Is Hell eternal, or do some/all escape it? In his recent book, Love Wins, author and pastor Rob Bell caused quite a bit of controversy (and anger) by making the argument that Heaven is the state that we are in when we follow God's will and Hell is the state we are in when we follow our own will, and that after death there is no reason to think that we will continue on in these state. He argues that we obviously have the choice to follow God's will our or own in life, but it is debatable if that decision will be available after death.

He essentially cites every single mention of Hell in the Bible and makes the case that most are fairly ambiguous when it comes to the eternal state of those who die rejecting God's will. He explains that a lot of the modern imagery of hell is a product of the middle ages, and is not in fact Biblically based (Satan is the ruler of hell, etc). I couldn't help but notice he did not mention several versus that did not mention hell explicitly, but which clearly reference it and seem to make clear it is eternal.

He also went on to cite a number of versus that indicate that God wants everyone to be saved and ask the question 'Does God get what he wants?'

  who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth

1 Timothy 2:4

So, is it debatable? Are there any denominations which do not place those who rejected or never heard the gospel in hell forever? Is it heretical to believe that some non Christians will not be in hell forever?

According to scripture, hell is real, and anyone who was not born again will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

  41“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
  42For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink,
  43I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’
  44Then they also will answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?’
  45Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’
  46And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” - Matthew 25:41-46 ESV

  14Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death.
  15If anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. - Revelation 20:14-15

This clearly states that anyone who does not follow Christ and accept Him into their heart will go to hell. It's inconvenient, but nowhere does it say that following him will be convenient. Anyone who thinks they have an expert knowledge of God is silly. God is too big for man to understand. We have the gift of prayer and his word to find answers in.

Francis Chan did a wonderful job of explaining this on YouTube.


What does Paul intend to say in 1 Corinthians 5:5? To be more clear, how can the person be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ by delivering such person (sexual immoral) to Satan for the destruction of the flesh?

  1 Corinthians 5:5 (NKJV)
  5  deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

If you read the general context of this passage in Corinthians you will find that there is a lot of stuff about church order, roles in the church, how to deal with problems inside and outside the body of believers, etc.

The verse you quote in particular starts to make sense when you see it as a reference to church discipline and understand the purpose of discipline. In this case we're specifically talking about the last possible stage of  disipline: excommunication. This is the final step a church will take in trying to bring somebody who claims to be a believer into alignment with their confession. Although the step is a drastic one, the purpose is no different than the earlier steps: Christ receiving glory as people are saved and brought from darkness to light.

Excommunication (or total removal of a person from the church) serves two purposes.

It protects the church. The church is supposed to be holy: the bride of Christ spotless and reserved for Him. Of course the church is also comprised of sinners, but we are in the process of being made holy. Step by step we are supposed to be conforming to his standards and looking more like him. If somebody is moving the oposite direction — deliberately and intentionally sinning and justifying their sin, then removing them from the body prevents the corruption from spreading.
It stands as a severe warning. The hope is that by being rejected by the church they will be made aware of the seriousness of their sin before God and realize that they need to repent. Removal from the church only happens after teaching, warning, and internal discipline measures have failed — in other words the person is not listening to lighter warnings. They still insist they are Christian but also insist on living in a manner inconsistent with Christianity. By rejecting their claim to "be Christian" and not allowing them to participate in church functions, they are forced to consider whether they really are Christian.

Back to your verse in particular: "Deliver this man to Satan" is a reference to excommunication -- where the church rejects a person's claim to be Christian and forces them to live outside the community of the church. If the person truly has been chosen and is being saved by the Lord, finding themselves outside the blessing of the church gives them an opportunity to discover 1) how they are living "according to the flesh"; 2) how they need to repent; and 3) how they need to rededicate themselves to the Christian values they once espoused.

If they do these things, the church must then welcome them back into the fellowship of the local assembly, and the whole process will have benefited them and will have brought them one step closer to their complete salvation. If they do not do these thing, the process will prove they never did belong to Christ and may in fact serve another master!

A church can turn a blind eye to serious sin, allowing people who profess to be followers of Christ to live like followers of the devil with complete impunity, but that is not what Jesus had in mind for his true followers.

Excommunication, on the other hand, is a means by which a local church upholds biblical and righteous standards, punishes those who persist in unbiblical and unrighteous living, and moves one step closer to fulfilling Christ's purpose for his bride the church:

  That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish (Ephesians 5:27 KJV).


Are there Christian equivalents for the four sublime attitudes or brahmaviharas of Buddhism (metta, karuna, mudita, upekkha)? The brahmaviharas are four sublime mental states recognized by Buddhism and for which there exist different meditative practices designed to cultivate them. Concretely, the brahmaviharas are:

Metta (loving kindness): wishing the happiness / well-being of all conscious beings.
Karuna (compassion): wishing the end of suffering for all conscious beings.
Mudita (sympathetic joy): rejoicing when a conscious being (oneself or other) is experiencing well-being (the opposite of envy).
Upekkha (equanimity):  "To practice upekkha is to be unwavering or to stay neutral in the face of the eight vicissitudes of life—which are otherwise known as the eight worldly winds or eight worldly conditions: loss and gain, good-repute and ill-repute, praise and censure, and sorrow and happiness". I understand that it is also associated with the ability to stay in the present moment, in a state of serene mindfulness.

Question: Are there equivalent concepts in Christianity for the four brahmaviharas?
For example, my own educated guess would be that metta and karuna have probably a lot of overlap with the concept of love in Christianity, but I'm not sure if it's a perfect equivalence. And I'm not so sure if perfectly equivalent concepts can be found for mudita and upekkha either. Of course joy is definitely a thing in Christianity, as it's part of the fruit of the Holy Spirit, but what about sympathetic joy? Perhaps praising God is a form of sympathetic joy, because you feel sympathetically happy about God's good qualities? And what about the sublime state of equanimity, and all this present moment awareness and mindfulness that comes with it?

Yes, there is in Christianity something similar to the four sublime attitudes in Buddhism. Instead of four, however, there is one, and that one is composed of eight significant attitudes. Those eight attitudes are expressed in a Christian's lifestyle.
In the apostle Paul's letter to the Christians in the province of Galatia, the apostle calls that one thing "the fruit of the Spirit" (Chapter 6, verses 22-23 NIV):

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Too often, I have observed, Christians refer to the fruit of the Spirit as the fruits of the Spirit. That is unfortunate, however, because the fruit of the Spirit is what you might call a "package deal." We could say quite accurately that with the fruit of God's Spirit, the whole is, in a sense, greater than the sum of the parts.
When a person is born again (or born from above) through the regenerating power of God's Holy Spirit, that person has been given all that he or she needs to live a godly life (see 2 Peter 1:3). Is there an instant transformation in that person's life? No. That transformation, referred to in Scripture as sanctification, is a lifelong process. Moreover, that process does not come about through human effort alone. The fruit of the Spirit is made possible by the Holy Spirit, not by human effort.
Salvation, of which sanctification is an important part, is a joint effort between God and every individual believer in Jesus Christ. In his letter to the Philippian Christians, Paul put it this way:

Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.
For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure (2:12-13 KJV, my italics).

Christians do not work for salvation. Salvation is a gift from God and not of works (see Ephesians 2:8-9), but Christians do work out their salvation in the warp and woof of life. Since God is the one who works within Christians to will and to do His good pleasure, all the credit and all the glory go to God. Christians are but vessels or channels through whom the fruit of the Spirit is fleshed out existentially.
Jesus put the same concept--different words--this way:

I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing (John 15:5 NASV, my bolding).

In short, the Christian's primary responsibility in working out their salvation is to  be "filled with the Holy Spirit" and "to keep in step with the Holy Spirit." Whatever attitude is needed in any given moment is a gift of the Holy Spirit. That gift comes through yieldedness, sensitivity, and obedience to the Spirit. While one Christian might struggle more with yieldedness in the area of patience than another Christian, the same Spirit is at work in both. The good news is that when a Christian fails to demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit, he or she can confess that failure God, receive forgiveness, and live to fight another day.


Why is Rome the holy city? Why did Rome become the seat of the Pope and the central location for the Church? I would think that Jerusalem would be the first choice. There are also a number of other cities that I would personally pick over Rome because of location and centrality to the early Church. Maybe the issue is that Rome was more central to the early church than I think it was.

I am looking for an answer that discusses the history mostly and the RCC opinion on this.

During the Siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD the city was destroyed almost down to the bedrock with not a stone left atop another, just as Jesus had predicted. Jews were forbidden to enter the city for a long time afterward. This also applied to a small Jewish dissent group called "Christians". This forced everybody (who were alive) to leave Jerusalem and move to the next possible alternative, wherever that was.

Reason 1: St. Peter was in Rome. St. Peter and St. Mark went to Rome to help Christians there. The Catholic Church has always held that Ubi Petrus ibi ecclesia, et ibi ecclesia vita eterna, that is Where there is Peter there is the Church, where there is the Church there is life eternal!. [St Ambrose (d. 397 A.D.), Commentary on the Psalms 40, 30]

So where else can Christians go when they have nowhere else to go? There are plenty of Church Fathers like St. Jerome  (Letters 15:1 [A.D. 396]) and St. Irenaeus who give this as the reason.

Reason 2: Rome was the largest and most powerful City on Earth. Hence, it was the best possible place to spread the Gospel quickly, as it was the most connected city. Remember "All road leads to Rome".

Reason 3: Pre-existing infrastructure. When the emperor Theodosius I made Christianity the official state religion, all pagan temples in Rome were converted into christian churches which made Rome amicable to the Christian population.

