jerusalem?
was jesus burned in his own dung outside the city walls of jerusalem?how then is jesus a sin offering? that's totally meaningless. what is spiritual death? is that same death that adam died when he ate from the tree? it's answer made up very recently to explain certain problems, such as god's lie.jesus is quoted in thomas as saying "Whoever discovers the interpretation of these sayings will not taste death." does that sound like he's talking about spiritual death to you? or real physical death? i don't believe in hell. or the devil.reading the passages about gethsemane it's interesting to notice that jesus is the only doing any talking. it's a one sided coversation. god doesn't expect us to be god. it's completely unreasonable to think that. it makes god out to be stupid and foolhardy.why does salvation rest on jesus being god, rather than the son of god, like the bible says? that makes no sense either.if all have fallen short of god, what about the archangel michael. has he sinned? is he capable of sin? about the the sons of god (gen 6, job 1, etc). are they capable of sin?i never said that i thought jesus wasn't anything special, just that i don't think he is god. the text supports my claim. it's woefully dualistic to think there is only god and man, and nothing inbetween, especially when jesus explicitly says that he is less than god, in your verse above. i don't believe in hell. the place that is called hell in most christian bibles is hebrew "sheol" or "grave." while not exactly a literal grave in every instance, the concept is closer to the greek hades, where people are dim shadows of their former existance.jacob, israel himself, said that he's going to hell. that's just ludicrous. but i guess according to your belief he would be.why make god out to be such an abominable tyrant, that he would sentance his children to eternal torture? i would argue that crucifixion was a form of execution, which would equate to the governmental power taking his life. it's called a devil's advocate argument. i know i didn't invent it. it's not my fault that no one is swift enough to pick up on it. i'd be interested to see that prophesy. it's common jewish belief that the messiah will be a son of david, because he will be a king of judah/israel, and all hebrew kings are promised to be of the line of david in samuel.however, jesus never sat on the throne at jerusalem, did he?but aside from that, you dodged the question. which genealogy is right? or should be believe paul and ignore them? i believe i pointed one out above, which you failed to address.want another good one? the morning star, as everyone should know, is "lucifer" in latin. wanna explain that one to me? took me a year to figure out. is god held to his own requirements?then ten commandments are a form of treaty, called a suzeranty. it's a treaty between a larger and a smaller power. we have lots of these documents from the period and area, and they all open by singing the praises of the larger power. "because i did this for you.... you must do this for me" and then they list requirements. the ten commadnments is structured exactly like this. the laws are aimed directly and only at the hebrews.why would god break them? who cares? who are we to question god?and "spiritual death" is still meaningless. the hebrew word in that verse is מות and this is the very same מות that is used in:

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Gen 5:5 And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died.

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clearly, the word means physical, literal death. actually, at the time of christ, the jewish temple was exempt from paying taxes to rome. if he followed the true teachings of christ, i'd imagine so. christ was a bit of a hippie, and went around teaching people to give away stuff. actually, nero was inattentive and out of touch with what was really happening in rome, let alone the roman empire. i doubt nero would have even known about paul.but i bet his underlings did.

no.if were to type a long paragraph, and only call god "G-d" in every instance, and then in another paragraph only call god "LORD" in every instance, and then in a third, only refer to god as "Jehovah" in every instance, wouldn't it look like i had copied and pasted from an orthodox jewish source, and a christian bible, and a JW source?we have two very distinct ways of refering to god in the torah:
אֱלֹהִים (Elohym) as in genesis 1:1-2:4 and
יְהוָה אֱלֹהִים (Yahweh-Elohym) as in genesis 2:4-25notice how elohym is repeated, but the YHWH is left off the first one? why is that? the occur in very consistent patterns too. YHWH is not used once in genesis 1. when it makes the switch to YWHW-ELHYM in chapter 2, elohym alone is only used once until chapter 5 and left out entirely in chapter 4.curious, huh? why so consistent? i'm not dealing with three lines of text and creative ways to say "god" i'm looking at 5 whole chapters of the bible, and consistency in using or not using the name.

regards isaiah's son. the son himself is not the messiah, but the harbinger of one, and this would have occured during the lifetime of ahaz.jesus's name was joshua, not immanuel.like i said, quoting verse will not work on me. i've usually read them already, and understand them. heresy. notice they tried to stone him for that? i think you missed the joke on that one.

