ElishaElijah
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I see very well in the Spirit and you definitely aren’t a believer or born again, according to the Word of God. Keep talking though because it always comes out the longer a person speaks.
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There is no evidence for God, so why do you believe?
- Thread starter an anarchist
- Start date
ElishaElijah
Return
How do the Jews approach God? They have no temple, no sacrifices, no Holy of Holies, all that has been gone. What happened to all that? The veil was torn in 2 when Jesus was crucified showing that He was the Way to God’s presence now.
dybmh
דניאל יוסף בן מאיר הירש
Sgt. Pepper
All you need is love.
I'm glad to see that you're not listening to some Christian on the internet telling you that you're not a Christian. Just remember that it's a stranger who wouldn't know you if you met on the street, so it should have no bearing on your personal spiritual beliefs.
joelr
Well-Known Member
Some problems with your term. It isn't agreed upon by all denominations, even Christians cannot agree what the actual meaning is and the original Greek doesn't support it.
So your entire argument based on this has completely fallen apart.
Born again, or to experience the new birth, is a phrase, particularly in evangelicalism, that refers to a "spiritual rebirth", or a regeneration of the human spirit. In contrast to one's physical birth, being "born again" is distinctly and separately caused by baptism in the Holy Spirit, it is not caused by baptism in water. It is a core doctrine of the denominations of the Anabaptist, Moravian, Methodist, Quaker, Baptist, Plymouth Brethren and Pentecostal Churches along with all other evangelical Christian denominations. All of these Churches strongly believe Jesus' words in the Gospels: "You must be born again before you can see, or enter, the Kingdom of Heaven." Their doctrines also mandate that to be both "born again" and "saved", one must have a personal and intimate relationship with Jesus Christ
Individuals who profess to be "born again" (meaning in the "Holy Spirit") often state that they have a "personal relationship with Jesus Christ".
In addition to using this phrase with those who do not profess to be Christians, some Evangelical Christians use the phrase and evangelize those who belong to other Christian denominations or groups. This practice is based on the belief that non-Evangelical Christians, even those Christians who are professed Christians, are not "born again" and do not have a "personal relationship with Jesus." They therefore believe that they should evangelize to non-Evangelical Christians in the same way that they would evangelize to people who do not profess the Christian faith.
Wait...it's a misunderstanding?
Historicity
Scholars of historical Jesus, that is, attempting to ascertain how closely the stories of Jesus match the historical events they are based on, generally treat Jesus's conversation with Nicodemus in John 3 with skepticism. It details what is presumably a private conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, with none of the disciples seemingly attending, making it unclear how a record of this conversation was acquired. In addition, the conversation is recorded in no other ancient Christian source other than John and works based on John. According to Bart Ehrman, the larger issue is that the same problem English translations of the Bible have with the Greek ἄνωθεν (anōthen) is a problem in the Aramaic language as well: there is no single word in Aramaic that means both "again" and "from above", yet the conversation rests on Nicodemus making this misunderstanding. As the conversation was between two Jews in Jerusalem, where Aramaic was the native language, there is no reason to think that they'd have spoken in Greek. This implies that even if based on a real conversation, the author of John heavily modified it to include Greek wordplay and idiom.
Ehrman, Bart (2016). Jesus Before the Gospels: How the Earliest Christians Remembered, Changed, and Invented Their Stories of the Savior.
Disagreements between denominations
To Sheldons Point, the religion DISAGREES ON THE MEANING!!!!
The term "born again" is used by several Christian denominations, but there are disagreements on what the term means, and whether members of other denominations are justified in claiming to be born-again Christians.
Catholic Answers says:
Catholics should ask [Evangelical] Protestants, "Are you born again—the way the Bible understands that concept?" If the Evangelical has not been properly water baptized, he has not been born again "the Bible way," regardless of what he may think.[72]
On the other hand, an Evangelical site argues:
Another of many examples is the Catholic who claims he also is "born again." ... However, what the committed Catholic means is that he received his spiritual birth when he was baptized—either as an infant or when as an adult he converted to Catholicism. That's not what Jesus meant when He told Nicodemus he "must be born again."[73] The deliberate adoption of biblical terms which have different meanings for Catholics has become an effective tool in Rome's ecumenical agenda.[74]
The Reformed view of regeneration may be set apart from other outlooks in at least two ways.
