Liberal, as I said, I’m happy to leave most of the points we were discussing for Part V. I just wanted to make sure that’s where they belonged.
Love, on the other hand, seems to be part of the exegesis (Scriptural analysis) you’re developing in Part IV. In Post #2, I pointed out one can’t reasonably assume John uses the term as defined here. (And, please, I’ve demonstrated repeatedly an understanding that you’re using special definitions, so there’s no need to keep reminding me). In reply (Post #8), you said, “As to whether John meant the same thing by love that I mean by love, I do intend to get into that in quite some detail.” In my most recent post, I was pointing out you had not yet done this. But, as akennett points out (and implicit in my comment), you are assuming Jesus meant the same thing as you do. Surely you can see how that’s not quite kosher, so to speak.
For what it’s worth, I think John’s use of the word love is relatively straightforward and obviously has nothing to do with erotic or romantic love. Rather, as between God/Jesus and us, love has the ordinary meaning of the love between a father and his children, i.e., in this context, God’s love for his creation and vice versa. See, e.g., John 3:16. Relatedly, in the commandment to love one another, the word has the ordinary meaning of love as between siblings or close friends. It means I’m supposed to care about you and vice versa. In a dog-eat-dog world, we’re supposed to put that aside and take care of one another, protect one another and advance one another.
Now, mutual edification (as defined here) is one means to that end, but not the only one. And I can see no reason to assume it’s the sum total of what John intended. (Bearing in mind the Johannine Gospel almost certainly was compiled by a community of Christians, not written by the Apostle.) In particular, it fits rather poorly with John 3:16, which arguably is the single most important verse in the Canon.
Support? That’s not what I derive from these passages. I think what it’d call it is inspiration, just in the ordinary sense of the term. The writings move me. They cause me to think. To examine myself and my beliefs. Hell, they even were instrumental in converting me from anti-Christian to Christian.
I could just as well paraphrase the words and accomplish the same thing (which is kind of how I view my statements of interpretation.)
To answer your question directly — and it is a reasonable question, which I would likely ask were I in your place — I can care what he says about love while not caring what he means by love because of the (possible) coincidence that what I mean by love finds expression in what he writes.
And why not? Why is a man not free to interpret poetry in whatever way it happens to inspire him? I’ve already said that I don’t believe this is The Word of God, anymore than say, Jesus the Son of Man by Kahlil Gibran is The Word of God. (Using that book almost would have sufficed, actually.) I don’t even know who wrote it. Neither do you. Nor does anyone else. And so, if we are to base meaning on the author’s intent, then there isn’t any way any of us could know what it means — since we don’t know who the author even IS — and so it might as well be gibberish (which, no doubt, it is to some).
I know I keep saying this, but it is as though it is being ignored: this is my personal witness. All of it. It is my interpretation. It is my understanding of what I read.
And again, criticially, I keep saying this as well: it is not necessary that you adopt for yourself the same meanings I assign. I’m not teaching a course on the Bible. I’m asking — and have ever only asked — that you understand what I mean when I use the terms. To turn your questions around on you, why is that too much to ask? Just because they don’t mean what Jerry Falwell said they mean? Or some random scholar? When Christian ones often disagree with non-Christian ones and even often disagree among themselves?
If my interpretations are of no concern to you, then I could understand if you weren’t even participating. But I cannot understand why I must be tied and bound by interpretations that preceded mine for any reason, either because they are old or popular or mainstream. They mean to me what they mean to me in these passages and in these contexts. I am sharing these meanings with a handful of participants and a few thousand viewers.
If you can show cause why I am bound by necessity to regard these writings in the manner in which some other person does regard or has regarded them, them convince me of that fact, and I will stop right now wasting everyone’s time. Otherwise, if I am as free to interpret with my brain as you are with yours, then let me procede.
Incidentally, love (“agape”), has traditionally been interpreted by very many people as “charity”. My meaning is not all that far removed from theirs. In fact, I have previously cited the Polycarp thread (in which people donated money to help them out) as an example of love in action.
And what is it? You know perfectly well that you are free to open a thread of your own, or a whole series of threads, expressing your interpretation, or the interpretations of whatever scholarship you trust. And of course, you are free to argue with me in this thread as well, but doing so with respect to my interpretations is a waste of everyone’s time (including yours) because the interpretations I have resulted from my conversion experience. My new understanding of “love” was more or less placed into my brain suddenly, and from where or by what means I do not know. Now, it took me some time to verbalize many of these things internally and formulate them into what expresses my faith in a coherent manner.
