Is there a possibility that **the apostles and early Christians ** (not you and me) saw Jesus as being the annoited ruler or prince of the nations; the new David. Not neccessarily God the Son. I know this is a bit un-Christian thing to say, but I just want to know, so that my faith may mature and that I will truly believe without doubts.
?From what I’ve read, it seems that you are open to the idea that “the apostles and early Christians saw Jesus as being the annoited ruler or prince of the nations; the new David. Not neccessarily God the Son.”The possibility you mention, is the fact of the matter
The notions of Jesus as
Pais Theou can mean “son of God” or “servant of God” - there is no perfect translation for it.
- Son of Man
- Messiah (= Anointed One)
- God’s Chosen
- Son of David
- Pais Theou
do not of themselves imply belief in the deity of the person or persons recognised as being Son of Man, etc.
The phrase “son of God” do not necessarily imply deity either - it often implies either
The identification of Him as Son of God, took time - it was not (to judge from the texts) immediate: it is not required by all or most of them. There were many reasons why He should not to be thought to be the Son of God in any distinctive sense: paganism was very familiar with “sons of god” or “of the gods”. So explicit description of Him as “Son of God” (in a distinctively Christian sense, that is) or as “God”, is very rare in the NT - belief in His Deity is indicated in much subtler ways than that.
- adoption as king
or- status as a heavenly being - as more or less what amounts to an angel
In the NT, these phrases are used with their familiar associations, yet also in a distinctive & new sense. For example, Jesus is depicted as the Messiah - but (& this is new) as a suffering Messiah; & eventually, as a Messiah whose death has expiatory value.
Any help
From what I have seen that phrase has either been interpreted servant of God or child of God. So basically we are not sure of what the phrase means? This is a big thing in my book, because if the apostles did not think that was equal to God, how did the Church come to that conclusion?Pais Theou can mean “son of God” or “servant of God” - there is no perfect translation for it.
That doesnt explain why in private, they still called Him “servant”. It’s one thing to use the reference when preaching, but why in private when you already ‘know’ who Jesus is.
Because the reference in Acts refers to Jesus’ role as the Messiah - the Messiah (the Christ: the Anointed King of Israel) in opposition to the “kings and rulers” of this world. Jesus’ role as the Messiah is based upon the Incarnation, that is, His lowering of Himself to become man. Only as a man, could Jesus be the Messiah, the kingly successor to David, Who stands in solidarity with the true Chosen People of the Covenant in opposition to those who belong to the kingdom of this world - the kingdom of darkness. This is what Acts 4:23-31is addressing, not Christ’s Oneness of Being with the Father. Here, the Apostles are praising the fact that they will be made to oppose worldly power and suffer as Christ Himself suffered. This places everything in the context of the Incarnation. The passage is referring to the same thing that St. Paul refers to in Phil. 2:6, when he says of Christ: “Though He was in the form of God, He did not claim equality with God, something to be grasped at, but lowered Himself, taking on the form of a slave” - that is, a Servant. This is what Acts 2 has in mind when it speaks of Jesus as God’s Servant. As a man, that’s what Christ was; and the Apostles have now succeeded to this ministry, which is what the passage is about.
It is literally “child of God,” but can refer to servanthood or “assistantship” in the same sense that Timothy is called the “child” of Paul or Mark is called the “son” or “child” of Peter, etc.
No, we know what it means. We just don’t pin it down to one, proscriptive meaning. It has a depth of meaning that should not be limited. It is a term used in the context of the Church’s organic understanding of how Christ relates to the Father, principally in His Incarnation, but reflecting upon His eternal relationship with the Father.The Apostles did think that Christ is equal to the Father. They were not polytheists. So, do the math: If the Apostles only believed in one God (e.g. Acts 17:24ff) and if they believed that Christ was in “the form of God” (Phil 2:6), and if they called Christ “my God” (John 20:28), and if they believed that Christ was present eternally with the Father (1 John 1:2), and not some kind of “lesser god” or “angel” who was created at some point by God the Father (the Arian doctrine), it therefore follows that the Apostles believed that Jesus is the SAME eternal God as God the Father. This is the organic Apostolic Faith. The Apostles merely did not express things as overtly as later Gentile-Christians would because they were Jews operating within the context of Judaism and did not wish to express their organic Faith in ways that would imply polytheism.
