NT: Forgiveness is cherrypicking?

pipelineaudio

Philosopher
pipelineaudio
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Feb 23, 2006
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A lot of people see the message of forgiveness as the summation of the new testament. I kind of think that is just cherrypicking

WHat say you?
 
pipelineaudio said:
A lot of people see the message of forgiveness as the summation of the new testament. I kind of think that is just cherrypicking

What say you?
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Well, any "summation" is by definition cherry-picking. If I asked you to tell me about the Star Wars movie, I doubt that you'd mention Captain Antilles, but you'd sure mention Princess Leia.

Jesus is kind enough to provide us with his own summation of the message of the New Testament in Matthew 22:37-40:

37 "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.'

38 This is the first and great commandment.

39 A second likewise is this,'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'

40 The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments."
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So as far as I can tell, "forgiveness" isn't bad for a one-word summarization.
 
what about all the Paul pages of rules, or the revelations? how do they have to do with forgiveness?
 
revalations reads to me of an angry sky dictator who forces you to do certain things then tortures the crap out of you and the rest of humanity for doing the things he made you do
 
pipelineaudio said:
revalations reads to me of an angry sky dictator who forces you to do certain things then tortures the crap out of you and the rest of humanity for doing the things he made you do
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.... which is part of the reason that it's not usually included in one-word summaries of the new testament; because its direct relevance to the central message is kind of limited.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but do you know what the word "summation" means (in a literary context)?
 
Alright Im fnding 106 pages of the NIV of Matthew, Mark, Luke and john, containing 56 references to forms of "forgive"

203 pages of paul and revalations and stuff
 
pipelineaudio said:
Alright Im fnding 106 pages of the NIV of Matthew, Mark, Luke and john, containing 56 references to forms of "forgive"

203 pages of paul and revalations and stuff
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Yes, but importance isn't measured by page count. If it were, the most important law in the United States would probably be the tax code, and the Constitution wouldn't even get a look-see. And Shakepeare himself would get lost in the sea of analyses of his writings.

The Pauline letters are essentially commentaries and interpretations on Christ's message as documented through the Gospels.

But what is that message itself?

What's the best one-word summary of the message you can come up with?
 
pipelineaudio said:
obey god or go to hell

one word I guess?

suffer
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You can do that with or without God, so I don't think that is a very complete summation. I also find one word summations of so complex a topic intellectualy lazy. Go for the sentence. :)

DR
 
pipelineaudio said:
obey god or go to hell

one word I guess?

suffer
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But that misses all the stuff about grace and God's infinite willingness to shower blessings upon us if we simply obey him.

From a Christian perspective, "suffer" is what will happen anyway if we don't read the Bible. So it's not a very good summation, because it doesn't say what the message is. (Really, it's a statement of the anti-message, if you want to look at it that way.)

The message, then is not suffering, but how to avoid suffering. And in one word, "forgiveness."
 
How to avoid suffering seems to me to be only a part of it

The main message is that many will suffer

Most if not all of revalations describes the suffering, not how to avoid it

The rest tells about a god who causes suffering, and how he sent himeself down to suffer so that he could impress himself.

Also some "miracles" IOW stories of how the cause of suffering removed the suffering for some
 
pipelineaudio said:
How to avoid suffering seems to me to be only a part of it

The main message is that many will suffer

Most if not all of revalations describes the suffering, not how to avoid it

The rest tells about a god who causes suffering, and how he sent himeself down to suffer so that he could impress himself.

Also some "miracles" IOW stories of how the cause of suffering removed the suffering for some
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"There is no evil in Lothlaurien, but that which you bring with you."

If that is what you want to find in the Bible, suffering, that is what you will see.

I take it you have read the entirety of the Bible, OT and NT, and studied it in detail?

Have you?

DR
 
Darth Rotor said:
"There is no evil in Lothlaurien, but that which you bring with you."

If that is what you want to find in the Bible, suffering, that is what you will see.

I take it you have read the entirety of the Bible, OT and NT, and studied it in detail?

Have you?

DR
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Yes, I have. I believe I am no dummy when it comes to the bible. However, I tried in this thread to say new testament. It is without argument (I would hope) that the OT god is so obviously evil, that forgiveness wouldnt be bothered to be brought up if taking it as a whole

I say NT, because so many christians believe Jesus wiped out the old stuff, and they have supporting verses (though of course there are also verses to say the OT still applies).
 
pipelineaudio said:
Yes, I have. I believe I am no dummy when it comes to the bible. However, I tried in this thread to say new testament. It is without argument (I would hope) that the OT god is so obviously evil, that forgiveness wouldnt be bothered to be brought up if taking it as a whole

I say NT, because so many christians believe Jesus wiped out the old stuff, and they have supporting verses (though of course there are also verses to say the OT still applies).
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OK. My take on it is that Jesus was trying to achieve a course correction on a ship that had sailed off in the wrong direction. (The Hebrew practices of the time.) The attributed statements of his in the Gospels point to him referring to the older law and "reminding" folks of applicability to their current situation. (OT Law is still the law people! ) That makes it hard for me to agree with the position on the OT you depict, but I won't argue that with you. I have heard it from others, both Christian and non Christian, tied to a New Covenant. As I uderstand that point, the New Covenant was to replace the old Covenant (the deal between God and Man) via this course correction. The schools of thought and argument on that fill up volumes. :)

So, your point of contention is that the New Testament is all about suffering?

Have you been reading a lot of Revelations lately? :)

DR
 
Well, any "summation" is by definition cherry-picking. If I asked you to tell me about the Star Wars movie, I doubt that you'd mention Captain Antilles, but you'd sure mention Princess Leia.
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You mean the cranky Red Leader? I hear he blew up 42 children because they called him "baldhead."
 
Of course what gets missed in the reading, especially by Fundamentalist Christians, is that there is nothing you can do to earn Grace. You only need accept it and place yourself under it.
 
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