Christian Doctrinal Understanding

[RexCA]

Good for you! You sed quotation marks correctly, and the question mark. Now, notice you wrote 9 lines, and there is not a period (not including the period for abbreviation!) once!

Nine lines all compressed into small space meaning, it is impossible to read. So, paragraphs and periods and commas! As someone used to say, "More white space!" I think that was another forum, perhaps?

So, here it is, cleaned up a bit.



Also, apostrophes, which is the setting aside of a small phrase, such as "I mean" or "to be fair." As above!

As to your comments, have you never played the telephone game? Usually a birthday parties, someone starts with a phrase, and whispers it to the person next to them. They whisper to the person next to them, and so on, till it gets back around the table to the last person. They say what was whispered to them. So, you might start with "Power Rangers," and end with "Baby in a Manger." So, no! The "chain" is always broken, and most of the time, not intentionally. Although where money and things like indulgences are concerned, probably intentionally!

Word of mouth, which is all most people had up till the invention of the printing press, was all people had. They might have heard it wrong, or communicated it wrong. They might have added something. This is a big issue in the Byzantine manuscripts. There were a multitude of copyists mistakes, which over 14 centuries or so, added up, so the last Greek manuscripts were utterly corrupted.

There is an early church manuscript called the Didache. It is a good thing to read, not for doctrine, but to see how this early manuscript deviates from the Bible, only one century later. We translated three of the chapters in Greek class. Some of it was straight from the Bible, but some was not in the Bible at all. For instance, a traveling evangelist who asked for money, was considered a false prophet. That is not in the Bible, although our class and professor agreed it would be a good thing. LOL

So, perhaps I write that comment here, and then someone tells someone else, they read that the Bible says any evangelist who asks for money is a false prophet. They tell someone else, the next thing you know, a church is formed, books written, and it is not in the Bible. It is made up, not inspired. It may have even been valuable for the early church. But, certainly not a command from God.

And finally, the point, is that - if people were Biblically literate, they would know that there is no prohibition against paying evangelists. That is not opinion, it is the truth. Yet, the church could easily have adopted this idea, codified it and said it is inspired, and made it a church tradition. That is the problem with the Catholic church. That has happened for 16 centuries, and the common people were purposely barred from reading the Bible, so they could not discern what were the real words written by the apostles were, and compare them to church doctrine, which had gone totally away from the Bible.

And you, my friend, besides needing to improve your reading skills, also need to read the whole Bible through. The fact that you have not read Psalm 119, says to me that you have barely touched the Bible. Until you have completed that, once, but more likely 10 or 20, or 50 times, like me, your comments are totally invalid. You will believe these corrupted Catholic traditions your whole life, until you actually read the Bible and find out they are not written there, and many of them directly contradict the Bible. I won't go into examples of this dreadful corruption, as there are whole threads written here on this issue.

PS. Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in the Bible. It is an acrostic poem, meaning each line of each stanza starts with a succeeding letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which has 22 letters. So, likely, you will not get through it today. If you had read the Bible, you would realize that!

A few things, first off I know how to use punctuation I just did not think it was such a big deal I mean we're not writing essays here eh? lol As for your telephone analogy I like it but I think something that should be pointed out is that while yes there were church fathers that did have incoherent ideas I do not believe them to be infallible per se, but something to take note of is that these guys overwhelming agreed on virtually all key concepts of Christian doctrine with a few exceptions on various points nobody is perfect. But I think what should be pondered on is that if the Church is truly governed by God and the clergy and the rest of the faithful are really inspired by the Holy Spirt than despite the many erroneous ideas that may have popped up over time the fact is truth would still stand assuming Christianity is even true at all. Now for this to be possible for us to have a Church that is lead by God truly and has given us the true inspired scriptures by the power of the Holy Spirit we would have to wonder how and by what human source it was that God governed essentially who is the church. The fact is there was no official New Testament until at least the late 4th century with the canonization of the Vulgate Bible at the Synod of Hippo in the year 393 AD. Now the question stands by what external source did Christians for the 360 years between this council and the ascension of Jesus use? The answer is inspired oral tradition carried down from Jesus himself to modern Christians through the Church. As for your comment on the Didache well what you said is very much non historical as the Didache was considered inspired very early on by most Christians and wasn't until very late that it was left out of the cannon and traditionally it is said to have been authored by the 12 apostles at the Council of Jerusalem in the year 50 AD so if you view this as contradictory to scripture that in itself is questionable when looking at Christian history. As for Psalm 119 I have read it before just not any time recently as a Catholic and a former Lutheran I understand how protestants look at scripture vs how Catholics do and right or wrong it isn't the same in Catholicism while reading scripture it is viewed as an act similar to prayer essentially study and I know most protestants would agree that much but from what I remember from the Lutheranism of my youth many protestants attempt to memorize various verses for future reference not saying this is a bad thing it just isn't the norm in Catholicism nor does that mean Catholics do not know scripture simply because they may not recall everything verse for verse in fact going back to weather or not I have read this piece I have read the entirety of the Bible 2 or 3 times including the Greek Septuagint one time that is not me bragging that is me simply correcting you. Again sorry for not indenting but eh at least I used punctuation lol and yes I will look at this verse today.