First, classical Roman Catholicism teaches that regeneration occurs at baptism, a view known as baptismal regeneration. Reformed theology has insisted that regeneration may take place at any time in a person's life, even in the womb. It is not somehow the automatic result of baptism. Second, it is common for many other evangelical branches of the church to speak of repentance and faith leading to regeneration (i.e., people are born again only after they exercise saving faith). By contrast, Reformed theology teaches that original sin and total depravity deprive all people of the moral ability and will to exercise saving faith. ... Regeneration is entirely the work of God the Holy Spirit - we can do nothing on our own to obtain it. God alone raises the elect from spiritual death to new life in Christ.[75][76]
Born again - Wikipedia
joelr
Well-Known Member
The same way you do. With words people wrote in the Iron Age based on popular mythologies. And by communicating with fictional deities, confirmation bias, cognitive dissonance.
Sacrifices? That isn't archaic?
Yes the veil was torn in 2 when a Bronze Age cultural mythology was impacted by 500 years of 2 occupying nations religious ideas and a new myth emerged combining all of them.
Now "born again"cults catch college students before they are learned of certain skills and tell them it's all true (well, just their version of it) and convince them the devil has infiltrated all scholars who don't back up their claims. Islam has a similar sect as well.
Sheldon
Veteran Member
Oh no you didn't... @ElishaElijah are you seeing this?
There's a real danger of a schadenfreude overload here.
joelr
Well-Known Member
You haven't demonstrated that is the word of any God? All you are saying is you bought into a claim with weak evidence.
Of course John is going to say Jesus is the way? He is a savior demigod? Salvation is the point of Greek savior Gods? That is what the myth is all about? This is why Hellenism was so successful and found its way into all local religions.
The Phoenician religion incorporated Hellenism and became the Bacchic Mysteries
The Persians were Hellenized and became the Mysteries of Mithras
Egyptian religion was Hellenized and became Mysteries of Isis and Osirus
Judaism was Hellenized and became Christianity
All had a savior son/daughter of God, undergoes an ordeal which he obtains victory over death, shares with those initiated into the cult for individual salvation, in a universal brotherhood, through baptism and a communal meal.
Hellenistic updates:
-the seasonal drama was homologized to a soteriology (salvation concept) concerning the destiny, fortune, and salvation of the individual after death.
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-his led to a change from concern for a religion of national prosperity to one for individual salvation, from focus on a particular ethnic group to concern for every human. The prophet or saviour replaced the priest and king as the chief religious figure.
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-his process was carried further through the identification of the experiences of the soul that was to be saved with the vicissitudes of a divine but fallen soul, which had to be redeemed by cultic activity and divine intervention. This view is illustrated in the concept of the paradoxical figure of the saved saviour, salvator salvandus.
Hellenistic thought is evident in the narratives which make up the books of the Bible as the Hebrew Scriptures were revised and canonized during the Second Temple Period (c.515 BCE-70 CE), the latter part of which was during the Hellenic Period of the region. The gospels and epistles of the Christian New Testament were written in Greek and draw on Greek philosophy and religion as, for example, in the first chapter of the Gospel of John in which the word becomes flesh, a Platonic concept.
https://wwwc.com/topic/Hellenistic-religion/Beliefs-practices-and-institutions
ElishaElijah
Return
What is the Day of Atonement then?
“The Lord spoke to Moses after the death of two of Aaron’s sons when they approached the presence of the Lord and died. The Lord said to Moses, “Tell your brother Aaron that he may not come whenever he wants into the holy place behind the curtain in front of the mercy seat on the ark or else he will die, because I appear in the cloud above the mercy seat. “Aaron is to enter the most holy place in this way: with a young bull for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering. He is to wear a holy linen tunic, and linen undergarments are to be on his body. He is to tie a linen sash around him and wrap his head with a linen turban. These are holy garments; he must bathe his body with water before he wears them. He is to take from the Israelite community two male goats for a sin offering and one ram for a burnt offering. “Aaron will present the bull for his sin offering and make atonement for himself and his household. Next he will take the two goats and place them before the Lord at the entrance to the tent of meeting. After Aaron casts lots for the two goats, one lot for the Lord and the other for an uninhabitable place, he is to present the goat chosen by lot for the Lord and sacrifice it as a sin offering. But the goat chosen by lot for an uninhabitable place is to be presented alive before the Lord to make atonement with it by sending it into the wilderness for an uninhabitable place. “When Aaron presents the bull for his sin offering and makes atonement for himself and his household, he will slaughter the bull for his sin offering. Then he is to take a firepan full of blazing coals from the altar before the Lord and two handfuls of finely ground fragrant incense, and bring them inside the curtain. He is to put the incense on the fire before the Lord, so that the cloud of incense covers the mercy seat that is over the testimony, or else he will die. He is to take some of the bull’s blood and sprinkle it with his finger against the east side of the mercy seat; then he will sprinkle some of the blood with his finger before the mercy seat seven times. “When he slaughters the male goat for the people’s sin offering and brings its blood inside the curtain, he will do the same with its blood as he did with the bull’s blood: He is to sprinkle it against the mercy seat and in front of it. He will make atonement for the most holy place in this way for all their sins because of the Israelites’ impurities and rebellious acts. He will do the same for the tent of meeting that remains among them, because it is surrounded by their impurities. No one may be in the tent of meeting from the time he enters to make atonement in the most holy place until he leaves after he has made atonement for himself, his household, and the whole assembly of Israel. Then he will go out to the altar that is before the Lord and make atonement for it. He is to take some of the bull’s blood and some of the goat’s blood and put it on the horns on all sides of the altar. He is to sprinkle some of the blood on it with his finger seven times to cleanse and set it apart from the Israelites’ impurities. “When he has finished making atonement for the most holy place, the tent of meeting, and the altar, he is to present the live male goat. Aaron will lay both his hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the Israelites’ iniquities and rebellious acts — all their sins. He is to put them on the goat’s head and send it away into the wilderness by the man appointed for the task. The goat will carry all their iniquities into a desolate land, and the man will release it there. “Then Aaron is to enter the tent of meeting, take off the linen garments he wore when he entered the most holy place, and leave them there. He will bathe his body with water in a holy place and put on his clothes. Then he must go out and sacrifice his burnt offering and the people’s burnt offering; he will make atonement for himself and for the people. He is to burn the fat of the sin offering on the altar. The man who released the goat for an uninhabitable place is to wash his clothes and bathe his body with water; afterward he may reenter the camp. The bull for the sin offering and the goat for the sin offering, whose blood was brought into the most holy place to make atonement, must be brought outside the camp and their hide, flesh, and waste burned. The one who burns them is to wash his clothes and bathe himself with water; afterward he may reenter the camp. “This is to be a permanent statute for you: In the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month you are to practice self-denial and do no work, both the native and the alien who resides among you. Atonement will be made for you on this day to cleanse you, and you will be clean from all your sins before the Lord. It is a Sabbath of complete rest for you, and you must practice self-denial; it is a permanent statute. The priest who is anointed and ordained to serve as high priest in place of his father will make atonement. He will put on the linen garments, the holy garments, and make atonement for the most holy place. He will make atonement for the tent of meeting and the altar and will make atonement for the priests and all the people of the assembly. This is to be a permanent statute for you, to make atonement for the Israelites once a year because of all their sins.” And all this was done as the Lord commanded Moses.”
Leviticus 16:1-34 CSB
Then if you read Hebrews this is explained how Jesus Christ fulfilled this Feast and is the once and for all sacrifice for sin and the High Priest that entered the Most Holy Place in Heaven and presented His own blood at the Heavenly altar for us once and for all.
“Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come, and not the reality itself of those things, it can never perfect the worshipers by the same sacrifices they continually offer year after year. Otherwise, wouldn’t they have stopped being offered, since the worshipers, purified once and for all, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? But in the sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year after year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Therefore, as he was coming into the world, he said: You did not desire sacrifice and offering, but you prepared a body for me. You did not delight in whole burnt offerings and sin offerings. Then I said, “See — it is written about me in the scroll — I have come to do your will, God.” After he says above, You did not desire or delight in sacrifices and offerings, whole burnt offerings and sin offerings (which are offered according to the law), he then says, See, I have come to do your will. He takes away the first to establish the second. By this will, we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all time. Every priest stands day after day ministering and offering the same sacrifices time after time, which can never take away sins. But this man, after offering one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God. He is now waiting until his enemies are made his footstool. For by one offering he has perfected forever those who are sanctified. The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. For after he says: This is the covenant I will make with them after those days, the Lord says, I will put my laws on their hearts and write them on their minds, and I will never again remember their sins and their lawless acts. Now where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer an offering for sin. Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have boldness to enter the sanctuary through the blood of Jesus — he has inaugurated for us a new and living way through the curtain (that is, through his flesh) — and since we have a great high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed in pure water. Let us hold on to the confession of our hope without wavering, since he who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to provoke love and good works, not neglecting to gather together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day approaching. For if we deliberately go on sinning after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire about to consume the adversaries. Anyone who disregarded the law of Moses died without mercy, based on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment do you think one will deserve who has trampled on the Son of God, who has regarded as profane the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know the one who has said, Vengeance belongs to me; I will repay, and again, The Lord will judge his people. It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Remember the earlier days when, after you had been enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings. Sometimes you were publicly exposed to taunts and afflictions, and at other times you were companions of those who were treated that way. For you sympathized with the prisoners and accepted with joy the confiscation of your possessions, because you know that you yourselves have a better and enduring possession. So don’t throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you need endurance, so that after you have done God’s will, you may receive what was promised. For yet in a very little while, the Coming One will come and not delay. But my righteous one will live by faith; and if he draws back, I have no pleasure in him. But we are not those who draw back and are destroyed, but those who have faith and are saved.”
