What did I Misunderstand, Zachariah?

Not sure what you mean by MATCH.The Greek version, using the one and only Greek word for virgin, might be misunderstood by Matthew. Or, perhaps he wanted to believe it meant something other than what it Obviously means, or doesn't mean, in Hebrew. As for intent to deceive, well ... He had probably already deceived himself, so the next step was easy and innocent, sort of.As to the location of Bethany. My bad. I was thinking of Cana, the place where the wedding is supposed to have been. It's easy enough to put places on a map where they are supposed to have been 2000 years ago, just because the Bible says so. Finding them and proving it are something else again. I need to do a bit of searching for the source of my skeptical information. I'll bet back to you later on that.dbThanks for the link to that map. I collect 'em.

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Maybe the author is unknown in this passage but the book of John is named so because it was written by John.

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who was john? i know a million guys named john.historically the many, many gospels we have were almost never written by the people they claimed to be. thomas for instance was written by someone claiming to be like the thomas of fame. luke is the only one i'm willing to believe as honest, because he claims to be writing it after the fact, and for the express purpose of reconciling stories.john, i disregard for a few reasons. it's blatantly antisemitic. (look at the passage about pilate and the jews, during the trial). by the time john was written, the early christian church sought to distinguish itself from judaism. they often did this by slandering jews. personally, i don't find that very christian. also, jesus walks around claiming to be god, the son of god, the savior, the only way into heaven, etc. this leaves two possibilities. one: this is really what happened, which makes jesus guilty of BLASPHEMY according to jewish traditions (distracting from god "the father") and his execution just. meaning he died for his sins, not ours. two: the book is meant as sheer propaganda, and not literal. the things attributed to jesus were to draw a following, not what he actually said.john also goes into much greater detail on certain parts than previously existing texts. this leads me to believe that much of john was pure fabrication, and designed to sell the christian religion, while making judaism look bad. not exactly the holy word of god.as a christian, i'm not quite comfortabel with the book. of course, that's reading it with an open mind.

And thanks for your input on the alternate meaning of the ",even unto ..." phrase, I don't know a lick about Hebraic or Greek languages. It just appeared to me to be used most often in the parallel emphasis manner, rather than conjunctive. I accept that Matt's interpretation is an innocent mistake. But I think you would probably agree that the silliness resulting from that mis-interpretation, plus the testimony of three other gospel writers that contradicts the two animal interpretation makes it obviously a mistake. Let me illustrate my point. If I told you that not only did my brother predict beforehand that the Yankees would win last years Superbowl, but that his prophecy actually came true because I witnessed the Yankees winning the Superbowl, then I am not only making the silly mistake that a baseball team couldn't even play in the Superbowl, but I am obviously lying when I say that I witnessed a highly improbable event. Now if I had said the Seahawks won the Superbowl (you can stop laughing now ), then I might be deceiving you or merely erroneous. My point is that if a mistaken claim of witnessing an actual event is matched to a mistaken interpretation of its prophesy, then it indicates more than two innocent mistakes. It indicates that the author of Matthew made the prophesized event "match" the identically mis-interpreted prophesy. Now, he can only change his witness to the prophesized event, because the prophecy is recorded long before his time, so it can not be manipulated by him. Only an intentional alteration of his witness can make the two match. [Unless he didn't realize that he was seeing double, in which case, it may be an innocent error, but even more grounds to throw out all of his testimony.]Edited because I felt like it.This message has been edited by mogur, 05-21-2004 08:55 PM

Great point, John's book is designed to sell a new radical religion to the Gentiles. Even Jesus, by most accounts, preached mainly to the Gentiles, and ridiculed the Hebraic elite until he scared them into oppressing him. The plan was to spread his new religion worldwide by obliterating the chosen people handicap. To exclude the traditional believers was essential to the Christian movement. Whether Jesus did this as a person, or as a fable, certainly hasn't affected its popularity. If Jesus was an actual radical zealot, then his disciples are fools. If Jesus is a fabrication, however, then the biblical authors are clever salesmen.America has been terribly anti-semitic until we learned that hating Muslims is way more fun . We seem to preach the NT on Sundays and spend the rest of the week practicing the OT. But, fundamentalistic religious genocide has been mankind's nature well across historical and national boundaries. I don't think an atheist dreamed up that "manifest destiny" crap that used to pass for national pride.Edited for further pontification.This message has been edited by mogur, 05-21-2004 08:23 PM

I'd be happy to take better digitals tomorrow in the daylight and ftp them to you. There are 10 very interesting maps in the back of this 1978 New American Standard Version bible that I just received. Or, I could just upload to the hosting site (since it's free, it has a 600Kb per file limit).Edited for content and a typo.This message has been edited by mogur, 05-21-2004 08:48 PM

