The Chosen

Janie23 said:

To put this sentiment in metaphor, the show is a mirror.

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This show is a mirror of the irreverence of The Chosen producers.

Anchorite said:

Jesus Christ never lied or sinned in any way.

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What verse says that?

You are falsely equating lying with sin. The midwife’s in Moses infant day were honored by God for lying about Hebrew women giving birth before they arrived (so they couldn’t kill the new born son Pharaoh’s orders). Rehab is so honored as being listed in Jesus’ genealogy and her honor is due to lying to those who were chasing Hebrew spies.

A semi-modern test is to ask if you would tell the gestapo where Ann Frank is hiding?

Anchorite said:

The food for thought you need to let ferment is that Jesus Christ never lied or sinned in any way.

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Actually, I'm ruminating on how John 2, John 6, John 15, The Last Supper, and the Crucifixion and Resurrection are all partake of a central metaphor -- and how that metaphor is likewise integral to the notion of repentance, and consistent with the Christ's spotlessness.

Wrangler said:

What verse says that?

You are falsely equating lying with sin. The midwife’s in Moses infant day were honored by God for lying about Hebrew women giving birth before they arrived (so they couldn’t kill the new born son Pharaoh’s orders). Rehab is so honored as being listed in Jesus’ genealogy and her honor is due to lying to those who were chasing Hebrew spies.

A semi-modern test is to ask if you would tell the gestapo where Ann Frank is hiding?

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Jesus never sinned.

2 Corinthians 5:20,21

We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

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Lying is a sin. When telling the truth could be risky, you remain silent, you do not lie.

Jesus was never in a position where telling the truth would be risky, e.g., “is Ann Frank hiding in your house?”

Jesus never lied about anything. You ignorantly misinterpret scriptures to assault the character of Christ. You don’t understand how sleeping can mean dead. You claim this temple means the temple Jesus was strolling through, rather than His body. And so forth.

Are you fond of lying, and wish to justify it?

Revelation 21:8

But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.

Mormons have a very different Jesus than the true Jesus Christ of the Bible. Dallas Jenkins does not seem to understand this.

Derral Eves, one of two Latter-day Saint executive producers of the hit show The Chosen, knows the show’s creator, Dallas Jenkins, has received pushback for choosing to work with members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Jenkins acknowledged working with and developing deep friendships with several members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in recent years with the show.

“I stand by the statement that those friends of mine that I’m referring to absolutely love the same Jesus that I do,” he said.

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Anchorite said:

Jesus Christ never lied

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Wrangler said:

What verse says that?

You are falsely equating lying with sin.

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Anchorite said:

Jesus never sinned.

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Not what you said, is it? Didn’t address my point, did you?

Anchorite said:

The food for thought you need to let ferment is that Jesus Christ never lied or sinned in any way. To claim that Jesus was deceptive, where do you think such blasphemy has its origin?

2 Corinthians 5:20,21

We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

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Hello, Brother, thank you, how are you all? We are well,

After reading reviews of The Chosen, the main point by fans is they do not care if the gospels are distorted, ridiculous fiction is added, and Jesus is misrepresented. They like The Chosen because it is entertainment. They like being entertained. They enjoy watching movies. Scriptural accuracy means nothing to them.

Negative reviews focus on the biblical errors and the dumbing down of the character of Jesus. They see The Chosen as misleading viewers and inventing a different Jesus who is very inferior to the true Jesus of the gospels. They also dislike the many unseemly, unlikely, and sexualized scenes (like with Peter and his wife).

So people who just love movies, and don’t care about biblical faithfulness, tend to approve of The Chosen and are offended by criticisms.

Triumph1300 said:

Maybe point that out to your friend in the White House.

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I have no friend in the White House.

Again, you jump to conclusions and seek to label individuals based on your faulty assumptions and hostile political bias.

I have never declared any allegiance to any politician or party.

You are Canadian. Your opinion about US politics is irrelevant.

