Ben Adam?

[rdcast]

I suppose my confusion comes from the notion that "Ben Adam" refers to "Adam before he sinned".

That's not what it means. It's use in Hebrew is used as an idiom meaning "human being", such as its use by the Prophet Ezekiel. Or the way it is used in Numbers, asking if God is a man or a son of man that he should lie.

In theory it could also refer to the immediate descendents of Adam, such as Seth, Cain, or Abel (i.e. Seth ben Adam); but this is not the typical usage in Scripture. In Scripture typical usage is simply "human being".

Now, when the Lord refers to Himself as "Son of Man", there is some conversation to be had, is the Lord using this term in its usual idomatic sense "human being", or is He drawing primarily from Second Temple Period language which uses the term (such as in Daniel) in a more messianic sense? This sense can also be found in non-Canonical Second Temple literature such as Enoch.

In any case, however, it has nothing to do with a pre-lapsarian Adam. Hence much of my confusion.

-CryptoLutheran

well, there's a huge gap of pre-lapsarianism, though what you're saying about Ben Adam often means so and so being from Adam, makes sense. I became confused when this was misused in a hubpage. You've brought much light into the subject. Thank you.

 

[seeingeyes]

Goodness, I just quoted myself

I asked this question about birthing because it seems reasonable to me that Adam was at his 9th month of his embryonic development, so to speak. Perhaps his helpmate was needed to coax him out of his garden womb. Would you have told your unborn baby to come out because it was much better out in the world? He'd be vexed with you. Which brings up a decent question, how did the garden expulsion affect Adam's opinion of God?

In other words, it took a woman to drag man out of the womb?

Interesting thought, I have to think about that one.

 

[rdcast]

If Jesus wasn't tempted to eat a piece of bread after a forty day fast, then he simply wasn't human, no matter what the theologians say.

Can't agree with the mother here. Jesus was hungry as it says, not tempted. I don't see Jesus Christ allowing temptation to occur. Beyond this, was He 100% human?

 

[rdcast]

In other words, it took a woman to drag man out of the womb?

Interesting thought, I have to think about that one.

Yes, and I believe it might take a woman to understand this, but not only a woman, but a mother.

 

[rdcast]

But the temptations of Satan didn't seem to be targeted at Jesus' physical desires, per se. Instead, they seem to be targeted at his very identity.

Indeed, Lucifer was hopeful to subjugate Christ.

 

[rdcast]

The first and third temptations start with "If you are the Son of God", and the second one offers all the authority that the Son of God should be expected to already have. What I see here is Satan appealing to the pride that a Son of God should, presumably, have. Hey man, if you've got the power, why don't you use it? And since Jesus is not using it, then Satan offers him some power, which would make Jesus beholden to Satan instead of God.

I appreciate your thoroughness, yet you're not quite there.
Satan understands and even anticipates the weakness of man. Knowing God has taken on man's nature, however the amount, Satan might find an angle. We shouldn't underestimate the brilliance of God's once highest ranked angel.

 

[rdcast]

This hearkens back to the snake in the garden playing up Eve's insecurities and offering the chance to be greater than she was, to be like God. And it hearkens forward to those yelling at Jesus to come down off the cross 'if you are the Son of God".

wow, so true

 

[rdcast]

But Jesus didn't bite. He wasn't like Eve, trying to scramble himself to the top of the pack. He didn't have anything to prove. He didn't need to be 'right', he needed to be righteous. And the righteousness of God lays down it's life for it's friends. Nothing that Satan was offering could advance his Father's cause.

Yet it did. Satan's offerings failed to the point he fled from God's divinity placed upon fragile man.

 

[seeingeyes]

Can't agree with the mother here. Jesus was hungry as it says, not tempted. I don't see Jesus Christ allowing temptation to occur. Beyond this, was He 100% human?

I think this might have to do with the differing meanings of 'tempt'.

If I say 'boy, I'm tempted to eat that doughnut even though it's fifteen minutes till dinnertime', that just means, 'I'm hungry, I want to eat'. If I say, "I bet I can tempt my kid to eat broccoli if I put cheese on it', that means 'I'm gonna try and coerce him to do something'.

