ARGH!!! Calvinism makes me furious!!!

[seekinganswers]

Incarnation? I haven't said anything about God becoming flesh! No sir, we are indeed talking about logic.

And yet when the scriptures speak of Christ as logos (logic), they speak of the incarnation. So you are without a foundation.

To speak english and be grounded in a certain culture first requires logic! To call me a resounding gong requires logic! For me to understand what that is and that you are saying it to me requires logic! To know that "God_Is_Truth" is my screen name requires logic! It's unavoidable!

No, it does not. To speak comes not by logic, but by being born into the world. The child does not learn a formal grammar in order to speak, and yet the child learns to speak very well. In fact, the logic must be overcome, because the child struggles greatly with the irregularities of the language. Logic doesn't help the child learn language at all; it only comes through experience. And it is my own experience of language (I have learned 4) that has taught me how useless logic is in really learning a language. Some of the most logically thinking people I have met have been worst at learning languages.

The majority of the world has learned to speak with not so much as one lesson being taught to them (in some instances they learned three or more languages). They didn't need to be actively making connections between things and words; the brain was already doing the work for them.

Without a brain one does not learn a language; and the brain does not consist in logical structures, but physical ones (synapses and nerves).

Without logic they don't mean anything to anyone. They only don't mean anything to him because of the difference in language which is certainly not the same thing as logic. Language is the application and use of logic. If I haven't been told how you used the logic (how the language works) then I can't understand you. But that's because of the language, not the ability to use logic.

I'm sorry, but you are really messed up with this kind of thinking. Language comes before logic; logos as a word comes before Logos as a universal structure to the universe. How could you even engage in an argument (whether internal or external) unless you had language? Logic consists in rational arguments and proofs (whether practical or theoretical), and such endeavors are impossible before one learns a language. In a child's development, the child learns language early on (in the first few years), while greater cognitive rationalities (making connections between causes and affects) develop much later. Child phsychology is now discovering that giving a punishing to a very young child is unwise, because the child cannot make the rational connection between the punishment and his or her own actions. Rationality develops in us much later than does language.

You don't think the same because you have access to different information (language, culture etc.). But you do both think, and that's where logic resides.

Spoken like a true modernist. Descartes was the first to make this statement ("I think therefore I am"). You have established a duality in this kind ideology without justifying such a move. So what one thinks is automatically compartmentalized from one's body. This Decartian dualism just makes me sick! Before Descartes it was not common to view the human being as a thinking being before the human is physical. Human thought was not cut off from the body. And this duality has led to atrocities and neurosis in our Modern age. And in Christianity it has led to a sickly evangelism that cares only for peoples' "souls" without any regard for their body. We forget Paul's statement in Romans 12 that calls us to offer our bodies as a singular living sacrifice, which is the content of our worship to God.

You mean humanity can't unite as humans? Are we not all the same type? You don't believe some humans are superior to or below others do you?

You are obviously not aware of what happens in Genesis 11. I suggest you go back and read that before you make such stupid statements. You think I am arguing for some sort of social darwinism? Do you not even realize that social darwinism develps from its grounding in modernity (the same grounding that you are proposing above)?

You cannot know God without logic! That's like trying to tell a tree to move! Without the ability to move, it cannot do so. Without logic (thinking) you cannot know God.

We don't know God unless God comes to us. We didn't have anything inherent to us that brought us to God. Show me in the scriptures where such was the case? The scriptures are about God's revelation to us. We couldn't know God before God revealed himself to us. We were trees, and when Christ shows up God allows us to walk.

You just said that we cannot understand God in any way. What in the world are you doing on a theology board? Further, God revealed himself in the creation (Romans 1).

Romans 1 is the worst prooftext you could have chosen. Paul in that chapter paints humanity as hopelessly enslaved to sin, unable to know God as the Creator (because they have exchanged God for a lie). God didn't reveal himself in Romans 1; God handed us over to our debased minds.

:shocked:

1 Corinthians 15
3For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,

4and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,

You are right that the message Jesus preached was not "I died for your sins", but christianity wasn't what it is today at that point either.

And yet not once in this passage does Paul equate the gospel to this singular message. I didn't remove that message from Paul; I was saying that the gospel for Paul consists in something quite other than Christ's "dying for our sins."

And you cannot know, follow, turn to, or believe in Christ without using logic.

You are like a barking dog. I'm surprised you haven't woken up the neighborhood, but I guess the neighbors have gotten used to your barking.

No one reduced God's revelation to logic! What we have been saying all along is that to understand God's revelation (creation, Christ, miracles, gifts etc.) requires the use of logic! God gave us heads for a reason!

God gave us bodies (integrated and wholistic bodies) for a reason. If were just heads we wouldn't get too far.

Matthew 22:37
And He said to him, " ' YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.'

You cannot love God with your heart, soul and strength without using your mind. You can't do any of them without your mind.

Anachronism at its worst. Mind for Paul is not filled with the same content as you give it here. Dianoia in the greek signifies purpose and attitude (not mind which is vous in the greek). I guess for Christ logic can't be removed from rhetoric either.