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Genesis 2:24: Hence a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, so that they become one flesh.

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are husband and wife on person?please don't quote random out of context verses at me, especially not from the text we're questioning the validity of. these are such standard christian quotes too. i'm nto stupid, and i have read them before. you failed to address my point. what meaning is a sacrifice we bear no part in? what are we giving up? what are we paying? atonement involves paying for something, my sins cannot be atoned by another.this is the very reason that guilt complexes are so common in fundamentalist christians. nothing is really done about thier own guilt, because they didn't have to pay any price for it. i think the primary purpose of sacrifices is not to appease and angry god, but to appease our own consciences. job spends just under 40 chapters taunting god into showing up. i would argue that we are separate from god. but i wouldn't call it spiritual death. well, then it didn't work, did it? i think the passage is suggesting something else: the evolution of the judaic faith away from sacrifices. notice they don't sacrifice animals anymore, even though they don't believe in jesus? qed, they have nothing to do with each other. no, but you were saying he is holding us to a godly standard of perfect. check your reference, lucifer was not an angel. or a demon. or the devil. your thinking paradise lost, not the bible. which genealogy is right, and which is wrong? what are you smoking? i want some. lucifer, in latin, means "bringer of light." similarly, noctifer means "bringer of darkness/night." why do i bring them up together? because they're both the planet venus. half the year it rises just before dawn, the other half, just before sunset. so for 6 months, it heralds the rising sun. we have a phrase for "noctifer" in english: "the evening star." similarly, "lucifer" we say as "the morning star."in hebrew, this word is heylel. in isaiah, he calls the king of babylon heylel, ben-shachar: shining son of the dawn. heylel comes from the word meaning to shine, and thus "bringer of light" and is PROBABLY also refering to the morning star, because that's certainly the way it appears in the latin vulgate (where we get the term from).it's also the title for the king of babylon. and some say orchestrated his own martyrdom. what do you mean "again?" bush is not god (thank god). we do not elect god, or change gods. i believe in god because i think he's real, not because i think he's nice. and yet the bible also depicts god as untruthful and unjust in places. curious. did i say god wasn't cruel? i said god doesn't hold us to a standard out of our own grasp. god is mightier than his laws, he is not bound by them. the original question was "what is the name of jesus's grandfather on his father's side?" the two verses say two different things. they CANNOT both be right, because joseph did not have two fathers. where does jesus sit on the throne in jerusalem? is there a difference?and actually, he did:

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Mat 19:21 Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go [and] sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come [and] follow me.

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good question! i'm not entirely sure i believe in heaven either, but i'm still working on that one. but jacob is? if god didn't want me to go hell, wouldn't he just say that i'm not going to hell? why did someone have to die for that?and if it's the death that saved people, how did jesus forgive sins and grant salvation BEFORE his death?

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Luk 7:48 And he said unto her, Thy sins are forgiven.
Luk 7:50 And he said to the woman, Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace.

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you're not entirely wrong, but not exactly right either.there was indeed a camp of aramean jews who believed in the power of words. all jews to some regard to (the reason the name of god is not spoken) but these guys took it far beyond. they're aramaic name for god was "memra" which meant "to speak" or, if you will, "the word."however, this is ONE aramaic targum, and should be considered apocryphal. not biblical.

yet you still missed the point. jesus saved that woman WITHOUT DYING.

but the bible is just another set human definitions, plural. there is no standard in the bible. it's not very consistent. you can quote a few verses that SAY god is consistent, but the bible is no consistent in its descriptions of him.

from the text. it's a sign delivered to be delivered to ahaz in specific. yes. do you know what isaiah means?there is no indication in the text that the person bearing this name is anything but that: a person. a form of the name of god being in the person's name means nothing -- almost every prominent name in the bible has some reference to god in it:isaiah, jeremiah, nehemiah, zechariah, hezekiah, josiah, and so all compain the "yah" from "yahweh"israel, immanuel, samuel, daniel, joel, ezekiel, etc, all end in the "el" from "elohym"immanuel DOES mean that god is with us -- but NOT in the person named immanuel. read the next few verses:

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Isa 7:16 For before the child [Immanuel] shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.

