Did Jesus Die on The Cross for The Just/Elect/Saved Whose Names Are Written in The Book of Life OR

No apology necessary. If I provide an answer, it'll probably be disagreed with, so it's best to ask whoever is advocating for it to explain what it means.

I am not saying that the present tense only ever describes a present moment of time. I am saying that the present is very rarely gnomic in kojne Greek. If a text can be understood with the present progressive sense in it's context, that is the most likely sense of the present in the text. If I say "Water is liquid," that would be gnomic. If during an experiment when I am freezing and boiling water, I say, "The water is solid," the continuous present is meant. Likewise, "The water is vapour." and "The water is liquid".

In scripture you are forcing a gnomic sense onto the present tense when it makes perfect sense as the present progressive, and you are denying the validity of inferring the primary sense of the present tense, because to admit it could have a progressive present sense would disarm your alleged proof text as a weapon to impose calvinism on the Bible.

Kinda difficult to do since we cannot come to agreement on just who the people are in Rom 3:10-18. You say they are just Jews, even though this passage has as its bookends vv. 9 and 23. And is it only Jews who are inherently unrighteous (v.12)? Or only the Jews alone who do no good (v.12)? And because you limit the scope to Jews, we cannot agree on what the nature of the passage is. I see it as a universal indictment of all TU, whereas you do not.

Furthermore, you keep raising the straw man argument that all reformed people,, apparently, believe the texts you cite above prove that all TUs have no spiritual understanding. And this clearly is NOT MY position. So...maybe you would want to take that issue up with someone who buys into your premise.

Lastly, the cite list above is woefully incomplete in terms of establishing biblical validity for the TD doctrine. It barely scratches the surface. So, it looks like we'd be doing battle for months...if not longer, if we were to go that route! Doing a rough count of a TD topical study I performed many moons ago, I come up with at least 90 passages. And that many passages speaks volumes about the tenor or scripture on the subject

Therefore, I like my idea better. You appealed to OT saints as your "proof" that TD can't be biblically justified. So, I'll take you up on that and meet you on your own turf. And in so doing, even, if it takes a two or three posts, it will still cut to the chase, relatively speaking, because I'm confident you will have no rebuttal of substance to offer. It would go faster than trying to "analyze" 90+ TD passages.

But meanwhile, while I'm preparing my Exodus argument, you could tackle the Conscience question I presented to you earlier in the week. You might recall that you appealed to man's conscience as being his ultimate (?) moral/spiritual compass, even though this faculty is as corrupt as the others. You essentially said it was the conscience that CAUSED [inherently evil] men to strive to do good, which would make evil man's conscience his good superhero. So, I followed up with a conscience question to you: I asked that since God cannot sin and man cannot not sin, do you also a attribute the conscience as being the reason why God cannot sin, cannot lie, cannot deny himself? Is God's conscience also the cause of his infinite goodness, holiness and righteousness? The root question to this problem: Why does God have the inability to sin, and man the inability to not sin? Is it conscience in both cases?

Also,. you never addressed my reply in 5738 to your short, dismissive reply to my observation that TU hate God. You implied in your post that I was reading too much into Jesus' words, so I appealed to several OT passages and the Greatest Commandment to show you that Jesus knew of what he spoke.

No, it does not make perfect sense, especially since I have given you several examples from the NT where it would not. Paul was clearly speaking aphoristically --making a concise statement of principle. For example, when Jesus told the Jews you are evil, he was stating a principle. He wasn't saying well...sometimes you're evil, and other times not so much. He was stating that there was a principle of evil within them. He was making a statement about their ESSENCE which never changes! This is why later on in the same epistle he wrote about the "law of sin" and "law of death" (Rom 7:23, 25; 8:2). Clearly, he was talking about the PRINCIPLE of sin and death.

the only people who find such things to be boring are those who are not yet regenerated.

1Co 2:14 But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

2Co 13:5 Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you are disqualified.

you might agree that God knows all things but does God decree all things that come to pass as I stated or are you are Deist who somehow thinks that God lets the cards fall as they may according to the will of man?

Please tell me, do you ever pray for people to be saved and if you do, why do you do so if according to you, God can not intervene over the sovereign will of man?

the only people who argue against the doctrine of total depravity are those who do not yet see themselves as God sees them but are still deluded in comparing themselves to others and coming to the conclusion that they are better than most and then somehow good when Scripture confirms that the very best that men do is likened to filthy rags before God (Isa 64:6) and that everything that man does which is not from faith is sin (Rom 14:23).

Why do all these signs of insanity keep popping up?

You misunderstand me. I said it proves what Paul is proving = Both Jews and Gentiles are under sin and Jews are not better than Gentiles.

