Message 1 of 168 (22915) 11-16-2002 6:48 AM

Ok wait I hear you saying, there is no evidence for this, even if we look at the greek there is no support for this.
In Matthew 1:16 we read "jacob the husband of mary" and in Matthew 1:18-19 we read ,
"This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly."
Surely these are the same people. In the greek version the same word is used to describe each man "aner. Each man is described as aner, each man must be the husband.
However when we go to the aramiac version of Matthew, the peshitta, used in the Assyrian Church of the East we find a different story.
The joseph mentioned in 1:16 is described as being "gowra, a word used elsewhere in Matthew to signify a father.
For example in matthew 7:9 it reads, "Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake?. The Aramaic reads "which man (gowra) among you...."
Thus the aramaic differentiates between these two different Josephs while the greek translator did not.
Ok now i hear you saying, "but Matthew was written in greek not in Aramaic", but again the evidence does not support this. take this quote attributed to Papias, “Matthew composed his history in the Hebrew dialect and every one translated it as he was able” (the "hebrew dialect, rather than hebrew language, being the hebrew dailect of aramaic or syrian).
Another interesting quote from this history is in Book V,
chapter 10 concerning an Egyptian father named
Pantaenus who lived in the 2nd century:

"Of these Pantaenus was one:it is stated that he went as
far as India, where he appears to have found that
Matthew's Gospel had arrived before him and was in the
hands of some there who had come to know Christ.
Bartholomew, one of the apostles, had preached to them
and had left behind Matthew's account in the actual
Aramaic characters, and it was preserved till the time of
Pantaenus's mission."

Quoted from the translation by G. A. Williamson, The
History of the Church, Dorset Press, New York, 1965,
pages 213-214.
So we see this apparent problem is easily resolved ;-)

Message 2 of 168 (22920) 11-16-2002 9:44 AM

Reply to: Message 1 by judge 11-16-2002 6:48 AM

You've probably noticed that a similar topic has had my attention of late, but you take a different tack, so lets see what we can do.

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Originally posted by judge:
However if we add up the generations it is quite clear there are only 41! A pretty obvious mistake!

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okey dokey

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Secondly Matthew tels us that Josephs father was Jacob
Matthew 16:19
" and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ."
whereas Luke seems to clearly and directly contradict this, Luke 3:23-24
"Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph,
the son of Heli, the son of Matthat,
the son of Levi, the son of Melki,
the son of Jannai, the son of Joseph,"

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OK. That is the significant chunk.

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Unfortunately many commentators have tried to explain this by ignoring what the text plainly says.

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Tell me about it

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Surely these are the same people. In the greek version the same word is used to describe each man "aner.

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There seems to be some debate as to what language Matthew actually wrote. Interesting but not a critical point, as I see it. Let's go with the Hebrew, as you propose.

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Thus the aramaic differentiates between these two different Josephs while the greek translator did not.

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The very first translation of Matthew from Aramaic which I stumbled across reads virtually identical to the more common translations.

http://ww.v-a.com/bible/matthew-1.html

Matt. 1:16 To Jacob Joseph, husband of Mary, the Mary to whom was born Jesus, who is called the Anointed One.

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So we see this apparent problem is easily resolved ;-)

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So the idea is that Matthew was written in Hebrew and that work was translated into Greek and into Aramaic. The Greek has an error, the Aramaic does not.

hmmm... we do not have the Hebrew original, so how do we know which is more accurate?

Translator error, eh? So much for God preserving his divinely inspired work. Just a note. I know you haven't brought this issue up.

Thirdly, the translation from Aramaic which I found contradicts you.

Even then, you haven't really addressed that the genealogies of Matthew and Luke are radically different.

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www.hells-handmaiden.com

[This message has been edited by John, 11-16-2002]

Message 3 of 168 (22941) 11-16-2002 4:46 PM

Reply to: Message 2 by John 11-16-2002 9:44 AM

John:
So the idea is that Matthew was written in Hebrew and that work was translated into Greek and into Aramaic. The Greek has an error, the Aramaic does not.

No I do not believe Matthew was written in Hebrew. The hebrew language had ceased to be the evryday language of judeans [i]long[i/] before. Matthew was written in the hebrew dialect, that being the hebrew dialect of Aramaic.

John:
hmmm... we do not have the Hebrew original, so how do we know which is more accurate?

judge:
There is no original hebrew.

John:
Translator error, eh? So much for God preserving his divinely inspired work. Just a note. I know you haven't brought this issue up.

Thirdly, the translation from Aramaic which I found contradicts you.

