Bizarro picture of the day

[Fenris]

http://failblog.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/fail-owned-cross-pricing-fail.jpg?w=375&h=500
I'm at a loss for words again.

[Tonton]

...I'm at a loss for words again.

I guess an unpresumptious and simple one made of wood would have gone for $7.77?

Anton

[HisLeast]

I always find cross fascination morbid.

If Jesus had come 2000 years later, would we be making decorative miniature electric chairs?

[CoffeeCat]

I always find cross fascination morbid.

If Jesus had come 2000 years later, would we be making decorative miniature electric chairs?

And would we be selling them for $6.66? :lol:

[Fenris]

And would we be selling them for $6.66? :lol:
According to this picture, the answer is "yes"....:hmm:

[CoffeeCat]

Gord Downie from the Canadian band 'The Tragically Hip' once asked the question "if Jesus was hung, would we pray to a rope?"

Would we all have ropes at the front of our churches? If it was an electric chair, would we have a picture of one mounted on the wall? It's not a question I'd try to be blaise about, or sarcastic about.... because I understand that a cross reminds Christians of what Christ went through on that cross. And that means the world to us. The cross means a lot to me, too.

I just wish it wasn't something turned into a commercial symbol and sold at religious stores, or whatever. It has a price on it that costs all our lives.... we can't put a dollar amount on it and put it on sale and pass it off as something pretty to hang on our walls.

If we want to purchase something to remind us of Christ, I'd personally rather see a picture of a stone rolled away in front of an empty tomb. It has more meaning to me.

Anyways, I'll not sidetrack your thread any longer. ;)

[Fenris]

Anyways, I'll not sidetrack your thread any longer. ;)
No, it's fine. This is "kicking back", and your musings are thought provoking.

[CoffeeCat]

Okie dokie, thanks. :)

[Urban Missionary]

I have a question Fenris...

No graven images...

IF you did believe that Jesus was God (and I know you do not), how would you view pictures of Jesus, crosses (like above), and the like?

[Fenris]

IF you did believe that Jesus was God (and I know you do not), how would you view pictures of Jesus, crosses (like above), and the like?
That is a really difficult question....:hmm: Let me think about it.

[Urban Missionary]

Difficult due to "graven images" or due to trying to imagine that Christ is God...;)

[Fenris]

I have a good imagination. I'm just trying to reconcile it with the graven images prohibition. If God is visible, would that remove that prohibition? I'm trying to ponder it.

[Vhayes]

Wow - that was... well... hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

[Fenris]

Wow - that was... well... hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.Blasphemous? :hmm:

[Fenris]

IF you did believe that Jesus was God (and I know you do not), how would you view pictures of Jesus, crosses (like above), and the like?
If God was incarnate it might remove the prohibition against graven images. My reasoning is thus:

Deuteronomy 4 says: 10 the day that thou stoodest before the LORD thy God in Horeb...12 And the LORD spoke unto you out of the midst of the fire; ye heard the voice of words, but ye saw no form; only a voice.... 15 Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves--for ye saw no manner of form on the day that the LORD spoke unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire-- 16 lest ye deal corruptly, and make you a graven image, even the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, 17 the likeness of any beast that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged fowl that flieth in the heaven, 18 the likeness of any thing that creepeth on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth...

God is saying "You saw nothing at Sinai, so don't worship anything you can see". Now, if God took a visible form, perhaps it would make worship of such a form permissible....?

(Mind you, as I've said many times I don't believe this is possible. But as a 'what if' scenario, I'll let the imagination wander....)

[Fenris]

Not the answer you were looking for?

[Urban Missionary]

Not at all. I am thinking about it.:hmm:

I don't know a single soul that has ever seen Jesus, and yet we see pictures of Him (his likeness maybe?) all over the place. It honestly makes me wonder if they are not "graven images".

Since you are not a believer (in Christ), I can only assume that you believe the appearances of God in the bible (Abraham/Moses) are not examples of a Christophany, so couldn't the removal of the prohibition of "graven images" apply to Judaism as well?

I have no agenda at all behind this, I am just curious of the Jewish understanding of "No graven images" and if we (Christians) violate that today with all of our protestant "relics".

[Fenris]

I don't know a single soul that has ever seen Jesus, and yet we see pictures of Him (his likeness maybe?) all over the place. It honestly makes me wonder if they are not "graven images".It doesn't matter if that's an actual picture of the guy or not. The point is, god was in human form.

Since you are not a believer (in Christ), I can only assume that you believe the appearances of God in the bible (Abraham/Moses) are not examples of a Christophany, so couldn't the removal of the prohibition of "graven images" apply to Judaism as well?No place in the bible is God in human form. In any form, actually. God specifically states "No man can see Me and live".

I have no agenda at all behind this, I am just curious of the Jewish understanding of "No graven images" and if we (Christians) violate that today with all of our protestant "relics".No graven images means no graven images.

[Urban Missionary]

Didn't God sit down and eat with Abraham? Didn't God cover Moses in the cleft and allow him to see his hinder parts?