Reason 4: Necessary to full-fill prophecy of Daniel. Some scholars like Dr. Scott Hahn interpret the prophecy in Daniel 7 as Rome to be the fourth kingdom and that Christ was to come, overthrow this kingdom, and establish an everlasting kingdom in its place. This is why the first thirty or so Popes kept coming back to Rome despite being martyred there.

Reason 5: Divine providence. As a Catholic, I personally believe the reason to be divine providence. If the Catholic Church is based in Jerusalem, then there would be unnecessary problems with other faiths which existed then and have come into existence since.


In the Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit, what is the the distinction between the gifts of wisdom, understanding, and knowledge? In the Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit, what is the the distinction between the gifts of wisdom, understanding, and knowledge?

  cf. Isaiah 11:2
  (RSVCE)
  2 And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him,
      the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
      the spirit of counsel and might,
      the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.[a]

  Footnotes: a. 11.2 The enumeration of the “gifts of the Holy Spirit”
  is taken from this passage.

and Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1831.

OK, I admit these are not explicitly Christian examples, but I would submit that they clearly demonstrate the difference between knowledge, understanding and wisdom.

Example 1:

Knowledge: you know when you press the "on" button, that the computer activates.

Understanding: you know that after pressing the "on" button, the electricity from the power grid enters your machine, is processed by the power supply, and is distributed with the proper characteristics for your computer to work.

Wisdom: You know that because lightning can generate power surges in the electrical grid that can damage electronic equipment, that it's better not to turn on activate the power button during a thunderstorm.

Example 2:

Knowledge: you know when your significant other is stressed upon arrival home after work, and requires some chill out time to regain a cheerful demeanor.

Understanding: you know that the stress is a result of the commute, and perhaps events that happened during the day, and has little or nothing to do with you personally.

Wisdom: you keep the first interval immediately upon arriving home for relaxing and stress reducing behaviors and activities, and save stress inducing ones for later.


Why is there such an emphasis on Jesus's suffering - particularly by the Catholic Church? It seems too me that the suffering of Jesus is exaggerated.  I mean so many people have suffered tremendously for years. For example, handicapped/sick people, prisoners, holocaust victims etc.

I don't understand why one person who suffered just a few hours / days is so special.  What makes people want to magnify/emphasize the suffering of Jesus so much?

On the surface, Christ's suffering may not appear necessarily unique in respect to the levels or duration of either physical or emotional pain, but it was certainly unique in respect to the nature of the sufferer and the spiritual dimension of the suffering: The completely innocent Incarnate Creator suffering at the hands of his rebellious creation; and the bearing of the burden of the sins of the whole world and consequential estrangement (albeit temporarily) from the intimate fellowship (enjoyed from eternity past) of the Heavenly Father. (cf. Philippians 2:5-8, Isaiah 53, Matthew 26:36-42 & 27:46)

edit: I believe the preceding paragraph would be largely agreeable to most Nicaean Christians. Catholics in particular are often encouraged to meditate on the suffering of Christ as it helps to develop a greater appreciation of Christ's work overall and leads the believer to turn their heart whole-heartedly to the Lord.  An example of this is the contemplation of the stations of the cross.


How does the doctrine of Papal Infallibility account for Peter's error? I understand that the Catholic Churches teaches the doctrine of Papal Infallibility.  How does that account for the Scripture that references Peter's error?

  But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he
  stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating
  with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated
  himself, fearing the circumcision party. And the rest of the Jews
  acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led
  astray by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that their conduct was not
  in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them
  all, "If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew,
  how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews?"  Galatians 2:11-14
  (ESV)

As this question explains, the Pope is not considered infallible every time he speaks, but only when he speaks ex cathedra. Essentially this means only when he makes a deliberately definitive pronouncement on a matter of doctrine. The quote you give is therefore not relevant. Even if Peter were considered a Pope at this point, the incident described would not invalidate papal infallibility.

The doctrine of papal infallibility is not founded on biblical texts specifically. It is founded on the (biblically supported) doctrine that the church is the custodian of truth, and that St. Peter was appointed by Christ as head of it. This article gives much more detail.


How are Orthodox monastic names chosen? Orthodox monks seem to always acquire monastic names when they join a monastery. Thus Mikhail became Macarius. (They also acquire a "seminary surname" if they did not have one already, though this seems not to happen any more since the newcomers already all have surnames.)

What rules or process guide the selection of the monastic names? Are they supposed to be Greek? Who makes the decision as to a name and what is it supposed to represent?

The monastic name is given at the Small Schema tonsuring by the person that performs it (a bishop or an abbot). It is him that chooses this name. He may or may not consult the monk himself or his community about it.

The names don't have to be Greek. But they should be the names of existing saints or ones that relate to some Truths of Faith.

The name is meant to honor a particular Saint and to endow the monk with a holy patron and a figure to imitate.


Who was the target audience of the Book of Job? The Book of Job is one of my favourite books in the Bible, especially for its lesson that even in suffering, you can still persevere and be a victor for Christ.

So I'm wondering, was the Book of Job written to inspire "everyman" believers (or possibly Israelites who tried to remain faithful to Yahweh) during their periods of martyrdom and suffering?

I can see the link between it, especially when Satan is described as being the instigator of multiple scenarios (Job 2, John 15:18-27, 2 Corinthians 4:4).

But that's just my theory so it'd be nice if there are any helpful answers.

Now the question of who is the target audience for Job is a tricky one, because there is the audience that Job intended, and the audience that God intended. Since the book is not addressed to a group as are Paul's letters, or to a son as is the Book of Proverbs, or to Theophilus as are Luke and Acts, the best clues come from understanding the purpose of the book.

In Job 19, the suffering man says this:

23 “Oh that my words were written!
    Oh that they were inscribed in a book!
24 Oh that with an iron pen and lead
    they were engraved in the rock forever!
25 For I know that my Redeemer lives,
    and at the last he will stand upon the earth.
26 And after my skin has been thus destroyed,
    yet in my flesh I shall see God,
27 whom I shall see for myself,
    and my eyes shall behold, and not another.
    My heart faints within me!

Job wanted the world to know that he believed that God would raise him from the dead.

God wanted the world to know that Job spoke the truth about Him:

  7 After the Lord had spoken these words to Job, the Lord said to
  Eliphaz the Temanite: “My anger burns against you and against your two
  friends, for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant
  Job has.  (Job 42:7)

And what was this truth that Job spoke? If you read Job's speeches carefully, you will see that out of his suffering he speaks prophetically about the coming savior and about many other events that were to come to pass. Evidence in the book points to it being written between the times of Abraham and Moses. The book is filled with examples of the several approved ways that God communicates with mankind, including sacrifice, looking for clues in nature, listening to wise elders, prayer, fasting, sabbath observance, dreams, visions, suffering, angels, and theophany. Job's prayer in chapter 19 cited above is a new contribution: the Word of God in written form. Just as Abraham prayed for a son and was blessed to become the father of many nations, so Job's prayer was answered beyond his wildest expectation: his story would become the first book of the Bible to be written down.

Job's main prophecy was that God was about to construct a written record of his dealings with mankind so that all people could know clearly what God expected of them and how to seek his favor. Thus Job's audience in general was the whole world. But in particular, you will see that many verses in Proverbs have their echo in Job, as do the Psalms, Ecclesiastes, Jeremiah, Revelation and even the words of Jesus in the Gospels. So another important audience was the prophets.

Amos said this in 3:7:

“For the Lord God does nothing
    without revealing his secret
    to his servants the prophets."

If Job is the first book in the Bible, then it stands to reason that, in addition to words about what would happen in the distant future, Job would leave instructions to guide people by telling them what would happen in the near future, to authenticate his next prophet. And so he does. The Bible has many references to papyrus as a symbol of the fragility of life.

Can **papyrus** grow tall where there is no marsh?
Can reeds thrive without water? (Job 8:11)

Which will be reversed when the savior comes:

The burning sand will become a pool,
    the thirsty ground bubbling springs.
In the haunts where jackals once lay,
    grass and reeds and **papyrus** will grow. (Isaiah 35:7)

Papyrus when formed into a swift boat is used to describe people trying to outrun God's judgment:

Woe to the land of whirring wings
    along the rivers of Cush,
2 which sends envoys by sea
    in **papyrus** boats over the water. (Isaiah 18:2)

In a chapter where Job says he cannot see God, he speaks of God walking on the seas:

He alone stretches out the heavens
    and treads on the waves of the sea. (Job 9:8)

This is ironic, since a man who says he cannot see God has just given a prophecy of Jesus walking on water! (Saint John Chrysostom noted this centuries ago.) In that same chapter, Job says this:

“My days are swifter than a runner;
    they fly away without a glimpse of joy.
26 They skim past like boats of **papyrus**,
    like eagles swooping down on their prey. (Job 9:26)

Job speaks of a swift papyrus boat as reflecting how fast his life is moving towards death. The context is the midst of a storm:

He would crush me with a storm
    and multiply my wounds for no reason. (Job 9:17)

Would you want to weather a storm in a boat made of papyrus? Not safe! So Job gives the image of a swift boat made of a material not fit for stormy weather, a material that cannot save him from a swift death. So can a papyrus boat save someone marked for death? Can the Lord make Job's words ironic and deliver a soul from a watery grave?

  3 But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket
  for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in
  it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile. Exodus 2:3

Who was placed in a papyrus basket and saved from drowning in the Nile? Moses!

So I would say that the immediate audience for Job was the Hebrew people, to endorse their great prophet, Moses, a man who would pen a large part of the Old Testament, and likely do so on scrolls made of papyrus.


