When is a Christian not a Christian?

13

Comments

  • Ricardus wrote: »
    What he does is treat the bible as structurally myth, not history. Which was pretty mainstream for much of the 20th century. Conservative forces have been gaslighting him for the last thirty years or so, such that the nonsense spouted all over him looks like common sense.

    I don't think the first two of his Twelve Points for Reform (link) could ever have been described as mainstream ...

    And 7 is pretty extreme too.

    In any case, to treat "the Bible" as structurally any one thing is a category error. The Pentateuch is not the Prophets, is not the Wisdom literature, is not the Gospels, is not the Epistles and none of them are whatever the heck Revelation is.
  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    So we are going back to Robert Runci. This nothing new and not that controversial.
  • ForthviewForthview Shipmate
    As far as I know Richard Holloway goes regularly of a Sunday to Old St Paul's church and goes to Communion. Given that many posters here have very disparate views as to what believe in Christianity and Christ means I don't think we have any reason to think of Richard Holloway as not being a Christian.
  • Forthview wrote: »
    As far as I know Richard Holloway goes regularly of a Sunday to Old St Paul's church and goes to Communion. Given that many posters here have very disparate views as to what believe in Christianity and Christ means I don't think we have any reason to think of Richard Holloway as not being a Christian.

    I got the impression from an interview with him a few years ago that he never believed what Christianity teaches, that he was one of a generation of decent, hard-working, compassionate, intelligent men who were directed into the church without any real consideration as to what they actually believed. Generally such folk these days (for better or worse) drift away from the church long before being considered for ordination. Whether or not we label Richard Holloway Christian is less important than deciding whether certain ideas he holds (or rejection of other ideas, like the incarnation) are compatible with Christianity. I wouldn't say that church attendance and participation in its rituals are definitive, plenty of non-believers attend and serve the church, for various reasons.
  • Copied from @Ricardus' link:

    6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

    No. 6 on Spong's list raises the obvious question, Does Spong use the terms "redemption" and "redeemer"? If so, how does he define them? If not, are we to understand that he regards them as meaningless words?

  • Nick TamenNick Tamen Shipmate
    What he does is treat the bible as structurally myth, not history. Which was pretty mainstream for much of the 20th century. Conservative forces have been gaslighting him for the last thirty years or so, such that the nonsense spouted all over him looks like common sense.
    Gaslighting him? In what way are they trying to make him think he is going insane? Do you mean something like mischaracterizing or misrepresenting his views?

    I generally fall into the camp of not questioning anyone’s self-identification as Christian, even if their view of what that means is quite different from mine. And at the same time, I see little value and much potential for harm in broad generalizations about any group, be it conservatives, liberals, or whatever else.

  • DafydDafyd Shipmate
    I think the obvious question for me is to ask what barbarian means if it isn't a pejorative for peoples who don't speak Greek or Latin (*).

    But while I think Spong is wrong I find it hard to draw a line that excludes him from Christianity and I don't see that I'd want to.

    (*) or a character who can enter rage for one minute as a bonus action.
  • AnteaterAnteater Shipmate
    Ricardus:
    I have a lot of sympathy for rank-and-file JWs, because they are effectively told "Proselytise, or be disfellowshipped" - if you grew up in the faith, your choice is between annoying a few strangers, and being cut off from your entire family.
    This post is not germane to the recently proceeding ones. It's just that I wanted to correct something.

    I left the JWs many many years ago, and it is possible they may have changed, but I doubt it. In my day nobody would be disfellowshipped for not proselytising. It's true they would be viewed as weak members, but I left off proselytising years before I left and never had any problems with that.

    Just saying.
  • Nick Tamen wrote: »
    I generally fall into the camp of not questioning anyone’s self-identification as Christian, even if their view of what that means is quite different from mine.
    Yes, I fully agree. And yet we can legitimately apply the adjective "Christian" to doctrines and beliefs, can't we? For instance, if someone self-identifies as Christian and also believes in vampires, we can say (truthfully, I think) that a belief in vampires is not a Christian belief, without implying that the believer is therefore mistaken in claiming to be a Christian.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Nick Tamen wrote: »
    I generally fall into the camp of not questioning anyone’s self-identification as Christian, even if their view of what that means is quite different from mine.
    Yes, I fully agree. And yet we can legitimately apply the adjective "Christian" to doctrines and beliefs, can't we? For instance, if someone self-identifies as Christian and also believes in vampires, we can say (truthfully, I think) that a belief in vampires is not a Christian belief, without implying that the believer is therefore mistaken in claiming to be a Christian.