John
Both the words gowra (Matt 1:16) ans baa'la (Matthew 1:19) can mean man or husband and gowra can mean father also (it is from a root word meaning strong one or protector).
The obvious question of course is why would the author call the [i]same[i/] joseph a 'gowra' in verse 16 and a 'baa'la' in verse 19?
Because he was talikng of two different men.
The proof of this is , as I showed, gowra is used to describe a [i]father[i/] in Matthew 7:9 for example.
So Victor has translated it following the english, but even he doesn't follow the meaning [i]within [i/] Matthew itself for the word gowra.

John:
Even then, you haven't really addressed that the genealogies of Matthew and Luke are radically different.

Judge:
Matthew gives jesus's geneology thru Mary and Luke thru Joseph.

All the best

Message 4 of 168 (22956) 11-16-2002 8:58 PM

Reply to: Message 3 by judge 11-16-2002 4:46 PM

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Originally posted by judge:
No I do not believe Matthew was written in Hebrew.

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Ok. I missed that part.

[quote][b]The proof of this is , as I showed, gowra is used to describe a [i]father[i/] in Matthew 7:9 for example.[/b][/quote]

This is interesting but I don't see that it is proof.

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So Victor has translated it following the english, but even he doesn't follow the meaning within Matthew itself for the word gowra.

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I don't see that he would have to translate the same word the same way every time. Sometimes languages don't work that way. Of course, this is largely semantic because my Aramaic is nil.

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Matthew gives jesus's geneology thru Mary and Luke thru Joseph.

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This is the position Funkie took and he didn't do a good job defending it. I can't say that I understand your line of reasoning well enough yet to make much of a comment.

Lets see.

Matthew 1:16. This is the verse where the word 'gowra' is used.

You believe this verse should read "And Jacob begat Joseph the FATHER of Mary..... " Yes? Interesting. It does solve the problem neatly.

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www.hells-handmaiden.com

Message 5 of 168 (23088) 11-18-2002 8:36 AM

The gospels are not biographies; they are highly selective works written by people with an agenda - to communicate in story things which they knew to be fundamentally true through their experience of Christ alive in the early church. That doesn't make the writers liars - they firmly believed that the truths that they were communicating through their writings were really true. But you only have to take one look at the different order the synoptic writers put things in, and the way they change the parables to suit their own intentions, to see that we're not dealing with biography.

That's my wishy-washy liberal view on it, anyway.

Message 6 of 168 (23166) 11-18-2002 11:46 PM

Reply to: Message 5 by Karl 11-18-2002 8:36 AM

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Originally posted by Karl:
Isn't it a simpler solution to this whole business that Matthew was writing for a Jewish audience, and so used a "traditional" lineage that portrayed Jesus as David's heir, and Luke was writing for a gentile audience and was merely showing that Jesus was as much a son of Adam as the rest of us - a real man, Son of Man as He keeps calling himself.

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Why would writing for a gentile audience involve showing that Jesus was a son of Adam-- a Jewish myth? And why does the lineage from David not show the same thing?

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Probably neither of them has the "true" lineage because the information probably wasn't available.

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Jews kept pretty good records of lineage as I understand it. I'd bet the information was available, or would have been had the works been written in Christ's lifetime rather than decades later.

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But the early church "knew" Jesus was the Messiah, and therefore must be David's heir; the actual names are pretty immaterial.

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I'd bet you are right, but this also blows the divine inspiration theory.

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The gospels are not biographies; they are highly selective works written by people with an agenda

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Agreed.

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- to communicate in story things which they knew to be fundamentally true through their experience of Christ alive in the early church.

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Again, agreed.

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That doesn't make the writers liars - they firmly believed that the truths that they were communicating through their writings were really true.

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And again... we agree.

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www.hells-handmaiden.com

Message 7 of 168 (23182) 11-19-2002 3:42 AM

I don't think divine inspiration is blown out of the water. The truths that the gospel writers were expressing were divinely inspired; their actual words and literary vehicle were not. Divine inspiration does not have to equal divine dictation - that is the fundamentalist view, but it is not the universal Christian one. For my money, there are too many contradictions and errors that can only be resolved by very convoluted and unlikely arguments - viz. the recent "rabbits chew the cud" debacle.

Luke traced back to Adam because although he was writing for a non-Jewish audience, he was working within a Judaistically derived tradition. Besides, there was no single human ancestral type common to all the Mediterranean myths, so linking it to Adam (who Christian converts would know about through adoption of the Hebrew Scriptures) is a good move. Besides, Adam means Man; Luke can then reinforce Our Lord's common humanity by reference to the "Son of Man" = "Son of Adam". Quite clever really. And totally missed by a lot of fundamentalist commentators who get tied up using Luke's genealogy to (a) "prove" Adam was a historical figure, and (b) get totally hosed when comparing the genealogy to Matthew's.