If Jesus was hungry, that means he wanted to eat (cause what else would hungry mean? ). If he wasn't hungry (i.e. 'tempted' to eat), then he wasn't human. Because human beings want to eat when they haven't for forty days.

But when Satan was 'tempting' Jesus, that means that he was trying to coerce Jesus into taking a certain action. Clearly Jesus passed that test.

It's important for us not to combine 'temptation' with 'sin'. They are independent concepts. We can sin without temptation (as in accidentally running over our neighbor's dog) and we can be tempted without sin (as in finding broccoli to be delicious with cheese on top).

 

[seeingeyes]

I appreciate your thoroughness, yet you're not quite there.
Satan understands and even anticipates the weakness of man. Knowing God has taken on man's nature, however the amount, Satan might find an angle. We shouldn't underestimate the brilliance of God's once highest ranked angel.

Oh you are absolutely right, he knows our weaknesses better than we know our own. And our primary weakness is the same one we had in the garden: the need to be 'better' than we are. And when we can't be 'better' than we are, we can at least point out how much worse every one else is. ("It was that woman! It was the snake!")

Adam and Eve were well-fed, but still couldn't resist stuffing themselves with pride. Jesus was forty-days hungry, but he had no trouble being content in his weakness according to his Father's plan.

 

[rdcast]

I think this might have to do with the differing meanings of 'tempt'.

If I say 'boy, I'm tempted to eat that doughnut even though it's fifteen minutes till dinnertime', that just means, 'I'm hungry, I want to eat'. If I say, "I bet I can tempt my kid to eat broccoli if I put cheese on it', that means 'I'm gonna try and coerce him to do something'.

If Jesus was hungry, that means he wanted to eat (cause what else would hungry mean? ). If he wasn't hungry (i.e. 'tempted' to eat), then he wasn't human. Because human beings want to eat when they haven't for forty days.

But when Satan was 'tempting' Jesus, that means that he was trying to coerce Jesus into taking a certain action. Clearly Jesus passed that test.

It's important for us not to combine 'temptation' with 'sin'. They are independent concepts. We can sin without temptation (as in accidentally running over our neighbor's dog) and we can be tempted without sin (as in finding broccoli to be delicious with cheese on top).

Nah, you're rationalizing from the standpoint of your sinful point of view. Jesus Christ was hungry because his physical body was demanding to be fed. Not that He was asking to feed it.

Something about this whole thing of fasting 40 days. What a feat, but I think how fasting prepares for struggles within principalities. Perhaps it was not to add to His struggle, but rather to prepare his human nature for the battle with the tempter.

 

[rdcast]

It's important for us not to combine 'temptation' with 'sin'. They are independent concepts. We can sin without temptation (as in accidentally running over our neighbor's dog) and we can be tempted without sin (as in finding broccoli to be delicious with cheese on top).

How? If we are so used to giving in to temptation, I can understand temptation doesn't really need to raise it's ugly head, but it is always ready and waiting for when it's victim balks.

I'm trying to assert that it's not the act, but the entertaining that creates the sin. After all, when I lust in my heart, I've already sinned as surely as I've done the act. No distinction.

 

[rdcast]

Oh you are absolutely right, he knows our weaknesses better than we know our own. And our primary weakness is the same one we had in the garden: the need to be 'better' than we are. And when we can't be 'better' than we are, we can at least point out how much worse every one else is. ("It was that woman! It was the snake!")

Adam and Eve were well-fed, but still couldn't resist stuffing themselves with pride. Jesus was forty-days hungry, but he had no trouble being content in his weakness according to his Father's plan.

Beautiful, and is why we need each other as Christ's family, girded for battle

 

[seeingeyes]

How? If we are so used to giving in to temptation, I can understand temptation doesn't really need to raise it's ugly head, but it is always ready and waiting for when it's victim balks.

I'm trying to assert that it's not the act, but the entertaining that creates the sin. After all, when I lust in my heart, I've already sinned as surely as I've done the act. No distinction.