    There are beliefs that are not part of Christianity, and beliefs that are contradictory.

    That a demonic entity (I don't believe in them but many Christians do) could reanimate a corpse and use it to do evil would appear to me to be not part. On the other hand a belief that God is an alien from the deathless planet Zarbos and the Second Coming is actually his fleet of starships coming to take us there, would be contradictory.

    Having said that unless we define "A Christian" as someone whose set of beliefs contains no members of the set "Not contradictory to a Christian Doctrine" it doesn't mean much on the individual level. By that definition the afore-mentioned putative demonic entities would qualify.
  • .
    David wrote: »
    "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another."

    Who cares if you, or I, or anyone else thinks someone is a Christian or not. Or anything, religious, not religious, or whatever. Just love one another.

    I read "love" as "be kind to" and be decent. Or in the words of Bill and Ted "be excellent to each other".
  • ForthviewForthview Shipmate
    I agree that we shouldn't bother too much about the name to put on someone's religion.
    Equally we should not be too precipitate about removing their name from the religion which they have in some way espoused.
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    edited April 3
    Just this morning you would think I out Sponged Spong. I am on a conservative theological fight club on Facebook. Someone posted something about how Christians can accept the Creation Story of the Bible and accept Darwin's understanding of humans descending from apes. I replied they should re-read Darwin and reconsider how human evolution theory sees humanoids branching off from earlier common ancestors with each branch developing independently from each other.

    Boy, did I get flamed for that!!! But I would argue that is what a fight club is for--to give counter-arguments and see what happens.
  • Alan29Alan29 Shipmate
    Copied from @Ricardus' link:

    6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

    No. 6 on Spong's list raises the obvious question, Does Spong use the terms "redemption" and "redeemer"? If so, how does he define them? If not, are we to understand that he regards them as meaningless words?

    Spongs view is one that has a lot of traction with me.
  • Merry VoleMerry Vole Shipmate
    And with Steve Chalke I think..
  • Alan29 wrote: »
    Copied from @Ricardus' link:

    6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

    No. 6 on Spong's list raises the obvious question, Does Spong use the terms "redemption" and "redeemer"? If so, how does he define them? If not, are we to understand that he regards them as meaningless words?

    Spongs view is one that has a lot of traction with me.

    Thank you for your reply, @Alan29. Would you care to share your views on the use of the terms "redeemer" and "redemption"? Do those words have a meaning, in this connection?
  • tclunetclune Shipmate
    Alan29 wrote: »
    Copied from @Ricardus' link:

    6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

    No. 6 on Spong's list raises the obvious question, Does Spong use the terms "redemption" and "redeemer"? If so, how does he define them? If not, are we to understand that he regards them as meaningless words?

    Spongs view is one that has a lot of traction with me.

    Thank you for your reply, @Alan29. Would you care to share your views on the use of the terms "redeemer" and "redemption"? Do those words have a meaning, in this connection?

    Allow me to offer one line that I find fruitful. Consider
    "...whoever wants to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must be the slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." (Mark 10:43-45. NET Bible)
    While evangelicals tend to jump immediately to atonement theory to unpack this metaphor, I would suggest something different.
    First, the image is one of Christ paying the ransom to buy the freedom of enslaved people. This has various aspects that would have resonated in that day: travel was perilous and pirates plentiful; people were captured and held for ransom that it was the obligation of family members to pay if possible (if not, the kidnapped person would be sold into permanent slavery by his captives); and Christ did something to free those people. So God is acknowledging the wretched captive as part of His family, which could only be seen as good news.
    But what did Christ do? To the PSA crowd, He died on the cross as some kind of obscure payment to someone. But I find it much more coherent to read this as saying that Christ became flesh -- that the incarnation was Christ imprisoning Himself in human form so that we could find our way out of our own enslavement to the flesh -- that Christ became like us so that we could become like Him. There is a long history of viewing the incarnation as the saving act of God, and there isn't a huge set of problems about who was being bought off and how Christ's murder paid anything to anyone.
    I've never thought of myself as a follower of Spong -- I am more of of a Girardian. In my form of that, the anthropology of the cross is about our tendency toward violence rather than some kind of Divine payoff to dark forces and the Divine intervention of the resurrection as an exclamation point on what Christ has done all along. To my mind, the big idea behind our redemption should be focused on the incarnation.
  • Alan29Alan29 Shipmate
    Alan29 wrote: »
    Copied from @Ricardus' link:

    6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

    No. 6 on Spong's list raises the obvious question, Does Spong use the terms "redemption" and "redeemer"? If so, how does he define them? If not, are we to understand that he regards them as meaningless words?