Message 8 of 168 (23954) 11-23-2002 3:37 PM

Reply to: Message 1 by judge 11-16-2002 6:48 AM

Hope you don't mind me bringing this discussion/debate over to this thread. This is from John's last (I think) comment on the geneaology discussion.

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Originally posted by John:
Well, there you have it. The Bible contains the criterion for the messiah. The bible also has the genealogy of Christ--two in fact. Neither of them are valid messianic lines. Ergo, as per the Bible itself, Christ ain't the messiah. Oops!

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Originally posted by Chara:
John, you have raised a valid question for which a suitable answer has not been made available to you. The absence of the answer does not prove your point.

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Originally posted by John:
No, it doesn't. However, in the absense of that answer my point stands. That is as proven as anything gets in the real world.

But on to some specifics. This is the sort of thing which seems to me to be too blatantly obvious for there to not be a ready made response. In fact, it seems like there should be mountains of refutations, correct or not. Yet, I get no response. Nothing. You pick on, for example, the figure for pi in the OT and you get a firestorm. This attack upon the messiah gets nothing? Very strange indeed.

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John, you mentioned that the Bible contains the criterion for the Messiah and I just wanted to remind you of some of those criteria (sp?) I found this list of Important Messianic Passages. I am sure that this is not something that is new to you. I honestly do not know if it is exhaustive or not, but I did find it interesting that they have all been satisfied.

Anyway, the point of posting this link was to point out that there are many criteria/criterion ummmmm qualifications for the Messiah that have been satisfied. Given the math of probabilities is it possible that the geneaology in question is not counter evidence (is that a correct phrase?), but something we just don't understand yet. Please note the emphasis on "possible".

Message 9 of 168 (23969) 11-23-2002 7:03 PM

Reply to: Message 8 by Chara 11-23-2002 3:37 PM

I will address only the first one which caught my interest, the statement that Messiah was to be born of a virgin (Isaiah 7:14). Read Isaiah 7 for yourself. The story is about the coming of an enemy (King of Assyria). It is NOT about the coming of a savior (Messiah).

When one looks at the entire story, and examines the Hebrew language used, it becomes clear that Isaiah is talking about a normal young woman, not a sexless or pre-sexual one (virgin).

db

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Bachelor of Arts - Loma Linda University
Major - Biology; Minor - Religion
Anatomy and Physiology - LLU School of Medicine
Embryology - La Sierra University
Biblical languages - Pacific Union College
Bible doctrines - Walla Walla College

Message 11 of 168 (24024) 11-24-2002 10:36 AM

Reply to: Message 9 by doctrbill 11-23-2002 7:03 PM

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saved by grace

Message 12 of 168 (24221) 11-25-2002 11:21 AM

Reply to: Message 8 by Chara 11-23-2002 3:37 PM

quote:

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Originally posted by Chara:
John and Funk,

Hope you don't mind me bringing this discussion/debate over to this thread. This is from John's last (I think) comment on the geneaology discussion.

quote:

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Originally posted by John:
Well, there you have it. The Bible contains the criterion for the messiah. The bible also has the genealogy of Christ--two in fact. Neither of them are valid messianic lines. Ergo, as per the Bible itself, Christ ain't the messiah. Oops!

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Originally posted by Chara:
John, you have raised a valid question for which a suitable answer has not been made available to you. The absence of the answer does not prove your point.

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Originally posted by John:
No, it doesn't. However, in the absense of that answer my point stands. That is as proven as anything gets in the real world.

But on to some specifics. This is the sort of thing which seems to me to be too blatantly obvious for there to not be a ready made response. In fact, it seems like there should be mountains of refutations, correct or not. Yet, I get no response. Nothing. You pick on, for example, the figure for pi in the OT and you get a firestorm. This attack upon the messiah gets nothing? Very strange indeed.

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John, you mentioned that the Bible contains the criterion for the Messiah and I just wanted to remind you of some of those criteria (sp?) I found this list of Important Messianic Passages. I am sure that this is not something that is new to you. I honestly do not know if it is exhaustive or not, but I did find it interesting that they have all been satisfied.

Anyway, the point of posting this link was to point out that there are many criteria/criterion ummmmm qualifications for the Messiah that have been satisfied. Given the math of probabilities is it possible that the geneaology in question is not counter evidence (is that a correct phrase?), but something we just don't understand yet. Please note the emphasis on "possible".