This is what I found on the subject of the location of Cana. Please pardon the cut and paste.CANA, of Galilee, a village of Palestine remarkable as the home of Nathanael, and the scene of Christs beginning of miracles (John ii. 1-11, iv. 46-54). Its site is unknown, but it i~ evident from the biblical narrative that it was in the neighbor~ood of, and higher than, Capernaum. Opinion as to identifica tion is fairly divided between Kefr Kenna and Kanlt-el-Jelil. The former; about 4 m. N.N.E. of Nazareth, contains a ruined church and a small Christian population; the latter is an uninhabited village about 9 m. N. of Nazareth, with no remains but a few cisterns.http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/C/CA/CANA_of_Galilee.htm

this assertion is not neccessarily correct. by many accounts, he was just trying to reform judaism. earlier texts indicate him saying things like that he didn't come to change the law but to fulfil it.This message has been edited by Arachnophilia, 05-22-2004 01:01 AM

It's on the map I posted. 13 miles west of the sea of galilee. About a mile east of Jotapata. Capernaum is on the edge of the
Sea of Galilee.

Boy, you really got that one right. I'm just throwing out my general impressions. I've only been immersed in serious study of this subject for a few weeks. Hardly enough to impress myself, much less anyone else.Yes, you are right that in Matt 5:17, Jesus claims to not have come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it. However, he thens proceeds to teach five pages of modifications to those laws, including- "You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for and eye, and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, do not resist him who is evil; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also."Lev. 24:19-20 "'And if a man injures his neighbor, just as he has done, so it shall be done to him: fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; ..."So, exactly how do I obey Jesus, without violating Moses' law?My assertion is based only on my impression that the book of John demonstrates that Jesus deliberately baited the religious elite, scoffed at most of the Hebraic traditions and it seems clear to me that he needed to be condemned by the church to satisfy his plan. He continually pissed off the Pharisees, but would always disappear just before they could stone him to death. He even delays Lazarus's resurrection by two days to maximize publicity. He repeatedly hid himself when things got too hot, then would fan the flames again, specifically to worry the religious leaders. That plan wasn't to get stoned to death by common Pharisees, and it certainly wasn't to be executed by the Romans as a common criminal. The plan was to be dramatically crucified by the Hebrew elders. If that wasn't his plan, then he is a piss-poor messiah, because that is how the story goes.John 11:47-54
Therefore the chief priests and the Pharisees convened a council, and were saying, "What are we doing? For this man is performing many signs. If we let Him go on like this, all men will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation." But a certain one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, "You know nothing at all, nor do you take into account that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish." Now this he did not say on his own initiative; but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation, and not for the nation only, but that He might also gather together into one the children of God who are scattered abroad. So from that day on they planned together to kill Him. Jesus therfore no longer continued to walk publicly among the Jews, but went away from there to the country near the wilderness, into a city called Ephraim; and there He stayed with the disciples.I rest my case.

well, yes, this is certainly true of the gospel of john. john was never directed at jewish people, but to direct people AWAY from it.the textual indications are of course that jesus's preaching was largely directed at jews, and not to radically change the religion itself -- just to redirect the hearts of the people. this mosaic law, like the babylonian precept it was stolen from, is designated limits on proper punishment and repunative measures. the idea was to establish a principle of fairness. often, in terms of goods (verse 21) the principle is repayment or replacement as punishment, but for things such as eyes and teeth, which could not be replaced, the same was still required of the offender. that is, should the original victim require it. but that was the maximum that could required. just one life, for one life. one eye for one eye, etc.what jesus was trying to do was point out that revenge, though legally allowable in this instance, was not a good thing, and it should not be motive of a person. it was not exactly an attempt to change the law of moses (presuming this is an actual mosaic law and not picked up later in babylon), but redirect the people under it. sort of the difference between laws and personal principles.i think, i'll have to check, that every verse following the proclamation of not changing the law, is this way. in that case, the verse serves as a sort of disclaimer.but anyhow, as for jesus's real message, should he have really existed, we may never know. all we have of him is bias propaganda literature, all with their own political intents.

If mosaic law means those in exodus 21, then verse 24 gives the 'eye for an eye' quote, but I used the leviticus reference only because it was more concise and wasn't complicated with a pregnant woman clause. At any rate, your point is extremely well taken, and I yield the point.

i'm still personally interested in knowing whether these passages were borrowed from the code of hammurabi before or during the babylonian exhile.i mean, it's pretty obvious that they stole it from there, though. This message has been edited by Arachnophilia, 05-22-2004 04:45 AM

My point is, that this map shows a location which the encyclopedia says is unknown. Anyone can produce a map. The inconvenient truth is that there are many places mentioned in the Bible which we have been unable to identify.db

True, true. But this map is in the BIBLE and my copy is inerrant. The infidels that edited your encylclopedia, who knows?

I appreciate your sense of humor.Hopefully we can someday confirm the location of Cana.db