You should calm down, lay aside your propaganda, and try to think clearly.

Some people like making it up as they go and some people enjoy such fantasy; just the way it is. We're living in a world where truth doesn't matter if you can make money from fiction.

Wrangler said:

What verse says that?

You are falsely equating lying with sin.

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There are a multitude of verses that equate lying with sin.

In the OT, the 9th Commandment tells us not to bear false witness -- which means it's a sin alongside other transgressions like adultery, murder, and theft. In Leviticus, it says not to steal, nor deal falsely, nor lie to each other, nor swear falsely by the name of the Lord, nor defraud one's neighbor or steal from him. Lying is a sin.

Proverbs lists seven things detestable to the Lord: Pride, a lying tongue, murder, wicked schemes, running towards evil, bearing false witness, and spreading discord. Lying is technically listed twice. Lying is a sin.

In the NT, Paul writes in Colossians 3 that we need to put on a new self upon being born again; we need to rid ourselves of anger, wrath, malice, slander, obscene speech, and lying to each other -- which is then equated with repentance: strip off the old self and put on the new self. Repentance means to stop sinning.

This is reiterated in Ephesians: rid ourselves of the old self corrupted in the lust of deceit; put on the new self by ridding ourselves of falsehood, and instead speaking the truth. In 1 Timothy, Paul describes sinners as murderers, fornicators, slavers, and liars. In Romans, he lists deceit alongside murder, envy, strife, slander, and greed. Lying is a sin.

And we know Jesus is without deceit from 1 Peter: "He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth." This is important, because for God to accept the sacrifice by which our own sins are ransomed by Jesus, he himself needed to be, like the traditional Passover sacrifice, "like that of a lamb without blemish or spot".

This means that to believe Jesus died for our sins, whereby he can redeem our own sins, we must have faith that Jesus didn't sin and didn't lie. Therefore, if an interpretation of Scripture presents the words of Jesus as a lie or a deceit, such interpretation must be recognized as being in error -- the error of someone who is actually an unbeliever.

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In John 8, Jesus says the truth will make us free, for committing sin makes us slaves to sin. (By reason, therefore, lying is a sin.) He explains that God is the truth, while the devil is the father of lies -- there is no truth in him. "Which one of you convicts Me of sin? If I speak truth, why do you not believe Me? He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God."

This helps to explain why unbelievers fail to understand the parables and metaphors that Jesus provides; they are inclined to misconstrue his words through blind literalism (underlining the fact that The Kingdom of God is superior to the material world), rather than believing and faithfully striving to understand.

Perhaps this is why Jesus is fond of parable and metaphor -- it makes visible those who have faith and those who do not, separating the wheat from the chaff.

This is exactly what happens in John 2, when the Pharisees (who are disinclined to believe Jesus from the outset) fail to accept the true prophesy that the temple of Jesus's body will be raised in three days after being destroyed; had they believed, they would not have conveniently assumed that he was referring to a building. (Though I have no doubt that had they actually believed, they would have torn down the building, and it would have been restored in 3 days, but they let the building stand, demonstrating their lack of faith.)

In John 6, he deigns to separate those who truly believe from those who follow merely because of the material bread they received, by distinguishing the ordinary bread that is literally eaten but which still leads to death (the wages of sin), from the heavenly bread that gives eternal life which is represented by Jesus himself. Peter begins to provide the correct interpretation at the end when he says that it is Jesus's words that give eternal life.

His body and blood are what is sacrificed on the Cross -- he is the temple that's destroyed and raised again in three days. What it therefore means to "eat the flesh and drink the blood" of Jesus is to integrate that action and teaching into one's self as if it were food. The metaphor is "Ideas are Food," by which we get food for thought, ideas to chew on, half-baked theories, devouring books, stewing on problems, regurgitating facts, being spoon-fed answers, and needing time to digest what we've been told.

He who hath ears, let him hear.