    Spongs view is one that has a lot of traction with me.

    Thank you for your reply, @Alan29. Would you care to share your views on the use of the terms "redeemer" and "redemption"? Do those words have a meaning, in this connection?

    They are not words I use, so I have nothing to offer here.
  • Thank you again, @Alan29. In that one short sentence you have given a full answer to my question. I wonder whether Spong might possibly give the same answer, word for word.
  • @tclune, thank you for taking the trouble to write such a long, carefully reasoned exposition of your views. If you don't mind, I will have a follow-up question I'd like to ask you, but first I need to fill in a couple of serious gaps in my own knowledge. What is PSA? Is it "penal substitution atonement" or something of that kind? And is this paper that I found online a fair introduction, for a beginner such as myself, to Girard's ideas?

    https://digitalcommons.denison.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1064&context=religion
  • Gramps49 wrote: »
    Just this morning you would think I out Sponged Spong. I am on a conservative theological fight club on Facebook. Someone posted something about how Christians can accept the Creation Story of the Bible and accept Darwin's understanding of humans descending from apes. I replied they should re-read Darwin and reconsider how human evolution theory sees humanoids branching off from earlier common ancestors with each branch developing independently from each other.

    Boy, did I get flamed for that!!! But I would argue that is what a fight club is for--to give counter-arguments and see what happens.

    Why did they flame you? It sounds like you have a grander view of creation than your confuters.
  • tclunetclune Shipmate
    @tclune, thank you for taking the trouble to write such a long, carefully reasoned exposition of your views. If you don't mind, I will have a follow-up question I'd like to ask you, but first I need to fill in a couple of serious gaps in my own knowledge. What is PSA? Is it "penal substitution atonement" or something of that kind? And is this paper that I found online a fair introduction, for a beginner such as myself, to Girard's ideas?

    https://digitalcommons.denison.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1064&context=religion

    Hi, @Ray Sunshine Yes, PSA is Penal Substitution Atonement. The article you linked to looks like a good overview of Girard's thought as I understand it. I am not an expert in Girardian thought by any stretch, but I was blown away when I first read The Scapegoat. I think Girard is a very interesting thinker, although he does (or did, he is no longer alive) have a tendency to see everything through the eyes of mimetic violence. After a while, it seems a tad claustrophobic. Nonetheless, it's a terrific and interesting vision that plays well with the rest of Christian thought -- at least to my mind.
  • tclune wrote: »
    There is a long history of viewing the incarnation as the saving act of God, and there isn't a huge set of problems about who was being bought off and how Christ's murder paid anything to anyone.
    tclune wrote: »
    To my mind, the big idea behind our redemption should be focused on the incarnation.

    My question has to do with this balancing act, if that is an acceptable metaphor, between the Incarnation and the Crucifixion, in terms of their theological significance. I see no reason to disagree with either of your two statements that I have highlighted here (nor, indeed, with anything else in your posts). But the question still needs to be asked, What was the effect of the Crucifixion, in theological terms? After the Incarnation, either there was some “work” left for the Crucifixion to do, or there wasn’t. I think there was, just as all or nearly all churches proclaim in their teaching.
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    Gramps49 wrote: »
    Just this morning you would think I out Sponged Spong. I am on a conservative theological fight club on Facebook. Someone posted something about how Christians can accept the Creation Story of the Bible and accept Darwin's understanding of humans descending from apes. I replied they should re-read Darwin and reconsider how human evolution theory sees humanoids branching off from earlier common ancestors with each branch developing independently from each other.

    Boy, did I get flamed for that!!! But I would argue that is what a fight club is for--to give counter-arguments and see what happens.

