God is love, Love is not Jealous, God is a Jealous god???

[Bradskii]

The straight answer: You ask me for the external citations in the Bible (the special revelation of God), if I fail to cite them already.

Why can't you figure that out? I'm a generic Bible-thumping fundie. What else would you expect me to say?

So you will always have the right answer. Fair enough. And...that leads to one comment and a couple of problems.

The comment is that you now become the oracle (the secondary manner in which we receive primary divine wisdom - as per Pythia, the oracle at Delphi). If I cannot gain divine revelation from the bible, I can ask you.

The first problem: If you refer to the bible for inspiration, then there are matters that might need resolving which are not referenced in the bible. So do you get a solution directly from God?

And the second problem: If other people use the bible as a means of revelation but come to different conclusions then who do I trust if their answer is directly in opposition to yours?

 

[Paulomycin]

So you will always have the right answer.

No, because (again) I'm not the primary source.

Fair enough. And...that leads to one comment and a couple of problems.

Yep. It was a gotcha game after all. Why am I not surprised?

The comment is that you now become the oracle (the secondary manner in which we receive primary divine wisdom - as per Pythia, the oracle at Delphi).

Again, no.

If I cannot gain divine revelation from the bible, I can ask you.

No. Not if you can independently verify it without my help. The primary source exists regardless of whether I'm there to hold your hand or not. Thanks.

 

[Bradskii]

No, because (again) I'm not the primary source.

No. Not if you can independently verify it without my help. The primary source exists regardless of whether I'm there to hold your hand or not. Thanks.

The primary source has passed on the correct answer to the secondary one. God has the right answer (that's accepted as a given) and now so do you. As you said. I could care less if you are the secondary or tertiary source. It matters not. Unless you can tell me how revelation gives you the right answer but you end up with the wrong one. You're either right or wrong...which is it?

And if I can verify the answer myself? Well gee, Paul. That's how this discussion started. Because if you have one answer and I have a different one then how does someone determine who is right? I said it's an example of relativity. What's right for you is not necessarily right for me.

And then you went on to say that you had divine revelation, so you are always going to have the right answer. See the last post for the comment and two questions. It would be good if you could address either of those two which are a direct result of what you have been posting.

 

[Paulomycin]

The primary source has passed on the correct answer to the secondary one. God has the right answer (that's accepted as a given) and now so do you. As you said.

But I'm not the only secondary source available, and never claimed to be.

I could care less if you are the secondary or tertiary source. It matters not.

I know you never cared, because it doesn't fit your presupposed narrative.

Unless you can tell me how revelation gives you the right answer but you end up with the wrong one. You're either right or wrong...which is it?

Exegetical "rightness" doesn't depend on me.

And if I can verify the answer myself? Well gee, Paul. That's how this discussion started. Because if you have one answer and I have a different one then how does someone determine who is right? I said it's an example of relativity. What's right for you is not necessarily right for me.

No. Exegesis is still objective, regardless of anyone's relative opinions otherwise.

Regardless, your petty gotcha-game is failing hard.

 

[Bradskii]

No. Exegesis is still objective, regardless of anyone's relative opinions otherwise.

This is two steps forward, three steps back...

If exegisis is objective, do you have access to this objectively correct answer in some way?

 

[Paulomycin]

This is two steps forward, three steps back...

If exegisis is objective, do you have access to this objectively correct answer in some way?

You already have it. Just read the Bible exegetically. Only accept the most exegetical interpretation. Reject its opposite ("eisegesis").

"I" am not necessary here.

 

[Paulomycin]

This is two steps forward, three steps back...

Because you're trying too hard to steer it. Stop hanging on so tight.

 

[Bradskii]

You already have it. Just read the Bible exegetically. Only accept the most exegetical interpretation. Reject its opposite ("eisegesis").

So I reach a different decision (we already did this but...). How do we know who is right? This was the very first question way back when and you are no closer to answering it then you were back then.

Pass the pliers Nurse Cratchit. I'll get this tooth out if it kills me.

 

[Paulomycin]

So I reach a different decision (we already did this but...). How do we know who is right? This was the very first question way back when and you are no closer to answering it then you were back then.

