A solid example from Scripture please.

[Thatgirloncfforums]

I'll see if I can find out online. The net isn't what it use to be. I remember looking into the Liturgy of St James but coming up empty.

I know you can find this sort of thing in the oldest Christian liturgies. I have a friend (my best friend form puberty into adulthood) who kept his skepticism on this from Protestantism when he became a priest and later a bishop in a small Church of the East jurisdiction/ denomination. I am trying to remember the Words to the Liturgy of Addai and Mari which blatantly say what he denies. A paraphrase was soliciting the prayers of the saints, including "our Lady the most holy virgin Mary, mother of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, may the Holy Spirit form in us" as it formed in you...

 

[GreekOrthodox]

John was written to the Greeks. His audience understood what he meant. The more we learn about the context in which Scripture is written, the more we understand it's plain meaning.

It's like if I were to pick up Shakespeare. I have to learn a lot, but his middle-class audience didn't.

What middle-class audience?? Most of the apostles were the equivalent of blue collar workers.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

My Pastor loves Heiser!

This reminds me of a video Matt Whitman on YT did, entitled something like, 'Yes Christmas is pagan and I totally don't care!'

It was my Pastor's fondness of Heiser that made me consider my op question. I couldn't understand why, if the pagans invoked their dead, the Israelites were forbidden to invoke theirs.

I love him too and have started listening to the EO "Lord of Spirits" pod cast and also bought "The Religion of the Apostles" from one of the contributors, I think his name is something like Father Stephen Young.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

I'll see if I can find out online. The net isn't what it use to be. I remember looking into the Liturgy of St James but coming up empty.

Yes that a great one because that is said to be the oldest in continuous use. But it's also hard to google, and if you find it probably will get one giant pdf of the entire service that you will have to read etc.

 

[Thatgirloncfforums]

What middle-class audience?? Most of the apostles were the equivalent of blue collar workers.

Shakespeare's audience was middle class

 

[Thatgirloncfforums]

I've been listening to that too! It's funny how everyone is becoming interested in the Divine Council all of a sudden.

I love him too and have started listening to the EO "Lord of Spirits" pod cast and also bought "The Religion of the Apostles" from one of the contributors, I think his name is something like Father Stephen Young.

 

[GreekOrthodox]

I'll see if I can find out online. The net isn't what it use to be. I remember looking into the Liturgy of St James but coming up empty.

https://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf07.xii.ii.html
Remember, O Lord, according to the multitude of Thy mercy and compassion, me also, Thy humble and unprofitable servant; and the deacons who surround Thy holy altar, and graciously give them a blameless life, keep their ministry undefiled, and purchase for them a good degree, that we may find mercy and grace, with all the saints that have been well pleasing to Thee since the world began, to generation and generation—grandsires, sires, patriarchs, prophets, apostles, martyrs, confessors, teachers, saints, and every just spirit made perfect in the faith of Thy Christ.

 

[GreekOrthodox]

Shakespeare's audience was middle class

Sorry, thought you meant middle-class of the Apostolic era

 

[Pavel Mosko]

I'll see if I can find out online. The net isn't what it use to be. I remember looking into the Liturgy of St James but coming up empty.

the Assyrian one though was worth noting simply because if you look at this in terms of let's say Holy Anthropology, like Saint Vincent Lerin's view of Tradition, that actually gives you proof of this belief being truly "Catholic" in the universal sense all the different ancient Christian peoples and Churches do believe in some form of it: Romans, Syrians and Assyrians, Armenians, Egyptians, Ethiopians, Indians, and naturally Greeks, how could I forget Greeks I guess I almost repressed them since they tend to steal the spot light.

We also could also include pre-Muslim Arabs, Medes and Persians.

 

[GreekOrthodox]

Romans, Syrians and Assyrians, Armenians, Egyptians, Ethiopians, Indians, and naturally Greeks, how could I forget Greeks... I guess I almost repressed them since they tend to steal the spot light.

There are two kinds of people, Greeks and People who Wish they were Greek."

 

[narnia59]

Perhaps it's bc this is the context in which even Protestants invoke their dead. The very fact that we have tombstones is a form of invocation. Like David said to the already deceased Jonathan, 'Very dear you were to me my brother. Your love for me was wonderful, more wonderful than that of women'

I've often wondered why people who don't believe you can pray for the dead put "Rest in Peace" on tombstones.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

I've often wondered why people who don't believe you can pray for the dead put "Rest in Peace" on tombstones.

lol

At different times I have seen Protestants express their own version of the intercession of saints. There is this one guy, who when talking about the Church expressed the same common metanarrative on Protestants on this topic. He is an old Charismatic minister (Later Rain Pentecostal) who made personal prophesy and giving prophetic words during church services really popular in not just the US but around the World. He was married and his wife in ministry with him, mostly supporting him, but doing ministry with the ladies, but occasionally giving little teachings etc.