    Why did they flame you? It sounds like you have a grander view of creation than your confuters.

    Like I said it is a very conservative site. They take the Bible literally, and they have a very narrow understanding of science, let alone human evolution. I think when I present counterarguments I am creating cognitive dissonance for them. Not the first time for me, though.
  • tclunetclune Shipmate
    But the question still needs to be asked, What was the effect of the Crucifixion, in theological terms? After the Incarnation, either there was some “work” left for the Crucifixion to do, or there wasn’t. I think there was, just as all or nearly all churches proclaim in their teaching.

    I tend to find most theology of the crucifixion as pretty foul and indefensible. The two understandings that resonate with me are Abelard's notion of moral influence and, as I mentioned initially, Girard's idea that Christ had to break through the scapegoat pathology we humans have been mired in -- which is all the more ironic because of the Mel Gibson treatment so many churches give the crucifixion. If there is any good that came out of the murder of Christ beyond those things, I am unable to see it.
  • ThunderBunkThunderBunk Shipmate
    For me, the cross shows "the measure and the pledge of love", and makes good on the pledge. It is there because we are to follow him - to allow ourselves to die for love in which we will live beyond that death. Also it does the what Girard describes, and James Allison talks about at some length.
  • Alan29Alan29 Shipmate
    tclune wrote: »
    There is a long history of viewing the incarnation as the saving act of God, and there isn't a huge set of problems about who was being bought off and how Christ's murder paid anything to anyone.
    tclune wrote: »
    To my mind, the big idea behind our redemption should be focused on the incarnation.

    My question has to do with this balancing act, if that is an acceptable metaphor, between the Incarnation and the Crucifixion, in terms of their theological significance. I see no reason to disagree with either of your two statements that I have highlighted here (nor, indeed, with anything else in your posts). But the question still needs to be asked, What was the effect of the Crucifixion, in theological terms? After the Incarnation, either there was some “work” left for the Crucifixion to do, or there wasn’t. I think there was, just as all or nearly all churches proclaim in their teaching.

    I tend to see the crucifixion in terms of the resurrection. Neither makes sense for me without the other - Gods Son was killed by bad men, but his Father was having none of it and raised him back to life. Love conquering death.
    Like others I find most explanations of redemption that involve placating the Father to be morally repugnant.
  • mousethiefmousethief Shipmate
    Copied from @Ricardus' link:

    6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

    No. 6 on Spong's list raises the obvious question, Does Spong use the terms "redemption" and "redeemer"? If so, how does he define them? If not, are we to understand that he regards them as meaningless words?

    Sounds like chronological snobbery.
  • Nick TamenNick Tamen Shipmate
    Alan29 wrote: »
    tclune wrote: »
    There is a long history of viewing the incarnation as the saving act of God, and there isn't a huge set of problems about who was being bought off and how Christ's murder paid anything to anyone.
    tclune wrote: »
    To my mind, the big idea behind our redemption should be focused on the incarnation.

    My question has to do with this balancing act, if that is an acceptable metaphor, between the Incarnation and the Crucifixion, in terms of their theological significance. I see no reason to disagree with either of your two statements that I have highlighted here (nor, indeed, with anything else in your posts). But the question still needs to be asked, What was the effect of the Crucifixion, in theological terms? After the Incarnation, either there was some “work” left for the Crucifixion to do, or there wasn’t. I think there was, just as all or nearly all churches proclaim in their teaching.

    I tend to see the crucifixion in terms of the resurrection. Neither makes sense for me without the other - Gods Son was killed by bad men, but his Father was having none of it and raised him back to life. Love conquering death.
    Same here about seeing the crucifixion in terms of the resurrection, though I tend to see it even more broadly: Incarnation, baptism, ministry, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension. They’re all integral parts and all part of one big picture, and I tend to think things get distorted when any are left out or when any one gets too much focus apart from the rest.

    As for “who” is responsible for Jesus’ crucifixion, I always tend to think in terms of it being “us,” as in all humanity. I’m very leery of any approach that says “they,” whoever “they” may be, are responsible. Anti-semitism and other dark things like that way, it seems to me.