Do parts of Hebrews 3 and 4 imply that saved Christians can become unsaved? A few nights ago, a friend and I were reading through Hebrews 3 and 4. A few verses in particular caught my attention...

  Hebrews 3:11-13 (NLT)
  11 So in my anger I took an oath,
     ‘They will never enter my place of rest.’ ”

  12 Be careful then, dear brothers and sisters. Make sure that your own hearts are not evil and unbelieving, turning you away from the living God. 13 You must warn each other every day, while it is still “today,” so that none of you will be deceived by sin and hardened against God.

  Hebrews 4:1 (NLT)
  4 God’s promise of entering his rest still stands, so we ought to tremble with fear that some of you might fail to experience it.

It seems to me as if these verses taken together imply that a Christian can become unsaved by falling away from following God. Now, I realize that I have to some extent taken these verses out of context, but I don't see any significant contextual change between these verses. So...is my interpretation right? If not, how is it wrong?

Answers should be Biblically-based, with straight-forward exegesis from related scriptures.

No.

My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.
28I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and
no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29My Father, who
has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to
snatch them out of the Father's hand. - John 10:27-29 ESV

and

I will not leave you or forsake you. - Josh. 1:5 ESV

and

For the LORD will not forsake his people; - Ps. 94:14 ESV

The logical explanation of the verses in Hebrews is that those who fall away were never truly participators in the covenant to begin with. Indeed, reading the surrounding context in Hebrews is quite helpful:

So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.
Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us
fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it.
2For good news came to us just as to them, but the message
they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith
with those who listened. 3For we who have believed enter
that rest... - Hebrews 3:19-4:3 ESV

As the author explains, those who did not enter never believed in the first place.  This may seem strange considering what appeared to be a strong faith, so it's helpful to go to James on the subject.

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does
not have works? Can that faith save him? ...You believe that God is
one; you do well. Even the demons believe - and shudder!  - James 2:14, 19 ESV

Typically faith is split into three categories: knowledge, assent, commitment. Most modern day Americans have knowledge (that is, most know of the gospel of Christ, or at least have heard of Jesus). Many believe that He died for their sins. But as James says, "even the demons believe!" Not so many, perhaps, actually trust God for their salvation. It is one thing to think that Jesus died for you, pray a prayer, and move on. It is another to live one's whole life utterly devoted to God, in light of Christ's death and wholly dependent upon that death for Salvation.
So, it seems the people in the church addressed in Hebrews were knowers, believers even. But "faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead." (James 4:17). And dead faith is really no use to anyone. With a dead (nonexistent, i'd argue) faith, those people never really trusted in God in the first place - they were never Jesus's sheep in the first place, so they were not snatched out of his hand.
[from the perspective of a reformed presbyterian.]


What was the Jewish understanding of baptism? Considering the message of John the Baptist and the Jewish leaders reaction to it, what was the existing Jewish thought about Baptism? Who needed to be baptized and when?

what was the existing Jewish thought about Baptism?
  Who needed to be baptized and when?

According to the German Wikipedia, baptism was not common in the time of John the Baptist among the normal Jewish people at all.

There were different smaller (and probably more radical) religious groups (like the Essenes) that practiced rites similar to baptism.

  ... the message of John the Baptist and the Jewish leaders reaction to it ...

The reaction of the Jewish leaders is surely caused by John's message, not by the rite of baptism itself:

According to Mt 3,7, John the Baptist explicitly accused the religious Jewish leaders of his time to live in sin.

This explains that the Jewish religious leaders definitely did not agree to his message at all.


What is the biblical basis against baptismal regeneration? Several different denominations teach that water baptism is a prerequisite for (or is essential for) salvation. What is the biblical basis against this teaching?

One of the best articles on this controversial subject is from the Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry, entitled Is Baptism Necessary for Salvation? by Matt Slick. I've included some of the key verses it refers to, and arguments it uses, below.

Romans 5:1 and Ephesians 2:8 show that we are justified by faith (not by faith + something else). Furthermore, Romans 4:1-11 talks of being saved by faith, not by works - including the "works" of the Jewish religious ceremony of circumcision. In particular, verses 9b-10:

  We have been saying that Abraham’s faith was credited to him as
  righteousness. Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it
  after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before!

In other words, Abraham's faith saved him before his circumcision; salvation comes before the religious ceremony, not as a result of it.

As a slight aside, another oft-cited example is the account of Jesus' crucifixion (Luke 23:40-43) where one of the criminals being crucified alongside Jesus is apparently saved without being baptised. Slick does not quote this, but does make mention of the many people who receive Christ on a hospital deathbed and don't get baptised before they die.

Colossians 2:11-12 links the Old Testament ceremony of circumcision with the New Testament ceremony of baptism; therefore what applied to circumcision (it follows salvation, which is by faith) applies to baptism.

1 Corinthians 15:1-5 says that it is by the Gospel that we are saved, and defines the Gospel as Christ dying for our sins and rising again. We are saved by Christ's endeavour, not our own. Paul emphasizes this earlier in 1 Corinthians 1:17a: "For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel" - clearly the two are different things, and it is the latter that Paul sees as the more important.

There are several other passages that say "if X then you are saved" where X does not include baptism; Romans 10:9 is a good one:

  If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your
  heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

Equally, Romans 6:23 describes eternal life in Christ as a free gift - in other words, we do not have to pay, or undergo any religious rite, in order to receive it.

Slick's article then goes on to explain those verses that may seem to say that baptism is part of salvation. That's beyond the scope of this question but I would recommend reading it when looking at this issue, particularly when considering the flip-side of this coin, the question asking for the Biblical basis for baptism as a prerequisite for salvation.


What are the theological implications of "filioque"? Depending on your tradition, the Nicene Creed may or may not say that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Son as well as from the Father:

  (Greek) τὸ ἐκ τοῦ πατρὸς ἐκπορευόμενον - who from the Father proceeds
  (Latin) qui ex Patre Filioque procedit - who from the Father and the Son proceeds

This has been a point of contention between the Orthodox and Western churches, the latter category including both Catholics and Protestants, for at least a thousand years, contributing to the Great Schism. I have read about the history of "filioque" but I have basically no idea what the theological difference is meant to be. I understand that there is some doubt about whether "ἐκπορευόμενον" means the same thing as "procedit", so both versions could be right (and apparently we all agree it would be wrong to insert "and the Son" into the Greek) but I don't see what either version of "proceeding" is meant to imply about the nature of the Trinity.

If the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, or from the Father alone, what does that actually mean for our understanding of God?

The filioque is meant as a theological explanation of the relationship between the Spirit and the Son. The Bible tells us that the Son is begotten from the Father, and that the Spirit proceeds from the Father, but any curious Trinitarian is going to wonder what the Spirit-Son relationship is. And the West, as a rule, is much more interested in nailing down theological specifics than the East.

As far as theology following from it, the filioque has led some western theologians to suggest that the Holy Spirit is the love between the Father and the Son, a love so strong that it is an actual person, which is an interesting thought.

The Orthodox have some doctrinal objections to it, largely that it makes the Holy Spirit a subordinate or less important member of the Trinity:

  The filioque distorts Orthodox Triadology by making the Spirit a
  subordinate member of the Trinity. Traditional Triadology consists in
  the notion that for any given trait, it must be either common to all
  Persons of the Trinity or unique to one of them. Thus, Fatherhood is
  unique to the Father, while begottenness is unique to the Son, and
  procession unique to the Spirit. Godhood, however, is common to all,
  as is eternality, uncreatedness, and so forth. Positing that something
  can be shared by two Persons (i.e., being the source of the Spirit's
  procession) but not the other is to elevate those two Persons at the
  expense of the other. Thus, the balance of unity and diversity is
  destroyed.

Historically, though, the contention has been at least as much about church authority as it has been about theology. The original creed (from the ecumenical councils at Nicea and Constantinople) did not include the filioque, and when the bishop of Rome unilaterally sanctioned its use, Eastern bishops saw that as something totally outside his authority to do.


Is there a good alternative word to “performance” to describe an evangelical worship team's actions? Especially since we have switched from in person to live streamed services due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and continuing as we have had a phased return with both in person people and live steaming, we’ve had a sense of the service being a production.
We’ve avoided using the term “performance” to describe the actions of the worship team, because we consider them to be leading the whole church, not performing to the church.
But we’ve struggled to find an alternative word to describe it. We want to say “you need to prepare to be ready for your X” for example.
It’s possible we’re hunting for a word that doesn’t really exist, nevertheless, is there a good alternative word to “performance” to describe an Evangelical worship music team's actions?

This is a non-denominational evangelical, independent church. Our hymns are mostly modern with a few more traditional. The instruments are piano keyboard, a couple guitars, drums / cajon and a singer (male or female).
Recent songs have included “Only a Holy God”, “This I Believe”, “Come Holy Spirit”, “Jesus Strong Kind”, “Amazing Grace”, “Yes, finished! the Messiah dies”, others “feel” similar to me!

Set is an acceptable musical term and doesn't carry as many negative or "performance" overtones as other words may.  It can be used of a final production in front of people, a studio session (session is another good possibility), or rehearsal.  Much more important than the labels we attach, (is it congregation or audience?), is what we are doing and why we are doing it.

Can a blind man lead a blind man? Will they not both fall into a pit? - Luke 6:39

As worship leader for a decade I found it was a near constant battle to keep myself in an attitude of personal worship while also striving for the highest level of "performance" of which we were capable.  At the end of the day I am firmly convinced that leading God's people in worship through any means (music in context here) is a spiritual endeavor and therefore if I am not actually worshiping the Living God I cannot hope to lead others.
Therefore, work hard in practice and rehearsal and then, on the day of the "performance", disappear into worship of the lover of your soul.