You are looking at Acts 4 like a Fundamentalist, not like a mature and rational person. The passage in Acts 4 that you site is not a video-taped documentary of the historical event, but rather an account of the event as presented by the author of Acts (St. Luke), who was a) a Gentile who wasn’t personally there and b) writing a theological work (the Acts narrative) which merely draws from history and uses history as a basis to communicate theological truths, but which does not seek to meticulously document every facet of the historical event in question. In other words, what you are reading in Acts 4 is not a documentary of what literally took place in some “private meeting” among the Apostles. Rather, what you are reading is St. Luke’s theological rendition of what took place, which is designed for the benefit of PUBLIC reading by his intended audience (a certain “Theophilus”/“God-lover” - see Luke 1:1-4 and Acts 1:1), who was apparently still learning about the Apostolic Faith and desirous of receiving a theological overview of all that Christ and the Apostles did.
. Especially here:Ive just read two of the links you posted and they are excellent. I encourage others to read them:
Believe me I am no bible fundamentalist, the only ones Ive probably ever met where Mormons and JW’s who visited our home
. You seem to be undermining the level of inspiration of the Scriptures. I say this because I don’t think that there is any orthodox teaching who would deny that the New Testament can be taken quite literally. Christain apolegetics relies on this I think, because the defence of Jesus’ divinity are based on the specific words Jesus spoke (the I am references, the last priestly prayer of Jesus and so forth).was not literally said for two reasons:
I’m glad you found them helpful.I really appreciate your effort here because it has opened up a new train of thought that I wasn’t using
Ive just read two of the links you posted and they are excellent. I encourage others to read them:
bringyou.to/apologetics/a5.htm (The God-Man Jesus Christ)
bringyou.to/apologetics/a117.htm (The Divinity of Christ)
No, it is you who are undermining the nature of the inspired text. The Gospels and Acts are not strict historical documentaries; rather, they are theological histories. If you read them any other way, you create needless problems, since the very same events and sayings of Jesus are described very differently in the different Gospels. This is because the sacred authors present historical events in the light of their theological objectives. As any first-year film student knows, there is no such thing as true documentary. This is because the minute you point a camera at something, you select a subjective point of view. The sacred authors do not pretend otherwise; they take a particular point of view - a particular theological focus, and their accounts of the historical events are given from those different perspectives. If you think otherwise - if you think that Divine inspiration is a matter of historical accuracy vs. theological truth - then you must assume that some Gospels are “more inspired” than others, or that some Gospels are not inspired at all. But, this is not what we are dealing with.
Not in the sense that you should ignore what type of literature you are dealing with. If you do this, then you cannot, to cite another example, reconcile John’s Gospel with the Synoptics. The Synoptics present a one-year chronology for Jesus’ earthly ministry. John presents a three-year chronology. Why the difference? Again, a theological objective is at play. The Synoptics do not intend to present a literal chronology of the time Jesus was active, but merely to symbolically reflect the motif of Isaiah of “a year of favor from the Lord” - a reference to the Messiah’s coming. John, writing 30 years later, gives a more exact record of the historical chronology. But, if one did not know this, one would have to conclude that John and the Synoptics are at odds with each other --that is, if one wishes to take the Synoptics as a dead literal historical account rather than a theological work that is based on historical events.
No one is saying that the Gospels are made stuff up, but they are not pure documentaries of the historical events either. They are history through the prism of theology. A mature Christian understands and appreciates this. We have Jesus’ words; but we do not always have a record of how He exactly and historically said them. Rather, we have them as recounted by first-hand witnesses who expressed them and re-presented them according to the theological objectives that they were trying to convey to the early Christian communities that they evangelized. This is a necessary distinction and something which a mature and educated Christian must realize.