Janie23 said:

There are a multitude of verses that equate lying with sin.

In the OT, the 9th Commandment tells us not to bear false witness -- which means it's a sin

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This is an error that we were all taught. How you know lying is different than false witness is Proverbs 6:16-19
16 There are six things the LORD hates,
seven that are detestable to him:
17 haughty eyes,
a lying tongue,
hands that shed innocent blood,
18 a heart that devises wicked schemes,
feet that are quick to rush into evil,
19 a false witness who pours out lies
and a person who stirs up conflict in the community.

Notice how lying is in verse 17 and false witness is in v19? These are regarded as different items among the list of 6 things to be hated. False witness, pertains exclusively to perjury, a witness in a court of justice. Notice too how lying is tied to pride, being haughty? Study notes in the NSRV Cultural Bible explain that lying from a place where you think of yourself as being too good so should escape condemnation is where this is coming from - as opposed to misdirecting one whose intentions are evil, like in the case of Moses Midwives, Rahab and Jesus enemies.

Not sure if you saw my post about Ann Frank. If asked, would you tell the Gestapo where she was hiding? Few would consider such lying a sin. And if you never saw it, I strongly recommend the dramatic role Robin Williams played in Jacob The Liar. It was set in a concentration camp where he reportedly had a radio where he got reports of the Allies winning and the Nazi's losing the war. Despite turning the camp upside down, the guard found no radio. Jacob's reports gave hope to those who lost all hope. He was given a choice by the commandant. Publicly admit he lied and live or be shot for lying. He looked around, saw the hope of all the prisoners and made his choice. I don't think it was a sin. Do you?

Another context of lying is would you tell Herod the Great where the baby Jesus was in the stable? I wouldn't betray our Lord with the truth.

Equivocating over the original commandments doesn't get us off the hook. Proverbs positions "a lying tongue" between pride and murder, connecting the two -- we can't escape lying as a sin just because Proverbs lists false witness separately; indeed, it makes it even more clear that plain old lying most definitely isn't excluded.

And Paul makes it very clear in multiple places that lying is a sin, as if there were still any doubt.

Such doubt undoubtedly arose from those who tried to evade the consequences through the dissimulating legalistic language of the most literalist interpretations. Such is the problem of "the letter of the law" versus "the spirit of the law." This may well be a problem inherent to language itself, but that's another story.

(This conversation does make me think that this is another reason why the Wedding at Cana features the miracle of Jesus turning water from ritual purification jugs into wine -- transforming the "law" of external rites, which don't change one's interior state, into "living waters" of the spirit that do change one's interior state. Such is the difference between the "spirit" and the "letter" of the law.)

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Now, as I mentioned before regarding Rome and Sanhedrin (and which also applies to Gestapo, KGB, and the like), there is a lie and hence a sin embedded in the hypotheticals regarding Anne Frank and Jacob's Radio -- these are situations rooted in false authority. Yes, the devil was the daddy of such diabolical institutions. Of course we should oppose such entities. As conceding to such would perpetuate a diabolical lie, so another strategy is in order.

One strategy is to hold one's tongue. It isn't a sin per se, but for someone of faith it's like wrapping that single talent in a napkin and burying it in the dirt.

Another strategy is to sin in response to sin by telling a lie. But then one should beg forgiveness from the Lord and examine why one didn't have the faith to either face persecution or to receive the Holy Spirit for direction out of that mess. I would hope that forgiveness is forthcoming, but that is for God to judge; repentance is still in order.

A better strategy is to openly defy such false authority, even at the price of one's own life. Indeed, we have many examples of Christian martyrs who refused to bend and were subsequently glorified.

Jesus lays out a final strategy, which I mentioned above: receiving the Holy Spirit. Jesus is able to escape false authority on multiple occasions because He's divinely inspired -- He is able to speak the Truth in a way that's multilayered through metaphors that point to greater spiritual truths over lesser material ones, and are laden with true prophesy. His use of metaphor creates a more truthful reality by separating the faithful from unbelievers. And He accepts that this will still lead to His death, but at an hour appointed by God, not men.

