Turning around parables and other stories

[AlanFromWichita]

We’re told not to judge, but then we study a Bible full of good and evil characters. I found a new way of reading the Bible that’s a bit allegorical but if you separate the people from the actions of the evil within them, under the command not to judge the people themselves become non-evil. Overall, I think we tend to think of stories as being “negative” when they are actually neutral or better – if one would focus on the lesson instead of the characters and how to “properly” judge them.

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Yesterday I was thinking about the 10 lepers who were healed and one came back.

Then in kicked my permanent self-issued challenge to make the story (not just Bible but any story) sound non-judgmental or even positive about it.

So we tend to focus on the fact that 9 did not come back so they must not have been thankful enough or whatever.

What if it’s a signal to us in the land of mass media that if you can perform a spiritual act of mercy then chances are you’re touching 10 times as many people as you actually hear from.

There. I didn’t change the facts, just looking at it differently, I made all 10 people, allegorically anyway, into positive messages instead of 1 positive and 9 negatives. Actually if everybody whom Jesus healed tried to take 5 seconds of His time to thank Him on this earth, he would be mobbed and couldn’t do anything.

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Here’s another one: Peter denying Christ.

Jesus told Peter that Peter would deny Him, but He didn’t say, “you coward, I’m ashamed of you.” On the contrary, if Peter had not denied Christ they surely would have killed him too , and there goes Jesus’s rock to build His church. Jesus knew He would die, so why couldn’t Peter’s denials be an actual strategy by which Jesus was preserving Peter to build His Church?

Alan

 

[ahs]

I think your way of looking at these leans towards a “let bygone by bygones” and “everyone is doing good so leave them alone” attitude. This is a neglect of our responsibility to admonish the sinner, to rebuke our neighbor, to correct those who are doing wrong.

We are not told not to judge. We are told not to “judge” as in “do not condemn”, do not judge the state of a person’s soul, nor condemn them to Hell. However, we are told that we MUST judge right from wrong and correct those who are in the wrong, and we must do this as we correct our own faults, accept admonition from others, and have carefully discerned right from wrong. We are also to do this in a gentle, yet firm manner. Charity PLUS Truth…not either/or, not one without the other. It’s an on-going process that never stops.

 

[AlanFromWichita]

dear ahs,

Thank you for the information. It wasn’t so much about forgiveness and permissiveness, than it was my confidence that the Holy Spirit truly does have things under control, and God’s will is in fact being done like we say in the creed.

In other words, I’m not saying that it was “excusable” that Peter denied Christ, I’m saying it was an action guided by the Spirit of Christ Himself (before Pentecost) and spoken through the Word, and without Peter having fulfilled that prophecy we wouldn’t even have a church.

But the bigger issue for the thread, is to see if we can take our human judgments based on external observations and assumptions out of the picture. It’s amazing how few need to remain there to make Jesus’s points.

I have reasons for this exercise; I have been giving huge spiritual, emotional, and mental consolations and I’m trying to help others go through exercises I think might help them have the same experience.

Alan

 

[AlanFromWichita]

Charity PLUS Truth…not either/or, not one without the other. It’s an on-going process that never stops.

 

[Crumpy]

this is such a broad subject, I have to say “good job” and keep an open mind.

I had an unpleasant encounter with a life-long acquaintance. He berated me many years ago (with no provocation I can think of) and sure enough he did it again, about five months ago.

I remember his last words vividly, because they were so demeaning to me, and provocative. It’s a case of me almost obsessive/compulsively trying to think of what my response to his irrational statement to me.

It makes me wonder.

About the one healed man who returned to Jesus to thank him, I know that my prayers and thoughs throughout the day are filled with thanks to God. Maybe the other 9 healed men were saying private thanks to God.

I had a kidney stone attack once, and I was in so much pain that I did not even pray about it. It was much longer than I would have thought, for my thoughts to turn to prayer and related matters. I not only wonder “why me” somethings – I pray to remind myself “why not me? Maybe it’s my turn. this is my cross, let me have it.”

 

[AlanFromWichita]

About the one healed man who returned to Jesus to thank him, I know that my prayers and thoughs throughout the day are filled with thanks to God. Maybe the other 9 healed men were saying private thanks to God.

I had a kidney stone attack once, and I was in so much pain that I did not even pray about it. It was much longer than I would have thought, for my thoughts to turn to prayer and related matters. I not only wonder “why me” somethings – I pray to remind myself “why not me? Maybe it’s my turn. this is my cross, let me have it.”