How do proponents of the dual nature of man address Hebrews 4:12, "dividing soul and spirit"? Those holding to a tripartite nature of man, or trichotomism, sometimes point to Hebrews 4:12 as evidence for their view that soul and spirit are distinct in man:

  For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. (NIV)

How do proponents of a dual nature of man (dichotomism), believing that the soul and spirit are two words referring to the same entity, understand this passage?

Proponents of dichotomism argue in two primary ways:

That the division is between soul and spirit, but that these are simply two aspects of the same thing
That the division occurs within the soul, and within the spirit, not between them

Between soul and spirit
In his remarks on this passage (Commentary on Hebrews, §222), Thomas Aquinas affirms the dichotomism taught by the church, but nonetheless does not see soul and spirit as synonyms here:

the soul is that to which pertain the powers by which the soul acts in conjunction with the body; whereas the spirit is that to which pertain the powers by which it acts without the body

He connects this understanding the passage as follows:

The Word of God effects and distinguishes between all those divisions and species [...] [The phrase] can be explained according to a Gloss in two ways: so that the soul refers to carnal sins which involve bodily pleasures, such as lust and gluttony; but the spirit refers to spiritual sins, which involve an act of the mind, such as pride, vain glory, and the like. Or by soul is understood evil thoughts, and by spirit good thoughts. Then the sense is this: reaching, i.e., discerning, unto the division of the soul and the spirit, i.e., between carnal and spiritual sins, or between good and evil thoughts.

Within soul and spirit
Other commentators argue that the penetration of the Word of God occurs within both soul and spirit, not to separate them from each other.  John Calvin writes:

The word soul means often the same with spirit; but when they occur together, the first includes all the affections, and the second means what they call the intellectual faculty. [...] Now, to come to the passage before us, it is said that God’s word pierces, or reaches to the dividing of soul and spirit, that is, it examines the whole soul of man; for it searches his thoughts and scrutinizes his will with all its desires. (Commentary on Hebrews)

Berkhof argues similarly (ST, 2.1.2.A.2), and Wayne Grudem sees the words as essentially synonomous:

The author is not saying that the Word of God can divide "soul from spirit," but he is using a number of terms [...] that speak of the deep inward parts of our being that are not hidden from the penetrating power of the Word of God.  If we wish to call these our "soul," then Scripture pierces into the midst of it and divides it and discovers its inmost intentions.  If we wish to call this inmost nonphysical side of our being our "spirit," then Scripture penetrates into the midst of it and divides it and knows its deepest intentions and thoughts. [...] In any case, soul and spirit are not thought of as separate parts; they are simply additional terms for our inmost being. (ST, 479)


Does Catholicism teach that there is a cyclic creation of the world? Many religions, like Hinduism teach that the world is in a cycle of creation: creation then preservation then destruction (fading, annihilation) of the world then creation of a new world, in a repeated cycles, and so on.

The mysticism of many religions adopt this view, i.e: creation of the world is eternal process, coming from no beginning and going to no end, in repeated cycles.

What is the opinion of Catholic Church regarding this matter?

None of the main parts of Christianity adhere to a cyclic view of creation. The Christian scriptures speak of the creation of the world (meaning the universe) by God "in the beginning" (meaning that nothing happened before that). Christians consider the creation was "Ex Nihilo" meaning that it was from nothing - there was no material from which the universe was made.

Likewise the scriptures speak of an end times of being with God which will last for ever. The "new world" will not be destroyed, not even for another creation.


What is the significance of transubstantiation? During the Eucharist ceremony where the Priest says some words and then transubstantiation takes place, what is the significance of this event?

I realize this is derived somehow from the last supper verse, but what does it mean?

Transubstantiation means the wine and bread literally become the blood and flesh of Jesus.

What does it mean to drink the blood and eat the flesh of Jesus?

Good question! The Transubstantiation is the spiritual AND physical process where the Eucharist changes into Jesus's real Body and real Blood at the hands of the Priest.

Summary

Jesus states at the last supper that "... this IS My Body..." As Catholics, we believe that He is telling us to have faith enough to believe His words. At the first supper and at every Mass held after, the Holy Eucharist has ALL the properties of Jesus's Body, yet has the outward appearance of Bread. By appearances, I mean every physical human observation that it can undergo. Whether that means touch, taste, smell, sight... it will still appear as bread. But, even with these outward properties, the Eucharist IS Jesus's Body. The same goes for the wine. We must have faith that He tells us what is true.

By taking Jesus's Body and Blood into your own being, you take in renewed strength against temptation. It brings closer the fact that Jesus made a sacrifice on the cross so that YOU may strive away from temptation. YOU must accept His sacrifice (the sacrifice of His Body and Blood) by taking Him unto yourself.

Three reasons why Our Lord Jesus Christ gives us His Body and Blood in the Holy Eucharist are:

    So that his Church on earth may receive Him through the sacrifice of the Mass.
    So that all of His people may remember the cross that he bore for them.
    So that all may remember the love that he has for us, and worship Him accordingly.

Personal Research

Click here for a thoroughly informative article on Transubstantiation by Frank J. Sheed

Click here for the Vatican's own explanation of Transubstantiation

You might also check out the Catholicism TV series which gives many stunning explanations on Catholicism in general (IT'S REALLY GOOD)

More on why we partake in His Body and Blood

I hope this has answered any questions you have had. Feel free to leave a comment below if not!

God Bless!


Is impotence developed AFTER the marriage (and consummation) a ground for annulment in Catholic canon law? I understand that antecedent impotence is ground for annulment in Catholic canon law. But what if the impotence develops AFTER the marriage? Would that also be a ground for annulment?

There are only three mentions of the word impotence in the Code of Canon Law:

1) In Canon 1084, section 1. This is the impediment which you mention:

  Antecedent and perpetual impotence to have intercourse, whether on the part of the man or the woman, whether absolute or relative, nullifies marriage by its very nature.

2) In Canon 1084, section 2. This describes limits to the ability of antecedent impotence to nullify a marriage:

  If the impediment of impotence is doubtful, whether by a doubt about the law or a doubt about a fact, a marriage must not be impeded nor, while the doubt remains, declared null.

3) In Canon 1680. This requires the annulment tribunal to consult an expert (presumably a medical expert) in such cases:

  In cases of impotence or defect of consent because of mental illness, the judge is to use the services of one or more experts unless it is clear from the circumstances that it would be useless to do so; in other cases the prescript of canon 1574 is to be observed.

The word sterility, which is not precisely synonymous, is also mentioned in the Code, in Canon 1084 section 3. This states that sterility "neither prohibits nor nullifies marriage".

It appears, then, that impotence developed (and known about) before marriage, and known to be irremediable, nullifies and prevents marriage; but impotence developed after marriage does not nullify it. Why would this be?

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, in its discussion of marriage, states that "Conjugal love . ... is open to fertility" (paragraph 1643, quoting the encyclical letter Familiaris Consortio; emphasis added). That does not mean (contrary to many caricatures of Catholic family life) that fertility is required. The Catechism specifically says, in fact,

  Spouses to whom God has not granted children can nevertheless have a conjugal life full of meaning, in both human and Christian terms. Their marriage can radiate a fruitfulness of charity, of hospitality, and of sacrifice.

(paragraph 1654)

Thus, if the intent and understanding of the spouses was originally to be open to having children, later loss of that ability does not change the validity of a marriage.

If one has gone into a marriage believing oneself (or knowing oneself) not to be impotent, but develops this debility later on, one's marriage is still, in the eyes of the Catholic Church, valid—at least to the extent that it was not otherwise impeded.


Are any fundamental Protestant beliefs historically heretical? People tell me that heresy is a belief that goes against orthodoy, the core Christian doctrine believed by "most Christians, in most times, in most places."  Many Protestant commentators make a big deal about films, e.g. the Shack, that contain what they consider heretical beliefs.  However, aren't at least some of the main Protestant beliefs heretical?  They were declared heretical by the Council of Trent, but what I am asking is whether they are heretical in the sense of not being believed by "most Christians, in most times, in most places."

For example, from the Wikipedia list of heresies, two beliefs of the heretical group Henricians are "recognition of the Gospel freely interpreted as the sole rule of faith," and "condemnation of the Eucharist."  Both are believed by at least most Protestants I know, and the first seems close to Sola Scriptura.  Sola Fides, "faith alone," also does not seem to fit the above definition of orthodoxy.

Is this perception correct, that fundamental Protestant doctrine are not believed by "most Christians, in most times, in most places," making Protestantism heretical in this broader sense?

The top answer on this related question states Protestants reject almost all the heresies identified by pre-Reformation creeds and councils.  If true, then this would answer my question with a no. However, while protestants use the same words, they can mean something different than the traditional understanding, such as what "apostolic" means.  And as noted above, many Protestants don't believe in the real presence in the Eucharist.

Your point that “Protestants reject almost all the heresies identified by pre-Reformation creeds and councils” is highly significant. There is no difficulty with them using the same words but attaching different meanings because they do not. This is particularly true of the Creed of Nicaea, formulated in 325 A.D. It states,

  “We believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, maker of all things
  visible and invisible;

  And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father,
  only-begotten, that is, from the substance (ousia) of the Father; God
  from God, Light from Light, Very God from Very God, begotten not made,
  of one substance (homoousios, consubstantial) with the Father, through
  whom all things were made, both in heaven and on earth; who for us men
  and for our salvation came down and was incarnate, was made man,
  suffered, and rose again on the third day, ascended into heaven, and
  is coming to judge the living and the dead;

  And in the Holy Spirit.