Not if you are mature in the Faith rather than a Fundamentalist. You yourself said it: We have St. Luke’s version of the events in Acts 4. We do not have a video tape recording of the meeting. We do not have a comprehensive documentary of it. Now, this does not mean that Luke’s version is wrong or made-up, but, it does mean that we only have what Luke intends to convey to us. He does not tell us what the Apostles were wearing that day; he does not tell us what they may have been eating or drinking, or how they sat together, or what else they talked about, or who exactly said what. Rather, Luke gives us a very narrow glimpse of this historical event; and the glimpse that he gives us is driven by his objective of recording it in the first place, which is to make a theological point. And that point is that the Apostles rejoiced because they had become suffering servants just like their Master Jesus. Thus, what is recorded and what is said about Jesus in Acts 4 does not represent the private understanding of the Apostles or the totality of what they believed about Him or shared with each other when they were alone. Rather, what we have is Luke’s account of this event which is driven by his desire to show that the Apostles were called to suffer just as the Incarnate Jesus suffered, and how they rejoiced in this realization. That is all that we have; and this is what you are seeing when you read this passage. To read anything more into it (as you do) is to ignore the nature of what you are reading, i.e., to ignore the type of literature this is.
Again, the inspiration and truth of the Gospels are not based on documentary detail, but on the accurate truth and substance of what they convey. Mark conveys what he was taught by Peter, but what he conveys is in a particular narrative form, which is not concerned with documentary-style detail, but with the theological truths that Mark intends to express. Indeed, one of the earliest references to the origin of Mark’s Gospel comes to us from St. Papias (a disciple of St. John), and even he understands this distinction. He writes:
This is, and has always been, the understanding of the Catholic Church. The Gospels are not pure documentaries, but theological works which take historical fact and present it in such a way as to ‘accomodate [it] to the necessarities of the [original] hearers.’ Only a Fundamentalist heretic thinks otherwise and fails to draw this distinction.
This is a Fundamentalist perspective. Being literal does not dictate or define inspiration; nor does that which in un-literal mean that it is untrue. A true story can be told in various ways. This is what the Gospels do. They present historical reality; but they do so through the prism of certain theological objectives, which influence what they write down and how they present it.
Your problem here is that you are misapplying the word “literal.” “Literal” does not refer to whether or not Jesus “really” cured people or “really” rose from the dead. It is the faith of the Church received from the Apostles that all these things “REALLY” happened. So, “literal” is not another word for “real.” The Gospels convey events that are real and historical, but they do not always do this using “literal” language. “Literal” refers to the type of literature with which one is dealing. One can write a “literal” account of the Battle of Waterloo, or one can write a “poetic” account of the Battle of Waterloo - or one can write a “theological” account of the Battle of Waterloo. The literal account will only tell you what happened - the facts, and only the facts. The poetic account will capture the essence of what happened, and perhaps convey something of what it was like to be there, which a literal account cannot do. But, a theological account takes the literal facts and presents them in such a way as to account for the deeper meanings of the events in question. A literal account cannot tell you what God’s perspective of Waterloo was - who He wanted to win; who He thought was just or unjust in the battle. But, a theological account can tell you what God thought of Napoleon or Wellington, and how His grace and His providence affected aspects of the battle. This is what the Gospels are - the type of literature with which we are dealing. Acts 4 is not a “literal” account of the event; it does not intend to present the facts or just the facts. Rather, it is a theological account of the event, which takes the real even and presents it in such a way as to make a theological point. This is the distinction - a distinction which you apparently do not appreciate, but should.
I’m not saying that he did. Those may have been the words that were prayed, but there were also other words that were not recorded here, i.e., other prayers that were prayed by the Apostles when they were in private which did testify to their belief in the Divinity of Christ (e.g. Phil. 2:6-11 and 1 Tim. 2:5-6 & 3:16, which were early Christian hymns). What we are probably seeing in Acts 4 is an early Christian hymn which had its origin at the event being recorded. But, what you are not seeing is that Luke’s account is driven by his intention to apply a particular theological meaning to the account. In this case, he seeks to show that the Apostles had succeeded to Jesus’ place as God’s Suffering Servant. That’s why he writes what he does, and that’s why he writes it the way that he writes it.
Sigh!
