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Yes, in this verse (John 3:5) “water” just means baptism. A quick glance at an online concordance suggests that this may br the only verse in the whole of the NT where the word “water” is used as a metonym in this way.

Acts 15:19-21 (ESV): 19 Therefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God, 20 but should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, and from what has been strangled, and from blood. 21 For from ancient...

So far, so good. On those points we seem to be pretty muxh in agreement. However, the question I’m asking on this thread is not primarily about Jesus’ own meaning. It’s more about the four evangelists and their choice of words. I’d like to ask you this: In six books ― the four gospels plus Acts...

“For” is a conjunction. It’s the usual translation (as here) of the Greek conjunction gar, which occurs over a thousand times in the NT. The twenty-seven books of the NT add up to just under 8,000 verses, meaning that gar occurs, on the average, once in every eight verses. You might say it’s...

Thank you, @Gideon300. For a newcomer to Christian Chat such as myself, that’s a very illuminating comment. Personally I’ve come to see Acts 15 as one of the most important chapters in the whole of the New Testament outside the Gospels.

In any discussion of the Mosaic Covenant and its impact on present-day Christians, there are many significant Bible passages to be taken into account, not least Acts 15, in which we learn of the Apostolic Council and its decision on requirements that Gentiles were required to comply with in...

The verse I remember seeing quoted in this context is Acts 20:7, introducing the Eutychus incident at Troas. It begins (in the ESV): “On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, ...” What can Luke’s reason have been for thinking he needed to tell his readers what...

Yes, there can be no doubt that it was the earjy Church that adopted Sunday, instead of Saturday, as the day for religious observance and for the weekly rest from work. But when did that happen? I imagine we are all agreed that it can have been no later than the reign of Constantine. But can it...

That explains everything! Thank you. I understand perfectly your objection to the use of the verb "break" in this context. On the other hand, in fairness to Bible translators from Jerome onward, it needs to be pointed out that they are not the ones to blame. The five original authors -- all...

Thank you, @JohnB. You sound very sure that the “bread” mentioned in this context can only be unleavened matzah, whereas an earlier poster on this thread, @Aaron56, sounds very sure that it is the opposite. In either case, that is not really the question I am asking here. My concern is not so...

Thank you, @PaulThomson. You have set out your argument very elegantly and very convincingly. Just one further question, if you don’t mind. Although you don’t say so explicitly, you give me the impression that you agree with my view that the expression “breaking bread,” whenever it occurs in...

Does the term “Eucharist” necessarily imply the use of unleavened bread rather than leavened? I wouldn’t have thought so, but I don’t really know. I’ve never needed to know. Maybe you’re right. But in any case, in first-century Judea unleavened bread was baked by common people in their common...

Do you really see some of those passages as just saying they were eating a meal? I know there are plenty of people who do, but I’ve never been able to see it. Of course, the feeding of the 5000/ 4000 took place several years before the Last Supper and the institution of the Eucharist. But the...

@Seeker47, our brief discussion about the Saturday or Sunday question has reminded me of something odd I once noticed about Luke’s wording in a certain verse in Acts. I’d be grateful if you could take a quick look at the last few words in the opening post of a new thread I just started, titled...

I missed the five-minute deadline for editing my post and now I need to correct a factual error. The two miracles of the loaves and fishes add up, in reality, to only fifteen of the twenty-seven occurrences of “breaking bread,” not to twenty-one as I mistakenly wrote. Apologies to all for...

“The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?” (1 Cor 10:16, KJV). “Breaking bread” is mentioned twenty-seven times in the NT, in contexts where the sacramental nature of the action...

Thank you, @Seeker47! In answer to your question about the OT Sabbath, I think it’s just as well to be specific because, in Christian use, we more often see the term used to refer to Sunday than to Saturday ― at least in English, though I don’t know of any other language where that curious shift...

^^^ This! @Seeker47, if you don't mind my asking, would you care to explain your reason for preferring that spelling of Our Lord's name, rather than the usual English spelling? And another, unrelated, question: Apart from the Seventh Day Adventists, are there any other Christian...

No, I wouldn’t describe them as synonyms. That would be overstating the case. But each one has its range of meanings and in certain areas ― notably in Bible translation, the activity we’re concerned with here ― those ranges can sometimes overlap. “Dispensation” is an altogether different case...

MM, did you look at that Bible Hub page I linked to in my post #226? It lists over forty (exactly forty-four, I think) translations of 1 Cor 11:25. More than three-quarters of them dissent from your opinion that “the cup Jesus passed was the cup of the new testament, not covenant.” In fact all...