Hebrews 10:1-39 CSB
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Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
A Jewish festival based upon a purely fictional character in the Bible.
ElishaElijah
Return
Well reminds me of this verse:
“For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but it is the power of God to us who are being saved. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and I will set aside the intelligence of the intelligent. Where is the one who is wise? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the debater of this age? Hasn’t God made the world’s wisdom foolish? For since, in God’s wisdom, the world did not know God through wisdom, God was pleased to save those who believe through the foolishness of what is preached. For the Jews ask for signs and the Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles. Yet to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God, because God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.”
1 Corinthians 1:18-25 CSB
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
Why would the fact that Moses never exist remind you of that? You belief appears to be a very shallow one.
SkepticThinker
Veteran Member
Yes. Who or what else would be at fault?
Humans are at fault because your God failed to inspire Scripture that all of his followers could easily understand and agree upon?
Sounds like the Scriptures weren't actually inspired by any God(s) then, at least, not any intelligent, loving and all-knowing God(s). An intelligent, loving and all-knowing God would have done better.
There are too many to list. As well as too many different denominations to list.
If you want to keep your head in the sand though, I guess that's your choice.
ElishaElijah
Return
Seems you just want to blame God instead of people. What happens for example is God says all sex outside of marriage is sexual immorality, pretty clear, even looking at someone with lust, or the only sex that God has said is appropriate is sex between a man and woman within the marriage covenant.
People don’t like this and then the justifications, rationalizations, twisting of Scripture.
Or Baptism, when and how. It’s clear in Scripture but then we have baby baptisms and sprinkling, not even biblical.
The Bible is clear that Jesus is the only way for salvation, then you actually have people claiming to be Christians saying there are different paths.
Not a Bible problem but people twisting scripture making things up.
Have not ever seen it end well for people that blame God or live contrary to His Word.
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Sgt. Pepper
All you need is love.
You would think that an all-knowing (Psalm 139:1-6; Isaiah 46:9-10; 1 John 3:20), all-powerful (Psalm 147:5; Job 42:2; Daniel 2:21), and ever-present (Psalm 139:7-10; Isaiah 40:12; Colossians 1:17) God would have done a much better job at inspiring the Bible to be easily interpreted and agreed upon by his followers, but that's obviously not the case with the God of the Bible. And that's why there are multiple versions of the Bible (Catholic, Greek Orthodox, and Protestant, with a plethora of varying English versions). And God's failure to be more clear with what the Bible actually teaches is why Christianity is so widely divided with Roman Catholics, Messianic Judaism, Anglicans, Orthodox (Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Ethiopian Orthodox, Greek Orthodox), and a smorgasbord of Protestants: Baptist (First Baptist, Second Baptist, Southern Baptist, Reformed Baptist, Primitive Baptist, Anabaptist, Freewill Baptist), Methodist, Lutheran, Pentecostal, Mennonite, Mormon, Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh-day Adventist, Assemblies of God, Church of Christ, Church of God, Church of the Nazarene, Apostolic Church, Presbyterians, Quakers, and literally hundreds of other Protestant churches.
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SkepticThinker
Veteran Member
Right?! Exactly.
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
Atheists do not "blame God". You can't blame a being that does not exist. Your version of God does not exist because of all of the logical inconsistencies that would be caused by his existence. You call those "blaming God" when they are refutations of your version of God. The most obvious refutation is that you keep claiming that God is a liar when you say that the myths of Genesis are true.
dybmh
דניאל יוסף בן מאיר הירש
There's multiple ways to acheive atonement.