'Some still living' disproves literal truth of the bible

When I am ready to talk more about signs, I'll do it.I am not evading some scary point you think you have. Right now I choose to concentrate on your reply from Luke 17.Noted that "jumping around" is fine with you as long as it establishes your argument.This is hypocritical of you. So stop complaining about my jumping around.Be back latter.

Speaking so soon ? I am working on a reply that takes me time.First we will deal with the Zechariah problem. Then we will deal with the different styles of writing between MAtthew and Luke.As if Christians have never heard these objections before.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

When hERICtic doesn't like something in the Scripture he likes to deny that it is Scripture. He didn't like Second Peter so he charges it with being a forgery. He doesn't like Matthew 23:35 about "Zechariah the son of Barachiah" so he makes a move to exclude that from Scripture also.At first glance it seems "Zechariah the son of Barachiah" is a mistake. After all the Jewish Bible at the time was laid out in different order from today's Christian "Old Testament". We might assume that Matthew meant Zechariah ben Jehoiada (2 Chronicles 24:20-22). Unlike the Christian Old Testament whose last OT book is Malachi the Jewish Bible of Matthew's day had Second Chronicles as its last book. Whereas Christians refer to Genesis to Revelation as the full sweep of God's word the Jews of Matthew's day would say Genesis to Chronicles to indicate their version of the full scope of God's word.This is how Matthew would have been familar with the lay out of the Hebrew Bible: Because their last in thier order was Chronicles some people think that Jesus must have meant Abel to Zechariah the son of Jehoiahda of the book of Chronicles.Many scholars however do not believe that Jesus was refering to Zechariah ben Jehoiada but as it says "Zechariah the son of Barachiah " (Zechariah 1:1) . "In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of Jehovah came to Zechariah the prophet, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo ..." (Zech .1:1) It is a fact that the Bible itself tells us nothing about how Zechariah the son of Barachiah died. That does not mean that Zechariah the son of Barachiah could NOT have been murdered in a similar manner as Zechariah ben Jehoiada.There are thirty Zechariahs in the Old Testament. Many prophets and priests were murdered by their persecutors. It should not be thought impossible that more than one Zechariah was murdered. And it is not clear that the locations within the temple complex referred to by Matthew and Chronicles were identical.It is suspected by some that Jesus was refering to another Zechariah. And though the Hebrew Scruptures tell us nothing about how Zechariah the son of Barachiah died, Jesus could have had information from non-canonical material on Jewish history telling them so.Jesus could have refered to some extra-biblical material in His discussions with other 1st century Jews. We are not confined to finding it in the OT text--it would be perfectly natural to find such material.In the case of Jesus' assertion that Zechariah son of Barachiah was killed in the same way as Zechariah son of Jehoiada we actually have several strands of extra-biblical material that suggest/support this.David H. Stern mentions two: "Josephus speaks of Zechariah the son of Barach as having been killed in the temple, and Targum Yonatan assigns the same kind of death to Zechariah the prophet." In his book The Historical Reliability of the Gospels by Craig Blomberg , Blomberg writes: "The fact that some rabbinic traditions (e.g. the Targum to La. 2:20 and the Midrash Rabbah on Ec. 3:16) also refer to Zechariah the prophet as being killed in the temple make the suggestion very attractive that Jesus is following extra-biblical tradition here. The coincidence of having two Zechariahs killed in a similar way leads many Jewish commentators to reject their traditions as also confused with error, but the coincidence is certainly not that impossible. After all, there are thirty Zechariahs in the Old Testament, prophets and priests were not infrequently murdered by their rivals, and it is not clear that the locations within the temple complex referred to by Matthew and Chronicles were identical." Heretic writes: Zechariah 1:1 says "Zechariah the son of Berechiah" .It is understandable and probable that if Jesus meant His condemnation to have the force that ("you have killed all the prophets up to now") it would have the strongest impact if the last martyrdom would have been the most recent and most explicit witness to Him. Zechariah the son of Barachiah would have served that purpose very well.Why? Because that prophet spoke of the "30 pieces of silver", by which God's Messiah was betrayed. He also prophesied about "your king comes on a donkey" and "the pierced YHWH" passages of Zechariah 12:10. These were the preachings of a prophet much latter than Zechariah ben Jehoiada of Second Chronicles.So the fact that the OT does not tell us how Zechariah the son of Barachiah died is not an insurmountable problem to Matt. 23:35.Glenn Miller writes about the span of Abel to Zechariah the son of Barachiah rather than the historically former Zechariah: I will attend to Heretic's quotation of Luke 11:47 in another post.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