  And those who say: ‘There was a time when he was not’, and: ‘Before he
  was begotten he was not’, and: ‘He came into being from nothing’, or
  those who pretend that the Son of God is ‘Of another substance
  (hypostasis), or essence (ousia) [than the Father] or ‘created’ or
  ‘alterable’ or ‘mutable’, the catholic and apostolic church places
  under a curse.”

According to that pre-Reformation Creed, Protestants cannot be called heretical. However, that ‘only’ deals with a particular heresy doing the rounds back then. It is one of the most significant, fundamental heresies, it needs to be said, but my point is that Protestants had no quarrel with the meaning of the words of that ancient Creed. They did not attribute different meanings to it, but wholly agreed with the orthodoxly Christian stance stated in that Creed.

We see what the Catholic church would call ‘heresy’ in other areas of belief. And Protestants make no bones about this either – they openly state why they disagree with Catholicism, not attempting subterfuge with cunningly different meanings attached to words. They called a spade a spade back in the day. Perhaps the best example of this lies in the realms of Church authority.

In 1302 Boniface VIII declared in the bull 'Unam Sanctam' that this church has

  "one head, Christ and his vicar Peter and the successor of Peter...
  For all men, it is absolutely necessary for salvation to submit to the
  Roman Pontiff. This we declare, affirm and proclaim." (DS 872; D 469)

Notice how the one head of the church, Christ, has to share this role with "the successor of Peter" - the Pope? And that there can be no salvation for anyone who does not submit to the Roman Pontiff? That was followed by Pope Clement VI (pope from May 7, 1342, to December 6, 1352):

  "No man outside obedience to the Pope of Rome can ultimately be saved.
  All who have raised themselves against the faith of the Roman Church,
  and died in final impenitence have been damned, and gone down to
  Hell." (Source: Pope Clement VI, "Super Quibusdam," as cited in
  "Apostolic Digest, Book V: The Book of Obedience")

Notice the progression from not obeying the pope to being against the Roman church, to impenitence and damnation?

Protestants protested that their salvation is not connected with bowing down to any man on earth – that you cannot hedge your bets and claim to have faith in Christ alone for salvation, PLUS faith in a Pope!  Catholicism claims that whoever does not accept the doctrine of the Roman Church and of the pontiff as the infallible rule of faith from which sacred Scripture derives strength and authority, is a heretic. Protestants put it the other way around. They claim that the infallible rule of faith from which all and any Christian derives strength and authority is sacred Scripture. This means that Protestants cannot bow before any Pope as the 'vicar of Christ' who is supposedly infallible in that role. But Catholics do. This is the main reason why Catholics called Protestants ‘heretics’ back then, and even now: their recognition of Scripture as the supreme source of authority, and not the statements/authority of any pope, also that salvation comes with faith that only what Christ did can save anyone, not with combining such faith with belonging to any organisation or obeying what the head of that organisation requires.


What is the difference between man's soul and spirit? It is easy to recognize the body as the physical matter that makes up a person.  The body is clearly distinct from the soul and spirit in several ways:

The body is visible to others.  (When I see you, I am seeing your body.)
The body is recognizable by others.  (I know who you are when I look at you.)
The body has a beginning and an end.  (Our bodies experience conception/birth and death/decay.)
The body directly interacts with the rest of creation.  (We touch, eat, move things around, etc.)

Are there similar comparisons that help describe the distinction between the soul and spirit?  I'm specifically interested in the viewpoints of those who believe in the tripartite nature of man, that is, that the body, soul, and spirit are the three distinct components of a person.

There is an interesting passage in the magnificat in Luke,

The phrase in verses 2:56,47   seems to indicate that Spirit and Soul basicly mean the same thing. Jewish verse uses a technique called parallelism where one line says something, and the next ,the same thing but using diifferent words for emphasis.

It might be pushing it a bit but the phrasing here does tend to present an interterminology and holistic viewpoint of the inner aspect of man.

Logicaly to say that there are two seperate parts of Mary rejoicing or exulting leads to an assumption that there are two independendant self consciouse, self expressing entities with in one person, who by the way is aware that they are present and active! Such a conclusion does not make sense.Especialy to the Jewish thinking, which was not so clear cut as the Greek dualism of the time. Up to that time many scholars indicate that the view was held that the body and the soul were a composite whole one linked to the other and not seperate in the way that later Theology developed and expressed the nature of man.

Therefore we must conclude that these terms "spirit" and "soul" refer to the immaterial part of human beings and are aspects and interchangable terms of expression of these.

I feel it is rather difficult and confusing to try to define too clearly the various parts of the above in terms of differentials. Especialy with those are all used in the NT particularly.

There are mysteries within the acts of God that are beyond our comprehension.cf Psalm 139. The problem we have is that we always want things to be 2+2= 4. It is just not that easy to come down hard and fast and defend a particular emphasis on the Biblical expressions of the nature of mankind.

In the classic text in Thessalonians Paul seems to be making a tri-partite affirmation, but it could well be he is using interchangeable terms to relate that he is talking about the entirety of the human being. Once again a kind of parallelism or overstatment for emphasis to give fullness of meaning could be the style in this passage. The rich vocabulary of the Greek Paul used gave ample opportunity for this kind of prose.

In summary the full data of the scripture uses the terms spirit, soul, and even heart interchangeably and the context indicates the process or functionality rather than a difference in substance or place within a human being. To press one or the other to make an absolute point of reference and fixed meaning tends to move away from the holistic view that the biblical record suggests.


5 meaningful contacts with Christians before considering the claims of the gospel I've been reading a book on Church growth (Growing A Healthy Church by Dan Spader and Gary Mayes) with a chapter on evangelism that says something which I've heard in churches before:

"Typically an unbeliever needs to have more than five meaningful contacts with a number of Christians before he or she will begin to trust the message of the gospel

Growing a Healthy Church
This seems to be a linchpin point supporting relationship-style evangelism but the book doesn't cite any sources and I don't seem to be able to find any myself. Can someone else locate the source of this claim whether it be a study or merely an idea proposed by someone else?

In marketing, this is referred to as the number of "touches" required to make a sale or convince someone. It is not unique to religion, nor does it guarantee success. In marketing, this is called "funneling":

In fact, this approach only works on a small subset (typically a one-digit percentage) of the number of contacts.
The number of touches documented in market research is usually 6 to 8, which corresponds to  "more than five meaningful contacts" in the question posted.


Book of Mormon writers by verse According to the Book of Mormon itself, it was written by many ancient prophets. The authors of this study made the assumption

  that the writers of each verse, or partial verse, could be identified according to information given in the text.

The authors of the study found their assumption accurate.

  Through the process of assigning each quoted segment a source, we identified over one hundred authors or originators.

Unfortunately the study was conducted in the infancy of the internet and I haven't been able to locate the database of verse-author assignments.

What available resource provides the author of each verse according to internal authorship statements?

The study you cite is an early attempt at wordprint analysis of the Book of Mormon. If you are interested in looking at attempts to identify authorship of portions of the Book of Mormon using this technique, you could look through the sources cited in this Wikipedia section. There have been a number of attempts at this type of analysis, and some of the authors of these studies may provide replication data that would allow you to look at authorship at the verse level. However, even if replication data is available, it may still not provide you with the verse-by-verse breakdown you want. Depending on the statistical model used, a verse-level classification may not be produced by the model. And even if a verse-level classification is produced by the model, it would be a probabilistic estimate. Because of this, a chart showing the model's "best guess" for each verse without taking into account the margin of error for that guess would be misleading.

If, instead, you are interested in a resource breaking down Book of Mormon authorship using authorship statements within the Book of Mormon itself, there is this chart available through BYU Studies. It does not identify authorship at the verse level, but it does provide a diagram showing which authors were quoted in which books, according to the text itself. There are also a couple of other authorship charts available in section 2 of this page.


Do any non-Swedenborgian Christian denominations have a smaller biblical canon than Protestantism? As covered in the Wikipedia article on Biblical canon, among the major branches of Christianity Protestantism has the smallest biblical canon, due almost entirely to a smaller Old Testament canon.

The various New Church or "Swedenborgian" denominations, however, have a considerably smaller canon for both the Old and New Testaments, as covered in this question: What writings are held as "biblical canon" by Swedenborgians?

Are there any other Christian churches or denominations whose biblical canon is smaller than the Protestant canon? If so, what books do they include in their canon, and what reasons do they give for their particular canon?

I strongly doubt there's been any of them around for >1500 years, but the 2nd century Marcionites fit the bill (source for quotation):

[Marcion's] canon consisted of two divisions: the Gospel, containing an abbreviated copy of Luke, and the Apostolicon, containing ten Epistles of Paul

As to the justification:

The main points of Marcion's teaching were the rejection of the Old Testament and a distinction between the Supreme God of goodness and an inferior God of justice, who was the Creator and God of the Jews. He regarded Christ as the messenger of the Supreme God.


Does Numbers 5:11-22 describe sanctioned abortion? Numbers 5:11-22 NIV

  11 Then the Lord said to Moses, 12 “Speak to the Israelites and say to
  them: ‘If a man’s wife goes astray and is unfaithful to him 13 so that
  another man has sexual relations with her, and this is hidden from her
  husband and her impurity is undetected (since there is no witness
  against her and she has not been caught in the act), 14 and if
  feelings of jealousy come over her husband and he suspects his wife
  and she is impure—or if he is jealous and suspects her even though she
  is not impure— 15 then he is to take his wife to the priest. He must
  also take an offering of a tenth of an ephah[a] of barley flour on her
  behalf. He must not pour olive oil on it or put incense on it, because
  it is a grain offering for jealousy, a reminder-offering to draw
  attention to wrongdoing.

