Jesus and the epileptic boy

[LilyM]

LilyM;5457020:

You seem to have a stake in this episode being about demonic possession. I have a stake in it being about the importance of faith, and prayer and fasting in healing of whatever kind.

Just because the gospels don’t say that Jesus cured in this way on other occasions doesn’t mean he didn’t. The gospels themselves say that there were many other works that Jesus did and many other things he said that were not included. And, I repeat, if biblical scholarship can throw light on these episodes in Jesus’ life then I’m always gonna take that into consideration when reading the gospels and NOT the opinions of someone hung up on a particular literal reading.

But you do have a stake in this - you’ve eaten up the fallible scholarship hook line and sinker and are regarding the footnotes either instead of, or at least over and above, the actual words of the text. Always a dangerous move.

 

[Brickmaker]

Brickmaker;5457077:

But you do have a stake in this - you’ve eaten up the fallible scholarship hook line and sinker and are regarding the footnotes either instead of, or at least over and above, the actual words of the text. Always a dangerous move.

Your opinion only. In my opinion, not taking scholarship into consideration is even more dangerous since all you are doing is giving your own literal interpretation of the gospel text and not looking at the underlying motivations and meaning.

 

[JaredR]

I looked this same story up in Mark.

“So they brought him. When the spirit saw Jesus, it immediately threw the boy into a convulsion. He fell to the ground and rolled around, foaming at the mouth.”

Epileptic seizures are either random or triggered by certain stimuli, so I guess it doesn’t seem likely that this was purely a case of epilepsy.

 

[po18guy]

LilyM, the following is not my quote. I have attempted to correct it. Someone knows color. Now, we’ll move on to the “quote” function…

Quote:
Originally Posted by -]po18guy/-] (Anonymous inexpert)
I’ll still take biblical scholarship into consideration long before I’ll take on the inexpert opinions of anonymous posters here.

 

[LilyM]

Your opinion only. In my opinion, not taking scholarship into consideration is even more dangerous since all you are doing is giving your own literal interpretation of the gospel text and not looking at the underlying motivations and meaning.

Taking scholarship into consideration doesn’t mean you have to agree with all of said scholarship, or even most of it.

I haven’t failed to miss the underlying motive about the importance of prayer and fasting, not by any means. I ALWAYS try to practice both when I have serious issues to put before the Lord, precisely because of that passage!

I am just incredibly unconvinced that Jesus had to manufacture a fake story about demonic possession to make the point. It would have achieved the same thing to say ‘some ILLNESSES can only be cured by prayer and fasting’. Or more simply ‘prayer is more powerful when accompanied by fasting’.

I looked this same story up in Mark.

“So they brought him. When the spirit saw Jesus, it immediately threw the boy into a convulsion. He fell to the ground and rolled around, foaming at the mouth.”

Epileptic seizures are either random or triggered by certain stimuli, so I guess it doesn’t seem likely that this was purely a case of epilepsy.

Thank you. It always pays to compare the Gospel accounts of such things.

Here’s a different example of what I was saying about the NAB footnotes. If you compare its notes on the episode of Mary Magdalene anointing Jesus’ feet (which is recounted in each Gospel) the footnotes try to claim that Luke’s recounting is in fact of a different episode.

Which is totally unjustified - for starters it is said to be at Simon’s house in Matthew, Mark and Luke, and at Bethany in both Luke and John. Clearly it IS meant to be the same episode, even if details are sometimes muddled as they are about other Gospel episodes. And if any argument could be made, it is possibly that JOHN’s is the different episode, since it states that it was at Lazarus’ house.

See what I mean about not taking the NAB footnotes as the be-all and end-all even if they are on the Vatican website?

 

[William1964]

I found this discussion quite interesting although, it became somewhat contentious. It really brings up a wider topic of which we as Catholics are faced with today. I think probably in earlier times one could trust that a Catholic could receive orthodox instruction from any priest or Catholic bible commentary and for that matter, a fellow Catholic. Today we can’t trust everything we read or hear. We have to be proactive and compare with what has always been taught to be correct/orthodox.

Even my wife received sinful counsel from a priest in the confessional. He told her using condoms in regard birth control is ok. It caused terrible problems in my marriage.

No doubt it’s the sign of the times. No doubt the end of the endtimes. We should all be the best Catholics we can be. God help us and grant us your Grace.

 

[peary2]

Someone brought up an interesting point today, and I didn’t know how to answer. Most people today recognize the boy in Matthew 17 as an epileptic, but at the time everyone assumed he was demon possessed. In verse 18, Jesus casts out the alleged demon. My first thought was that perhaps he was demon-possessed and had epilepsy as a side effect, but that seems like a stretch. Why didn’t Jesus recognize it as an illness?

It would be interesting to find out if the translators purposely put in the word ‘epileptic’ because that is the conclusion they came to, or if the Greek meant something else entirely. If Jesus cast out demons then that is what they were. The other fact is is that in some possessions, the possessed can mimic seizures.

 

[po18guy]

See what I mean about not taking the NAB footnotes as the be-all and end-all even if they are on the Vatican website?

Modernism rears its ugly head yet again - sometimes in some footnotes. Also, just look at what the Vatican press corps and Secretary of State’s office has done, changing the words of our Holy Father, which created an uproar. The “Vatican” stamp of approval does not mean what it once did, in spite of the protestations of our new brother member.

Being from Oz, you might not have followed the USCCB much. I have watched them since before I became Catholic. As an organisation, they have slowly become more worldly and are in need of prayer.

 

[po18guy]

I found this discussion quite interesting although, it became somewhat contentious. It really brings up a wider topic of which we as Catholics are faced with today. I think probably in earlier times one could trust that a Catholic could receive orthodox instruction from any priest or Catholic bible commentary and for that matter, a fellow Catholic. Today we can’t trust everything we read or hear. We have to be proactive and compare with what has always been taught to be correct/orthodox.

Even my wife received sinful counsel from a priest in the confessional. He told her using condoms in regard birth control is ok. It caused terrible problems in my marriage.

No doubt it’s the sign of the times. No doubt the end of the endtimes. We should all be the best Catholics we can be. God help us and grant us your Grace.

Amen! The Church is supposed to be in the world - not the world in the Church!