Peace,
Michael

 

[sentientsynth]

And yet when the scriptures speak of Christ as logos (logic), they speak of the incarnation.

The LOGOS was in the beginning with God. The LOGOS becoming flesh speaks to the incarnation.

 

[God_Is_Truth]

And yet when the scriptures speak of Christ as logos (logic), they speak of the incarnation. So you are without a foundation.

Except you forget that the Word existed before He was flesh. And yet agin you overlook that to understand what logos is, to understand what Christ is, what a foundation is, what scriptures are etc. you must use logic. logic is the foundation of any and all reasoning.

No, it does not. To speak comes not by logic, but by being born into the world.

Speaking in the sense of making audible noises, yes. Speaking as in communicating information, no. You cannot speak information without using logic.

The child does not learn a formal grammar in order to speak, and yet the child learns to speak very well. In fact, the logic must be overcome, because the child struggles greatly with the irregularities of the language. Logic doesn't help the child learn language at all; it only comes through experience. And it is my own experience of language (I have learned 4) that has taught me how useless logic is in really learning a language. Some of the most logically thinking people I have met have been worst at learning languages.

Logic is what interprets the experience! A child learns through observation in that they process the things they observe learn to imitate them to bring about a desired reaction. That's logic! You can of course reason incorrectly but you are still using logic!

The majority of the world has learned to speak with not so much as one lesson being taught to them (in some instances they learned three or more languages). They didn't need to be actively making connections between things and words; the brain was already doing the work for them.

DUH! God made our brains able to think logically! But that you can speak at all requires the use of logic. Any and all speaking first requires thinking which is logic.

Without a brain one does not learn a language; and the brain does not consist in logical structures, but physical ones (synapses and nerves).

Yes, but it is a function of the mind where thinking takes place. And it is in the mind that logic is used. You cannot learn anything without logic.

I'm sorry, but you are really messed up with this kind of thinking. Language comes before logic;

No, it cannot. That's not possible.

logos as a word comes before Logos as a universal structure to the universe. How could you even engage in an argument (whether internal or external) unless you had language?

How could you ever learn a language without logic? You couldn't even begin!

Logic consists in rational arguments and proofs (whether practical or theoretical), and such endeavors are impossible before one learns a language.

Advanced logic consists in formal arguments and such, yes. Basic logic does not have to lay everything out. It simply observes, learns, and understands. That's what logic/reasoning/thinking is.

In a child's development, the child learns language early on (in the first few years), while greater cognitive rationalities (making connections between causes and affects) develop much later. Child phsychology is now discovering that giving a punishing to a very young child is unwise, because the child cannot make the rational connection between the punishment and his or her own actions. Rationality develops in us much later than does language.

Logic for a child is simplified and basic, but it still exists. Without logic we are beasts of the earth, stupid.

Spoken like a true modernist. Descartes was the first to make this statement ("I think therefore I am"). You have established a duality in this kind ideology without justifying such a move. So what one thinks is automatically compartmentalized from one's body. This Decartian dualism just makes me sick! Before Descartes it was not common to view the human being as a thinking being before the human is physical. Human thought was not cut off from the body. And this duality has led to atrocities and neurosis in our Modern age. And in Christianity it has led to a sickly evangelism that cares only for peoples' "souls" without any regard for their body. We forget Paul's statement in Romans 12 that calls us to offer our bodies as a singular living sacrifice, which is the content of our worship to God.

I didn't say anything about dualism! All I said is that everyone thinks! I fully believe that our thinking is connected to (and thus can be impaired by) our brains. That's not the issue here though. The issue is thinking period, also called logic. To offer one's body means to take control of it (uses logic) and do with it what is demanded. It is impossible to take control apart from logic.

You are obviously not aware of what happens in Genesis 11. I suggest you go back and read that before you make such stupid statements. You think I am arguing for some sort of social darwinism? Do you not even realize that social darwinism develps from its grounding in modernity (the same grounding that you are proposing above)?

What does the tower of babel have to do with humanity being equal?

We don't know God unless God comes to us. We didn't have anything inherent to us that brought us to God. Show me in the scriptures where such was the case? The scriptures are about God's revelation to us. We couldn't know God before God revealed himself to us. We were trees, and when Christ shows up God allows us to walk.

If God did not give us the ability to know him, we could not. But he has given this ability to everyone.

Romans 1 is the worst prooftext you could have chosen. Paul in that chapter paints humanity as hopelessly enslaved to sin, unable to know God as the Creator (because they have exchanged God for a lie). God didn't reveal himself in Romans 1; God handed us over to our debased minds.

What?! Paul's point is that the world rejected that which was evident! It wasn't that they couldn't see it, it's that they didn't follow that which they did see! That's why God is a just God!

And yet not once in this passage does Paul equate the gospel to this singular message. I didn't remove that message from Paul; I was saying that the gospel for Paul consists in something quite other than Christ's "dying for our sins."

Did you forget to read the opening statement?

1 Corinthians 15
Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand,

2by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.

Guess you missed that part eh? Talk about embarassing....

God gave us bodies (integrated and wholistic bodies) for a reason. If were just heads we wouldn't get too far.

