Are people who are dating single?

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seoulsearch

OutWrite Trouble
May 23, 2009
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wouldnt he just have said he was widowed if he had been married?
I dont think people should complicate things as it was quite clear in those times he was unmarried.
Yes, that's what I wonder about as well.

An answer we won't know until we speak to him ourselves someday.
 

Lanolin

Well-known member
Dec 15, 2018
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when Paul wrote about the unmarried and widowed, and said 'even as I' I think he was referring to being or staying single and saying it was a good thing to be.

I think if he was widowed there would have been a reference to his deceased or 'sleeping' wife or maybe children. We know that Paul called Timothy his son but that was meaning his spiritual son.

Stephen died for being believer, can you imagine Paul having a wife, what if she had believed while Paul was Saul she would have had a major rough time of it!
 

Lanolin

Well-known member
Dec 15, 2018
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I think aside from that if you are 'dating' it means you on a date with someone and going out, it means you are not single you are with that person alone for a few hours, so you are a couple or potential couple for those two or three hours you are dating. Its pretty much the intent.
You dont want to be single.

if you make the commitment whatver way you do it, hold hands, exhange rings, locks of hair, spit or blood or WHATEVER you obviously want to form a bond, maybe permanetly with the other person. If you go so far to have a baby, change your name, location and address to anothers and leave your family behind, obviously that is a huge life change for someone. Some people think they can bribe someone to do this by offering a lot of money.

I dont know how much different this is from prostituion...
 

JesusLives

Senior Member
Oct 11, 2013
14,554
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You are "not single again" the moment you are first married.

Is it not true that what decides that on a tax return is whether or not your marital status is 'married' rather than whether or not your marital status is 'single'?

Did it occur to you when you decided to ask this question that the governmental tax agency you refer to is "all in" to playing "the devil's game"...??? (Just wondering.)
What is the devils game? Asking for a friend...
 

Amanuensis

Well-known member
Jun 12, 2021
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Not sure if Pharisees were required to be married. The Saducees, another sect, DID ask about marriage. They were a bit obessesed with it and didnt believe in the resurrection.

Paul was a Pharisee.
You have stated what I believe is the consensus. Paul probably was never an official member of the Sanhedrin even though he was a disciple of one of their most renown members, Gamaliel.

As his disciple he was probably interning and given tasks of greater responsibility with the authority of the Sanhedrin or members of the sanhedrin behind him in that he held the coats (witness) of those who stone Stephen, or voted for people to be put to death. He was given letters from the Sanhedrin to arrest people and all of these things I think he did as a Pharisee who was "earning his stripes" to one day be a member of the 70. I am sure that he was a sure bet for appointment but Jesus met him on the Road to Damascus and changed all that.

And later Paul considered all that he had accomplished and those things that were promised him among the leadership if he had stayed on that track as garbage and worthless compared to knowing Jesus.

Most of the sources I have read say that it was not required for a Pharisee to be married, but encouraged and that it was a requirement for a member of the Sanhedrin.

I don't think Paul had ever been married. But Paul did say ...1 Cor 9:5 Have we no right to lead about a wife that is a believer, even as the rest of the apostles, and the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas? (which of course was a way of saying that he and Barnabas did have that right)
 

Lanolin

Well-known member
Dec 15, 2018
23,460
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who would really want to marry a Pharisee though? :unsure: