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sandusky
Guest
Absolutely.
The context of the passage makes it very clear—He was with God; He made all things; in Him was life; The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.
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The context of the passage makes it very clear—He was with God; He made all things; in Him was life; The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.
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bookgirl32
Guest
So wouldn’t it make sense, especially in light of how John speaks of it, that “The Word” was always God, and the scriptures in and of themselves were the written revelation of that Word?
You said yourself above that “the Word became flesh”, did the OT become flesh? Isn’t “becoming flesh” implying that the Word existed before it became flesh? So was the Word scripture? I have no problem with calling the Bible the word of God, just a problem with equating the Bible to Jesus.
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sandusky
Guest
No. I’ve given you the contexts, the words, and the definitions.
There is both the Word of God, and the word of God.
Then don’t equate the Bible to Jesus; they are separate depending upon the context
of “W(w)ord.”
The Bible is the message of God.
The statement(s) of God.
The matter concerning Christ.
The word of God.
Do you give up something in recognizing that?
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bookgirl32
Guest
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jmcrae
Guest
When I think of “oracles” I think of those little old men dancing around, at the beginning of the movie The 300 when they are prophesying about the war that is to come, and then at the end of that sequence, that girl who makes the final prophecy of doom. Of course, those men and the girl were false oracles - nevertheless, I’m sure that’s what the writers of Scripture were thinking of when they used that term - they probably weren’t thinking of words written down in a book.
A “living oracle” is probably a person who is so infused with the Holy Spirit that he or she can’t speak anything except the word of God.
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sandusky
Guest
Which do think is the better reference for understanding the words of the NT which was originally written in Koine Greek—a Greek Lexicon, or, a scene from the Silver Screen? :ehh:
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guanophore
Guest
I am scaring myself now. I am agreeing with Sandusky! All these references are to Sacred Oral Tradition. The only thing we probably don’t agree on is that the Catholic Church teaches that these were never “nullified” or discontinued because some of them were written in the NT.
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bookgirl32
Guest
It was originally written in Greek, but what language were the people in it speaking? (I seriously am not sure about that).
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jmcrae
Guest
Well, I think it’s obvious that an Oracle is a reference to the spoken word, and to the person or people speaking the word; not the written word. They are clearly discussing the Oral Tradition; not the Scriptures.
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sandusky
Guest
What is important is that the Spirit of God, through inspiration, directed the writers to write, in their own individual style, the precise words He desired to have written, and, He had them write those words in Greek.
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sandusky
Guest
That doesn’t answer my question; nevertheless, OK.
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jmcrae
Guest
The answer to your question is “it depends on the credentials of the movie writer as compared to the writer of the Greek lexicon.” In this case, I do actually happen to trust that Frank Miller has a better grip on the nuances of ancient Greek culture in this specific instance than some of your Protestant scholars - no disrespect intended, of course.That doesn’t answer my question; nevertheless, OK.
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Church_Militant
Guest
Irrelevant…since I state it is just my theory. It’s conjecture based upon discussion with people like you…Also your blog; try getting a reputable blog to publish it.
BTW, I not that you didn’t respond to the meatier post that preceded that one. Oh well…
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CentralFLJames
Guest
Fellow Catholics,
I wanted to ask a question here to get your opinion on an observation that just suddenly popped out at me as I was reading some of the counter-replies to some of the ridiculous fundamentalist assertions in this thread.
This is ALL speculative thesis but wanted to get your initial comments. I am not trying to start a heresy here only see if this idea is theologically possible and does not contradict any scripture or Church Dogma.
There is some non-symmetry in how we Catholics conceptualize the spiritual mechanism of the Immaculate Conception that has been bothering me. In scripture God often does things in pairs to ratify or confirm truths over different time periods and through different writers. For the record absolutely fully accept the Immaculate Conception Dogma. But in truth we do not have a lot of early life information in scripture itself about Jesus nor Mary. So I wanted to entertain if perhaps God used the same identical mechanism He used in the Incarnation for preserving Mary from original sin. That is, does anyone know if apart from silence in scripture if anything in scripture precludes God in His Second Person (Jesus) before He became Incarnate in the flesh using the Holy Spirit to essentially impregnate Mary’s mother (believed to be Anne). Right now we have a general belief that Mary was preemptively saved from original sin by by some mysterious and unknown specific spiritual mechanism. So I wanted to think through the possibility that Mary was really conceived like Jesus was by the Holy Spirit Himself.
I know that we have no specific scriptural basis for this new thesis but it suddenly occurred to me that the entire mechanism of how original sin is imparted could be through the seed of the father only. My underlying thesis is that Adam was more at fault than was Eve in sinning against God since He was told in person not to eat the forbidden fruit. Mary was approached by the Serpent and argued with him and tried to resist him. But Adam did not even bother to think twice about disobeying God and then tried to blame Mary when God confronted him about his sin. It could be that original sin extends through the curse of the male seed alone. This imposes a co-dependency of humanity between male and female for the propagation of the race where life can not exist without the other but with an intrinsic curse in that co-dependency. This has a lot of profound spiritual and theological implications for the male-female relationship itself that I won’t get into here.
So, this is entirely speculative thesis that requires that 2 paired truths be simultaneously present for it to work:
James
I wanted to ask a question here to get your opinion on an observation that just suddenly popped out at me as I was reading some of the counter-replies to some of the ridiculous fundamentalist assertions in this thread.
This is ALL speculative thesis but wanted to get your initial comments. I am not trying to start a heresy here only see if this idea is theologically possible and does not contradict any scripture or Church Dogma.
There is some non-symmetry in how we Catholics conceptualize the spiritual mechanism of the Immaculate Conception that has been bothering me. In scripture God often does things in pairs to ratify or confirm truths over different time periods and through different writers. For the record absolutely fully accept the Immaculate Conception Dogma. But in truth we do not have a lot of early life information in scripture itself about Jesus nor Mary. So I wanted to entertain if perhaps God used the same identical mechanism He used in the Incarnation for preserving Mary from original sin. That is, does anyone know if apart from silence in scripture if anything in scripture precludes God in His Second Person (Jesus) before He became Incarnate in the flesh using the Holy Spirit to essentially impregnate Mary’s mother (believed to be Anne). Right now we have a general belief that Mary was preemptively saved from original sin by by some mysterious and unknown specific spiritual mechanism. So I wanted to think through the possibility that Mary was really conceived like Jesus was by the Holy Spirit Himself.
I know that we have no specific scriptural basis for this new thesis but it suddenly occurred to me that the entire mechanism of how original sin is imparted could be through the seed of the father only. My underlying thesis is that Adam was more at fault than was Eve in sinning against God since He was told in person not to eat the forbidden fruit. Mary was approached by the Serpent and argued with him and tried to resist him. But Adam did not even bother to think twice about disobeying God and then tried to blame Mary when God confronted him about his sin. It could be that original sin extends through the curse of the male seed alone. This imposes a co-dependency of humanity between male and female for the propagation of the race where life can not exist without the other but with an intrinsic curse in that co-dependency. This has a lot of profound spiritual and theological implications for the male-female relationship itself that I won’t get into here.
So, this is entirely speculative thesis that requires that 2 paired truths be simultaneously present for it to work:
- Mary had to have been conceived by the Holy Spirit to avoid the stain of original sin rather than just preserved from original sin through some other mysterious divine preemptive act and
- Original Sin must come as a consequence of inheritance from only the Father’s seed.
James
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mercygate
Guest
Maybe this should go to its own thread. Short answer: no. In the theology of redemption, Christ is the “one mediator” – not in the sense of legal mediation but as the uniquely conceived and joined God-man Who unites our humanity with the divinity of God. His alone is the mediation of the flesh to the Spirit. His alone is the Incarnation of God.
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CentralFLJames
Guest
OK - thanks. I still want to entertain the idea that original sin may be passed through the male seed only. Perhaps a new thread…
James
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justasking4
Guest
What Marian dogmas do protestants retain today?
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Kay_Cee
Guest
Not by your own criterea, which is that those answers must be specifically stated in the Bible.
You seem like an intelligent person, so I’m incredibly surprised you misunderstand what this is all about.
I can’t even get into that until we first establish the proper system for determining what we should believe. You’ve said that the Bible has to specifically state that Mary was sinless before you’ll believe it. Well, if I went by your system, I would have to say the Bible must specifically state that that is the system we should use for determining what should be believed.
Amen! But that’s not what I’m talking about.
Let me put it to you this way: where on earth did you get the idea that beliefs must be specifically stated in the Bible before they should be believed? Did you get that idea from the Bible? I’ve read it from cover to cover, and I sure don’t remember seeing that!
What you don’t seem to get is that I am doing you a favor by pointing out a flaw in your reasoning. You say you won’t believe something unless it’s specifically stated in the Bible. So, why can’t bookgirl say the same? Why can’t she too say she won’t believe something unless it’s specifically stated in the Bible–except in her case, that “something” is the idea that beliefs must be specifically stated in the Bible?
Look. Suppose someone said to you, “We can never be sure anything is true.” Well, you could tell that person, “Then we can never be sure it’s true that ‘We can never be sure anything is true.’ Your statement is self-defeating because it can’t stand up under its own criterea.”
Do you get it? **Your idea is self-defeating because it can’t stand up under its own criterea. **
And this goes to the very heart of the matter. You’ll never convince bookgirl of your position if you’re basing your argument on a faulty premise. Why should she believe things have to be specifically stated in the Bible if the Bible doesn’t specifically say so?
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justasking4
Guest
The scripture is the only source of knowledge on Mary that we have. Whether a person believes you need to base all beliefs on the scriptures is not the issue for this particular claim about Mary being sinless.
Do the scriptures in any place state that Mary was sinless?
Does anyone who knew here i.e. Jesus or her family or friends state anything about her being sinless?
Do any of the apostles in their writings say anything about her being sinless?
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mercygate
Guest
Mother of God.
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