But that’s the reason I’m here right now. That’s what I’m doing in this series of threads. The epistemic sources I use are sources that are meaningful to me.
But these are assumptions for the sake of argument, a request that I made as early as the second thread, and then stressed again in the OP of the third thread. I’m not asking you to believe what I believe or even to use the words in your ordinary comings and goings the way I use them. But I am asking that you understand what I mean, and use the terms as I do only in this series of threads, and only so that we can communicate. Likewise, if you are going to communicate to me about these matters, then if you are not going to use my vocabulary, how will I understand you? What I’m striving for is a mutual understanding. By telling you what I mean by “love”, you need only commit to memory or make reference to these resources. In fact, I promised that I would reiterate them all at the beginning of Part V so you will not have to struggle so, if indeed it is a struggle, to understand.
And I hope you will understand that every tangential discourse in which we engage — many of which you yourself have acknowledged are premature — actually delays the epistemological development that is underway, including the viewpoints of John about love. With fondness, I must point out that you are almost the **other-wise **of this particular series. In Part III, he could barely wait to get to Part IV, and in Part IV you can barely wait to get to Part V.
Since I have defined God as love, then there is no point making leaps about what these passages say about love until we examine more closely what they say about God (or Jesus or the Holy Spirit). That will come. Be patient. I don’t want to lose you, but if you feel you need a break and simply cannot abide a process that seems sluggish to you, then I will not be offended if you come back at some later point when you think that your particular issues are being addressed. Meanwhile, there are issues besides those you and I have discussed, and for the sake of other-wise, MrDibble, RevenantThreshold, and the thousands of lurkers, I think it is important that I continue my methodical approach, which namely is to cite passages and my interpretations of them.
I would hesitate to assign that sort of meaning. And certainly, it is as renegade as the meaning I myself have assigned. The sort of love you describe was typically rendered as “philos” — brotherly love, as in Philadelphia, and not as “agape”, which is the love that is of concern to me. It is “agape” and not “philos” that was commanded by Jesus. If you are looking for a more traditional interpretation, the term most often used for centuries was “charity”. (Note to Greek scholar-type grammar Nazis: I’m not bothering to look up the declensions or other grammatical elements of the terms. They are understandable enough in the manner I have Anglicized them.)
There is another reason, besides, that I would hesitate to assign your meaning as well, especially if, as you would have it, other Gospel sources are consulted. See, for example, this passage from Luke:
“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple”
Luke 14:26
That does not sound like, at least to me, any sort of brotherly love or love of a parent for her children.
Naturally, I couldn’t disagree more — not about the importance of John 3:16, but about its meaning.
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
John 3:16
This passage speaks to the essence of Jesus as uniquely spawned by God, and the eternity of both Him and those who “believe in” Him. (To be defined shortly.) It speaks also to the fact that God served in His capacity as the facilitator or conveyor of goodness by immersing Himself into His creation vis a vis becoming one of them, and thereby speaking to them directly as one ordinary free moral agent might speak to another. The goodness He spread — the people He edified — is documented in terms of every manner of means from performing miracles to telling stories (and in one case, remaining silent). It speaks also to God’s aesthetical evaluation of man; namely, that he is worth saving from death.
Now the definition.
Believe in: trust, cling to, rely on. It is not an intellectual belief, but an essential belief. To “believe in” God does not mean merely to acknowledge His existence; it means to depend on him in the manner that a crippled man depends on his wheelchair.
Incidentally, my definition of “belief” coincides, I think, directly with the Amplified Bible — for those who demand some sort of authoritative sourcing.
For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten (unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life.
Thank you for making exactly my point. Just as we couldn’t communicate and understand each other without having a common vocabulary, neither can a reader have an understanding of a text without having one.
Funny. But I think it rather more important that you take your own words to heart, and re-examine John and your other sources in light of their vocabulary, rather than your own. Since it’s so important and all.
It is my witness, and therefore my vocabulary that matters.
Now, that is something on which you and I apparently will not be able to agree. Luckily, however, it does not disqualify you in any way to participate now and in Part V. That’s because, as I’ve said before, whether you agree with my interpretation is unimportant to me. What is important to me is merely that you understand my view.
I like knowing what people mean when they explain themselves and their worldview to me. In real world conversations especially, I find myself interrupting often to ask something like, “and by ‘gooodness’ you mean what, exactly?”. I think I do that here, too. Sorry for the rather Wittgenstein-ish meandering.