What was dishonest about what I wrote about Zechariah the son of Barachiah?I did not even go to tektonics.org. You assumed that.The source that I did use I gave credit to. At least I mentioned the name Glenn Miller. And his website "The Christian Think Tank" is not Tekton Education and Apologetics Ministries, James Patrick Holding. He may have a link to it. But I did not use it.Furthermore, the webstite that you insinuate me of using said that there were 6 possible solutions to the Zechariah the son of Barachiah issue. One of the possible solutions, JPH says, is that the Zechariah in question is unknown.So where is my dishonesty ?I did not even use that webstite. And the website I used said that there were more than 6 possible solutions to the issue. I proposed what Miller considers as the best among them.I have the right to propose the better among a number of possible solutions. I have explicit permission from Glenn Miller to quote his website.Using anyone's material is not necessarily a wholesale endorsement of everything written by that person. I in fact may NOT agree with everything else an apologist writes.So where is the dishonesty ? Or is it that you think ALL Christians who defend their faith against the skeptical are "dishonest" on general principle ?At any rate if you cannot point out the dishonesty the proper thing to do would be to retract your accusation that I am being dishonest.As for the subject of SIGNS. I can't yet dedicate my time to it because I refuse to allow certain faulty concepts proposed by you to go unspoken to.And I am quite a few posts behind dealing with those points I believe merit reply. For this reason it is better that we do not continue as a dialogue but just make our points third person style. But you can do what you want.I have not finished writing about the moral generation. When I have then possibly I can give dedicated attention to the issue of signs.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

hERICtic devotes three points to Zechariah ben Barachiah. When I take time to reply, he says its moot.He brought it up. If it were such a moot point he could have not brought it up. At any rate now I will deal with the second section of his post. Question:Will the opposers of the past who killed Abel and the other righteous persons up to Zechariah be absolved from guilt ?Will only the contemporary generation be punished for the murders of those people and the PAST generations be excused ?When it says in Luke " In order that the blood of all the prophets which has been poured out from the foundation of the world may be required of this generation " did Jesus mean that the PAST generations would not be held responsible ?I say of course not. Cain will still have to answer to God for the murder of Abel. Therefore "this generation" is a perjorative term expressing that the current audience is in a negative moral solidarity with Cain and all the other OT persecutors. The current audience is the epitome of a long negative attitude which reaches back across chronological boundaries.Jesus could not have meant that RATHER THAN Cain being held responsible the current audience would be instead. Rather He must have meant that they ALL together will be held responsible.So "this generation" the negative qualitative group of Israel's leaders who have resisted the prophets over many chronological boundaries.In Matthew 23 immediately after the sentence "Truly, I say to you, All these things shall come upon this generation" Jesus speaks of His past attempts to shelter Jerusalem: Practically in the next breath Jesus turns from the phrase "this generation" to "you would not" speaking to Jerusalem the city WHO IN THE PAST and over various chronological boundaries, would not be sheltered by God.(Jesus is God incarnated)Therefore I submit that "this generation" in verse 36 and "you" in verse 37 indicate a moral generation of the religious leaders against God. Time limit is not the restrictive. The solidarity of their negative attitude over different life spans is the issue.Now consider the logic here. If Jesus was saying that ALL.... ALL of the guilt because of past persecutions would be placed upon the current chronological generation, then NONE of it would be placed on past chronological generations. That would mean for example the CAIN would be absolved from all guilt. And all retibution owed CAIN would instead be put on the current chronological generation.I don't think that makes sense. And I don't think that would be the proper way to understand "Truly I say to you, All these things will come upon this generation" (Matt. 23:36) or the Lukian version "Yes, I tell you, it will be required of this generation." (Luke 11:51) But if Cain is held responsible ALONG with the latter and modern day Cain like persecutors, then together they share a negative solidarity expressed as a moral generation which knows no specific time limits.In the futue God will send more prophets and apostles, and "some of them they will kill and persecute" (Luke 11:49) or Matthew's version "Some of them YOU will kill and crucify, etc." (Matt. 23:34). There is no good reason to believe that after 70 AD there would be no divine retribution against similar opposition to His servants. The word "YOU" in Matthew 23:34 implies these future persecutors are of the same generation. The behavior was in the past. The behavior is in the present. And the behavior will continue into the future. "This generation" is best understood there as a moral generation.The entire Old Testament testifies pretty strongly that the persecutors of the past prophets were not absolved if they did not repent. There is no reason to believe that Israel of Jerusalem was absolved of her unrepented of crimes and that God was waiting for the chronological age of Jesus to do so. That would not makes sense in light of the Babylonian captivity or other disciplinary actions God took on Israel.Furthermore, in Acts Peter speaking to the Jewish leaders exhorts them to "be saved from this perverse generation" (Acts 2:40).Would Peter mean that they should be saved from being contemporary people ? How could they do that ? But by repenting and believing in the Messiah whom the leaders had opposed they COULD be saved from the moral generation.And that is what happend to 3,000 on one occasion and 5,000 on another. They came into the new covenant church life as Christians and were saved from the perverse moral generation of Messiah opposing religious leaders.Now if hERICtic protests that this is all jumping around or not the point, just remember, HE is the one saying there is NO other understanding of "this generation" in the New Testament except chronological. So this post is NOT beside the point.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