This is what I mean. Jesus didn’t say the other 9 were actually bad, although the “tone of voice” of the scripture seemed to indicate – but how do we know? Body language, word usage, and slang changes all the time.

As far as your cross, I agree there too. Note Jesus didn’t say to pick up His cross, but our own. And if we carry our own cross, with or without help from others, then we are seeing that our sins go the same way as Jesus took the ones he soaked up – to eternal reconciliation.

Rom 8:
For what the law, weakened by the flesh, was powerless to do, this God has done: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for the sake of sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the righteous decree of the law might be fulfilled in us, who live not according to the flesh but according to the spirit.

Alan

 

[AlanFromWichita]

I’ve been thinking about whether this discussion is ready to happen … I don’t think I’ve framed it well yet so there still may be something to it.

How about Peter cutting off the servant’s ear? Couldn’t that foreshadow some of the things the Church has done as an institution? Jesus may be the lamb, but His church stands up against worldly powers because it is in itself a large worldly institution with a lot of influence.

So yes, Jesus fixed the ear, but can’t that be a lesson that we will fight – even unto our own deaths – for the longevity of the word? If it came that quickly to Peter, a sinful man, to strike, the entire civilizations that will follow will react likewise. So this is wisdom on demo here.

The point I wish to make is strong, but the examples I’m finding are very weak I’m afraid.

Alan

 

[DCNBILL]

This is what I mean. Jesus didn’t say the other 9 were actually bad, although the “tone of voice” of the scripture seemed to indicate – but how do we know? Body language, word usage, and slang changes all the time.

As far as your cross, I agree there too. Note Jesus didn’t say to pick up His cross, but our own. And if we carry our own cross, with or without help from others, then we are seeing that our sins go the same way as Jesus took the ones he soaked up – to eternal reconciliation.

Rom 8:
For what the law, weakened by the flesh, was powerless to do, this God has done: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for the sake of sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the righteous decree of the law might be fulfilled in us, who live not according to the flesh but according to the spirit.

Alan

Alan, your observations made me turn to study this passage (Luke17: 11-19) once again and this is my take on it;

The nine lepers who did not come back to thank Jesus were actually being obedient and following the command of Jesus to present themselves to the priests, so that they could be declared “clean” and once again participate in the Temple rituals and rejoin in the sacramental nature of their faith.
The one leper who returned to thank Jesus was a Samaritan and did not have any need to be declared clean by the Jewish priests, so his form of gratitude was to return to the one who made him clean and to thank Him instead. This can be looked upon as a foreshadowing of Christ taking over the Temple sacrifice and becoming, Himself, the new sacrifice to which all the nations will gather to join in worship and thanksgiving.

 

[AlanFromWichita]

Alan, your observations made me turn to study this passage (Luke17: 11-19) once again and this is my take on it;

The nine lepers who did not come back to thank Jesus were actually being obedient and following the command of Jesus to present themselves to the priests, so that they could be declared “clean” and once again participate in the Temple rituals and rejoin in the sacramental nature of their faith.
The one leper who returned to thank Jesus was a Samaritan and did not have any need to be declared clean by the Jewish priests, so his form of gratitude was to return to the one who made him clean and to thank Him instead. This can be looked upon as a foreshadowing of Christ taking over the Temple sacrifice and becoming, Himself, the new sacrifice to which all the nations will gather to join in worship and thanksgiving.

That’s good information, and is right along what I meant about being judgmental toward scriptural characters! Thank you!

Alan

 

[AlanFromWichita]

Thought_Officer:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=658183

Bad idea. You might actually have something to say that is interesting. Why do you intentionally silence yourself using language you know won’t fly? Why don’t you go report your own thread and ask for mercy and see if you can stay here since you have these “nonstandard insights” to offer?

It’s easy to find things that scare, annoy, or enrage people. The challenge is, when those things need to be shared how to do that without scaring, annoying, or enraging people.

Alan

 

[AlanFromWichita]

Thought_Officer:

That’s good advice, and if you want the truth, I really don’t want to waste anymore time here. Procrastination is the problem, and I’m whittling down my resources.

That was a good sage word though, and you’re right.

Warm regards

Some people you will find very sensitive but others, if you are writing sincerely, will follow you a long way into logic they don’t understand, trying to understand. Usually at least one of us ends up learning something.

I have had times of atheism, and of other version of non-Christian ways of thought. Now I am both Christian and Atheist, in a way. I don’t say that to be provocative, but I’m on everybody’s side that’s really what Jesus was all about. There is a way to refuse the gifts from God, but God gives good gifts even to those who don’t believe.

Alan