Who? Why, the exegete. . .of course.

Pass the pliers Nurse Cratchit. I'll get this tooth out if it kills me.

Sit--down. You're not even qualified to diagnose anyone, let alone operate on them.

 

[Paulomycin]

How do we know who is right?

Question: "What is the difference between exegesis and eisegesis?"

Exegesis means that one allows the text to speak for itself, whereas eisegesis indicates that one makes the text say what they want it to say. Individuals who desire to know the actual truth of the Scripture will practice exegetical interpretation. Eisegetical interpretation always tries to read one's own presuppositional biases into the text.

 

[Bradskii]

Who? Why, the exegete. . .of course.

And yet again...that would be you if you were the exegete would it not? So you'd have the right answer. Agreed?

 

[Paulomycin]

And yet again...that would be you if you were the exegete would it not? So you'd have the right answer. Agreed?

No and no. Anyone is capable of exegesis, or at least finding someone to exegete a text. It pretty much applies to any written text. Not just the Bible.

Look, this isn't that complicated.

 

[Bradskii]

No and no. Anyone is capable of exegesis, or at least finding someone to exegete a text. It pretty much applies to any written text. Not just the Bible.

Look, this isn't that complicated.

So if we have a moral problem and you need a solution, where do you go to get it? You said revelation before. Tell me again because just above I said that you'd be right if it was obtained by revelation and you said no you wouldn't.

 

[Paulomycin]

So if we have a moral problem and you need a solution, where do you go to get it? You said revelation before. Tell me again because just above I said that you'd be right if it was obtained by revelation and you said no you wouldn't.

The Bible = Special Revelation from God.

As opposed to General Revelation of nature.

Those are actual Christian Doctrines. If you can at least understand the difference between the two, then you can see where I'm coming from.

 

[Bradskii]

The Bible = Special Revelation from God.

As opposed to General Revelation of nature.

Those are actual Christian Doctrines. If you can at least understand the difference between the two, then you can see where I'm coming from.

You're repeating yourself uneccessarily. But not answering the question. Here's where the tooth pulling comes into it. I keep having to ask you the same thing time and time again. So one more time...

If you have a moral problem and you need a solution, where do you go to get it?

Edit: Hang on. That first line was the answer? So you get it from the bible? Yeah?

 

[Paulomycin]

If you have a moral problem and you need a solution, where do you go to get it?

Fine, you tell me.

Edit: Hang on. That first line was the answer? So you get it from the bible? Yeah?

Whatever. Just get to the big dramatic "gotcha" already.

 

[Bradskii]

Fine, you tell me.

How can I tell you where you'd search for the answer? I'm asking you. Yet again...

If you have a moral problem and you need a solution, where do you go to get it?

 

[Clizby WampusCat]

THE rules are, "You don't get to ban an entire category of apologetics." Period. There must have been some sort of mistake.

Ok, All I know is I posted the thread about gods goodness and they deleted it, said it was in violation.

 

[Amoranemix]

Excellent question, and the problem is in the English language. The word Jealous has 2 main meanings:
#1 Feeling or showing envy of someone or their achievements and advantages / hostile toward a rival or one believed to enjoy an advantage : ENVIOUS.
#2 Fiercely protective or vigilant of one's rights or possessions / intolerant of rivalry or unfaithfulness.
In 1Co 13:4-7 the word translated 'jealous' is Gr 'zeloo' which has meaning #1.
In Exo 20:4-6 the word translated 'jealous' in Gr 'zelotes' in the LXX and it has meaning #2.

God should know better. An omniscient being would know that these days people don't read Aramenian and Greek and should have written the Bible (i.s.o. having it written and assembled by humans) in languages people can read today. That would avoid people being confused.
Or maybe God just doesn't care.
What is the point in saying that love is not envious ? Was/Is there any reason to believe that love or God is envious ?
Also, that fiercely protecitive jealousy is not entirely compatible with love. Love is not jealous, contrary to what the Bible suggests.