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*just a little nudge*
Is this being ignored because it makes no sense? needs clarification? is so laughable that there's no point in responding? has no answer?

Message 13 of 168 (24254) 11-25-2002 2:12 PM

Reply to: Message 12 by Chara 11-25-2002 11:21 AM

http://www.tpub.com/religion/shortstories/newsubmit/newpage6.htm

i'd be interested in what others have to say

Message 14 of 168 (24256) 11-25-2002 2:37 PM

Reply to: Message 12 by Chara 11-25-2002 11:21 AM

quote:

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Originally posted by Chara:

*just a little nudge*
Is this being ignored because it makes no sense? needs clarification? is so laughable that there's no point in responding? has no answer?

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I saw this post and meant to spend some time on it, but forgot

Below is a list taken directly from the site mentioned. I have left out the chapters and verses except where directly relevant to my comments.

First off, the proof for nearly every fulfilled prophecy is the NT, at least as this cite has it listed. The problem with this ought to be obvious. The NT was written ~60-150 years after the death of Christ by people well aware of the OT prophecies and perfectly capable of writing the NT so that Jesus fits the bill. And, no, I don't have to prove that this actually is what happened. As long as it is option, the book cannot be proof of itself.

Secondly, some of the proofs for the fulfillment of OT prophecies are more prophecies in the NT. This is too nuts for words. How can one unfullfilled prophecy be proven by yet another (as yet, to be kind) unfullfilled prophecy?

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Important Messianic Passages

Messiah to be the seed of the Woman

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A bit of a no-brainer really. We all fulfill this one.

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Messiah to be the seed of Abraham

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Not a tough thing really, since the myth has Abraham to be the ancestor to all of the Isrealites, or damn close. Basically, this one says "he has to be a Jew"

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Messiah to be of the tribe of Judah

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Matthew 1:1-2 >> Abram > Isaac > Jacob > Judas > Phares > Esrom

Luke 3:33 >> Abraham > Isaac > Jacob > Juda > Phares > Esrom

Good so far...

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Messiah to be of the seed of Jacob

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Notice the genealogy above. Being from the Tribe of Judah, he is by default the seed of Jacob. Basically it is a slightly more general phophecy than the one preceeding it.

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Messiah to be of the seed of David

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To make this work you have to violate jewish genealogical rules. Since most of the rest of the thread is about this specifically. I am going to skip it here.

http://Torah.freeyellow.com/page35.html

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Messiah to be a prophet like Moses

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This is a weird one. How does one tell if this has been fulfilled or not? Like Moses? Much of what Jesus taught flies in the face of Moses' teachings.

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Messiah to be the Son of God

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Another weird one. We have only the word of a couple of people whe were not even born at the time of the event. And it is virtually impossible to reconcile with Christ being the seed of David. Jews didn't trace genealogy via females so it wasn't through Mary that he got this precious seed of David.

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Messiah to be raised from the dead

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Nice story. One of about a hundred resurrection myths. There is no evidence that it actually happened so calling it fulfilled is just silly.

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Messiah to experience crucifixion

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The two psalms cited describe the cruxifiction of the NT quite well. I'd say the NT was written to fit this prophecy. Is there any evidnce outside of the NT? Nope.

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Messiah to be betrayed by a friend

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Well, we all fit this one.

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Messiah to ascend to heaven

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This is another one of those typical-of-every-religion prophecies. But that aside, the only evidence that this happened is the book making the claim.

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Homage and tribute paid to Messiah by great kings

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The only evidence that this happened is the book making the claim.

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Messiah to be a priest like Melchizedek

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I don't recal that Christ was a priest at all. The verses in Hebrews is odd to me. Don't you think this priesthood would have been mentioned in the Gospels?

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Messiah to be at the right hand of God

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This is a fulfilled prophecy? How does one know?

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Messiah, the stone which the builders rejected, to become the head cornerstone

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Far too cryptic and ethereal to have meaning as a fulfilled prophecy.

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Messiah to be born of a virgin

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Verification anyone? Even the NT itself seems to be a bit schizophrenic about this one.

Is. 7:14 translates the Hebrew 'almah' as virgin. 'Almah' more correctly means young woman.

And the verse in Isaiah is referring to a person living the time of the prophecy, not in the time of christ. So it seems to me. The virgin birth was to be God's way of taking the heat off of Ahaz.

Oh, and the verse says the virgin born child will be called Immanuel. Jesus is not called Immanuel in the NT, not once. So this ain't him anyway.