(One could generously paint Jacob's Radio as a metaphor for spreading the gospel -- here, the Radio is the Holy Spirit, which Jacob can hear after his experience on the Ladder, and the Allies prevailing over false authority would be a prophecy of Good News; I myself would have to see the film to see if the metaphor truly holds water.)

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We have to go back to Proverbs and come full circle -- the first in that list is Pride. This is the antithesis of self-sacrifice. For ego cannot bring about the ego-death pointed to by the Cross. Pride is a "sin" because it keeps us missing the mark, with the target being a return to God. That's why Pride is on the list.

Let's return to an earlier conversation:

Janie23 said:

Where does faith fit in when one has already seen?

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Wrangler said:

That’s THE question man has wrestled with since the Garden.

I hate faith and aspire to god like knowledge, which explains why Adam and Eve are the forbidden fruit.

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The problem is that the aspiration to god-like knowledge (of life, the universe, and everything?) prevents access to the same. One gets there through faith, for it is faith that can put the ego aside so that the self can die and be received by God. The gnostics called this experience "gnosis" and had techniques for conferring it. But it comes at a cost: proof denies faith. And that makes it ever more difficult to get back. "Blessed are those who have not seen, but still believed." We should not aspire to god-like knowledge or gnosis, nor should we encourage it; it gets in the way of being subsequently received by God again. It's a stumbling block.

Likewise, "lying" is on the Proverbial list because it gets in the way of being received by God, for God is the Truth.

To casually claim that Jesus is "lying" or "being deceitful" when we've been explicitly been told that there was never even deceit on His tongue... no, in the face of the apparent inconsistencies you've highlighted, I think we're behooved to demonstrate His Truth instead. Which means we have work to do.

Thankfully, I can say there was a saving grace to your prompt: it's given me the impetus to study the Scriptures more deeply than I ever have before, and indeed that study has already yielded much fruit. I still have to mull it over before I can spill more digital ink on such deep thought in yet another post. But I am grateful.

I'm not sure we're actually at odds with each other, Wrangler. I think we just have very different frames of reference. Or at least I hope. Here's what I see to be our main difference: I consider apt metaphors to be true, but you seem to consider them to be lies or deceits. I find it strange that you're anathema to metaphor. It might actually be the babel fish you've been looking for.

The Kingdom of God is at hand, but we do not see it.

Yours in Love and Christ,
Jane

Janie23 said:

Equivocating over the original commandments doesn't get us off the hook.

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It’s not an equivocation one little bit! The commandment is a prohibition against perjury, period. Pretending it means the same as general lying does not honor God’s word. Most people who study S rioture deeply will tell you that it is more nuanced, figurative and hyperbolic than we tend to speak today.

I’m disappointed that you started off your rebuttal re,ting on the 10 commandments because I do believe there are much better verses to support your position. Obviously, doubling down on it shows you are entrenched In a false narrative.

Janie23 said:

And Paul makes it very clear in multiple places that lying is a sin

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Why do you ignore the many verses I cite and just repeat your point? (Without actually citing Paul’s “many” verses?)

For the record, I’m not saying there are no verses that call out lying. In fact, the verses I cite in Proverbs did just that! It’s that there is context, which I provided multiple times. Why didn’t you answer my questions?

Wrangler said:

Notice how lying is in verse 17 and false witness is in v19?

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Wrangler said:

Not sure if you saw my post about Ann Frank?

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Wrangler said:

If asked, would you tell the Gestapo where she was hiding?

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Wrangler said:

Jacob The Liar. …. He looked around, saw the hope of all the prisoners and made his choice. I don't think it was a sin. Do you?

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Wrangler said:

Another context of lying is would you tell Herod the Great where the baby Jesus was in the stable?

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