I will continue now establishing some epistemological sources, along with my interpretations.
So, because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jews [ones gathered for a feast] persecuted him. Jesus said to them, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working.”
John 5:16-17
Once again, Jesus behaves sinfully in the eyes of the law of the prophets by working on the Sabbath (which he had said was made for man), and once again He reminds the people that there are issues greater than moral ones or ethical ones. He saw great value in His Father’s work, and there was no earthly circumstance — like a calamity, or a celebration, or a day of the week — that was going to change that. As long as the work of God is being done (and the work of God is to convey goodness; i.e., be good), then there are no valid moral or ethical codes that will stop it. All that will interfere with the work of God is sin; i.e., opposition to love.
Incidentally, the particular Jews whom the Beloved referenced were identified in verse 1 of the same chapter.
Next, we have:
“I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life.”
John 5:24
We’ve already learned from the Beloved that God is eternal, and so are His believers. But something new here, and important, is the notion that because of her belief, a person “has crossed over” from death to life. In other words, the death itself is finished.
Since obviously, that is impossible for the physical side of man (a person who is alive and believes cannot have already physically died), then it must apply to the spiritual side of man (which we discussed very early on). A believer (defined as someone who trusts in, relies upon, and clings to God) has already begun her new life. Her rebirth. (We will recall the lesson to Nicodemus about being “born again”.)
And finally:
But do not think I will accuse you before the Father. Your accuser is Moses, on whom your hopes are set. If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But since you do not believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say?"
John 5:45
It is yet another event in which Jesus stresses His timelessness (what with Moses writing about Him and all). It is also yet another opportunity when Jesus stresses His unwillingness to judge or accuse. And finally, it is a profound appeal to reason. Why, as He asks, would a person believe someone whom she does not even know when she is unwilling to believe someone in whom she is expected to trust? He is saying that He is the fulfillment of the writings of Moses, and that rejection of Him is ironic.
The problem is simple. When you say, “as I define love, Jesus is saying to edify one another, or value one another aesthetically.” you are making an assertion as to what John means. Whether this is a reasonable interpretation of John is a fair subject for discussion or Part IV is a waste of time. You did say, after all, “If you feel that any of my specific interpretations are far-fetched or even outright wrong, this is the time and place to say so.”
So, which is it? Are we discussing John or the Gospel According to Liberal? If the former, my comments are apropos. If the latter, let’s dispense with comments and just let you tell us what you believe. But, then, it would be nice if you could tell us why your views have any epistemological basis.
And, for something like the third time, please stop implying I’m having difficulty following the definitions. Honest, I’m not. Relatedly, when you say you’re clearing up misconceptions (as you have said at least twice), what you’re really doing is refining (even changing) your position. I don’t have a problem with your doing such, but implying I wasn’t correctly describing your original position is, well, disingenuous.
I apologize for seeming disingenuous, and for implying that you have difficulty following the definitions.
Yes, I do not mind people arguing with my interpretations. You and I, for example, covered whether Jesus commanded us to love as agape, philos, or eros. So argue with the interpretations all you want. I am inviting that.
But what I mind is people arguing that I am not allowed to make a given interpretation because of whatever reason — be it some alleged author’s intent or the traditional views of mainstream Nicene religion politicians.
Arguing with my interpretation means, to me, arguing for example that John 5:24 is talking about the physical side of man; i.e., disagreeing with me. But NOT telling me I have no right to think the way I think.
I read these passages as poetic, and interpret them as poetry. They inspire my faith. And they give me inductions that will be established in Part V as premises. But the premises (and the inferences that follow) will use a vocabulary that I am defining.
It is nothing more than the very convenience for which language was invented — so that everytime I need the phrase “mutual edification”, I can use a single word. Or when I talk about reality, everyone knows that I mean “that which is necessary, essential, and eternal”. Otherwise, things could get very wordy and exremely hard to follow. Things are easier to follow, at least to me, when terms are defined in an understandable way and then people use those terms rather than all the words in their definitions.
As to what “[we are] discussing”, I can say only that I am discussing my faith. I am describing it to all who view. Presently, I am laying out what I have read that I find pertinent to that view. In other words, it is my source of knowledge. The fact that I use a simplified vocabulary to discuss it is completely unremarkable, just as if we were assigning the term “inertia” to mean “the resistance of mass to a change in its state of motion”. It is to facilitate understanding. Of my faith. Which I take from John (and other sources).