The proposition being made is that Jews are not better than Gentiles. The last sentence in Romans 3:9 begins with "for" and is used to explain the proposition. The OT quotes are used to prove both Jews and Gentiles are under sin and thus substantiate the proposition the Jews are not better than the Gentiles.

One of the problems here is that being under sin does not equate to what traditional Total Depravity says.

Another problem here is being discussed between you and @PaulThomson. This is the problem of interpreting the present tense verbs. You are interpreting them to be gnomic, which means you're basically saying all these statements are timeless facts. Yet Ps14 speaks of a time when God looked down from heaven and distinguished between fools who say there is no God vs. God's people who obviously did not say there is no God.

In addition, as I've been saying, I see there being no way to make this all gnomic - timeless fact - when there are men from Abel through the birth and identification of Messiah on earth who were obviously not saying there is no God.

Assuming it is Paul making the case in Rom3:9-18, all he has to do is show that both Jews and Gentiles are under sin and Jews are not better than Gentiles. He doesn't need a gnomic timeless fact to do this. All he has to do is show what he's even previously stated in rhetorical argument, that some Jews did not believe and that the history of the Jews is a mess of disobedience and idolatry. But it is not a timeless fact that they all were always doing what Paul quotes from times in history.

What TD needs to do with these verses is prove that no men could seek God ever because dead men can't do anything.

What you need to do is prove that that no men could seek God ever, even though being spiritually dead does not include a total
inability to understand and not reject some spiritual truth.

As I understand traditional TD, it uses 1Cor2:14 to say unregenerate men cannot understand anything spiritual. You'll find this verse on the list I posted above which I took from one of the @maxamir graphics. I've never said all Reformed believe the same thing. In fact I've said they do not. I've also pointed out that you are not being traditional if you believe the spiritually dead can understand some spiritual truth.

I'd be satisfied to see you conclusively prove TD from some of the verses I listed. Even if you'd like to prove why some of them are wrong in your view (like 1Cor2:14). As far as I know, I've got months, so let's get started and see how we do.

I pointed to men from Abel through the birth of Christ at minimum to say that no men were ever seeking God is a fallacy. This is where you and I began. But this is just one of a few things I pointed out concerning my disagreement with your interpretation of Rom1-3. But I'm happy to see you prove the gnomic - timeless fact - that no men in history ever sought God.

Throwing 90+ my way doesn't mean anything to me. I don't think TD can be proven by the traditional list of TD passages. Also, since you do not believe traditional TD, why are we calling what you believe "TD"? Would you like to relabel it to "RTD" or something, since you're not really arguing for traditional TD, are you?

You misstate what I stated re: conscience. It was put forth in the way that Paul uses it against the Jews who had the written Law, so nothing more than a factor in the argument that your gnomic - timeless fact - concerning all men of all time never sought God is again left wanting. How does this have anything to do with God having no ability to sin?

I'm not going back to a side-track and in turn won't go back to point out how much of my work you ignore.

Honestly, what surprises me a bit, is how you too turn away from offers to get into a passage of Scripture in detail to prove your case for TD or TI or RTD or RTI or whatever you'd like to label it. I'll call it RTD for now. I don't think we exhausted Rom1-3. Maybe we can't. The more I look at it the more complex it may be. So, how about another verse or single section of verses on the traditional list? No side-tracks to ULIP or any modified version for now. Prove RTD.

Maybe you could also define RTD once again and clarify precisely how RTD differs from TD.

I'll even begin by pointing out that we may be in agreement on a few propositions. Please correct me if we are not in agreement and explain why:

1. All unregenerate men in Adam 1 - both Jews and Gentiles are spiritually dead and under the dominion of sin.
2. Spiritual death does not mean that men cannot understand [some] spiritual truth.

Clever play on words! They're detour signs to keep us off of Scripture Discussion Road.

Ah so... No wonder the only message I've been able to pick up from them is, "KEEP OUT."

And DANGER AHEAD.

The fallacy of composition occurs when an argument incorrectly assumes that what is true for the parts is also true for the whole (e.g., if someone or something contains some evil, it must be all evil and contain no good.

You like to say, "X clearly teaches... " and "X was clearly speaking..." when the texts you are citing do not clearly fit only one possible sense, the one you need it to convey to support Calvinism, the one you assert it clearly states. Since you can neither see nor acknowledge the other senses of those texts, you prove yourself to be a blind guide.

In the negative inference fallacy, a negative conclusion from affirmative premises is a syllogistic fallacy committed when a categorical syllogism has a negative conclusion yet both premises are affirmative.

You are arguing that to say that Rom. 3:10-18 is addressed to Jews and is stating something as true regarding Jews, then it must be inferring that the same is not true of Gentiles. That is a logical fallacy called the negative inference fallacy. If you refuse to deal logically with biblical texts, how do you hope to reach logical, rational conclusions regarding their meaning.