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see? you've chosen one of multiple ways to read this. what sounds more probable to me is that jesus is refering to god by name, and it got mistranslated (since god's name does mean "i am") uh, no, i'm the one sticking to the bible here. bull. i had nothing to do with. i wasn't there, and even if i was, i don't own a jesus. it happened before i was born, let alone before i sinned. i am not giving up anything by believing. psychologically, and according to law of god, jesus cannot be a sacrifice. i don't feel any better that someone else is bearing my sins -- i feel worse. precisely. not a sacrifice. gift &ne sacrfice. in fact, i'd say it's the opposite. god's giving something to us, not vice versa. but again, why was death neccessary? as i've quoted before, jesus forgave sins before his death. not sure. like i said, crisis of faith. personally, my opinion is that jesus's life was more important. and i don't believe that god became man, ever. we are separate from god because god is separate from us. we are not gods. how does one turn their back on themselves? go practice that for a while.

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Mat 6:7 But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen [do]: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.

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jesus says: repitition doesn't make you right.seriously, go read the book of job. the whole premise is that job has not sinned. if he has, his test is merely punishment. job is called perfect, which has to mean "without sin" in this context. there is no other possibility. i bite my nails. could i still be blameless if i keep biting my nails? how intimately do you think god cares about the standards?i think he cares about intent, and the big things, but is not asking us to be perfect in the modern sense of the word, and certainly not in the godly sense of the word. you. read my posts before you make a fool out of yourself. i do believe i referenced isaiah 14. it is not refering to anyone but the king of babylon. people who read greek. again, bush is not god. nor is any other man. we do not elect our god, and he does not sit in authority because of any social contract. we cannot overthrow or kill our god. our god is god because HE IS. we don't have a choice in the matter, except whether we believe or not.and yes, there ARE a lot of people who do not believe in god precisely because he does not follow his own rules, according to the bible. you may be interested in this old thread: http://EvC Forum: Why I am creationist -->EvC Forum: Why I am creationisti caused quite a stir in it, actually. mike the wiz asserted that people believe in evolution because of their "fear of bibleGod being true." he was being facetious of course, but i, in turn, responded that this is a perfectly valid reason why people shun christianity, and listed a bunch of "crimes" of god. mike got REALLY upset, called me an unbeliever, saying that i was accusing god and saying blasphemy etc.if i spoke blasphemy, then the bible is blasphemous, because nothing i said cannot be found in the bible. here's the list of bible quotes about god doing things outside of our standards of morality: http://EvC Forum: Why I am creationist -->EvC Forum: Why I am creationistgod's law clearly does not apply god: only man. that's nice. what's the name of joseph's father?

ooh. i'll think about that one.

i've already demonstrated that jesus neither fits the requirement for atonement, nor can sin be forgiven before being committed, nor does salvation depend on being death and/or perfection.there is no strict judaic base for modern christianity. it doesn't line up.

i alleged no such thing. i pointed out what the bible says. i never once said that i thought it was contradictory, because i don't think it is. it's not fault that what the bible says about god doesn't fit your frame of mind. that post was discussed at length in that thread. i'm not really interested in arguing about whether or not god told the israelites to steal, and whether god killed millions of innocent children. any idiot can open bible and read that story. none of those were googled. they all come from reading the bible, and familiarity with the bible. and like i believe i said in the post, 90% of those came from the first 4 books. that's not a lot of reading, you know. it's not my fault that i'm capable of examining the text with a critical mind. god gave me the gift of a brain, i like to use it sometimes.i've also spent time thinking about the answer to this "problem." but you (and swift) don't seem to like it: god is greater than his own morality, and not bound by the laws of men. it's not our place to judge the actions of god, because he is god.so what if god lied? or killed people? that's his job, and he does what's in the best interest of whole, often at the cost of the few. that's just the way the world works, and just the way god made things.

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Mat 1:16 And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ.