It does come across to me more like you want to challenge my definitions than my interpretations or maybe both. But as the person who is composing the proof, the privilege (and the responsibility) of defining terms is mine. And since it will be my argument, the choice of premises will be mine. And since I draw my inductions primarily from John, the onus of giving my interpretations falls upon me.
I don’t understand why this would be at all controversial to anyone.
Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your forefathers ate manna and died, but he who feeds on this bread will live forever.
John 6:56-58
Jesus, the Beloved tells us, seems to be referring again to some sort of body politic of gods (or spirits or souls, etc.) We are in Him, and He is in His Father, and His Father is in us, and so on and so on. There is oneness as in the oneness of an orchestra where we are concerned. But between Him and His Father, there is oneness as in the oneness of the value of pi — there are not two or three values of pi, but one and only one.
The metaphor of eating flesh and drinking blood evokes, of course, consumption. And so we are to consume God. Put another way, we are to consume love. Put finally this way, we are to consume the edification God (or love) conveys to us. We are to be good, and to receive goodness gladly.
And the last today is this:
The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.
John 6:63
More on the duality of man, but even more on which of the sides matters more. If the Spirit gives life, then it can clearly be said that the Spirit has great value (or is worth quite much). The animal side of man, however, is so insignificant by comparison, that it “counts for nothing”. That is, it is aesthetically empty.
But then there is a surprising new metaphor: His words are spirit and “life”.
Definition:
Life: having the qualities of being eternal, necessary, and essential. Or, put another way, having the qualities of reality. “Life” and “reality” may be considered synonyms.
I’m sorry if this seems to you a digression. To me, it’s central, if the object is to interpret John. Of course you may define your terms however you like. What you may not reasonably do is assume John is using those words in the same way. For example, the “definition” that God is love came from John. Actually, I don’t think that was intended as a definition; rather it was a poetic description (as you say) and not a statement of his entire essence.
Consider a light-hearted example. Suppose I say this cow is mottled brown. But, obviously, there is more to the cow than its color. Moreover, no one would infer that all mottled brown things are cows or that only cows may be mottled brown. So, too, with God is love. There’s more to God than that. More importantly, one can’t reasonably infer love emanates only from God. Especially as you have defined the word.
Now let’s take up John 3:16. We agree it’s a very important verse. Interestingly, I like the amplified translation you provided in Post #82, “For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten (unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life.” Do you really not see that this is a very different explication of love than your definition? On the contrary, it sounds very much like the love of a father for his children, which is how I suggested the passage should be interpreted. Nothing about edification (as defined here) or anything like it.
Interpretation of the commandment to love one another is more muddled. Part of the problem is that the same word is being used as both a noun and a verb. Whether this is an artifact of the original Greek is more than I know, as I know almost nothing about Koine Greek. So, when you say that, if brotherly love had been intended, the correct word would have been philos, I’m in no position to dispute you. Although, perhaps, agape was used poetically, as the context was Jesus’ saying we should love one another as he has loved us.
All of which, though, is rather beside the point. The point is this. Did the Johannine Gospel mean love as “the means by which goodness is conveyed,” where goodness is “edification of one free moral agent by another, who also becomes edified.” If so, you’ve got a sound premise and off we go to Part V (when you’re finished with the exegesis). If not, you’ve layered over John an ideosyncratic set of definitions which take us in the wrong direction.
I say all this because I’m fairly certain you think John, in fact, means the term this way. Or, at least, when you read it, that’s what you see. Indeed, it seems to me that was your breakthrough conversion “ah ha!” The problem is that you haven’t demonstrated this proposition and “it’s my thread and I get to define terms” doesn’t come close to doing so. Care to elaborate?
With due respect to all participants, all of whom have edifed me personally, your posts are the most interesting of all. They are digressions, to be sure. But at the same time, a person cannot procede forward if there is something behind her holding her back. Therefore, if there is something you feel you need to say — even if it does diverge — then it is important that you say it. This is how communication is established. Someone like you says, “Hey, wait a minute. I don’t get how you derived X. Why can’t X be Y?” That gives me a chance to make myself more plain. More clear. Better understood. And that’s, again, what this is all about.