I’m afraid your inclination toward anachronism is amazing. Defending the Trinity or even defining its theology was not an issue for Luke. You are imposing that preoccupation on this passage (be careful, this is what heretics tend to do – they take one passage out of the whole context and run with it to try to make their own preconceived point). All that Luke is interested in here is to show that the Apostles now joyfully accepted suffering and persecution in the same way that Jesus did. This is why the prayer uses the words that it does. The words do not imply that Jesus is not God or that the Apostles believed that Jesus is something less that God. A modern-day Catholic Mass could recite this exact same prayer! Again, in Luke 9:3, Jesus says not to take a walking stick. In Mark 6:8 (recounting the same event), He says exactly the opposite. Which did He literally and historically say? He couldn’t have literally and historically said both. It’s time for you to approach this as a mature Catholic.. Based on what you have said, I think I have not been a ‘fundamentalist’, just ‘immature’ in my bible reading. These posts I can tell have come from someone whos reflected quite a bit on how to approach the Scriptures.Well, that style in which you have been reading the Sacred Word is fundamentalist. That’s how Fundamentalists approach the text. I did not mean to judge you or declare that you intend to be a Fundamentalist. Rather, you took a fundamentalist approach without meaning to, which is a common mistake among modern, English-speaking Catholics and Protestants. People from older cultures (e.g. the Mediterranean) don’t seem to get caught up in that area (they are prone to other problemsI can say that I cannot bring up any fault with what you said, except when you referred to me as a fundamentalist
). Our Anglo-Saxon culture tends to have a dead literal bent.I wish I reflected more.
Actually, the truth that I shared with you is simply the ancient Catholic understanding of the nature of the Gospels. They are historical accounts seen through the prism of theological expression, not straight documentary; this is why we don’t have only one Gospel. The Apostles never intended to produce a strict historical narrative of their time with Jesus (see John 20:30-31), but to convey the essence of the Good News for the liturgical reading of the Church. This is what the New Testament is.I am very glad that we are apparently on the same page now. Gloria Deo.
Because both the JWs and the Mormons are cults, and they refuse to see lots of things.
They are also quite happy to distort the original content of Scripture (in the translations of the King James that they use) in order to accommodate their loony, un-Apostolic doctrines. Most Protestants, of course, do not go that far, and are at least faithful (or try their best to be faithful) to the historical content of Scripture. Their problem is that they read Scripture divorced from the Traditional understanding of the ancient Church - what St. Thomas Aquinas called the “sensus fidelium”, the Church’s Traditional and universal “sense of the Faith.” The Trinity (as defined at Nicaea) was merely a clarification and formal articulation of this organic “sense” of the Faith, i.e., the impilict understanding of how Father, Son, and Spirit related to each other, as was shared in common (that is, universally) by all the Apostle-founded city-churches throughout the Roman world.Partly; but the JWs and Mormons (and Protestants, to a lesser degree) have more serious problems; and this is the product of the Protestant rejection of the authority of the Church, i.e., the ancient belief that the chief custodian of the Apostolic Faith is not the Bible alone, but the living, Spirit-guided and infallible Church (the Body of Christ), which Scripture calls “the pillar and foundation of Truth” (1 Tim 3:15) because it received the “Spirit of Truth” at Pentecost, Who Jesus promised will “remain” with His Church “always,” leading it “in all Trurth” (John 14:16-17 & 16:13). The Protestants essentially call Jesus a liar because they believe that the Church did fall into formal error and departed from the content of the Bible - as they interpret that content, of course.
And, on top of this, they use a Protestant translation of this New Testament canon (the King James), which they then distort to fit their novel doctrines. If the JWs or Mormons are the “true Church,” why don’t they have their own Bible, apart from any influence from the “apostate” Catholics or Protestants?? Of course. If the Protestant doctrine of sola Scriptura (Bible alone) were true (for Protestants, JW’s, and Mormons all begin with this premise), then the Bible should a) contain some command telling us to live by Bible alone (which it doesn’t) and b) it should be WAY more specific about a lot of things, which it is not. One simply cannot read Scripture properly apart from the Traditional and consistent understanding of the ancient Church - the Church which canonized the Bible (that is, decided what books would go into it) in the first place! The Scriptures belong to the Catholic Church, and they are to be used IN the Catholic Church, not outside of it.