  16 “‘The priest shall bring her and have her stand before the Lord. 17
  Then he shall take some holy water in a clay jar and put some dust
  from the tabernacle floor into the water. 18 After the priest has had
  the woman stand before the Lord, he shall loosen her hair and place in
  her hands the reminder-offering, the grain offering for jealousy,
  while he himself holds the bitter water that brings a curse. 19 Then
  the priest shall put the woman under oath and say to her, “If no other
  man has had sexual relations with you and you have not gone astray and
  become impure while married to your husband, may this bitter water
  that brings a curse not harm you. 20 But if you have gone astray while
  married to your husband and you have made yourself impure by having
  sexual relations with a man other than your husband”— 21 here the
  priest is to put the woman under this curse—“may the Lord cause you to
  become a curse[b] among your people when he makes your womb miscarry
  and your abdomen swell. 22 May this water that brings a curse enter
  your body so that your abdomen swells or your womb miscarries.”

  “‘Then the woman is to say, “Amen. So be it.”

I recently saw this post by an atheist claiming this passage describes bible-sanctioned abortion in the case of a cheating wife. I had read this passage previously, but it never screamed out abortion to me; however, on a second reading it's not so clear. Is he correct in that this is abortion? If not, then what is this passage talking about?

It is not about abortion, it's about Jealousy and the Lord acting as a witness in trials that otherwise had none.

Note that the NIV is the only translation to use the word 'miscarriage' (see Numbers 5:22 in parallel to 18 other translations). The translators interpret 'Your thigh to rot' and 'to rot [your] thigh' as 'miscarriage'. Whereas the Hebrew for 'thigh', יָרֵ֑ךְ (yā·rêḵ), is translated elsewhere in the NIV Bible as 'side'.

  "Gird your sword on your side, you mighty one; clothe yourself with
  splendor and majesty." (Psalm 45:3 NIV)

And the Hebrew for 'to rot', or 'waste away', נֹפֶ֥לֶת (nō·p̄e·leṯ), is translated elsewhere in the NIV as 'to fall down' (see Judges 19:27 NIV) Similarly, only a couple of translations even translate בֶּ֖טֶן (be·ṭen) and בִּטְנֵ֖ךְ (biṭ·nêḵ) as 'womb'. The rest use 'belly' or 'abdomen'.

Interpreting these scriptures to mean abortion is isolated to the questionable translation given in the NIV.

The section copied below does a really good job of explaining these verses (source link included).

Numbers 5:11–31. The Trial of Jealousy

This law for determining the guilt or innocence of an adulterer is puzzling in many respects. At first it seems heavily biased against the woman for there is no similar requirement for the man. A close examination of the law will show what was involved in it and why the Lord revealed it.

“The rabbins who have commented on this text give us the following information: When any man, prompted by the spirit of jealousy, suspected his wife to have committed adultery, he brought her first before the judges, and accused her of the crime; but as she asserted her innocency, and refused to acknowledge herself guilty, and as he had no witnesses to produce, he required that she be sentenced to drink the waters of bitterness which the law had appointed; that God, by this means, might discover what she wished to conceal. After the judges had heard the accusation and the denial, the man and his wife were both sent to Jerusalem, to appear before the Sanhedrin, who were the sole judges in such matters. The rabbins say that the judges of the Sanhedrin, at first endeavoured with threatenings to confound the woman, and cause her to confess her crime; when she still persisted in her innocence, she was led to the eastern gate of the court of Israel, where she was stripped of the clothes she wore, and dressed in black before a number of persons of her own sex. The priest then told her that if she knew herself to be innocent she had no evil to apprehend; but if she were guilty, she might expect to suffer all that the law threatened; to which she answered, Amen, amen.

“The priest then wrote the words of the law upon a piece of vellum, with ink that had no vitriol in it, that it might be the more easily blotted out. The words written on the vellum were, according to the rabbins, the following:—‘If a strange man have not come near thee, and thou art not polluted by forsaking the bed of thy husband, these bitter waters which I have cursed will not hurt thee: but if thou have gone astray from thy husband, and have polluted thyself by coming near to another man, may thou be accursed of the Lord, and become an example for all his people; may thy thigh rot, and thy belly swell till it burst! may these cursed waters enter into thy belly, and, being swelled therewith, may thy thigh putrefy!’

“After this the priest took a new pitcher, filled it with water out of the brazen bason that was near the altar of burnt-offering, cast some dust into it taken from the pavement of the temple, mingled something bitter, as wormwood, with it, and having read the curses above mentioned to the woman, and received her answer of Amen, he scraped off the curses from the vellum into the pitcher of water. During this time another priest tore her clothes as low as her bosom, made her head bare, untied the tresses of her hair, fastened her torn clothes with a girdle below her breasts, and presented her with the tenth part of an ephah, or about three pints of barley-meal, which was in a frying pan, without oil or incense.

“The other priest, who had prepared the waters of jealousy, then gave them to be drank by the accused person, and as soon as she had swallowed them, he put the pan with the meal in it into her hand. This was waved before the Lord, and a part of it thrown into the fire of the altar. If the woman was innocent, she returned with her husband; and the waters, instead of incommoding her, made her more healthy and fruitful than ever: if on the contrary she were guilty, she was seen immediately to grow pale, her eyes started out of her head, and, lest the temple should be defiled with her death, she was carried out, and died instantly with all the ignominious circumstances related in the curses.” (Clarke, Bible Commentary, 1:634.)

Several points should be noted.

Although this ritual focused on the woman, it in no way implied that men who committed adultery were to be excused, for the law clearly stated that adulterers of both sexes were to be stoned (see Leviticus 20:10).
In a way, the law provided protection of two different kinds for a woman. First, without this law it is possible that a husband could unjustly accuse his wife of infidelity. If his word alone were sufficient to convict her, she would be in a terrible state indeed. Putting the determination of guilt or innocence into the hands of God rather than into the hands of her husband, or even other men, ensured that she could vindicate herself if she were innocent.
The second positive benefit is more subtle but probably is of even greater value. If a husband suspected his wife of adultery, one result would be a terrible strain in the husband-wife relationship. In today’s legal system, with no witnesses to prove her guilt, the court would probably declare her not guilty. But the basis for her acquittal would be a lack of positive evidence of her guilt rather than proof of her innocence. Such a legal declaration, therefore, would do little to alleviate the doubts of the husband and the estrangement would likely continue. Neighbors and friends also would probably harbor lingering suspicions about her innocence. With the trial of jealousy, however, dramatic proof of God’s declaration of her innocence would be irrefutable. The reputation of the woman would be saved and a marriage relationship healed. Thus, true justice and mercy were assured, and the whole matter would be laid promptly to rest.
Those who ask why there was no parallel test a woman could ask of her husband should remember that if the accused woman refused to undergo the trial by drinking the water, her action was considered a confession of guilt. Thus, she and her partner in the evil act would be put to death (see Leviticus 20:10). If she attempted to lie and pass the test, but brought the curses upon herself, this result too was considered proof of the guilt of her male partner. It is possible that a wife who believed her husband guilty of infidelity could ask that his suspected partner be put to the trial of jealousy. The outcome would immediately establish the guilt or innocence of her husband as well as that of the other woman.
Thus, in a world where the rights of women were often abused, the Lord provided a means for protecting their rights as well as seeing that evil was put away and justice done.

Thus, in a world where the rights of women were often abused, the Lord provided a means for protecting their rights as well as seeing that evil was put away and justice done.

Source: Old Testament Student Manual Genesis-2 Samuel, (1980), 196–202: Numbers 1–12: Wilderness Wanderings, Part 1, (section 17-10: Numbers 5:11–31. The Trial of Jealousy)


Neurotheology and God Does the field of Neurotheology present a threat to Christianity?

Neurotheology is a field of science that tries to correlate brain states to spiritual experiences, such as speaking in tongues, prayer, and meditation.  Scientists' understanding of the brain is getting more and more detailed.  My question is, if it succeeds in correlating the two, does that threaten the Christian beliefs in God, spiritual beings, free will, human consciousness, etc.?  Or would it actually reinforce those concepts?

Barbara Bradley Haggerty (most known for being NPRs religion correspondent but also a former Christian Science practitioner turned Christian herself) investigated many of these claims in her book The Fingerprints of God. The book seeks to be a compendium of scientific investigations about the brain and its relationship to God.

While to book itself is fascinating, her conclusion is what speaks to your question. Her basic point was that these investigations may explain brain functioning better but ultimately still leaves a lot of room (an imperative actually) for God.

She also suggests that what all of the deepest religious practices reveal is that while each religion moves one closer to the God hinted at by the scientific research she chronicles, they do so in different ways, leading Haggerty to the analogy of a bike wheel.

She presumes that all religions get you to the same God (This is a highly questionable postulate in most forms of Christianity, but it is what she espouses). She sees each religion as a single spoke of that wheel leading one to God. Borrowing practices from other religions doesn't get you closer to the center because each one is a completely different path.

What is interesting in regards neurotheology is that in Haggertys estimation, these scientific studies in many cases point towards the reality of transcendent Spiritual being who calls but does not command adherence, thus allowing for Spirit, God, and free will, much like the original Christianity from which Haggerty begins.


Is the Catholic Church NOT against all birth control? Card. Kasper made the following comments in an interview with WNYC Radio’s Brian Lehrer as transcribed in this article ‘The Church is not against birth control at all’: Cardinal Walter Kasper:

  Lehrer asked whether married couples who already have “three children
  and live in poverty” should not be “allowed to use birth control to
  prevent more conception?”