I do not need to assume John is using the words the same way that I am using the words. I would need to do that if, for example, I were going to write something about the book of John. But I’m not. I’m going to write something about the book of Liberal. John serves merely as my inspiration. What I am sharing in this particular thread is the verses in John that did and do inspire me. They are the verses from which my premises formed based on what they meant to me, not what they meant to you, or John, or anyone else..
Early on, in the very first thread, we established that all terms, like “aesthetics” for example, would be “Liberalian” terms. See this post and this post. It’s as I explained there, we cannot discuss Kant without using “synthetic” as he defined it. (And no, it isn’t like a motor oil or a fabric) — it means “statements in which the terms alone are insufficient to determine the truth of the proposition”. Why is Kant, or anyone else who waxes philosophically, allowed to assign such a meaning to such a word, while I am not? Why was Newton allowed to call his mass times acceleration “force”? It never meant that before. Because its meaning was already close? Well, as I have said, my meaning of love is already close to the traditional meaning of love as “charity” (agape). Charity edifies both the giver and the receiver. Your posts make it seem like I’m as far afield as someone defining “love” to mean “eating toasted cigarette butts”. I think, with respect, that you’re wrong.
Shortly, you will cite a problem that stems from gammar. (We touched lightly on this when we touched on Wittgenstein in an earlier thread.) Here, the grammar is as important as it is when you cite it. Things can indeed be described by adjectives. Some things by many adjectives. Cows certainly can be mottled brown, just as God can be omnipotent, omniscient, or full of shit — whatever your point of view, you can assign an adjective or adjectival phrase. But the Beloved, had he wished to describe God in the manner that he might describe a mottled brown cow, would be expected to say “God is loving” rather than “God is love”. The verb in the latter sentence is a copula. Like, “I am Lib” or “A bachelor is an unmarried man.”
Everything that God is springs from His agency as the facilitator of goodness. His eternity is derived from it. His essence is derived from it. His necessity is derived from it. The fact that He is real derives from the fact that He is love. This will all be shown in Part V. To give a premilinary example, however, let’s talk about eternity. As the agent of goodness, He is infinitely edified in terms of time, and therefore transcends time (since infinities are singularities). That makes Him timeless, and that makes Him eternal. His omniscience derives from it. And so does His omnipotence. His mercy. His justice. His favorite item from the salad bar — you name it. (Being a bit lighthearted in return.) At the root of everything He is, there is love.
Then there will be no consensus between us about this, because it describes to me vividly just how much God values man, which we established in Part I was a matter of aesthetics. Even the phrase “greatly loved and dearly prized” suggests an evaluation of great worth. The edification stems, not from the deed of sending the Son, but from the fact that the Son saved people, and gave them eternal life. They will eternally love God, and He will eternally love them. God will grow. (We discussed this also earlier.)
No, even in English it is not used both as a noun and as a verb. It is a verb. Unlike John the Beloved’s copula, there is no “to be” here. It is, in fact, a grammatical imperative. “Love one another”. Love is a verb. It is the present active subjunctive tense. The Greek, conjugated, is ἀγαπάω (agapaō). It appears the same in John three times — 13:34, 15:12, and 15:17.
Oy.
I’m sorry, but I simply reject your prescriptivism. I’m not writing about the book of John. I’m writing about my faith. If I decide at some point to write about the book of John, I will take great care to research even beyond the research I’ve done, and I would include mainstream interpretations of all the words. But since that is not what I am doing, then why should I be going about the business of doing what that requires? Instead, I am going about the business of doing what is required to explain my faith, the inspiration for which is mostly found in how I interpret John.
The problem, it seems to me — and by that, I mean the problem in our understanding one another — is that you think I am doing one thing, while in fact I am doing something else. There are only three ways to resolve that misunderstanding, as far as I can tell: (1) I could change what I am doing, and write a series of threads about the book of John; or (2) you could realize that I am writing about my faith, which my personal interpretation of John inspired; or (3) we could come to some mutual understanding that my interpretations of John are not mainstream, and that if I were to use mainstream interpretations, they would not adequately describe my faith.
Well, I have already conceded number (3). I have already said that I cannot express my faith using say, typical Baptist interpretations of the encounter with Nicodemus. And number (1) is not only too onerous at this time, given the amount of personal investment I already have put into the task at hand, but it is also of no interest to me. And so that leaves us with (2). If you are unwilling to concede that I have a right to express my faith with John as my inspiration — even though I interpret John differently from how you or someone else interprets it — then we are at an impasse. And further progress (between you and me) is impossible.