Paul saying Jews are unrighteous, does not logically imply that Gentiles are righteous. Paul saying Jews don't keep on doing good, does not logically imply that he thinks Gentiles do keep on doing good. Your arguments are insane.

In response to my early request that you define the Reformed doctrine of Total Depravity (“TD”) you provided the above. I’m going to reformat it into a few propositions, so it’s easier for me to follow as you build from this foundation and explain how Scripture supports your view. If you have 90+ Scriptures you think do support you, then I'm raring to go.

I’m going to label this as RTD (Rufus Total Depravity) because as I understand you, you do not agree with all TD as it may be presented by others. Please do correct me if I misunderstand and thus misrepresent what you say:

RTD:

1. Man’s “depravity” means “corruptness” and “sin indwelling man”
2. Man's depravity (corruptness and indwelling sin) is total in the quantitative sense
3. All of man’s faculties (mind, passions, conscience and will), which are seated in his heart, have been totally corrupted, are totally indwelt by sin, are totally depraved.
4. Jesus Christ confirmed this by saying all men are inherently evil in their essence and that only God is inherently good in His essence.
5. Scripture confirms RTD as it says:
   1. "A little leaven (depravity, corruptness, sin, evil) leavens the entire loaf" (Gal 5:9)
   2. "Does a fountain send out from the same opening both fresh and bitter water?" (Jas 3:11). (Can salt water produce fresh?)

As the time of this post, this definition of RTD references only 2 Scriptures. Not knowing what are the 90+ passages of Scripture you see proving RTD, I’d like to look at these 2 you have referenced to see if they are proof of RTD:

NKJ Galatians 5:1-12 Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. 2 Indeed I, Paul, say to you that if you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing. 3 And I testify again to every man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to keep the whole law. 4 You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace. 5 For we through the Spirit eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. 6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love. 7 You ran well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? 8 This persuasion does not come from Him who calls you. 9 A little leaven leavens the whole lump. 10 I have confidence in you, in the Lord, that you will have no other mind; but he who troubles you shall bear his judgment, whoever he is. 11 And I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why do I still suffer persecution? Then the offense of the cross has ceased. 12 I could wish that those who trouble you would even cut themselves off!

• The leaven Paul speaks of in Galatians is a false gospel of circumcision that can leaven the mind of Christians and estrange them from Jesus Christ and cause them to fall from grace.
• This type of teaching about leaven is also found in the words of our Lord Jesus Christ when He warned of the leaven – which is the teaching of the Pharisees and the Sadducees Matt6:6-12.
• Paul in 1Cor5 spoke of this same axiom of leaven when dealing with a sinful man being allowed to remain in the Corinthian congregation and that congregational glorying in sinful behavior can spread through the whole lump/congregation. Paul compared the leaven of malice and wickedness vs. the unleavened sincerity and truth. Thus, once again leaven is spoken of by Paul in the sense of being opposed to truth (like the false gospel in Galatians) and how such error can spread through the mind of a congregation.
• In Luke13:20-21 Jesus also spoke of the good of the leavening process when He spoke of how the Kingdom of God would spread.
• Although I understand the axiom of leaven leavening the whole lump, Galatians 5 is not speaking of sin totally leavening the essence of men and I find it interesting that in the NC Writings the general sense of the leavening process is how information – truth and error - spreads in the minds of men and not in how sin leavens the totality of the essence of men.

NKJ James 3:1-17 My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment. 2 For we all stumble in many things. If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body. 3 Indeed, we put bits in horses' mouths that they may obey us, and we turn their whole body. 4 Look also at ships: although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires. 5 Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how great a forest a little fire kindles! 6 And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell. 7 For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and creature of the sea, is tamed and has been tamed by mankind. 8 But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. 9 With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. 10 Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so. 11 Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? 12 Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Thus no spring yields both salt water and fresh. 13 Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. 14 But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. 15 This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, demonic. 16 For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. 17 But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. 18 Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

• James3 is in the general context of how not many men should take teaching roles in the Ekklesia because all men stumble in word – in what they say. And James3 is about Christians learning and growing to not curse men who came into being in the likeness of God, to not stumble in word – in speech which expresses the mind, to not boast and lie against the truth if they have bitter envy and self-seeking in their hearts, to function in the wisdom from above, to be wise and understanding, to have and sow the fruit of righteousness and make peace.
• This axiom of the 2 kinds of springs – one of sweet water vs. bitter or salty is an interesting one.
  • FWIW to you, I see a few layers to James3.
    • It’s a warning to men who would become teachers in Christ’s Ekklesia. They best be able to function in the wisdom from above, to be wise and understanding, to control their tongues, to be advanced and advancing in maturity, and to instill this same function in their congregations.
    • It’s a call to Christians to become developed to the maturity just mentioned for teachers.
    • It’s a call to Christians to love one another as Christ loved us, to have the fruit of righteousness developed in them and to make peace by sowing righteousness in peace.
    • It’s thus a call to Christians to do what no man is able to do, which is to control their bad/evil, restless tongues that are full of deadly poison that curses men who have come into existence according to God’s likeness.

