Comment by christopher8827 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by christopher8827 | Hacker News Reader

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christopher8827

> I don't think that's in line with Jesus' teachings of humility and helping the poor etc, especially not given how much money goes and went around in the church.

Hmm, but in the Exodus, the ark of the covenant was glided in gold with cherubs on the four corners. Same with the Jewish Temple, it was probably decked out in marble. Unlike Protestants, Catholicism have arts, choral music and statues and architecture not because they are "worshipping it" but because these things are supposed to direct the mind upwards towards God.

I think the Catholic Mass is the ancient form of worship by the early Church. There's multiple references to the Real Presence in the Eucharist in New Testament (ie. the road to Eramus and the breaking of bread, and in John 6:53*) and the Sanctus is still in the Eucharistic Prayer, and besides, its an obvious break with the Jews who did burnt offerings in the Temple.

John 6:53–58, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them. 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 ancestors ate manna and died, but whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”

Exodus was as far from Christ as we are.

The Old Testament can't be used to counter Jesus - Jesus is the counter to the Old Testament. He is the reason it's "Old" - humility, loving all without conditions, forgivenes, turning the other cheek - The Greatest Commandment, none of them are ignored or "misinterpreted" in any justified way, even if that way is quoting scripture from Exodus.

That's a very unusual context for me, in my tradition (reformed Presbyterian) we definitely don't view things that we way in general, the God of the old testament is the God of the new and Jesus didn't wholesale make the old testament invalid, only the parts of the law that he had already satisfied. (Eg no need for more animal sacrifices, we've already sacrificed enough via Jesus) (Notably, the moral law and parts of the ceremonial law are still valid)

It is interesting to think about why it's ok to differ from the old temple. Granted of course some of it is cultural differences, we're not the same people and it's 1000s of years later, and perhaps it was different because we're not the theocratic state of ancient Israel.

But something for me to think about why this component is no longer needed (my church is very classic boring protestant architecture)

Agreed except for this comment.

> parts of the ceremonial law are still valid

Westminster Confession 19.3:

“All which ceremonial laws are now abrogated, under the new testament.”

The reason the ceremonial law is abrogated is because it pointed forward to Christ who was to come. But since Christ has come, retaining the ceremonial law is tantamount to denying Christ (see full text of WCF 19.3 and book of Hebrews).

If you were thinking of the link between baptism and circumcision, remember that God gave the covenant promise and sign to Abraham 430 years before Moses (Gen 17, Gal 3:17), so circumcision predates the law.

All the law was ended by Jesus and replaced by The Greatest Commandment, as it is the only law that we need.

To follow every law within the Bible except that one is to fail to follow Jesus - to follow only that law and none of the others is fine by him according to his own words.

Speaking any law as higher than the law laid down by the Son of God himself is denying Christ.

Interesting, the confession considers 'remember the sabbath' to be 'moral law', not ceremonial, also 19.3 . Thanks for the reminder!

Exactly right. One way to know the Sabbath is moral rather than ceremonial is the Sabbath was established in Genesis 2:1-3. That means the Sabbath pre-dates the Law, and even pre-dates sin. So Adam and Eve would have kept the Sabbath before the Fall, and so would have all their posterity if they had never fallen.

As confirmation of that idea, Exodus 20:11 states that the reason God gives the fourth commandment is because the Sabbath is a creation ordinance, and by implication is therefore moral.

I hope that helps! God bless.

Adam and Eve had no conception of the Sabbath - they never worked or labored for anything prior to leaving the garden. God walked and talked with them daily, whenever apparently - what need for their to be to recognize that which is accessible and available all the days.

What purpose would a God have at all for the life inside his creations to set aside 1/7 of their time "for him" anyways?

Lots of silly, silly stuff people say God thinks

It's important to remember that the sabbath was a gift to man from God per Jesus

Mark 2:27 NIV [27] Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.

Genesis 2:15 ESV The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.

You are a believer I take it - did he not split the veil?

Why do you think you can pick and chose what he invalidates and what he doesn't? He left one - ONE rule with two parts, it's very simple, even children have the ability to understand.

Every Christian I speak always says something like this - "a common misconception" " not my understanding" "according to the church fathers" - so many quite not Jesus at to counter me quoting Jesus, the man who is the basis of all your beliefs.