Because God has no true rivals that are equal to Him.
Jealousy is only bad when there are other equivalent beings around. If there are no other true gods, then Yahweh has every right to be jealous.

Jealousy is misguided if there are no equivalent beings. Probably the biblical authors thought these rival gods were real competition. God should have corrected them. Or maybe he just didn't care.

... I think that what Paul was implying in 1 Corinthians 13:4 is that we shouldn't have the kind of jealousy that comes from wanting something that isn't rightfully ours to begin with ...
In God's case, He has the RIGHT to begin with, just as our wives have the RIGHT to expect us, their husbands, to focus on them and not on "other women."

Paul failed to grasp the nature of the disagreement. It is not about what one should do with what is rightfully ours, but it is about what qualifies as rightfully ours.
What RIGHT that God allegedly has to begin with are you talking about ? The right to be worshipped ? I understand that is God's personal opinion and consequently the personal opinion of his fans, but it is not a fact.

God is perfectly righteous and good. Any of His characteristics will fit this reality.

God is righteous and good according to himself. So were Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin and Pol Pot.

Yes, God can destroy ones so their evil does not continue . . . including so they do not ruin themselves much worse.

That is indeed compatible with jealousy, especially without the biased appeal to motive. The Bible does indeed depict a god with many character flaws, including jealousy, but it does not describe a loving god.

So, if we're going to spend time evaluating Paul's theological and moral thinking in 1 Corinthians, then we'd need to take a whole lot of things about Paul and his mind into account for us to understand what he had to tell the Corinthians about the nature of "Christian" Love.

Indeed. Writing holy scriptures that people could understand without doing all that would lack creating opportunities for confusion. God probably knew that.

The law of non-contradiction is that 'A' cannot equal 'non-A' in the same place or relationship.
Love is not jealous.
God's love is particular to the elect.
God's jealousy is towards the reprobate.
[ . . . ]

The question is not whether it is possible to make a few claims about God that are consistent. Like for Santa Claus, that is indeed possible. However, that does not imply other claims made about God (in the Bible for example) should be taken seriously.

God is love. And God is a jealous God, meaning He protects His own and does not tolerate disloyalty/unfaithfulness or rivalry.
Love is not jealous, meaning envious.
Two different meanings. Two different contexts.
It's good to be jealous in good things always.
Seems pretty simple. Inerrancy remains intact. Operator error - the Book is fine.

If your exegesis is correct, then the flaw is not in the orinal text, but in the English translation, which makes the Bible outdated.
An original error still remains : the Bible claims that love is intolerant of unfaithfulness or rivalry, which is false. (Daniel Marsh emphasized that in post 36.)

So you neglected to tell me why the 1 Cor passage and the Exodus passage are different. What is the definition of Jealous as used in Exodus 20:5 and the definition as used in 1 Cor 13:4?

I already hinted at this earlier. "Godly jealousy" is an emotional upset a person, or God, experiences when something that belongs to her, or Him, is unrightfully misplaced and/or neglected.
[ . . . ]
"Carnal jealousy," on the other hand, which Paul is referring to in 1 Corinthians 13:4, is the desire and envy that comes with wanting something that is "not yours and not due you"; it's more like "gross envy."

Jealousy does not depend on the actual state of affairs, but on beliefs, feelings and opinions. One may thus experience jealousy for something that one has no rights over.
However, you call the jealousy that is actually justified 'godly' jealousy and misplaced jealousy carnal jealousy.
So, according to you Paul was missing the point. The disagreement was not on whether carnal jealousy is justified – by definition it is not – or whether 'godly' jealousy is justified – by defintion it is –, but whether particlar jealousies are carnal or 'godly'.
Paul merely shared his disapproval of the jealousy of the Corinthians, oblivious to the fact that this would later generate apparent contradictions in the Bible.

