I do forgive people who have wronged me, and when I can’t forgive I also ask God the grace to be able to do that.
But again forgiveness doesn’t mean being exempted from justice. Someone can forgive the man who killed their son and at the same time want them to serve their sentence and find intolerable to think of them as being free to roam the world as they please (as it would add further insult to their son’s memory, to see the man who killed him being free from every consequence).
You are conflating two things that are very different.
They were Christians of the undivided Church, once again. The fact that the Catholic Church remained faithful to the teachings that were taught back then instead of reinventing the faith is certainly not a bad thing.
But there were no such things as “Catholics”, “Orthodox” and “Protestants”, back then. Certainly not in the sense these terms are understood today.
I honestly don’t know what you understood from my writing, if you write “why bother”.
I searched for information about this.
It seems that 1 and 2 Maccabees are deuterocanonical for RCC.
For the Eastern Orthodox church 1, 2 and 3 Maccabees are canonical.
Georgian Orthodox church seems to include also 4 Maccabees among the canonical books.
For Protestants, these books belong to the Apocrypha and are not canonical.
In Judaism, none of the books of Maccabees are canonical in the sense that they are not included within Tanakh.
So, there are various traditions. Protestantism follows the tradition of the Judaism (Masoretic Tanakh) in this matter. RCC seems to follow what was included in the traditional version of Septuagint. The Eastern churches include also books found in some versions of Septuagint or other Greek translations of the Hebrew scriptures.
You give Luther too much credit. He was an influential figure in history but not more than that. Even in the Reformation, Luther was a figurehead, rather than the person who wrote or decided everything. Luther wrote more than the other leaders, which may explain why he is credited for so much in history books. The Lutheran churches played an important role after the time of Luther, which is probably another reason why Luther became such an influential person in the minds of the following generations.
Edit:
The words of the persons you cited in an earlier comment are not authoritative sources for me. The citations show that there were such beliefs among the Christians of the third and later centuries, possibly even earlier, but all the beliefs among the early Christians were not correct. There were conflicting beliefs among the early Christians, which is a sign of a need to judge what they said or wrote, rather than swallowing everything without considering why they had such beliefs. There is also the problem that we tend to interpret their words so that they fit within our frame of interpretation; we put more into the sentences than the words actually tell.
So because it is on the behalf of others that is allright then.
So was Jonah’s righteous judgement on the Ninevans.
There you go again. making wild assertions about what God can or cannot do, or who He cannot forgive, or what punishment He must administer.
That is not forgiveness for anyone’s sake but their own. It is empty.
And that is also the problem with Justice. It is never enough to satisfy.
Even eternity is too short.
You really need to get rid of your anger.
And understand what it means to truly forgive and forget!
I see no other reason to pray for them. Once dead they are in God’s care and domain. Furthermore, God being out of time an space will have already made His decisions without you.
You can justify it as much as you like, but it has no theological value, and never has, Just because people in the past did it means nothing. It proves nothing. But you keep holding on to it.
I simply don’t have a religion à la carte as you do.
It’s not empty. The absence of forgiveness in this case would imply that they will not forgive their son’s murderer even when he gets out of jail 30 years later. Or that they would want to kill him once he gets outside.
Forgiving him means recognizing that he can have a second chance after paying for his crime.
What you are talking about is not forgiveness, it is indulgence and spitting in the faces of people who face injustices and wrongdoings.
You don’t. The Church does. And Christians in the first millenium did. That’s more than enough for me.
Faith is something to be preserved and transmitted, not something to be changed and reinvented to suit the needs of an ever-changing world.
Yes, and they were solved ecclesially. It was the Church that decided where was the truth between conflicting interpretations. Which is also why there was such a thing as the “undivided Church”.
Otherwise there would have been various conflicting Churches with incompatible doctrines in the first millenium already.
Praying for the dead was never judged as hetherodox, and the burden of proof lies on those who claim it is, basing their understanding upon the teachings of the revolutionaries (because that’s what they were: they completely revolutionized everything, starting with the invention of the idea that the single Christian should have judged the orthodoxy of ecumenical councils and that the Church could not give an authoritative interpretation, which is an idea that is completely alien to the living faith of the Christians of the first millenium) who lived a millenium and a half later.
And upon their arbitrary rejection of the canonical nature of the book of the Maccabees.
That‘s forgiveness. You have a twisted and completely wrong idea of what forgiveness is.
You mistake forgiveness for lack of justice, and you elevate indulgence and anarchy.
It would not be forgiveness if they thought that even after serving the sentence the killer of their son shouldn’t be able to live normally, wanting the killer of their son to serve their sentence while for example praying for his redemption and conversion is most definitely forgiveness.
You have a completely twisted and absolutely wrong idea of what forgiveness is.
And you can understand it by thinking what would happen in the world if your idea of forgiveness were to be applied. It would literally be hell on earth.
Actual Christian principles make the world a better place when they are applied, your principle, if actually applied, would make it a hellhole.
I’m responsible of what I say, I’m not responsible of what you understand.
It is you who should at least try to understand what you are taking about. You are a long way from that. Sometimes I even wonder whether you actually think what you write; because it leaves me speechless more often than not.
You think forgiveness should be a blank check to do what you please without consequences. Be a saint or be a genocidial monster, it doesn’t matter, you you are forgiven!!! You can spend your time raping little girls, without repentance, just like you can spend your time to help the poor and the neediest, and in both cases your fate will be the same, because forgive and forget, Namaste!!!
This is incredibly and totally wrong that it’s self-evident.
Even a little child would and could understand it.
Matthew 5:6: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they shall be satisfied”.
Romans 2:4: “Or do you show contempt for the richesof his kindness, forbearance and patience,not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance”
Richard’s Gospel claims that justice is a human concept and need, that repentance is not necessary, that asking justice is a bad thing.
You keep you own Gospel, just don’t try to pass it for the actual one, thank you.
I edited my earlier comment somewhat to show the background of the traditions.
RCC seems to follow what was included in the traditional version of Septuagint. Eastern churches included also books found in other Greek translations of the Hebrew scriptures.
Christianity inherited the ‘Old Testament’ (Tanakh) from Hebrews. In this, we stand on what was considered ‘canonical’ among the Hebrews. Septuagint (the oldest known Greek translation of Hebrew scriptures) included Tanakh but also Hebrew writings that were not part of Tanakh. The Greek Christians read Septuagint or possibly some other Greek translations of Hebrew writings. As they could not read Hebrew and did not know much about the Hebrew culture, Septuagint got an influential role for the Greek-speaking Christians. What was included within Septuagint had authoritative importance, even those Hebrew writings that did not actually belong within Tanakh (not authoritative within Judaism). That can be seen as cultural misunderstanding.
Luther was not the reason why the books of Maccabees are not canonical within Protestantism. Protestants just realized that all the translated writings within Septuagint had not an authoritative role in the Hebrew tradition and faith. Tanakh was authoritative, the other Hebrew writings were not.
And why does it matter, when they were (and still are, for every Churches that has apostolic succession) authoritative for the Church? The Jews didn’t recognize Jesus as the Messiah either, much less as God, the Church did.
I really can’t see how the judgment of the Church founded by Christ is less important than the “Hebrew culture and faith”.
I’m sure your Bible even says that repentance is not needed, because God forgives and forgets and doesn’t even require that, right?
Anyway
Luke 18:7–8, Jesus promises justice for God’s people: “And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night?”
Romans 12:19: “Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,”says the Lord.”
Can we just stop with your unorthodox ramblings and call it a day?