I think you’ll find this already answered substantially above. You ask that question because you do not yet fully realize what the Bible is. The Bible is merely a collection of writings that the Apostles left for the Church. The Apostles produced other writings which the Church did not succeed in preserving (e.g. 1 Cor. 5:9, Colossians 4:16, etc.). Furthermore, the Apostles clearly never intended for their writings to contain absolutely everything about the Apostolic Faith (see 2 Thess. 2:15). Rather, they assumed that the Church itself would be the custodian of the Faith and pass it down from one generation to another (2 Tim. 2:2, etc.). The Apostolic Faith was not entrusted to the mere academic discernment of some text - this is the chief mistake of Protestantism – but was entrusted to a new Covenant people (1 Peter 2:9-10) who, like the Jews before us, would preserve the true Faith in the very living of it - the formal life and worship of the Church. This is why the Bible doesn’t dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s. It was never designed to do so.Well, this comes in time. But it doesn’t come by reading the Bible in isolation. It comes with gaining an overall understanding of the historical Apostolic Faith and understanding how our forefathers read Scripture, going all the way back to the 1st Century. Christianity is a historical Faith, and one must understand it in historical context.
No, it is not wrong. God can speak to us personally through His Word. The only problem with this that can arise is when one makes their personal discernment of Scripture the final authority. This is denied by Scripture itself: 2 Peter 1:20 and 3:15-16. The final authority is the formal and Traditional understanding of the Church. If one remains faithful to this, then one is free to discern Scripture as a private individual without going astray. Our Faith must be in the Spirit-guided Church’s authority, not in our personal discernment alone. Christ formed us into a Church (a collective Body) for that reason. We are to hold to the same, consistent Faith: 1 Cor. 1:10. This is essential.
Indeed. This is a rampant problem among the Protestants who, because of it, are separated into thousands of disparate sects, all with the same Bible, but all interpreting it differently. This is clearly not what Christ willed for His Church, but it is the natural result and fruit of the man-made doctrine sola Scriptura (Bible alone). But, if one remains faithful to the formal and consistent teachings of the ancient Church (the Catholic Church), one cannot fall into this kind of error or disunity. The Protestants do not really believe in 1 Cor. 1:10, nor are they able to obey this command; abd the reason they are unable to obey this command, is because they do not obey Heb. 13:17, which tells us to “Obey those who have the rule over you and submit yourself, for they watch for your souls, as those who must give an account.” If you ask a Protestant who TRULY has “the rule” over them, i.e., who in the Church they MUST “obey” and MUST “submit to,” the honest answer is: No one; for, the Protestants do not follow what the Bible truly commands, but Martin Luther’s man-made doctrine in which he declared “In matters of faith, each Christian is for himself both Pope and Church.” This is the same person who came up with the doctrine of sola Scriptura (Bible alone), and the only reason he promoted it was in order to promote the former doctrine. For, the real purpose of sola Scriptura was to justify the first Protestants’ rejection of the Catholic Church’s rightful authority over them. This rebellion has back-fired on them, dividing them into many thousands of opposing sects. But, as Scripture says, “God is not the author of confusion” and “A tree is known by its fruit.”
Well, not exactly. We may all - should all! - read the Bible, and reading the Bible is of great benefit to a Christian. What we may not all do is assume that we all have equal understanding of the Bible, or that any of us are the final authority in terms of interpreting the Bible. As St. Paul says in 1 Cor. 12, “Are all [in the Church] teachers?” The answer to his rhetorical question is of course: No. Some in the Church know the faith better than others, and some are more knowledgeable about Scripture than others. But, even among our “smart people,” obedience to Christ-given authority is essential, for it is the Spirit Who guides the Church, and not human intelligence. The Spirit preserves the Church in the true Faith, and often despite both stupid bishops and arrogant geniuses. A Catholic places his trust in this, for it has proven to be trustworthy for 2,000 years. So, continue to read the Bible. Just don’t make yourself the final interpreter. Remain open and obedient to the Traditional understanding of the Spirit-guided Church, to which these Scriptures belong and then you will truly be nourished by what you find in your prayerful reflection on the Sacred Texts.