This is an exaggeration.Out of the 51 verses in Matthew 24 the words only appear in verses 32 and 33. You have to read through 31 verses before you see those words. "But learn the parable from the fig tree: As soon as its branch has become tender and puts forth it leaves, you know that the summer is NEAR.

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So also you, when you see all these things, know that it is near, at the doors." (Matt. 24:32,33)There is a sense of urgency in verses 3 - 31.
But a sense of urgency is not a prediction as to time.You read 28 verses before you are told that a event B comes "immediately" after an event A. "Immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

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And at that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribles of the land will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory" (vs 29,30)We are told that IMMEDIATLY after an A there will follow a B.We are not told how much time elapses between the verbal warnings of Jesus and event A. The closeness of B to A only is expressed. The closeness of the Son of Man appearing to the end of the tribulation is indicated.How long it will be TO the tribulation is not given.There are a few passages telling the disciples in essence not to prematurely expect the end. These passages contain phrases like: "... beginning of the birth pangs, (v.8)
... but the end is not yet. " (v.6) We are told that the end comes after the gospel of the kingdom is preached to the whole inhabited earth (v.14)[/b]We are not told that that will take a short time or a long time.We are not told that immediately after Jesus speaks tribulation like no other commences. We are not told when it begins.Out of 51 verses I could only find 2 which mentioned "near" and "at the doors". Following this there are yet another 21 verses (v. 35 through 51). And the tone of all those verses is that because the disciples are IGNORANT or precisely WHEN the second coming of Christ is to occur they must therefore be prudent, vigilant, and ready.My conclusion:I have no problem seeing that the apostles themselves expected and hoped that the second coming would be in thier lifetimes.All indications I see from their writings reveal that this did not stop them from preparing their followers for the contingency that He might NOT come before they died. And there is absolutely no sense of the lessening of their enthusiam.Personally, I think the integrity of Jesus Christ is above questioning. If there is a discrepency between His teachings and the facts as we see them, I choose the position that His integrity is beyond reproach and the problem must be on the side of our interpretation of His teachings.Skeptics have the right to assume that the problem is rather on the side of Christ's teachings. And you can trust in a failed prophecy concept if you wish.I see too many other evidences that allow for the understanding of a delay in His second coming. It is not insignificant to me that not only was the word delayed used in His teaching but there is a prophecy of the termination of it in the book which most thoroughly expounds on last things, the book of Revelation: The book of Revelation is even more dedicated to eschatology then the book of Matthew. I have to consider all that is written on the matter. I don't care if this is seen as "jumping around".Probably the most deciding factor is how the word "generation" should be interpreted in Matthew 24:34.I see a perjorative expression, qualitative in nature rather than chronological.In Psalm 12:5-8 we see the wicked persecuting the righteous. And then the Psalmist says "Thou, O Lord, will keep them [the righteous] Thou wilt preserve him from this generation forever. The wicked strut about on every side, when vileness is exalted among the sons of men." I believe that both in Matthew 24:34 an in Psalm 12:5-9 "this generation" is not ised to mean "all people who are NOW alive". Nor is the meaning "all people in this forty year period". Rather it means "the wicked" who afflict the righteous. The issue extends over chronological lines. Therefore it is to be preserved from it "forever", ie. as long as it is needed.The matter is spiritual and moral rather than chronological.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

The question of what signs are for was answered by me in message 333 about 20 posts ago when I wrote: Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

Hi John10:10,You wrote to hERICtic this: I would have to review this contraversy over 2 Peter. However, I don't think pushing it out of the NT canon will do anything for hERICtic's cause.The passages I used from 2 Peter saying "Do not let this one thing escape you, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like one day" (3:8) is a reference anyway to Psalm 90:4. The truth of God still stands. Maybe hERICtic will now have to charge Psalm 90 with being a forgery too, to get rid of the truth.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