 

[Snoozy]

once u get into the church fathers and all that u will drown in all that.
remember the catholic church burned all the heretic writings and WRITERS even. so what church history we got left is corrupted. just believe the bible dont let the catholics fool u with the "we were founded in 33ad, u in 1500ad" garbage.
da position of a "pope" is demonic.

 

[RexCA]

once u get into the church fathers and all that u will drown in all that.
remember the catholic church burned all the heretic writings and WRITERS even. so what church history we got left is corrupted. just believe the bible dont let the catholics fool u with the "we were founded in 33ad, u in 1500ad" garbage.
da position of a "pope" is demonic.

This is literally false you can come across writings from early Christians that were considered heretics some of which were very influential theologically to Christianity as a whole including Origen, Tertullian, Arius, Nestorius etc. Heck Martin Luther and John Calvin are both seen as heretics by the Catholic Church I have no problem getting finding their works. Another thing the Catholic Church has never "burned anyone at the stake" the executions of the inquisition were all done by the state you can fact check that if you would like nothing false about it.

 

[Depleted]

not an appropriate one as nothing about this question relates to JWs at all

What question? Reread your first post. There was no question, no punctuation, no clarity, it was a bunch of words put together. You have asked "What" to every person who has tried to answer your first post, but the truth is, because you don't believe in punctuation at all, the people answering are trying their best to figure out what you are asking, if you are asking anything.

This is the 21st century, punctuation matters for communication, I've read the full first page, and you have yet to communicate.

This really is your choice. Would you rather keep adding more words without punctuation or would you like a question answered? If the former, have fun talking to yourself. If the latter, than use punctuation and complete sentences. But stop blaming everyone else. At least they're trying. Will you?

 

[RexCA]

What question? Reread your first post. There was no question, no punctuation, no clarity, it was a bunch of words put together. You have asked "What" to every person who has tried to answer your first post, but the truth is, because you don't believe in punctuation at all, the people answering are trying their best to figure out what you are asking, if you are asking anything.

This is the 21st century, punctuation matters for communication, I've read the full first page, and you have yet to communicate.

This really is your choice. Would you rather keep adding more words without punctuation or would you like a question answered? If the former, have fun talking to yourself. If the latter, than use punctuation and complete sentences. But stop blaming everyone else. At least they're trying. Will you?

Again I apologize for the punctuation I did not think it was such a big deal as I was not planning on writing essays but seriously? How is the original question difficult to understand at all nothing in the questions said anything about JWs, Catholics and JWs do not share very much in common theologically that was literally an ignorant reply NO APPOLOGIES

 

[Snoozy]

This is literally false you can come across writings from early Christians that were considered heretics some of which were very influential theologically to Christianity as a whole including Origen, Tertullian, Arius, Nestorius etc. Heck Martin Luther and John Calvin are both seen as heretics by the Catholic Church I have no problem getting finding their works. Another thing the Catholic Church has never "burned anyone at the stake" the executions of the inquisition were all done by the state you can fact check that if you would like nothing false about it.

listen uce, it dont matter if we can find all the early church writings my point was that we should go by the bible and not these bozos of the 4th century. the church fathers didnt agree among themselves either and some were way off. u can prove anything by quoting those guys.

go by the bible not a church that claims to be founded on 33ad was da meaning of my message.

 

[RexCA]

listen uce, it dont matter if we can find all the early church writings my point was that we should go by the bible and not these bozos of the 4th century. the church fathers didnt agree among themselves either and some were way off. u can prove anything by quoting those guys.

go by the bible not a church that claims to be founded on 33ad was da meaning of my message.

you are aware if there were no Church Fathers there would be no Bible Christianity would be relying on oral tradition still and which early Christian writings count as New Testament scriptures would probably be in question. Saying ignore the church fathers and church history and go read the Bible is circular reasoning I'm not saying to not read the scriptures I'm saying don' propagate ignorance of the scriptures by telling people to ignore history of Christianity

 

[Snoozy]

you are aware if there were no Church Fathers there would be no Bible Christianity would be relying on oral tradition still and which early Christian writings count as New Testament scriptures would probably be in question. Saying ignore the church fathers and church history and go read the Bible is circular reasoning I'm not saying to not read the scriptures I'm saying don' propagate ignorance of the scriptures by telling people to ignore history of Christianity

God leads His people by the Holy Ghost. if u are alone in an island with no church history or even a bible, God will hear u call upon the name of the Lord.

we are privileged to have da bible. and i do respect the people who defended the writings from persecution. but if u have seriously read the church fathers u know those guys were off the wall. strange and diverse doctrines they held. many disagreed among themselfs also. just be aware, put the bible as ur authority over da church fathers is all im saying.