Yes, but that doesn't change anything I said.

Anachronism at its worst. Mind for Paul is not filled with the same content as you give it here. Dianoia in the greek signifies purpose and attitude (not mind which is vous in the greek). I guess for Christ logic can't be removed from rhetoric either.

Peace,
Michael

Purpose and attitude both involve logic.

 

[godrulz]

God's revelation came in written form (in addition to the person of Christ and creation).

We need logic, grammar, cognitive ability to understand revelation. We are in the personal image of God with intellectual, volitional, and emotional capacity. Using the noodle/coconut is not unspiritual. God invites us to reason with Him and each other. We should study to show ourselves approved. Theology requires searching out matters, the glory of a king (Proverbs). It is the basis for practical living. :readthis:

 

[seekinganswers]

Except you forget that the Word existed before He was flesh. And yet agin you overlook that to understand what logos is, to understand what Christ is, what a foundation is, what scriptures are etc. you must use logic. logic is the foundation of any and all reasoning.

No, in fact, "though the world was made through him, the world did not know him; he came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him." We didn't know the logos. And the logos was not a set of universal principles or laws; the logos was God and was with God (as a person, not as an impersonal logic).

Speaking in the sense of making audible noises, yes. Speaking as in communicating information, no. You cannot speak information without using logic.

That is not true. One learns to communicate without any reason or logic. The brain is quite adept at it. You need not be conscience of your ability to speak in order to speak. In fact, the best learners of foreign languages are the ones who don't have to think about it, but who are able to allow their brains to do it for them.

And you forget that languages aren't very logical; most languages do not have a logic to them (unless they are created by humans for the very purpose of being logical). "I ran" does not follow the logic of the English language; it is identified as an "exception" along with many other examples.

Logic is what interprets the experience! A child learns through observation in that they process the things they observe learn to imitate them to bring about a desired reaction. That's logic! You can of course reason incorrectly but you are still using logic!

And that ordered observation is imbedded in the child from without not from within. The child learns the logic of his or her parents. And the logic doesn't become a part of the child until later stages of development. Logic is has a rhetorical base in humans, meaning that logic has no reality outside of a context. There is not a logic that exists outside of flesh and blood (Jesus is not a set of universal principles).

DUH! God made our brains able to think logically! But that you can speak at all requires the use of logic. Any and all speaking first requires thinking which is logic.

So "DUH!" is a rational argument now, is it? I'm going to recant everything I said because you said "DUH!" To revert to that time of my life, "Get real!" Only someone who has no clue about how his brain works would say that it is "logical." We have yet to figure out why the brain does the things that it does. It defys logic in a very real way (sleeping makes no sense; we thought it was needed to rest the brain, and then we discover that the brain is most active in sleep; we have yet to figure out why, nor have we affirmed it to be logical). As I said before, languages themselves defy logic, so that if the brain were purely logical it would never learn a language. Brains are physical, and develop connections that are made permanent as it grows older. It is flexible in its beginnning and much less flexible towards the end of its life (which comes with the rest of the body). Your brain cannot be cordoned off from the rest of your body; the way you think has everything to do with your context. "Logic" is a product of society, a necessity in its own right, but entirely contextual so that logic must change when you move from one group to another. Christ is incarnated differently from person to person and from the 1st century to now. Look at a picture of Christ in my church, and he is white. Go to the southern baptist congregation in my neighborhood and Jesus is black. Jump over to Korea and Jesus is a Korean. And none of these images reflect the Palestinian Jesus who was born in the first century. This is not logical, and yet I would love to see you go to the black church and tell the people that Jesus wasn't black based on your "logical" approach to the matter. Even you are not grounded in logic, because you probably still have an image of Jesus that is white stuck in your head. And guess what, you'll never overcome that image. Does that mean that you can never know Jesus, or does it mean that God has to invade your experience of the world once again for you to see who Christ is? Without the Spirit, Christ would not be known to us today (because no one was able to just look at Christ and say, oh yeah, he's God). Even Nathaniel in the gospel of John flees when Christ is on the cross; rationality goes out the window as we must rely on the comforter to guide us.

Yes, but it is a function of the mind where thinking takes place. And it is in the mind that logic is used. You cannot learn anything without logic.

No, it is not in the "mind," but in the physical brain. Your brain in its physicality does the work for you. It has nothing to do with logic, and everything to do with synapses and neurons; if I mess with your neurons, I mess with the way you think; I even mess with your logic (as has been done through torture all across the globe).

No, it cannot. That's not possible. Yes it is, because language defies logic (explain to me the logic of "I ran" over "I runned"?). You have to have a language first that you learn; you don't have to have logic (and in fact that is not a single child who is born with a logical framework for language; they have a physical ability to learn; they don't have a logical intuition).

How could you ever learn a language without logic? You couldn't even begin!

Yes you could, because all you need is the spoken language. You don't need a basic logic; you just need to put a child into the setting and the child learns the language. This works with Chinese or English (languages whose logic [i.e. grammar] are quite distinct from one another; it takes a different logic to learn Chinese than it does to learn English).

Do you know how people first learned a second language? They couldn't use logic (to this day we cannot be certain of what even the Hebrew says in many places throughout the scriptures; when all we have is our "intuition" we really have accomplished nothing; we did ok with the Hebrew because we also have a tradition of Hebrew spoken throughout the ages. If we didn't have context no amount logic could help us to learn Hebrew. In fact, there a many ancient writings that we have yet to dicipher (and that is only because the language has been lost; language is not logical; it is contextual and particular).

Advanced logic consists in formal arguments and such, yes. Basic logic does not have to lay everything out. It simply observes, learns, and understands. That's what logic/reasoning/thinking is.

But this is entirely contextual; it is not universal. The way one reasons is contingent upon where one is.

Logic for a child is simplified and basic, but it still exists. Without logic we are beasts of the earth, stupid.

So you're saying that animals are not governed by logic? This is how I know that you are equating Christ with a false logic. Christ doesn't merely govern humanity; Christ is the Lord of Creation, and by whom all things have been made. Even the animals have a logic in this sense. Animals do learn and reason (probably at the same level as a child in most cases). They do not always have a complex reasoning, but they do have the ability to learn and adapt. It is amazing.

Logic is not inherent to us as human beings. Logic must develop out of one's context. Logic is a terrible term, because it pretends to be something it is not in our world. We try to pretend that there is something that makes us unique, that allows us to be eternal in some way. There is nothing in us that will not go to the grave. We will not escape death. The mind is grounded in the physical structures of the brain, so that when the brain is dead, the mind will cease to be as well (we will not outlive ourselves). And that means it is not logic that makes us unique; it is life that grounds us in the Creation, so that if we do not have life, we are nothing. And life is not something that is logical. You cannot give a reason for life (for the Creation). And if you do, you have projected yourself upon the Creator; you have engaged in idolatry.

I didn't say anything about dualism! All I said is that everyone thinks! I fully believe that our thinking is connected to (and thus can be impaired by) our brains. That's not the issue here though. The issue is thinking period, also called logic. To offer one's body means to take control of it (uses logic) and do with it what is demanded. It is impossible to take control apart from logic.

And your affirmation of thinking comes from Descartes. You weren't the one who had that idea. It is entirely contextual, a phenomenon of Modernity.

What does the tower of babel have to do with humanity being equal?

Now you have changed the issue. I was saying that we as humans are not united in ourselves (in our ability to think). Now you have changed the matter over to "equality" as if equality were grounded in one's ability to think. In the modern period it was our ability to "think" that led us to differentiate ourselves from others, who were not as rational, not as intelligent, not as "civil." Notice, a person in a coma has ceased to be a thinking being. Yet that person is no less a person. Many are born with brains that will not allow them to think "properly," and yet they do not cease to be human because they don't think like you and me. Logic does not unite humanity; God unites us, because God is the giver of life, and life unites not only humanity but also the whole Creation. We are even united to the animals in our life (for God gives both us and the animals life).

If God did not give us the ability to know him, we could not. But he has given this ability to everyone.

No he has not. He handed us over to our own thinking, which did the exact opposite; it caused us to exchange the image of God for images produced from the Creation.

What?! Paul's point is that the world rejected that which was evident! It wasn't that they couldn't see it, it's that they didn't follow that which they did see! That's why God is a just God!

"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,
because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them."

God didn't make us with the ability to know God; God revealed himself to us from the beginning, even with a revelation that is shown forth in our very selves (in the very Creation). It is not that God programmed us to know him; God made us, and related to us in that Creation so that he revealed himself to us; Christ becomes the culmination of this singular revleation of God to us. It is not logical; it is revelational (apocalyptic).

Did you forget to read the opening statement?

1 Corinthians 15
Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand,

2by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.

Guess you missed that part eh? Talk about embarassing....

I did not mean to remove, "Jesus atones our sins;" what I was trying to point out was the fact that the gospel consists in much more than the atonement. Many in fundamentalist traditions present the gospel as Jesus' atonement alone, and this is incorrect. Jesus' atonement is only one aspect of the gospel; the gospel as a whole movement is understood in the way that I have stated, because that is exactly how Paul presents it to the Gentiles of Thessalonica.

Yes, but that doesn't change anything I said.

It does. It means that the mind does not exist as distinct from a context; logic means nothing without rhetoric.

Purpose and attitude both involve logic.

You don't understand. Logic as a universal is not logic that is involved in attitude and purpose. I am against logic as a universal concept. Logic is contextual (logic must be tempered by rhetoric). If you want to talk about logic as a universal in the Greek you speak of logos; if you want to speak about human participation in that logic you speak of the mind (vous). Jesus uses neither of these words.

Peace,
Michael

 

[Clete]

Said the fool whose only retort was an insult to his opponent, and the same fool who claimed he would say no more as he continued to blab away.

I, like God, am able to repent. I see however, that unlike God, I did so in error in this case.

My apologies for haven given you another chance to prove your weren't a complete blithering idiot.

 

[seekinganswers]

God's revelation came in written form (in addition to the person of Christ and creation).

We need logic, grammar, cognitive ability to understand revelation. We are in the personal image of God with intellectual, volitional, and emotional capacity. Using the noodle/coconut is not unspiritual. God invites us to reason with Him and each other. We should study to show ourselves approved. Theology requires searching out matters, the glory of a king (Proverbs). It is the basis for practical living. :readthis:

This I completely agree with, Godrulz (something that does not happen often between you and I). But the reason I agree is the fact that you place revelation first and logic second. Logic is not the overarching structure for the Creation in what you have said, God is the one in whom the Creation is grounded. And you have not tried to asign a logic to God, but you have imbedded it within humanity (our response), and God's "logic" is revelational (which means it does not fit into the Creation). God is other than the Creation, and so God must invade this Creation; he does not submit to its logic as if God could be confined by the Creation. God is the one who sets the bounds of Creation, not the one who is bounded by it.

And God's "invasion" is not done by force (exhastive control), because God's invasion happens from the beginning (when God divides the darkness, and the waters to make space for life). God creates (that's God's invasion) and so that which resides in the space God has created can never fully be an enemy (though we might try to be). The true enemy of God runs up against God, which results in his or her own destruction (so the true enemy is nothing at all). God has declared even the so-called enemies his friends, and has invited them by his Son into life (for he is the Maker of them all). Pharaoh became a watery chaos when he tried to use his armies against Israel, and what happened to the watery chaos? It was absorbed into itself. Pharaoh was going to be an example to the nations, whether it would come by obedience or by his own destruction. He was destined to show the glory of God (one way or another).

God wasn't inherently known to the nations; his glory must be proclaimed. It is not a logical thing (something that can just be witnessed in the Creation). It is an apocolyptic thing whereby God invades our world to reveal himself to us. Revelation (God) comes first; logic is only secondary.

Peace,
Michael

 

[seekinganswers]

I, like God, am able to repent. I see however, that unlike God, I did so in error in this case.

My apologies for haven given you another chance to prove your weren't a complete blithering idiot.

Repentance is not something over which you can boast. If you can elevate yourself above me, you have not repented at all. You have just delluded yourself into thinking that you are better than you are.

You never gave me a chance. You like the Muslims and Christendom before you have tried to be an invasion on me (by coersive power), so that either I agree with you or I am your enemy that can be killed (or in your case that can be insulted and made fun of and condescended to). If I had truly been an "idiot" as you have so gracefully put it, you never would have responded to me in the first place. Instead, in labelling me an idiot you have only proven your own idiocy.

Whether you agree with me or not, Clete, you are my brother, and I will never call you my enemy, but my friend (even if you decide to excommunicate me). And though we may enrage one another, I am still called to love you because that is Christ's command to me (as it is to all his followers), and it is the very example of his life that I have seen lived out by my brothers and sisters in Christ (even in you). Debate is not worth it if this testimony of Christ in us cannot be lived out within it.

Peace,
Michael

 

[sentientsynth]

seekinganswers,

I was hoping to ask you a couple of foundational questions.

1.Does truth exist?
2.Does truth contradict itself?


Please, if you would, keep your answers limited to two to three short sentences.


SS

 

[seekinganswers]

seekinganswers,

I was hoping to ask you a couple of foundational questions.

1.Does truth exist?
2.Does truth contradict itself?


Please, if you would, keep your answers limited to two to three short sentences.


SS

Truth is reality (ontologically defined) in God; in fact, truth is the only reality there is. Anything else is either a corruption of the truth or an absence of it altogether.

Truth as theologically defined is not contradictory to itself; truth anthropologically defined is contradictory (truth is not grounded in humanity; we participate in the truth through Creation and through obedience to God's will).

There is no truth outside of God; all that is grounded in God is truth. That which is not rooted in God is a lie (both to God and unto itself).

Peace,
Michael

 

[sentientsynth]

seekinganswers,


Thanks for the reply, and for keeping your reply short, sweet, and to the point.

Truth is reality (ontologically defined) in God; in fact, truth is the only reality there is. Anything else is either a corruption of the truth or an absence of it altogether.

Truth as theologically defined is not contradictory to itself;

Absulotively. :up:

truth anthropologically defined is contradictory (truth is not grounded in humanity; we participate in the truth through Creation and through obedience to God's will).

I think I see what you're saying. A little murky though.

I would say that anthropological truth is a contradiction in itself. It is a contradiction in terms. I think that you and I agree on this. Let me know if I don't. (Once again, two, three short sentences. )

There is no truth outside of God; all that is grounded in God is truth. That which is not rooted in God is a lie (both to God and unto itself).

Exac-a-tic-a-ly.

God is God. God does not contradict Himself. And as God is truth, the truth cannot contradict itself.

It may not be readily apparent, but from this we can formulate logical laws. God has made us creatures with the ability to understand his communications to us. God's word is clear and unambiguous. And God has given man the means by which to understand the world around him, so long as his understanding is rooted in God's Word. Any attempt to understand the world through a means outside that which is revealed in His Word is "anthropological truth," and thereby unjustified.

It is "knowledge falsely so-called."

So we've seen that God is truth. The truth then cannot be contradictory.

Why, then, seekinganswers have you taken issue with truth, which is God's gift to men, with a firm foundation in God Himself?



SS

 

[godrulz]

It is true that if I press these keys, I get letters on the internet. It is true that if I overeat, I will get fat or if a poke out my eye, I will go blind. It is true that if I put a key in my ignition, the car will start. It is true that synthetic discoveries in chemistry are real despite not existing from the beginning of creation. Is all truth really grounded in God and His being? Spiritual revelation is from God. Smashing a glass on the ground does not flow from His 'ontologogy'.

 

[sentientsynth]

Godrulz, it's apparent you have no clue what I'm talking about. Please torch straw-men elsewhere.

Is all truth really grounded in God and His being?

In case you didn't notice, this is Godrulz's question:

Is all truth really grounded in God and His being?


Yes, Godrulz. All truth is grounded in God.

 

[seekinganswers]

God is God. God does not contradict Himself. And as God is truth, the truth cannot contradict itself.

But it is more than this. Anything that contradicts the truth does not have substance whatsoever. The only reality is truth (that which is grounded in God).

It may not be readily apparent, but from this we can formulate logical laws. God has made us creatures with the ability to understand his communications to us. God's word is clear and unambiguous. And God has given man the means by which to understand the world around him, so long as his understanding is rooted in God's Word. Any attempt to understand the world through a means outside that which is revealed in His Word is "anthropological truth," and thereby unjustified.

To make laws is to take this too far. God cannot be known in laws, nor does God entirely disclose himself to us. When God tells Adam and Eve not to eat of the tree, he does not say why, nor is God obligated to. When God warns Cain, God gives Cain no reason for accepting Abel's offering over Cain's own.

Sometimes the world around us is just not comprehensible (and this is a theme prevelant throughout the scriptures). There is no reason why Job should suffer but he does. There is no reason why Lazarus the beggar should die in the gutter, and yet he does. Theodicy has been attempted to explain these things away, but God is silent as to an answer. Innocent people die in this world, and God does not explain why those innocents suffer for the sins of others (why does God allow sin to enslave humanity, for sin is a power that enslaves us against our will?). There is no logic to explain this to us; God is silent, and points the question back at us, for we are not the creators of the Heavens and the Earth and such questions are not for us to be asking; "Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm. He said: 'Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me. Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? Tell me, if you understand" (Job 38:1-4). God does not lie within the limits of God's own Creation, so to make laws for God out of the Creation is absurdity.

God sets the perogative (without any reason other than the reality that God is the Creator and that God is good).

Even a lie is grounded in the truth, no matter how much that lie may have distorted that truth to its own end. A lie is nothing without the truth (for a lie only has substance as it feeds off of the truth, parasitically.

When you make a law, you give substance to what is not. We would only need laws if we thought that there were another reality other than God (the truth). In the presence of God there is no need for law (for God himself instructs us in life and in the truth). Torah in the Hebrew does not mean law (primarily) but actually is instruction. There is the torah of God, but there is also the torot of the rabbis. Torah is always to be understood as teaching or instruction (which must be learned in the presence of the teacher). Torah without the Creator is dead. Laws are not given by one who is master, but by one who seeks to master that which is not already his. God doesn't need to define a universal law (which is the way in which Israel stumbles) for God inscribes his torah (teaching/instruction) on our hearts. Law takes the place of God; it watches over us until Christ comes, who will be the righteous king who instructs us in the teaching of God (only because we are too stubborn to receive God as our King). We will be justified (rectified) before God by pistis (the faithfulness of Christ to the law, and our faithful response to this king).

It is "knowledge falsely so-called."

So we've seen that God is truth. The truth then cannot be contradictory.

Why, then, seekinganswers have you taken issue with truth, which is God's gift to men, with a firm foundation in God Himself?

God doesn't need to give us an understanding of the world that we can acheive on our own; God comes alongside us and teaches us what the world is about by disclosing to us God's very self (in Christ, in whom the whole world is grounded). Logic as a set of laws is a means of control (for the Greeks it was used to understand the fates who had an exhastive knowledge of the laws of the universe and could manipulate them according to the will of the gods; fatalism comes from logical constructs of the universe, not freedom). Logic gives rigidity to the universe that is far from what we find in the scriptures. The Cosmos is not an ideal, nor is the ontology of the Universe held in some universal and disconnected set of "ideas" (matter being connected to what is evil). Reality is tied to the very cosmos in the Creation (God's Spirit comes to dwell in the flesh), so that reality becomes something much more maleable than what we find in Greek Philosophy. The Greeks tied reality to logos (in a similar way in which we want to define the cosmos by logic), and because of that it was hierarchical and unchanging (it reflected the social structure of the Roman Empire). Christians understand the universe to be grounded in the Trinity (as the Creation proceeds from the Father through the Son and the Spirit, and back to the Father in praise). Christians understand the cosmos as grounded in love, not in logic.

Does this at all help to explain the qualms that I have with what you have been saying?

Peace,
Michael

 

[sentientsynth]

Seekinganswers,

Please forgive that I haven't responded to your entire post. I am aimed at dealing with foundational issues in your thinking. Once you and I have clarified these, we may move on to scripture itself.

I wrote: God is God. God does not contradict Himself. And as God is truth, the truth cannot contradict itself.

SA replied:

Anything that contradicts the truth does not have substance whatsoever. The only reality is truth (that which is grounded in God).

I agree.

To make laws is to take this too far. God cannot be known in laws, nor does God entirely disclose himself to us.

God has revealed that He is God, that He is the truth, and that the truth does not contradict itself.

We therefore may not say that God is not God. We are held to affirming what God has revealed, and not contradicting it.

Do you agree?


SS

 

[seekinganswers]

It is true that if I press these keys, I get letters on the internet. It is true that if I overeat, I will get fat or if a poke out my eye, I will go blind. It is true that if I put a key in my ignition, the car will start. It is true that synthetic discoveries in chemistry are real despite not existing from the beginning of creation. Is all truth really grounded in God and His being? Spiritual revelation is from God. Smashing a glass on the ground does not flow from His 'ontologogy'.

Godrulz,

You have created a duality that is just not justifyable. Why on earth is it proper for you to make a distinction between what is "Spiritual" and what is purely "physical." For someone who detests Greek Philosophy you have certainly done well in taking up the understanding of the physical as being lesser than the Spiritual (and putting them almost at odds with one another; spiritual things deal with eternal things while physical things are temporal and less than perfect). God created the World (yes, even the glass that you smash on the table). And God not only created the world, but he created/creates the world according to his will (by God and through God and unto God are all things). You see the life of the world is not it's own. Our life (and the life of all creatures) is God's (God's Spirit comes to dwell in our members so as to imbue them with life). Now a glass might not share in that life in the same way that we do, but in God giving that glass over to our governance (as we are transformed into God's image), it does share in the life that we envision (because we acheive a sense of purpose and will that we share with God).

If God is not the ontological grounding for all things, than there is something that is truly other than God (and you succeed in making God out to be much more transcendant than I ever accomplished). Transcendance for me deals with contingency (our life consists in God's life; not vice versa). Yet there is nothing that is outside of God. God envelops all things, so that in God's transcendence, God cannot help but be immanent. In your understanding of God, God is first entirely other so that God must become immanent from his transcendence. For me the transcendent God is the immanent one. God is intimately related to God's Creation because God is the one in whom the Creation is grounded (in its very being). And God is not equaly contingent; it cannot be said that God's life is the sum of life in the Creation (this is no panentheistic or pantheistic view of God). It is this dramatic tension that is harmonized in the Trinity.

So see that you have not been so successful in divorcing yourself from Greek thought, because you are not sufficiently been aware of the ways in which Greek thought has infiltrated your own thinking through your ties to this world.

Peace,
Michael

 

[seekinganswers]

God has revealed that He is God, that He is the truth, and that the truth does not contradict itself.

This seems redundant to me (it seems to be a truism). When you say that "God is the truth and that the truth does not contradict itself" it is like saying that God is truth and God is not a non-truth. What is the significance in making such a statement, unless you want to give a reality to the "non-truth"? There is no contradiction for God. When God speaks into the chaos he speaks unopposed (like when light shines into the darkness, and the darkness flees in its presence, because darkness is nothing more than the absence of light). Truth is truth. I don't want to define truth by non-truth (anymore than I would define light by the darkness). The darkness is nothing without light; lies are nothing without the truth. Contradictions are what we see in the world (especially when we are not grounded in the truth; because we have allowed the lies to corrupt us). The lie holds nothing; it is parasitical to the truth. And when God shows up, the lie will be show for what it truly is (nothing). So I don't want to define God's truth as "non-contradictory," for it places ontology in another place other than God. Truth is the only ontological reality; all other realities are parasites of this truth. And without the truth (without the host) the lie is nothing (the parasite has no life).

We therefore may not say that God is not God. We are held to affirming what God has revealed, and not contradicting it.

Do you agree?

Once again, do you understand the qualms I have with the way in which you are stating this? God's revelation to us cannot be defined by the "contradictions." That would be to give an onology to the contradictions. It would be to affirm the Modern philosophy which grounds reality in the self (in the thinking person). God cannot be defined in opposition to human self. That is like defining the truth as a non-lie. What on earth would a "non-lie" be? Mathematics might be able to say that a double negative makes a positive, but language does not quite work that way (it is much more nuanced in language, because words do not form equations in the same way as numbers, numbers being an abstraction of reality). The truth is not the opposite of a lie, because a lie is grounded in the truth (you have to know what truth is first before you can say what a lie is).

Yes we are indebted to the revelation of God (especially in Christ for us Christians). And as far as contradiction is concerned, we are more concerned with falsity than we are with alternate realities. What is not grounded in God is false (it is idolotry; worshiping deaf dumb and mute idols). In this much I agree; we must not submit to the corruption of the truth; but I will not go so far as to say that the corruption has a reality in itself that can truly replace God's reality. The lie is forever contingent upon the truth for its substance, and as soon as the truth has been entirely removed, the lie ceases to be anything of substance at all. I cannot say, "The sky is green" unless sky and green have already been defined. The lie I tell about the color of the sky is nothing without the truth in which it is grounded.