Again, I think this is a matter of semantics. When the Bible says, "Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil," does that mean Jesus was tempted? Not able to be tempted? Attempted to be tempted?

We both agree that Jesus was without sin, so perhaps we should leave it at that and let the poor, out-of-work, English majors parse the rest.

 

[rdcast]

Again, I think this is a matter of semantics. When the Bible says, "Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil," does that mean Jesus was tempted? Not able to be tempted? Attempted to be tempted?

We both agree that Jesus was without sin, so perhaps we should leave it at that and let the poor, out-of-work, English majors parse the rest.

Young lady, semantics are words and the living word of God is divine semantics. It doesn't say Jesus Christ was tempted, it says he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted. That doesn't say he was tempted but was being tempted by the tempter. An act outside of Jesus, coming from the evil one.

I should add, it wasn't until after the 40 day's of fasting that the tempter came to Him.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Try reading the temptations of Christ in the context of our Lord's kingdom ministry. How He describes the kingdom and how it is antithetical to the powers and principalities of this world (the first is last, the least will be greatest, etc); then see how the temptations show Christ's patent refusal to be the sort of messianic king which was hoped for.

Christ did not come to establish an earthly kingdom of power; but to render the kingdoms and powers of the world, governed by violence, impotent; which He accomplishes by His Death and Resurrection. Thus the kingdom, as recorded by St. Luke, is "amongst you", in the Person and Ministry of Jesus, God's Messiah, the King.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[rdcast]

Christ did not come to establish an earthly kingdom of power; but to render the kingdoms and powers of the world, governed by violence, impotent; which He accomplishes by His Death and Resurrection. Thus the kingdom, as recorded by St. Luke, is "amongst you", in the Person and Ministry of Jesus, God's Messiah, the King.

Perhaps the final outcome was the establishment of God's Kingdom in our hearts.

 

[x141]

In other words, it took a woman to drag man out of the womb?

Interesting thought, I have to think about that one.

This is the process of time, a laboring to bring forth, but this is not the truth but gives birth to a lie or a duality or an eye that is not single. Here the journey of the two sons, heavenly, earthly begin culminating at the cross were the two are made one. Each of us have a lamb that was slain from or because of the foundation of the earth. Jesus' son of man was in heaven therefore his angels descended and ascended without steps and his nakedness was never discovered. This is the process of a harlot/earhtly Jerusalem that rules over all the kings of the earth until she becomes desolate. She is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, one makes God into merchandise, who would make Abraham rich, the other is where we are called out of ... to the Egyptians the Hebrews were an abomination and the Hebrews were a slave to this perception which abomination is in the holy place or the garden/city/jerusalem, a man that makes desolate thus bringing to pass that which was never out of place to begin with. The river that flowed into this garden became parted as men of warfare parted Jesus' garments into four heads, but his coat was without seam therefore they cast lots as if it were merchandise. Warfare does not build the house neither does violence establish it. This is a laboring. The river Euphrates is the summation of the other three and is not the truth but a narative of death. The river of life is not of labor, it is like the kingdom, freely given ... the word of God (scripture) like the son of God is not divided, it is our perception that divides it ... if we don't eat the process/labor ends. We are born from above, the woman/bride/mind of christ/virgin is the mother of us all which Mary the mother of Jesus is a picture of.

 

[x141]

I'm trying to assert that it's not the act, but the entertaining that creates the sin. After all, when I lust in my heart, I've already sinned as surely as I've done the act. No distinction.

The woman ate of the fruit of her own tree, being decieved long before she ever took of it.

Jer 49:12 For thus saith the LORD; Behold, they whose judgment was not to drink of the cup have assuredly drunken ...

 

[rdcast]

The woman ate of the fruit of her own tree, being decieved long before she ever took of it.

The tree of the knowledge of good and evil preceded Eve, did it not? And it was commanded of all not to eat of it. The serpent did work through Eve to get at Adam it would appear. Try not to postulate too much unless you have strong supporting scripture. Even then, the appearance of creating new scriptural material makes it impossible to debate.