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what's the name of (joseph and the technicolor dreamcoat) joseph's father? jacob. interesting. note that you can't hold this "begat" to mean adopted by marriage, otherwise jesus might not be god's biological son. note how one is FIFTEEN GENERATIONS longer than the other? note how matthew's doesn't line up with chronicles? sorry, ONE of those three texts has to be in error. the messiah, by tradition (if not text) has to be an heir to david's throne. luke's text only seems to be concerned with being from the line of david, not being an heir. interesting.This message has been edited by Arachnophilia, 12-12-2004 07:38 PM

glady. i'll break it down nice and simple. (spacing and brackets mine)

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Isaiah 7:10-14

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And the LORD spoke again unto Ahaz, saying: "Ask thee a sign of the LORD thy God: ask it either in the depth, or in the height above."

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But Ahaz said: "I will not ask, neither will I try the LORD."

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And he [Isaiah] said: "Hear ye now, O house of David [King Ahaz]: Is it a small thing for you to weary men, that ye will weary my God also? Therefore the Lord Himself shall give you [King Ahaz] a sign: behold, the young woman shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel..."

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and then it goes on to talk about assyria. the verse, one more time.

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Isa 7:16 For before the child [Immanuel] shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.

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i don't know how to make this any more clear. they're saying that before the child even reaches his bar mitzvah, the kings will be gone. the gospel of john, yes. and i will and have defended that position with what? the bible. give god my soul? he gave it to me. my soul is of god. this is not something that can be proven. rather, i was asserting that there other ways to read the text that you seem to have missed. you sir are a discredit to christianity. love your enemy? compassion? do unto others? these aren't important? his teaching and his message meant nothing, so long as he died? jesus is not a lamb, he was a person. he did more than just get led to slaughter.in fact, there are gospels that don't even record his death. i've read one of them. yes, in john. this is the topic being addressed. look, even if he was god, and became man, being a jewish man, he would still be held to god's law, even if he himself wrote those laws. for him to be the sinless sacrificial lamb christianity claims he is, that would include not breaking god's law, even if he is god. and that includes not walking around claiming to be god. even if he is god.quite simply, to the letter of the law, it is blasphemy. do you want to believe in a christ who broke the laws of god? john records blasphemy, and this the exact reason we are having this debate. no you won't. i've drawn my own conclusions, and that's what we're arguing now, isn't it? it's called a metaphor. ever read genesis 11, the tower of babel? king nebuchadnezzar, whom is the king in question if i recall correctly, rebuilt that tower during the lifetime of isaiah. the tower was said to reach to the heavens (sky skraper, stairway to heaven, etc) and it was the glory of the babylonian empire.talking about crushing babylon would mean the tower falling from the heavens it reached to, and the king (refered to as a star) falling with it. see? symbolism.insert a 911 reference if you like, since that was more or less their goal too. if we're gonna say "throw logic to the wind" then just say it. belief is irrational, after all. but face it, either there is a separation, or their isn't. if jesus was separated from god, then he is separate from god. it's called a joke. they idea of the humor was me thinking of you spinning in circles on the floor, like homer simpson trying to read the writing on the back of his head. are we debating translations now?my text says "blameless." but more over, as i've explained innumerable times, the context indicates that the word means "without sin." read the book. most of it's an argument between job and his friends about whether or not he has sinned. job asserts that he as not, consistent with the first two chapters.clearly, if job did sin or had sinned in the past, he would have accepted his punishment. personally, no. hebrew is the next laguage i need to learn. but i've heard several opinions on meaning of the word we translate as "betray" by people who do speak greek. take it up with dpardo, he disagrees. although i think you have a better chance at being right than he does. apocryphal literature agress with you, at least, and matthew indicates actual parentage where luke is just a list.

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the son of Joseph, which was [the son] of Heli

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now, of heli could mean of the house of heli. but either way, that's not how marriage works. son in law would be a completely different word. rather, it says "ioseph tou eli, tou matthat, tou levi, tou..." etc.i've seen some opinion that it COULD be saying (because of the lack of the preposition on jospeh) that the genealogical sequence begans at heli, joseph being a paranthetical asside. meaning, the verse would read like this "And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed the son of Joseph) of Heli..." etc. which is, btw, what the text says. but the meaning changes completey depending on where you but the parentheses.i dunno, but this sounds offtopic. make another thread we'll discuss there.