My breakthrough conversion “ah ha!” was, as I already said, John 8:58, “In all truth I tell you, before Abraham was born, I am.”
And honestly, I have no idea what proposition it is that you want me to demonstrate unless it is what you said; namely, “when you read it, that’s what you see.” In what way can I better demonstrate to you that I read these passages a certain way other than by quoting them and then commenting on how I read them? And that’s exactly what I’m doing (in between these interesting asides.)
My teaching is not my own. It comes from him who sent me.
John 7:16
Jesus affirms that what he says are words relayed to us from God Himself. (Compare this with a portion of John 6:63, already noted — “The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.”)
The following passage refers to protests that he healed a man on the Sabbath:
Jesus said to them, “I did one miracle, and you are all astonished. Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs), you circumcise a child on the Sabbath. Now if a child can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath? Stop judging by mere appearances, and make a right judgment.”
John 7:21-24
We’ve already covered the Sabbath thing to a fare-thee-well. What is of real interest in the above passage is the last sentence, an imperative. We are not to judge by appearances. Recall the example from the second thread (on morality and ethics) of walking by an alleyway and catching a glimpse of a wealthy man handing food over to a poor man. “What a good man!” some might likely observe, when all the while, the wealthy man is only trying to lure the homeless man into his car, so he can take him away to rape and murder him.
This is why we must not make moral judgments. We cannot know the innermost hearts of people. Like optical illusions fool our brains, appearances can fool our judgment. (We already covered the point that we routinely make ethical judgments, in courts of law, for instance.) But Jesus tells us to make “a right judgment”, and a right judgment is an aesthetical judgment (as we have discussed in quite some detail previously.) In other words, judge by how much something is worth. Jesus is saying above that healing a man is worth more than honoring some hypostatized day, or engaging in some disfiguration ritual.
This is our final source for the day:
Finally the temple guards went back to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why didn’t you bring him in?”
“No one ever spoke the way this man does,” the guards declared.
“You mean he has deceived you also?” the Pharisees retorted. “Has any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed in him? No! But this mob that knows nothing of the law—there is a curse on them.”
Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus earlier and who was one of their own number, asked, “Does our law condemn anyone without first hearing him to find out what he is doing?”
They replied, “Are you from Galilee, too? Look into it, and you will find that a prophet does not come out of Galilee.”
John 7:45-52
The religion politicians are attempting to silence Jesus because He is, in their view, stirring up trouble and dissent. The last thing a politician of any sort wants — whether in business, government, religion, or the arts and sciences — is trouble and dissent.
They contrast Him with the law. (Note that He has made similar contrasts of His own all throughout His ministry.) Nicodemus is sympathetic, having consulted with Jesus on occasion, and having been greatly edified by Him. (The whole “Flesh gives birth to flesh, and spirit gives birth to spirit” thing, or the “born again” thing.)
I have freely taken personal interpretations of the Beloved’s writings, but I won’t take an interpretation with respect to why the “rulers or [the] Pharisees” did not believe. My suspicion of their motive would be irrelevant. They could be exceptions of some kind to the generality expressed above. But for whatever reason, most of the people who believed He was the Christ were the unwashed riff-raff, rather than the educated and erudite.
Liberal, I’m sorry to have wasted your time. And mine. I tumbled to the disconnect a couple days ago, in Post #88, when I asked whether we were discussing the Gospel According to John or the Gospel According to Liberal. If you had answered that question plainly then, as you have now, you would have spared both of us a couple of posts. Indeed, had you replied to my first post in the thread (#2) by explaining that what John means is irrelevant, you would have saved both of us a lot of time. Instead, you implied (in Post #8) that we were discussing John. You have since made it clear we are not.
Frankly, the Gospel According to Liberal interests me very little. You’re just some guy with a thesis. And, to your credit, you don’t even claim this thesis is divinely inspired. I may pop in in Part V if I have something interesting to say. Or not. I’ll decide that when the time comes.
PBear, you shouldn’t feel as if you’ve wasted your time. At the very least, you’ve helped to expose these threads for what they are, rather than for what they claim to be.
We are discussing John in the sense of what John means to me. I have made that abundantly clear since the very first thread, as my links above show.
Yes, that’s right. I’m just some guy with a thesis, and though my faith is divinely inspired, the thesis is inspired (mostly) by the writings of John the Beloved. This is what I have said in nearly every post over the past page. If you pop in in Part V, I am confident that whatever you say will be interesting.