He did not say we could make exceptions, in fact, to use the OT as appropriate - to support Jesus and his teachings, the rule/divine laws that we were given, of which there was only 10 was VERY CLEAR about our taking liberties with interpretation.

Thou Shall Not Judge. No exceptions for this one either - this morally, ethically, legally, socially, none.

Next time you read the Bible - Jesus was frustrated as fuck with the "Church" of his time - he very strongly disliked them as much as a man that claims to be the Son of God can.

He said we are the church - US, the believers, not a building, not a congregation, not a fellowship - US.

He said that in an attempt to prevent the church from becoming as it is now - nothing remotely like him or his teachings, beliefs or values.

The shape of the modern church frustrates me to no end.

I consider myself a believer, but every time I look at a Christian organization I find their foundational document to be "The Book of Common Prayer" or some other 16th century nonsense.

Do we really need to have each member give 10% of their income so we can pay one guy upwards of six figures to give a 30-minute motivational speech once a week? That was probably useful when he was the only person that knew how to read, but today I find that the kind of person who takes that job is completely detached from the lives of ordinary people who go to work for a living.

The attitude many believers treat non-believers with is also appalling. The baseline I've seen is "you should be friends with non-believers because you can convert them". The worst I've seen is borderline xenophobia and encouraging to only consume media from approved christian-aligned sources. My younger sister attended a christian high school, and the student that spoke at her graduation gave a speech I can only describe as "we must retake the culture from our enemies, deus vult". I was appalled, but many of the adults in attendance ate it up. I don't remember Jesus warning people about enemies. I do remember him warning people about being curt towards their neighbors. Do modern christians not know what a Samaritan means?

The alignment of politics with evangelicalism has been awful, and I'm not looking forward to where it will lead.

A Samaritan was essentially the enemy of the Jew which is what makes the story so poignant.

As for how to interact with non believers, Paul talks about this in his letters to the Romans and the church in Corinth.

1 Corinthians 2:14 NIV [14] The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.

1 Corinthians 5:11-13 NIV [11] But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people. [12] What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? [13] God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked person from among you"

Romans 8:7-8 NIV [7] The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. [8] Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.

The reason Christians are encouraged to bring the gospel to non believers is commonly referred to as the great commission. However this should be given and not forced .

Luke 9:5 NIV [5] If people do not welcome you, leave their town and shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.”

2 Timothy 2:24-26 NIV [24] And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. [25] Opponents must be gently instructed, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, [26] and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.

Even so, Christians should expect to be hated

John 15:18-19 NIV [18] “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. [19] If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.

> The reason Christians are encouraged to bring the gospel to non believers is commonly referred to as the great commission. However this should be given and not forced .

I'm familiar, but it's tangential to what I'm saying. I'm referring to the belief that you should only engage with non-believers because it represents a recruitment opportunity. It's not a belief that I see preached (often), but it's definitely one that I see people practice. The view that relationships with non-believers is inherently adversarial is one that I don't appreciate.

The context above that verse is important. It's not that Christians shouldn't associate with non believers, but avoid believers "brothers and sisters" that are basically fake.

1 Corinthians 5:9-10 NIV [9] I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— [10] not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world.

The pastors and priests I know do much more than 30 minutes of work a week. In addition to the sermon, they provide counseling, perform weddings, funerals, attend each if not leading, visit the sick and homebound, attend to church business, help coordinate activities, help solve conflicts, represent the church, do Bible studies during the week, help with children's programs and so on.

I don't think I would have the stomach to deal with the types of things they deal with. The amount of suffering and grief alone would be hard.

There are definitely sects that take the job much more seriously than others. I personally have known too many that basically end up coordinating a group of volunteer assistant pastors and deacons to nearly all of the work. Frequent month-long vacations as well (they're called "sabbaticles" because it sounds biblical).

They also frequently run into some moral scandal (plagiarism, adultery, theft), plead for forgiveness (because reporting them to the denomination heads would leave them jobless), and then move states to repeat the playbook elsewhere.

Some of the kindest, most thoughtful people I've met were pastors too, though, so I won't say that the entire profession is evil. The monetary and social status incentives that the position grants also attracts some of the worst people, though.

