I’m far more conversant with the Albigensian Crusade than you possibly could be.
You cant experience the afterlife heaven here. Thats what im talking about. You cant both physically and spiritually experience the afterlife heaven or hell here
On what basis do you make this statement?
On the basis that first you just cant because you are not able to experience the afterlife here(you are still alive) and second if you could experience heaven and hell here whats the point of a heaven and hell after you die? People that often states that you live a heaven or hell in this earth usually rejects the idea of an afterlife .
You stated that you understood “God will not save everybody due to their decision to choose either to be with him or not.” Your use of the word “choose” makes me believe some people have misled you about what God asks in order that one be included in his New Creation. Biblically, the concept is not the connotation of the benevolent “choose”, but the malevolent “not reject”. There will have been billions of souls who never knew he existed and has a forever-blissful-hereafter awaiting those who chose him. One cannot choose that which he does not know exists, and the Bible makes it clear Jesus is a wise and merciful Judge. The Bible speaks of two resurrections. The first resurrection is that of “The Righteous”. (I Thessalonians 4: 16) “…with the trumpet call of God, the dead in Christ will rise first…”. These will not be judged at the Last Judgment, because they have already been judged by their own consciences, as a result of which, they came to repentance, turned away from sin and obediently followed Jesus. SOME denominations preach a jargon that says these are all those who were “saved” on Earth, in their thinking, who professed Jesus to be Lord, but this is a totally man-made, false doctrine. No one is saved on Earth. Salvation will be given by Jesus when he comes. Those in the first resurrection are NOT those who SAID they chose Jesus, but those who, after repenting of sin, continued in the resolve to kill every impulse to sin, and followed Jesus, obediently and joyfully. Big difference. No one who once chose Jesus, who said “I repent of sin”, but then lived in selfishness, uncaring about the needs of other, will be among the righteous in the first resurrection. There is no mention in I Thessalonians of the resurrection of those who died, but NOT in Christ. They will be raised later, at the end of the age, when Jesus makes the final selection of who will enter eternal life and who will not. Those who did NOT die in Christ, will continue to “sleep” in death until the second resurrection, described in Revelation.
(Revelation 20: 12, 13) I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. These sentences prove false the teaching that God saves ONLY those who CHOOSE him, purposefully. Jesus judges those who did not die while actively living in purposeful service of Him, according to what they did; according to their works. This allows for those who never even knew Jesus existed to find eternal life. The key to the Judgment is this: those previously resurrected, bypass the judgment. It is clear judgment is only for those who did not die in Christ; judgment is only those in the second resurrection. “The dead were judged according to what they had done”. If people did not know God. how could they know to do right instead of wrong?.Because the Creator built into every man an awareness of right and wrong - a conscience. A baby does not know right from wrong, but at a certain point - God knows - we ALL know what is right and wrong. Even if people do not know to make a conscious decision to accept or reject God, they do make decisions as to whether or not to obey or reject the voice of their own conscience. Jesus, as Judge, will have perfect wisdom and will judge fairly. He will know every person’s works from birth 'til death., because they are all written in a book of life. He knows how to weigh them, but the only possible measure is obedience to conscience. There are many scriptures to prove that He will not allow anyone to die until he has firmly established whether he obeys his conscience, which is the same as choosing or, or whether he disobeys his conscience, which is the same as rejecting God.
Where we get our so called Christian ideas from…
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In Ancient Egypt, it was believed that upon death, one’s fate in the afterlife was determined by the weighing of one’s heart. One’s heart was kept within the body during mummification so that it can travel with the deceased into the afterlife. Upon death, one entered the underworld (Duat), where Anubis, the God of the dead, weighed the person’s heart on a scale against the feather of Ma’at, the goddess of order, truth, and righteousness. If the heart weighed more than the feather, meaning that the person was more wicked than good, then the heart would be devoured by Ammit, a demon with the head of a crocodile, the front half of the body of a leopards, and the back half of a hippopotamus, but with goat arms. If a person’s heart was devoured by Ammit, then he would die a second death and be completely annihilated from existence.
Yeah of course we get them from there. Whats next : Was Jesus Mithras?
I think you will find there is more in common between Christianity and the Magi of Zoroastrianism.
I have refuted this in a previous post about your assumption thag the OT doesnt speak of sn ressurection
[1] But you have not proven that Christianity is more like Egyptian metaphysics than like Persian metaphysics.
[2] Three (3) speculative verses on an afterlife is not consistent with 200 years (or more) exposure to Egyptian culture.
You havent either so…
Ohhh yeah. Since i refuted that afterlife was common in the Jewish culture and some verses in the OT suggests that you now make the assumption that it was borrowed by Egypts mythology. You are mixing mythology with Christianity . One cannnot be true. These two are not compatible
Aye George, they have that common Egyptian ancestry.
I suppose you mean I haven’t proved the OPPOSITE?
We have archealogical proof that the Jewish kings embraced the Egyptian symbols of immortality. So where do we find O.T. chapters that give license to that symbolism?
As to the issue of Egyptian vs Persian influence, virtually all academics refer to Persian influence when it comes to angel-ology, or to a dualism of Good vs. Evil.
I’m not sure it really matters; we use Pagan motifs all the time to explain Christian concepts. And as Justin Barrett points out, there are inborn tendencies to belief that we all share; and thus, we would appropriate common expressions.
In some ways, saying that we incorporate other cultures into our faith is even a conspiracy theorist’s love (not to discount it): there’s no bug–it’s all just a plot…
Whereas don’t you think that the truth lies somewhere between the two? Sharing a common understanding mainly shows that we have common backgrounds. It doesn’t mean that Christianity isn’t true; nor does it mean that the exclusivists are always right–that we have some sort of special knowledge known only to a few. Credulity can cut both ways.
I’d like to read Lewis’ account on the “Fern-Seed and Elephants.”. While I’ve read excerpts and questioned some of it, it sounds like it has some apt points
Thanks for your discussion.
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Would you remind us about that story / essay? Or link to it if possible?
Yeap. It was common for jewish to convert to the Egyptian religion
Yeah the point is christianity is no such thing. Unless you are a gnostic
@Daniel_Fisher is the Lewis expert who quoted from this most recently, I think. Here’s a post, however, that seems to summarize his intent
C. S. Lewis: "Fern-Seed and Elephants"
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Nick. Paradise after death is jam tomorrow if we don’t pursue it for others now. Paradise starts at home.
Yeap. Im sure the kids in africa get so much help from you and me that the afterlife paradise must be a jam(to them as well). Yeah i agree
You can say it was common…
… but from Enoch to the Witch of Endor, we dont actually see any robust discussions of any afterlife… let alone an Egyptian version.