[ . . . ]
The point being made here [Exodus 20:5] is that God is stating that He is against idolatrous cultures and forms of worship. So, when it says that He visits the iniquity upon the subsequent generations, we need to notice that the qualifier is "of those who hate Me."[2] The implication here, and the historical context being that, it was typical during the time in which these commandments were written for people to live and be raised within static societies. So, in that context, we could say that if a father lives in a non-Israelite culture and hates the Jewish God, that father's children will also hate that god too.[ In other words, there is nothing redeemable in the society that will halt the social transfer of idolaty; the father sins and leaves a legacy for his children in which the children will surely follow. This kind of thing is alluded to by Jesus when He dealt with the Pharisees. See Matthew 23:28-36.

[2] The author portrays God as someone who simplistically categorizes people in those who love God and those who hate him, where presumably everyone who does not love (meaning worship) him is considered to hate him.
[3] It is worth mentioning that is the fault of the father nor of the children.

[ . . . ]
So, what do we make of this in our now pluralistic, democratically demanding societies? What we make of it is that in the Old Testament, the Commandments were a set of directive given by God, originally given to the Jewish people to show them that it is imperative for them to 'keep the faith' and not fall into idolatry, because faithlessness of that sort does not just affect one's self, but has repercussions for one's posterity and society. [ . . . ]

How is that supposed to follow ? Lack of faith in the Buddha also has consequences for posterity and society. Yet that does not imply one should 'keep the faith'.

In an age where we routinely change the definitions of words (gay sex means 'love', free speech means hate speech, marriage means whatever you want it to mean, biological gender means "I haven't decided yet") ...apparently the bible is the only book that isn't allowed to contain metaphors, allusions, contranyms, analogies, contextual intention...

If we evaluate the Bible for what it is, a collection of ancient, copied, translated books written by different authors at different eras, then few skeptics would complain about contradictions. However, some people pretend the Bible is more than that. The Bible's criticism may be unwarrented, but neither is its praize.

@Clizby WampusCat FWIW this alleged contradiction can be easily harmonized so long as you can get your head around a two-word concept commonly referred to as "tough love".

God does many, many things which fall into this category. And the unloving, distrustful jealousy which Paul rightly admonishes in the context of marriage, is not identical with, or comparable to, the real, truthful love of a God who loves us so much that He doesn't want us to flirt with false gods like Mammon (money) Aphrodite (lust) Mars (power/war).[4]

Let me ask you this. If I was absolutely and totally ambivalent to whether or not my wife was having an adulterous affair, would that me an indication of how much - how little - I loved her? Isnt it true that if God didn't love us, He wouldn't care about our fidelity nor our 'adulterous' behaviour?[5]

[4] They seem very similar. The main difference is your bias.
[5] Your analogy appears false. You assume without justification that the relationship human – God is like a relationship wife – husband.

I ask again, don't you agree that if God didn't care about our infidelity, wouldnt that be in indication of whether - how little - He loves us?

Indeed. Many behaviours are consistent with not loving. You provided another example.

I dunno, seems to me that God saying, "How could you worship other gods, I should be all the God you need and you should be satisfied with worshipping me! I'm going to punish you for worshipping other gods!" isn't much different than a husband saying, "How could you love other men, I should be all the man you need and you should be satisfied with loving me! I'm going to punish you for loving other men!"

And in God's place, the punishment is to let you go your own way and experience life outside His blessings and protection from the evils she's going to be attacked with. This is something these discussions don't usually get into - His punishment includes just letting us go our own way and letting the world have at us - since this is what we think we want.

Indeed. That is what happens in the real world, God not doing anything, which is in stark contrast with what is described in the Bible, God punishing people.

[ . . . ]
And for you to define justice isn't to establish anything specific but rather to simply express what you think you'd like for it to be within utterly human bounds, and without a God looking over our shoulders about it. So, this whole thing about "justice" --being whatever justice is--- is contingent upon whether there is a biblical God or not. [ . . . ]

Justice does not require a god, unless one defines it contingent on a god, which is what Christians implicitely do.

Didn't he threaten the children and the children's children for the sins of the father?

No, He didn't threaten. In the biblical narratives, we read that God has at times actually killed (executed) entire families for the sins of one member. Of course, on the other hand, we also find God forgiving entire families and providing salvation paths for ... entire families. So, it goes both ways.
This is how the notion of "Covenant" is different that the simple idea of a Modern Social Contract.

