Joralex and Yaro, open to comment.

Concerning the comments about god "being wrong" for using different definitions:Whether or not one considers god to be the ultimate authority on what words mean or the collected community of speakers, there is this fact:If you know that the people to whom you are speaking use the specific words in a specific way, then it behooves you to speak in that fashion so as to be understood.Why would god speak to people using terms he knows they won't understand?And more importantly, why would he get upset when they inevitably misunderstand?------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Joralex responds to me:

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If you know that the people to whom you are speaking use the specific words in a specific way, then it behooves you to speak in that fashion so as to be understood.

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Why would god speak to people using terms he knows they won't understand?

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And more importantly, why would he get upset when they inevitably misunderstand?

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It is up to us to seek out His meaning... not for Him to conform to ours.

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That doesn't answer the question nor does it address the point.If I know that you do not and cannot understand the language that I speak, then it would be a fool's errand to continue to speak in that language. As the cliche goes, it is foolish to try to teach a pig to sing: It frustrates you and annoys the pig.According to the Bible, we will never be able to understand his words. So since god knows that humans will never be able to understand his language, it would be foolish for him to insist upon it, especially when trying to make very important statements. Instead, he should use the language of the people to whom he is communicating.Why would you spout French to a speaker of Chinese and then get upset when he looks quizzically at you?

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I fail to see what you cannot comprehend about this trivial point.

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Strange, I was going to say the exact same thing to you.How do you expect humans to be able to understand the mind of god when the mind of god is inherently incomprehensible?Do you speak to a 3-year-old as if he were a poet laureate? Is it the 3-year-old's fault for not understand what you're talking about?Or, when speaking to a 3-year-old, is it not the responsibility of the adult to adapt to the communication restrictions of the child since the adult is the one that can adapt his thought processes?If we are but children to god, why doesn't god treat us as children and speak to us in ways we can understand?

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No, wait, I do see : people that do not believe in God in essence make themselves to be 'god' - the 'defining authority'.

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Incorrect. Where did I say I don't believe in god? Are you making an assumption? Anybody who disagrees with your theology is an atheist?------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Prozacman responds to me:

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Interestingly, Jesus speaks to his audiences in aphorisms and parables, which all have a great deal of meaning tucked away in them.

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Indeed, but those parables require a common cultural history in order to work.There was a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode that sorta dealt with this: Captain Picard was stranded on a planet with an alien. While the universal translator was capable of translating the individual words, the meaning was completely cryptic because they spoke in metaphors. An analogy was made that if we were to do that in English, we might refer to a romantic setting as "Juliet on her balcony." But, that requires a knowledge of the story of Romeo and Juliet and what that image represents. It would be meaningless to somebody who didn't have that cultural background to fill in the details.So we're left with the original point: Why would god, who knows that we poor humans don't understand his language, refuse to accomodate us by using ours? If god really wants us to pay attention, wouldn't the best course of action be to use a method of communication that the recipient comprehends and will not misinterpret?------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

crashfrog responds to me:

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What I never understood (and part of why I think Star Trek is bad science-fiction) is how that society is supposed to work.

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That crossed my mind, too, but it could eventually become a highly abstract way of saying things. That is, it would sorta be a "pictographic" method of speaking. The original context surrounding the metaphor is lost as the metaphorical unit, itself, acquires the meaning of that context. Thus, "Juliet on her balcony" is the translation for "romance." If you associate the big phrase, "Juliet on her balcony," with the same instances that you would the single word, "romance," then we just have a language that has really, really big words.Now, why the UT couldn't make this comprehension, I dunno. The only reason I could think of is that the physical utterings still contained enough semantic remnants that it was confused and got stuck translating the individual words rather than recognizing the larger patterns contained in clumps of words. But, they never mentioned that and it smacks of "Doubletalk generators at maximum, Captain."Notice when Picard came back, he used what he had learned about their method of speech to communicate with the other ship. He didn't try and force English upon them. A method of communication was found and exploited in order to have an exchange of ideas.When you know they don't understand what you're saying, simply saying it louder and slower doesn't solve anything.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!