Anyway his wife of 65 or so years died. And he still is carrying on in ministry, but watching again out of curiosity, I noticed him speak about her. "That she is watching us from heaven right now, praying for us etc." And thought it amusing that he sort of ended up believing in his own version of this, because he was very vocal about things he thought were false teaching and corruption and this was definitely one of them!

 

[Thatgirloncfforums]

This is common. Very rarely have I met a Protestant who will say, 'My dead loved one is dead to me'. Protestants seem to recognize the need of those grieving to still connect with their deceased. I know of a Lutheran pastor who said that it was okay that he speak with his dad, bc God can tell his dad what he said.

I'm odd I guess. The intercession of the saints gives me no comfort at all. I'm more comforted by the idea that they are with God somewhere but far away from me and what I got going on.

Psychology is strange.

 

[prodromos]

Shakespeare's audience was middle class

I don't think you can easily claim that middle class Greeks were all up to speed in Aristotle and Plato.

 

[GreekOrthodox]

This is common. Very rarely have I met a Protestant who will say, 'My dead loved one is dead to me'. Protestants seem to recognize the need of those grieving to still connect with their deceased. I know of a Lutheran pastor who said that it was okay that he speak with his dad, bc God can tell his dad what he said.

I'm odd I guess. The intercession of the saints gives me no comfort at all. I'm more comforted by the idea that they are with God somewhere but far away from me and what I got going on.

Psychology is strange.

In the Orthodox memorial service, the final prayer reads

Priest: O God of spirits and of all flesh, You trampled upon death and abolished the power of the devil, giving life to Your world. Give rest to the soul(s) of Your departed servant(s) (Name) in a place of light, in a place of green pasture, in a place of refreshment, from where pain, sorrow, and sighing have fled away. As a good and loving God, forgive every sin he (she, they) has (have) committed in word, deed, or thought, for there is no one who lives and does not sin. You alone are without sin. Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and Your word is truth.

Priest: For You are the resurrection, the life, and the repose of Your departed servant(s) (Name), Christ our God, and to You we offer glory, with Your eternal Father who is without beginning and Your all-holy, good, and life-creating Spirit, now and forever and to the ages of ages.

 

[GreekOrthodox]

I don't think you can easily claim that middle class Greeks were all up to speed in Aristotle and Plato.

Luke and Paul are probably the two that come to mind out of all of the main NT figures.

 

[Thatgirloncfforums]

I've often wondered why people who don't believe you can pray for the dead put "Rest in Peace" on tombstones.

Why have tombstones at all- I mean what are you saving the bodies for? A resurrection? Maybe, but Christ doesn't need our tombs. Remembering someone is an act of making them present, like in the Eucharist.

Something that I do appreciate about paganism is the idea of hearth gods, essentially, your deceased relatives remained a part of your family and became the guardians of your home. You took care of them through drink and food offerings.

Why would God forbid such a kind act, or did he? Speaking of Scripture alone lol, I do wonder to what degree the Gentile religions prophesied or look forward to Christianity?

 

[Thatgirloncfforums]

Speaking of Catholicity, hearth gods and ancestor worship is universal. I suppose God might have forbidden it bc the nations were ruled by demons and the god of the dead was still a thing. But once Christ took over the realm of the dead and the dead are under his dominion, 'worshipping' them no longer means honoring and becoming subjected to death, but honoring and being subjected to Christ.
I'm sorry. Am I a little morbid?

Why have tombstones at all- I mean what are you saving the bodies for? A resurrection? Maybe, but Christ doesn't need our tombs. Remembering someone is an act of making them present, like in the Eucharist.

Something that I do appreciate about paganism is the idea of hearth gods, essentially, your deceased relatives remained a part of your family and became the guardians of your home. You took care of them through drink and food offerings.

Why would God forbid such a kind act, or did he? Speaking of Scripture alone lol, I do wonder to what degree the Gentile religions prophesied or look forward to Christianity?

 

[narnia59]

Why have tombstones at all- I mean what are you saving the bodies for? A resurrection? Maybe, but Christ doesn't need our tombs. Remembering someone is an act of making them present, like in the Eucharist.

Something that I do appreciate about paganism is the idea of hearth gods, essentially, your deceased relatives remained a part of your family and became the guardians of your home. You took care of them through drink and food offerings.

Why would God forbid such a kind act, or did he? Speaking of Scripture alone lol, I do wonder to what degree the Gentile religions prophesied or look forward to Christianity?

I haven't read this but heard it was good.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B0085RZRO4/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

[GreekOrthodox]

Why have tombstones at all- I mean what are you saving the bodies for? A resurrection? Maybe, but Christ doesn't need our tombs. Remembering someone is an act of making them present, like in the Eucharist.

My grandmother didnt want a marble slab over her grave. One less thing she would have to deal with for the Resurrection!