  [Card.] Kasper responded, “Well, the Church is not against birth
  control at all. … It’s about the methods of birth control. … I
  do not want to enter into this characteristic…how they have to do it.
  It’s their personal conscience and their personal responsibility.”

The audio is here: The Pope's Theologian | The Brian Lehrer Show.

The question is whether the Catholic Church is NOT all against birth control, and from the Cardinal's words, whether there are licit methods of birth control.

cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2366-2372 |  The fecundity of marriage

The Roman Catholic Church has always supported Fertility Awareness methods of family planning - previously the Calendar method as a form of birth control. The church is not opposed to family planning - only to methods they would consider equal to killing children who have already been conceived or otherwise frustrates the unitave marital act. Being open to what God would do in a marriage, even if precautions such as a calendar method are used, is important. Hence, Kaspar's very deft retort:

  Kasper responded, “Well, the Church is not against birth control at all. … It’s about the methods of birth control.

This document in particular talks about Family Planning in the Catholic church.

As they state:

  At the first stage of life, centers for natural methods of regulating fertility should be
  promoted as a valuable help to responsible parenthood, in which all individuals, and in
  the first place the child, are recognized and respected in their own right and where every
  decision is guided by the ideal of the sincere gift of self. (EV, #88)

What they oppose is:

  It is therefore morally unacceptable to encourage, let alone impose, the use of methods
  such as contraception, sterilization, and abortion in order to regulate births

Indeed, surprisingly perhaps for some, the church discourages abstinence for married couples, recommending instead Love and Life in the Divine Plan - which means sex, even sex for pleasure, as long as it is truly good sex - meaning within marriage. The church has long noted God's command to procreate.  It just needs to be done responsibly.


Who are the "extreme Anabaptists" who believed that regeneration makes people incapable of sin? While reading Louis Berkhof's Systematic Theology, I noticed an interesting tidbit about the beliefs of "extreme Anabaptists" on regeneration.  He argues:

  [Regeneration is not] a complete or perfect change of the whole nature of man, or of any part of it, so that it is no more capable of sin, as was taught by the extreme Anabaptists and by some other fanatical sects. (4.6.C)

From this I gather that these "extreme Anabaptists" believed that at least some part of the "nature of man" was completely, perfectly transformed in regeneration, making the regenerate unable to sin.

This does seem outside the norm for Anabaptists, and it makes me wonder:

Who taught this, and when?
Did they consider regeneration to be something instantaneous (as in Reformed theology), or a process (like sanctification)?
Did they believe that the whole nature of man, or only a part of it (soul? spirit?) was transformed?

The belief you're interested in is Christian perfectionism. Perfectionism was held by a number of people during the Reformation era, and was especially widespread in the low countries. Advocates included Anabaptist Melchior Hoffman, the Reformed Sebastian Castellio, and the nondenominational Dirck Coornhert (Van Veen, 2004).

However, it's also worth considering the context for Calvinist claims of Anabaptist perfectionism. That name has been used as a derogatory epithet from the Reformation until the present.

  John Calvin's own frustrations with the Anabaptists
  had to do with the fact that the Anabaptists "out-Calvinisted" the
  Reformed community on at least two important points. The first was
  church discipline. The Calvinists were very critical of Catholics and
  Lutherans for their lack of attention to the role of discipline in the
  Christian community. The Anabaptists, however, took discipline even
  further than the Calvinists, insisting on very tight patterns of
  communal control. The Calvinists, obviously stung by this criticism,
  responded by labeling the Anabaptists as "perfectionist."

  -Mouw, R. J.
  (2000). Reflections on my encounter with the Anabaptist-Mennonite
  tradition. Mennonite Quarterly Review, 74(4), 571-577. summarizing Balke, 1981

As Mouw describes, Anabaptists can be understood as the extreme perfectionist end of a spectrum in terms of expectations for regeneration and personal transformation, so Berkhof may well be thinking of that spectrum without having any particular writer in mind.

While in this post I'm accepting that the label of perfectionism can be objectively applied to some writers, Perfectionism is usually a label applied by others while rejected by those to which it is applied (Augsburger, 1981).

  Often those Christians and groups of Christians who have honestly and
  earnestly sought to live a life of high dedication, obedience, and
  holiness have not only been misunderstood but also frivolously
  condemned as hypocrites or self-righteous. The attempt to strive
  toward perfection ("Be ye therefore perfect even as your heavenly
  Father is perfect") has often been erroneously labeled perfectionism.
  The Anabaptists and Mennonites have suffered under this charge from
  the beginning.

  -Harold S. Bender, Perfectionism, in Mennonite Encyclopedia.

To be thorough, you'll also want to look into early Christian debates about post-baptismal forgiveness of sins in early Christianity. Tertullian, was highly regarded among early Anabaptists, and they were surely influenced by his position.

For mainstream early Anabaptist authors perspectives on regeneration and quotes that could easily be interpreted as perfectionist, see especially Augsburger, 1981.

Further reading on early Anabaptist perfectionism

Augsburger, M. S. (1981). Concern for Holiness
in the Mennonite Tradition. The Asbury Journal, 36(4), 28-44. doi:10.7252/Journal.01.1981W.03
Balke, W. (1981). Calvin and the
Anabaptist radicals. Grand Rapids, MI.: Eerdmans.
Hughes, R. T. (1986). Christian Primitivism as Perfectionism: From
Anabaptists to Pentecostals. In S. M. Burgess (Ed.). Reaching Beyond: Chapters in the History
of Perfectionism. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, p. 213-255.
Van Veen, M. G.
(2004). "No One Born of God Commits Sin": Coornhert's Perfectionism.
Dutch Review of Church History, 84, 338-357.


Does the Bible give the reasons (if any) for God choosing Abraham? Is there any reason given in the Bible as to why God chose Abram to be the father of Israel?

For example, Noah seems to be chosen by God because he is Righteous.

  "Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation." (Gen 6:9 ESV)

Is any reason given for God choosing Abram/Abraham to be the father of Israel?

Scripture gives this answer:

  Genesis 18:18-19 King James Version (KJV)

  18 Seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation,
  and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him?

  19 For I know him, that he will command his children and his household
  after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and
  judgment; that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath
  spoken of him.

God, in His perfect Omniscience chose Abraham because He knew Abraham would fulfill His purpose.

More here.


Why is oil the suitable "matter" for the Sacrament of Confirmation? The Catholic Church teaches that for each of the seven sacraments she administers, there is matter and form of the sacrament [cf. Sacraments | New Advent].

Some catechisms also describe a sacrament as "an outward sign of inward grace instituted by Christ".

To me, it is easier to understand "pouring of/living water" being the matter of the sacrament of baptism [cleansing from original sin], but it is not readily apparent to me why anointing with chrism is required matter for the sacrament of confirmation.

Why is oil the suitable matter for the sacrament of confirmation?

The best answer will also explain how oil is connected with receiving the Holy Spirit in the sacrament of confirmation.

Both the new and the old Catechisms have something to say in this respect, and approach the subject from slightly different angles.
The Roman Catechism states in its article on Confirmation:

We now come to treat of the component parts of the Sacrament, and first of its matter. This is called chrism, a word ... appropriated by common usage among ecclesiastical writers to signify that ointment only which is composed of oil and balsam with the solemn consecration of the Bishop. A mixture of two material things, therefore, furnishes the matter of Confirmation; and this mixture of different things not only declares the manifold grace of the Holy Ghost given to those who are confirmed but also sufficiently shows the excellence of the Sacrament itself.
... Nor indeed could any other matter than that of chrism seem more appropriate to declare the effects of this Sacrament. Oil, by its nature rich, unctuous and fluid, expresses the fullness of grace, which, through the Holy Ghost, overflows and is poured into others from Christ the head, like the ointment that ran down upon the beard of Aaron, to the skirt of his garment; for God anointed him with the oil of gladness, above his fellows, and of his fullness we all have received.
Balsam, the odour of which is most pleasant, can signify nought save that the faithful, when made perfect by the grace of Confirmation, diffuse around them such a sweet odour of all virtues, that they may say with the Apostle: We are unto God the good odour of Christ [cf 2 Corinthians 2:15]. Balsam has also the power of preserving from corruption whatever it is used to anoint. This property seems admirably suited to express the virtue of the Sacrament, since it is quite evident that the souls of the faithful, prepared by the heavenly grace of Confirmation, are easily protected from the contagion of sins.

Chrism is still formulated of (usually olive) oil and balsam. The website ForYourMarriage.org, created and maintained by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, states in an article on it:

Like all our sacred oils, Chrism is made from olive oil, although other vegetable oils can be used if olive oil is unavailable. And like the other two, Chrism is blessed at the end of Lent by the diocesan bishop, at a special liturgy called the Chrism Mass.  Unlike to other sacramental oils. Chrism is scented, usually with essential oil of Balsam, giving it a woody, pine-like fragrance.

