The Big Question

[JaphethShemHam]

Bible Gateway passage: Romans 1:27 - New Revised Standard Version

 

[JaphethShemHam]

Why does the Church mandate that priests be celibate? - Catholic Straight Answers

 

[JaphethShemHam]

"Why? There is no indication that a continuation of twelve apostles was ever necessary, nor does it matter what languages they spoke. Judas was replaced, this was something the Eleven decided to do because they felt it important to keep their number--but when the twelve apostles began to die nobody felt the need to replace them."

You state there is no indication and then give the indication! Smh Nobody felt the need? Hello, read what Jesus said to his disciples about priesthood.

Bible Gateway passage: Matthew 16:19 - New Revised Standard Version

 

[JaphethShemHam]

Why would one think that descendants, population, prosperity, etc are the "greatest blessings?

How do you figure that Stalin's language (Russian) is one of the most populous? Now, Mandarin? Absolutely one of the most spoken languages in the world, and that is largely because China is an incredibly populous nation.

After Mandarin, the most widely spoken languages in the world are:

1. Spanish
2. English
3. Hindi
4. Arabic
5. Bengali
6. Portuguese
7. Russian

There are certainly a lot of Russian speakers, again, Russia is a big country with a large population.

So I guess I don't understand this "Big Question", because the assumption that things like prosperity and cultural influence are "the greatest blessings" isn't an assumption I share and don't see a reason for accepting it; and just from a purely statistical perspective while it's true that the Stalinist and Maoist regimes were brutally horrific, it does not follow that the largest number of speakers are Russian and Mandarin, only Mandarin is. As can be seen, Spanish, English, Hindi, Arabic, Bengali, and Portuguese are all more widely spoken than Russian is.

I suppose, yes, Russian is a more widely spoken language than, say speakers of Taushiro, which as of the last time these things were recorded all the way back in 2002, there was only one known native speaker. So, relatively speaking, Russian is a far more widely spoken language than a lot of languages.

Is there a point here that I'm missing?

-CryptoLutheran

20 Bible verses about Blessings, To Abraham

 

[Radagast]

The Big Question isn't about Arabic, it's about the 4.6 billion Asians that appear to be blessed with more descebdants than the Abrahamic faiths combined!

There are two kinds of descendants of Abraham: biological (which includes Arabs) and spiritual (which includes Christians).

On 2015 data, 55.5% of the world was Christian, Muslim, or Jewish. So your numbers seem wildly wrong.

 

[JaphethShemHam]

Do Roman Catholics recognize marriages by other Christians? No, because they do not recognize them as Christians, which can be said for alot of so called Christian denominations. So who's numbers are wildly wrong? For example, let's take one denomination of Islam, let's say Sunni, that's 1.5 billion people. Now let's take one denomination of Christianity, any one.

 

[Radagast]

Do Roman Catholics recognize marriages by other Christians?

Roman Catholics in fact do recognise marriages by other Christians, and even non-Christians, as valid (unless there is an impediment such as incest).

Catholic Canon Law #1057: A marriage is brought into being by the lawfully manifested consent of persons who are legally capable. ... Matrimonial consent is an act of will by which a man and a woman by an irrevocable covenant mutually give and accept one another for the purpose of establishing a marriage.

For example, let's take one denomination of Islam, let's say Sunni, that's 1.5 billion people. Now let's take one denomination of Christianity, any one.

I don't see your point. Are you pretending that Sunni Islam is monolithic? And if it was, what would that prove?

 

[JaphethShemHam]

Roman Catholics in fact do recognise marriages by other Christians, and even non-Christians, as valid (unless there is an impediment such as incest).

Catholic Canon Law #1057: A marriage is brought into being by the lawfully manifested consent of persons who are legally capable. ... Matrimonial consent is an act of will by which a man and a woman by an irrevocable covenant mutually give and accept one another for the purpose of establishing a marriage.



I don't see your point. Are you pretending that Sunni Islam is monolithic? And if it was, what would that prove?

The BBC isn't pretending they know how to count:
Sunnis and Shia: Islam's ancient schism

There are different orders of Sunni, just like there are different orders of Catholics, but they are all recognized as one. Notice your photo shows Schools.

