I'm not going to bother answering arguments that focus on your assumptions of what Jewish people thought and how that effects what could or could not be the case with New Testament revelation. These are all speculations on your part and I don't want to waste my time addressing speculations of what you think Jews would or would not have accepted. Most Jews did not accept the Gospel Paul preached, period. Clearly God was not concerned with making his message palatable for the Jewish masses.
I will respond with a famous rule made by an accepted Trin scholar respected by all. Gordon Fee, Number One Rule of Exegesis: Consider the historical context overall.
Amen. Touche.
This isn't a "smoke" screen. You are bringing up the Greek language to prove your point. I am showing how your points display a complete lack of knowledge about the Greek language. I don't know how you can bring up a point using Greek language, I respond to that point by showing you that you don't know how Greek grammar works, and suddenly I am trying to "smoke" you with Greek expertise. One guy with a PhD does not prove a point. We could take 1000 PhD's with expertise in the Greek language and I am absolutely confident the other 999 would disagree with Jason if he is arguing that "God" is the subject and that it should be used as an adjective meaning "godly." So if you want to use scholarship as rationale for your beliefs, then you are fighting a losing battle here.
I don't really argue from Greek language at all, primarily but rather from the basis of Judaic Religion which is your basis also, sir. I am not a Greek expert and never said I was, but neither are you from what I can see, deciding things can only be interpreted ONE WAY every time in the Greek.
Hint: Just as in English, every verse can be taken at least 5-6 ways and be significantly different a few ways. If you don't understand THIS then maybe you don't understand language in general, sir. The cohesion of verse in the Body of Written Word as a whole must be from reason and common sense in the end. Why? Why....since God intended the Written Word to be read by and to common men, women and children not just scholars like YOU who can scintillate meanings over others.
I find your second statement telling....once again. You have already DETERMINED what John would and would not say and you are bound and determined to find someone who agrees with you. This is not scholarship and it is not theologically honest. Scholars look at the information and allow the truth to determine their conclusions. They don't make conclusions and allow that to determine what they will allow to be truth. I appreciate your honesty in your biases, but if you are going to be biased in this manner, you should stop trying to justify your bias with scholarship. Your position has nothing to do with Greek, scholarship or what is actually written in any particular passage. It has everything to do with what you have already determined based on your preconceived notions developed from your self-education through Google.
Let me allow for your decrepidation of my inherent lack of character. And tell you a simple paradigm which changed my whole line of investigation 2 years ago. The first three Creeds of the Christian Church has NO STATEMENT that Jesus is God. Very telling, not of YOUR CHARACTER sir, but of the Character of the first two generations of Christianity:
Ireneus Rule of Faith 3rd Century
. . . this faith: in one God, the Father Almighty, who made the heaven and the earth and the seas and all the things that are in them; and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who was made flesh for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who made known through the prophets the plan of salvation, and the coming, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the bodily ascension into heaven of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and his future appearing from heaven in the glory of the Father to sum up all things and to raise anew all flesh of the whole human race . . .
****************************************************************************************************************
Third Century Old Roman Symbol
I believe in God the Father almighty;
and in Christ Jesus His only Son, our Lord,
Who was born from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary,
Who under Pontius Pilate was crucified and buried,
on the third day rose again from the dead,
ascended to heaven,
sits at the right hand of the Father,
whence He will come to judge the living and the dead;
and in the Holy Spirit,
the holy Church,
the remission of sins,
the resurrection of the flesh
(the life everlasting).[7]
*******************************************************************************************************************
Fourth Century Apostolic's Creed
1. I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.
2. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.
3. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary.
4. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried.
5. He descended to the dead. On the third day he rose again.
6. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
7. He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
8. I believe in the Holy Spirit,
9. the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints,
10. the forgiveness of sins,
11. the resurrection of the body,
12. and life everlasting.
Amen.
Yeah. I'm dead wrong along with all the major English Bible translations ever produced. And you know this because Jason says so? (My brief looking at reviews on his assessment of the NWT does seem to indicate that he believes Theos should be translated "godly"...FYI)
He does allow for a more qualitative word "God" than the usual meaning of THE GOD, sir. My own [ly] is a nothead flourish. I know you love 'em, sir. That's why you keep coming back for more, sir.
Here's a tuition free Greek lesson for you...
kai Theos en ho Logos.
We know both Theos and Logos are nouns due to their -os endings. In Koine Greek, word order doesn't matter. In English, the subject is at the beginning of the sentence, but not so in Greek. In Greek, the subject can be in the beginning, end or middle of the sentence. What matters is not the order, but the endings. So, here we have two possible subjects...Theos and Logos. How do we know which is the subject? Well, that is why one has the definite article and the other does not. The definite article tells us that Logos is the subject because it has the definite article "ho." So, this means that Theos is the predicate nominative. It means it could be translated "and the Word was God" or "and the Word was a god." More likely is the translation, "and the Word was God."
Maybe you know just enough to get you patooty in the slammer. I knew a few know-it-alls like that in High School. Smarty pants they were.
For your info and in order for us to convo please don't tell me there is a RULE which says the definite noun has to be the subject. All the definite article does is make a noun specific, sir. I don't know how to convince you of this. You might have to think on it a little.
Well if God was "fully man" then he could most certainly die. Although it was merely the body of the man Jesus that died. His Spirit did not die, but because he was truly a man and not a ghost, he was capable of dying. Jesus was quoting Psalm 20. Read the entire Psalm. In the midst of his feelings of separation, there is complete trust in God, knowing that he would live and God would be glorified.
Well, I'm fully man and when I die I won't be able to do much. In fact for awhile I'll probably be sleepin' and from my own experience or from what my wife tells me I'm not much good for doing anything but snoring. However Jesus was a man greater than me by far, so who knows...
...maybe he COULD raise his own self up, even though he was snoring at the same time. This is possible, theoretically. Just not from anything I ever saw.
Most people dead for instance can't even get out of the dirt they got put in, as far as I know.
What doesn't make sense is why God would allow a third party to die for our sins and how this would somehow cleanse the sin of the entire would and yet God would "alone" be the Savior of all. You have not answered many of my questions and the ones you have tried to answer....well, again...you need to steer clear of the Greek language if you plan to answer my theological questions for you (and Purity who has apparently checked out once they were called upon to defend their theology).
I guess your 'would' is 'world.' Jesus is the Savior who was planned and created for just such a thing. Salvation. So who then is the Savior? God first. Jesus second.
And Purity is too pure for a blood and guts battle. I can see how he would stay away. However nothead isn't, he too dumb to know he's in the sewer of an argument.
Ignorance is sometimes bliss.