Maybe we should camp here for a bit and give you the opportunity to explain how and why James proves RTD.

• If we do camp here in Scripture for a while, then I may be asking you many questions about this James letter and challenging you to remain in context and explain it.

well, as a Calvinist I would not expect you to bored. burned out maybe...but not bored

still boring

you obviously have no idea what most others believe being concerned only with the spread of your false gospel of Calvinism saves

I'm not surprised you would think so

In the above post I asked you the bolded question. I'm going to ask you to clarify your answer which I will quote in sections, so I can attempt to make my questions clear:

Here you seem to answer my question in the affirmative that man is unable to understand anything spiritual "because he's not spiritually capable of arriving at substantial and essential understanding of spiritual truth;"

• So, you have seemingly qualified your answer with a causal statement, which as I recall you have recently repeated in another post.
• So, it's not that man cannot understand anything spiritual, but that man cannot arrive at a substantial and essential understanding of spiritual truth.
  • And the cause of this inability is that he's not spiritually capable.
    • So, I guess you are saying man has the ability to understand a little bit of spiritual information, but nothing substantial and essential.
      • What would you say is substantial and essential understanding of spiritual truth?
        • The existence of God?
        • The sinfulness of man?
        • The Gospel of Jesus Christ?
        • Where do you draw the line between minimal and substantial and essential?

NKJ John 12:23-43 But Jesus answered them, saying, "The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified. 24 "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain. 25 "He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 "If anyone serves Me, let him follow Me; and where I am, there My servant will be also. If anyone serves Me, him My Father will honor. 27 "Now My soul is troubled, and what shall I say? Father, save Me from this hour'? But for this purpose I came to this hour. 28 "Father, glorify Your name." Then a voice came from heaven, saying, "I have both glorified it and will glorify it again." 29 Therefore the people who stood by and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, "An angel has spoken to Him." 30 Jesus answered and said, "This voice did not come because of Me, but for your sake. 31 "Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out. 32 "And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself." 33 This He said, signifying by what death He would die. 34 The people answered Him, "We have heard from the law that the Christ remains forever; and how can You say, `The Son of Man must be lifted up'? Who is this Son of Man?" 35 Then Jesus said to them, "A little while longer the light is with you. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you; he who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. 36 "While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light." These things Jesus spoke, and departed, and was hidden from them. 37 But although He had done so many signs before them, they did not believe in Him, 38 that the word of Isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled, which he spoke: "Lord, who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?" 39 Therefore they could not believe, because Isaiah said again: 40 "He has blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts, Lest they should see with their eyes, Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, So that I should heal them." 41 These things Isaiah said when1 he saw His glory and spoke of Him. 42 Nevertheless even among the rulers many believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess Him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue; 43 for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.

• As is usual, these simple references to verses like John12:40 have much more going on in context.
  • Yes, God did blind the eyes and harden the hearts of some Jews at a certain time of history as Isaiah said He would do.
  • But it also seems clear that some unregenerate men were able to substantially and essentially understand the message of Jesus Christ and even believe in Him.
  • It also seems that Jesus qualified some of the problems with men being things they chose:
    • Loving life vs. hating life in this world.
    • Serving Him and following Him vs. not serving Him.
    • Having not learned from Torah correctly.
    • Loving the praise of men more than the praise of God and fearing being put out of the synagogue.
  • And what do we do with Jesus saying He will draw all men to Himself?
  • How does all of this compare with RTD?

Correction of the verse reference:

NKJ 2 Corinthians 4:1-6 Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart. 2 But we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. 3 But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, 4 whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. 5 For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus' sake. 6 For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

• Again, yes, the god of that age had blinded some,
  • But why only some and how does this prove RTD when only some unregenerate can be blinded and obviously other unregenerate cannot?
• I'd also like to call your attention to the fact that Paul and others were dealing with men's consciences. You challenged me for bringing up men's consciences in relation to this RTD (or TD) theory. Yet here the conscience of man is a factor in belief in the Gospel.

I'll take up the rest of what you said and the Scriptures you referenced when I can return to this. I have an important (to me) question about your next statement because you reference 1Cor2:14 which TD also references in regard to unregenerate man's inability to understand spiritual information. I'd like to be clear as to how RTD compares to TD in this regard, so I will be posting that verse and surrounding context and observing what it is and is not saying in regard to TD use of it.