 

[Radagast]

The BBC isn't pretending they know how to count:
Sunnis and Shia: Islam's ancient schism

Huh?

There are different orders of Sunni, just like there are different orders of Catholics, but they are all recognized as one. Notice your photo shows Schools.

Let's say, for the sake of argument, that Sunni Islam was monolithic. So what?

 

[JaphethShemHam]

Huh?



Let's say, for the sake of argument, that Sunni Islam was monolithic. So what?

Lets say your Canonical law only applies to Catholics, they need permission from a Bishop to marry outside the Catholic Church, but yeah so what, lets make things up as we go along, isnt that the Christian way. Fact is Sunni are blessed with 1.5 billion souls without over 20k denominations to make things up as they go along. Who cares King James put greyhound in Proverbs because he cared more about his dogs than people, so what?

 

[Radagast]

The Big Question isn't about Arabic, it's about the 4.6 billion Asians that appear to be blessed with more descebdants than the Abrahamic faiths combined!

When you talk about "4.6 billion Asians," you are including 6 of the top 8 Muslim-containing countries (Indonesia, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Iran, Turkey). Altogether, more than 1 billion of those "Asians" is Muslim. There are a lot of Christians in that part of the world also. And a few Jews.

Islam is an Abrahamic faith. So is Christianity. And Judaism.

 

[Radagast]

Lets say your Canonical law only applies to Catholics, they need permission from a Bishop to marry outside the Catholic Church

Yes, the Catholic church has specific rules about marriages where one person is Catholic and the other is not. So?

Who cares King James put greyhound in Proverbs because he cared more about his dogs than people, so what?

You are no longer making any sense at all.

 

[JaphethShemHam]

When you dont care about accuracy nothing makes sense.

 

[Hawkins]

The Big Question isn't about Arabic, it's about the 4.6 billion Asians that appear to be blessed with more descebdants than the Abrahamic faiths combined! You are mistaken about Arabic in the home and what mothers say to their children. All prayers are in Arabic, from the moment the baby is born and in the house. Muslims do not pray in different dialects, they pray in one Arabic of Semitic origin.

I simply think that you missed the big picture.

The whole establishment is closed tied to the fundamental way how humans getting facts. Do you know black holes exist, as a science? 99.99% humans know for a fact the black holes exist but without evidence, as evidence is only available to the very few scientists who are professed in black holes and only they have access to the rare and expensive equipment to get to the evidence. If so then how the mass of humans get to the fact. They rely on the "testimony" of those few scientists in direct contact with the fact to get to the fact.

Similarly, history is written by a rarely few historians seriously gathering facts from eyewitnesses accounts, and for the rest of human kind in humanity to read with faith. Our daily news on newspapers and TV channels actually behave the same. We don't normally dig up evidence behind each piece of news. Instead we rely on the small bunch of reporters and journalists in contact with facts and eyewitnesses to get to facts. We all go through an extremely small amount of humans in order to get to facts and it's by faith. That's how incapable we humans are.

That said. Science is about how a phenomenon repeat itself into the future. We can thus have the option to join the scientists to get to the evidence. Daily news are today's event in the world, technically we can also have the same option to join the reporters/journalists to get to the same facts. This is however is not true for histories. We can't join the historians to gather facts for eyewitnesses accounts as the facts themselves are long gone with the eyewitnesses. This means we humans are more incapable in terms of reaching a past fact.

Religion (Abraham's) is about the reaching of a future fact. It's impossible for humans to get to future facts. We thus need a God to get to such an info. God either shows up for everyone to access the future info or, if He has a good reason not to show up publicly, He has to choose His own reporters to "preach" His own news, and for His info to flow across the timeline of humanity. Abraham is so chosen. He and his descendants are supposed to be the "small amount" of humans acting as a direct contact between God and men for the majority of humans to get to God's info (similar to how humans get to a past fact through the small amount of historians ever lived).

Isaiah 44:7-8 (NIV2011)
Who then is like me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and lay out before me what has happened since I established my ancient people, and what is yet to come— yes, let them foretell what will come.
Do not tremble, do not be afraid. Did I not proclaim this and foretell it long ago? You are my witnesses. Is there any God besides me? No, there is no other Rock; I know not one.