Peace,
Michael

 

[godrulz]

Godrulz, it's apparent you have no clue what I'm talking about. Please torch straw-men elsewhere.


In case you didn't notice, this is Godrulz's question:

Is all truth really grounded in God and His being?


Yes, Godrulz. All truth is grounded in God.

Is the fact that I am named William (true) necessarily grounded in God or would it still be true even if God did not exist?

 

[godrulz]

Godrulz,

You have created a duality that is just not justifyable. Why on earth is it proper for you to make a distinction between what is "Spiritual" and what is purely "physical." For someone who detests Greek Philosophy you have certainly done well in taking up the understanding of the physical as being lesser than the Spiritual (and putting them almost at odds with one another; spiritual things deal with eternal things while physical things are temporal and less than perfect). God created the World (yes, even the glass that you smash on the table). And God not only created the world, but he created/creates the world according to his will (by God and through God and unto God are all things). You see the life of the world is not it's own. Our life (and the life of all creatures) is God's (God's Spirit comes to dwell in our members so as to imbue them with life). Now a glass might not share in that life in the same way that we do, but in God giving that glass over to our governance (as we are transformed into God's image), it does share in the life that we envision (because we acheive a sense of purpose and will that we share with God).

If God is not the ontological grounding for all things, than there is something that is truly other than God (and you succeed in making God out to be much more transcendant than I ever accomplished). Transcendance for me deals with contingency (our life consists in God's life; not vice versa). Yet there is nothing that is outside of God. God envelops all things, so that in God's transcendence, God cannot help but be immanent. In your understanding of God, God is first entirely other so that God must become immanent from his transcendence. For me the transcendent God is the immanent one. God is intimately related to God's Creation because God is the one in whom the Creation is grounded (in its very being). And God is not equaly contingent; it cannot be said that God's life is the sum of life in the Creation (this is no panentheistic or pantheistic view of God). It is this dramatic tension that is harmonized in the Trinity.

So see that you have not been so successful in divorcing yourself from Greek thought, because you are not sufficiently been aware of the ways in which Greek thought has infiltrated your own thinking through your ties to this world.

Peace,
Michael

Paul refuted the Greek philosophies that made spiritual real but matter/physical less spiritual. I do not hold to these false philosophies. The BODY/physical is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Physical creation was 'very good'. What on earth are you rambling about?

 

[seekinganswers]

Paul refuted the Greek philosophies that made spiritual real but matter/physical less spiritual. I do not hold to these false philosophies. The BODY/physical is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Physical creation was 'very good'. What on earth are you rambling about?

All of the Creation is grounded in the Creator (that is all physical Creation). God has decided to reside in the Creation through humanity (not as singular and individual persons) but as a people imaged after the God of Creation (that is humans [plural], members united in a singular body [flesh], male and female, were made after the image of God; marriage being the image of the church, according to Paul). Human beings as individuals do not bare the image of God in themselves. It is only in as much as they love God by also loving the neighbor that they truly image their Creator.

So humans making a glass and deciding to break it on the table is no less a spiritual matter for us than are questions of our salvation, for our life in general is a spiritual matter, and the physical structures with which we come into contact, the physical bodies with which we relate are defining our life just as much as we define them. God does care about the Creation and how humanity treats it, and God makes it a very spiritual matter in torah (even the land is cursed by our sin and must be healed as a result of it; in those times this is speaking quite literally, as it would do the same in our time, as wars led to the salting of the land, which turned it into fallow land that could no longer bare life; much of conventional warfare has the same affects in our time).

The Body of which Paul speaks is most often the church as defined as united members. Even in Romans 12 Paul calls us to offer our bodies as a singular living, holy and acceptable sacrifice, which is our spiritual/logical act of worship. And yet today most often you will find both Protestants and Roman Catholics defining this body as a "Spiritual" and "invisible" body that won't be witnessed until we have gone to heaven (leaving behind our bodies and the world with them). Paul doesn't speak this way. Though there is a hint of catholicity in his use of the term ekklesia (which allows for a hope for the eschatological gathering), the word cannot be divorced from its very literal meaning, the congregation, or the gathering. In the Roman world ekklesia (the term we translate into "church") is a word that was used to talk about social gatherings, especially polis gatherings that defined the life of the cities (poloi). Ekklesia was the same term used to talk about the town meetings, which is a nuance of the word that has been completely lost in its English rendering. That is because the English "church" has its roots in the greek meaning "The Lord's house," which signifies that we have reverted in many ways back to the temple ideology of the pre-exhilic Israel. God and humanity meet in a place and no longer in a person (namely Christ).

So don't sit here and pretend like you have agreed whole-heartedly with Paul without doing any real work, because you are failing to see how much you have been influenced by the latent Platonism running through our tradition. We cannot pretend that it isn't there, otherwise we will only allow it to continue to have power. It will take repentance for us to remove this sin and return to something that is more faithful.

Peace,
Michael