The current Catechism has a slightly different take to the reasons for chrism's suitability:

Anointing, in Biblical and other ancient symbolism, is rich in meaning: oil is a sign of abundance and joy; it cleanses (anointing before and after a bath) and limbers (the anointing of athletes and wrestlers); oil is a sign of healing, since it is soothing to bruises and wounds; and it makes radiant with beauty, health, and strength.
Anointing with oil has all these meanings in the sacramental life. The pre-baptismal anointing with the oil of catechumens signifies cleansing and strengthening; the anointing of the sick expresses healing and comfort. The post-baptismal anointing with sacred chrism in Confirmation and ordination is the sign of consecration. By Confirmation Christians, that is, those who are anointed, share more completely in the mission of Jesus Christ and the fullness of the Holy Spirit with which he is filled, so that their lives may give off "the aroma of Christ".
By this anointing the confirmand receives the "mark," the seal of the Holy Spirit. A seal is a symbol of a person, a sign of personal authority, or ownership of an object. Hence soldiers were marked with their leader’s seal and slaves with their master’s. A seal authenticates a juridical act or document and occasionally makes it secret.
Christ himself declared that he was marked with his Father’s seal. Christians are also marked with a seal: "It is God who establishes us with you in Christ and has commissioned us; he has put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee" This seal of the Holy Spirit marks our total belonging to Christ, our enrollment in his service for ever, as well as the promise of divine protection in the great eschatological trial.

(Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraphs 1293–96)
In summary, then, one can say that the oil of chrism, when used for Confirmation, has the following characteristics:

By its fluidity, it signifies grace flowing from Christ to the confirmand.
By its smell, it signifies the diffusion of the virtues of Christ around the confirmand.
By its historical associations, it signifies being set apart for God, sealed by the Holy Spirit, marked as belonging to God.

These are the reasons why the Church believes the oil of chrism to be the appropriate matter for the Sacrament of Confirmation.


When a Jehovah's Witness is reinstated how does the congregation react? When a disfellowshipped person takes the steps necessary to be accepted back into the Jehovah's Witness faith an announcement is made to the congregation informing all of the reinstatement of this person into the fold.

How is such an announcement worded and how is the congregation supposed to react to the news?

Beside baptism and marriage, reinstatement is one of the most joyous occasions Jehovah's Witnesses have. It feels very much like it did for the father of the prodigal son at Luke 15:17-24, as well as for the shepherd who found his lost sheep at Luke 15:4-7.
All announcements are supposed to be made in the last 3 minutes of a meeting. The reinstatement announcement is made to the congregation they were disfellowshipped from, as well as to the congregation they are currently in (if they've since moved). The announcement is basically guaranteed to be met with applause and is worded as:

[Name of person] is reinstated as one of Jehovah's Witnesses.

There are some relatively new publications for ones who desire to return to the congregation. There is the brochure, Return to Jehovah, as well as a modern-day drama, The Prodigal Returns.
The brochure contains this box on the last few pages:

How Will The Congregation Receive Me?
You can be sure that members of
the congregation will warmly welcome you. Rather than criticize or
judge you, they will confirm their love for you and do whatever they
can to encourage you.—Hebrews 10:24, 25.
“I was embarrassed to return to the Kingdom Hall. I wondered how the
friends would treat me. One of our elderly sisters who was there 30
years ago said to me, ‘Welcome home, Son!’ That really touched my
heart. I was truly home.”—Javier.
“I went to the Kingdom Hall and sat
in the last row so that no one would notice me. However, many began to
recognize me from the days when I had attended as a child. They
welcomed me and embraced me so affectionately that I felt an
overwhelming peace. It was as if I had come home.”—Marco.


Moses' Age when moving to house of Pharaoh? How old was Moses when he went to live with Pharaoh's daughter?

Most likely just after being weaned from the breast.

  Pharaoh's daughter said to her, “Take this baby and nurse him for me, and I will pay you.” So the woman took the baby and nursed him. When the child grew older, she took him to Pharaoh's daughter and he became her son. She named him Moses, saying, “I drew him out of the water.”  Exodus 2:8-10 NIV

Since the princess was only paying for nursing services and she wanted a son badly, once her milk dried up baby Moses goes back to the new Pharaoh's daughter mommy at the ripe old age of 6 months-ish.


What is the biblical argument used by Protestants against the Catholic doctrine of Penance? The Catholic Church holds to the doctrine of Penance.  As I understand it, this refers to various deeds prescribed by a priest to the confessing person that must do to make amends for his own sin, since mere confession is presumably insufficient.
Wikipedia says this about the doctrine of Sacramental Penance:

In a sacramental understanding of the term, "penance" applies to the
whole activity from confession to absolution. Generally speaking,
however, it is used to characterize the works of satisfaction imposed
or recommended by the priest on or to the penitent. Traditionally,
penance has been viewed as a punishment (the Latin poena, the root of
pen(it)ence, means "punishment"), and varying with the character and
heinousness of the offences committed...
Raised up from sin, the sinner must still recover his full spiritual health by doing something more to make amends for the sin: he must 'make satisfaction for' or 'expiate' his sins."

Protestants generally reject this doctrine.  So, what is the specific biblical argument they use to oppose the doctrine of Penance?

The basis for the necessary rejection of Catholic penance in the reformation was threefold. a) We need no human priest as we are priests ourselves. b) we have access to Christ our high priest without any other mediator, and c) we never, under any condition, need to do a 'work' to obtain forgiveness - ever.

Forgiveness can only be obtained by faith in Christ. Confession of particular sins by believers is not to obtain justification or general forgiveness but particular application of our previous justification in cleansing - this is called forgiveness in brining us back into better fellowship with God. That is, as we have already been declared righteous by faith, God has sworn to give himself no other choice, according to the justice of his faithfulness, except to forgive is.  If God has in a sense no choice (from his own gracious decree) how monstrous  is it to imagine that we should approach a man, rather than our own high priest, to declare our forgiveness? Our forgiveness is not optional, rather it is our reasonable expectation to receive of God by faith, apart from any good work. To add to this monstrosity that we should receive an evil insinuation as though we also had to 'work' for forgiveness is a blasphemy against the high priesthood of Christ.

What does the scripture say:

Christ is our high priest who we are to approach, not St. Somebody, Mary, or any earthly priest:

  For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Hebrews 4:15-16, ESV)

We are all priests:

  But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. (1 Peter 2:9, ESV)

We obtain full and general forgiveness in our justification without respect to any good work:

  For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law. (Romans 3:28, ESV)

As a result of full pardon we can be cleansed in particulars that bother our conscience (without any requirement of a work, of course) by simply directly confessing our sin to our only high priest, Jesus;

  If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.(1 John 1:9, ESV)

Under these consideration most Protestants fully reject the need for penance as a sinful thing contrary to faith in God. Actually, anyone who has performed any kind of penance under the guidance of a Priest would technically have fairly good reason to confess that sin to Christ. One must always go straight to the high priest and not ignore him by devious means and such a show of godliness that denies the power thereof.


Did St. Paul know the doctrine of the Trinity? Did St. Paul know anything about the doctrine of the Trinity (3 Persons in 1 God) but ran out of ink to fully explain it?

Or would the Trinitarian doctrine of the Athanasian Creed, for example, have been news to him if he lived in the 4th century?

Taken from St. Pauls writings:

For in Him (Jesus)all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form Col 2:9

Perhaps one of the clearest indications that Paul thought Jesus was Yahweh comes from the fact that he used Monotheistic Old Testament passages which uniquely referred to Yahweh and applied them to the Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 10:13 cf. Joel 2:32; 1 Cor. 1:31 cf. Jer. 9:24; 1 Cor. 2:16 cf. Isa. 40:13; 1 Cor. 10:26 cf. Ps. 24:1; 2 Cor. 10:17 cf. Jer. 9:24 for just a few examples).  1 Corinthians 2:16, for example, alludes to Isaiah 40:13 which is in the context of some of the most explicit monotheistic statements in the entire Old Testament (cf. Isaiah 40:13-28; 43:10; 44:6, 8; 45:5).

Paul also described Jesus as Creator, "Yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom are all things and we exist for Him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we exist through Him." (1 Cor. 8:6).

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. 17 He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. 18 He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything. 19 For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, 20 and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven. Col 1:15


What does Leviticus 25:10 mean in context? The Liberty Bell has an inscription with a quote from Leviticus 25:10:

  Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.

My question is, what does that quote mean in its original context?  Clearly, although it might have been the intent of the people who made the Liberty Bell, it did not mean "Spread the philosophy of classical liberalism to everyone", because liberalism is of course a doctrine that only born in the Enlightenment.  So what does liberty mean in this passage?  Does it mean freeing slaves or something?

The Year of Jubilee

Every 50 years, the Jews were required to return any land they had bought back to its original owners, as well as set all their slaves (who wanted to be freed) free. This is what Levicitus 25:10 is talking about. Hebrew slaves were already ordered to be freed every seventh year (Ex 21:2), for slavery among Hebrew brethren was always meant to be temporary (as a means of settling debts). It was more like indentured servitude. The Jubilee emancipation is not described as being limited to just Israelites, but any and all slaves.

There are Christian groups who read the commands in the Old Testament and deduce which ones apply to us today. They might say (not being one of them, I don't know how they judge in this particular case) that we should observe the same rule if we lived in a society where slavery was permitted. Paul as much as said that slavery is to be avoided (1 Co 7:21), so it's not as though this provision in the OT is prevailing justification for allowing slavery.

I certainly don't read it as demanding action on our part to free other people's slaves. It's about setting your own slaves free.


Why is the Holy Spirit often referred as "Ghost"? Why is the Holy Spirit often referred as the Holy "Ghost"? Does not the term ghost usually used in a negative connotation that relates to "scaring away"?

Basically, language changes over time.  The Holy Spirit is referred to as the Holy Ghost in earlier English translations, such as the KJV and the Douay-Rheims.  At that time, the word "ghost" seems to have had the same connotations as "spirit" does today.

So, it was a great translation then, but today the word "ghost" is too closely associated with the ghosts depicted on Halloween and such.

The original languages certainly did not intend to associate the Third Person of the Trinity with such images, so "spirit" is a better word in our language today.