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Galilee to be the first area of Messiah's ministry

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Not a hard prophecy to fulfill. Jesus, hopefully would have bee fright enough to get this part right.

The prophecy in Isaiah is written in past tense. Prophecies are usually in the future, yes?

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Messiah will be meek and mild

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We all know Christ had a temper, and those money changers got a good taste of it.

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Messiah will minister to the Gentiles

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Again, not a hard thing to pull off.

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Messiah will be smitten

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It is remarkable easy to get yourself executed. Just piss off the church, as Christ found out.

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Messiah to suffer, die and rise again.

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The only proof is the book that makes the claim. Silly. Besides the resurrection stories don't track exactly anyway.

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The new and everlasting Covenant

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And we are to know that this is an EVERLASTING covenant, how? This cannot be considered fulfilled until the end of time, when we can look back and see if it was everlasting or not.

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Messiah as the right arm of God

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I'd like to know how this is supposed to be a fulfilled prophecy?

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Messiah as intercessor

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Verification? We have some guy saying so. Oops, sorry. We have some guys who never met Jesus saying that he said so.

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Messiah will perform miracles

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Miracles are a dime a dozen in mythology. Why is this myth to be taken literally while the others are not?

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Messiah is called "The Lord"

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Another silly sort of prophecy. I guess this make up for not being called Immanuel?

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The time of Messiah's coming prophesied

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I want someone to try to explain this one to me.

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Bethlehem to be the place of Messiah's birth

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The verse in Micah refers to a clan not a place and the prophecy refers to a military leader, which christ was not.

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Messiah will enter the Temple with authority

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So Christ threw a fit and this qualifies him? Hardly a difficult thing to pull off.

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Messiah will enter Jerusalem on a donkey

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Matthew has Jesus sitting on an ass and a colt (Matt. 21:5) Mark and Luke have him riding a colt only (Mark 11:7 and Luke 19:35) While John opts for only the ass (John 12:14)

You call this fulfilled?

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Messiah will be pierced

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And to think my mom had a fit when I pierced my ears.

Zacheriah 12;10 hardly seems like aprophecy anyway. God is talking in the past tense.

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Messiah to be forsaken by his disciples

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Zach 13:7 God is threatening livestock and children? Smite the shephered and the sheep shall be scattered? Not a terribly striking statement for a tribe of nomadic pastorialists. Its just common sense.

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The coming of the Holy Spirit in the days of the Messiah

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Where is the verification?

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Opposition of the nations; Messiah's final victory over death

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Death seems to be getting along just fine.

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The glorious Messiah; Messiah as King

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Right. Christ the King. Are they serious? Was not a King.

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Submission of all nations to Messiah's rule

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This is at best, not yet fulfilled. What then is it doing among the supposedly fulfilled prophecies?

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The Gentiles shall seek the Messiah of Israel

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The gentiles seek Baba Ram Dass and L. Ron Hubbard as well. What is this supposed to prove?

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www.hells-handmaiden.com

Message 15 of 168 (24260) 11-25-2002 2:54 PM

Reply to: Message 11 by funkmasterfreaky 11-24-2002 10:36 AM

Can I ask you what makes you think that this (Isaiah 7:14) is a Messianic prophecy?

Also, can you prove Jesus fulfilled ANY messianic prophecies?

Without the Bible of course, someone who fulfilled so many prophecies surely wouldn't go unnoticed by contemporary historians.

Brian.

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Remembering events that never happened is a dangerous thing!

Message 16 of 168 (24264) 11-25-2002 3:38 PM

Reply to: Message 14 by John 11-25-2002 2:37 PM

quote:

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Originally posted by John:

quote:

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Originally posted by Chara:

*just a little nudge*
Is this being ignored because it makes no sense? needs clarification? is so laughable that there's no point in responding? has no answer?

---

I saw this post and meant to spend some time on it, but forgot

Below is a list taken directly from the site mentioned. I have left out the chapters and verses except where directly relevant to my comments.

First off, the proof for nearly every fulfilled prophecy is the NT, at least as this cite has it listed. The problem with this ought to be obvious. The NT was written ~60-150 years after the death of Christ by people well aware of the OT prophecies and perfectly capable of writing the NT so that Jesus fits the bill. And, no, I don't have to prove that this actually is what happened. As long as it is option, the book cannot be proof of itself.

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John,

You have confused me in this discussion (not a difficult thing to do, so don't pat yourself on the back yet ) I understood that we were discussing a geneaology written in the Bible that you suggested did not line up with what other scriptures said about the coming Messiah. Now that I have presented internal evidence that these other things line up, you step outside of the context of the discussion. (At least thats the way I perceive it).