  • Yes. It's why attempts to pin it on the Romans (to take the heat off the Jews) worry me. Both are wrongheaded and dangerous. It's the humans.
  • Alan29Alan29 Shipmate
    Nick Tamen wrote: »
    Alan29 wrote: »
    tclune wrote: »
    There is a long history of viewing the incarnation as the saving act of God, and there isn't a huge set of problems about who was being bought off and how Christ's murder paid anything to anyone.
    tclune wrote: »
    To my mind, the big idea behind our redemption should be focused on the incarnation.

    My question has to do with this balancing act, if that is an acceptable metaphor, between the Incarnation and the Crucifixion, in terms of their theological significance. I see no reason to disagree with either of your two statements that I have highlighted here (nor, indeed, with anything else in your posts). But the question still needs to be asked, What was the effect of the Crucifixion, in theological terms? After the Incarnation, either there was some “work” left for the Crucifixion to do, or there wasn’t. I think there was, just as all or nearly all churches proclaim in their teaching.

    I tend to see the crucifixion in terms of the resurrection. Neither makes sense for me without the other - Gods Son was killed by bad men, but his Father was having none of it and raised him back to life. Love conquering death.
    Same here about seeing the crucifixion in terms of the resurrection, though I tend to see it even more broadly: Incarnation, baptism, ministry, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension. They’re all integral parts and all part of one big picture, and I tend to think things get distorted when any are left out or when any one gets too much focus apart from the rest.

    As for “who” is responsible for Jesus’ crucifixion, I always tend to think in terms of it being “us,” as in all humanity. I’m very leery of any approach that says “they,” whoever “they” may be, are responsible. Anti-semitism and other dark things like that way, it seems to me.

    Indeed. Its human nastiness.
  • EnochEnoch Shipmate
    Yes. It's why attempts to pin it on the Romans (to take the heat off the Jews) worry me. Both are wrongheaded and dangerous. It's the humans.
    Exactly. There are good Jews, lots of them, the disciples, Mary and Martha, Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus etc, and bad ones, Caiaphas and the establishment. Likewise, there are bad Romans, Pilate, the soldiers who mock Jesus etc, and good ones like Pilates' wife and the centurion who exclaims that the dying Jesus was Son of God.

    The reason why there were no Shipmates on either side in the gospels is that none of us were either in Judea or born at the time!

  • "Good Jew"**- does this include Jesus in your mind?


    **"Good Jew" is a phrase which always makes me uncomfortable.
  • Nick TamenNick Tamen Shipmate
    **"Good Jew" is a phrase which always makes me uncomfortable.
    Me too.
  • Alan29Alan29 Shipmate
    Enoch wrote: »
    Yes. It's why attempts to pin it on the Romans (to take the heat off the Jews) worry me. Both are wrongheaded and dangerous. It's the humans.
    Exactly. There are good Jews, lots of them, the disciples, Mary and Martha, Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus etc, and bad ones, Caiaphas and the establishment. Likewise, there are bad Romans, Pilate, the soldiers who mock Jesus etc, and good ones like Pilates' wife and the centurion who exclaims that the dying Jesus was Son of God.

    The reason why there were no Shipmates on either side in the gospels is that none of us were either in Judea or born at the time!

    I think you have to be either Jewish or sensitive to the feelings of a people who have been persecuted for 2000 years with the gospels providing all the excuses needed.
  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    It seems to me that some on here are seeing through 20/21st century glasses. PSA fits in that it carries on the day of atonement and makes it permanent. It is not illogical
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Hugal wrote: »
    It seems to me that some on here are seeing through 20/21st century glasses. PSA fits in that it carries on the day of atonement and makes it permanent. It is not illogical

    Justice being satisfied by visiting brutal punishment on an innocent party is as illogical as it gets.
  • DafydDafyd Shipmate
    Hugal wrote: »
    It seems to me that some on here are seeing through 20/21st century glasses. PSA fits in that it carries on the day of atonement and makes it permanent. It is not illogical
    I don't think there's anything especially modern about the principle that it is unjust to punish the innocent.

    Nor is PSA specifically anything mich to with any ceremony performed on the day of atonement. There are certainly theories of Jesus's atonement that see him fulfilling the ritual of the day of atonement, but PSA isn't one of them. The sacrifice on the day of atonement isn't being punished for anything.



