You have no idea whether they performed that first test. You have no explicit certification that the substance was human blood or contained hemoglobin. Your source doesn’t say they “isolated AB+ human blood”. You don’t really have anything to show that any tests took place - just 2nd or 3rd hand accounts from biased sources. You are making assumptions.
It think it’s both-and. I think the trinitarian lens is a “good fit” for interpreting the passage (in other words, it points to an confirms trinitarian thinking as well as offers an explanation for it—circular? Ultimately everything is, thus “good fit” is what we should be looking for).
1 Like
The Bible describes God’s creative activity using a 7 day framework that serves as an etiology for the Sabbath, but in reality we know the universe is almost 14 billion years old and the earth is around 4.5 billion years old. The Bible describes a worldwide flood that wipes out all of humanity, but in reality, we know any Genesis flood must have been localized.
Are these just scientific arguments that can go either way? I can connect it to scripturebut to do so without the aforementioned point would be to give a false impression that I think I need to. I’m not a proponent of that model of scripture and I take general revelation seriously. God is described as unchanging numerous times and is also labeled the creator AND sustainer of all things, etc. The same with Jesus. If the Word stopped existing as such, only for an instant, so would everything sustained by the Word. God cannot do the logically impossible like will Himself out of existence. Nor can God stop being God. Jesus took on a human nature. Creedal Christianity plainly spells this out. Modern Christians who disagree with this are on the outside of the store looking in.
Vinnie
1 Like
You are trying to put God into your box of understanding and therefore put the limit of what Jesus can or can’t do. How do we define God who is beyond understanding? The only way we can define God is thru His revelation in His good book and of course also thru His creation. Thru His creation in cosmos, we can see his grandeur work, but it does not explain who or what God is really like. I am not sure if we can define God and then put the limit of what God can or can’t do.
You put this as reality while we can’t even comprehend how big the universe is. All we can calculate is the observable universe. How about the universe that is unobservable by us because that light is too far to reach us. That is not reality, but the best scientific calculation available to us. Whether the flood was localised or global was open to discussion. Not sure if there is a solid proof either way though I don’t mind either one.
My point is this. When the subject matter is the nature of God (Jesus) as in Phil 2, it is basically unknownable to our limited mind. Perhaps we should start from what Paul was really saying in that chapter.
“good fit” is a good word actually. I like it. It is like staring at a huge zigzag puzzle where pieces start to put in place and have the good fit. However, when starting with trinitarian lens, we assume that we basically know what our God is like and working from that. However, perhaps our vision of God might or might not have the good fit from all the pieces in the Bible.
The only problem I have with trinitarian lens is because our starting point is from other human perspective instead of revelation of God in the Bible. There is no such outright revelation of trinity in the Bible. Trinity was formulated thru centuries of thinking and thru debates and also speculations, not thru solid exegesis of the Bible. It does not mean that it is wrong. It just means that trinity dogma was formulated thru the thinking of men about God, not the direct revelation from God to us.
To claim that there is no exegesis would be false. Where else can we have got this notion from other than how God has revealed Himself. Perhaps you are confusing single or explicit understanding from a more general wide view. Both are still exegesis, technically.
This is the fallacy of claiming that every notion of belief must have a “citation” or specific reference. The Bible is not a book of quotes, nor is it to be read simply at face value and quoted as such.
Richard
1 Like
Perhaps, but if we are talking about the nature of God, then yes. I think a revelation of God is needed.
for example :
But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. (2 Peter 3:8)
How did Peter know this fact? He took it from Ps 90:4 which was the revelation of God to Moses. No one could deduce this understanding from reading the book of creation or even the Bible if it is not written outright for our benefit.
But Peter was not talking either science or mathematics. In modern parlance “a watched kettle never boils”. IOW our view of time is not the same as God’s. The figure of 1000 is just nominal. We see time as linear, God does not. That is what matters. Judaism does not use figures as mathematics but symbolic, as in 40 or seven. They are not to be taken as literal. The Israelites were in the wilderness for a heck of a long time!
Richard
good point. But how God see time is beyond our understanding. We have no clue of how God sees time actually. That understanding is beyond us on this side of life. Therefore, when the Bible reveal one aspect of God as such, it is wise perhaps for us to accept it as such.
Except that you are giving it a meaning that was not intended,
Richard
Perhaps that was the intended meaning. who knows?
1 kings 18
**6 **When the men were returning home after David had killed the Philistine, the women came out from all the towns of Israel to meet King Saul with singing and dancing, with joyful songs and with timbrels and lyres. **7 **As they danced, they sang:
“Saul has slain his thousands,
and David his tens of thousands.”
David had only killed Goliath!
Richard
Perhaps a more careful reading of the passage is warranted.
First of all it is not 1 Kings 18, but 1 Samuel 18:7.
Secondly,
And David went out and was successful wherever Saul sent him, so that Saul set him over the men of war. And this was good in the sight of all the people and also in the sight of Saul’s servants. (1 Sam 18:5)
Apparently, David had been put in charge of Saul’s army and he was successful in what he did.
Then perhaps “David his ten of thousands” would make a lot of sense literally.
That is not what it says
6 When the men were returning home after David had killed the Philistine, the women came out from all the towns of Israel to meet King Saul with singing and dancing, with joyful songs and with timbrels and lyres. **7 **As they danced, they sang:
“Saul has slain his thousands,
and David his tens of thousands.”
(I copied out of Samuel, yes, not concentrating)
Richard
it is what it say Richard. The Philistine here refer to Philistine army that was defeated by the army under David, not the single goliath. That is why I said that “exegesis” of the Bible is really crucial.
Whether Transubstantiation or Consubstantiation or Symbolism, I think the discussion here is totally disregard Jesus’s point. Let’s look at the passage below :
And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” (Luke 22:19 & 1 Cor 11:24).
The whole purpose of Holy Communion is to remember Christ’s sacrifice for us. Discussing about transsubstantiation, cons or symbolism are actually pointless and missing the message that Jesus wanted to convey to us. Sad to see how church and denomination split over secondary issue of what happened to the bread and wine while at the same time missing the importance and meaningfulness of Holy Communion.
1 Like
Not in the context of that chapter. David had not been given command yet. He was still just a shepherd boy.
**8 **Saul was very angry; this refrain displeased him greatly. “They have credited David with tens of thousands,” he thought, “but me with only thousands. What more can he get but the kingdom?” **9 **And from that time on Saul kept a close eye on David.
It cannot be any clearer.
Richard
I would say that it includes more than just remembering Christ’s sacrifice because the remembering should also include the life of Jesus and the teachings that Jesus told to his disciples - the whole packet. As Matthew 28:19-20 tells:
“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (NIV)
Otherwise, I largely agree with you. Transubstantiation, Consubstantiation or Symbolism are interpretations that are secondary in importance. It would be helpful to think/meditate on what was the crucial point in the commands of Jesus.
Why did he command us to have such a ritual as the Eucharist/Holy Communion/Lord’s Supper?
Probably not with the intention that we should start speculating and fighting about what happens to the bread and wine in the invisible dimensions.
I believe the Bible to be trinitarian. I’m not talking about the specificity of the formulation of the Creeds (like…did Paul mean exactly that?). But it’s too much of a stretch to contend that the Creed-writers fabricated their definitions in contradiction to what is revealed in scripture.
That’s a “bad fit” explanation.
How about because that’s what sticks with the grammar? I figure Jesus chose His words carefully, and thus they mean what they say and that is what He meant. SO when He held a matzoh in His hand and said, “This is My Body”, it was no different than at Creation with “Light – be!”