This can be explained from a Christian perspective by it being a Christophany (pre-incarnate appearance of Christ), but I have no idea how to explain it from your point of view since the Bible clearly says that "No man has seen God at any time."

[Fenris]

Didn't God sit down and eat with Abraham?No.

Didn't God cover Moses in the cleft and allow him to see his hinder parts?It's not clear what exactly Moses saw, but it wasn't a human back. Rashi says Moses saw God's "attributes" but not His "essence". The Talmud says that Moses saw the knot at the back of God's "Teffilin". In any case we do not attribute any sort of form to God.

This can be explained from a Christian perspective by it being a Christophany (pre-incarnate appearance of Christ), but I have no idea how to explain it from your point of view since the Bible clearly says that "No man has seen God at any time."
Well, we don't believe that God has a body, or indeed anything we can comprehend.

[Urban Missionary]

Well, we don't believe that God has a body, or indeed anything we can comprehend.

I agree with you...:o



:lol:

[Fenris]

I agree with you...:o

Then all we have to do is get rid of the pesky Jesus problem, and you can be Jewish! :lol:

[Urban Missionary]

Help me to understand these verses then...

1 The LORD appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day. 2 Abraham looked up and saw three men standing nearby. When he saw them, he hurried from the entrance of his tent to meet them and bowed low to the ground.
3 He said, "If I have found favor in your eyes, my lord, [a] do not pass your servant by. 4 Let a little water be brought, and then you may all wash your feet and rest under this tree. 5 Let me get you something to eat, so you can be refreshed and then go on your way—now that you have come to your servant."
"Very well," they answered, "do as you say."

6 So Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah. "Quick," he said, "get three seahs [b] of fine flour and knead it and bake some bread."

7 Then he ran to the herd and selected a choice, tender calf and gave it to a servant, who hurried to prepare it. 8 He then brought some curds and milk and the calf that had been prepared, and set these before them. While they ate, he stood near them under a tree.

9 "Where is your wife Sarah?" they asked him.
"There, in the tent," he said.

10 Then the LORD [c] said, "I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife will have a son."
Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, which was behind him. 11 Abraham and Sarah were already old and well advanced in years, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing. 12 So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, "After I am worn out and my master [d] is old, will I now have this pleasure?"

13 Then the LORD said to Abraham, "Why did Sarah laugh and say, 'Will I really have a child, now that I am old?' 14 Is anything too hard for the LORD ? I will return to you at the appointed time next year and Sarah will have a son."

15 Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, "I did not laugh."
But he said, "Yes, you did laugh."

[Urban Missionary]

Then all we have to do is get rid of the pesky Jesus problem, and you can be Jewish! :lol:

That is going to take much longer than either of us have on this earth...;)

[Fenris]

Help me to understand these verses then...
This came up elsewhere on here recently.

It's a translation issue. If you could read Hebrew the paragraph looks different. Where the bible says "The Lord" in the first verse, it's God's name: YH-VH. When the Abraham says "my lord" in verse 3, it says "adonee", which simply means "my lord" , or "sir" with no implied divinity. If you go to Israel shopkeepers will use that term with you. :D

So the three men are not God at all, but angels. Although Abraham doesn't know that at the start of the chapter, since he prepares a meal for them.

Verse 22 specifically says that the men left, but God stayed on with Abraham.

[ConqueredbyLove]

Then all we have to do is get rid of the pesky Jesus problem, and you can be Jewish! :lol:

;)

:hug: :hug: :hug:

[Urban Missionary]

This came up elsewhere on here recently.

It's a translation issue. If you could read Hebrew the paragraph looks different. Where the bible says "The Lord" in the first verse, it's God's name: YH-VH. When the Abraham says "my lord" in verse 3, it says "adonee", which simply means "my lord" , or "sir" with no implied divinity. If you go to Israel shopkeepers will use that term with you. :D

So the three men are not God at all, but angels. Although Abraham doesn't know that at the start of the chapter, since he prepares a meal for them.

Verse 22 specifically says that the men left, but God stayed on with Abraham.

I get that part. I have not ever thought that the three men were God. The part I do not get is "The LORD (YH-VH) appeared to Abraham"

Sorry I was unclear. I thought it is fairly obvious that there is a distinction between the two...

[Fenris]

I get that part. I have not ever thought that the three men were God. The part I do not get is "The LORD (YH-VH) appeared to Abraham"

Yes, so? Abraham became aware of God's presence. It doesn't follow that God therefore has a body.

[Urban Missionary]

I do not have any resources here at work... what is the word for appear in Hebrew? What does it mean?

[Fenris]

I do not have any resources here at work... what is the word for appear in Hebrew? What does it mean?
וַיֵּרָא

"VaYira"

"Appeared" is a reasonable translation. I'm trying to see what terms is used with Moses, since he had many more interludes with God.

[tayariswife]

I guess an unpresumptious and simple one made of wood would have gone for $7.77?

Anton
i love it!! :pp

[Urban Missionary]

The reason for the question is that usually God "appeared" as a fire or as a light or as a burning bush, or as something and it seems to be missing here.