Yeah, that is sad. The biggest mistake I think is made in modern Christianity is forgetting that all fall short and that somehow Christians are somehow better humans than others.

Well yeah, opulent temples are in line with Jewish traditions but the other poster is suggesting that's not in line with the teaching of the new testament specifically?

Not necessarily but like much interpretations differ. An old retired pastor friend once described the story of Mary anointing Christ with the expensive oil and being chastised by Judas as a “waste” with Jesus correcting Judas (John 12). He expressed that story as possibly symbolic of how we should regard Christ as the glorious king of kings and despite His servant humility, He is still deserving of the finest we have including opulence in His houses of worship.

We had this conversation while I was struggling as a member of the church over a remodel of our sanctuary and what I felt were excessive expenses that were more for beauty than function. Essentially “a waste”. I asked his opinion

Always kind of thought provoking when an octogenarian pastor makes you realize that you identified with Judas’s attitude.

It does seem like an odd attitude for a messiah who commands his followers to give up their entire identity for a life of extreme poverty and charity - who took a whip to the moneychangers in the temple and denounced the rich as unworthy of heaven - to insist on opulence and luxury for himself. I think Judas had a point.

Did He insist on it, or did He allow it to happen? Also, did He ask everyone to give up their identity and live a life of poverty?

It's bc it's added later to justify this bs - that's why it's Judas being corrected bc the person making the addition or changes already knew he was the bad guy.

T

Does this story feel legit to you?

Judas - the Betrayer who trades his divine friend with like tons of followers and influence for silver pieces, 30 of them I think, Judas speaks to materialism as unnecessary and Jesus corrects him as "well for me and my Dad, expensive is appropriate" - the guy who gets to town and is all like, "where the tax collectors and prostitutes be at?" They were the most controversial figures in that society...

Today, were Jesus to show up today, already having been born to some woman immaculately a fews back, he wouldn't step foot into a Church with his name on it - you'd be far more likely to find him hanging out with Trans people, homeless - he tended to have a thing for broken people, something about improving them and whatnot.

> Does this story feel legit to you?

No more or less than any story from that time period. What is in the Bible is literal, historical, metaphorical, philosophical…etc. So could it be true? Sure. Could it be an illustrative fiction? Sure. Could it be false or mistranslated? Sure. Could the message require a contemporary contextual understanding that we don’t have in 2024? Sure.

> Today, were Jesus to show up today, already having been born to some woman immaculately a fews back, he wouldn't step foot into a Church with his name on it

It’s always funny to me when someone (anyone…from any side or spectrum of the theological debate) seems so confident that they know how “Jesus today” would behave, when apparently from the accounts written near to when he was present on the earth even his closest disciples and friends who were with him at the time were often surprised by his behavior. To make the claim that He would shun His houses today doesn’t seem to be rooted in the historical understanding about Him that we do we have. He apparently wasn’t too happy with what was happening in the Temple at that time, but still set foot in it, if only to make a point.

> you'd be far more likely to find him hanging out with Trans people, homeless - he tended to have a thing for broken people, something about improving them and whatnot

Back then He sought out the rich, the poor, the right, the wrong, the clean and unclean, the nobility, the nobodies, the religious, the Jews, the gentiles—basically all folks of all types that were milling about in Judea in that time period. Would that somehow be different in 2024 and He would just gravitate to marginalized people? Doesn’t seem to be in character with what He did then.

As somebody outside of religions (thank you both parents, probably the greatest gift one can give to one's kids - freedom of faith and self determination, something almost impossible as adult if indoctrinated young), these kind of discussions are funny to me.

Why? They are present in every corner of the world, every religion. And all you need is to take few steps back and stop taking everything literally, trying to find some universal life guidance in bronze age texts. Not that its not there completely, some things are universal, but so are half the self-help books for example or literally any other serious text. Frank Herbert's Dune series is way more appealing and worthy to me for example and truths in it way more universal, yet I am not basing my whole life and morals on it, nor do I feel the need to push it on rest of the world.