Israel was chosen for God to tell what has happened and what is yet to come.

More critically, the majority of humans in the end need faith to be saved. God thus need a "small" Israel for His facts to convey, and for the rest to rely on faith to be saved.

Abraham's dilemma is that he lacks children, however God doesn't want him (the Jews in the end) to marry the idol worshiping Canaanites who actively practicing children sacrifice. The promise is partly for Abraham to have his descendants while refusing the intermarriage as Lot did. Only this way, Israel can be built as the "small amount" of God's witnesses.


That said. Muhammad is not even an eyewitness account. He gathered his info from a self proclaimed angel whose identity cannot be confirmed. OT prophets are credible persons can be identified by people back then for their testimonies to be written down and conveyed. They all acquire info directly from God, but not Muhammad. Muhammad is just as clueless as you are, as he didn't know what the "small amount" testimonies are, where multiple account plays a crucial role. OT Bible is all about how the different eyewitnesses from the different time of history of Israel all portraying the same God. That's the point of testimony.

 

[JaphethShemHam]

Glad you mentioned Canaanites, Canaan=merchant. They are still sacrificing children to idols, have you noticed the opioid epidemic or the top 10 causes of death in the US? You don't see that in Islamic countries. More people die on US roads than 9/11 every month, but you don't see anyone crying about the chariots of fire.

 

[Hawkins]

When you dont care about accuracy nothing makes sense.

No, that depends. All ancient histories (i.e., before human writing capacity) as we read today are in the form of myths. History = his story. It is so because it is out of human capacity and capability to keep history more systematically till the invention of paper. (Satan has to pick the right time to write his book, no offense). The Bible for some time may have to rely on word of mouth to convey. This is shown by the trained up ability of the Jews to convey the laws in the oral form.

Of course this is not about how humans record a history. It's all about how God convey His message through the incapable humans long before the invention of paper (which is a huge breakthrough).

 

[Hawkins]

Glad you mentioned Canaanites, Canaan=merchant. They are still sacrificing children to idols, have you noticed the opioid epidemic or the top 10 causes of death in the US? You don't see that in Islamic countries. More people die on US roads than 9/11 every month, but you don't see anyone crying about the chariots of fire.

As a Chinese I understand more about the numbers of death. In the past several hundred years, we have more than 100 million (3 times the current population of Canand) death tolls as a direct and indirect result of rebellion against the governments.

 

[JaphethShemHam]

No, that depends. All ancient histories (i.e., before human writing capacity) as we read today are in the form of myths. History = his story. It is so because it is out of human capacity and capability to keep history more systematically till the invention of paper. (Satan has to pick the right time to write his book, no offense). The Bible for some time may have to rely on word of mouth to convey. This is shown by the trained up ability of the Jews to convey the laws in the oral form.

Of course this is not about how humans record a history. It's all about how God convey His message through the incapable humans long before the invention of paper (which is a huge breakthrough).

The oldest writing is by a Sumerian King, The Epic of Gilgamesh, which bears a striking similarity to Noah and the Flood, not to mention The Code of Hammurabi has the 10 commandments and is from the same area, which just so happens to be where Abraham pbuh emigrated from.

 

[JaphethShemHam]

As a Chinese I understand more about the numbers of death. In the past several hundred years, we have more than 100 million (3 times the current population of Canand) death tolls as a direct and indirect result of rebellion against the governments.

Did you know some Jews teach that China is the land of Nod, where Cain was sent, a derivative of Canaan, ie. Merchant.

 

[ViaCrucis]

"Why? There is no indication that a continuation of twelve apostles was ever necessary, nor does it matter what languages they spoke. Judas was replaced, this was something the Eleven decided to do because they felt it important to keep their number--but when the twelve apostles began to die nobody felt the need to replace them."

You state there is no indication and then give the indication! Smh Nobody felt the need? Hello, read what Jesus said to his disciples about priesthood.

Bible Gateway passage: Matthew 16:19 - New Revised Standard Version

The Keys of the kingdom have nothing to do with "priesthood".

-CryptoLutheran