I don't think you would be able to back that up. All teachings concerning the coming of Christ are in fact NOT all along the line of it being soon.But the "soon" is a more of a subjective matter of how wisely one utilizes TIME.For example, you hERICtic know that one day your life will come to an end. You are obviously an adult and have by now this realization.Tell us, is your death coming "soon" or is it a long way off ?Think of it. All your plans will come to an end. All your dreams will come to an end. You will be stopped in your tracks concerning whatever endevours you are pursuing. It is all coming to a termination one day. Whatever mark you have made in life will be set forever as it is.Is that day coming "soon" or is that day a long long way off ?I wager that how "soon" you consider the day of your death to be coming has much to do with your appreciation of how to use the TIME that you have now.It is much the same with Christ's second coming. Probably most people, when He comes, will think He came TOO soon rather than too late. It depends a great deal on how they used the available time they have.And it is for this reason that the parables AFTER Matthew 24 were given by the Lord Jesus teaching His followers the wise use of the time that they have to be prudent, watchful and ready to meet the Lord.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

I wonder if you are losing it.I discuss signs in Matthew 24 and you respond that you didn't mean JUST Matthew 24. Now you seem to be saying the opposite "JUST Matthew 24".I lost a post also. I labored an hour verse by verse on the 51 verses of Matthew 24 to examine them which included the words "soon" or "nearby" etc.Well, like you, in a split second I erased that post accidently. Then I gave you the abbreviated summary under the heading "Signs".Your reply in essence "I DIDN'T SAY JUST MATTHEW 24 !".
Now you're back to insisting "JUST MATTHEW 24!" All, that is ALL of the teachings in the New Testament on the second coming of Christ do not all stress "soon". Many do. All do not.The Bible is more balanced then you want to be. You want it to be a caricature and lopsided.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

The question of what signs are for was answered by me in message 333 about 26 posts ago by now when I wrote: Please look again at the last two sentences. Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

The tactic of displaying exasperation at repeating yourself is getting old.You should be able to refute me without this show. As far as I can see your argument is beginning to boil down to exasperation at repeated requests.I am looking for some other substantive contributions now. Okay. But you are not contemplating anything else in his writing.How SOON is your last day of life ?This Bible is a book of LIFE. You cannot say that Peter's expectation makes the delayed second coming of Jesus wrong.At best you can say He didn't return as SOON as Peter wanted or expected.Please answer me - How SOON is your last day of life coming ? I did not read your websites.And I do not see any difference. To God one day is LIKE a thousand years. And that is all I have said.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

I think he's got it.Right, to God one day and a thousand years are like each other. So if God's PEOPLE more and more get to thinking like God thinks, they TOO ... will realize that a thousand years is like one day ... TO GOD.But His coming is STILL soon. Because He is King of kings and Lord of Lords. And because we have to give an account to Him of every careless word we uttered let alone our actions as Christians.Because we have to stand before His blazing gaze from which NOTHING is hidden. And because we have to be examined by the One who lives in us.You bet your bottom dollar its coming SOON!Doesn't it depend a lot on your attitude towards the One who is coming ?

The signs are like indications pointing to His coming. Is that what you want ?They are like signals saying "You're on the right track. Don't worry."When you take off in an airplane there are signs along the runway. No doubt the pilots understand what each one of them mean.When it is coasting out to the runway there are signs all along the ground. This doesn't mean the pilot is to full thrust the engine as soon as the first two or three signs are seen.I'll tell you one of the tale tell SIGNS which will accompany Christ's return. That is a lot of skeptics saying that He's not returning. We fully anticipate that the number of intellectuals jeering and mocking saying "Where is this Second Coming of Jesus Christ anyway ? You're deluded. You're in error."Jesus knew this. And Jesus also said "... when the Son of Man comes will He find faith on the earth ?" (Luke 18:8) For every passage you show me that the Second Coming is close I can show you another two passages arming and equiping the believers for endurance, long suffering, steadfastness, and perserverance indicating that they are in the race for the long run.I take BOTH kinds of utterances seriously as a Christian.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

Who wants to examine with me some passages emphasizing the OTHER side of the Second Coming of Christ?That is that it is not so near and that the saints should arm themselves for the long haul of faith.Do you think that God Almighty accompishes nothing within His people in the intervening years before Christ's second coming ?Don't you know that God is growing a crop of divine life within people on the earth ?Sure He is. That is why in Revelation 14 the "SIGN" (1:1) of the reaping of a Harvest is equated with the second coming. Christ is like a farmer patiently cultivating His crop of God-men and God-women on the earth: This is a sign of the second coming of the Son of Man on the clouds of Heaven to rapture to Himself His "crop" of believers on the earth. It corresponds to the teaching of 1 Thess. 4:17.You see ? Jesus is like a patient farmer growing His crop. Finally the hour to REAP the HARVEST will come. He does not want to reap the crop prematurely. He is waiting for the maturity of the growth to RIPEN the crop.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.