God also blamed entire families.
God providing salvation paths ? That is contingent on the unproven assumption that some people live happy afterlives.

Capital punishment clearly deals a devastating blow, creating widows and orphans. Incarceration deprives many families of their sole bread winner. The legacy of a criminal record is an albatross around the neck of more people than just the convict.
What is the secular rebuttal and justification for this modern version of visiting the sins of the father on the sons? Its much the same as the theological apologetic rationalization.

This is my rebuttal : Do you have a better alternative ? If so, then go present it in parliament and get it passed.

I dunno, seems to me that God saying, "How could you worship other gods, I should be all the God you need and you should be satisfied with worshipping me! I'm going to punish you for worshipping other gods!" isn't much different than a husband saying, "How could you love other men, I should be all the man you need and you should be satisfied with loving me! I'm going to punish you for loving other men!"

... well, what kind of spouse actually then goes ahead and beds down with 40 other lovers ... and then has the gall to act surprised that the faithful spouse is jealous?
Should the faithful spouse put up with that? I think not.

Is God faithfull ? How many 'spouses' does he have ?

He is jealous for our good . . . not merely being possessive like abusive partners can be, for using someone.[6] Love does not have us just using anyone . . . if we are all-loving the way Jesus wants. There are people who are about using people, and they pick their gods accordingly.

[6] What evidence can you present to support that claim ?

Ok, It is still wrong to punish people that did not perform a crime.

Punishing innocents for crimes may dissuade crimical behaviour, like punihing the colleagues of employees who violated China's one child policy.
In case of the punishment dished out by God there appears to be no justification though.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that children being punished for their parents sin wasn't a very typical thing to happen in ancient Israel. No, if we find entire families being punished by God in these ancient narratives of the O.T., there's probably something more to it all than what a plain jane reading of but a few verses within it can indicate to us (as in Achan's case).

That is probably your bias shining through. You personally disapprove of group punishment and yet that is what God appears to be doing. So he must not have been doing it a lot and when he did, he must have had a good excuse.

OK maybe I can provide some for you. which of this do you need evidence, that God is all good...

Who's definition of good are you using?

Christians don't provide clear, unambiguous definitions for moral concepts, but what they usually mean with good is 'good according to God's personal moral standard'.

That was 'to step outside' and consult an objective morality (which is assuming that which we need to discover - but we'll let that slide).

You can't discover anything if you don't want to.

You are mistaken. I am confident that even you have made discoveries you did not want to make.

OK then simply ask "what are the characteristics of God". I do not think you can get in trouble by asking that question.

No. I was told questioning gods goodness was not allowed.

You can't blame them. Suppose on a Nazi forum some dude came question Adolf Hitler's goodness. I would expect them to be angry.

Even if they quote the same passage of Scripture, there is always some difference to their uses of the passage. That doesn't make Scripture subjective --just their use of it. Same with morality.

No. The use of something and the evaluation/qualification of something are two different things.

I thought jealousy was a sin.

It can be.
Maybe it is like how being sorry can be good or a sin.
If I am sorry I got caught, it's a sin.
If I am sorry I did something wrong and I change and do not do it, that's better.
So, in the case of God being jealous . . . He is caring about the good of ones He is jealous about.[7]
But an abusive boyfriend can be jealous in a way of merely wanting to use and possess his girlfriend, maybe.

[7] I am confident that is what the propaganda teaches, but is he really ? Maybe he is like an abusive god who dishes out punishment even to third parties when he does not get the attention he craves.

 

[Andrewn]

You're repeating yourself uneccessarily. But not answering the question. Here's where the tooth pulling comes into it. I keep having to ask you the same thing time and time again. So one more time...

If you have a moral problem and you need a solution, where do you go to get it?

Edit: Hang on. That first line was the answer? So you get it from the bible? Yeah?

You're enjoying this discussion too much. Must be a dentist or a school teacher .

In some situations, the meaning of good for you isn't the same as it is for me. So how do we solve this?

We follow our best guess based on disciplined interpretation of the Bible, under the conviction that Bible writers represented the Mind of God, who is righteous.