  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    No the blood washes the people’s sins clean. Jesus being sinless his sacrifice washed us clean.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    How?
  • DafydDafyd Shipmate
    Hugal wrote: »
    No the blood washes the people’s sins clean. Jesus being sinless his sacrifice washed us clean.
    That's not what is meant by PSA. PSA is specifically the idea that God needs to punish somebody for our sins and we are let off because God punishes Jesus instead of us.

  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Dafyd wrote: »
    Hugal wrote: »
    No the blood washes the people’s sins clean. Jesus being sinless his sacrifice washed us clean.
    That's not what is meant by PSA. PSA is specifically the idea that God needs to punish somebody for our sins and we are let off because God punishes Jesus instead of us.

    Back in my Charevo days the OT sacrificial system was itself interpreted in PSA terms. IME, of course.
  • tclunetclune Shipmate
    KarlLB wrote: »
    Dafyd wrote: »
    Hugal wrote: »
    No the blood washes the people’s sins clean. Jesus being sinless his sacrifice washed us clean.
    That's not what is meant by PSA. PSA is specifically the idea that God needs to punish somebody for our sins and we are let off because God punishes Jesus instead of us.

    Back in my Charevo days the OT sacrificial system was itself interpreted in PSA terms. IME, of course.

    A tad anachronistic, wouldn't you say?
  • Alan29Alan29 Shipmate
    Hugal wrote: »
    No the blood washes the people’s sins clean. Jesus being sinless his sacrifice washed us clean.
    Yuck!
  • Alan29 wrote: »
    Hugal wrote: »
    No the blood washes the people’s sins clean. Jesus being sinless his sacrifice washed us clean.
    Yuck!

    Is it real blood or symbolic blood? Is it wine or blood at communion? Many many rabbit holes to wander in and out of.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    tclune wrote: »
    KarlLB wrote: »
    Dafyd wrote: »
    Hugal wrote: »
    No the blood washes the people’s sins clean. Jesus being sinless his sacrifice washed us clean.
    That's not what is meant by PSA. PSA is specifically the idea that God needs to punish somebody for our sins and we are let off because God punishes Jesus instead of us.

    Back in my Charevo days the OT sacrificial system was itself interpreted in PSA terms. IME, of course.

    A tad anachronistic, wouldn't you say?

    Just reporting, not supporting.
  • RussRuss Shipmate
    Dafyd wrote: »
    Hugal wrote: »
    It seems to me that some on here are seeing through 20/21st century glasses. PSA fits in that it carries on the day of atonement and makes it permanent. It is not illogical
    I don't think there's anything especially modern about the principle that it is unjust to punish the innocent.
    Do you not think that the notion that it is just to punish the sons for the sins of the fathers is less convincing than it used to be ?
  • Nick TamenNick Tamen Shipmate
    Russ wrote: »
    Dafyd wrote: »
    Hugal wrote: »
    It seems to me that some on here are seeing through 20/21st century glasses. PSA fits in that it carries on the day of atonement and makes it permanent. It is not illogical
    I don't think there's anything especially modern about the principle that it is unjust to punish the innocent.
    Do you not think that the notion that it is just to punish the sons for the sins of the fathers is less convincing than it used to be ?
    I’ve heard an explanation of those verses recently that has a different take on it—rejecting that children are punished for the sins of their fathers, and saying that those verses are properly understood as expressing judgment on the generations that continue in or perpetuate the sins of their forebears.

    “To the third and fourth generation” is a Hebrew idiom basically meaning “as long as it goes on” or “as long as it takes”—in this case, as long as it takes to break the cycle of repetition.

  • Russ wrote: »
    Dafyd wrote: »
    Hugal wrote: »
    It seems to me that some on here are seeing through 20/21st century glasses. PSA fits in that it carries on the day of atonement and makes it permanent. It is not illogical
    I don't think there's anything especially modern about the principle that it is unjust to punish the innocent.
    Do you not think that the notion that it is just to punish the sons for the sins of the fathers is less convincing than it used to be ?

    Thinking of the current trial of an American police officer who knelt on the neck of a black man and killed him. It's the black man who is again punished as the police officer's ancestors punished his father and grandfather isn't it? Thus without the resolution of the sins from times past, without 'punishment' or at least reconciliation, the pattern of the sin is repeated, isn't it?
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    I don't buy PSA. A wrathful God? Rather, I see God becoming at one with us and dying our death as a way of showing just how deeply God loves us.
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