Those were stories, no moral value greater than old greek (or persian, hindu etc.) tales which always had some strong message beyond story on the surface. Stories made up by men, hundreds of years after christ, which were retold probably 20x before somebody wrote them down (and then 20x translated between various slangs, languages and targeted meanings). Current bible has little to do with original story, its simply not technically possible for complex stories to be preserved 100% for hundreds of years by just retelling them.

You realize that say sunni vs shia muslims are, when reduced to few words, a conflict between which member of the family was the truest believer and whose words are more important, while having 0 reference to actually decide so? Yet conflicts between those are numerous and victims of those in hundreds of millions.

Every time I see people desperately looking for specific truths, there is some deeper underlying problem and inability/unwillingness to decide something rather trivial for oneself. Like which sort of music should be happening where - what the heck does this have to do with actual faith in your god(s)? Do you also consult religious text when picking up Sunday sweater color? Deities are not that petty, not even in those bronze age tales, its just showing human flaws and fears.

that's all brave and probably well intentioned, but there is another side to it. The Bible was specifically "a single agreed upon text" so that groups of people in real life could stop fighting about theology points, big and small. It still exists today. "The Bible is the Truth" end of statement. It is not because you personally cannot find new meaning in non-Bible things.. it is specifically to get groups of people "on the same page" .. that phrase is used today. The written nature of it also tends toward stability.

Perhaps in an unsatisfying way to an adolescent, the answer is there already, and you personally find your place in the order that is established by your ancestors and lead you life. Mostly the whole exercise is opposite of adolescent exploration. IMHO this is neither bad nor good. It is boring and meant to be boring, to prevent deadly conflict, wasted efforts, petty differences etc.

Based on this boring interpretation, Christians went on to build massive, mighty buildings, large civilized empires and vast written knowledge available to literate citizens. Those things did not have to happen at all. The triumph is that they did happen. In modern times we mostly dont even regard these things, since they are "obvious."

Please note that I am not saying this is the only one True Path at all, just describing things.

Not disagreeing per se, but what you write about as the goal was not achieved, far from it just look around and look at history. Its probably due to human flaws rather than anything else but that doesn't matter at the end. Look at all the sects of christianity, they can't agree on even basic things. There used to be wars killing tens of millions between those sects.

Again, human flaws, but that's the whole point - we can't escape them, no 'absolute truth' fixing anything. And that 'absolute truth' doesn't stand test of time, or should we be really killing gays on spot and also brides that aren't virgins?

Christianity doesn't throw away its hebrew origins (old testament) - which is properly schizophrenic experience to have those 2 books next to each other and attempting to say you believe in both. Its a fatal flaw of christianity that it wasn't started from scratch - basic secondary school logic will fail it very easily since those are really 2 distinct religions. Because you basically believe in 2 gods, 2 versions of events, 2 distinct set of morals which can't be merged together. You can't claim its fine to be psychotic petty mass murderer and preach love and forgiveness for everybody at the same time, thats just desperate self-lie to maintain unmaintainable. I see folks doing it all the time just to be clear, but its always a desperate house of cards and they very quickly shy away from any deeper discussion in fear of questioning a pillar of their existence.

Which goes back to first sentences of my previous post - thankful to my parents they didn't do this to me. I am doing the same to my kids, they can decide what they want in their adulthood, not a second earlier.

Ok, I once believed this also but I've now read the Bible's "iterations" - the Bible that exists now has been heavily edited, added to and changed.

> probably the greatest gift one can give to one's kids - freedom of faith and self determination, something almost impossible as adult if indoctrinated young

This really isn't possible to give someone. Your cultural upbringing will flavor your core beliefs, whether religiously or non-religiously

Not sure I understand. My father is catholic. Mother is protestant/evangelical. Both decided in their adulthood to stop practicing it and not push a single speck of it in me, consciously, without caring 'what others will say'. They didn't push me into some religious schools (unlike my wife who has rest of her life to deal with maybe well-meant but massive trauma of strict religious upbringing, psychologists can only help so much). My parents literally defined my cultural upbringing, more than anybody/anything else combined.

Anybody strong enough can do that, but lets be honest here, most people are not that strong and rather will go the path of least friction and most comfort and not the best long term path.

As said, I am eternally thankful to them for this since when looking back I clearly see choices they've made.

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